Military Blocking Construction of Wind Power

Finnish Energy Industries (ET) says that the military is blocking plans to develop wind power. The Defence Forces say that studies need to be done on windmills' effects on radar, but so far has not agreed to help fund research.

ET, the Defence Forces and the government have been arguing over the issue most of the autumn. Research done in western Europe and the United States points to windmills interfering with the reliability of radar, a view echoed by the Technical Research Centre of Finland.
In recent years windmills have grown taller and the size of wind power parks has increased.
"We want reliable and sensible research done across Finland on the effects of radar and wind power parks for training and schooling purposes," says Lieutenant-Colonel Arto Ikonen from the General Staff of the Defence Forces.
"By no means are we opposed to wind power, but the effects have to be studied quickly."
Government won't pay for study
Finland's Energy Industries ET and power companies have agreed to pay for half of the hundreds of thousands of euros needed for the study, but says neither the military nor the government is willing to co-operate.
"We've asked the Defence Forces, and they won't help pay for it," says ET's Director of Power Generation, Jukka Leskelä. "Neither will the Defence Ministry, nor the Ministry of Employment and the Economy."
ET feels that the Defence Forces' views have essentially stagnated windmill construction in Finland. In Kotka, for example, local power company Kotkan Voima has suspended plans to build a wind power park because of military objections.
"On the one hand, the government supports building wind power, but then a government agency, the Defence Forces, blocks their construction, and the government has no money to study the issue," fumes Leskelä.

Officials: Deportation of All Foreign Criminals Unrealistic

Ibrahim Shkupolli, who killed five people and himself in Espoo on December 31, could not have been deported without significant changes to Finnish immigration practices, say top law enforcement and immigration officials.

In recent days, Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen and Interior Minister Anne Holmlund have publicly questioned why Shkupolli, a Kosovo Albanian, was allowed to remain in Finland despite several criminal convictions and a rejected citizenship application.
If politicians intend to lower the threshold for deportation to a level that might have prevented the Sello shopping mall shootings, major changes would have to be made to current legislation.
“Our judicial and administrative court procedures would have to be changed significantly,” National Police Commissioner Mikko Paatero told YLE. “Hundreds of people who would have to be deported.”
Deportations Bog Down in Red Tape
Heikki Taskinen, Director of the Immigration unit at the Finnish Immigration Service, agrees.
“We would be talking about hundreds or even thousands of cases annually,” he estimates.
At present, less than 100 deportation rulings are made each year, most of them involving individuals guilty of serious crimes, he says. Most of these cases become bogged down in the administrative court appeal process, which can drag on for years.
Police seek deportation orders based on comprehensive evaluations of each case. The individual’s ties to Finland play a major role in this decision. As Shkupolli had lived in the country for 18 years, legislative changes that would have allowed him to be deported would be so broad that virtually any foreigner convicted of any crime would have to be deported.
In 2008, about 2,500 foreign citizens resident in Finland were convicted of crimes at the district court level -- proportionally about the same as Finnish citizens.
Taskinen points out that since the deportation process is so arduous, carrying out thousands of cases a year would represent an immense amount of work for officials.
“Deportation is a very heavy-handed procedure. It does not simply mean that the person has to leave Finland; it also means they are barred from entering the entire Schengen area,” which includes 25 European countries. This has a drastic impact on the individual and his or her potential family members, he notes.

Mangled Train Car Removed, Rail Traffic Normalises

Local train traffic in and out of Helsinki has returned to normal, although some routes may experience delays when businesses reopen on Thursday. The wreckage of Monday's runaway train crash has been cleared up.

The train cars that crashed into a building at the Helsinki Railway Station have been extracted from the building they ploughed into. The most severely damaged car was towed to the depot at night, once rail traffic had died down.
Three tracks at the railway station are still out of commission, while engineers inspect the track and contact wires for damage. They might have to be replaced before trains can begin using those tracks again.
Officials had feared structural damage to the building, but it survived the crash and the extrication better than expected. Although the building is not in danger of collapsing, plenty of repairs are necessary before the space can be used again.
Train Derailed, Crashed into Hotel
On Monday, four runaway double-decker Intercity train carriages separated from a train before crashing into platform 13 in Helsinki. The 70-tonne vehicle travelled a further 10 metres before crashing into the wall of the Holiday Inn at the end of the platform.
A train conductor who had been in the carriage sustained light injuries to his arm. No-one else was injured.

Weather Favours Kemi Snow Castle Project

The Snow Castle, an annual winter attraction in the northern city of Kemi, is being built on schedule this year, thanks to favourable weather conditions. In some years, mild temperatures have been a challenge to the project.

