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One of the most innovative, and arguably, bizarre, math books to be written is Who is Fourier? A Mathematical Aventure. It's a wonderfully easy approach and fun approach to quite a lot of math (some of which is high level.) By no means is it an academic study, but it's a strong enough introduction that you'll feel more comfortable with math.

Having said that, it's not for you if you don't like cutesy. Parts of it are essentially Hello Kitty does math.

On the other hand, quite a lot of people in this world would likely get off on that.

There are plenty of self study guides that one can purchase.

Another option, if it fits into a persons schedule, would be to take classes through a community college. Costs are lower, classes are generally smaller than a university and schedules are often flexible for working adults.

Another thought I had is home schooling materials. I've never personally been involved in homeschooling, but as I understand it these kids can earn a highschool diploma at home. So why couldn't someone put themselves through such a program just to learn the information? I'm sure there are lots of resources out there for this, a quick google turned up this one.

Lots of people have pointed out that Outlook is much more than an e-mail client --- it's really an Exchange client, and the killer app there is shared calendaring and, more generally, shared resources. This is far from trivial to implement. If you are wondering why, I'd suggest reading Dreaming in Code, which follows the Chandler project. (Chandler has often been touted as an "outlook killer".)

Love or hate Microsoft, the simple fact is that no one at the moment has a good response to Exchange and Sharepoint.

So is this the final director's cut or the final ultimate collection or the final on HD-DVD or the final but we'll add some new useless commentary in the next edition final...

Look, nobody is forcing you to buy this. If you want the Director's Cut and no frills, buy the single disc release which has been available for a year for $10 or less. If the print has run out or you want more extras, buy the two-disc set, it's only about $15. If that's not enough, there's also a 4 disc set. For us movie freaks they are offering the 5 disc set.

The previous release had horrible image quality. This new release fixes that, and you aren't forced to buy the extras. What exactly is your problem here?

So is this the final director's cut or the final ultimate collection or the final on HD-DVD or the final but we'll add some new useless commentary in the next edition final...

Look, nobody is forcing you to buy this. If you want the Director's Cut and no frills, buy the single disc release which has been available for a year for $10 or less. If the print has run out or you want more extras, buy the two-disc set, it's only about $15. If that's not enough, there's also a 4 disc set. For us movie freaks they are offering the 5 disc set.

The previous release had horrible image quality. This new release fixes that, and you aren't forced to buy the extras. What exactly is your problem here?

FitPC has USB.
      -- You can add a usb wifi peripheral to turn it into an Access Point.

http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/default.aspx?EDC=785329

      -- add a usb/ethernet

for a DMZ with three ethernets...
usb ethernet example: http://www.amazon.com/Belkin-F5D5050-Networking-Ethernet-Adaptor/dp/B000062R4P

disclaimer: I just googled, no idea about linux compatibility of these particular devices.

USB makes this completely flexible...

I believe this was mentioned in Future Noir.
I'd have to dig up my copy to confirm that though.

The fallacy in your argument lies in your assertion that "people feel defrauded" by Vista, or rather, that they have a right to "feel defrauded" by Vista.

we can even pretend for a minute that [Vista] really is garbage.
YOU STILL BOUGHT IT.

The GGP created a context. I argued within that context, under the assumption Vista was garbage (ie, it failed to live up to its description/reasonable expectations given its description) and was sold to some people. That would be fraud. Those people would be defrauded. People in that circumstance could feel defrauded. And there'd be a sound basis to demand redress for harm because for no one to do so would lead to significant economic harm (among other things). Is that clear?

Vista is EXACTLY what was promised.

I'm not entirely sure what was promised for Vista (beyond, of course, the newsworthy feature removals that occurred prior to release), so I can't argue on this point.

It works the same as [or better than] the betas, the RCs,

I can't really argue with that. But, the issue at hand is how well Vista works in comparison to XP, not in comparison to beta versions of itself. I will admit, however, that I don't recall hearing Microsoft specifically state that Vista would have any XP backwards compatability, so perhaps any assumption that Vista can run any Win32/Win64 application is entirely invalid.

it works like every product description says.

