Domain: lmu.edu
Stories and comments across the archive that link to lmu.edu.
Comments · 7
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Re:Meanwhile in an alternate universeI'm having a hard time getting that from the document in question unless you're referring to something other than this. There's a lot of good discussion about the effects of the other aspects of the war, but it also says:
The atomic bombings considerably speeded up these political maneuverings [attempts by those seeking surrender to convince had liners that it was an unwinnable war] within the government. This in itself was partly a morale effect, since there is ample evidence that members of the Cabinet were worried by the prospect of further atomic bombings, especially on the remains of Tokyo. The bombs did not convince the military that defense of the home islands was impossible, if their behavior in government councils is adequate testimony. It did permit the Government to say, however, that no army without the weapon could possibly resist an enemy who had it, thus saving "face" for the Army leaders and not reflecting on the competence of Japanese industrialists or the valor of the Japanese soldier. In the Supreme War Guidance Council voting remained divided, with the War Minister and the two Chiefs of Staff unwilling to accept unconditional surrender. There seem little doubt, however, that the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki weakened their inclination to oppose the peace group.
...A quip was current in high government circles at this time that the atomic bomb was the real Kamikaze, since it saved Japan from further useless slaughter and destruction. It is apparent that in the atomic bomb the Japanese found the opportunity which they had been seeking, to break the existing deadlock within the government over acceptance of the Potsdam terms.
It's an interesting read, and I don't think the conclusions are as clear cut as what you're describing.
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Re:History repeating itself?
Especially since North Korea is like the USSR on steroids
N. Korea would have to kill most of it's population just to match the Soviet Union, never mind surpass it. During '37 and '38, according to their own archives, the NKVD executed an average of 1000 people a day; 600k in two years. They were the original photoshoppers.
So don't exaggerate the atrocities of N. Korea. They're lightweights.
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Re:Morality of driving
Are you sure about that? Have you heard of Good Samaritan/Duty to Assist laws? What about suicide?
http://academic.udayton.edu/legaled/crimlaw/02-Elements/03casekGenovese.htm
http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1343&context=llr -
Screenshot of it working
Works very fast. This is right before I patched my system with the latest kernel ( you can see the ubuntu updater in the background ). http://www.cs.lmu.edu/~j/files/rootExploit.png
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Re:Your link is the bibleDid you ever notice how science changes its anwsers so damn often. But the Bible stays the same.
I'd like to point out that the Bible has changed many times throughout it's lifetime.
http://myweb.lmu.edu/fjust/Bible/English_Translati ons.htm -
Re:no G77 rocks.g77 does a reasonable job of implementing the Fortran 77 standard, but most of the legacy code (at least the subset that I've come across) relies heavily on VAX extensions.
That's too bad, but I can believe it. Vax was founded in 1977, so some people could have been using their extentions all along. I suppose issues like that keep the G77 team working. I have not run into that problem with my work or I did not recognize it. Most of my pain came from 90/95.
I hate all such extentions because they don't play with each other. I can only hope that free software adoption will provide a reasonable path to language extention for the future. I like fortran 77 because it did a good job of what it was supposed to - formula translation easy enough for scientists and engineers to use.
I'm sure you have been there, but this page claims many common VAX extentions are supported.
6. Other g77 extensions (NOT compatible with Fortran90)
Many extensions to the official Fortran77 Standard were introduced by companies which produced Fortran compilers for sale, but not all of these were incorporated into Fortran90. You may find that existing "Fortran77" code makes use of some of these non-standard features. Fortunately g77 supports some of the more common extensions, especially those of VAX Fortran. The most important ones are listed below.
There is even a command line option for it:
"-fvxt Use VAX Fortran interpretation of certain syntax "
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Re:Pretty common scenarioHow about this?
The eye has always elicited awe from anyone who has studied its structure carefully. The clear tissue of the cornea curves just the right amount, the iris expands and contracts to modulate the amount of light entering, the lens adjusts to distance, so that the optimal quantity of light focuses exactly on the surface of the retina, etc. It seems to be so carefully crafted that it is hard to imagine how its design could be improved upon. In the 19th century this conviction reached its zenith in William Paley's Natural Theology (1802), which took the eye as the basis for an argument for the existence of an all-wise, all-powerful Intelligent Designer. A closer look at the vertebrate eye, however, may lead one to a different conclusion. Blood vessels and nerves traverse the inside of the retina, and then dive through an opening in the retinal wall on their way to the optic nerve. This creates a blind spot at their point of exit, and some distortion as photons have to make their way through the tangle of blood vessels and nerves before striking the retinal wall. It may not be a large distortion, but the vertebrate eye is clearly not designed as well as it could be. This arrangement also fails to anchor the retina securely to the inside of the eye, so that retinal detachment sometimes occurs (e.g., in boxers). The "backwards" wiring of vertebrate eyes is a good example of (i) bad luck and (ii) historical constraints. Hundreds of millions of years ago the layer of cells that happened to become light sensitive in our ancestors was positioned "incorrectly," but because it provided a selective advantage, it was retained and evolved into the modern backwards-wired vertebrate eye. Even though a better design existed in an abstract "morphospace" (i.e., the space of biologically possible forms), once evolution of the eye started down a certain path, backing up (i.e., going back to a relatively less advantageous form) and starting over, became impossible. Squid eyes, on the other hand, are designed more sensibly, with nerves running on the outside, reducing distortion and securing the retina so that it cannot detach. Were squid to take up boxing, one would see far fewer prematurely terminated careers due to detached retinae.
A simple google search turned up this paper
I'll leave it as an exercise for the readers to find a reference for marsupial pouches.