Large corporate environments chance at a glacial speed. If anything, they merely add, never subtract - the proportion of Fortune 1000 companies which have mission-critical mainframes is close to 100%, as it has been for the past 50 years. Similarly, pretty much all of them still have a VAX or AS/400 similar mini-computer running something critical. The waves of consultant-pushed fads wash over these institutions with virtually no effect. They all run small "incubator" tech-evalutation groups so they can sort out which of the new tech is likely to produce useful ROI, but the actual adoption rates of these new techs is very slow.
Mid-sized companies are pretty similar, though they're a bit more aggressive with dumping older technology. They don't generally replace it with cutting edge stuff, though, since that's a huge risk they don't want to take. Pretty much every "tech upgrade" I've ever seen in this space is replacing a 30-year-old setup with a design which first showed up a decade before. Mid-sized companies go for solidly-proven tech.
Little companies are where the most change happens, for the good and bad. The bad side is that many small companies don't have the expertise to handle the adoption of new processes and tech properly, and thus screw it all up, and then kill the company. I've seen this happen at both small tech AND non-tech companies, where an insufficiently funded/staffed/knowledgable IT "department" killed the company. Literally. The good is that small companies are where the experimentation happens, and, particularly in tech-oriented ones, it's where the next wave of computing is really prototyped then refined.
The general answer to the article is that any sane company's IT department will look 90% identical to what it is now in 10 years, and even in 50 years will almost certainly still be at least 50% identical. For those able to handle the risk, things will chance on a decade-by-decade basis; but, the reality is, those companies will either have died or turned into mature (and risk adverse) companies by then. So, while the small company space is a place of rapid change in IT, at a specific company, a period of rapid evolution will be followed either by death of the company, or evolution to the long-term stability type.
The short of it is: NEVER trust a consultant trying to predict the future for you. Particularly if they're extrapolating on "new" tech.
The short answer to your question is: YES, no matter what subfield of computing you go into (Networking, Systems, Software Engineering, QA, Release, or Project Management) you'll need advanced Maths. Which advanced maths depend on the specific subfield. But the reality is, you're far better off knowing most of the stuff that a 2nd-year Math major has to take.
If you're a Software Engineer (and, to a lesser extent, QA), you'll likely need the Maths which help you describe real-world actions or model real-world happenings. This means Geometry, Trig, Calc, plus Maths common in Physics, plus application-specific stuff, like various Linear Algebra, Complexity, Markov Modeling, Game Theory, etc. Basically, Software Engineering has the biggest demand on Math knowledge, but it varies according to the type of project you're on.
Networking and Systems depend heavily on the Linear Algebra and Discrete Math fields, particularly Set Theory, Game Theory, Complexity/Computability, and Graph Theory. Most of this is not writing down equations, but having an intuitive understanding of the problem being presented because you've had the requisite background. For instance - modeling network traffic flow and determining system load both require Graph Theory and Complexity, but it wouldn't be immediately obvious to the outsider.
Release and Project Management are less Math-intentive, but it's still important to have college-level Maths as a strong foundation. Complexity/Computability, Linear Algebra, and, particularly, Statistics, Graph and Game Theory are cornerstones of these fields.
The reality is that Math is a significant part of any Computer Science degree, and is critical in daily professional use. Outside specific programming positions (e.g. those involved in modeling of some kind), it's not the same use as a Civil Engineer or the like would be using Maths. But you have to be comfortable thinking about Maths, and you need to have significant educational background to be successful.
Personally, beyond Geometry and Trig, I'd think that you'll have to take about 6 semesters of some sort of Math in a reasonably rigorous CompSci program. You'll probably only use 3 of those courses on a regular basis, but you'll never know WHICH 3 you'll be using at, so you need all of them.
If you find Math difficult, tedious, or boring, you need to seriously rethink a CompSci degree (and, by extension, a career in something normally requiring a CompSci degree). Or you need to talk with your Maths professors/teachers, and figure out why you have difficulty or are bored during Math classes. Either way, it's a required skill for the profession.
...I've got a bridge somewhere that needs to be sold that you might be interested in.
Bitcoin does irrefutability (i.e. the ability to prove that a transaction occurred, and occurred only once). I can thus prove that I do, in fact, own all Bitcoin I possess.
It never has been anonymous. There are characteristics that make it more difficult to trace the payer, but the protocol and implementation have never been configured (or designed) to be a strongly anonymous technology.
You (and the +5 poster a thread or two up) misunderstand "transformative" use.
The proper analogy to video gameplay has already been decided on by the courts, and it is written plays (which, also applies to screenwriting).
All three take another work, and produce an interpretation of that work. The original playwright/screenwriter/videogame author still is the owner of the base copyright being used, and the work is classified as a Derivative Work. The performer has also contributed significant copyrightable-product, but the genesis and base of the entire (new) work still rests on the original play/screenplay/game.
Also, just because something is "transformative" doesn't absolve it of the requirements to be of "limited" domain. Using the entirety of a video game (artwork included) in your new LP video is pretty much the definition of "not limited".