Given that the official Vista feature list is 60MB+ big and seems to only work in Vista, I can't readily take Microsoft's word to quote. But, if you wish to include every product description:

"Delivers all of the entertainment features available in Windows Vista Home Premium; includes everything you need to enjoy the latest in digital photography, music, movies, analog TV, or even HDTV" -- Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate

Now, given people are having trouble with their sound cards, requiring the d/l of sound card drivers (if they exist), I'd say it doesn't include everything needed to enjoy music.

Every program I had running on XP now runs on Vista. Every movie I have plays on Vista. Every part of the operating system works as advertised.

If that's the case for you, that's great. But that doesn't make it true for everyone.

People just didn't know what they were buying.

Why do you believe this is the case? Are the product descriptions not descriptive enough? Is it reasonable impossible to properly describe all things properly in English? Is there a gap in Microsoft's marketing that fails to provide people who want information the information they desire? Or are people just too lazy and stupid to bother doing the research? Btw, I'm giving the benefit of the doubt here and assuming no form of fraud.

And that's the consumer's fault, not Microsoft's.

Well, it's nice to know it's the consumer's fault. How did you reach that conclusion? Did you hand out a test? Are you someone who does support who is aware of all the publicly available information? Is your conclusion based on the anecdotal data of you (and possibly some friends)?

But too bad it won't contain this version...

If you want the voiceover then get the 5 disc set. It will contain all the released cuts of the movie, plus some extras.

I am enjoying the second act that F. Scott Fitzgerald said we Americans don't get to have in our lives -- instead of just being a guy who "used to be" an actor, I'm also a guy who "currently is" a writer -- and even though I don't think any of us knew it at the time, Slashdot played a huge part in making it happen.

Just get a Kill-A-Watt. My desktops use about the same power as a lamp with a 75 watt bulb in it, my laptop is 20-30 watts.

I developed graphics workstation software in the period 1970-1990. There is an abundance of prior art for these claimed patents. Windowing and the idea of multiple views of a single workspace on a single display was commonplace during that period.

There were many academic papers and conferences; ACM SIGGRAPH publications go back to 1967 at least. By the time SIGGRAPH organized, the field of computer graphics was already well-established: many proprietary graphics systems were already in use in private industry and government. Newman and Sproull published their landmark text Principles of Interactive Computer Graphics in 1973.

Other especially good veins to mine for prior art are satellite imaging software for both government use (spy satellites) and for oil prospecting. Another active area was geophysical processing workstation software. The major oil companies were the non-military non-spy pioneers in these areas.

It's called Cooking With the Sun" by Dan and Beth Halacy.

Go for it! They're dead cheap to make and if built really well and cared for, can last a lifetime. The energy savings are absurdly huge, and the experience of "slow food" cooking is good preparation.

I would also recommend learning about hay box cooking... it's not solar, but it uses an order of magnitude less energy - all you do is heat up the contents to a high degree of temperature, and then stick the whole thing in a highly insulated box. Come back a few hours later and bingo: food is cooked.

I want to make a "hay box" out of space shuttle tiles...

RS

RS

James Bamford has written (in Body of Secrets ) about the NSA can depend on the help of other countries, namely the UK, New Zealand, and Australia, to intercept communications for the U.S. What major Internet pipes run through those three countries (well, probably not much through NZ)?

More like 2 decades in practice, and of course the necessary techniques were mostly hashed out on paper decades earlier.

There was a show on PBS in 1991 called "The Astronomers" (see here). It's a bit dated now (as we should hope!), but one episode documents a team of astronomers coordinating VLBI around 1989-90 using stacks of videocassettes and the postal service. IIRC it was an early use of VLBI, but not necessarily the first. It worked just fine even though it was a bit slower than we now communicate.

There are solid scientific reasons to believe that we are unique. Rare Earth Hypothesis

If you'd like to refute a general statement, then it would help to escape the generalization at least a little bit.

