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Beautifully said. And I completely agree that Airdvr is posting to investigate and think about his beliefs, not just school others on theirs. Wendy P.

I know this thread is titled "White privilege" specifically, but I think that's muddying the waters more than it should be, and I also think you're making a genuine effort to understand better. The core principle of privilege (as I understand it) that addresses what seems to be your main concern, is the phrase "All other things being equal"... All other things being equal, being white (in a Western nation) will give you an advantage over those who aren't. All other things being equal, being male will give you an advantage. All other things being equal, being heterosexual will give you an advantage. All other things being equal, being born into a middle-class family will give you an advantage over those who were born into poor families. Etc, etc. I'm a straight white male, as were all my peer group growing up. But they were largely middle class and above, with both parents around, whereas I grew up fairly poor with a single mother (for most of my childhood). All other things being equal, their economic privilege gave them a measurable leg-up on me. I could have done better than I did with hard work, but I also didn't have the role-models to show me how and why. It doesn't mean you need to feel bad about your successes, or that you didn't earn them. It's just a matter of acknowledging that others didn't always get the same opportunities you may have, based on something they had no control over. Comparing Tiger Woods to an average white Joe in Appalachia is pointless, because of course he enjoys some privileges they don't. If you compared him to a white golfer of similar fame levels though, you might see some divergence. That's all privilege really is.

Nah, he's busy counting how many views his thread has. Wendy P.

If you are ever ordering a new Vector you can special order it with both main closing loop attachment points. I highly recommend this option to everyone.

Neighbors are into horses in all directions from my property. Large animal vets are very expensive because the vet has to travel. $1000-1500 a year is not unusual. They need bedding, figure a 1/2 bale per horse per day($1) for five months. They need food a couple lbs of grain a day and 1/4 bale alfalfa Generally $125 a month. Many of these horses don't see a rider in the course of a whole year. I tried leaving out floss for the cat. So far nothing. When you adopt a stray thats what you get.

this is what so many people refuse to acknowledge. they see it like a pie. give a slice to someone who doesn't have one means to take it away from them to do so. it's more like air. there is plenty for everyone. giving air to one does not mean you take it away from another. or we could just bake more pies.

Well, it's newer material than what brenthutch offers, which is really just going in circles. At least to me. Maybe brenthutch just lowered my standards a lot. ZP is clearly used to speaking to non-scientists, judging by the amount of chaotic, nonsensical bullshit she came up with, using bad computer code, name-dropping random 200 year old scientists, jumping around various arguments chaotically - she's a con artist crackpot. She intentionally uses jargon to try to intimidate and try to impress, it might work with laypersons but when faced with people who actually know stuff it kind of collapses pretty quickly. And don't lose hope - a glimpse of her page seems to indicate some election deniership as well (particularly in Georgia) so there's still a chance she'll turn full RonD.

Can anyone in this crazy thread explain to me why Venus is twice as far from the sun as Mercury but it’s surface temperature is around 40% hotter? Another weird thing, Mercury’s surface temperature is only that hot on the hemisphere facing the sun. For some reason, Venus’ surface temperature seems to be relatively uniform all around. It’s gotta be the retrograde rotation, right?

Well, systems that could drop off the local grid under DR control (or even shed load) would have certainly made the problem easier to deal with. But I agree not being part of the larger grid was a big deal. That's one of the reasons that DR controls/microgrids/BTM storage are considered a cost effective solution. Substations - transmission lines - large generation facilities - all those are expensive and aren't going to get much cheaper. They've been around for decades and all the cost that can be taken out of them, has been taken out of them. But BTM equipment is made of battery cells, inverters, switches and load measuring devices, and operates at low powers/voltages. And those DO get cheaper pretty quickly. Inverters are made of the same basic stuff as EV's and those have been coming down in price as economies of scale kick in. Batteries as well. Even in the past 15 years, inverter prices have dropped by over a factor of five, batteries by a factor of almost ten. That's going to continue for a while. It's already at the point where new solar is cheaper than new transmission lines. Combine that with intelligence and storage and it's a cheaper way for utilities to improve reliability and build out their customer base. But how that will be monetized - will people pay for it themselves? Will utilities do that on their own? - is still a big question. Yep. And how to price that into the solution is the challenge.

Aircraft, and their structures are usually designed for a particular engine. Since certification depends so much on that, it's pretty difficult to retrofit. The GTF I talked about took 20 years to develop, then Airbus spent about $1 billion and approximately 4 years from announcement to first flight to put it on the A320 NEO (new engine option). There had to be some structural reinforcements for the wing and changes to the pylon to accommodate it. But as billvon said, hybrids probably don't offer that much advantage for skydiving ops, especially for the smaller cessna operations I think those will go straight to full electric.

Sure; there are already fairly high power accessory drive PTO's and starter/generators on turbines. The retrofit would involve just replacing one of those external gadgets. However it won't be all that useful for skydiving aircraft. Skydiving aircraft are, 99% of the time, doing one of two things - climbing (at close to full power) and descending (at zero/negative power.) And while you could regen during the descent and use that during takeoff, significantly downrating the turbine to take advantage of that will lead to much longer climb times. The place that will be useful is during normal operations, where a battery assists during takeoff, then shuts down while the combustion engine handles cruise. That would allow smaller and more efficient engines to handle the bulk of propulsion while still having enough power for takeoff/go arounds.

I am opposed to E- just another level to pay to more money to uspa. If you want a higher level- make the D harder to get. if E is expert- and an injury occurs- do they graduate to F (fail) there are too many disciplines out there- for another license level to show “skill”

Depends. Do you like to eat Ramen noodles?

While I am not yet a skydiver, my father Ken Coleman most definitely was. My memories as a child are of drop zones, skydivers, formations and lots of parachutes. Names and faces of Mike Michigan, Dick Byrd, Fred Sands, Rocky Evans and numerous others are a huge part of those memories. Now, I am trying to find out more about my father and his skydiving history, beyond the obvious like AFF. I am looking for people I knew back then and information to help piece together my dad's skydiving history. As I am going through all his things there signed photos from the Beech Nuts and Rainbow Flyers, numerous medals, AFF training videos and all of his dive logs that I am entering electronically to track dad's history. If you can help me piece more information into the puzzle, please write back.