I've looked at a couple of those videos, and the amount of content which is copyrightable Nintendo (or whomever the on-screen game author is) is WAAAAAY beyond anything allowable for Fair Use or similar exception.
I'm certainly not in favor of Nintendo or the like suing these folks for copyright infringement. The "unique performance" issue is certainly one which can be discussed, but I liken this to plays - sure, the individual performance of a play is unique, but since you didn't write the script, you can't expect to be profiting from the performance without the author's permission.
Thus, I can't see why the authors of these videos are complaining that Nintendo gets the ad revenue. I think that's an entirely reasonable compromise - Nintendo essentially implicitly licenses the video authors to show those derivative-work videos, in return for the publicity and the ad revenue.
Nintendo, of course, could be much less tone-deaf about saying the preceding, of course.
But, in the end, those videos are derivative-works under copyright law, and they can't be shown without some sort of license.
MoveOn.org isn't solely a 503(c).4 organization. They're very explicitly split into two branches: the main site, which engages in all the permissible organizational and democratic (small 'd') stuff, and the MoveOn PAC, which explicitly is a registered PAC and does promote candidates and specific issues. Their books are separate, and open, and the sections of the web site where PAC vs 503 stuff goes on is clearly demarked. Donations are also clearly marked as to whether you're giving to the PAC or the 503.
The problem with many of the newer 503(c).4 organizations is that they:
(a) don't file the appropriate paperwork, so it's hard to see if they're complying with the reporting and transparency requirements
(b) Engage in activities that are, at best, grey advocacy, and at worst, outright political support of individuals and issues.
I do agree that we need more auditing, and that the selection of who to target was wrong. But that doesn't mean there isn't a serious problem on the Right around this, particularly since there's been a whole lot more money poured into Right Wing 503(c).4 orgs in the past 4 years, and also because the vast majority of these organizations seem to be very heavily politicized, and much less socially-oriented.
FYI - laws say it's fine for a 503(c).4 to advocate certain general positions (i.e. "Clean Water", "Less Coal, more Wind", and do what used to be called "Community Organizing"), so long as they did not promote specific candidates or parties or legislation/initiatives. The problem has been that may 503(c).4 orgs aren't obeying those restrictions.
That is, you see a lot of Left-Wing 503(c) doing general voter registration and promoting Big Causes. Recent Right Wing stuff has heavily been oriented around "Defeat taxation" and "Stop Immigration" and the like, which leads (or is intended) to be mostly legislative lobbying, which is NOT OK for a 503(c).4
First off, I do think it was politically motivated, at least in the extent that someone decided to do something that would be looked favorably on the higher-ups. That's not OK, and people should get fired for it.
However, do note that what they are discussing here is auditing 503(c).4 organizations, to make sure they were complying with the regulations.
That is, these organizations are supposed to be engaging in NON-POLITICAL activities, for which we give them the benefit of being non-profit (and, making donations to them tax deductible).
There's been an explosion of 503(c).4 organizations over the past 4 years (after the Citizen's United decision), and a large number of them have been funded from "right-wing" sources. These organizations have been very lax about filing the proper paperwork about their donors, and in fact, have been downright secretive. And many of them are engaging in activities that very much skirt the line (if not cross it entirely) of political advocacy. The quantity of money (and number of organizations) engaged in this kind of shadowy advocacy/political support is very seriously tilted towards right-wing sources.
The fact is this: if you want to engage in political activity, then fine. Government can and should not have any say about your content. But if you want to get tax-free benefits, then there's a certain set of rules that you MUST play by, and claiming that this is suppressing Free Speech because we won't give you the benefit while you violate the rules is sophistry.
All 503(c).4 organizations need more scrutiny. I'm pretty sure that the IRS was engaging in the equivalent of racial profiling here, with the added notion of pleasing some political higher-ups. But at the end of the day, if those 503(c).4 organizations were breaking the law, then it's hard to say the IRS wasn't doing it's job by auditing them.
OK, first off, tracking such objects is a useful exercise, for many reasons, not just for the OMG, WE'RE GONNA GET HIT, crowd.
Unfortunately, it's practically useless for the purpose it's being touted for. That is, to give short notice warning of an impending impact.
Firstly, given the design criteria, we're looking at 48 hours notice, maximum, before an impact. Note that at the outer edge of this prediction envelope, it's a predicted impact - that is, one with a significant change of impact, but not a certainty of one. Now, hopefully, people would take this as seriously as we now do Tsunami Warnings. But think about it one more step:
Secondly, the impact area simply can't be computed until relatively shortly before impact. That is, if we detect the incoming meteor 48 hours ahead of time, it will take a couple of hours to compute a rough impact zone (meaning, just which part of the GLOBE it will hit), and likely you won't have a decent small error probability zone (meaning, something less than 100 miles across) until 12 hours or less before impact.