Very cold weather is also challenging, as temperatures below -20 degrees Celsius can be problematic for the equipment used in the construction of the structure, which is built mainly of snow and ice. However, Jouni Heikkilä, CEO of IP-Heikkilä, which is responsible for the construction, says that cold temperatures are nevertheless always better than rain.
“The snow cladding is neat and better looking. Dampness causes discolouration, among other problems,” Heikkilä says.
IP-Heikkilä, which has been involved in the project seven times, expects the construction to be completed in about half of the normal time. In addition to the good conditions this winter, the company can benefit from experiences of previous years.
The Snow Castle is scheduled to open at the end of January. It is the 15th time that the project has taken place.

Runaway Train Carriages at Helsinki Railway Station

Four runaway two-level Intercity train carriages that separated from a train crashed into platform 13 of the Helsinki Railway station early Monday. A train conductor who had been in the carriage at the time of the incident sustained light injuries to his arm.

The accident was apparently caused by faulty brakes on the vehicle. Train workers were aware of the malfunction and warned persons standing on platform 13 to be on the alert for a possible collision before directing the rail cars to platform 13.

Platform 13 was selected for the emergency stop as it was felt that a concrete barrier would slow down the careening carriage. However the 70-ton vehicle travelled a further 10 metres through the buffer before crashing into the wall of the Holiday Inn Hotel at the end of the platform. No bystanders were injured in the incident.

The impact into the hotel wall damaged the sprinkler system and put the office wing of out of commission. Emergency officials are currently investigating the damage caused to the building.

Pentti Grönroos of Helsinki Emergency Services explained that upon impact the cabs of the double-decker train climbed up the hotel wall to the base of the third floor.

Crash Disrupts Traffic

The accident disrupted rail traffic at the Helsinki Railway terminal between 8.30 and 9.30 Monday morning. Officials were however able to restore rail service and power to the terminal, except for tracks 11 and 13. Officials estimate that repairs to tracks 11 and 13 will be completed by Monday evening.

Several trains were cancelled during the day and there have been delays of 15 minutes to an hour in departures. The number of scheduled local commuter trains has also been reduced.

Both long-distance and commuter rail traffic may continue to experience disruptions through Tuesday morning.

The train conductor and a few other workers were in the train at the time of the accident. The Kuopio-bound train was reversing in the Helsinki station, when four cars became detached and crashed into the hotel wall.

