MacroTurtleLibido

I was walking back to my car to get some other things when he shot me.

I'm sorry, but that's just not enough detail.

We can all assume that the cars are located 180 degrees away from the targets. That's how ranges are typically set up. You park here, walk to the lanes with their benches, and fire *that* way away from the cars.

So it wasn't like your friend was slightly off axis as they were checking out the gun in an unsafe way. They fired backwards!

That means something really dumb like (a) twirling it like a western gunslinger or (b) aiming it at you and pulling the trigger thinking it was unloaded.

While I do have a morbid curiosity when it comes to such things, as an active and avid shooter the real learning is in understanding precisely what happened so we can learn from the experiences of others.

This is an AMA. So ... WTF actually happened?

How complex is the gut biome?

Corollary question: will 'we' (you guys) ever be able to model/understand something so complex or will we have to be like farmers with soil and learn how to improve something too complex to fully comprehend?

Wondering about your biologists thoughts on this hypothesis:

Given that every organism grows into, and often beyond, an abundant food source, and given that humans "invest" 10 or more calories of fossil fuels into each calorie actually ingested, and further given that there are no plans (yet) for how to feed everyone in the future from depleted soils and declining fossil fuel net energy, what are the chances that humans have already overshot their ecological limits?

That is, do you ever connect your predator-prey insights to the expanding multitudes around you?

Whenever I listen to Newshour I get angry and have to shut it off.

Why? Because it's pure propaganda. I hate propaganda.

It broke for me when PBS switched from calling the extrajudicial rendition and torture of suspects (many of whom turned out to be innocent) what is was - illegal fucking torture! - to the Bush-administration approved "abuse."

It wasn't abuse, it was torture.

Every time I heard a PBS anchor say "abuse" my anger would come up.

Then I thought, WTF am I giving my time and attention to corporate and administration shills and whores?

This is what's actually in my heart and mind. Not to dump on you, you just should know there's a lot of us who feel this way and that's what's rotting your "profession" from the inside out.

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No, I am a scientist.

I like data. I also dislike people claiming things they are not, but that's a personal issue.

Here's the data from the USGS. They flew thermal imaging planes overhead six days after the attacks and reported surface temperatures of ~1,000 degrees F in areas around WTC 1, 2 & 7.

https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2001/ofr-01-0429/thermal.r09.html

I figured anybody who was actually there would have known this.

Carry on.