Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,807 Year: 3,064/9,624 Month: 909/1,588 Week: 92/223 Day: 3/17 Hour: 1/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Trump and Trump supporters keep using the Y2K Fallacy, and it is driving me crazy
vimesey
Member
Posts: 1398
From: Birmingham, England
Joined: 09-21-2011


(4)
Message 76 of 190 (886105)
05-06-2021 6:39 AM
Reply to: Message 75 by Tanypteryx
05-05-2021 7:55 PM


The right wing has a strong vested interest in, and a strong track record of seeking to undermine expert scientific, medical and economic opinion. For the most part, that opinion is heavily weighted against the privileged greed of the right wing's puppet masters (eg the clear economic evidence against any benefits (to the vast majority) of trickle down; the undeniable weight of scientific evidence for climate change and the looming disaster that presents). At every turn, complex but well evidenced expert opinion is attacked and denied, so that they can sell their simple carnie spiel to people who don't understand the evidence, and who are being (and have been) trained for a long time to dismiss experts as part of a non-existent global conspiracy.
Denying the existence of the y2k threat is just another example of that brainwashing agenda.

Could there be any greater conceit, than for someone to believe that the universe has to be simple enough for them to be able to understand it ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 75 by Tanypteryx, posted 05-05-2021 7:55 PM Tanypteryx has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 77 by Tanypteryx, posted 05-06-2021 11:44 AM vimesey has replied

  
Tanypteryx
Member
Posts: 4344
From: Oregon, USA
Joined: 08-27-2006
Member Rating: 5.9


(3)
Message 77 of 190 (886109)
05-06-2021 11:44 AM
Reply to: Message 76 by vimesey
05-06-2021 6:39 AM


Denying the existence of the y2k threat is just another example of that brainwashing agenda.
I call them the Trump's Moron Cult, but obviously it extends far beyond his influence, but he makes the perfect symbol of their stupidity and assholery.

What if Eleanor Roosevelt had wings? -- Monty Python

One important characteristic of a theory is that is has survived repeated attempts to falsify it. Contrary to your understanding, all available evidence confirms it. --Subbie

If evolution is shown to be false, it will be at the hands of things that are true, not made up. --percy

The reason that we have the scientific method is because common sense isn't reliable. -- Taq


This message is a reply to:
 Message 76 by vimesey, posted 05-06-2021 6:39 AM vimesey has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 78 by vimesey, posted 05-06-2021 12:18 PM Tanypteryx has replied

  
vimesey
Member
Posts: 1398
From: Birmingham, England
Joined: 09-21-2011


Message 78 of 190 (886110)
05-06-2021 12:18 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by Tanypteryx
05-06-2021 11:44 AM


It's such a shame that people can and do fall for this stuff.

Could there be any greater conceit, than for someone to believe that the universe has to be simple enough for them to be able to understand it ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 77 by Tanypteryx, posted 05-06-2021 11:44 AM Tanypteryx has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 79 by Tanypteryx, posted 05-06-2021 3:24 PM vimesey has not replied

  
Tanypteryx
Member
Posts: 4344
From: Oregon, USA
Joined: 08-27-2006
Member Rating: 5.9


Message 79 of 190 (886113)
05-06-2021 3:24 PM
Reply to: Message 78 by vimesey
05-06-2021 12:18 PM


It's such a shame that people can and do fall for this stuff.
And embarrassing.

What if Eleanor Roosevelt had wings? -- Monty Python

One important characteristic of a theory is that is has survived repeated attempts to falsify it. Contrary to your understanding, all available evidence confirms it. --Subbie

If evolution is shown to be false, it will be at the hands of things that are true, not made up. --percy

The reason that we have the scientific method is because common sense isn't reliable. -- Taq


This message is a reply to:
 Message 78 by vimesey, posted 05-06-2021 12:18 PM vimesey has not replied

  
Sarah Bellum
Member (Idle past 595 days)
Posts: 826
Joined: 05-04-2019


Message 80 of 190 (886457)
05-20-2021 6:08 PM
Reply to: Message 67 by AZPaul3
05-04-2021 9:44 PM


