"Assuming there are 500 reactors in use in the world, the above CDF estimates mean that, statistically, one core damage incident would be expected to occur somewhere in the world every 40 years for the 2003 European Commission estimated average accident rate or every 100 years for the 2008 Electric Power Research Institute estimated average accident rate." [1]
"5 serious accidents in 60 years represents an actual historic global annual risk of 1/12 or 8.3% per annum" [2]
"If no cooling system is working to remove the decay heat from a crippled and newly shut down reactor, the decay heat may cause the core of the reactor to reach unsafe temperatures within a few hours or days, depending upon the type of core."
"The sample of premodern populations shows an average modal adult life span of about 72 years, with a range of 68-78 years (Table 4). While modal age at death is not the same as the effective end of the life span, because modal age refers to a peak in the distribution of deaths, it may reflect an important stage in physiological decline. [...]
"Our approach is to assess and analyze available demographic data on extant hunter gatherers and forager-horticulturalists (i.e. peoples who mix hunting and gathering with swidden agriculture). In order to understand the processes that shaped the evolution of our life course, it would be useful to have data on mortality and fertility profiles across populations and over evolutionary time. Given that these data do not exist, we utilize and critically evaluate data on modern groups, as one ‘imperfect lens’ into our past." [1]
[1] Gurven, M., & Kaplan, H. (2007). Longevity among Hunter-Gatherers: A Cross-Cultural Examination. Population and Development Review, 33(2), 321-365. Retrieved from www.jstor.org/stable/25434609
Downvotes are often attached to inconvenient truths.
The safety of nuclear power is based mainly on wishful thinking. It's the classic folly of chasing short-term cost savings and ignoring long-tail risks.
Professor Grimm's death is a horrible tragedy and a major blow to the community. He will be greatly missed by those who were fortunate enough to know him.
Perhaps institutions that issue grants should require that the receiving organization ban "quotas" from their internal policies.
David Mermin wrote a classic paper that illustrates the strange statistical properties of entanglement in a way that doesn't require any physics knowledge.
"A simple device is described, based on a version of Bell's inequality, whose operation directly demonstrates some of the most peculiar behavior to be found in the atomic world. [...] The extraordinary implications of its behavior should be evident to anyone."
A quick search also turned up this animation that demonstrates Mermin's device:
The claim is that the term "funds" included in the definition of "financial transaction" [1] covers bitcoins.
"Funds" typically denotes cash or an asset that is highly liquid, not just anything which can be purchased or sold. Black's Law Dictionary defines "fund" as a "sum of money or other liquid assets established for a specific purpose."
Bitcoins, at this stage, are accepted almost nowhere, recognized by few people as currency, and represent a tiny, highly volatile and risky niche compared to other markets. It's much easier to convert a used iPhone (the top search on eBay) into cash, sell concert tickets on craigslist, or trade collectibles, than it is to convert bitcoins into legal tender, but no one would mistake those goods for "funds." The law isn't intended to cover anything which can be exchanged for cash. In fact, it specifically enumerates the following types of property separately when defining the scope of "financial transaction": "real property, vehicle, vessel, or aircraft." [1]
Because currency is accepted nearly everywhere as payment, the government considers it difficult to police and subject to special penalties when used for criminal ends. Goods like collectibles or bitcoins don't operate at that scale, since they're accepted by relatively few businesses and specialized experts as payment. If a tiny (in comparison to the economy at large) experiment like bitcoin is "funds", then almost any object bought or sold in a zillion stores and marketplaces can be construed as "funds". Any quid-pro-quo could be considered laundering, which broadens the law beyond its intended scope.
The ruling says:
"Ulbricht's alleged conduct is more akin to a builder who designs a house complete with secret entrances and exits and specially designed traps to stash drugs and money; this is not an ordinary dwelling, but a drug dealer's 'dream house.'" [2]
It's not illegal to build a house with secret entrances and compartments. Such a house could be used by anyone who wanted to hide their own possessions on their own property. The fact that someone might use it for illicit purposes doesn't implicate the owner or builder. It must be proved separately that the owner or builder knowingly entered into some kind of agreement with another conspirator to facilitate a crime [3]. Merely hosting a chat room isn't a conspiracy.
Unfortunately, this is just a perpetuation of the same pointless drug war. The prosecution's position is wildly overblown. The alleged activities are akin to operating a motel where a victimless offense might have been committed by a third party.
Drug prohibition is ineffective and is on the way out in favor of treatment and social programs that are more effective.
(A) a transaction which in any way or degree affects interstate or foreign commerce
(i) involving the movement of funds by wire or other means or
(ii) involving one or more monetary instruments, or
(iii) involving the transfer of title to any real property, vehicle, vessel, or aircraft, or
(B) a transaction involving the use of a financial institution which is engaged in, or the activities of which affect, interstate or foreign commerce in any way or degree;
It's easier to create a PayPal account, link it to your bank account, list an iPhone, wait for someone to buy it (could take anywhere from minutes to days realistically), wait for them to pay you, take it to UPS/FedEx to deliver it, and then transfer the funds to your account than to visit one of the Bitcoin exchange sites?
>It's much easier to convert a used iPhone (the top search on eBay) into cash, sell concert tickets on craigslist, or trade collectibles, than it is to convert bitcoins into legal tender
Really? What about all the services like Bitstamp? I am fairly sure that bitcoin is more liquid than used iPhones.
> Really? What about all the services like Bitstamp? I am fairly sure that bitcoin is more liquid than used iPhones.
The actual problem is that the entire concept of trying to separate currency from commodities is defective. Forget about used iPhones. You can walk into any pawn shop and exchange a bar of silver for goods or cash. Does that mean silver is a currency? What about copper? Or gasoline? Try to buy something on Craigslist and offer to pay with a gas card. More likely to succeed than offering bitcoin.
Bitcoin aims at being money, notwithstanding its relative lack of convertibility. I went to the bitcoin Foundation website just now: 'Bitcoin Foundation standardizes, protects and promotes the use of Bitcoin cryptographic money for the benefit of users worldwide.' (my emphasis)
Bitcoin has been referred to as a 'cryptocurrency' since its inception, and much as I treasure my own copy of Black's Law Dictionary, its definitions are not legally binding. You might as well say 'my clients large collection of unfinished diamonds and gold nuggets don't amount to a hoard of wealth - have you ever tried to buy groceries with an unfinished diamond? I rest my case!'
As an analogy, I would say a law against counterfeiting money shouldn't apply to things which aren't currencies (like counterfeiting a designer handbag or forging Linden dollars in Second Life...). If the law's purpose is to protect and maintain the legitimacy of certain bedrock instruments the public relies on (cash, real estate titles), I think it's overreaching to extend it to every aspiring virtual (or even gaming) currency...
The laws against counterfeiting money don't apply to counterfeiting designer bags or Linden dollars. They have separate counterfeiting laws to cover that.
I think you made the counter-point yourself - because "cash" is so difficult to police governments treat it specially. Bitcoins are or perhaps are becoming a medium of exchange that is hard to police and attractive to criminals. So irrespective of our current definitions of funds society has an imperative to treat bitcoin as funds and so as something to be policed. Hence the ruling.
Well ok, the ruling was really "no, there is no way you are snidely gettin off Scott free because the law forgot to think of crypto-currency"
So basically you're arguing that bitcoin's lack of success thus far at achieving its explicitly stated aims is a defense? What if he were conducting transactions in Syrian or Iranian currency? This is a disingenuous argument.
No, it doesn't. It says any currency, along with all kinds of things that aren't currency but which can more-or-less readily be converted into currency, including travelers' cheques and negotiable instruments, both of which are probably less liquid than bitcoins. Indeed, a bitcoin is a "negotiable instrument".
I quote:
(5) the term “monetary instruments” means
(i) coin or currency of the United States or of any other country, travelers’ checks, personal checks, bank checks, and money orders, or
(ii) investment securities or negotiable instruments, in bearer form or otherwise in such form that title thereto passes upon delivery;
"Those sent to work in town often had some input in their choice of master and some, like Frederick Douglass, were allowed to live on their own upon surrender of satisfactory wages." [1]
That was probably far from the norm in the 1830's. Frederick Douglass was no less in bondage though.
Later in life, Mr. Douglass said:
"[E]xperience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other". [2]
"Frederick Douglass was an African-American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement[.]" [3]
"5 serious accidents in 60 years represents an actual historic global annual risk of 1/12 or 8.3% per annum" [2]
"If no cooling system is working to remove the decay heat from a crippled and newly shut down reactor, the decay heat may cause the core of the reactor to reach unsafe temperatures within a few hours or days, depending upon the type of core."
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_damage_frequency
[2] https://silo.tips/download/complexity-implies-unknowable-ris...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decay_heat