seanflyon

Nit pick: Electrolysis is more like 70% efficient, but once you add the losses from compression and turning that hydrogen back into electricity, your 30% figure sounds about right.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water#Efficien...

I'm not arguing in favor of our current regulation, I'm saying that it is hard to fix and you can't throw it out altogether.

I don't think unregulated nuclear is a good idea. Safer reactors would require less regulation and you could argue that even for current reactors our regulation is excessive. The bottom line is that efficient regulation is a hard problem and to use nuclear power we need to either solve that problem or endure inefficient regulation.

> the tsunami it experienced was accepted by the best engineering data at the time to be impossible.

I find that hard to believe. It was the 4th largest earthquake in the last century and doesn't make the Wikipedia list of "Megatsunamis". It was more a question of how long between such extreme events than if such an extreme event could occur.

> not actually convicted of doing what is alleged

Do you mean "not actually guilty even though they were found guilty" or do we put people on sex offender registries without due process?

> as part of an issued sentence or punishment for an original crime.

I think this is the key point. You have a fundamental right to work for anyone who wants to hire you. The government can take away that right (and other fundamental rights) as punishment for a crime when you are convicted. I don't see how they can take away rights that are not a part of that sentence. That would be like calling you back for another year of prison after your sentence was completed.

> Many countries already do this.

I don't think I could name a 1st world county that doesn't do that.

Minimum wage guarantees you will make a minimum of $0 + all eligible welfare benefits.

With BI, You will never be in a situation where you will be poorer for earning a dollar you just won't be an entire dollar richer.

Any electric heater will be approximately 100% efficient, but electricity is generally much more expensive per unit energy than than natural gas or oil. If you have decided that electricity is your best option, you should compare convenience, installation cost, and whether you want to heat specific areas or the entire house.

Though on Earth it's our atmosphere that stops the high energy particles.

This enables a self driving car to charge. Your car can drop you off and go park.

Which is not a fair comparison because gas stations must meet 100% of the refueling demands of gasoline cars and charging stations only need to meet a tiny percentage because most charging takes place at home or at work.

I think that would still fit pretty well with "those providing 'real' value are so productive that they support all that dead weight and yet still continue to grow".

> it's not related to censorsphip at all.

Censorship: the practice of officially examining books, movies, etc., and suppressing unacceptable parts.

Isn't the suppression of "unacceptable" information the stated goal of the right to be forgotten?

Could you explicitly state what it is you are referring to? I'm not familiar with github's content restrictions.

> Marginal cost generally increases after a while

That is possible, but I would generally expect the opposite with economies of scale.

Define "regressive" because when I google it I get "(of a tax) taking a proportionally greater amount from those on lower incomes". Are you talking about the wealthy having greater ability to find tax loopholes or do define "regressive" as everyone paying the same proportion of their income?

> You assume we are already paying everyone fairly for the value they create.

No, they are assuming that some employees are generate less than $15 of value per hour. They could be 'worth' $14 and currently paid $9.

I think it would become much more palatable if someone came up with a plan for basic income that didn't require tripling the federal budget.

It's sad that they mistook kilowatts for kilowatt-hours, but I think acre-foot is a good unit for measuring volumes of water. It helps communicate the scale of water use.

It seems like you are drawing a distinction between "tank" and "pressure vessel", could you explain what the difference is?

I agree with you about the e-Golf. I had previously seen numbers like this: http://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-scorecard/ that make the e-golf look like they were converting a few hundred cars to electric drivetrains as a test, but I didn't realize that the car was selling in meaningful numbers in Europe. I would love to know if they are making a profit on them or plan to in the near future. You might be right about the i3 as well, but everything about it screams "concept car" in my mind. I also consider the Volt to be a serious attempt to win the market, but it's not a fully electric vehicle.

Already exists: http://www.edison2.com/

With the exception of the Leaf, all those fully electric cars seem more like tests or prototypes than serious attempts to win the market. Nissan is anything but passive when it comes to fully electric cars, but all the other major car makers are being, in my opinion, overly cautious.

You just completely ignored the question you replied to.

The conversation ended.

> Uber is a giant negative externality

Could you elaborate on this?

> Even if companies wanted to do the right thing and keep the overall pay constant

It has nothing to do with what companies want. They don't pay an employee $X because they like to get rid of money, they pay $X because if they offered less that employee would go elsewhere and they would have to settle for a less productive employee, or none at all.