All of the points you made about humans in space boil down to that putting them in space is dangerous, difficult, and old-timey nostalgic and emotional (without explaining why that's bad - ad hominem attacks are usually reserved for those occasions where the arguer is incapable of making a useful point).

You refute my point about retrofitting a multiple thousand pound piece of cargo with 30 pounds worth of parts and repurposing it to do something useful by saying that putting another multiple thousand pound one in space would be more expensive. That doesn't follow, nor does it disagree with what I said.

And your point about being able to easily make a robot better able to move on 4 legs than a human can on two shows a lack of respect for the engineering genius displayed by robotics engineers - it's not that easy. There are quite a few teams trying to build stable quadrupedal walkers, and the few which have made really stable platforms have yet to produce one that can get back up if it falls over. Each new robot has a new and dramatically different set of engineering challenges precisely because we have yet to build one which is capable of matching a human for reliability and versatility.

The set of requirements for keeping a human being alive for a few months is pretty clear - we need food, water to drink, we need to be kept in a certain temperature range and atmospheric pressure, and the right atmospheric composition (with a broad range of tolerances).

The most obvious advantage of the human body over any exploratory robot created to date is that it contains a human brain (ignoring completely that the human body is self-repairing for small faults). Whereas it takes a full eight minutes (four minutes each way) to communicate with a Martian robot if it needs correction (eight minutes in which the thing can drive itself off a cliff and set your mission back 2 or 3 years), a human in orbit could adjust the damned thing in milliseconds.

The most significant advantage to putting a human in space is the advantage of putting human judgment within reach of a problem. We have yet to make software versatile enough to be able to handle all of the challenges faced by any exploratory mission. The people on the ground which make these things work are nothing short of miracle workers, and their achievements are doubly astounding when you realize how fuzzy the equipment parameters are at dates ridiculously close to launch. I recommend reading Mpping Mars by Oliver Morton to get a rough idea of just how difficult unmanned missions really are to coordinate.

There are still open questions about Mars which our probes and rovers and decades of looking at photographs have failed to reveal. We have spent decades flinging glorified cameras at other worlds while the powers that be continue canceling funding for decent research probes which would provide more useful information to the scientists back home.

There are still a great deal of open questions about the effects of microgravity and reduced gravity on humans which can only be answered by putting humans into space. If the human race wants to outlive the Earth, it's going to need to go to space eventually.

Finally, to answer stodgy grumblings about how humans don't belong in space:
There were people in ancient times who considered that there was no world outside of their own country, or at least nothing worth sending civilized man to. Europe used to be the beginning and the end of the world (at least for the Europeans). Eventually Europeans realized that the world was a big place and expanded. To use a hackneyed example, people thought that humans had no business flying either, and now people fly for business all of the t

In the book http://www.amazon.com/Halting-State-Charles-Stross/dp/0441014984/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/103-5637353-9593416?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1192128514&sr=1-2 Halted State by Charles Stross, a key plot centered around avatars from one game being able to move to another. While there are too many obstacles today to really make this feasible or desirable, In the not too distant future, I believe our kids will look back and wonder what took so long.

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has had artificial dragonflies with eavesdropping capabilities since the 1970s. The mechanical dragonflies were originally constructed to spy on clandestine meetings conducted spontaneously in open spaces, such as parks, where anything larger would be too conspicuous. The operator controlled the dragonfly via remote with a laser pointer like device. These were built and they actually flew and were controllable, but they proved to be ill suited for outdoor use where wind of 2mph or more would render them ineffective (the motor powering the wings was simply not strong enough to overcome the air currents). This was all documented in the book Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class by T. J. Waters.

I remember reading about this kind of thing when I was growing up-- it was "Danny Dunn, Invisible Boy."

http://www.amazon.com/Danny-Dunn-Invisible-Boy-Williams/dp/0671450689/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Dunn,_Invisible_Boy/

In "Class 11," by T.J. Waters, a book about the first class of CIA counter-terrorism field agents trained after 9/11 (on pgs 15-17 of the hardcover edition), he claims that the CIA had fully functional flying radio bugs that were nearly indistinguishable from real dragonflies unless you look at them close up and from directly overhead, and that we had these back in 1967.

