Posts by Bart Janssen
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Hard News: Lowering the Stakes, in reply to
Problematic. What if it’s a second bike purchase / upgrade / replacement and you already own all of those things? Does this apply to second-hand sales on TradeMe?
If you think it's time to upgrade your bike then your helmet probably needs an upgrade.
If you plan to sell your bike on trademe because you've bought a new one then you now have your old helmet to sell with the bike.
Sure it could get a little silly for some people (looks at my friend with 3 different bikes now) but those people will be the minority.
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Hard News: Lowering the Stakes, in reply to
Why do i call it shoddy?
Also only two intersections. The Mt Albert/Dominion Rd intersection would give quite different data as would intersections in light industrial areas.
However, they chose two intersections where there are a lot more cyclists ... almost like they were trying to prove some pre-determined hypothesis.
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Hard News: Lowering the Stakes, in reply to
You can’t sell a car without working lights, but you can sell a bike in that condition.
You also shouldn't be able to sell a bike without a helmet.
Not that you shouldn't be allowed to ride without a helmet.
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Hard News: Lowering the Stakes, in reply to
Far safer to break the law and ride on the footpath
Which I do as well in certain places.
BUT when I'm on the footpath, I'm the danger.
So I slow right down to near walking speed and give any pedestrians the right to what is, after all, their space that I'm borrowing.
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Hard News: Lowering the Stakes, in reply to
Queue-jumping isn't illegal per se.
True when there is a cycle lane leading to the green box, but there are other situations where it is illegal, but hardly either dangerous or any hazard to the drivers. I tend to slide up the left in some queues but there are others where I deliberately take my place in the queue, partly because I think it is safer and partly to show I'll obey the same restrictions as the cars.
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Mt Albert road has a cycle lane marked in green that is simply used as an extra lane by 90% of drivers. With a free left turn onto Sandringham Rd that crosses the cycle lane (and any cyclists that happen to be brave enough to use it) it is a ridiculous piece of design.
But the real problem is the attitude of drivers. Cyclists rarely cost a driver more than a few seconds, yet those seconds are considered reason enough to attempt to murder the cyclist with their car. I'm sure very few drivers actually think of it like that but that is the potential consequence of cutting off a cyclist to save those seconds.
Stranger still is the anger (blind rage?) that some people feel because a cyclist is able to travel quicker through traffic, whether it be through illegal queue jumping or through dedicated cycle lanes.
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Hard News: Climate, money and risk, in reply to
underlying anti-intellectualism at work
I'm not sure, I don't think so.
But it is true that we venerate physical elites fairly easily but it isn't cool to say I was lucky enough to be born with the ability to remember a whole lot of shit from lectures and hence am quite good at something intellectual.
Most folks can reel off a list of kiwi sporting greats, and an alarming number of folks can give you the details of said greats sporting achievements.
We don't seem to do the same with intellectual or even artistic achievers.
It does lead to weird situations where for example people will trust Susan Devoy's opinion about science ahead of someone who actually knows what they are talking about. Or Mr Hide's opinion ahead of the experts at NIWA, referencing Mr Hide's leet dancing skillz as credentials of course.
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Hard News: Climate, money and risk, in reply to
If scientists were some kind of sainted caste whose training required them to maintain a priestly detachment from mundane concerns that might be of more than passing interest. As you’ve made it clear from your postings here, they’re largely barnacles on the economic boat.
Ok I hope I haven't jaded everyone's view of what a scientist is or is not.
To be clear scientists (a generalisation follows) generally do what they do for personal and sometimes altruistic reasons. The job is too hard and too financially unrewarding to do it for any other reason. Scientists usually love what they do, again it's too hard to do if you don't love it. Scientists generally believe that what they do is for the good of everyone and everything on the planet.
But getting funding to do science is a whole other beast. We do the science in spite of the funding restrictions not because of them. The right honourable Mr Joyce may want me to do what I do in order to make his cronies lots of money but it rarely works out that way. Which is something of which both sides of the funding equation are well aware.
Scientists are not a sainted caste nor are they homogenous nor are they all "good". But the majority are "good", a surprisingly large majority. So if you wanted to pick any group to sanctify you could do worse.
Barnacles they are not - although barnacles are cool.
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Hard News: Climate, money and risk, in reply to
The same applies to the dubious claimed benefits of dairy research.
Because oil drilling research is bad then all research is bad? Really?
And just as an aside the problem is that this govt and previous govts demand that research show immediate economic benefit for NZ or they are not interested in funding. This is a policy our MPs have put in place.
There are very very few scientists in NZ who like this situation and few who believe it is a good thing for NZ long term. But in order to change it we'd need the public to tell their MPs to stop trying to "optimise" research. Not because optimizing research is a bad thing but because politicians don't have the skills to do the job.
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Hard News: Climate, money and risk, in reply to
your line matches that of FedFarmers
I also find it of deep concern that I am arguing in line with Fed Farmers. I really have no desire to increase our dairy herd I also have no desire to see dirty farming practices continue. I also really do understand that carbon/water/nitrogen are all connected and targeting one will inevitably have a positive impact on the others.
I am just left with the belief that dairying is a special case in NZ. I don't think it's a good thing that it is a special case but I also don't think ignoring that fact is good.
What I am left coming back to is the question of how best to deal with climate change. I see no reason to believe that applying an ETS to farming in NZ will do that. I would much rather spend our time effort and money doing things that really will make a difference to climate change. As far as I can tell no actual emission reduction in NZ will have an effect globally. There is a real participation value in reducing emissions and we can sometimes have political influence. But to have a real impact from NZ anything we do needs to be applicable worldwide, that is the reality of being a tiny country.
You say
takes some of the already significant profits and redirects them toward national-good or global-good activities
but I'm not sure I have seen anything to indicate that the ETS does any such thing. If the ETS encouraged farmer towards better practices I'd be keener, but as far as I can tell a tax based on cow burps leaves the farmer with no behavioural changes that are good and instead almost certainly results in avoidance behaviour. A tax on water use would be different but this is a tax on carbon emissions.