How to Argue with a Creationist

Debating with a creationist is actually really easy, because they only have a few standard arguments, and haven't come up with any new cogent ones for some time. These standard arguments have been published time and time again, and a practiced creationist can handily draw them like a six-gun at the drop of a hat. All of their arguments are silly in their wrongness and easily debunked, and if you're prepared in advance, it's easy to beat down any creationist with a quick verbal body slam. You're not going to change their mind, since creationists do not base their opinions upon rational study of the evidence; but you might help clear things up for an innocent bystander who overhears.
So here are the standard arguments for creationism, and the standard rebuttals from the scientific consensus, starting with my favorite:
Evolution is just a theory, not a fact. This is an easily digestible sound bite intended to show that evolution is just an unproven hypothesis, like any other, and thus should not be taught in schools as if it were fact. Actually, evolution is both a theory and a fact. A fact is something we observe in the world, and a theory is our best explanation for it. Stephen Jay Gould famously addressed this argument by pointing out that the fact of gravity is that things fall, and our theory of gravity began with Isaac Newton and was later replaced by Einstein's improved theory. The current state of our theory to explain gravity does not affect the fact that things fall. Similarly, Darwin's original theory of evolution was highly incomplete and had plenty of errors. Today's theory is still incomplete but it's a thousand times better than it was in Darwin's day. But the state of our explanation does not affect the observed fact that species evolve over time.
The next argument you're likely to encounter states that Evolution is controversial; scientists disagree on its validity. Creationists have latched onto the fact that evolutionary biologists still have competing theories to explain numerous minor aspects of evolution. Throwing out evolution for this reason would be like dismissing the use of tires on cars because there are competing tread designs. Despite the claim of widespread controversy, no significant number of scientists doubt either the fact of evolution or the validity of the theory as a whole. Creationists often publish lists of scientists whom they say reject evolution. These lists are probably true. In the United States, the majority of the general public are creationists of one flavor or another. But the scientific community has a very different opinion: Most surveys of scientists find that 95 to 98 percent accept evolution just as they do other aspects of the natural world.
Creationists also argue that Evolution is not falsifiable, therefore it's not science. One of the fundamentals of any science is that it's falsifiable. If a test can be derived that, if it were to fail, falsified a proposition, then that proposition meets a basic test of being a science. Something that cannot be tested and falsified, like the existence of gods, is therefore not a science. Creationists accept this to the point that they use it as an argument against evolution's status as a science.
In fact, evolution could be very easily falsified. Evolutionary biologist JBS Haldane famously said that a fossilized rabbit from the Precambrian era would do it. Another way to falsify evolution would be to test any of the innumerable predictions it makes, and see if the observation doesn't match what was predicted. Creationists are invited to go through all the predictions made in the evolutionary literature, and if they can genuinely find that not a single one is testable, then they're right.
The next argument to be prepared for is that Evolution is itself a religion. This argument has become increasingly popular in recent years as creationists have tried to bolster their own position by decorating it with scientific-sounding words like intelligent design. And as they try to convince us that their own position is science based, they correspondingly mock evolution by calling it a religion of those who worship Darwin as a prophet and accept its tenets on faith since there is no evidence supporting evolution. Clearly this is an argument that could only be persuasive to people who know little or nothing about the concept of evolution or Darwin's role in its development. This argument is easily dismissed. A religion is the worship of a supernatural divine superbeing, and there is nothing anywhere in the theory of evolution that makes reference to such a being, and not a single living human considers himself a member of any "evolution church."
Creationists also like to argue that Evolution cannot be observed. Part of what you need to do to validate a theory is to test it and observe the results. Although there are evolutionary phenomena that can be directly observed like dog breeding and lab experiments with fruit flies, most of what evolution explains has happened over millions of years and so, quite obviously, nobody was around to observe most of it. This is true, but it misstates what observation consists of. There's a lot of observation in science where we have to use evidence of an event: certain chemical reactions, subatomic particle physics, theoretical physics; all of these disciplines involve experimentation and observation where the actual events can't be witnessed. The theory of evolution was originally developed to explain the evidence that was observed from the fossil record. So in this respect, every significant aspect of evolution has been exhaustively observed and documented, many times over.
One of the most tiresome creationist arguments against evolution tries to claim that There is an absence of transitional fossils. If the ancestor of the modern horse Miohippus evolved from its predecessor Mesohippus, then surely there must be examples of transitional fossils that would show characteristics of both, or perhaps an intermediate stage. I use the horse example because the fossil record of horses is exceptionally well represented with many finds. If evolution is true, shouldn't there be examples of transitional stages between Miohippus and Mesohippus? The creationists say that there are not. Well, there are, and in abundance. You can tell people that there aren't, but you're either intentionally lying or intentionally refusing to inform yourself on a subject you're claiming to be authoritative on. Kathleen Hunt of the University of Washington writes:

A typical Miohippus was distinctly larger than a typical Mesohippus, with a slightly longer skull. The facial fossa was deeper and more expanded. In addition, the ankle joint had changed subtly. Miohippus also began to show a variable extra crest on its upper cheek teeth. In later horse species, this crest became a characteristic feature of the teeth. This is an excellent example of how new traits originate as variations in the ancestral population.

