The Folly of Scientism - <AUTHOR> http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-folly-of-scientism <comment><USER2> A reply under the title of "The folly of 'The folly of scientism'" by Professor Jerry Coyne of the University of Chicago, who frequently reads and comments on issues related to the philosophy of science:

[http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/12/08/the- folly...](http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/12/08/the-folly-of-the- folly-of-scientism/)

". . . . Hughes is an evolutionary biologist with wide-ranging interests, and I've really liked some of his papers."

. . . .

"The big problem with Hughes's essay is that despite his claim that there are other ways of apprehending truth beyond science—ways that involve the three areas of ethics, metaphysics, and epistemology—he gives not a single example of a question that those disciplines have answered."

<comment><USER3> Wonder if Coyne realizes the circular and non-responsive nature of his reply.

To rephrase this, science is the only thing we know. Show me something that's not science that we know. Of course, you can't. You've given yourself the answer before you begin to ask the question.

Effective science and humility have to go hand-in-hand. Otherwise you're just creating a new religion with the rubric "science" stuck on it.

<comment><USER4> Maybe we are thinking of "scientific" in different terms, but I know lots of things that are not scientific.

I'm speaking broadly here, but qualia are not scientific. My internal experiences aren't scientific. So I'd say that, on one sense, at least half of what I experience is not scientific.

No one actually knows what is going on inside of my head at this moment. Yet I know my own thoughts, emotions and experiences. Science may know that I can experience love, for example. But it can't tell me that I am experiencing love at this moment, as I write this comment, or who I fall in love with.

<comment><USER5> That science can't yet know you're experiencing love at this moment (if indeed that's the case) isn't a reason to think it never will be able to. I know it's common to think of our internal thoughts and experiences as metaphysical things, but I know of no evidence that they're anything but chemical and physical processes. You know, science.

<comment><USER4> Oh, I'm not saying that thoughts and experiences _aren't_ physical things -- I didn't mean to imply otherwise.

The question I was responding to was: "Show me something that's not science that we know". My response is that there are lots of things that we, as people, actually know but can't study scientifically.

<comment><USER6> Love and emotions are being studied scientifically. The neurotransmitters behind love and affection are extremely well studied. One could quite easily construct experiments to see if exiting fMRI technology can determine the difference between a brain experiencing love and one not. These questions are in every way within the domain of science.

<comment><USER7> While this is all true, it wouldn't tell us much about the actual experience of feeling the emotion. That would remain metaphysical.

<comment><USER6> I do not see any reason to suppose this is true. I grant that this is question that is not being tackled by current research (as far as I know, as neuroscience and theoretical neuroscience are in a period of boom right now), but that does not make it scientifically intractable. There is little I can say about this as I do not know what you mean by "the actual experience".

<comment><USER7> As in, the difference between the neurological processes that govern ones mental state, and the subjective experience of having that mental state.

For example, if I'm hungry and eat a good meal the changes in my brain chemistry that induce the sense of well being that follows are well understood.

That doesn't tell me anything at all about the actual subjective experience of feeling pleasure though. That is something distinct.

<comment><USER6> Is it? The signals in your nervous system that give you the sensation of pain are pain.

Let me make an argument by analogy.

You are saying that understanding the chip architecture and the instruction set of a computer does not allow you to understand what it is like for that chip to run a given program. Is that a fair analogy? Can you improve it?

If this is a fair analogy, then I think it is clear that you are wrong. We absolutely can understand what running a given program is like. We may need to use a different vocabulary and abstract away detail in order to efficiently communicate the idea of running the program (say, talk about a data structure rather than the individual bits that compose it), but that is true in every field. This is basic tool of reasoning.

If that is not a good analogy, please let me know how. I am not satisfied at all that I understand what you mean when you write "the actual subjective experience". I understand what those words mean but I cannot match them with an object.

<comment><USER7> Essentially your argument is that consciousness doesn't exist. That we are equivalent to highly sophisticated computers running a program, is that correct?

The problem with this argument is that your conscious perception is actually the _only_ thing you can know to exist. Everything else is sense data fed into that consciousness. You assume that the external world that manifests itself via sense data exists because it appears consistent.

But as I sit here typing this the only thing I can know _with certainty_ is that 'I' exist and am conscious (by definition).

This process of being conscious, of perceiving the world, is what I am arguing is outside the realm of science.

Now I know a number of people are of the opinion that if you have a sufficiently complicated machine, biological or otherwise, consciousness will become some emergent property. And maybe this is so. But just saying 'it emerges' is not science. It's hand waving. So instead we have to just accept that for the moment we cannot speak of it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This essay should be required reading for anyone who thinks science is or should be the only legitimate way of understanding the world.

For more information, I strongly recommend:

"Naturalism and the Human Condition: Against scientism" by Frederick A. Olafson

and

"Scientism" by Tom Sorell

<comment><USER9> What are some [legitimate] examples of non-science ways of understanding the world?

<comment><USER10> Consciousness/experience.

<comment><USER11> How, specifically?

Given the incredible variance in available descriptions of "the conscious experience", I would posit that "consciousness" itself exists only as a mental grouping and nothing distinct.

As an exercise: explain what exactly constitutes a "car", including the point where such an item officially "stops being a car" during the process of disassembly. Show your work.

<comment><USER7> I don't think they are referring to the phenomenon of consciousness, rather than the experience of consciousness itself.

<comment><USER11> Where does that demarcation line fall? Is there anything to consciousness besides the experiential phenomenon?

To illustrate: there is no such thing as the movie "It's a Wonderful Life", just a series of individual frames that our eyes and brains perceive as a whole unit only because of perceptual and cognitive limitations (basically, compression). We know far less of anything beyond the present moment - speaking of individual experience - than most believe. I posit that "consciousness" exists as nothing more than a cognitive compression artifact.

<comment><USER7> Do you regard the subjective experience of being concious as a something that can be adequately described by detailing neurological processes? As in, I know you might argue that a specific combination of atoms will correspond to a specific mental state. That doesn't really tell you anything about the subjective experience of being in that mental state though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I thought we were done with Constructivism a long time ago. And scientism is not the biggest problem in a world where climate change, stem cells and creationism debates still exist.

Unfortunately philosophers alienated scientists with their postmodern (de-)constructivism to the point of creating enmities (such as the Sokal affair[1]). At this point, when scientists speak to philosophers, one gets the impression that there's nothing to learn from them that they don't already know (or even worse, that philosophers dance around subjects).

The author seems frustrated that philosophers are no longer the highest authorities, but that's just the current state of philosophy.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair>

<comment><USER8> This might come as a surprise, but not every philosopher is a postmodernist. Postmodernists aren't even in the majority. They're a relatively small minority in an ocean of different philosophical outlooks. Even many so-called postmodernists deny the label applies to them.

As for who alienated who in the Sokal affair, it should be remembered that Sokal was the original perpetrator of the hoax, and appeared to have initiated it with the sole aim of discrediting philosophers he did not approve of.

<comment><USER12> No doubt about that; yet postmodernists seem to be the ones most engaged in what is perceived as a pursuit to discredit or trivialize science. Unfortunately, they are loud people so it's hard to hear other, more interesting views on the philosophy of science. I would be grateful if you could suggest some good books.

<comment><USER8> On the Analytic side, take a look at Balashov's and Rosenberg's "Philosophy of Science: Contemporary Readings"

On the Continental side, the classic essay is Heidegger's "The Question Concerning Technology".

I'd also recommend Jacques Ellul's "Technological Society".

And, while not dealing directly with science, I think Foucault's critiques of power in discourse are very relevant.

Earlier in this thread I'd mentioned:

"Naturalism and the Human Condition: Against scientism" by Frederick A. Olafson, whose critique comes from a phenomenological perspective.

and

"Scientism" by Tom Sorell, who's a neo-Kantian.