Does anyone think that a 12 hour warning of an impact can have any actual damage mitigation effect? Sure, if the area being hit has (a) a relatively low population, AND (b) a very good transportation system. But virtually all places on the Earth fail at one of those. There's simply no way to effectively evacuate even a mid-size city in time, and it's not like you can put everyone into blast shelters like the old Nuclear War scenarios wanted us to do.
So, spend the money on ATLAS, and get ourselves some great astrometric data for future use. It just won't be any sort of useful in terms of damage avoidance.
This is interesting, since all the scientific data I've seen says that ultimately, Venus is far better than Mars as a target for Terraforming, yet this research is claiming that Venus is far outside the habitable zone, while Mars is smack in the middle of it.
Mars simply lacks two things: (1) the ability to generate a good strong magnetic field (too small, and no molten iron core), so it gets constantly bombarded with far more solar radiation than terrestrial life can stand outdoors, and (b) its much smaller mass and lack of magnetic field make is impossible for Mars to hold an atmosphere that's much more than it has now. So the result is that, while Mars superficially seems a better place for life now, there's no good way for us to transplant onto Mars without having to either live underground or under thick domes.
Venus, on the other hand, already generates a good magnetic field, and has no problem holding a significant atmosphere. It's just too hot and toxic. But a couple thousand tons of bacteria into the upper atmosphere will solve that problem, so Venus is actually the best candidate to turn into an Earth-like place.
I guess we'll have to look for two criteria: (1) which planets are most likely to have Earth-like indigenous life on them, and (2) which planets are best suited to be terraformed for occupation by us.
You forget the place that Java has had the most success: Enterprise computing.
I'll agree that the sum total of the Java Plugin + JDK Libraries + JVM provides too much opportunity to attack on the desktop / web app space. There's simply too many flaws in the plugin and libraries. The JVM itself, though, is very solid (fewer than 10 major flaws over 15 years).
However, Java as a middleware platform is simply far better than any of the alternatives, and that's where I expect it to remain. Insulated from the types of attacks that render Java dangerous on the desktop, middleware app servers play directly to Java's big strengths: speed, ease of development, and massive library support, plus a framework which helps discourage the types of coding flaws that hurt middleware computing the most. Java will likely remain king of middlewhere for a long time, and deservedly so.
On the desktop or as a downloadable app, well, yes, Java is simply never going to measure up to the better cross-platform alternatives.
However, part of the social contract that exists to support Copyright, is the implicit agreement that "We (society) allow you to protect your item, and in return you make more of them so we can use them". Failure to live up to that implicit contract (i.e. sequestering I.P.) on the content provider's end voids the social contract (i.e. consumer's promise to respect Copyright).
I'm not a big fan of many of the justifications for copyright infringement, but in cases of "lost" authorship or abandonware or failure to publish or deliberate removal of a product from market, the I.P. author has effectively forfeited any rights they have.
Oracle completely screwed up the acquisition, and made major changes to the Java division. Management was completely redone, and the release/bug process was made much worse (not that it was great under Sun).
All the old Sun personnel got pissed off at Oracle, for a variety of reasons. Less than 25% of those there in 2008 are still in the Java division; and, that's from an organization where people averaged 10+ years of work at Sun. Oracle hasn't been able to replace this brain drain, and is unlikely to ever succeed in restaffing to an acceptable level. The JDK codebase is incredibly complex - far worse than practically anything else I can think of, including the Linux kernel. The number of people on the planet who are good VM coders numbers maybe a hundred or two. That's it. And the rest of the organization has been decimated, too.
I worked at Sun for 6 years in the JVM group before the acquisition. I stayed on for another 1.5 years before I left. I only know a handful of people there anymore, and they're staying simply to ride it out to retirement (all are in their 50s). Over three dozen people I used to work with are gone, and there's no decent replacements.
Basically, people used to working "the Sun Way" detested the new "Oracle Way" and decamped en masse between 2009 and 2011. The whole Java division is a shadow of itself, and won't ever recover.
"Small Government" Republicans don't want any restrictions on businesses, and think all "services" (as you point out) should be either individual contribution or charity, but they're big into legislated morality.
Hence, the concept that all they want to regulate (or have the government care about) is what kind of sex you're having.
At some point in the (now distant) past, "small government" republicans actually were for responsible spending, and that included basic services and some thing that a Tea Party person would rage at as "socialist". I haven't see a GOP candidate actually advocate that (and mean it) for at least two decades, and now going on three.
RTFA indicates that this is almost identical to the ballistic computer (aka gunsight computer) found in practically any modern MBT or IFV. They've shrunk it down and merged it with a rifle. However, they've once again failed the "Just because we CAN, doesn't mean we SHOULD" question.
It's what taking a $400 M-16 and mating it with a new 25mm grenade launcher, then running it through the Military Industrial Complex gets you: a $800,000 weapon that's too bulky to use, of marginal benefit, and of questionable utility.
