Domain: pbs.org
Stories and comments across the archive that link to pbs.org.
Comments · 5,110
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Again, this is a trillion dollar bet
That the market already played and lost once
"[A]n elegant mathematical formula that helped create a multi-trillion dollar industry" but that lead markets to "began to act in ways that no one had seen before and they began to lose 100 million and more, day after day after day, until finally there was one day when they dropped half a billion dollars, 500 million in a single day"
There are unpredictable variables in the market (as it mostly deals with human expectation on production and consumption), and computers are not 100% reliable when it comes to predicting random events. They may help, but not replace the human "gut feeling". -
Re:Doesn't it take a little longer?
I would suggest they probably tried introducing HIV into a blood sample of the patient, and tried to see how successful HIV was in reproducing. If it can reproduce well in "normal" blood, but badly in the blood of the patient, that's a reasonable indication that they're immune.
An interesting study would be to take a control blood sample from the volunteers before vaccination and see how successfully HIV reproduces in it. Then, take another sample after there has been time for immunity to develop and compare how successfully HIV can reproduce in that to the control sample. That way, you could be reasonably sure that the vaccine was causing the results in this particular patient. After all, some people are genetically immune to HIV to begin with.
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Re:Most people aren't as smart as you.
And what often works best is to show them your product over and over and over and over and over and over. Like in Gatorade commercials, which are often just a montage of many clips of sweathy athletes drinking Gatorade. The same goes for shampoo.
Showing the product over and over again is only effective if it's marketed to the right demographic and the image that's shown over and over again is both memorable and easily associated with the product. The Geiko gecko is both memorable and easily associated. On the other hand, my favorite shampoo commercials is the series where the woman is making orgasmic sounds while washing her hair. Everyone who's ever seen that commercial remembers it. Nobody knows what brand is represented.
Sometimes merely repeating the content over and over is more damaging than helpful. There's one advertisement that runs in my region which is so annoying I'll change the channel EVERY TIME because it's simply too painful to sit there and endure the ad. Not only is the advertiser losing a customer, but the show it's financing is also losing part of the audience...
The real strength of Google in television advertising will be when cable companies are ready to start streaming personalized content to the digital set-top boxes. That's when we'll all watch the same episode of the network broadcast show but enjoy (?) personalized content during the break.
Cringely talked about that in this column back in January.
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see cringely, january 2006, for details
This would be a clever bit of insight on ZDnet's part if it hadn't been exhaustively explored by Robert Cringely seven months ago.
Basically, by buying up bandwidth and data center capabilities everywhere, google could insert context-driven advertising into any video stream on its way to the consumer, and do it far more efficiently and effectively than the networks are capable of. -
Cringely
Cringely has been predicting this for quite a while now.
I can see this being both good and bad - we'll only get ads served to us based on subjects that we are interested in, but on the other hand we'll only get ads served to us based on subjects that we are interested in. The marketing people will be able to play on peoples insecurities a lot more efficiently.
I can also see embarassing times ahead for people who look up a lot of porn too... -
Re:Not to give anyone any ideas
To get to the gates you go through security. But yeah, the LAX plot was supposed to detonate outside of the airport. Fortunately the bomb was stopped at the Canadian-U.S. border.
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Re:Converts don't matter, logic does...
The direct action of sitting at a segregated lunch counter on the restaurant owners private property and not eating thus denying the restaurant owner their livelihood is not one bit different than non violently blocking a logging road using direct action. I'm quite certain that seeing your attitude of justifying police violence against environmental activists who harmed no one, that in 1962 you would have advocated for the same against civil rights activists using the justification of
"it's violence against the means of production, it's violence against the citizens who depend on unrestricted use of that LUNCH COUNTER for their livelihood."
Of course you can't say that NOW because people who advocated non violent direct action for civil rights for African Americans won a great moral victory, and you know you'd look like an asshole if you tried to argue for Dr. King being sprayed with a fire hose. Similarly in 20 years my prediction is that justifying police violence against activists who harmed no one trying to save the last 4% of old growth Redwoods (1) will be similarly frowned upon and you will change your tune conveniently forgetting your previous position on the matter. Your ATTITUDE and form of argument is the EXACT same one segregationists used in the south, think about that for a moment and hang your head in shame.
(1) http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/environment/jan-jun e99/trees_3-3.html
p.s there is no such thing as "violence against the means of production." Only sentient beings that can suffer EXPERIENCE violence. You can say property destruction is unjustified sabatoge but it is not violence. Remember as well that sabatoge is always debatable too, after all one mans sabatoge wielding terrorist, is another mans French resistance. -
Re:They recommend an upgradeYou know, I really have to wonder why Apple doesn't do what Cringely suggests here: perfectly transparent XP emulation, on OS X.