None of the above are postmodernists.

<comment><USER12> Thank you

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The author believes scientific inquiry should not 'overreach' into subjects that have traditionally belonged to fields like philosophy, metaphysics, epistemology, and religion, because, he explains in painful detail, science can't have all the answers.

Regardless of whether one agrees with him or not, his argument makes NO sense to me. _The relevant question is not whether science can have all the answers, but whether science yields better or more accurate answers than those other approaches._

<comment><USER14> It has been asked whether science yields "better or more accurate answers" than other approaches.

We know that most published scientific research results are wrong.

[http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal...](http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124)

Therefore flipping a coin and always guessing "heads" yields more accurate results than science.

Now what? Has this insight taught us anything?

<comment><USER12> That's a sweeping over-generalization. More like "many inferences based on statistics are not as strong as they appear to be many are not even true". That article is important (and well known) for a certain type of life sciences publications; it's a problem that is being addressed already. That's another good thing about science, you can measure how wrong you are.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> So science showed itself to be a powerful tool for determining truth about _some_ subjects and exposed the ridiculousness of most pre-scientific ideas concerning those subjects.

Now that a higher level of certainty is available for some subjects people have higher expectations about what level of confidence they demand from an idea purporting to tell them something about reality. They also have a lot more scientific knowledge about the ways in which and the reasons why these other methods fail, often spectacularly.

I guess I'm guilty of scientism. I assume that if these "other ways of understanding" failed nearly completely at discovering truth in every subject that has been touched by science I assume this extrapolates to the subjects we cannot apply science to.

I fail to see why accepting our current limitations about what it's possible for us to know is anything other than the opposite of hubris.

Once another system of thought actually makes predictions that answer questions about reality then I will happily change my mind. Until then I'm not satisfied with the horrible levels of accuracy they have been shown to have. I'll just stick with the humble scientific opinion: "We don't know yet, we haven't figured out how to move beyond conjecture about this issue".

</comment><comment><USER16> In a world with the three body problem and godel, humility should be the defining characteristic of the intelligent.

Should.

<comment><USER17> I'm always suspicious of people who are think they've got it all figured out...in _any_ area, much less the full extent of human knowledge. I've been there, and I was always out of my depth; I just didn't realize it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I was most struck by the line that _"It easily becomes an interpretive blank check, permitting speculation that seems to explain any describable human trait."_ This has long been a criticism "real" evolutionary scientists (like geneticists) have leveled against the speculative nonsense often seen coming from sociobiology/evolutionary psychology [0].

Science works to find scientific conclusions. But the trappings of science are sometimes applied in ways that have little to do with actual science.

[0] [http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2012/09/17/12091...](http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2012/09/17/120917crbo_books_gottlieb?currentPage=all) \-- note that sociobio/ev psych _can_ produce real science. In my experience, though, most of what they produce is "just-so stories", as Gould's comment points out.

</comment><comment><USER19> For too long, the vast majority of scientists have kept silent, keenly aware of the limitation of their knowledge, and leaving it to idiots (e.g. Bill O'Reilly's nobody can explain the tides...) to make sweeping and completely false statements. We don't have all the answers yet (and never will) but that should not stop scientists from voicing their opinion more vocally and more frequently.

</comment><comment><USER20> Maybe it's just me, but I all I see is the strong parallels of "Scientism" in HN.

</comment><comment><USER21> This is an article on the limitations of science, but it contains no science. Isn't that interesting?

For example the author concedes, in the first half of one paragraph, the existence of "genuinely scientific" evolutionary psychology. Then he spends the second half on the abundance of unserious -- not just philosophically unserious, but _scientifically_ unserious -- material in the same field. And that's all he has to say about the actual content of evolutionary psychology.

But good science speaks for itself:

"""The left side of the [neanderthal] skull had a large dent, apparently from a ferocious blow, and the rib cage -- also on the left side -- had the head of a spear lodged in it.... [He] had died roughly 50,000 years ago, the earliest known homicide victim. His killer, judging from the damage to the skull and rib cage, bore the lethal weapon in his right hand.

The fossil record of injuries to bones reveals two strikingly common patterns (Jurmain et al, 2009; Trinkaus & Zimmerman, 1982; Walker, 1995). First, the skeletons of men contain far more fractures and dents than do the skeletons of women. Second, the injuries are located mainly on the left frontal sides of the skulls and skeletons, suggesting right-handed attackers. The bone record alone cannot tell us with certainty that combat among men was a central feature of human ancestral life. Nor can it tell us with certainty that men evolved to be the more physically aggressive sex..."""

...and even if they could, our ancestors habits offer limited guidance on how we should act today. Stabbing people with pointed sticks is now frowned upon. Do we need to be told this by a tenured philosophy professor?

But note how much clearer the prospects and limits of science become when you know something about what it has already told us in the here and now. When your knowledge is limited, all you can talk about is the limits of knowledge.

</comment><comment><USER22> Strangest part:

>What is the nature of reality? Where did all this come from? Did the universe need a creator? ... Traditionally these are questions for philosophy, but philosophy is dead. Philosophy has not kept up with modern developments in science, particularly physics. Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge.

>Though physicists might once have been dismissive of metaphysics as mere speculation, they would also have characterized such questions as inherently speculative and so beyond their own realm of expertise. The claims of Hawking and Mlodinow, and many other writers, thus represent a striking departure from the traditional view.

It's weird that the author takes a non-scientific introduction to a pop- science book that is aimed to appeal to the layman's understanding of the world, and makes it out that Hawking and Mlodinow are departing from traditional views in their science.

</comment><comment><USER23> the magazine itself looks great - never seen it before. there's a nice article on ray bradbury at [http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-dark-and- star...](http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-dark-and-starry-eyes- of-ray-bradbury)

and it's currently half price for subscriptions and only $10 delivery international. i just signed up for two years :o) thanks for posting this.

<comment><USER24> I wish more journals would follow this example. This is a really smart way to widen the reach of their ideas.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I must admit, I haven't read the entire article, but he puts many of my own sentiments into words better than I could myself.

</comment><comment><USER11> _"Likewise, many cosmologists have articulated various forms of what is known as the "anthropic principle" — that is, the observation that the basic laws of the universe seem to be "fine-tuned" in such a way as to be favorable to life, including human life."_

Simple answers to this: (a) we have far too few examples of life (on a galactic scale) to gauge the actual "Goldilock" range for life suitability, and (b) we have a documented tendency to assume agency even in its manifest absence, which renders all such anthropomorphic impressions highly suspect.

 _"In that case, we are still left without ultimate explanations as to why that universe exists or has the characteristics it does."_

Begs the question of whether "why" even matters at such a scale. Like the "then what created god?" question, the chain must either stop somewhere or recede infinitely to a "bad question" asymptote.

 _"For a complete evolutionary account of a phenomenon, it is not enough to construct a story about how the trait might have evolved in response to a given selection pressure; rather, one must provide some sort of evidence that it really did so evolve."_

Apply that same criteria to all other _non_ -evolutionary explanations, then come back with their relative measures of predictive value. Who wins that tournament of efficacy?

 _"For comparison, we know a quite a lot about the physiology of digestion, and we are able to describe in great detail the physiological differences between the digestive system of a person who is starving and that of a person who has just eaten a satisfying and nutritionally balanced meal. But this knowledge contributes little to solving world hunger."_

The discovery and implementation of a system that makes hunger more objective, for example, would help address work hunger by freeing up overeaten food for those in greater need. Unimpressed.

 _"Harris seems to think that free will is an illusion but also that our decisions are really driven by thoughts that arise unbidden in our brains. He does not explain the origin of these thoughts nor how their origin relates to moral choices."_

What about the receipt of controlling, "unexplained" "unbidden thoughts" contracts a _dis_ belief in free will? The claim that Harris leaves them "unexplained" or unrelated to moral choices speaks more to the author's ignorance of Harris's work than anything else.

