CSpec

lol

This is what happens when you don't allow immigration.

Washington Post says fear of nuclear accidents is worse for your health than the radiation: Although radiation escaping from a nuclear power plant catastrophe can increase the risk of many cancers and other health problems, stress, anxiety and fear ended up in many ways being much greater long-term threats to health and well-being after Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and other nuclear accidents, experts said Monday. “The psychological effects were the biggest health effects of all — by far.” … “After almost every radiological emergency, anyone or anything seen as or perceived as associated with the emergency came to be seen by others as tainted or something to be feared and even the object of discrimination.” … [After] a much less severe nuclear accident in 1999 in Tokaimura, Japan, … people in other parts of Japan refused to buy products from that region, and travelers were turned away from hotels and asked not to use public baths and swimming pools. … Studies of more than 80,000 survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki blasts have found that … only about 500 [cancer] cases could be attributed to the radiation exposure the people experienced.

This thing is awesome.

OK, is there anything I can do to protect myself to minimize exposure? That's what I want to know more than anything. Again, what fraction of an X-ray can you expect 5000 miles away?

If this is the worst case disaster for a nuclear plant, nuclear seems pretty darn safe to me.

This footage of the sea relentlessly flooding a town is incredible: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2011/mar/14/tsunami-kesennuma-video

A black Panamera has started parking in a driveway near my house. I think the same guy also owns a red 911 GT3.

Tim Harford on Twitter: "The attention given to the Japanese nuclear plants (worrying) vs. the Tsunami (unimaginably tragic) seems disproportionate."

CNN was saying the explosion was near the plant, not at the reactor. An explosion in/of the reactor is such an incredibly remote possibility that it's hardly worth even thinking about. Chernobyl was a horribly designed plant that wasn't maintained properly and run by people who made mistake after mistake reacting to the situation. This is a modern plant that, in the case of a meltdown, should be almost completely self-containing. Freaking out about the plant isn't called for at all. *edit* Look at what happened when Three Mile Island melted down... external to the plant, nothing. TMI is still running the other reactor at the plant. No one was hurt. All that happened was it ruined that one reactor and showed that the safety systems worked, but everyone freaked out anyway. I suppose it's possible that this event could be a bit worse than that in a worst case scenario, but that's considering the plant got nailed with a freakishly nasty series of earthquakes and a massive tsunami. It's still, in the worst case scenario, not going to come anywhere near the events of Chernobyl. Sorry, but depending on how this $h! blows across the ocean, I'm in the line of fire for radiation exposure. I want to know what is actually happening so I can prepare accordingly to protect myself. And I certainly don't trust the US government to tell me the truth, either. Since Sendai is like 5300 miles away from you, how much radiation are we talking? An X-ray? A fraction of an X-ray? A PET scan?

True, but you need money to afford buildings that aren't shacks. Haiti had plenty of building codes but no one followed them because the country is desperately poor.

The interior looks pretty nice, but I suspect this car will be fairly lame.

Thankfully prosperity saved many thousands of lives in Japan. That was a huge quake, but since they don't live in huts this wasn't a repeat of 2004 Indonesia where over 230,000 people perished. And yes nuclear power is fine.

You think it will lower prices even 9/10ths of a cent? No of course not. I was half joking.

Hey I'm cheering those people on: lower prices for me.

Huzzah!

Sweet. Coming to DC in June.

Welcome! yes, pictures please.

I think this looks fantastic.

Not convinced. Has a whiff of Daewoo about it.

The Richard Branson profit motive part works for recreational spaceflight for tourists, and hopefully one day for regular commercial flights as the crafts can go much faster. The more abstract science-y research-y stuff with no concrete profit opportunity will still be publicly funded. NASA will administer grants to private companies, which is how much (if not most) government research is carried out. NASA is a bureaucratic and bloated mess--winding it down to some grant experts who fund energetic and innovative private firms seems like an improvement, no? All of that should take place subordinate to bold exploration. The history of the space program shows a grand display of advances in technologies that could not have happened without it. It has spurred the growth of countless industries and thus repaid us many times over. Like what?

The Richard Branson profit motive part works for recreational spaceflight for tourists, and hopefully one day for regular commercial flights as the crafts can go much faster. The more abstract science-y research-y stuff with no concrete profit opportunity will still be publicly funded. NASA will administer grants to private companies, which is how much (if not most) government research is carried out. NASA is a bureaucratic and bloated mess--winding it down to some grant experts who fund energetic and innovative private firms seems like an improvement, no?

It will take some time for the price to come down, but not 100 years. Imagine discussing the possibility of 55" flat screen TVs in modest living rooms with someone in 2001.

Uh, what? This is already happening: http://www.virgingalactic.com/