Lots of smoke here, from such a small fire! Guess I should check in more often...
It was a bug. It was a real bug that caused problems and would have caused a lot more problems had not a lot of instances of it been fixed. A lot of people spent a lot of time fixing it (as they do for all kinds of bugs) and kudos to them. It's not denigration of their programming chops to notice that, as bugs go, it was mundane, rather than apocalyptic. Apologize if I can't get around to responding to everybody's posts, but I hope this article from Nature magazine helps. GPS glitch threatens thousands of scientific instruments
quote:
Researchers worldwide are racing to get ahead of a bug in the US Global Positioning System (GPS) that could cause data loggers, including thousands of scientific instruments, to malfunction starting on 6 April. The glitch, known as the ‘week number rollover’, could trigger GPS receivers — which enable devices used throughout research to keep highly accurate time — to reset their clocks and spit out corrupted data.
Scientists in fields from seismology to particle physics are checking whether their instruments — which might be portable, or anchored in bedrock or polar ice — are susceptible. For those that are, researchers are updating them to pre-empt the issue, using instructions from manufacturers.
“The rollover is a serious issue,” says Christian Haberland, a seismologist at the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences in Potsdam. “It means a big additional effort and work. In some cases, field equipment has to be replaced.”
The issue affects many scientific instruments, such as seismometers, that depend on GPS receivers to time-stamp their data, as well as global arrays of instruments such as radio-telescope that use GPS time to stay in sync. They do this using time signals from GPS satellites’ ultra-precise atomic clocks.
Many consumer devices such as satnavs are immune to the issue because the rollover doesn’t affect positioning accuracy or because new devices have been built to deal with the problem; people can check and update their models on manufacturers’ websites.
The glitch arises because of how the satellites broadcast the timestamp. Their signals include a binary ten-digit ‘week number’ in GPS time, which began on 6 January 1980. Receivers use the number to calculate the exact date and time. But 10 digits covers only 1,024 weeks, or 19.7 years. That limit will be reached for the second time at midnight on 6 April universal time, when the week number broadcast by the satellites will roll back to 0 (the first rollover happened in 1999 when there were far fewer GPS receivers in use around the world). Susceptible devices risk reading the 0 as being in the past and could start generating incorrectly timestamped data.
The upcoming glitch is likely to mainly affect mostly older GPS receivers or those lacking recent updates to their ‘firmware’ — software programmed into a device’s permanent memory — that ensure devices are not confused by the rollover. Vulnerable GPS receivers won’t necessarily stop working at the stroke of midnight — some may fail in weeks, months or years depending on how they were configured.
Instrument manufacturers, such as Nanometrics, Topcon and Güralp, have created web pages where users can check whether their models are vulnerable, and download firmware updates to safeguard their instruments or buy newer models.
Instruments that rely on Russia’s GLONASS system, the European Union’s Galileo network or China’s Beidou system won’t be affected by the rollover.
Field specifics
The field of geoscience is particularly affected because it uses GPS time extensively. Operators of large instrument networks in the United States, Canada and Germany have been testing and updating affected receivers for months, says Haberland.
UNAVCO, a global consortium of 230 universities and research organizations based in Boulder, Colorado, has arrays of GPS instruments deployed globally — including in polar regions — that continually measure Earth’s shape and the motion of its crust. This infrastructure is important to many fields in the Earth and atmospheric sciences.
Despite the updates, “some instruments will produce corrupt data that may be lost, or recovered only by tedious data corrections”, says Frederick Blume, a project manager at UNAVCO.
The Canadian Geodetic Survey has updated its receivers’ firmware, but “we will still be on the edge of our seat during the rollover”, says Brian Donahue, a senior geodetic engineer at Natural Resources Canada in Ottawa.
GFZ-Potsdam researchers have begun testing their pool of 934 seismic recorders. So far, they have fixed 13 of 22 field recorders dotted around the Alps that require urgent attention, and they will replace or update hundreds of receivers expected to be affected before the end of 2022. It’s arduous, says Haberland, because many recorders can’t be updated online and must be brought back to the lab.
The organization is also one of several trying to raise awareness of the rollover to individual researchers, Haberland adds.
Meanwhile, Japan’s Tokai to Kamioka (T2K) experiment — which studies neutrino particles by firing them hundreds of kilometres — uses GPS receivers to synchronize its particle beams and distant detectors. T2K is well prepared for the 6 April rollover, says Hans Berns, an engineer at the University of California at Davis who helped to design T2K’s synchronization process.
In the 1999 rollover, some high-end devices failed, but a bunch of low-cost back-up receivers saved the day, he recalls. The expensive ones “started spitting out funky date numbers”, he says.
This wasn't a story about the Y2K bug. It was an article published 3 April 2019. Software has bugs in it. Lots of bugs. The Y2K bug was just one of many and rather more pedestrian than most. It got publicity because it was scheduled to happen at the beginning of a year ending in a lot of zeroes, so it coincided with THE YEAR OF THE APOCALYPSE, unlike the similar bug in the article above. Also the description of the Y2K bug fit easily in a sound bite that the TV newsreaders can read in their short breaks between commercials. The last paragraph of the article is interesting too...
I suppose the Y2K panic falls into the same category as the story of the $400 hammer the Defense Dept supposedly bought. It didn't really happen (The extra cost was an artifact of flawed government accounting for overhead costs). Or the story of President Obama's birthplace being in Africa (Something about an erroneous listing in the Harvard Law Review about him being "born in Kenya and raised in Hawaii and Indonesia". Or maybe it was the multiculti hype in a press release issued to sell one of the books he wrote). That didn't happen either, but some people still purport to believe it, after all the publicity that fastened onto a snippet of "evidence" in the story.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 67 by AZPaul3, posted 05-04-2021 9:44 PM AZPaul3 has seen this message but not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 81 by xongsmith, posted 05-20-2021 6:31 PM Sarah Bellum has replied
 Message 82 by ringo, posted 05-22-2021 1:20 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