 _"This view [emphasizing the impact of genes and circumstance on the frequency of "moral behavior"] undermines the possibility of happiness and moral behavior for those who are dealt a bad hand, and so does more to degrade than uplift at the individual level."_

Try telling that to had their "moral" capacity demonstrably inhibited by damage to their frontal lobes.

Any hope of addressing such organic damage to impulse control lies in the advancement of neuroscience, which might provide an actual _fix_.

The alternative equates to expecting a computer user to search online for their own answer as to why their Internet connection is down.

 _"Continued insistence on the universal competence of science will serve only to undermine the credibility of science as a whole. The ultimate outcome will be an increase of radical skepticism that questions the ability of science to address even the questions legitimately within its sphere of competence."_

A straw-man, then begging the question. Given how much we know of the foibles of human cognition, perception, and recollection, the responsibility for taking something out of the sphere of science lies with those who would attempt the removal. Best of luck doing so without hard data, i.e. science, though.

tl;dr: a biologist reaches far outside her area of experience (and into, e.g., neuroscience) in order to try and fault the scientists actually in those fields for finding scientific answers to once-philosophical questions in their own fields. That, and the author's ultimate position boils down to an argument from consequence.

</comment><comment><USER26> I'd be interested to know if anyone actually holds to the ideas mocked as 'Scientisim', or if it's just another example of a strawman in the 'Darwinist' mold.</comment>


Obama orders intelligence chief accused of lying to Congress to lead NSA review - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/12/4614968/president-obama-james-clapper-dni-surveillance-review-group

<comment><USER2> What a cowardly title. Clapper himself admitted to giving Congress the 'least untruthful' answer. He's an admitted liar, not an accused liar.

</comment><comment><USER3> At least he picked someone we can trust to tell the truth, I mean, he wouldn't lie twice, would he?</comment>


What the Swiss Franc Appreciation Means - <AUTHOR> https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/01/16/what-the-wild-swiss-franc-appreciation-really-means-currency-wars-federal-reserve/?utm_content=buffer0ea36&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer <comment><USER2> # It was expected

I think it was expected from the outset that this would be a temporary peg/floor. There has been recent hints on this.

# It's not a war

Also, this isn't a 'currency war' in anyway. If there is any adjustment that other countries typically dislike it's devaluations, since that'll make their currency relatively more expensive, causing a short-term disadvantage for exporters [whom often line politicians pockets]. This was the opposite, a revaluation (or correction).

Inconsistently people called this a 'currency war' when the floor was introduced too[1].

# Losses

Sure, a few companies were bankrupted because of risky speculation, that happens all the time. It was foolish to believe that this floor would exist indefinitely, and thus any position making that assumption would obviously be very risky.

Interestingly people lost money[2] when the floor was introduced only 3 years ago. Sometimes memory is short.

[1] [http://citywire.co.uk/money/have-swiss-won-currency-war- with...](http://citywire.co.uk/money/have-swiss-won-currency-war-with-shock- and-awe-franc-move/a521772)

[2] [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2037632/Kweku- Adobol...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2037632/Kweku-Adoboli- Swiss-bank-UBS-unaware-blew-whistle-HIMSELF.html)

<comment><USER3> My impression is that economists generally thought the Swiss central bank would keep the peg, because why wouldn't they? There's no economic law stopping them and it was obviously good for the Swiss economy.

The fear of central banks with large balance sheets is a powerful political force, one that economists don't really appreciate. The rational thing would be to keep the peg (or even better, target inflation or NGDP) but an unfortunate majority of politicians and voters are fearful of "printing money". Just as central banks around the world keep making the mistake of allowing falls in the inflation rate during a recession, economists keep making the mistake of assuming the next central bank will listen to them.

<comment><USER4> Keeping the peg means buying more and more euros. It's not sustainable.

<comment><USER5> It was. The Swiss central bank just had to print francs to sell for euros. It wasn't like the rest of the world didn't want those francs. Remember that this floor was about keeping the franc down.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "To put the Swiss franc move in perspective, in the currency cross rates for free-floating major foreign exchange currencies — like the Swiss franc or the U.S. dollar, the euro or the British pound sterling — a 2 or 3 percent move would be considered big. A 20 percent move is outlandish, a freak black swan event without precedent."

It's not a black swan event if it was predicted, widely, well in advance. Smart, reasonable people declared the policy unsustainable from day one. One good example being Mike Shedlock at globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com.

<comment><USER7> Genuine question then. If you had money to burn (I.e. gamble) where would be the smart place to put it over the short to medium term, and see a tidy return?

<comment><USER8> not somewhere someone in internet comments told you to put it

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Anyone who thinks the that the peg was unsustainable should remember a basic bit of supply of demand.

Assume the demand of Swiss francs is "x".

Assume the supply of Swiss francs is "y".

If the price of francs is higher than what Switzerland wants, then:

x = y + z

where z is the amount needed to match supply with demand.

In that circumstance, Switzerland can print z amount of francs -- that is entirely sustainable. And that is what it was doing for the last few years. Keeping the price stable is the same as saying that it was printing z amount of francs, so that y+z equalled x.

Anyone who says this was unsustainable is simply not thinking clearly.

<comment><USER10> No it's not that simple. Since Switzerland was fixating 1EUR = 1.2CHF there was a new problem arising when the US dollar went up: Arbitrage. People could exchange USD into EUR and then into CHF (source: Official statement of the Swiss central bank). The result: The Swiss Franc was pegged to the USD as well. Now that's some serious pressure, and that's why the Swiss central bank decided to give up on this unsustainable endeavour. And your calculation is nice and dandy, but if z grows too large then you get a massive inflation which is very damaging.

<comment><USER9> About this:

"if z grows too large then you get a massive inflation which is very damaging"

No! No! No! I am surprised there are so many people on Hacker News who are bad at math. You can not get inflation unless:

x < y + z

but what I wrote was:

x = y + z

you can not get inflation while that is true. Remember, you face deflationary pressure for as long as:

x > y + z

and that is what Switzerland was fighting. Not inflation, but deflation.

<comment><USER10> You are mixing two concepts. One is the "outside" value of the currency, that is, for how much foreign currency you can exchange it for. The other is the value inside the country. For example, the Swiss frank may appear 20% stronger but croissants in Switzerland still cost exactly the same. If you just print money you will get an inflation inside the country and the prices will go up.

<comment><USER9> About this:

"You are mixing two concepts."

You have no idea what you are talking about. This creates deflationary pressure:

x > y + z

So long as x is greater than y plus z, then it is cheaper for the Swiss to import their croissants from Italy or Germany or Austria, or anywhere else. And also their microtechnology, hitech, biotechnology and pharmaceutical goods. That is why every article written about this so far says that dropping the peg is bad for Swiss industry, and therefore bad for the Swiss economy. So long as this is true:

x > y + z

then it is easier for the Swiss to import things, because everything outside of Switzerland appears to be cheaper. And that, of course, puts downward pressure on prices from domestic producers as well. Thus, the pressure is deflationary, not inflationary -- the problem is that prices will fall, not that prices will rise.

<comment><USER10> Inflation is measured with the price of a basket of goods. Inflation is not measured in terms of the CHF-EUR exchange rate. If you keep your equation x = y + z then yes there will not be an inflation in terms of EUR but the basket can (and will!) still be subject to inflation. Because the EUR is not equal to basket of goods. Nobody is going to import croissants because then they'd be days old and taste like shit.

<comment><USER9> You really have no idea what you are talking about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Paul Krugman's take: [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/16/opinion/paul-krugman- franc...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/16/opinion/paul-krugman-francs-fear- and-folly.html)

</comment><comment><USER12> Someone: can you explain why Swiss National Bank could not sustain keeping the value if Frank low against Euro? It seems like the only thing they need to do is to purchase more Euros with Francs they print, right?