I'm told Apple has long had this running in the Cupertino lab -- Intel Macs running OS X while mixing Apple and XP applications. This is not a guess or a rumor, this something that has been demonstrated and observed by people who have since reported to me.
Think of the implications. A souped-up OS X kernel with native Windows API support and the prospect of mixing and matching Windows and Mac applications would be, for many users, the best of both worlds. There would be no copy of Windows XP to buy, no large overhead of emulation or compatibility middleware, no chance for Microsoft to accidentally screw things up, substantially better security, and no need to even take a chance on Windows Vista. -
Re:The Perceived Threat of Science
The most apparent flaw is that the theory of Evolution as I understand it proposes that living, conscious creatures were generated from inanimate matter.
Evolution occurs in increments - some big, but most very small. The origins of life are believed to be extremely simple organic molecules that had some ability to replicate. [See research into the origins of life, such as the primordial soup experiments: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_life/ ] Complex attributes, such as binocular vision, opposable thumbs, and consciousness arrive much later in the evolutionary timline. This relates to your second "observed flaw":
Another, albeit less easy to understand flaw is that the theory of Evolution proposes that higher forms of life (e.g. humans) Evolved from lower forms of life (e.g. monkeys/apes).
This pattern is driven by the "survival of the fittest" mechanism described by Darwin in the book. Evolution is spurred by mutations in the genome [mutations caused by transcription error, radiation/chemical damage, etc]. Most mutations are benign. Many mutations are detrimental - resulting in disability and/or death. Some mutations may allow an organism to better survive in its environment - better camouflage, faster attack/escape, ability to digest different "food", etc. Organisms that are more likely to survive are more likely to live long enough to procreate and pass on those beneficial attributes. [See http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/1 1/18_smallpox.shtml/] Some mutations are both detrimental and beneficial - the defect that causes sickle-cell anemia also provides some protection against malaria. [See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/01/2/l_0 12_02.html/]
Our definition of "higher forms of life" is obviously biased, but we could probably agree it involves the addition of some attribute that increases the complexity of the organism in such a way as to significantly improve its chance of survival. The increased brain mass of humans allowed us to push our use of tools and language to the point where we could hunt and gather more effectively, communicate abstract ideas, maintain a record of experiences, radically adapt ourselves to our environment and our environment to ourselves, and ponder the origins of the universe and life. -
follow the money
Trillion dollar bet
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2704stock market.html
What did teh winners do with some of the money? Dot come boom and bust, easy come easy go.
What of the losers like worldcom and enron, to only name two?
What does mother nature and father physics say about it?
9/11
is such wrongful world economic manipulation worth punishing?
the best way to address terrorism is to deal wioth the cause, not the symptoms.
and to remove the ignorant politicians and war mongers. -
Fear the gong sound
I imagine the vibration described here would sound like a large gong.
Or maybe a bell. Ask not for whom the bell tolls... -
Re:Old time rivals at it again...
Really, I think Tesla would be much higher-frequency than that.
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Interactivity
I think a primary problem is interactivity. If you're trying to create something truly important and artistic that conveys some complex ideas, then each element of your medium should be critical to the expression. In the cases of most writers and artists, a non-interactive movie or book or painting is more direct. Adding interactivity in most cases just makes it a game and is simply to make it more entertaining. Most books turned into games seem like cheapened versions to me.
The trick is to make the interactivity integral to telling the story or making your point, and that's hard. To date I think the only things that really come close to "highbrow" games (by his vague definition) are simulators, perhaps because they're educational. He mentions a couple, but I was also thinking of flight and historical simulators too.
And I think it was a mistake to mention comics because it's really a counter-example in some ways. They have been legitimized in their own way with Raymond Pettibon, Daniel Clowes, etc. It's a different kind of highbrow.
I also think the discounting art movies hurts the credibility of the article. A super-formal, "old man" kind of high brow is not the only kind. And there are games that fit into this artsy category, like Mel Chin's "Knowmad" or Cory Arcangel's work. Is this not high brow? -
Faith and ReasonFaith and Reason, much discussed as of late. For anyone interested in more information about how scientist and theologian handle the seemingly incompatabilities between the two, Slate provides this fascinating set of discussions @ http://meaningoflife.tv/ Long conversations with scientist, theologians and philosphizers. I reccommend you watch the entire intervies not the snippetts.
