Is there any credible objective evidence that Ian Murdock was abused by the police? I think that you could have chosen a clearer example of police abuse to better support your point.
Don't want to derail this to be about choosing better examples because there are plenty of examples out there and if you'd like to offer another you are more than welcome to contribute yourself.
Murdock was just what came to mind because he contributed so much to open source software and to a large community of people. He was a trailblazer in the realm of OSS and I think that was an important role for humanity to have people willing to take those steps. Gates did a lot to give us the MS OS, Murdock did a lot to bring Debian/Linux to more people.
I believe Ian Murdock is a credible source. Of the people involved, the most credible and respectable source available; but outside of that small group of people, only the universe knows for certain. Or things that exist in other dimensions. Or outside the realm of dimensions. Whatever.
Indeed, bread is a processed food. Would you elaborate on your comment? I can understand it in one of two ways: it's pedantic with nothing more implied; it's implying there's no meaningful distinction between bread and, say, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, Doritos, or TV dinners. Or do you mean something else?
23andMe has contributed to the science described in several dozen articles published in the top journals: https://www.23andme.com/for/scientists/. Is all of that useless garbage?
They have plenty of publications, most of which are "we found genes assoicated with <X>".
Unfortunately, association studies don't tell you much beyond "there is a correlation between X and Y" which typically needs to be followed up with a lot more research. It's not even clear that association studies really pay their way- they cost a lot and produce associations, but the link to disease treatment is often very poor.
it's really a shame nobody has truly shown a very convincing way to convert genotyping/genomics and medical records into better treatment.
>it's really a shame nobody has truly shown a very convincing way to convert genotyping/genomics and medical records into better treatment.
ugh..I am being downvoted for asking what makes this particular discovery significant . I am really curious, what are some of your thoughts on what makes this particular correlation different.
Basically, the reason this is not significant is that there is no way to turn gene-disease associations into treatments. At best, it helps you focus on a gene target, but as you can see, this gene's protein product is an important player that has a role far beyond preventing/causing (or affecting the severity of) disease.
What's different (and it's not particularly different) is that this PR is in response to a social media challenge, the research was partly funded by it. Whether that means anything is hard to say- I don't really see ice bucket challenges scaling up to many diseases.
It's a demonstration that even in a niche most people wouldn't think of, drug administration, there's already dozens of cost-effective medical uses, and the number is going up as more research is done and sequencing goes down.
I am no way qualified to interpret or make any sense those. 23andme has been in existence for over a decade, sure these papers might be great but have they led to anything tangible that a ordinary person like me can benefit from ? I am genuinely curious, i really want to know.
I've been a subscriber for over 7 yrs and have gotten all the upgrades they offered over the years. I am yet to get a single useful peice of data out of it. All my extended family has it too and none of them have gotten anything out of it other than of entertainment value. If they have made significant breakthroughs why I am as a consumer not seeing any benefits in over a decade.
I (correctly) self diagnosed (later confirmed by gastroenterologist) my Celiac disease through 23andme. But that is the easiest 1:1 gene correlation out there. My friend found out he had the same Parkinsons gene as Sergey Brin, and there are potentially things you can do to prepare. Exome testing may or may not be useful, depending on how much you invest in analyzing the results. I think it was of limited value until I ran it through Promethease.
I don't know anybody in the field who thinks that 23andme, on its own or in collaborations, has made any truly signficant scientific contributions. I haven't read all their papers, but I've read some, and have talked to their scientists extensively, and I really haven't heard of anything that is strikingly important that could be solely attributed to 23andme.
Their relative finder feature seems to work pretty well.
That area would have changed a lot, if it weren't for a very active preservation effort. The Walden Woods Project, founded by Don Henley (yes, that Don Henley) prevented multiple large commercial development projects from happening in the 1990s, and has allowed the character to be maintained.
Buffett (via Berkshire Hathaway) has made huge amounts of money selling insurance against catastrophes. This includes natural disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis, and floods, as well as other catastrophic events including terrorism.
Yes, of course. I was pointing out that Buffett has thought more carefully about terrorism risks than most people, since his business has written very large insurance policies providing (limited) terrorism coverage.
Buffett's insurance business took a $2.4 billion underwriting loss from the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks. The insurance industry as a whole paid $33 billion in claims (in 2001 dollars).
Right, you probably wouldn't get terrorism coverage as part of your homeowner's policy. However, terrorism insurance is big business! Berkshire Hathaway has extended coverage to airlines, the World Cup, the Sears Tower, etc.
That's because terrorism wasn't specifically defined as an "act of war" for general risk policies under the underwriting standards of the time. (although anything nuke has been excluded for many years) War requires a nation-state actor. Terrorism is a broader concept.
The premise of the job posting, "Salesforce is a hugely profitable company..." is also completely false.
Salesforce had negative earnings for fiscal year 2012, losing millions of dollars. The projections for 2013 call for much larger losses. It is unclear when, if ever, Salesforce will be profitable again. The company has recently been hiding their huge losses by trumpeting bogus financial numbers using non-standard (non-GAAP) accounting practices.