I usually see the opposite, where the country, like Russia for example, is unable to keep its currency high, because they don't have enough foreign currency reserves to buy their own national currency.

<comment><USER13> Seigniorage, the ability of an institution to print a worthless piece of paper that other people believe is worth something, is a very valuable power, one which is earned over decades, even centuries, of prudent policy. You don't want to mess with this by printing billions, at the risk of destroying your reputation (resulting in inflation, and/or speculation against your currency, as others have pointed out).

More prosaically, also, every time the SNB prints a swiss franc, that piece of paper is marked as a liability on its balance sheet (and the corresponding euro amount purchased is the asset). So they optically "lose money" if their assets decline in value versus their liabilities, as happened last week. Of course, they could then print more CHF to cover the loss, but then we're back to my first point.

Finally, and as an aside, the biggest loser in this whole thing was of course the SNB itself, at least on paper. It has CHF liabilities and foreign currency (and gold) assets to the tune of 500bn dollars. On paper then that was a 75bn USD loss. Conversely, and this is worth keeping in mind amidst the frenzy of headlines about broker losses, remember that markets must net off, so all those swiss francs that the SNB sold to defend against appreciation, were held by the market (individuals, brokers, funds, corporates, other governments). Thus it is likely that there are some huge winners out there, whose net wins are greater than the net losses to the tune of about 200bn * 15% (the amount that they intervened in the past 2 years * the percentage move).

<comment><USER14> Just trying to understand why when the SNB prints CHF it becomes a liability. Is it because whoever they sell it to (in return for some asset such as Euros) can at least in theory redeem the CHF as gold?

<comment><USER13> Like any liability of any entity, when you possess a swiss franc, you have a claim against the assets of the SNB. The assets of the SNB include a lot of gold and many foreign currencies. These assets have been accumulated in various ways, but are generally the foreign assets of the country in question (held on behalf of the people of the country by their central bank), plus the accumulated profits of the central bank over the years on this capital. Crucially however, just like "goodwill" in a company balance sheet (often a much larger ledger entry than any tangible assets), there is a large proportion of the value of the issuer's paper (be it equity or in this case, money) that is made up of intangible assets. Those intangibles essentially amount to the credibility of the entity, that is, the fact that _other people_ believe that the piece of paper that it issues has value. Thus you have a claim against some of their assets, yes, but you're also hoping, just like with equity, that the value of the goodwill stays high (similarly for GOOG, AAPL or FB or any other company). The value of the goodwill is determined by the strategy and actions of the entity being seen as sound, and ultimately profitable, by the market.

Long story short, I don't personally know of any central banks who explicitly promise gold back against their liabilities anymore (this disappeared at Bretton Woods). Thus your claim is (mostly) on the credibility (goodwill) of the bank which is highly dependent on it not issuing too much paper.

As far as your claim on the tangible assets is concerned (the foreign currencies and gold), you will not be able to walk into the SNB with a 100CHF note and ask for the tangible share of what that represents. In practise, if the CHF loses value, the SNB will (amongst other measures such as raising interest rates and trying to put pressure on its government to spend less), protect your 100 CHF by selling its foreign currencies and gold into the market, "defending" your asset. That's how your claim on the tangibles works out in practise: the assets are paid back out to the market if there is pressure on the currency. Of course, again, only a small portion of the value of the CHF will be backed by gold and FX. The rest of the value comes from the fact that it is accepted by merchants and people in exchange for real goods and services. That's goodwill, otherwise known as "credibility" in monetary economics.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I wont call the Swiss decision a currency war. Swiss decided for itself, that it wanted to float the Franc again.

But we had a currency war at 16th December 2014 when Rubel dropped by nearly 40% on one day, and went up again next day. This was a currency war against Russia that failed. Russia had to push about US$100 billion on the market at that day, to win this currency war. The other side therefor was likely also a state owned player.

<comment><USER16> It was most likely investors pulling out even more money from Russia and Russians buying foreign currency.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> No problem if ths swiss bank had continued printing francs. E1, E2, E3 and so on in USA make clear the hyperinflation risk doesnot exist in this case. But there will be much harm in swiss companies. Exports in Swisszerland means 70% of GDP. And much harm in Poland and other countries with households buying their homes n swiss franck. So, problemes for their financial systems.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is funny:

> Central banks are political entities which exist at the behest of > government. And as such, they will always need to be mindful of politics if > they are to maintain political favor and to keep their independence.

So, to remain independent they need to be dependent of politics.

</comment><comment><USER19> Good news for ski racers - FIS prizing just got significantly more valuable.

</comment><comment><USER20> Finally, news about financial markets from a source that knows what it's talking about.</comment>


Looking Forward to 2018 - <AUTHOR> https://letsencrypt.org/2017/12/07/looking-forward-to-2018.html <comment><USER2> I was sortof hoping for LetsEncrypt to offer S/MIME</comment>


11+ Years of Kickstarter: MySpace widgets, missing vowels, & scrapped designs - <AUTHOR> http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/happy-3rd-birthday-kickstarter?ref=hn

<comment><USER2> Finally a story that doesn't repeat the notion of "if you havent executed upon your idea in two years, you should think of something else".

<comment><USER3> Agree, but they were also _very_ lucky that some other team didn't come up with the idea and executed during that time.

<comment><USER4> As I understood it IndieGoGo launched before Kickstarter. I think the luck lands more in the realm of positive press early on - something IndieGoGo didn't get the same amount of. And honestly - that has to do with (IMO) the polish Kickstarter had to it when it launched.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> We're all familiar with the difference between idea and execution. But I'm really impressed by Kickstarter's understanding that they don't have a monopoly on either:

"the idea is one thing, and kickstarter is another. kickstarter is the manifestation of the idea in one way, by one set of people. but the idea will outlive kickstarter. people will be funding and building community around their projects, on the web, in this general way, for a long long time."

It reminds me of a piece I recently read - and for the life of me can't find again - that talks about the difference between starting with a product and moving up the abstraction path and starting with an idea and moving down that path, getting more and more specific until you find the product that is a manifestation of your vision.

</comment><comment><USER6> I can't believe it took them 11+ years. It felt like a recent startup.

<comment><USER7> I can totally believe it- it's just that we're repeatedly sold stories about startups that get hockey stick growth two days after launch.

I remember seeing an interview with the founder of Pinterest, who was slightly annoyed at the coverage they'd been getting- they had been working on it since 2008, but everyone was talking about it as if it had just launched.

<comment><USER8> If you dig into Crunchbase, it seems like a common theme is _at least_ two years from inception to explosion.</comment></comment></comment>


I've Just Launched "Pwned Passwords" V2 - <AUTHOR> https://www.troyhunt.com/ive-just-launched-pwned-passwords-version-2/ <comment><USER2> Dated 22 February 2018. Discussion from 2 years ago [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16432344](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16432344)</comment>


Ask HN: How can startups based in India get a US merchant account? - <AUTHOR>

Indian banking laws don't allow for recurring billing of credit cards. This can become a hassle for our customers. We would like to use a US merchant account and gateway to work around this. What are our options? <comment><USER2> How about using google checkout or amazon payments. Both of them allow for recurring payments afaik.

<comment><AUTHOR> From what I have been able to make out, both these services are not available in India.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> How about 2checkout?</comment>


Abstract of the NTSB Report on Air Canada flight 759's taxiway overflight at SFO [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://ntsb.gov/news/events/Documents/DCA17IA148-Abstract.pdf <comment><USER2> The report identifies good preventive measures. Autotuning the ILS would be handy, as would an aural alert for lateral deviation, perhaps announcing, "Localizer, Localizer."

The crew may have caught the closure of 28L and planned better with a review of NOTAMS before top of descent and including them in the approach briefing.