He goes on to mention that this technology, being 40-years old, "pales in comparison" to what they have today.

You can view these pages for free at Amazon. Search inside the book for "dragonfly" and they'll come right up. It wouldn't let me direct link to the pages.

I agree with your point, but I'm not so sure about the choice of example--the Bavarian Radio Orchestra has produced some damn fine recordings, actually. I recently found this (http://www.amazon.com/Shostakovich-Symphony-No-Sergey-Aleksashkin/dp/B0007D0AUU/ref=sr_1_1/002-3144820-4888024?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1192111144&sr=8-1) recording of Shostakovich's 13th Symphony ("Babi Yar") which is really wonderful and (and this underscores your point) it was a steal too since it's not from a "big name" orchestra.

Nobody will mind if we swing one of these around

For anyone who liked this:
It's taken from a book written by Lynne Truss published in the UK roughly 3 years ago.
Amazon Link

"What equipment would I need to watch Disney's Song of the South?"

Ahh, DVD from Amazon, perhaps? Well, also a region 2 dvd player. But not impossible.

http://www.amazon.com/South-James-Baskett-Warrick-Driscoll/dp/B000V105YO/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-0522433-0666422?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1192079210&sr=8-1

Lucky for you both X-Wing AND Tie-Fighter used a 3D engine!

Also had you taken a second to use google you would have seen that Lucas Arts released X-Wing Trilogy, a compilation that contains all previous games with improved (still 3d!) graphics.

http://www.amazon.com/Lucas-Arts-80718-Star-Wars/dp/B000050I88

suspect Star Trek Online will do better than yet another Sword & Sorcery game

You make an good observation. Richard Bartle, author of "Designing Virtual Worlds" talked about this same aspect.

Here's a snippit of what he has to say...

Why are there so few Wild West vitual worlds? Because it's very hard to explain why Joe Newbie's character can't enter a shop, buy a loaded six-gun, and empty it into the back of a character someone else has been playing for five years. They didn't call those things "equalizers" for nothing! Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Horror worlds have fiction-preserving ways out of this, as do ones based another hundred years or more into the past. It's not the only issue, though - there are plenty more. Following are some examples:

• Crime fiction doesn't work well as a genre because players don't want to divulge clues to one another. This means they're discouraged from communicating; most designers would prefer to encourage them.
• Comedy flops as a genre. You laugh the first time something funny happens, but by th etenth time that same thing happens, it ceases to amuse you.
• Romance doesn't work for virtual worlds. Sex does, but romance doesn't. If you start out with the former, you rapidly end up with the later.
• Lone heroes or heroines don't translate well into virtual worlds. It doesn't make sense to have 5,000 people running around who all act like Indiana Jones, Lara Croft, James Bond, or Dr Who. There wouldn't be room for them in the real world, let alone a virtual one

~ Designing Virtual Worlds, Richard A. Bartle, New Riders, p.40-41

The gem is just one of many great points he covers. Anyone who's a fan of video games and MMO's would probably truly enjoy reading this book. It's basically a complete history of MMO's with great details on how virtual worlds work and how they don't.

I've learned a lot in just 100 pages. Though, it was released in 2003, so it's only current up to Dark Age of Camelot, which is a bit sad as I would LOVE to hear his views on the monster that is World of Warcraft as he analysis games such as EQ, DAoC, Ultima Online, MUDs, MUCKs, MUSHES, AC, AO, and SWG.

Cheers,
Fozzy

Nothing in this world is perfect. Sorry. You are going to have to live with it. Doesn't it suck when you buy a product advertised as being "award winning" and it breaks down just after the warranty period? Everything and everyone is hyped beyond belief in this day and age -- and it happened in the past, too. I could list examples, but it would take too long.