Also Check out Bill Moyers show Faith and Reason on your local PBS station or @ http://www.pbs.org/moyers/watch.html
The conversations are long and dry, but the content is golden. On the subject of how old the Universe is, I default to the only known answer Old, Older than any of us.
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The NSA is a spy organization, but do we need it?
The answer is "NO" but its a matter of taking away the need to spy.
The NSA has been included on the list of things that failed pre 9/11.
their computer failed for three days.... all of their computer and for teh same three day.
But they should have known that when you wrongly manipulate world economy, bad things will follow,
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2704stock market.html
its a force of nature that man is unavoidably subjected to:
We have the resources, knowledge and manpower to eliminate the need to spy
http://web.archive.org/web/20021108011109/http://w ww.worldgame.org/wwwproject/
The question is: why is it not happening?
with over 6 billion people on this planet, you can be sure the human force causing such a waste is only a fraction of the total count, who typically just wants to live their short life and raise a family, perhaps see some of the wonders of the world and of mans creations first hand.
Amazing how it all comes down to the use of abstractions (the non-real) to communiocate ideas, beliefs, etc. And even more amazing how most people are so easily blinded by those who are very good at communiocating bad.
Maybe the world just has to come to the conclusion that it is far more expensive to do the wrong things than it is to do the right things. That doing the wrong things is simply no longer affordable, before it will change. -
Earlier work covered on NOVA
Some other cool info on this story was covered on a episode of PBSs NOVA.
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Re:Scientific Undiscovery
Actually, one of the most astounding things revealed by the Palimpsest was a method for determining the volume of an irregular shaped object. In this case, he chose to devide the object in infinitely small cross-sections--wait a minute...he discovered integration! He was probably the first to even think of the concept of infinity. Maybe he was naked when he did it? You can purchase an hour-long documentary from Nova here: Archimedes' Palimpsest Unfortunately the site is bereft any great detail, but the documentary was fascinating. I can't even imagine what the world would be like if this information had not been lost. Integration before Newton? That's astounding. Knowledge like that would have changed the history of Science and Mathematics--the whole world. -T
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Why Listen when you can watch?
For those who don't want to listen, Nova had an hour-long documentary on the Archimedes' Palimpsest [PBS Nova site].
It was shown earlier this year about 4 months ago.
Cheers,
Tai -
Re:This was on NPR last week
And Nova was talking about it back in 2003: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/archimedes/
Of course they hadn't started with the X-Rays at that point. -
Re:have they been to tthe 'least developed nationshttp://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/india/t
h estory.htmlThanks for the info.
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What a wasteThrowing all that energy away.
We can achieve the same goal by allowing the reprocessing of nuclear "waste". PBS had a good interview on the subject, which mentions that power generating reactors are only permitted to extract less than 1 percent of the energy. This is what leaves the "waste" highly radioactive.
I keep putting the word waste in quotes, because it's more like a nuclear fuel reserve than an unusable energy source. Use all the energy, and the half-life of what's left is a few decades.
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What a wasteThrowing all that energy away.
We can achieve the same goal by allowing the reprocessing of nuclear "waste". PBS had a good interview on the subject, which mentions that power generating reactors are only permitted to extract less than 1 percent of the energy. This is what leaves the "waste" highly radioactive.
I keep putting the word waste in quotes, because it's more like a nuclear fuel reserve than an unusable energy source. Use all the energy, and the half-life of what's left is a few decades.
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Obligatory S. Jobs-Quote on Microsoft and Taste
Steve Jobs on PBS' Triumph of the Nerds:
"The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste, they have absolutely no taste, and what that means is - I don't mean that in a small way I mean that in a big way."
;-) -
Good show regarding this very subject
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Re:Well what do you expect?Think about it for a moment. During any time in U.S. history can you think of any other president about which such comments have been raised?
Yes. President Wilson
He's mostly remembered in history as the president who brought America into World War 1 (and who unsucessfully tried to create a lasting peace with the creation of the League of Nations), but what is often overlooked is his attack on civil liberties at home. His presidency makes George W Bush's look positively tame.
With the use of the Sedition Act (created back in 1798 but never used), the new Espionage Act (1917) and the Alien Act (1918), Wilson pretty much went to war and destroyed the left wing in the United States. Ill-defined laws, it permitted arrest for things as simple as speaking against the war effort or membership in the communist party. Newspapers were heavily censored, mail routinely opened and read. Wilson and his administration encouraged a climate of fear, and suggested people spy and report on any unpatriotic neighbors.