When I'm up there, and sleepy, I ask for a coffee and pull out the NOTAMS for one last look before we pull up the approach in the computer, manually set up the radios, and do the briefing.

On final approach, more precise ground based monitoring would be nice to have in case things are fubar in the plane.

<comment><USER3> Just for SFO you have 84 NOTAMs.

!SFO 06/079 SFO OBST RIG (ASN 2017-AWP-3368-NRA) 373740N1222224W (0.5NM NE SFO) 41FT (34FT AGL) FLAGGED AND LGTD 1806201400-1811010100

This is a flagged and lighted obstruction half a mile way that is 34 feet above ground level.

Now put in a full route and takeoff airport and maybe if you have had some stops during the day. The NOTAM seems a bit long. Then if are overseas and have to deal with the BS political notams. Check out greece and turkey notams.

...THE REF (B) TURKISH NOTAM A3009/16 LTAAYNYX (111139 EUECYIYN JUL 2016) HAS NO GROUND, CANNOT PRODUCE ANY INTERNATIONALLY LEGAL EFFECT WITHIN ATHINAI FIR/ HELLAS UIR AND IS CONSIDERED NULL AND VOID.

I'm curious how many pilots fully read all NOTAMs, locate them geographically to understand where they are etc etc on every flight.

<comment><USER4> Outputting that in lower case could be a small step to making them easier to parse, and therefore more likely to be read. I find the text you posted tiring even to look at.

THE REF (B) TURKISH NOTAM A3009/16 LTAAYNYX (111139 EUECYIYN JUL 2016) HAS NO GROUND, CANNOT PRODUCE ANY INTERNATIONALLY LEGAL EFFECT WITHIN ATHINAI FIR/ HELLAS UIR AND IS CONSIDERED NULL AND VOID.

vs

The ref (B) Turkish NOTAM A3009/16 LTAAYNYX (111139 Euecyiyn Jul 2016) has no ground, cannot produce any internationally legal effect within Athinai FIR/Hellas UIR and is considered null and void.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, good luck with changing hundreds of established, life-or-death-systems, most of them actually embedded in planes in the airline industry worldwide, at the same cutover date, to suddenly support mixed-case script.

Have a one-hour watch to understand what kind of beast you are wrestling here: [https://media.ccc.de/v/31c3_-_6308_-_en_- _saal_1_-_201412281...](https://media.ccc.de/v/31c3_-_6308_-_en_- _saal_1_-_201412281245_-_beyond_pnr_exploring_airline_systems_-_saper)

<comment><USER6>
      good luck with changing hundreds of established,
      life-or-death-systems, most of them actually
      embedded in planes

Seems to me that's precisely the sort of thing the NTSB _is_ supposed to be able to do?

Of course IMHO a mere change of case doesn't go far enough.

<comment><USER5> You do realize that US planes still have to be able to fly to countries other than the US, and vice versa, right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> As a private pilot, small planes going down occasionally are just a fact of life. But this incident scares me. There were four planes lined up on the taxiway the Air Canada narrowly missed. The worst aviation accident ever was a collision of two 747s resulting in 583 deaths: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster) \- this could have doubled that number.

<comment><USER8> Is it plausible that that AC759 could have taken out all 4 other planes? I don't really have a sense of the distances planes are spaced out on taxiways at major airports.

<comment><USER5> Spacing between planes on a taxiway is a lot shorter than you would imagine. Depending on type, a 25-50 meters apart is common.

Keep in mind that these four planes were preparing for take-off, meaning that they were fully fuelled...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I've been anticipating the release of this report this since I heard about the incident.

I work on an avionics product that's designed to prevent this exact scenario. We use the aircraft's position along with a database of runways and taxiways to determine if the aircraft is approaching the runway the pilot intends. If we determine the aircraft is landing, we issue a visual and aural alert to the pilot ("TAXIWAY LANDING" or "NOT A RUNWAY").

<comment><USER10> How do you account for winds and pressure differences, both of which will modify an approach. A plane may look like it is landing short, or to the left/right, when in fact the pilot is anticipating a change in wind as they drop in altitude.

<comment><USER9> Good question. We've run into similar issues while developing a related feature that helps pilots perform a stable approach. Sometimes pilots were performing a circling approach to a different runway, and a naive approach to determining lateral deviations would have caused a nuisance alert.

For this particular system, the alerting threshold is only met when we've determined that the aircraft is "landing". As I mentioned in another comment, I'm vague about this point because it depends on the way the aircraft manufacturer has configured this state machine. Sometimes we use throttle position, altitude, speed above Vref, gear position, height above threshold, etc. You're correct that conditions can slightly modify an approach, but we're confident that we can nail down "we're landing" closely enough to mostly eliminate nuisance alerts.

<comment><USER8> What's your market? Light aircraft? airliners?

<comment><USER9> Our market right now is general aviation and business jets. I believe our biggest customer is the Cessna Citation Longitude (max takeoff ~40,000lbs). I noticed the NTSB abstract had some recommendations for inclusion and certification of a system on a broader range of aircraft. Larger aircraft are required to have similar safety-related systems such as terrain, reactive windshear, etc so this could be the next step.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is what is called a 'cascade of failures' in aviation - and the term is used elsewhere. Multiple failures resulting in a catastrophic failure. In your own life and goings about, it's sometimes interesting to do a failure analysis and you'll often find you experienced a cascade.

It's really unfortunate that the cockpit voice recorder was overwritten. I'm guessing they're using very old technology where storage space is at a premium.

They're still using the flashing X on closed runways - e.g. at SEATAC right now. The lights looked incandescent a couple nights ago while passing the X. So not very bright or visible.

This accident would probably have been one of the worst in history. Multiple passenger planes on the taxiway taken out by a passenger jet.

</comment><comment><USER12> If anyone would like to listen to the ATC radio: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW- ETmZU0u8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW-ETmZU0u8)

<comment><USER13> OMG that is just pure gold! The United guy is SOOOO laconic. Like him speaking up on the open freq saved hundreds of lives and he sounds like he's reading yesterday's corn future prices.

<comment><USER14> Reminds me of the BA Flight 9 announcement:

> Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We have a small > problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get > them going again. I trust you are not in too much distress.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm surprised that remote video cameras aren't used by tower controllers.

The perspective of the control tower makes it difficult to catch issues like this, but a simple video camera aligned with the center-line of each runway would allow controllers to more easily verify that planes are lined up as well as other possible issues like gear down & locked, etc.

<comment><USER16> > I'm surprised that remote video cameras aren't used by tower controllers.

I'm surprised that forward-looking infrared cameras aren't more commonly used in civilian aircraft, especially given the availability of staring arrays with decent resolution/framerate that don't require cooling.

Even without the requisite certification for use as a for-realsies landing aid, it's nevertheless a useful tool to get situational awareness in inclement weather / at night.

<comment><USER17> They are more commonly found aboard 'experimental' aircraft because of the certification issues you pointed out.

<comment><USER18> And high-performance infrared cameras are also probably one of those things that end up on arms control lists. (Since it's not just useful for spotting planes on your "runway", but also for spotting tanks or people on your hill requesting an ordnance delivery)

<comment><USER19> I have several of these emails (when ordering to Australia):

Hello,

Your recent SparkFun order contains 1x KIT-13233: FLiR Dev Kit. This item is export controlled by the United States government. By law, we are required to gather the following information from you as the importer:

1) Do you intend to sell or send this item to anyone in any of the following countries: Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, or Syria?

2) Will this be used in any military applications?

3) Will you be the ultimate end user of this item? If no, please go to 3.a.

3.a) If you are not the end user, who will this item be sold or transferred to? Please include full name, physical address, end use and confirmation that they will not sell or transfer this item to any party in Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan or Syria.

4) What is the end use of this item?

5) Where is the location where the item will be used?

Response to all five questions is necessary before we are able to ship your order. If we don't hear back from you within one week, your order will need to be canceled.Please let me know if you have any questions. I hope you have a great day!