Honestly, the Marine Corp and British Marines have a solution that works far better than either the OICW or this new gadget: it's called PRACTICE. I'm willing to bet that putting in a couple of dozen hours at a local shooting range would do the potential buyer of this gadget far more good. Not to mention saving them $15k or more. I also seriously doubt this "system" is rugged enough to be used (and abused) in the field for any length of time, even just for hunting. Even by pampered super-rich hunting dilettantes.
Sometimes, technology just gets in the way of getting things done.
Too much power needed for GPU these days...
on
But Can It Run Crysis 3?
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· Score: 3, Informative
The bad part is the "recommended" graphics card is now the upper level of the mid-range, the Nvidia 560 or 660, and the ATI 5870.
This is becoming a real big issue for Graphics cards, far more than video RAM or any other part of the system.
The problem is that the upper-mid-range cards now require *very* significant power. The 560/660 and 5870 above really require TWO 6-pin supplemental power connectors, since they're now pulling 200W under load. The problem there is that this means a 500W+ power supply, and ONLY high-end workstations or custom gaming rigs have those, so you're inherently cutting out the section of the population which games, has a pretty beefy rig, but got a pre-made system from HP/Dell/whomever, none of which have more than a 400W (and usually a 300W) power supply.
I'm a excellent example: I happen to have a HP Z210 workstation - that's a Xeon E3-1200-class CPU (which kicks the crap out of everything consumer-class, including the i7 series), 16GB of RAM, and an SSD. Yet, it was only designed with a 400W power supply, as it was targeted for mid-level pro graphics. I've been looking, and the absolutely fastest GPU I can use is the Nvidia 650 Ti; everything else draws too much power. Consumer PCs are in an even worse situation, since they might have a high-end i5 Ivy bridge CPU, but they've only got 350W power supplies, which probably can't even drive my 650 Ti, let alone a 660. So, you're looking at having to buy a system for $1500 (sans graphics card) rather than $500 to play these games.
Realistically, game makers need to target the lower-mid-range cards - at least, they have to be able to play very well at around 1680x1050 or 1440x900 on one of those lower-power-draw cards (e.g. Nvidia 650 or AMD 7850).
Frankly, I think this is going to be a *big* drag on the PC Gaming industry, since unless they can convince Nvidia/AMD to cut down on the power-draw requirements, or somehow get PC makers to beef up their PS more, new games won't be able to run reasonably on ANYTHING not a custom gaming rig. And that's a *tiny* portion of the market.
And, EVERYONE else has to do it, so why should software get a free pass?
Software has gotten completely away from this, to its detriment. I'm not talking about being bug-free. I'm not even talking about being able to prevent "evil exploits", though programs which fail basic standards of secuity should be held to the same standards that any other product should. What I am talking about is that the program (let's say a word processor) doesn't crash repeatedly when run on OSes it is sold as "compatible" with, doesn't randomly delete your data, or doesn't read your on-line cookies and insert your name, SSN, and credit card number into the file format when you save the document. That is, software should have to do EXACTLY what it says it does, and nothing more. Any deviation from that should require a FREE FIX from the manufacturer, in a short amount of time, and manufacturers should be liable for unreasonable (in the legal sense) damage that it causes (e.g. in the case of a word processor, if it decided to erase your system drive, that's unreasonable, and the mfg owes you damages, but deleting a saved file, while requiring a fix, shouldn't trigger damages).
It's time we quite treating software as something so horribly unique and different than any other possible thing that humankind has ever developed that NONE of the prior rules on warranties, fitness of purpose, or consumer protection should ever apply.
All other manufacturers manage to deal quite well with product liability, so why is software supposed to be so different? Remember, product liability is about things that are unreasonably broken, or that the manufacturer knew about, and refused to fix and still cause damage. It's not about being able to hunt down all the heisenbugs ever possible.
As the VFA (Very Fine Article) points out, detail is nice, up until it interferes with gameplay. Naturally, where that line is depends entirely on the the style of gameplay and the actual mechanics of the game in question. Therefore, there can be no general answer to this question. However, the intelligent answer is "Detail level should be part of the Requirements Process"; that is, the level of detail should be explicitly set to not interfere with gameplay, and it should be a QA requirement to make sure it doesn't (and appropriate feedback should go to the development team to dial detail back when it does).
Personally, I play mostly 4X and RTS games these days (my 40-year-old reflexes doom (no pun intended) me in any FPS, and I hate RPGs). I've noticed that 4X/RTS games are now very much at (or over) the line where detail interferes with gameplay. Take Civ5 for example: the ability to zoom down and see in great model-like rendering your units and cities "feels" really cool, but (a) it's completely orthogonal to playing the game, and (b) it places serious limits on the size and scope of the game itself. Frankly, I'm much happier with non-infinitely-zoomable 4X/RTS games, since the point isn't to watch the equivalent of a FPS happening, it's too conquer the universe/world, and micromanaging (or viewing) individual units is actually anathema to something that is supposed to be Strategic in viewpoint. For these genres, bitmapped icons are effectively the minimum necessary detail, and everything else is Eye Candy. Eye Candy should never interfere with the point of the whole game.