In fairness, at the time America was quite a different country than it is today; there was a huge influx of immigrants and a tremendous upsurge in radical groups and new ideas, a good number of which advocated overthrow of the US government. America was also at war with Germany, at a time when about 40% of the country was of German descent. There was true fear that the country was threatened by forces within. However, the steps Wilson took were far more drastic than were needed.
A good introduction to some of this stuff can be found at http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0204f.asp . I learned about it with the more specific cases discussed at http://www.seditionproject.net/ . PBS also has a nice summary of some of it in their documentary about Emma Goldman (a radical and anarchist) at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/goldman/peopleevents
/ e_redscare.htmlUnfortunately, this part of American history is largely forgotten, which is a shame because it has a lot of parallels to today. But I guess it's like they say: those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.
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De-Sanitization of WarThe Iraq War is differs markedly from past wars in one critical aspect: while Washington sends a small minority (i.e., the soldiers) of Americans to Iraq to possibly die, the overwhelming majority of Americans has made no sacrifices whatsoever for this war. During World War II, the entire nation made sacrifices for the war. Yet, during the Iraq War, we Americans are not even paying extra taxes to finance the war. We are simply delaying the payment of the war to future generations.
The Iraq War has not affected the lives of the majority of Americans.
Personally, I find such a situation to be gross and atrocious. If we demand that a minority (i.e., the soldiers) of Americans sacrifice their lives for a war, then the rest of America should endure, at a minimum, the sacrifice of paying extra taxes to finance the war. How can I, as an American, support sending another American to die in a foreign land yet refuse to make any sacrifice for the war?
Since the Iraq War has not affected the lives of the majority of Americans, we Americans unconsciously view the war as a sort of remote thing that is happening "over there". The war becomes even more remote when we do not see the upfront carnage of the war. People in Iraq are bleeding and dying on the streets. Islamic thugs are blowing up the bodies of both Iraqi civilians and British soldiers. Yet, we see none of this carnage. It is out of sight and out of mind for most Americans as we stuff ourselves with hot dogs at the baseball stadium. Life is good, and we do not experience the suffering "over there".
I firmly agree with exposing the public to as much of the war as possible. I encourage American soldiers to upload as much of the videos of carnage (to YouTube and the like) as possible. We need to, at least, see the suffering to understand what war is.
I applaud the "News Hour" for broadcasting all the names and faces of the fallen American soldiers as their names are released by the Pentagon. I also applaud Ted Koppel for devoting an entire episode of "Nightline" in 2004 to reading the names of the soldiers who had died in both Iraq and Afghanistan. They must not die in obscurity.
By the way, the prime political supporters of the Iraq War have tried to generate American "support" for the war by sanitizing it -- removing any sacrifice (i.e., delaying paying the cost of the war to future generations) and trying to stop reporters, like Ted Koppel, from broadcasting the names of the fallen soldiers. "Support" generated by such manipulative means does not equate to actual support for the war. If we Americans were forced to pay the actual cost of the war (through higher taxes) and were forced to know the daily carnage in Iraq, then this "support" might evaporate. I daresay that even most neo-conservatives would oppose this Iraq if they were forced to pay for it (through higher taxes).
If the majority of Americans refuse to genuinely support a war (by paying for the cost of the war and by facing squarely the carnage caused by the war), then we should never send our soldiers to die in that war. I believe that most Americans do not genuinely support the Iraq War.
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Re:Big "OH Brother"
Actually, crushed pills have become one of the main ingredients in meth. You should watch this episode of Frontline. Here's the link to the full eposide online. It's an eye opener. The sources are not hard to use at all. It's really easy to remove the cornstarch filler from most pills on the market and be left with the main ingredient of interest- pseudoephedrine.
Also, severe control of a main ingredient in a drug has worked in the recent past. Anyone remember quaaludes? Didn't think so.
I don't want control and intrusion as much as the next reasonably educated and politically aware person, but to say harsh controls over substances don't ever work is incorrect.
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Re:Look! I'm running a meth lab!
If you are wondering why the restrictions are in place, watch this:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/
The gist is
a) it *is* cost effective
b) restricting key ingredients has worked in the past - see qualudes
c) there are 9 factories in the world making ephedrine and pseudoephedrine on an industrial scale http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/ #18. None of these are in the US. Cold & flu tablets are conveniently available at your local pharmacy. -
Re:Look! I'm running a meth lab!