<comment> semi-extrinsic I've had this exact one for all sorts of kit. Digital pressure regulators, optics alignment hardware, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I'm not operationally familiar with SFO. But based on experience at other airports, a taxiway at night can be a sea of black at even 100' above the ground. I would probably see airplane navigation lights at some point, but would I bet my life on it? No. So this incident has to be taken seriously.

However, I'm still not clear from this reporting how the crew mistook blue taxiway lighting for white runway lighting. This isn't supposed to be subtle, and I haven't ever experienced it to be subtle.

Edit: OK there is a partial explanation here that appears as though at the time they committed to taxiway C as runway 28R, the visual cue they relied on was airplane lighting looking like it was runway lighting. Airplane taxi and takeoff/landing lights are white, navigational lights are green or red. Strobes usually aren't on while on the ground or at least probably shouldn't be.

It's an interesting dilemma. And fatigue is a significant contributing factor as well.

<comment><USER21> I don't understand it either.

Here in Seattle, SeaTac airport has a parallel taxiway (Taxiway Tango) with a long history of being mistaken for a runway. The list of things tried so far to resolve the issue is interesting:

[https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2015/12/31/tango- ta...](https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2015/12/31/tango-taxiway-a- history-of-mistaken-landings-and.html)

<comment><USER22> The very first thing I thought of upon reading your comment "The list of things tried so far to resolve the issue..." was "What about a big lighted 'x'?" then I clicked the link.

<comment><USER23> I'd like to know why they removed it.

<comment><USER24> Exactly my question. It's 9000+ feet long. Put a lighted red X on it every 1000 feet. Or, maybe Xes aren't the answer, but there must be _some_ technique to produce a startling visual warning.

It's probably a situation like Chesterton's fence. There are probably good reasons for not having the Xes. At least I hope so, I hope it's not just "that costs money and then we have to maintain it". The money can't be an issue. How much would 500 or 1000 deaths cost? How expensive are all the other proposals which have been mentioned? Those aren't cheap either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> "The cues available to the flight crew to indicate that the airplane was aligned with a taxiway did not overcome the crew's belief, as a result of expectation bias, that the taxiway was the intended landing runway."

Damn. It didn't matter that the whole world was telling him it was a taxiway because he was so sure it was a runway.

</comment><comment><USER26> Gotta hand it to the NTSB - they are thorough. This is just the abstract.

<comment><USER27> Also that they cite fatigue / circadian low as one of the core causes. I thought they might avoid it because of the potential cost implications for the airline industry.

<comment><USER28> Worth noting that the Canadian regulations are looser than USA in that respect - the Air Canada pilots were in compliance with home regs, but would have been in breach of FAA regs.

Other point is that the NTSB isn't generally particularly shy about calling out the need for expensive changes (one example being their recommendation for fuel tank inerting systems after TWA 800). They have no power to mandate their recommendations be implemented after all: that's the job of the FAA.

<comment><USER29> Why does a plane in US airspace not follow FAA regs?

<comment><USER28> Well, it does pretty much, just not that bit (14 CFR 117). In this Air Canada case it's governed by 14 CFR part 129, which covers operations by foreign air carriers in the USA.

[https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-2011-title14-vol3/xml/CFR-...](https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CFR-2011-title14-vol3/xml/CFR-2011-title14-vol3-part129.xml#seqnum129.15)

EDIT - removed erroneous reference to 14 CFR 121.480-> which applies to cargo ops.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> > Cockpit voice recorder (CVR) information was not available for this incident > because the data were overwritten before senior Air Canada officials became > aware of the severity of this incident.

How long are recordings normally kept? I would assume at least a few days for mundane flights (storage is cheap, isn't it?) but any sort of incident similar to this I would assume they keep recordings for much longer, if only for internal purposes.

<comment><USER31> The tower recordings are posted above.

>(storage is cheap, isn't it?)

Not on ancient planes where everything needs a billion certifications from all sorts of regulatory bodies.

<comment><USER32> There's other issues at play. Pilots hate the idea of more monitoring of the cockpit, and have been vocal in trying to prevent e.g. a video recording of the cockpit being part of the "black box", even though it would have helped to shed light on a lot of aviation incidents[1].

1\. [https://www.wired.com/2014/07/malaysia-370-cockpit- camera/](https://www.wired.com/2014/07/malaysia-370-cockpit-camera/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Speaking with a fair level of ignorance, how hard would it be for some onboard computer to be freaking out that a landing attempt is being made way off course of a known runway?

Going to guess this is one of those things where, yes, we have all the requisite technology, but practical implementation is the hard part.

<comment><USER9> I get excited seeing stories about aviation on HN because it's something I work on every day. I've written a few comments above but I'm developer on the system you described (and more) being used in aircraft today.

With a GPS and onboard databases of runways and taxiways, we can determine if a pilot is attempting to take off or land on a taxiway. The key is preventing nuisance alerts when the pilot is just flying around and happens to be aligned with a runway. The "11 secret herbs and spices" depend on the aircraft but are usually speed and configuration (ie landing gear) based. Approaches are fairly predictable and we can use that to sequence through a state machine that tells us the pilot intends to land.

Here's a video of the system on a G1000 (meant for smaller planes) skip to 0:45ish [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2bswm0w4cY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2bswm0w4cY)

<comment><USER33> Thank you for sharing. Really cool to see just how much real-time GIS there is in aviation these days.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> As per [https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press- releases/Pages/NR20180925b.a...](https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press- releases/Pages/NR20180925b.aspx):

>The full report will be available on the NTSB website in several weeks.

</comment><comment><USER8> Are there any reports from passengers on the taxiway planes? I'd have to imagine an A320 flying 60' over your roof would cause a fairly large disturbance.

</comment><comment><USER34> It's kind of baffling to me that there's a system for detecting collisions with other airplanes in the sky (TCAS) and a system for detecting collisions with the ground (EGPWS) but not system for detecting collisions with other airplanes on the ground. This easily could have killed a thousand people.

<comment><USER35> Different problems, no? Trying to pick out an airplane against the ground is different from detecting an object in the air, which doesn't generally reflect radio back, and detecting the ground, which does reflect. The problem you're describing requires you to differentiate between two things that both reflect signals back to you. It's obviously do-able since the military does it all the time for targeting. However, I doubt it's cheap and there might be cheaper ways to do it that don't leverage the two systems you've mentioned.

<comment><USER36> TCAS uses active transponders, not radar reflection. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_sy...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision_avoidance_system#System_description)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> CVR overwrite is bad news here. The crew knew this was a serious problem when it happened, there's no way they should have allowed the CVR, crucial evidence of exactly what happened, to be overwritten.

Perhaps the full report will have more detail on this, as it stands I have to believe somebody made the decision to overwrite this because they thought it'd be better if it didn't exist. Whether that's the crew, their bosses or other staff, somebody managed to go from "serious incident, preserve evidence" to "maximum ass covering" and that person or persons are an obstacle to effective investigation and thus to safe air travel.

<comment><USER38> They actually do clearly state in this PDF that a degree of fault lies in the crew being compromised by fatigue. Operating for 19 hours straight definitely places an individual in an area where one can be fighting to pay strict attention, even when it really counts.

There's also plenty of communication with Air Traffic Control in the tower, and not a whole lot of gaps to introduce significant mystery, so it's pretty unlikely that there would be anything earth shattering on the cockpit voice recorder.

<comment><USER37> What I'd expect the CVR to provide good evidence of is the extent to which crew were actually doing the checks that should have caught this error, and their reaction when they belatedly discovered their true position.

Without even trying to mislead investigators a human will report a sanitised version of events when not cued by facts. "Then I scratched my arse and sniffed my finger" is not going to appear in this sanitised version of events even if true. Neither is "I glanced at the panel, I know I'm supposed to scan it, but usually anything important flashes red". The tower log helps, CVR is better, and CCTV better again.