Detail for detail's sake is stupid. Frankly, game mechanics matter far more than detail; game reviewers also need to adjust their reviews to penalize game developers when detail interferes with gameplay.
Firstly, TFA is dead wrong in stating that human population has been relatively stable throughout most human history. This is blatantly false, for anyone who has bothered to look at the historical record. In pre-history, human populations have varied wildly, from up to several dozen million to possibly as low as several tens of thousands. Likewise, once "civilization" has started, human populations have obeyed a rather steadily increasing geometric curve. We notice now because we're finally at the heel portion of the hockeystick curve where the numbers start increasing quickly.
Secondly, the decline in number of children per woman is primarily tied to increasing Woman's Rights in a society. The closer women are treated like property (both culturally and legally), the higher the number of children borne, and the inverse when women and men are treated equally. Women's Rights is also closely correlated (and, likely a causative factor) in development of a significant middle class. Religion only has an impact in so far as it affects Women's Rights (which, it certainly can have a very negative impact).
Also, there are two major factors that aren't really addressed in TFA: lack of energy, and water. Advanced civilizations require ludicrously larger amounts of power than low-tech societies, and, even with conservation, this isn't going to change. We need power to run our 1st world countries, and the more everyone else tries to emulate us, power requirements will be exponential (probably high exponential) in growth. Until we have real clean energy, this energy demand and the side effects of providing energy is going to be the number one environmental pressure. On the other hand, (decreasing) access to clean water for both drinking and agriculture is something that is radically reshaping societies, as we can't really de-salinize enough to make a difference at this point, and we're well on our way to draining many historical water sources out of existence. Water will be the new oil which people fight over, likely very, very soon. It's already a major friction point in the Middle East and Indian subcontinental areas.
To quote the old Chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times."
While the effects you describe are definitely real and a huge issue, significant-footprint EMP really requires a thermonuclear device, not a "small" fission one.
For maximum EMP damage, 10,000 feet is far too low an altitude. You want a minimum of 50km altitude. So, to do a EMP, you must have orbital launch capability (i.e. Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile or better capability). Loading a nuke onboard a plane and detonating it at 40,000 feet won't work for producing an EMP of any effect.
Maximum area of the EMP is limited to "line of sight" to the detonation point. So, detonating higher in the atmosphere gives a larger potential EMP radius. However, the higher the altitude, the lower the total amount of radiated energy from the blast converted into EMP. This is primarily due to the atmosphere absorbing a significant amount of the energy before it reaches ground level. And, of course, EMP is not some binary works-or-not; it's a power level, and each device has a different level of interference that it can withstand before frying. So, you're faced with a tradeoff: the higher you detonate the warhead, the larger the potential area of the EMP, but the weaker the EMP is throughout the entire area.
Realistically speaking, warheads under 100kt don't produce usable EMP. At the minimum effective EMP altitude of about 30km, 100kt produces a useful EMP (one which will fry unshielded simple commercial electronics) directly underneath the weapon detonation, perhaps in a hectare or so. A 200kt weapon (the maximum effective yield of a non-boosted, pure fission weapon) could produce a EMP with maybe a few km or so radius.
Effective EMP areas require 300-400kt or more, which requires, at minimum, a boosted fission/fusion weapon, which is much more difficult to build than a pure fission weapon. With these, you might be able to get an EMP radius of 50-100km or so. To get the really big EMP, you need a thermonuclear weapon, ideally in the low MT range (2-5MT). These are the weapons that were used in the USA and USSR's Fractional Orbital Bombardment systems you read about in fiction books. They can produce the 1000km+ radius effects.
Given all the above, to do any real EMP, you need BOTH orbital launch capability, AND boosted fission nuclear weapon ability. At this point, a total of 6 countries (USA, Russia, UK, France, China, India) have this ability, with two possibly working on it (Pakistan, North Korea), and nobody else getting there anytime soon (even Israel is unlikely to have the requisite missile capability). In the big scheme of things, not something that we really have to worry about more than general nuclear weapon use, as EMP use is far beyond the capabilities of any non-state actor, and fairly obvious if any state-level attempt is being made to produce one.
All the above criticisms about unstable governments (and leaders) is valid, though the original article did have some interesting points about stability in international relations.
All the article's points are completely moot, however, as it doesn't discuss non-state actors at all. That is, organizations which are NOT governments tied to geographic locations. And, there is where the problem with nukes lie.
Proliferation means an increasing risk that non-state actors will get their hands on nukes. And, non-state actors are bound (and influenced by) none of the inhibiting factors that governments have, when dealing with possible use of nukes. Indeed, mere possession of a nuke by a non-state actor is something almost guarantied to start a war, instantly. Because, there is very little down side to using said nuke by that non-state actor.
I'd be interested in seeing a good analysis of exactly WHY something like the Keystone XL pipeline (or the OP's huge number of railcars) is necessary for shipping crude to the Gulf Coast.