If you are wondering why the restrictions are in place, watch this:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/
The gist is
a) it *is* cost effective
b) restricting key ingredients has worked in the past - see qualudes
c) there are 9 factories in the world making ephedrine and pseudoephedrine on an industrial scale http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/ #18. None of these are in the US. Cold & flu tablets are conveniently available at your local pharmacy. -
US Govt. is the LEAST abusive users of CALEASee this Robert Cringely article:
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20030710. html"Israeli companies, spies, and gangsters have hacked CALEA for fun and profit, as have the Russians and probably others, too. They have used our own system of electronic wiretaps to wiretap US, because you see that's the problem: CALEA works for anyone who knows how to run it."
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Didnt judah folkman do this in the 60s?
From http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2805canc
e r.html In 1961 the U.S. Navy introduced the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. It was designed to stay at sea for months at a time. But there was a problem. The blood supply could only be stored for about three weeks. To help find a long-lasting substitute for whole blood the Navy drafted young doctors, among them a surgeon named Judah Folkman. JUDAH FOLKMAN: I was assigned to work on the problem of, "could you dry the hemoglobin part of blood, the red part, like you dry coffee, and then reconstitute it by adding salt water and have it all ready to go?" NARRATOR: Dr. Folkman's job was to find out if reconstituted hemoglobin could keep tissue alive like real blood does. With his colleague Fred Becker, Judah Folkman built a crude imitation of a circulatory system and attached a living organ, a rabbit thyroid. When the pump was turned on, the hemoglobin began to circulate and sure enough, the thyroid gland thrived. -
Re:Deadbeat
I don't know if this is the FIRST place to say they are deadbeats, but where I know it from is the best show ever, Frontline. Specifically the episode "The secret history of credit cards". It was Ben Stein who specifically said that credit card companies call people who pay their balance in full each months are deadbeats
link for ya: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cred it/view/
People need to watch more pbs -
Re:More than enough info"So why was he in Iraq again? WMDs that have never been found? or revenge for Saddam's attack to kill his father maybe? Whatever reasons were presented have turned out to be either excuses or lies or both."
I'd say his father is the far greater villain in the situation. People forget the things he did when he was head of the CIA during the 80's. I digress. We're talking Bush Jr. Reasons to go into Iraq.
1 - 75 unanimous security council resolutions finding Iraq in violation of the terms of their surrender. In 1991 the UN authorized military force against Iraq, and peace was dependent on their complete duplicity. They did not cooperate, and while many say that the US belitted the UN, in fact one could argue that if the US did nothing, the UN would become a joke. I don't understand why the UN will jump head first into an evolving situation they don't understand (like sending troops into Yugoslavia as it broke up) while completely ignoring genocides like Rwanda. The UN waves its finger, but rarely does anything about anything. How many times could they insist "comply or else" if "or else" meant nothing?
2 - WMD did exist. Saddam used them on his own people, and he currently stands on trial for that. This is not disputed by anyone. We gave them plenty of advance warning before we went into the country, and we watched a huge caravan leave Iraq into Syria. At the time Powell suggested that those were the smoking guns we would now never find. But we did however find sarin gas, and illegal missiles. He found storage facilities, and training manuals detailing how to use the WMD. So they did exist, and we found some of them. Why do people continue to insist they never existed and they we never found any?
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/out
l ook/3997601.html http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-de c98/clinton_12-16.htmlHere is what I don't understand. Governments all around the world insisted they had WMD. Clinton bombed Iraq without consulting Congress or the UN, and no one questioned him. Kerry, Gore, Clinton and every Democratic leader insisted Iraq had WMD. They all voted to go to war. But after the fact, they all insist the Bush invented the situation and lied. How is that possible? This is why I hate partisan politics. Facts are obscured by trying to make the other party look bad.
3 - 30 million Iraqi civilians lived in fear for their lives. Saddam intentionally kept food shipments out of cities, shut off water, used rape and torture as a means to keep the populace fearful. Some Iraqi civilians were driven to living in caves, because he declared open genocide on the Kurds.
I hate to invoke Godwin's law here, but consider this. After WWI, Germany was smacked down with the Treaty of Versailles. They weren't supposed to arm themselves. Hitler decided to test the water, built weapons and marched troops into the DMZ by the Rhineland. The world didn't want to go back to war, so they ignored the situation. Iraq is not the power Germany was, however, at the time Germany was in its worst economic situation ever and had no weapons. We watched as Hitler openly defied the League of Nations and braced for war. If we stopped Hitler when he first marched small forces into the Rhineland, how many tens of millions of lives might have been spared?