It also really helps to get into the routine of analysing this stuff. If your aircrew routinely skip steps 4, 18 and 23 from the checklist, only finding that out when 200 passengers die in a crash is stupid. Let's find out now. That needs lots of heavy lifting, pilots have to trust the airlines not to fire them for ordinary human frailties, and airlines have to accept that their pilots are human and "But the manual says not to do that" doesn't make it stop happening magically.

You're right that fatigue is an obvious element here, and there are several technical countermeasures mentioned. I definitely don't want to come across as believing in a conspiracy to hide the facts, but on the other hand I struggle to believe that it took over 30 minutes to get this thing back down after the incident and so the overwrite was not a decision. And if we agree it was a decision, it was a seriously bad one that should not be repeated.

<comment><USER38>
      I struggle to believe that it took
      over 30 minutes to get this thing
      back down after the incident

If your inferring that a 30 minute offset was introduced, in order to dump the stale audio buffer, before permitting access to the CVR instrument on the ground, I'd offer the idea that there were 4 other planes on the taxiway, waiting to take off, and that the intervening 30 minutes could be eaten up by letting those planes depart, based on an array of other factors.

A concerted effort to dump the recorder buffer would require the participation of more than just the flight crew, since it manipulates the standing traffic pattern. Not an impossibility, and we know that in-group "walls of silence" definitely accumulate in high-intensity industries, but the air traffic control audio suggests a really minor transgression of situational awareness, even if the circumstances are assuredly unforgiving ones.

In the radio audio, the pilot clearly states that he's noticing lights on what he imagines to be his runway, and asks for confirmation as to what they might be. The tower reaffirms that he's all clear. Only then does a pilot from one of the planes on the ground speak up, and complain.

At that moment, both ATC and the plane realize the error. It's arguable that the pilot anticipated a likely go-around, based on intuition that the lights he was observing were definitely other planes, and that what appears to be an extremely close call proves it's own margin of error as reasonable, given that the participants recovered from the error.

<comment><USER37> No, I'm _implying_ that I don't believe it took 30 minutes to get down. Based on the abstract I would say you're going to find out it came back down in under 30 minutes, and then "oops" they let the CVR be re-used, overwriting the recording anyway.

The text from the linked abstract says: "Cockpit voice recorder (CVR) information was not available for this incident because the data were overwritten before senior Air Canada officials became aware of the severity of this incident"

One of the nice things about working in the Web PKI is that this crap doesn't get you anywhere since keeping records is one of the requirements, and any time the options are "This issuer might be crooked or they might be incompetent" both are disqualifiying anyway, no need to figure out which it is to make a determination.

It lets me sleep easier, were people at Symantec reckless, or were they so greedy that they actively tolerated fraud? Don't care, not my problem now, let their shareholders worry about it.

<comment><USER38> Oh, I don't know about these particular ideas you're chasing. There are quite a number of independent, redundant resources that would be very difficult to align forgeries across and present as fraudulent data, worldwide, for weeks, months, and even years after the incident.

It just sounds like a fishing expedition for some kind of cover up that exploits an incredibly narrow gap, covered by a myriad of alternative information sources that are more than capable of sealing up an air tight sequence of events by other means.

Open, consumer information sources like flightaware.com alone had the answer to the questions you're asking, long ago.

The radar history for this event was paywalled here for days after the event:

[https://flightaware.com/live/flight/ACA759/history](https://flightaware.com/live/flight/ACA759/history)

The open, freebie log only gives like two weeks of charts, but the data you mention was lying around, available for like 8 months, to anyone with premium access to that particular service. And anyway, I'm sure it's just a convenience wrapper to public data that's still floating around to anyone willing to dig.

Here's another service, if you've got $500 bucks, and _really_ would like to know right now:

[https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ac759/](https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ac759/)

And to reiterate, this is only costing money today on account of being late to the party.

Multiple systems surfaced this data to the world in real time, and openly back-logged for months after. I'd bet good money a wide audience fact checked exactly what you've suggested a long time ago (even here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14741605](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14741605)). But my opinion isn't very important when the information is available in a general sense, to anyone who really wants it, even now, more than a year later. Feel free to be suspicious about these resources being far downstream and non-official consumer products, but if that doesn't suffice, then other (much, much bigger) doubts occlude any potentially satisfactory assessment which won't get solved in a random thread by amateur internet detectives like us.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


95-Degree Days: How Extreme Heat Could Spread Across the World - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/22/climate/95-degree-day-maps.html <comment><USER2> _In the United States, electricity use soars as temperatures rise and more households use air-conditioning more frequently. One recent study found that the United States' electric grid would have to handle a 7.2 percent increase in peak demand this century under a moderate warming scenario._

It would be wise to promote passive solar design. Relying on AC just burns more fuel and this makes global warming worse. It winds up being a vicious cycle and it isn't actually necessary.

We also need to support more pedestrian and bike options. There are lots of little things that can help. These tend to not get counted and when things don't get as bad as people expected, this news tends to get swept under the rug. But if you are really concerned about this, you can make some modest lifestyle changes to help curb this trend. If you live in a first world country, your modest efforts will generally count for more than you think because we tend to consume so much more than people in less developed countries.

Some years back when I was taking environmental law classes, one American consumed something like 200 times as much as someone from India. So cutting back a few percent as an American is potentially about like outright eliminating the impact of several people from a less developed country. Even very modest cut backs can be about like someone from a less developed country cutting their consumption in half.

<comment><USER3> The smart grid is being designed now to solve this. Increase efficiency, allow for renewables (wind and solar), and reduce transmission loss (averages 7% in USA), etc. Let's just hope we can properly secure it, the advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) has a very large attack surface and spans from homes, to distribution, transmission and ultimately all the back to power generation.

<comment><USER2> Passive solar is better than having a smart grid, and we can also do both. Using little or no electricity is more efficient than using green electricity.

I think we really need to push for passive solar design. It is the answer that allows for high quality of life and lowered use of electricity. Most other answers involve doing without. This does not.

<comment><USER4> Almost all examples I've seen of passive solar design assume that a new building is being built, and often use unconventional techniques and materials. I've seen a smattering of retrofit examples, but get the impression that they're pretty expensive relative to the results. Are there proven, economical approaches for existing buildings, especially those for which renovations are subject to building codes?

<comment><USER2> I don't have firsthand experience, but I know some techniques can be retrofit. Low hanging fruit includes landscaping to provide shade in summer and a wind break in winter. Here are a couple of articles found with a quick google that look pretty solid at first glance:

[http://www.motherearthnews.com/green-homes/passive-solar- hom...](http://www.motherearthnews.com/green-homes/passive-solar-home- zmaz80mazraw)

[https://www.homepower.com/articles/home-efficiency/design- co...](https://www.homepower.com/articles/home-efficiency/design- construction/passive-solar-retrofit)

<comment><USER5> Wind breaks suck for shoveling snow. They become perpetual snow drifts.

<comment><USER6> Use it where it makes sense, this isn't hard to plan out and think ahead. For example, you could landscape this way all over Seattle or Portland, and in most of Hood River, OR as the wind is only consistently strong in small areas in the winter.

Also, no reason you can't plant or prune existing trees/shrubbery such that they don't become a blocker for snow, we do it all the time out in Eastern Oregon. A little forethought goes a long way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> It is sometimes hard to tell with these types of very slowly developing changes if there is actually a worsening or not situation happening. It's like watching grass grow in real time and trying to see if it's length is _really_ changing. Is it really getting worse or is it an enormous "good old days" fallacy? Mixture of the two? Scientific evidence of course points to a very grim future of more dry, hot, barren, inhospitable land area...

