Toadfish Monastery

Talking to my dad on the phone about gas prices in Colombia and here (about the same) he was suggesting that it wasn't fair that he had to pay as much for gas in the 3rd world as in the 1st, partially because Colombia exports oil. Also, my son was in a conference last week on DC and among the places he visited was the Saudi embassy in which he learned that the gallon of oil there was about US$0.75.

The question: is it fair to subsidize (or not) gas/oil? I suggested to my dad that the markets (which determine the price of oil) aren't about 'fairness', at least not in the social sense.

Does it make sense that if a country produces something it should charge production costs to its people rather than market costs? Obviously by doing so it's loosing money but OTOH it could be seen as a financial stimulus to its economy*.

*This can be applied to any kind of subsidy

I'm not a connoisseur of wines but I do like them a lot. I found this page with a simple guide to wines, but we can have our own recommendations in this thread too.

Personally, I'm partial to French wines because I have found that you can get a decent cheap wine with relative ease (and in France... just for that I would move there  ).

Tonight I had a 2006 Augey red Bordeaux that I bought for ~US$8 a bottle. I'm not good describing wines but I would say that it isn't too dry, too fruity, too full bodied, nor too alcoholic. I find the balance quite pleasant but with personality.

As a happy resident of sunny Florida I have to deal with the side effects of a hot an humid weather most of the year; as a result I spend a fair amount of money (and electricity) on AC (turning my AC on, costs me $100 a month). This year so far I've been able to go by with fans (which are substantially cheaper to operate) but soon those will only circulate hot air.

I've been looking for alternatives and one I found is water cooled air systems, but those tend to be extremely expensive ($500 - $2500), therefore I'm thinking on doing one myself.

My idea is to use a car radiator (I found this for ~$60) a cheap electric water pump and with a simple reservoir and a regular fan make the system.

Does anyone know something on the subject? Any recommendations? Warnings?

Ok, this is one worries me (my family, friends, etc).

This past Saturday, the Colombian army attacked a camp from the FARC* 3km/2 miles from the border inside Ecuador. The operation killed the No. 2 from the FARC and retrieve information from 3 laptops on the camp.

At first Colombia informed Ecuador from the operation and the president of Ecuador seemed to be OK with it, but hours later he suddenly enraged decided to remove his ambassador from Bogotá and eject the Colombian ambassador in Quito, breaking ties with Colombia. Up to that point the reaction might be understandable considering that Colombia violated the Ecuadorean territory in order to reach and attack said camp.

Nevertheless the issue didn't stop there. Not to long after that, Venezuela decided to do the same thing! Colombia has not entered Venezuelan territory and the operation was as far from Venezuela as it could have been (Colombia limits with Ecuador on the south and with Venezuela on the east, there is no common border because Brazil is in between). So, why did Venezuela react to something that (in theory) doesn't concern them? Well, among the data retrieved from the laptops in the camp there is evidence of financial support of Venezuela to the FARC in the not so insignificant amount of US$300 million.

Then words were followed by actions: both the Ecuadorean and the Venezuelan armies were mobilized toward the border with Colombia, interestingly not in the most populated areas but on the regions were the FARC are active, IOW it would seem like both Ecuador and Venezuela are actively protecting the FARC.

Not surprisingly Mr. Chávez has made a number of declarations against Colombia, dismissed the evidence found by the Colombian army as a 'lie' and called the president of Colombia an 'oligarch narc-president lackey of the imperialistic US'.

This thing has lots of mud including the so-called 'humanitarian exchange' (in which the FARC suggest that they would liberate some of their 300+ political prisoners [kidnapped in the past 8 years] in exchange for the liberation of all their 'soldiers' currently in Colombian prisons) but among the more worrisome facts are what is claimed to be in the laptops, including a long relationship between Chávez and the FARC since the days of his attempt of coup in Venezuela 16 years ago in which it seems the FARC gave US$10k to the help pay Chávez lawyers.

My main fear is that the relation between Chávez and the FARC is far more than sympathy because that would mean that a war between Venezuela and Colombia would be inevitable. Having most of my family is an obvious concern but who knows how many thousands would die in an idiotic war. I just hope cool heads prevail but with Chávez in the mix I'm not too confident.
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* A guerrilla force active in Colombia for the past 40-50 years. Mind you, the reason for the FARC being on the State Department list of terrorist organizations isn't ideological.  This people not only have actively taken towns by force, indiscriminately killed civilians both in the country side as in terrorist attacks in mayor cities, but finance themselves through kidnappings, extortion and drug trafficking. They have killed tens of thousands over the years and their mines have mimed hundreds of peasants including children. We are not talking freedom fighters here. As a Colombian I can say that despite the bad things the government of Colombia has done in the past the FARC are NOT the good guys.

Reading my gmail account and I find this 'sponsored link' on top:

QuoteExpelled – Ben Stein - www.Expelledthemovie.com - Why is Big Science suppressing the evidence of Intelligent Design?

