Posts by Mark Davies 16 publicly visible posts • joined 6 Sep 2007
Oh I don't know.... maybe because the oceans absorb all the CO2 they can at ambient temperature/pressure, maybe because there is no incremental additional plant/algae growth.
BTW filling either of these carbon sinks is not a good idea, too much CO2 in the ocean leads to acidification which kills molluscs, coral etc. too much algae growth uses all the oxygen and kills the animals there...
I am a MS Windows fan - the worst piece of software that I have to use regularly is iTunes and whilst my iPhone 4 is great it is no use for doing anything business related.
I'd see this in the same way. At the moment airport lounges are full of people travelling on business with a laptop and an iPad. They'll get out the laptop to do their work on and then use the iPad to watch a movie once they have finished working.
A decent MS tablet would cover both of these things - I can watch movies and play great games on my Windows device, I couldn't update a spreadsheet, document, plan, code etc. on an iPad.
I was at the lecture this morning - I thought it was entertaining and worth going to.... And I don't even work for MS.
I have to say though that this report is a bit, well a bit tabloid, i.e. misrepresenting a couple of things.
For example I kind of thought, like most people there, that Steve chosing not to answer all of the 6 or 7 questions posed by the El Reg journo, was not stonewalling but was to the benefit of students and business people who the lecture was aimed at. These event are not primarilly aimed at journos, are they? Surely other people attending the event should get to ask some as well? And I, like a number of people had trouble hearing some of the questions (and I was only a few rows behind the El Reg journo), so I can easilly believe that Steve asking for the question to be repeated was genuine.
It's a shame this wasn't run like most of my University's alumni events, i.e. no (or very limited) press, ensuring people only get to ask one question and Chatham House rules. The event might be a bit more useful for the rest of us then.
F*ck me! I can't believe I'm defending MS!
The accused loses all my sympathy when I read about indecent images of children.
I think that is a very legitimate crime to investigate and prosecute - the more the police can use to (legitimately) convict the accused the better.
Please stop conflating separate issues like this - freedom of speech is a good issue to right about, but only when it involves consenting adults.
but this patent seems to be so broad that it would cover any device that could be used in your hands and then form part of an immersive, goggles based device.
Current iPod, iPhone etc are a bit big, but a couple of generations down the line (whether produced by Apple or not) they might be thin and light enough for this. Imagine a phone/games tablet that is also light enough to stick over your eyes on the plan/train - could be a good seller.
I would argue that the Copernicus/Catholic Church analogy really applies the other way around.
On one side you have many Churches, many politicians and many big businesses saying "man can't be responsible for global warming" all with their own reasons, in the case of many religious people simply because it is "arrogant to believe man can have this power over God's world". This group wheel out "scientific" experts and use personal attacks to try and discredit the theories of AGW, in the same way they did against Galileo or Newton, the same way they did to support cigarette sales in the 50s and 60s.
Anyone with any knowledge of science knows it is rarely simple to explain or demonstrate to people withour specific domain knowledge, results are often marginal and that you often will get some results that contradict others.
I say we should believe the experts in the field - and by and large, in fact in proportions very rarely seen in any scientific debate, they all seem to agree that AGW exists and is happening. There is also some fairly clear evidence to support this, the shrinking of glaciers, the retreat of arctic ice, the trend in global average temperatures etc. etc.
Are they going to pass this information onto their flagship councils - Westminster has more CCTV than any other borough, and raises more funds through traffic control than any other borough by a significant margin. Another nice sound bite contradicted by the Conservatives behaviour where are in power...
Every time I hear the Tory leaders talk about IT it is as though someone has generated a bunch of random sentences filled with the latest IT buzz words. Whether this is open source or not makes no difference, the best tool should be selected for the job on the basis of its merits for that job. Poor management of the IT projects and internal politics (especially for the NHS projects) have been the real show stoppers and open source will not solve those problems.
Having Dave spout about IT is like me spouting about, oh I don't know, sixteenth century Indonesian wood carving. I could look up some applicable words on the net, chuck them innappropriately into a sentence and then clap myself on the back. But I can't be a*sed...
Great comment from Cameron and typical of him. Having a central database has many advantages and disadvantages - those related to security pretty much cancel out, a huge number of records in one place could lead to security issues if not properly managed, but having a large number of disparate databases each requiring a separate manager to patch etc. is equally risky. I've been involved in building large systems for banks - they tend to go for the centralised approach as it is easier (and therefore safer) to manage.
When is somebody going to challenge the Tory party's complete lack of IT understanding?
Icenian,
Please re-read my earlier point:
"There has been open debate, but amongst those who know what they are talking about, i.e. climatologists, that is how peer review works. That means that it shouldn't have to be re-debated by arm-chair scientists like yourself, in the same"
I'm not trying to deny people a platform based on their viewpoint but deny them an equal platform based on their lack of expertise.
This is not free speech issue - the Global Climate Change discussion is not the same as the discussion on education, it's not about personal beliefs or points of view - it is about evidence.
In a discussion on quantum mechanics would we feel the need to have an impartial viewpoint presented by the BBC? Would we have to have a journalist/politician/footballer/pundit challenging string theory on the grounds that the scientists proposing it are exhibiting bias over brane theory? Would we give credence to some bloke banging on about his own, personal anecdotes over detailed, peer-reviewed research?
NO - so why do we have to put up with this when we are talking about global climate change.
Wade, Wade, Wade....
It's always interesting to see those who refuse to believe evidence use this argument. There is a wealth of evidence supporting the theory of global climate change, there are numerous papers by numerous scientists in many respected, peer reviewed publications describing this.
Lined up against this is the vested interests of some governments (US hang your head in shame), some corporates and some individuals all trying to ensure that their interests are met. This oposition has managed to twist this into a political arguement rather than a scientific argument yet they still claim there are no facts supporting the theory of global climate change.
There has been open debate, but amongst those who know what they are talking about, i.e. climatologists, that is how peer review works. That means that it shouldn't have to be re-debated by arm-chair scientists like yourself, in the same
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