When someone is committing great atrocities, like Saddam did, you take action.
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Re:Progress, Frogs or Sheep?
"Please post the link(s) to any stories proving the family/police theft story.
...huge stretch, made with a flimsy offhand reference." It's not that people make flimsy, offhanded remarks. The problem is you're either too lazy or too stupid to keep up with current events or do your own homework. Stop asking for "proof" when with a little effort you can learn these things yourself. Thank charge of your own education and quit asking to be spoon fed. I'll make a guess who you voted for, LoL. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/snit ch/readings/hidden.html http://www.reconsider.org/tidbits/2000-05-31%20Sur e%20sounds%20like%20stealing%20to%20me_.htm For example, a traffic stop in the Texas Panhandle last week resulted in seizure of more than $32,000 in cash, reported the Amarillo Globe News: Troopers pulled over a Pontiac sedan for speeding about 5:30 p.m. Friday, reports show. The driver consented to a search, and a drug dog found more than $32,800 in the trunk of the car. A drug dog alerting to cash suggests that drugs may have been in contact with the money at some time, according to DPS. The cash was for http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/50450_assets13 .shtml -
Re:I wish they would instead do something more use
My comment about mitochondrial DNA was refering to the fact that neanderthal mitochondrial DNA has variations that human mitochondrial DNA does not. Your mitochondrial DNA is very similar to your mothers mitochondrial DNA. Based on that, we can make statements about whether or not you are her descendent. Since neanderthal mitochondrial DNA has variations and mutations that are not found in humans, it means that there was very little interbreeding going on (perhaps there was a little bit, but it has been lost in the subseqent millenia). No humans have ever been found that have neanderthal-type mitochondrial DNA.
Comparing mtDNA of these Neanderthals to mtDNA of living people from various continents, researchers have found that the Neanderthals' mtDNA is not more closely related to that of people from any one continent over another. This was an unwelcome finding for anthropologists who believe that there was some interbreeding between Neanderthals and early modern humans living in Europe (which might have helped to explain why modern Europeans possess some Neanderthal-like features); these particular anthropologists instead would have expected the Neanderthals' mtDNA to be more similar to that of modern Europeans than to that of other peoples. Moreover, the researchers determined that the common ancestor to Neanderthals and modern Homo sapiens lived as long as 500,000 years ago, well before the most recent common mtDNA ancestor of modern humans. This suggests (though it does not prove) that Neanderthals went extinct without contributing to the gene pool of any modern humans. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/neanderthals/mtdna.ht ml
Some anthropologists have argued that people evolved at least partly from the Neanderthals. The opposing theory is that modern humans evolved in Africa, then spread outward, overwhelming earlier hominids including Neanderthals. The short, squat Neanderthals inhabited much of Europe from about 100,000 years ago until dying out about 28,000 years ago. "Neanderthal DNA is distinct from modern humans," Goodwin says, "and there are no examples of humans having Neanderthal-type DNA." http://cogweb.ucla.edu/Abstracts/Goodwin_00.html -
One word..
DeBeers. They have the world's monopoly on diamonds and are quick to buyoff any new mines and ventures to control the supply. They are shitting bricks(diamonds?) and spending millions into detecting the ever more sophisticated synthetic diamonds. With all the effort they force on you to make the "perfect" diamond it will cost more than just buying one from them.
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Forget batteries, go with EthanolIf we here in the United States are serious about removing dependence on foreign oil, shouldn't we follow the Brazillian model and switch 100% to ethanol rather than wasting time with batteries?
More info:
-NPR
-Carnegie-Mellon
-ABC News (why corn ethanol is not so great), and which points out:For consumers, switching to ethanol would cost only about $100 per car. Kammen said all it takes are some new hoses and a new gas cap. "This is actually a switch we could make very easily and very quickly," he said.
Kammen is working to get an initiative on California's November ballot requiring that all new cars sold in the state be flex-fuel ready within five years. According to UC Berkeley, in 2004, ethanol-blended gasoline accounted for just 2 percent of all fuel sold in the United States, though nearly 5 million vehicles are already equipped.
"Converting to fuel ethanol will not require a big change in the economy," Kammen said. "We are already ethanol ready. If ethanol were available on the supply side, the demand is there."