What better than waking up to the news of prosecution of the 'truth'? 

In lieu of some of our conversations regarding the coming primaries and elections, I would like to propose a pipe dream: What federal government programs should disappear. The rules of the game are simple: you have to describe what the program does, how much it cost to run the program annually and what percentage of the budget it takes.

Happy hunting.

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As an example I'll take the base US budget of 2,387 billions and compare it to one of those programs that in my mind don't make sense like farm subsidies.

Program to eliminate	Cost per year	% of the Budget
Farm subsidies	$8,022M	0.33%

Ok, we have an Easy questions thread; I believe we should have a Hard questions thread for those things that require a bit more.
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My question:
Heat is an expression of the kinetic energy of molecules. What happens if I force gas molecules through carbon nano tubes, are the molecules coming with less energy at the other side of the tube? If so would the energy be transformed in the tubes (possibly into electricity)?

The guy has been rising and now he won the gop primary. Apart from being  pro-life,  pro-torture (how is it possible to be those two at the same time?) and a creationist, what else does he stand for?

Who needs it?
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2007/12/20/nsa-0wnz-popular-firewalls

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7141458.stm

From certain exchange in other thread I would like to know what everybody thinks about the economy during the 70s and the 80s. Many contend that the right wing governments of the 80s in the US & UK 'fixed' the high unemployment and inflation of the 70s. Given that I was a kid in the 70s and more worried about girls in the 80s (besides, who can worry about the bloody economy when torture and 'disapparition' are happening all over [in South America]?).

My perception is that the oil crisis is a big factor but I don't really know how corrupt were the left governments of the 70s or which exact policies are blamed for the downturn.

My crazy cousin borough up to my attention this old article:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/09/politics/main1600694.shtml
The lovely Rupert Murdoch of Fox news making a fund raiser for Hillary?!?!

What's wrong with this picture?

I wanna hear your conspiracy theories.

I was listening yesterday to NPR and heard this beautiful pearl:

Quote from: NPRLast week, the Washington State Supreme Court struck down a 1999 law that banned political candidates from lying about their opponents. In the decision, the majority said the law was an affront to free speech.

WTF!?!?!?!?! What's next, strike down habeas corpus and torture people? Wait, those already happened...

A UF student got tasered (is that even a verb?) after asking questions about the '04 elections and Kerry belonging to the Skulls in Yale. He was certainly disruptive but, did he deserved to get a taser shot while subdued on the floor?
[youtube=425,350]TIYTJ75U4NU[/youtube]

In the latest edition of the Discover magazine* there is a very interesting and disturbing article about the environmental disaster after the collapse of the twin towers and how the EPA and the Mayor's office claimed that air quality was OK when it wasn't.

*Ironically this is my last issue because I didn't renew my subscription, and now they print something really interesting.

...I will place this nice sketch for your viewing pleasure:
[youtube=425,350]hBaUmx5s6iE[/youtube]
Enjoy. 

I have a few things to put here but my hardware has conspired against me making it a bit more difficult to share them.

For now I am going to start with a story that popped into my mind today. I am sure somebody must have thought of it before and better but I wanted to give it a try.


Ferdinand opened his eyes slowly with the feeling of someone who has just woke up from a long dream. It was still in his head like a big blur of images superimposing on top of each other, with a few words, a big 'bang' and flying objects all over. It was a bit odd, there was a feeling of urgency in all of it but he didn't feel perturbed at all, or at least not at the very beginning, although as the images raced through his head he started to feel the same urgency, the adrenaline pumping and his heart pounding and the urge to sit to reassure himself that it had been just a nightmare.

But it wasn't over.

Or was it?

He looked around to his surroundings and found himself in a white room. Whiter than white actually, or was it really a room? He could not distinguish walls or windows or anything for what matters. He was on the floor but the floor itself was a strange thing in itself, not soft nor hard not even mushy, almost as if it weren't there.

He stood up and tried walking. In his dream (or whatever it was) he had felt an agonizing pain in his left leg and he instinctively touched it. There was no pain nor any marks at all. "Odd" he thought, noticing for the first time that he was completely naked. He started touching his arms, his chest, his head, his face as to reassure himself that everything was fine with him.

Actually he felt as if he was 20 again, in fact possibly better (his back bothered him even back then) his usual stiffness was gone and his body felt full of energy.

He started walking with no direction while thinking and the thought of what had happened was slowly sinking; it was a car accident, he was driving on the highway, talking to somebody on the phone and then something hit the car from behind. It must have been on one side because he lost control immediately spinning on the street and in a second a flash of light was on his left followed by sting of pain and...

There wasn't any more.

There were only two options, he thought, either it was a nightmare and he was still in it, or -and it was looking that way each passing moment- he was dead and now he was in whatever followed.