In the UK, my parents had snow every year where they lived. Now snow in the same area is getting extremely rare, happening only twice in large-ish amounts over the past 10 to 15 years (source: i lived there too for over 20 years). Over my (rather) short time on Earth, i swear that we never used to get so many heatwaves as a child.

It feels like we all collectively killing our children (or if not them, then their children), but nobody can do anything about it. The future of Earth's climate is one of those things that really gets people down it seems from a very anecdotal view of the people around me. The helplessness of it all.

<comment><USER8> I think losing hope that we can't do anything against it is really dangerous.

I know we haven't been on the verge in _this_ way, but I do really believe that we can overcome this with human innovation. Even if it means having to pummel some rich, greedy folks first.

<comment><USER9> Oh make no mistake, speaking for myself, I think we absolutely can do something about global warming.

I just don't believe we will.

In fact I would bet a significant dollar amount that by 2035 or so we will have done nothing and we _might_ be debating risk mitigation strategies since, by then, the effects may finally be too profound to ignore (e.g. chunks of Miami Beach regularly under water).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Focusing global political will into action to address climate change is hard.

What is depressing is that even when local benefits are present, it is challenging to enact policy. Case in point: the folks over at Citylab periodically write about the loss of urban forests.

Here is an article from May'17: McMansions Are Killing L.A.'s Urban Forest. [https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/05/as-officials-push- for...](https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/05/as-officials-push-for- plantings-remodeled-homes-are-killing-las-trees/525069/)

Look at the attached map, even the liberal enclaves of Santa Monica, Venice, Manhattan Beach, BelAir, Hollywood Hills and Beverly Hills show tree cover loss.

Sad.

<comment><AUTHOR> We need a new ' _Manhattan project_ ' to find and enforce a solution. The best and brightest minds from all over the world in one place, focusing on this issue 24/7\. The situation cannot be underestimated anymore.

Realistically, we can't expect people to live peacefully in lands without food and water. This is going to kickstart the biggest migratory wave in history.

<comment><USER11> > We need a new 'Manhattan project' to find and enforce a solution.

No, we don't. Large-scale geoengineering proposals have already been made and they are like <$1B each. Many have been calculated to reduce global average temperature by multiple degrees for hundreds of years. It's completely ridiculous that everyone is still complaining about climate change. $1B is significantly less than the total cost spent worrying about these things so far, not to mention the cost of actual damage already incurred and predicted to occur.

EDIT: for starters, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_climate_engineering_to...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_climate_engineering_topics) and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_engineering#Proposed_s...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_engineering#Proposed_strategies)

<comment><USER12> If you're going to make _staggering, sweeping claims_ , it would be nice of you to do more than link two Wikipedia articles with a bunch of undifferentiated stuff in them. How about some detailed examples of why this is so not-a-big-deal? Show some work?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I saw it was 115 in Phoenix yesterday, like what? As a Canadian that does not even compute.

<comment><USER14> 115 in Phoenix at this time of year is not abnormal. Having grown up in southern Arizona 105 or 110 was not uncommon and really didn't deter us from going out, of course going out met going to a pool.

<comment><USER13> Yeah I didn't really have a larger point about this being due to climate change or anything. I realize that no one specific data point is ever evidence of climate change or lack thereof (unlike that senator who brought a snowball into Congress).

I could handle 115 in a pool... probably couldn't handle the walk to/from the vehicle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> In Greece we're expecting a heatwave in the following days that will reach up to 109 F. So 95 looks like Christmas.

<comment><USER16> I spent my younger days living in Las Vegas and adapted fairly quickly to the heat after moving there. However there was always three qualitative steps when it came to heat, when temperatures cross 100F (38C), when they cross 110F (43C), and when they cross 120F (49C).

Generally the temperatures stayed below 110 but it was pretty easy to know that the temperature was "over 100" or "under 100". Once the temperature got to 110 it started to feel oppressive. Out by Lake Mead where we would sail and play on the 'beaches'[1] when it occasionally crossed 120 it actually started feeling threatening. Even in the water I always felt "You must get out of this heat" when it was over 120. Sort of an existential threat to health and safety.

The interesting bit is the water carrying capacity of air when it is warmer. As global temperatures rise, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere goes up. If that turns into clouds in the stratosphere it continues to get hotter, if it turns into clouds in the troposphere it gets colder.

[1] We called them beaches but really its just the desert running into the water that is backed up behind Hoover dam.

<comment><USER17> Reminds me of an anecdote that I read about the admirable society of Dubai. Apparently, the law requires that once the officially measured temperature exceed 50C/122F, the slaves (or whatever the official term is) are given the day off from the construction sites.

Anyway, the officially measured temperature tends to never exceed 49C, even when anyone could measure with their own thermometer that it's really hotter.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> 95 degrees is really nice in Arizona and miserable in Oregon because of relative humidity.

</comment><comment><USER19> If humans really are causing climate change, nothing appreciable will be done until there is no choice - that's by and large how people operate unfortunately.

<comment><USER13> If by people you mean the 30-40% of any given population that will fight tooth and nail against anyone telling them what to do, I agree.

Not _everyone_ is opposed to climate change action. Those that are are loud and fight hard for power. We need to remember that. At one point it felt hopeless to take on the tobacco industry.

<comment><USER20> It's 30-40% of the population that opposes the token non-solutions that have been proposed by liberal governments. A lot more than that would oppose the drastic economic measures that would be necessary to really avert climate change.

<comment><USER21> Thing is, Greenpeace started to work on green development in the eighties, along with several leftist faculty and think tanks. Now, thirty odd years later, liberals have a nice thirty year head start and the solutions we know will work are optimized in accordance with liberal values, that is higher taxes and a better live for everybody. If you don't like that, well you solve problems with the solutions you have, not with the solutions you want.

<comment><USER20> > and the solutions _we know will work_ are optimized in accordance with > liberal values

We don't know what will work. Liberal solutions like the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Accords, probably won't: [https://www.ecowatch.com/james-hansen- climate-change-2030724...](https://www.ecowatch.com/james-hansen-climate- change-2030724330.html).

<comment><USER21> Yes, by itself these will not be enough. However, in Kyoto the international community agreed that there is a problem, in Paris the international community set (self imposed, not enough and non binding) targets for emissions. It will need several additional steps into the same direction to get a workable framework, and that will hopefully happen over the next decade. The (American) right will not like any of these steps, but they did not propose any alternative, it could have been possible to find market based solutions and respect national sovereignty more, or rely on the virtue of small communities etc., but these proposals were simply not developed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > _In the United States, some urban planners are already experimenting with > techniques like adding green spaces or increasing the reflectivity of > rooftops to cool down city centers during heat waves._

As usual, anything but suggesting people change their behavior to reduce global warming.

We want laws to force us to do things, but won't do them otherwise. Where is the call for us to change our behavior?

<comment><USER23> Because nobody wants to live like Appalachians when they can live like San Franciscans. One is clearly more comfortable.

<comment><USER24> Don't city dwellers in general consume less greenhouse gases due to improved density and efficiency?

<comment><USER23> The improved density and efficienty allows population that necessitates the use of factory farming, petrochemical based fertilizers, massive infrastructure, traffic congestion etc. Per individual the carbon footprint is smaller (until you get to the really rural poor), but overall the effect of this process is more consumption on net. It's just the way it is. If we really wanted to go green, we'd all be on mopeds and have one shirt.

<comment><USER24> You're making a Malthusian argument. Yes, if you were to kill the city dwellers, then net carbon release would be lower. Given the same amount of humans, however, distributed with rural or suburban densities, you face a dramatic increase in carbon release. Unless humans were to go back to pre- industrial populations, carbon release would be much higher.

I think that rural life is more enjoyable than urban life, but feelings don't change the facts.

So I'm not sure what you're advocating. It is almost as if you are changing the argument in order to feel as if you won.

<comment><USER23> I'm not advocating anything.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>