I realize that 80% of the US's refineries are on the Gulf, but, given a couple of things:
The tar sands are *relatively* clumped together in Alberta
After a re-alignment of oil sources, the vast majority of tar sands oil will be used domestically (Canada and USA)
building a refinery is expensive, but we need the extra capacity anyway
refining close to the tar sands extraction site reduces the total requirements for transport of the final products (i.e. the oil source to refinery to recipient); that is, not only do you reduce the total volume of end product being produced (as refining 1 gallon of crude produces under 1 gallon of end-products), but you can ship end products essentially directly from the tar sands to end-users. Given that the distance from the Gulf to the end-users is no shorter than from Alberta to the end-users, this saves a whole lot of transportation costs for the crude oil.
what's the cost differential between building the Keystone XL vs a large refinery (or a couple) up in Alberta?
Something similar goes for the various Shale gas extractions - I would think that it would be far better to build power generation (since that's where 90% of the gas is going to go) right near the gas fields, and then spend money on an upgraded Power Grid, rather than try to ship the gas around to existing power stations.
Basically, I think we're falling into the trap where we just assume that transportation is less expensive than co-location of end use. I'd far rather pay for another refinery and gas power stations (added capacity) AND a better power grid, than cough up the same amount for just another couple of pipelines (which, frankly, all they add is environmental disaster potential).
I didn't mean to imply that you could match a bullet to a gun to an owner via a gun's serial number. As maryland's experience shows, matching a bullet to some database of previously-fired bullets is very hard to do.
The "aid to investigation" from a gun's serial number is when the gun is actually found, the serial number gives a place to start investigating the ownership record (i.e. tracking).
That's exactly what the microstamping would do - once you found a case at the scene of a crime, police could look up the number in the database and figure out who registered the gun it was fired from, then start their investigation there as to where the gun was last seen, et al. Microstamping is significantly different than bullet ballistics matching.
The "truth" I'm referring to is the societal sense of "truth" we seem to come to regarding a situation - that is, what we (as a society) tend to collectively assign as the "most likely probability" of what happened. Think of it as the "truth" that is arrived at in a courtroom - it's an imperfect picture at best, but one which we ascribe to as the actual event. "Truth" tends to be a social illusion, allowing us to feel confident that we understand the situation. It may or may not accurately reflect the actual event.
"What really happened" is hard to describe, but I'd say that it's what recording the entire scene, beginning to end, from all possible angles so nothing was missed would produce, plus being able to fully understand everyone's intentions and how actions reflected those intentions. That is, "what really happened" is the full, actual event.
Just like any smart criminal will remember to scratch off the serial number on the gun he's using, so it can't be traced?
Oh, right, that doesn't actually happen for the vast majority of cases. The fact that someone might be able to circumvent this doesn't negate its usefulness.
In fact, all those schemes people present to collect or prevent brass from being lost are impractical at best, and highly unlikely to be implemented by the common criminal. Remember, gun crimes are almost exclusively crimes of passion or with no forethought, and even in crimes where planning is well-done, the actual crime tends to be a very high-stress situation, and people are extremely likely to make mistakes.
And, how does this hinder legit gun ownership more any more than having a serial number on the gun frame? Oh, that's right, it DOESN'T.
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Large corporate environments chance at a glacial speed. If anything, they merely add, never subtract - the proportion of Fortune 1000 companies which have mission-critical mainframes is close to 100%, as it has been for the past 50 years. Similarly, pretty much all of them still have a VAX or AS/400 similar mini-computer running something critical. The waves of consultant-pushed fads wash over these institutions with virtually no effect. They all run small "incubator" tech-evalutation groups so they can sort out which of the new tech is likely to produce useful ROI, but the actual adoption rates of these new techs is very slow.
Mid-sized companies are pretty similar, though they're a bit more aggressive with dumping older technology. They don't generally replace it with cutting edge stuff, though, since that's a huge risk they don't want to take. Pretty much every "tech upgrade" I've ever seen in this space is replacing a 30-year-old setup with a design which first showed up a decade before. Mid-sized companies go for solidly-proven tech.
Little companies are where the most change happens, for the good and bad. The bad side is that many small companies don't have the expertise to handle the adoption of new processes and tech properly, and thus screw it all up, and then kill the company. I've seen this happen at both small tech AND non-tech companies, where an insufficiently funded/staffed/knowledgable IT "department" killed the company. Literally. The good is that small companies are where the experimentation happens, and, particularly in tech-oriented ones, it's where the next wave of computing is really prototyped then refined.
The general answer to the article is that any sane company's IT department will look 90% identical to what it is now in 10 years, and even in 50 years will almost certainly still be at least 50% identical. For those able to handle the risk, things will chance on a decade-by-decade basis; but, the reality is, those companies will either have died or turned into mature (and risk adverse) companies by then. So, while the small company space is a place of rapid change in IT, at a specific company, a period of rapid evolution will be followed either by death of the company, or evolution to the long-term stability type.
The short of it is: NEVER trust a consultant trying to predict the future for you. Particularly if they're extrapolating on "new" tech.