Right now, you can go to any music store and pull out a CD and demand they let you listen to it in the store. I did that with a CD I was unsure about a few years ago. And I say that because that is how long ago it was that I decided to purchase a CD (and no, I don't download music). You can listen to the whole thing right there, in the store. Get off your ass and do it.

You can also go to an on-line retailer and hear bits of at least half the songs on an album. Here (amazon) is an example of a Chili Peppers album. Is that not enough for you?

As for artists whose music is not available -- that's what eBay is for. You have to buy used. You have to look around. It is the same thing that has been done for long time. I was able to purchase a Tom Paxton CD I wanted through eBay (also a European release) when I could not get it in North America. That's life. Advocating downloading because it is easier does not make it right.

I respectfully disagree. You are not watching the action from some physical and psychological distance. You are role-playing the character. You are being explicitly rewarded for the growing sadism of your kills.

Let me respectfully DISAGREE. Many horror movies are much worse then you will ever find in modern games, and to top it off most games havea cartoony bent and feel to them. Should we call the censorship police on bugs bunny and all the other violent cartoons for kids?

This reminds me of the "blood" in mortal combat and streetfighter controversy during the mid(?) 90's. The truth of the matter is "Physical and psychological distance", is you just BACKWARDS RATIONALIZING your position.

Go watch the saw 1, 2 or 3, it's people who watch and enjoy movies like that, that are sick motherfuckers. You will never find something on the level of SAW in a video game.

Saw 3

I see no problem whatsoever with this. If the sellers are sensible, they will price the product at the price the market will bear: people will pay more for things they particularly want. Sure, a set of Beethoven's symphonies can go for USD$ 18.98 if they're performed by the Dresden Philharmonic, or for USD$ 67.98 if they're conducted by Georg Solti or John Eliot Gardiner. That's absolutely fine: if people are willing to pay more for Solti and JEG, all well and good; if they're not, there's the Dresden Philharmonic. Same with contemporary music. If people are willing to pay $60 for an album by Celine Dion, well, it sucks to be them. Or maybe not, from their point of view: if they're willing to pay the price, clearly it's worth it to them. Personally, I'll be the one browsing through the Naxos CDs, more often than not, but that's fine.

Variation in pricing is a good thing, if the variation reflects demand for the product. You wouldn't expect to have to pay the same for an ersatz coffee maker as for a Krups; so why would you expect to have to pay the same for the Bavarian Radio Orchestra as for Karajan?

I see no problem whatsoever with this. If the sellers are sensible, they will price the product at the price the market will bear: people will pay more for things they particularly want. Sure, a set of Beethoven's symphonies can go for USD$ 18.98 if they're performed by the Dresden Philharmonic, or for USD$ 67.98 if they're conducted by Georg Solti or John Eliot Gardiner. That's absolutely fine: if people are willing to pay more for Solti and JEG, all well and good; if they're not, there's the Dresden Philharmonic. Same with contemporary music. If people are willing to pay $60 for an album by Celine Dion, well, it sucks to be them. Or maybe not, from their point of view: if they're willing to pay the price, clearly it's worth it to them. Personally, I'll be the one browsing through the Naxos CDs, more often than not, but that's fine.

Variation in pricing is a good thing, if the variation reflects demand for the product. You wouldn't expect to have to pay the same for an ersatz coffee maker as for a Krups; so why would you expect to have to pay the same for the Bavarian Radio Orchestra as for Karajan?

I see no problem whatsoever with this. If the sellers are sensible, they will price the product at the price the market will bear: people will pay more for things they particularly want. Sure, a set of Beethoven's symphonies can go for USD$ 18.98 if they're performed by the Dresden Philharmonic, or for USD$ 67.98 if they're conducted by Georg Solti or John Eliot Gardiner. That's absolutely fine: if people are willing to pay more for Solti and JEG, all well and good; if they're not, there's the Dresden Philharmonic. Same with contemporary music. If people are willing to pay $60 for an album by Celine Dion, well, it sucks to be them. Or maybe not, from their point of view: if they're willing to pay the price, clearly it's worth it to them. Personally, I'll be the one browsing through the Naxos CDs, more often than not, but that's fine.

