I can’t figure this out. When I read the article, it seemed to say that bikes and pedestrians would be accommodated in roadway design. This sounds reasonable to me, since I pay taxes for the roads(state and federal income tax, sales tax, property tax, and yes, even gas taxes, vehicle registration, etc.) and I want to be able to walk and bike safely. However, I find that many roads were not designed with safe walking and biking in mind, even though by law cyclists and pedestrians are allowed to use nearly all roads except for limited access highways.
When I read some of the comments, though, it was almost as if many people had read a different article. I don’t know what that one said, but apparently it was about banning motorized vehicles, or closing roads to motorized vehicles. I went back and read the article, and there is just nothing in it that suggests anything like that.
There is a quote from a lobbyist that this new approach would be an economic disaster. It almost sounded like he was responding to a different proposal than the one in the article, too. Apparently, he thought that trucks would be banned from using the road system. I usually don’t pay too much attention to lobbyists in general, though, because they tend to whine and exagerate whenever they feel threatened.
So this is all very strange. Maybe someone can explain why the article I saw didn’t say any of those negative things about getting rid of cars. I follow these issues, and I’ve never heard anyone propose or support such a thing.
Tag: quotations
“Privates by Satan”
“In closing, however, I think this does reveal a common thread that runs through all creationist thinking. If anything comes up that makes you feel uncomfortable, no matter how well supported by evidence and accepted by an overwhelming number of scientists, just pretend it doesn’t exist.”
The Panda’s Thumb: Privates by Satan
Actually, my favorite part of this article was the following:
“How are kids supposed to react to this supposed textbook when they see these pictures and then look at themselves in the mirror? What if little Bobby gets all freaked out because he’s got this thing between his legs that the book says he shouldn’t, so while his parents sleep he grabs a butcher knife and sets himself up for a career as a castrato?”
[Gould gets most of the credit for teaching me words like ‘castrato.’ 2014-03-05]
Leonardo was a man, who had a craving for yams
“One of us spent years as an Oxford tutor and it was his habit to choose controversial topics for the students’ weekly essays. They were required to go to the library, read about both sides of an argument, give a fair account of both, and then come to a balanced judgment in their essay. The call for balance, by the way, was always tempered by the maxim, ‘When two opposite points of view are expressed with equal intensity, the truth does not necessarily lie exactly half way between. It is possible for one side simply to be wrong.'”
imatter: July 2005
“If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”
[John Stuart Mill, English philosopher (1806-1873)]
Contemplate and consider.
YoungFemaleScientist [another good point]
And another thing:
“I’m wondering if this is the real reason people do 9-year postdocs: how else do you learn whether to market yourself as a pharmacogeneticist or not? Or is that what they’re doing for the last 6 years of postdoc- making themselves ridiculously qualified for positions nobody could possibly be qualified for? Where are all these people? I’m thinking most of them must be MDs, because I have yet to meet any postdocs who work in the fields I’m seeing advertisements for now. “