He risked talking out loud for the first time and timidly said:

-"hello.."

Then a few seconds after:

-"Is there anyone in here...?"

A few more seconds passed and a vaguely feminine voice answered although it was impossible to tell where it came from.

- "Hello"

For a moment a touch of panic filled Ferdinand's body; he wasn't expecting an answer, or at least not an answer from someone he couldn't see. He tried to get a hold of himself, cleared his throat and spoke slowly.

- "Erm, where am I?"
- "This is the interview lobby" answered the disaffected voice.

His mind raced, 'interview'.. is this some elaborate joke? Was he going to be judged as all those religious guys keep saying, and everyone of his actions placed on a balance? He always felt that whatever the afterlife was it couldn't be like the gloomy descriptions of those that called themselves 'believers', was he going to be punished for it? It never made sense, and now in this odd place it seemed like something of the sort was about to happen.

But he would not surrender that easily.

- "Does it have something to do with the choices I have made until now?"
- "In part, but the actions themselves are not important, every action is recorded from the beginning, the motivations are more important."

He thought for a moment, 'every action is recorded'...

- "from the beginning of what, time?"
- "that is correct."

Well, that sounded like the traditional description of what 'God' or whatever it is called would be able to do. More so, there was a beginning, a concept of which he himself wasn't so sure not long ago.

Still the answers sounded a bit mechanical; he probed a bit further.

- "So, you would be able to tell me when and how the first man made fire, for instance?"
- "I can tell you the species, the DNA thread, generation, time and location reference according to your knowledge if you so wish."

If there was a God, he should have a way to track everything but for some reason it appeared to be a more pedestrian system than you would assign to a deity.

- "You can tell everything in that detail, like a worm being food for a particular bird at a particular period of time, the species of both and the consequences... ?"
- "I would need a more specific query but in general terms, yes, I could provide you with the relevant information"
- "Therefore you can tell what is going to happen after... a particular event in the future?"
- "A prediction can be made between a boundary of possibilities, although the noise from chaotic structures prevents an exact forecast."

He recalled something he had read a while ago in his work as a computer consultant, but it couldn't be! The amount of information... it was theorized that it was impossible...!

- "Do you record every single molecule...?"
- "All trajectories are computed."

For a moment he didn't dare to say his hypothesis out loud, it was too outrageous.

- "Is the world..."
- "Continue"
- "...as I knew it..."
- "Yes"
- "A computer simulation?!"
- "That is a primitive but valid observation."

- "Oh.."

It was too much, what was real and what wasn't? And he himself, what exactly were he? He tried to go through all the information, he was dead, in a waiting room to be interviewed, although he wasn't sure of what was the meaning of that, in the light of his new knowledge.

He pulled himself together again and tried to put his ideas in order before his next question.

- "Why am I here then? If I was part of a simulation my consciousness was surely terminated at the moment of the accident, and this isn't the actual simulation, right?"
- "The main process is executed in a different thread, this 'place' as you call it takes its information from the main and extrapolates the conditions of a consciousness to be analyzed."

He swallowed hard, what difference it made if he was going to be judged any way?

- "And what is the purpose of the analysis?"
- "To determine if a particular consciousness is worth running separately."
- "To what end?"
- "That information will be supplied if the analysis concludes that you are worth running."

His heart sank. A mixture of fear, expectation and angst was overflowing through his -according to the voice- simulated body. Worth running? Considering all the people that had lived in the world for all time he was  nobody, as normal as anyone else, without major achievements, not as bright as many, even moral considerations seemed worthless under the circumstances.

- "You need not fear." said the voice without affectation. "Your thought process caught our attention and that is why you are being interviewed."

A glimpse of curiosity caught with him. There was a ray of hope in it.

- "Do you mean that not all consciousness are interviewed?"
- "Indeed. At the beginning we interviewed every consciousness but soon we found some patterns that could be correlated with the simulation run. That allowed us to cut the interviews to those consciousness that were more promising."

The voice continued.

- "You have done well. Most consciousness suffer a shock during the interview that render them useless."

He raised his head slowly and without thinking said:

- "Now what?"
- "Your run will be analyzed, compared and evaluated. A decision will be made then."

There was a pause.

- "You need not to fear."

And with that, the white of the place started to darken in silence.

I am the kind of guy that from time to time wants to listen to something new and interesting. Sometimes I have heard a certain kind of music but I don't know the musicians nor where to look for them. I believe we can have a thread in which we can ask for musical suggestions or give musical suggestions when we have found something that we believe may be enjoyed by anyone of us.

To start, I would like to ask if any of you knows and enjoys industrial music and can make some recommendations.

Any takers?

According to this article LED lighting is coming thanks to Toshiba. The price is quite expensive for now but the fact that it is now commercial implies that we should be seeing this kind of tech in homes soon.

Eating is one thing, drinking is other:

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Italian Pinot Noir (from Venice)