Variation in pricing is a good thing, if the variation reflects demand for the product. You wouldn't expect to have to pay the same for an ersatz coffee maker as for a Krups; so why would you expect to have to pay the same for the Bavarian Radio Orchestra as for Karajan?

Light would have always refracted prismatically, however a rainbow still requires a certain set of conditions to appear. In addition pre-flood condition on earth are thought to be radically different then they are now. This is hinted at in scripture, there are many books on this topic

http://www.amazon.com/Waters-Above-Earths-Pre-Flood-Canopy/dp/0802491987

It is reasonable that this could have been the first rainbow

No no no no no. I'm not sure if I've read that exact book but I did read one on the supposed antediluvian vapor canopy. This is the very definition of unfounded, speculative fringe science. The very same book postulated that the atmospheric pressure was around 30 psi with such a canopy, the fall of the canopy and great flood sundered the continents, and the highly oxygenated atmosphere also allowed for the great ages of biblical men such as Methuselah. None of this is sound science, and very few would even accept it in science fiction.

Changing the physical functioning of an animal does seem within the scope of God.

The problem with that premise is that we are faced with a world that demonstrably operates according to natural laws. While our understanding of some laws may be incomplete, these rules are nevertheless present and bounding the natural world. Gravitation existed before we had a word for it, it will continue to exist long after we are gone. We see no evidence for divine intervention with the natural operation of the world. We see no evidence for transubstantiation, the resurrection of the dead, walking snakes, talking donkeys, global floods, or a 6,000 year old Earth. One can suppose that if God intended us to think, he would have given us brains. Drawing upon this conclusion, it would take a perverse God to lay out all the evidence of the world being the way science has discerned it and yet for the truth to be as creationists claim it. That would be a perversion worthy of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

How many children did Adam and Eve have? The Bible does not give us a specific number. Adam and Eve had Cain (Genesis 4:1), Abel (Genesis 4:2), Seth (Genesis 4:25), and many other sons and daughters (Genesis 5:4). With likely hundreds of years of child-bearing capability, Adam and Eve likely had 50+ children in their lifetime.

And yet the rules of genetics differed back then, such that incest and inbreeding did not lead to birth defects and the end of the human race?

Science without a doubt has proven "micro-evolution" or evolution within a species, anyone who refutes that is an idiot and not a scientist. There is fossil evidence that weakly supports transition between close species, however this has not been proven beyond reasonable doubt. The idea of evolution from a big bang, soup of chemical, etc can only be stated as a theory at best. Fanatics from both side preach their theories as fact and only misinform.

I would suggest making a good study of evolutionary zoology. You will be absolutely astounded at the proofs for evolution amongst just the mammals, let alone all the other critters crawling and scuttling across the face of the earth. What you will find is an astounding economy of evolutionary design across species. You can see common traits between living animals and fossil ancestors that depict the gradual change and evolution from one form to another, according to the pressures of natural selection. True flight has developed in vertebrates three separate times (I believe the number is three) -- the pterodactyls, birds, and bats. In every case, the forelimbs have been turned into wings, fingers elongating to provide the flight surfaces. In the case of birds, feathers were adapted be the true flight surface. There are an array of gliding animals as well ranging from squirrels to lizards and snakes. Again, there are examples of convergent evolution. Consider the shark, dolphin, and ichty

May I recommend... ...Who is Fourier?

(It's a math book, not a biography.)

I got a *lot* out of this book. (Read the reviews on Amazon, as well.)

If I see you at the Seattle party, I can lend it to you.

The book (out of print, published 1993) is currently available on Amazon for as little as a penny. Looks very cool (as do some of the other books which Amazon mentions on the same page, like the one called The Big Splat, or How Our Moon Came to Be.

Thanks for the recommendation.