The layperson need look no deeper than Wikipedia to find a long list of transitional fossils. But be aware that many species known only from the fossil record may be known by only one skeleton, often incomplete. The older fossil records are simply too sparse to expect any form of completeness, especially if you're looking for complete transitions. It's not going to happen. However, the theory of punctuated equilibrium predicts that in many cases there will be no transitional fossils, so in a lot of these cases, creationists are pointing to the absence of fossils that evolutionary theory predicts probably never existed.
Here's another creationist argument, and when I first heard it I said "What the heck are they talking about??" It's that Evolution violates the second law of thermodynamics. The second law of thermodynamics states that there is no reverse entropy in any isolated system. The available energy in a closed system will stay the same or decrease over time, and the overall entropy of such a system can only increase or stay the same. This is an immutable physical law, and it's true. Creationists argue that this means a complex system, like a living organism, cannot form on its own, as that would be a decrease of entropy. Order from disorder, they argue, is physically impossible without divine intervention. This argument is easy to make if you oversimplify the law to the point of ignoring its principal qualification: that it only applies to a closed, isolated system. If you attempt to apply it to any system, such as a plant, animal, or deck of cards, you've just proven that photosynthesis, growth, and unshuffling are impossible too. Organisms are open systems (as was the proverbial primordial goo), since they exchange material and energy with their surroundings, and so the second law of thermodynamics is not relevant to them. Innumerable natural and artificial processes produce order from disorder in open systems using external energy and material.
In a related vein, creationists also argue that Evolution cannot create complex structures with irreducible complexity. This argument was made famous by Michael Behe, an evangelical biochemist, who coined the term irreducible complexity. Take a complex structure like an eyeball, and remove any part of it to simulate evolution in reverse, and it will no longer function. Thus, an eyeball cannot have evolved through natural selection, as a non-functioning structure would not be a genetic advantage. It seems like it makes sense at face value, but it's based on a tremendously faulty concept. Evolution in reverse is not accurately simulated by taking a cleaver and hacking an eyeball in half. The animal kingdom is full of examples of simpler eye structures, all of which are functional, all of which are irreducibly complex, and all of which are susceptible to further refinement through evolution. For a dramatic visual example of how irreducible complexity can and does evolve through gradual refinement, and yet remain irreducibly complex, take a look at Lee Graham's applet the Irreducible Complexity Evolver at http://www.stellaralchemy.com/ice/.
Another effort to fight science using logic states that It's too improbable for complex life forms to develop by chance. This is the old "747 in a junkyard" argument. How likely is it that a tornado would go through a junkyard, and by chance, happen to assemble a perfect 747? The same argument was made centuries ago by William Paley, except he referred to the exquisite design of a pocketwatch, and pointed out that such a thing is so complex and delicate that it had to have been designed from the top down by a creator. This argument is simply reflective of ignorance of the extraordinary power of evolution's bottom-up design mechanism. Once you have an understanding of multigenerational mutation and natural selection, and also understand how structures with irreducible complexity evolve, there's nothing unlikely or implausible about evolution at all. In fact, genetic algorithms (the computer software version of evolution), are starting to take over the world of invention with innovative new engineering advances that top-down designers like human beings might have never come up with. Bottom-up design is not only probable, it's inevitable and nearly always produces better designs than any intelligent creator could have.
You should also be prepared to hear that Evolution cannot create new information. Based on a misinterpretation of information theory, this argument states that the new information required to create a new species cannot suddenly spawn into existence spontaneously; new information can only come from an outside source, namely, an intelligent creator. This particular argument doesn't go very far, since any genetic mutation or duplication can only be described as new information. Not all of that information is good. Most of it's useless, but once in a blue moon you get a piece that's beneficial to the organism. New genetic information is observed in evolutionary processes every day.
For a final blow from the logic department, be ready for the argument that Evolution does not explain some aspects of life or culture. This is an argument which is really just a logical fallacy: that since evolution does not explain everything, it is therefore entirely false. Evolutionary biologists are the first ones to stand up and say that there are still plenty of aspects of life we're still learning about. That doesn't make the things we've already learned wrong. It's also increasingly common for creationists to point to things that have nothing to do with the origin of life and speciation, like the Big Bang and the age of the earth, and argue that since the theory of evolution does not explain those things as well, it is therefore false. This is an even greater logical fallacy. Theories explain only those observed phenomena they are designed to explain. They are not intended to have anything to do with stuff they have nothing to do with.
Those are the standard arguments. One thing I can't easily prepare you for are the non-standard arguments you might get from a creationist who doesn't know his business very well. For example, when evangelical actor Kirk Cameron and Christian author Ray Comfort were given a platform by ABC television in April 2007 to express their beliefs to the creators of the Blasphemy Challenge, they didn't even know the standard arguments and just started throwing random stuff out left and right in a way that's much harder to debate intelligently. Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy had a similar experience when debating moon hoax believer Joe Rogan, and he summed it up quite aptly by pointing out that it's easy to know the science better than a believer does, but a believer can easily know the pseudoscience way better than you. Stick with what you know, and don't allow an unpracticed creationist who's all over the place to steer you off the track.

Multiple Murder Motive Still Uncertain

Police have completed forensic investigations at the scenes of five murders and a suicide in Espoo on Thursday. However, interviews with eyewitnesses and Prisma store employees continue.

Police have confirmed that the gunman, Ibrahim Skhupolli, had repeatedly threatened his ex-girlfriend before stabbing her to death and shooting four others on Thursday.
No new information about the motives of the killer has come to light. Police have, though, further confirmation that Shkupolli had stalked and threatened his ex-girlfriend for some time before the killings.
"The suspect was placed under a restraining order last April, so it's been a matter of months," points out Chief Inspector Tero Haapala of the National Bureau of Investigation. "However, there is evidence of stalking and harassment well before April. This was a long-term problem, one going back years."
Haapala confirmed to YLE that the ex-girlfriend that Shkupolli stabbed to death on Thuesday was seen in his company only a few days before the killing. Police have heard from several witnesses that two were seen together shopping.
Finnish investigators have been in communication with officials in the former Yugoslav republics about Ibrahim Shkupolli, who was an Albanian Kosovar. No new relevant information has come to light, nor have rumours been confirmed that Shkupolli had a military background.
Police are still seeking contact with people who knew Shkupolli, and have requested calls to the NBI at 071 878 6891 between 9 AM and 9 PM daily or by email to tiedotus.krp@poliisi.fi.
The S-Group, which owns and operates the Prisma store where four employees were killed has scheduled two minutes of silence at all its shops and stores for noon on Monday. Customers are also being asked to participate.