  
xongsmith
Member
Posts: 2578
From: massachusetts US
Joined: 01-01-2009
Member Rating: 6.8


Message 81 of 190 (886460)
05-20-2021 6:31 PM
Reply to: Message 80 by Sarah Bellum
05-20-2021 6:08 PM


what??
Sarah Bellum writes:
I suppose the Y2K panic falls into the same category as the story of the $400 hammer the Defense Dept supposedly bought.
No, it doesn't. Our colleagues continued employment didn't depend on a $400 accounting error. There were jobs at stake in many places around the globe. Your hammer story never put anyone's job at risk.

"I'm the Grim Reaper now, Mitch. Step aside."

- xongsmith, 5.7d


This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Sarah Bellum, posted 05-20-2021 6:08 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 83 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-05-2021 9:28 AM xongsmith has not replied

  
ringo
Member (Idle past 411 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


(1)
Message 82 of 190 (886495)
05-22-2021 1:20 PM
Reply to: Message 80 by Sarah Bellum
05-20-2021 6:08 PM


Sarah Bellum writes:
... as bugs go, it was mundane, rather than apocalyptic.
Winter in Saskatchewan without power IS apocalyptic.

"I've been to Moose Jaw, now I can die." -- John Wing

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Sarah Bellum, posted 05-20-2021 6:08 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 84 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-05-2021 9:30 AM ringo has replied

  
Sarah Bellum
Member (Idle past 595 days)
Posts: 826
Joined: 05-04-2019


Message 83 of 190 (886753)
06-05-2021 9:28 AM
Reply to: Message 81 by xongsmith
05-20-2021 6:31 PM


Re: what??
Oh, clearly a lot of programmers are needed to fix bugs. That doesn't alter the fact that some bugs are more serious than others, does it?
As for jobs, most likely there were lots of bureaucratic jobs at stake in the political battles that originated the $400 hammer legend, weren't there?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 81 by xongsmith, posted 05-20-2021 6:31 PM xongsmith has not replied

  
Sarah Bellum
Member (Idle past 595 days)
Posts: 826
Joined: 05-04-2019


Message 84 of 190 (886754)
06-05-2021 9:30 AM
Reply to: Message 82 by ringo
05-22-2021 1:20 PM


Hmm, wasn't Global Warming supposed to alleviate that problem by now?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 82 by ringo, posted 05-22-2021 1:20 PM ringo has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 85 by vimesey, posted 06-05-2021 11:07 AM Sarah Bellum has seen this message but not replied
 Message 86 by ringo, posted 06-05-2021 1:34 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

  
vimesey
Member
Posts: 1398
From: Birmingham, England
Joined: 09-21-2011


(1)
Message 85 of 190 (886756)
06-05-2021 11:07 AM
Reply to: Message 84 by Sarah Bellum
06-05-2021 9:30 AM


Here’s a fairly simple exposition of why global warming (or climate change) can lead to certain parts of the planet experiencing extremely cold snaps:
This Is Why Global Warming Is Responsible For Freezing Temperatures Across The U.S.
Basically, it’s the impact of overall global warming on the polar vortices. Worth a read.