The other one was about a kid who befriends a neighbor working in 4-D stuff. The kid (because he's young and has an open mind or something) learns to move about in that dimension as well, and communicate with creatures living in other dimensions. Don't remember the title of that one, thoguh.

I believe that's The Boy Who Reversed Himself. I remember having read that when I was in highschool.

Does this mean that the universe is going to suddenly go All of an Instant on us? Because that'd be pretty sweet.

except that Forza 2 isn't a bargain bin game... it's on of the 360's top sellers and still fetches full price at retail. http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-Forza-Motorsport-2/dp/B000FRVCAA/?qid=1191942433

See if you spot the bait and switch:

"10 years ago, the operating system was only 5% of the price of the PC.

When additional software, in fact the bare essentials for running a functional desktop are shipped with Windows, this figure for bundled software reaches to over 50% of the total cost of a new PC, as evidenced by the Acer court case."

The breakdown of the Acer case was "135.20 euros for Windows XP Home, 60 euros for Microsoft Works, 40.99 euros for PowerDVD, 38.66 euros for Norton Antivirus and 37 euros for NTI CD Maker."

On my Windows machine, I use free software for all of the above, except Windows itself. NONE of those outside of Windows itself are "bare essentials for running a functional desktop."

I also suspect that's the full price for a non-OEM Windows XP Home install, as it's considerly more than the System Builders version (£59.99 or about 86.97 EUR), considerly less than the 52% cited.

-FL

"Hey, let's have dinner tonight"

(Robotic Google voice) "May we suggest ... Chez Panisse ... which is 2.4 miles from your present location, Bill, and 1.3 miles from your present location, Karen. Reservations are available at 7:30 and 7:45 PM. A reservation has been made for you at 7:30. Bill, please turn right on Western. Karen, go 1 mile straight ahead to Central, then turn left on Western. Chez Panisse is at 1540 Western. Have a nice dinner, and thank you for choosing Google for your phone service."

Okay, it's funny, and it's a little scary. But consider that, in a gift economy, this kind of interaction might actually prove beneficial. Imagine, for example, if Chez Panisse actually turned out to be the right place for a date? Bruce Sterling wrote a charming story about this, titled Maneki Neko. While the spectre of Big Brother and Total Information Awareness looms large over any information-based society, we sometimes lose sight of the fact that this power can be used for good as well.

They key to this is to understand one of the second-level effects of the adage 'Information is Power'. As long as nobody gets a stranglehold on the information, it can be used to mitigate and even subvert the efforts of governments and corporate entities to control the message, to tell us how we feel. To the extent that Google is willing to do help with this, I support them.

Your first is not anything like proof of existence of a deity. It's proof of a natural process and of non-random laws. As far as I know, science has not yet discovered how the universe was created. Can you provide a reference?

Non-Random is enough for me, but a good book on the topic is The Frontiers of Science and Faith.

In fact, to the rational theologist, the ONLY threat science offers to faith is the random nature of quantum physics. *ALL* else, to the rational theologist, is just another scripture, another look at the mind of God from a different perspective. Of course, the rational theologist isn't threatened by competing religions anymore either- except the irrational ones of course. A random, indeterministic universe where at the quantum level the best we can do is probability and a random, unknowable Diety that commands us not to kill one day and to kill every Kufar the next; both of these are equally threatening to the rational theologist.

I don't see the link between your second statement and science.

Then you need to RTFA! The whole point is that the experience of the spiritual is no longer a haphazard experience involving fasting, prayer, meditation and hallucinogenic drugs. It's now a repeatable experiment. From my own theological background- 'tis a pity Mother Theresa failed to live to this day, we could have ended her long dark tea-time of the soul that had persisted for the last 50 years of her life.

Perhaps I misunderstood your claim that science has proven both your points, and that these points in some way support the hypothesis that there is a deity or deities. Could you elaborate?

All of the evidence we've ever had of God, that any theologian has ever had of God, has been 1) His Works and 2) Personal, subjective experience of God. #1 is easily provable to the man who has had #2. But without #2, it's impossible to prove #1. This is the challenge atheism has always presented- how to give people #2. And the answer WAS, you can't. Until now. Now we have a repeatable way to give people #2. Irrational Faith is no longer required- Rational Faith can be proven.

