An interesting observation

This paragraph is excerpted, out of context, from an article by bruce_schneier talking about return on investment for business security.  It's an interesting observation nonetheless:

Or take another example: airport security.  Assume that all the new airport security measures increase the waiting time at airports by — and I'm making this up — 30 minutes per passenger.  There were 760 million passenger boardings in the United States in 2007.  This means that the extra waiting time at airports has cost us a collective 43,000 years of extra waiting time.  Assume a 70-year life expectancy, and the increased waiting time has "killed" 620 people per year — 930 if you calculate the numbers based on 16 hours of awake time per day.  So the question is:  If we did away with increased airport security, would the result be more people dead from terrorism or fewer?

(Emphasis above is mine, just lest it be overlooked that it's a speculative number there.)

Sightings

I was almost back home from physical therapy this morning when something ran across the road about a hundred feet ahead of me.  My first thought was, "That's a big dog."  Second thought was "That's a funny-looking dog, and a funny gait for a dog too" (if it were a horse, I'd have said it was cantering).  Then the realization came, all within the space of maybe a second and a half, "Hey, wait, that's not a dog at all.  That's a young black bear, if I'm not mistaken."

The dangers of good intentions

C|Net has a pictorial on concept cars commissioned by Peugeot.  The text for this one says "[...] including the drum [rear] wheel that was designed for stability."

Except that it seems to me that drum rear wheel will not only reduce stability on all but perfectly smooth and level surfaces, it'll make the rear end of this car horribly prone to hydroplaning.  Building (and buying) tires for it is going to be a bitch, too.

There are concepts in this pictorial that I find somewhat intriguing, such as #6, the variable-geometry Peugeot 888.  This is not one of them.  And concept #9, the Opena, is just silly.  What was he thinking?

The ugly side

The ugly side ... well, OK, the OTHER ugly side ... of the RNC in Minnesota.  (Thanks to radarrider for the pointer.)

Incidents like this kind of weaken the case of protests that police actions in St. Paul were disproportionate and unwarranted.

(Note:  Unless the police had specific prior warning that specific groups of people were planning such attacks, and it appears they didn't, I still agree that yes, police actions in St. Paul WERE disproportionate and unwarranted.  Applicable terms to look up include "prior restraint".  And as for the idiocy of suggesting that possession of a cell phone or computer constitutes evidence of having committed a crime ... come on, people.  There's 301 million people in the US (estimated as of July 2007), and 219.4 million of them own cell phones.  See also ithildae's commentary.)