The short answer to your question is: YES, no matter what subfield of computing you go into (Networking, Systems, Software Engineering, QA, Release, or Project Management) you'll need advanced Maths. Which advanced maths depend on the specific subfield. But the reality is, you're far better off knowing most of the stuff that a 2nd-year Math major has to take.
If you're a Software Engineer (and, to a lesser extent, QA), you'll likely need the Maths which help you describe real-world actions or model real-world happenings. This means Geometry, Trig, Calc, plus Maths common in Physics, plus application-specific stuff, like various Linear Algebra, Complexity, Markov Modeling, Game Theory, etc. Basically, Software Engineering has the biggest demand on Math knowledge, but it varies according to the type of project you're on.
Networking and Systems depend heavily on the Linear Algebra and Discrete Math fields, particularly Set Theory, Game Theory, Complexity/Computability, and Graph Theory. Most of this is not writing down equations, but having an intuitive understanding of the problem being presented because you've had the requisite background. For instance - modeling network traffic flow and determining system load both require Graph Theory and Complexity, but it wouldn't be immediately obvious to the outsider.
Release and Project Management are less Math-intentive, but it's still important to have college-level Maths as a strong foundation. Complexity/Computability, Linear Algebra, and, particularly, Statistics, Graph and Game Theory are cornerstones of these fields.
The reality is that Math is a significant part of any Computer Science degree, and is critical in daily professional use. Outside specific programming positions (e.g. those involved in modeling of some kind), it's not the same use as a Civil Engineer or the like would be using Maths. But you have to be comfortable thinking about Maths, and you need to have significant educational background to be successful.
Personally, beyond Geometry and Trig, I'd think that you'll have to take about 6 semesters of some sort of Math in a reasonably rigorous CompSci program. You'll probably only use 3 of those courses on a regular basis, but you'll never know WHICH 3 you'll be using at, so you need all of them.
If you find Math difficult, tedious, or boring, you need to seriously rethink a CompSci degree (and, by extension, a career in something normally requiring a CompSci degree). Or you need to talk with your Maths professors/teachers, and figure out why you have difficulty or are bored during Math classes. Either way, it's a required skill for the profession.
...I've got a bridge somewhere that needs to be sold that you might be interested in.
Bitcoin does irrefutability (i.e. the ability to prove that a transaction occurred, and occurred only once). I can thus prove that I do, in fact, own all Bitcoin I possess.
It never has been anonymous. There are characteristics that make it more difficult to trace the payer, but the protocol and implementation have never been configured (or designed) to be a strongly anonymous technology.
You (and the +5 poster a thread or two up) misunderstand "transformative" use.
The proper analogy to video gameplay has already been decided on by the courts, and it is written plays (which, also applies to screenwriting).
All three take another work, and produce an interpretation of that work. The original playwright/screenwriter/videogame author still is the owner of the base copyright being used, and the work is classified as a Derivative Work. The performer has also contributed significant copyrightable-product, but the genesis and base of the entire (new) work still rests on the original play/screenplay/game.
Also, just because something is "transformative" doesn't absolve it of the requirements to be of "limited" domain. Using the entirety of a video game (artwork included) in your new LP video is pretty much the definition of "not limited".
I've looked at a couple of those videos, and the amount of content which is copyrightable Nintendo (or whomever the on-screen game author is) is WAAAAAY beyond anything allowable for Fair Use or similar exception.
I'm certainly not in favor of Nintendo or the like suing these folks for copyright infringement. The "unique performance" issue is certainly one which can be discussed, but I liken this to plays - sure, the individual performance of a play is unique, but since you didn't write the script, you can't expect to be profiting from the performance without the author's permission.
Thus, I can't see why the authors of these videos are complaining that Nintendo gets the ad revenue. I think that's an entirely reasonable compromise - Nintendo essentially implicitly licenses the video authors to show those derivative-work videos, in return for the publicity and the ad revenue.
Nintendo, of course, could be much less tone-deaf about saying the preceding, of course.
But, in the end, those videos are derivative-works under copyright law, and they can't be shown without some sort of license.
MoveOn.org isn't solely a 503(c).4 organization. They're very explicitly split into two branches: the main site, which engages in all the permissible organizational and democratic (small 'd') stuff, and the MoveOn PAC, which explicitly is a registered PAC and does promote candidates and specific issues. Their books are separate, and open, and the sections of the web site where PAC vs 503 stuff goes on is clearly demarked. Donations are also clearly marked as to whether you're giving to the PAC or the 503.
The problem with many of the newer 503(c).4 organizations is that they:
(a) don't file the appropriate paperwork, so it's hard to see if they're complying with the reporting and transparency requirements
(b) Engage in activities that are, at best, grey advocacy, and at worst, outright political support of individuals and issues.
I do agree that we need more auditing, and that the selection of who to target was wrong. But that doesn't mean there isn't a serious problem on the Right around this, particularly since there's been a whole lot more money poured into Right Wing 503(c).4 orgs in the past 4 years, and also because the vast majority of these organizations seem to be very heavily politicized, and much less socially-oriented.