An interesting report on "locking down CO2 emissions" can be found at
The News Hour with Jim Lehrer -
Re:I'm all for being an earth concious consumer...To do roof repairs, but it's not as if Clinton/Gore placed them back up either.
roof repairs? did it take eight years to repair that roof?
here is a speech that carter gave in 1977. some of the predictions were a bit accelerated in terms of dates, but there is a lot here that's quite precient:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/filmmore/ps_c
r isis.htmlsome quotes:
"With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes. The energy crisis has not yet overwhelmed us, but it will if we do not act quickly."
"The most important thing about these proposals is that the alternative may be a national catastrophe. Further delay can affect our strength and our power as a nation."
"I know that many of you have suspected that some supplies of oil and gas are being withheld. You may be right, but suspicions about oil companies cannot change the fact that we are running out of petroleum."
"Now we have a choice. But if we wait, we will live in fear of embargoes. We could endanger our freedom as a sovereign nation to act in foreign affairs."
carter then goes on to provide a plan with ten principles that include conservation, protection of the environment, and development of new sourcese of energy that will be necessary to provide for us in the "next" century.
the next century is here. wouldn't it be nice if the US actually did that starting 25 years ago?
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Re:I'm all for being an earth concious consumer...Whatever else anyone might say about President Carter, he was both (a) absolutely right and (b) truthful at all times. Unfortunately, Americans didn't like it when he told them the truth in 1977:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/carter/filmmore/ps_en ergy.htmlTonight I want to have an unpleasant talk with you about a problem unprecedented in our history. With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes. The energy crisis has not yet overwhelmed us, but it will if we do not act quickly.
Reagan got elected partly by telling Americans he loved them and didn't want them to make any changes like pesky ol' conservation. He 'solved' the energy crisis by mortaging the future -- a typical conservative tactic, unfortunately. Hope the Democrats pull it together and present real opposition before the elections, 'cause we need it. -
Computer pioneer Prof. Donald Knuth does it ...
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DosEMU maybe, but there's still hope.
DosEMU may be tricky, but that's because DOSEMU is just a dos window (a dos box). Only let DOS program to run and implement a very little compatibility. So software needs to play nice and standart. As you said : DLL may become handy to make it run.
On the other hand DOSBOX is a full emulator, that emulates everything from CPU, thru DOS to hardware. Even nonstandart stuff like VoodooMode (flat linear memory without protected mode CPU) is being worked on.
And there are effort to get Win3x and Win9x working in it.
But as GP said, it's very likely that Microsoft will find a way to b0rk the virtualisation environnement so that :
- Older windows don't work well in a Microsoft(c) Virtual(tm) environment, forcing users to pay for the more expensive recent OS.
- Windows Vista itself will be dependant on some undocumentend feature not available to non-licensed VM maker : Windows User will be free to virtualise everything. Mac user may probably be able to virtualise Windows inside a Intel based Mac OS X host as I, cringely tried to predict (if Apple is ready to pay microsoft for that).
- But I'm sure Microsoft will try whatever they can to impede users to virtualise Windows in an open-source solution like Xen. People running Windows from the safety of an environnement virtualised inside the stability of a linux host is the last thing that Microsoft needs to keep its monopoly.
What I mean is that most of the linux users usually keep somewhere a Win partition for dual booting for the few application (games) that aren't ported or don't have open-source equivalent. A virtualisable Vista will get rid of this dual booting hassle. -
Why do they fight?
Why are we so often the target of terrorism, and not other countries? How come Canada doesn't have to worry about terrorist attacks in their country, despite their defense budget being miniscule compared to ours and their equally (if not more) free and open atmosphere?
Do you think Palestinians simply have a genetic defect which compels 17 year-old girls who once aspired to be journalists or teachers to strap bombs to their chest and blow up Israelis? Why would a nation with no standing army want to purposely instigate war with the second most well-armed nation in the world--thanks to the billions of dollars of annual defense aid from the U.S.? Because they've got some sort of terrorist gene and the Israeli government just isn't doing enough to protect its citizens?
Here are some reasons the Palestinian Arabs commit acts of terror:
- They are proxies for a wider Arab world who will not tolerate a Jewish state in lands perceived to be Arab and Muslim
- They are victims of a philosophy of hate and death (Wahabism) and are goaded by spiritual leaders
- They cannot successfully wage conventional war against a powerful enemy
- Stalemate with Israel is still preferable to them than capitulation
- They know they cannot be annihilated by Israel because of world opinion so they don't fear reprisals
- There is no indigenious economic opportunity in the West Bank
The Palestinians have received billions in direct US aid, as do Eqypt and Israel
The fact that the military industrial complex exerts enormous influence over our government and is exploiting our position as the world's superpower for its financial interests has nothing to do with the creation of terrorists, I'm sure.