While you're at it, can you please provide a reference for this as well? In all credible double-blind tests I've ever read about, prayer was shown to have no effect whatsoever.

Depends on what you're looking at prayer to DO. In this case, there's a scientific document that you need to read: This work of Eastern science took several thousand years to write, and is far more credible than anything else I've ever seen on the topic of exploring connections to the divine (especially the connection at the point of death). Several thousand case studies went into it.

Unlike the irrational faiths- the rational theologist doesn't throw out subjective evidence merely because it is SUBJECTIVE.

Your first is not anything like proof of existence of a deity. It's proof of a natural process and of non-random laws. As far as I know, science has not yet discovered how the universe was created. Can you provide a reference?

Non-Random is enough for me, but a good book on the topic is The Frontiers of Science and Faith.

In fact, to the rational theologist, the ONLY threat science offers to faith is the random nature of quantum physics. *ALL* else, to the rational theologist, is just another scripture, another look at the mind of God from a different perspective. Of course, the rational theologist isn't threatened by competing religions anymore either- except the irrational ones of course. A random, indeterministic universe where at the quantum level the best we can do is probability and a random, unknowable Diety that commands us not to kill one day and to kill every Kufar the next; both of these are equally threatening to the rational theologist.

I don't see the link between your second statement and science.

Then you need to RTFA! The whole point is that the experience of the spiritual is no longer a haphazard experience involving fasting, prayer, meditation and hallucinogenic drugs. It's now a repeatable experiment. From my own theological background- 'tis a pity Mother Theresa failed to live to this day, we could have ended her long dark tea-time of the soul that had persisted for the last 50 years of her life.

Perhaps I misunderstood your claim that science has proven both your points, and that these points in some way support the hypothesis that there is a deity or deities. Could you elaborate?

All of the evidence we've ever had of God, that any theologian has ever had of God, has been 1) His Works and 2) Personal, subjective experience of God. #1 is easily provable to the man who has had #2. But without #2, it's impossible to prove #1. This is the challenge atheism has always presented- how to give people #2. And the answer WAS, you can't. Until now. Now we have a repeatable way to give people #2. Irrational Faith is no longer required- Rational Faith can be proven.

While you're at it, can you please provide a reference for this as well? In all credible double-blind tests I've ever read about, prayer was shown to have no effect whatsoever.

Depends on what you're looking at prayer to DO. In this case, there's a scientific document that you need to read: This work of Eastern science took several thousand years to write, and is far more credible than anything else I've ever seen on the topic of exploring connections to the divine (especially the connection at the point of death). Several thousand case studies went into it.

Unlike the irrational faiths- the rational theologist doesn't throw out subjective evidence merely because it is SUBJECTIVE.

The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture

They could always turn The Children of Hurin into a film...

The Hobbit isn't the kind of book that makes me pissed off about length of copyright. After all, you can get a copy of it for as little as a dollar. Meanwhile, in my own field of linguistics, there are quite old works that are still useful, but they are still under copyright. In one case, the rights are owned by the academic publisher Routledge, which obscenely prices a 100-page paperback as high as $135. When students can't build up a library of important literature, and scholarship is impaired, then there's something wrong with copyright.

The Hobbit isn't the kind of book that makes me pissed off about length of copyright. After all, you can get a copy of it for as little as a dollar. Meanwhile, in my own field of linguistics, there are quite old works that are still useful, but they are still under copyright. In one case, the rights are owned by the academic publisher Routledge, which obscenely prices a 100-page paperback as high as $135. When students can't build up a library of important literature, and scholarship is impaired, then there's something wrong with copyright.

This is the only Hobbit movie I need.

Definite "must buy" according to the appropriate recommendations by this reviewer http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A2IWRKMMIH1Y6R/ref=cm_cr_auth/104-0238679-1953525?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview.