Huge study about safety can be misinterpreted by SUV drivers

Try reading some science. USA Today is your source for science? LOL!

 

Absolutely correct. Darwin's theory was not a "theory of evolution", it
was a "theory of natural selection" which described how observed
evolution happened.

--
Tom Royer
Lead Engineer, Software Test
The MITRE Corporation
202 Burlington Road
Bedford, MA 01730
Voice: (781) 271-8399
FAX: (781) 271-8500


"If you're not free to fail, you're not free." --Gene Burns

 

Whatsa matter, Lloyd, logic get your tongue? You were spouting all the green
tripe like an advocate a few days ago until contrary info and logic showed
up, now all you can say is "More BS"? No Greenpeace awards for YOU!

 

More logic, eh Lloyd?

 

We're waiting for a lucid response Lloyd? (Hey, how come you can't explain
for us the creation of the Sahara, huh? How many coal-fired powerplants did
that take?)

 

Lloyd, the world trembles at the searing intellect behind your pithy
posts....

Hey, don't worry, one of those 9 morons the Democrats have out there wagging
their tax & spend, cut & run gums might get elected and save your whole
little comfy green peer group from further humiliation.

 

OK, if I understand this (and it was my fault the Pinto was named!) Ford
lost a court case that did involve a fire. They then did a recall designed
to protect the fuel tank from other components in a rear end collision, so
that if another accident caused a fire they couldn't be blamed for not doing
something. In litigious times, this is certainly a valid business response.

I certainly didn't intend to imply that a Pinto, casually driving along
would suddenly burst into flames (was that in Naked Gun?).

Presumably, from your comments, the Ford position was that the Pinto was no
more prone to fire than other vehicles of the same class, but they could not
afford not to do something. (Sorry about the double negative).

Was any organisation (such as the NUTS) used to validate what Ford did, or
was it just evaluated within Ford that this would be sufficient to avoid
losing other cases?

 

Was it baseball in general, or home runs? Shouldn't we plot those against
temperature. Trouble is, I think I sense some global cooling coming on.

 

I have some Analog magazine articles from 1972 on the coming ice age.

Then there's the theory expressed in Niven's _Falling Angels_ --
humans ARE causing global warming, AND we're set to go into a new ice
age. But they cancel out, until those pesky environmentalists get
their way.

(Yes, _Falling Angels_ is a work of fiction, and Analog is known as an
SF magazine, though the articles were "fact" articles. Climatological
predictions are also works of fiction -- the climate is a chaotic
system and we have only the foggiest idea what the initial conditions are).

 

This is false. No such document related to the Pinto existed. People repeat
this lie so often it has become a "truth." For once can you prove that the
document exists?

Regards,

Ed White

 

On this topic I think that taping these sources would just result in
their depletion and return to foreign sources once dry. I think it
should be a national defense priority to leave this oil in the ground
until it's really needed.

You are scraping the surface on a bigger aspect of the political
environmental movement. It's essentially anti-energy. What I have seen
is that massive clean energy proposals are fought on environmental
grounds. Because once they are scaled up there are *some*
environmental effects. Generally the ugliness of them is the primary
objection. The end result is staying with coal and other fossil fueled
plants, the status-quo.

I'd really wish they focus their efforts on getting 19th century mineral
laws updated so the US tax payer wasn't taken for a ride by elected
officals and their buddies. But that's another story.

Much of the time I wish we could get another president like TR with
regards to conservation. As it sits we seem to get ones that try to
make a good image to the greens while profiting from enviromentally
damaging businesses (Al Gore) to the sort of situation where the
environment is damaged and the US taxpayer gets ripped off. (typical
republican policies)

 

I suppose it depends on what you use as definition of the sun. Strictly,
the verse implying the sun and the moon certainly comes after plants, but
"light" in general came before that.

The rest of the sequence is not bad, though, is it?

Then there is the question of the definition of a "day".

Does Creationism require a belief in Joshua stopping the sun?


If we had been there in a Sebring convertible with the roof off we could
have seen for ourselves.


As regards a flood, it is interesting that some sort of flood has been
reported in a number of old, unrelated texts, IIRC.

DAS
--
---
NB: To reply directly replace "nospam" with "schmetterling"
---
[...............]

.........................

 

Actually, humans as we know t hem have been around how long?

And who said that the five days preceding were 'days' as we know them...?
Wasn't time a bit different in the first microseconds of Big Bang? Or maybe
Fred Hoyle was right and then where do we start?

;-)
DAS

 

Do you mean NHTSA? NHTSA forced the recall. There is plenty of evidence to
support the notion that Ford (and other manufacturers) lobbied against the
implementation of safety standards that would have forced all cars, including
the Pinto, to have better protection for the fuel tanks. I can understand the
companies motivation. However why do we have giant bureaucracies to protect us,
if they roll over and play dead every time some executive whines about a new
standard. If NHTSA had done its job, the Pinto would have had the gas tank
shield and longer filler neck from day one. Even without the shield the total
number of Pinto fire related death was probably less than 30 (and don't forget
there were millions of Pintos). I am not saying that 30 is an acceptable number,
but it is not a number that sets the Pinto apart as an especially dangerous
vehicle for its time.

As I recall (and this is from memory), the case that garnered the most publicity
involved a Pinto backing down an expressway that was rammed by a dump truck
moving at highway speed. The gas cap was not on the vehicle. Ford contended that
it had been left off and this was a major contributor to the fuel spill and
fire. The plaintiffs lawyers claimed that it was detached in the accident
(although it was never found) and that it was irrelevant anyway since the tank
had ruptured - not surprising since it was mostly pushed into the rear seat.
After losing a 100+ million dollar case (in 1978 dollars), the guys at Ford just
threw every fix at the gas tank they could think of - at least short of
installing NASCAR style fuel cells.

GM had a similar problem with early Chevettes. A suspension bolt would puncture
the fuel tanks in relatively minor collisions. GM never fought any of the cases
in court and quietly recalled the Chevettes to change the fasteners and had a
shield to the tank (this recall was in 1978). No one ever mentions the Chevette
as a fire bomb, yet the early Chevettes were at least as dangerous as the Pinto.

If you do a Google search, you can still find a number of very inflammatory
articles on the subject. Mother Jones created one worthy of Dateline. If you can
find the article it may convince you to drive to Dearborn and try to torch Ford
World Headquarters. The fact that a lot of it is creative journalism should
probably stop you. The Pinto was, and still is, a favorite poster child for
Trail Lawyers that want to encourage otherwise honest people to treat every
misfortunate like a winning lottery ticket. They exaggerate the danger and
exaggerate the pay out in a blatant attempt to recruit client that they use to
enrich themselves. People need a way of punishing manufacturers who knowingly
build dangerous products. I just don't think that every honest engineering
decision that goes wrong rises to the level of a capital offense. I drove a
Pinto for 5 years, and my Sisters drove one for almost 10. None of use worried
about the potential for a gas tank fire. When the recall was announced in 1978
we had both of our Pintos updated. However, I would not have spend $10 to do the
upgrade if it had not been free. The risk was below the noise level as far as I
was concerned.

Millions of Pintos drove billions of miles and never burst into flames.

Regards,

Ed White

 

Looks like Lloyd replied to every other post except this one. I guess that
when he shouts "Learn some science", our educator didn't mean from himself.
Interesting how he is vocal in criticizing other opinions as long as they
don't come from other scientists, and equally has no intention in backing up
what he believes himself.

Dave Milne, Scotland
'99 TJ 4.0 Sahara

: Lloyd, what's your opinion on the sunspot theory ? This has been a long
and
: boring thread, but if you can give us an intelligent critique on it, I for
: one would be genuinely interested.
:
: Dave Milne, Scotland
: '99 TJ 4.0 Sahara
:
: : : And now another theory as to possible causation for global warming:
: :
: : http://www.drudgereport.com/flash2.htm
:
:

 

Its not the start that worries me....

Ed

 

No, No, No Lloyd, it was in USA Today, not exactly a bastion of right-wing
propaganda last time we looked.

 

We repeatedly ask YOU to provide some science and you can't. Other than to
spout mantras from the green playbook you're clueless...PROVE YOUR POSITION!

 

On this topic I think that taping these sources would just result in their
depletion and return to foreign sources once dry. I think it should be a
national defense priority to leave this oil in the ground until it's really
needed. >

Probably, unless it was tied to a comprehensive conservation program, but
we'll likely never see thatbecause both sides would have to compromise.

environmental movement. It's essentially anti-energy. What I have seen is
that massive clean energy proposals are fought on environmental grounds.
Because once they are scaled up there are *some* environmental effects.
Generally the ugliness of them is the primary objection. The end result is
staying with coal and other fossil fueled plants, the status-quo. <

Right, and it's incredible how much could be done without the obstructionist
tctics of radical greens, their trial lawyer buddies, non-profit scam
artists, etc. as I said we've had decades to develop alternative sources and
every proposal is killed before it can move forward. Europeans have
continually refined nuclear power over that period of time while we've sat
around blocking development. The only two nuclear accidents occured with
aging old-tech operations, particularly the Russian site. Yet technology
exixts to not only make it safer, it can provide an immediate stop-gap to
the greens fears of drilling, etc.

My favorite hy[pocritical green stance is their drive to de-commision the
glen canyon dam, drain Lake Powell and tear it down. Naturally this would
destry the town of Page, AZ, remove a perfectly clean source of energy and
recreation for millions in the Southwest. Why? So they can walk in the old
slot canyons under the lake and look at the petroglyphs on the walls of the
canyon, like there aren;t thousands of otehr places around the area that
provide the same assests. No, these are the most obstinate, selfich people
on the face ofth Earth and they deserve all the derision that comes their
way. It's always "no, no, no", but they have no alternative solutions other
than to live in a cave somewhere.

 

They aren't planning on living in a cave. That's for you. They are planning on
sitting in a warm home and being flown to environmental support functions in
private jets or driven in limos. I mean the world only has enough resources for
truly dedicated environmentalist to live well. The rest of us, well we need to
preserve those precious resources for the truly committed environmentalist -
right?

Wasn't there an environmentalist that arrived at an event in an Insight and then
drove the Insight just out of sight of the masses and got into a limo? Wasn't it
Ariana Huffington who flew across country in a private yet to attend an
SUV-bashing event? The hypocrisy on both sides is enormous.

Ed