Could there be any greater conceit, than for someone to believe that the universe has to be simple enough for them to be able to understand it ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 84 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-05-2021 9:30 AM Sarah Bellum has seen this message but not replied

  
ringo
Member (Idle past 411 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 86 of 190 (886760)
06-05-2021 1:34 PM
Reply to: Message 84 by Sarah Bellum
06-05-2021 9:30 AM


Sarah Bellum writes:
Hmm, wasn't Global Warming supposed to alleviate that problem by now?
Don't make yourself look even stupider.
If global warming made the winter of 1999-2000 minus 25 instead of minus 30, how would that save any lives?

"I've been to Moose Jaw, now I can die." -- John Wing

This message is a reply to:
 Message 84 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-05-2021 9:30 AM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 87 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-22-2021 9:48 AM ringo has replied

  
Sarah Bellum
Member (Idle past 595 days)
Posts: 826
Joined: 05-04-2019


Message 87 of 190 (886964)
06-22-2021 9:48 AM
Reply to: Message 86 by ringo
06-05-2021 1:34 PM


Such scintillating repartee, no wonder I only check in here every month or so!
Sigh. The idea that the globe is boiling is one thing. The idea that the winter is -25 rather than -30 is quite a different thing. And that's the point.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 86 by ringo, posted 06-05-2021 1:34 PM ringo has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 88 by ringo, posted 06-22-2021 12:20 PM Sarah Bellum has replied
 Message 89 by Tanypteryx, posted 06-22-2021 6:24 PM Sarah Bellum has replied
 Message 90 by kjsimons, posted 06-22-2021 7:49 PM Sarah Bellum has replied

  
ringo
Member (Idle past 411 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


(1)
Message 88 of 190 (886966)
06-22-2021 12:20 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by Sarah Bellum
06-22-2021 9:48 AM


Sarah Bellum writes:
The idea that the globe is boiling is one thing. The idea that the winter is -25 rather than -30 is quite a different thing. And that's the point.
The point is that there is no apocalyptic difference between -25 and -30. Like there's no difference between beheading somebody and shooting him before you behead him. Dead is dead, at -25 or -30. You can't wish away global warming by claiming that -25 is "not as bad as" -30.
Sarah Bellum writes:
... no wonder I only check in here every month or so!
That's one way to avoid learning anything.

"I've been to Moose Jaw, now I can die." -- John Wing

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-22-2021 9:48 AM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 91 by Sarah Bellum, posted 07-11-2021 5:19 PM ringo has replied

  
Tanypteryx
Member
Posts: 4344
From: Oregon, USA
Joined: 08-27-2006
Member Rating: 5.9


(2)
Message 89 of 190 (886976)
06-22-2021 6:24 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by Sarah Bellum
06-22-2021 9:48 AM


no wonder I only check in here every month or so!
Why so often?

What if Eleanor Roosevelt had wings? -- Monty Python

One important characteristic of a theory is that is has survived repeated attempts to falsify it. Contrary to your understanding, all available evidence confirms it. --Subbie

If evolution is shown to be false, it will be at the hands of things that are true, not made up. --percy

The reason that we have the scientific method is because common sense isn't reliable. -- Taq


This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-22-2021 9:48 AM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 100 by Sarah Bellum, posted 07-21-2021 6:22 PM Tanypteryx has not replied

  
kjsimons
Member
Posts: 821
From: Orlando,FL
Joined: 06-17-2003
Member Rating: 6.7


Message 90 of 190 (886977)
06-22-2021 7:49 PM
Reply to: Message 87 by Sarah Bellum
06-22-2021 9:48 AM


Obviously you don't grow fruit or vegetables. The changing climate is causing huge issues with the viability of agriculture. The crazy swings in temperatures when we transition from winter to spring is outpacing the ability of some crops to adjust. In the last 20 or so years I have noticed that several of my fruit trees (down in Florida) are flowering early due to the warm winters just to have a frost/freeze (the crazy swings in temperature) kill all the blossoms, hence no fruit that year. This is happening quicker than evolution can cope without huge die offs. It's not a good thing.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by Sarah Bellum, posted 06-22-2021 9:48 AM Sarah Bellum has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 99 by Sarah Bellum, posted 07-21-2021 6:21 PM kjsimons has not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024