And so it should! Did you see the way the MIC lullabied Zarqawi's ass? Wow!
Next victim please...
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Re:Where are the comments?
According to Cringely Apple has a legal right to use the actual Windows XP API itself due to their 1997 cross-licencing agreement with MS. He claims that he has been told that Apple has long had running in their labs "Intel Macs running OS X while mixing Apple and XP applications."
If he is correct, and OS X 10.5 includes this level of native Windows application support directly within OSX and without the need for virtualised hardware or reverse engineered API translators such as wine then it could actually be a real "Vista killer" -
Did his first wife write his papers or not?
http://www.pbs.org/opb/einsteinswife/
r/e Mileva Maric
I found this fascinating - Einstein is an iconic figure, so criticism is not taken well, but I found these to be a fascinating read. No idea how good the underlying sources are, but if there is any merit to them, he may not deserve a good deal of the credit he is given. Reminds me of Tesla vs. Marconi or Tesla vs. Edison. -
Does it have the part where he fucks his cousin?
The truth is Einstein was not a healthy man.
First off his wife helped him come up with the e=mc^2 theory, yet she received no credit for it.
In the original publishing of the theory in 1905 she was credited with co-author credits
Einstein himself spoke to her as an equal in respect to science. He all but admits to collaborating with her on his 1905 papers which made him famous.
In a 1901 letter he refers to the theory of relativity as our work
Another small piece of Einstein history that few people know is the terms of his divorce from his first wife (The woman mentioned above) was that she received all prize money when he wins a Nobel prize for the theory of relativity. He agreed to this and in fact Einstein never saw any of the money when he won the Nobel prize.
Einstein awarded Nobel PrizeAfter seven nominations, Albert wins the 1921 medal for physics. He gives the prize money to Mileva, per their 1919 divorce agreement. It is the smallest cash award since the Nobel Prize was created, worth about $348,000 (in 2003 USD).
Sorry, I can't link to it but it is in the PBS timeline.
The kicker is that after his divorce from the woman who helped make him famous, the guy married his cousin. Yup, his COUSIN!!!!
cousin fucker
So there you have it folks, the man so many think of as a symbol of modern science not only stole ideas (or at the very least refused to acknowledge getting help) from his wife but also decided that it would be fun to screw his cousin. -
Does it have the part where he fucks his cousin?
The truth is Einstein was not a healthy man.
First off his wife helped him come up with the e=mc^2 theory, yet she received no credit for it.
In the original publishing of the theory in 1905 she was credited with co-author credits
Einstein himself spoke to her as an equal in respect to science. He all but admits to collaborating with her on his 1905 papers which made him famous.
In a 1901 letter he refers to the theory of relativity as our work
Another small piece of Einstein history that few people know is the terms of his divorce from his first wife (The woman mentioned above) was that she received all prize money when he wins a Nobel prize for the theory of relativity. He agreed to this and in fact Einstein never saw any of the money when he won the Nobel prize.
Einstein awarded Nobel PrizeAfter seven nominations, Albert wins the 1921 medal for physics. He gives the prize money to Mileva, per their 1919 divorce agreement. It is the smallest cash award since the Nobel Prize was created, worth about $348,000 (in 2003 USD).
Sorry, I can't link to it but it is in the PBS timeline.
The kicker is that after his divorce from the woman who helped make him famous, the guy married his cousin. Yup, his COUSIN!!!!
cousin fucker
So there you have it folks, the man so many think of as a symbol of modern science not only stole ideas (or at the very least refused to acknowledge getting help) from his wife but also decided that it would be fun to screw his cousin. -
Road Map
So I suppose the purpose of having a road map is so that we can see where we didn't go.
Xix. -
Re:Ctrl-Alt-Del comic
I repeat: "Stop making race a big deal, and race stops being a big deal."
That's right! If you don't acknowledge its existence, it's not really there! Let's look to the myth of the noble Ostrich for an example of how to behave! (/sarcasm) -
Re:no, British English makes sense
I don't know most linguists, but I did find this page about the Pacific Northwest accent.
What is "least-accented"? In order to produce spoken language, one must use sounds with some consistency. Different regions favor different sounds and different choices of phrase. How can an accent be less or more on an absolute scale? -
Wrong
The parent possibly is a troll, but it expresses a common wrong belief. English speech continues changing. Do You Speak American? was an entertaining look at how it has changed. http://www.pbs.org/speak/ In particular, look here.