FYI - laws say it's fine for a 503(c).4 to advocate certain general positions (i.e. "Clean Water", "Less Coal, more Wind", and do what used to be called "Community Organizing"), so long as they did not promote specific candidates or parties or legislation/initiatives. The problem has been that may 503(c).4 orgs aren't obeying those restrictions. That is, you see a lot of Left-Wing 503(c) doing general voter registration and promoting Big Causes. Recent Right Wing stuff has heavily been oriented around "Defeat taxation" and "Stop Immigration" and the like, which leads (or is intended) to be mostly legislative lobbying, which is NOT OK for a 503(c).4
First off, I do think it was politically motivated, at least in the extent that someone decided to do something that would be looked favorably on the higher-ups. That's not OK, and people should get fired for it.
However, do note that what they are discussing here is auditing 503(c).4 organizations, to make sure they were complying with the regulations.
That is, these organizations are supposed to be engaging in NON-POLITICAL activities, for which we give them the benefit of being non-profit (and, making donations to them tax deductible).
There's been an explosion of 503(c).4 organizations over the past 4 years (after the Citizen's United decision), and a large number of them have been funded from "right-wing" sources. These organizations have been very lax about filing the proper paperwork about their donors, and in fact, have been downright secretive. And many of them are engaging in activities that very much skirt the line (if not cross it entirely) of political advocacy. The quantity of money (and number of organizations) engaged in this kind of shadowy advocacy/political support is very seriously tilted towards right-wing sources.
The fact is this: if you want to engage in political activity, then fine. Government can and should not have any say about your content. But if you want to get tax-free benefits, then there's a certain set of rules that you MUST play by, and claiming that this is suppressing Free Speech because we won't give you the benefit while you violate the rules is sophistry.
All 503(c).4 organizations need more scrutiny. I'm pretty sure that the IRS was engaging in the equivalent of racial profiling here, with the added notion of pleasing some political higher-ups. But at the end of the day, if those 503(c).4 organizations were breaking the law, then it's hard to say the IRS wasn't doing it's job by auditing them.
OK, first off, tracking such objects is a useful exercise, for many reasons, not just for the OMG, WE'RE GONNA GET HIT, crowd.
Unfortunately, it's practically useless for the purpose it's being touted for. That is, to give short notice warning of an impending impact.
Firstly, given the design criteria, we're looking at 48 hours notice, maximum, before an impact. Note that at the outer edge of this prediction envelope, it's a predicted impact - that is, one with a significant change of impact, but not a certainty of one. Now, hopefully, people would take this as seriously as we now do Tsunami Warnings. But think about it one more step:
Secondly, the impact area simply can't be computed until relatively shortly before impact. That is, if we detect the incoming meteor 48 hours ahead of time, it will take a couple of hours to compute a rough impact zone (meaning, just which part of the GLOBE it will hit), and likely you won't have a decent small error probability zone (meaning, something less than 100 miles across) until 12 hours or less before impact.
Does anyone think that a 12 hour warning of an impact can have any actual damage mitigation effect? Sure, if the area being hit has (a) a relatively low population, AND (b) a very good transportation system. But virtually all places on the Earth fail at one of those. There's simply no way to effectively evacuate even a mid-size city in time, and it's not like you can put everyone into blast shelters like the old Nuclear War scenarios wanted us to do.
So, spend the money on ATLAS, and get ourselves some great astrometric data for future use. It just won't be any sort of useful in terms of damage avoidance.
-Erik
This is interesting, since all the scientific data I've seen says that ultimately, Venus is far better than Mars as a target for Terraforming, yet this research is claiming that Venus is far outside the habitable zone, while Mars is smack in the middle of it.
Mars simply lacks two things: (1) the ability to generate a good strong magnetic field (too small, and no molten iron core), so it gets constantly bombarded with far more solar radiation than terrestrial life can stand outdoors, and (b) its much smaller mass and lack of magnetic field make is impossible for Mars to hold an atmosphere that's much more than it has now. So the result is that, while Mars superficially seems a better place for life now, there's no good way for us to transplant onto Mars without having to either live underground or under thick domes.
Venus, on the other hand, already generates a good magnetic field, and has no problem holding a significant atmosphere. It's just too hot and toxic. But a couple thousand tons of bacteria into the upper atmosphere will solve that problem, so Venus is actually the best candidate to turn into an Earth-like place.
I guess we'll have to look for two criteria: (1) which planets are most likely to have Earth-like indigenous life on them, and (2) which planets are best suited to be terraformed for occupation by us.
Like I said, interesting...
-Erik
You forget the place that Java has had the most success: Enterprise computing.
I'll agree that the sum total of the Java Plugin + JDK Libraries + JVM provides too much opportunity to attack on the desktop / web app space. There's simply too many flaws in the plugin and libraries. The JVM itself, though, is very solid (fewer than 10 major flaws over 15 years).
However, Java as a middleware platform is simply far better than any of the alternatives, and that's where I expect it to remain. Insulated from the types of attacks that render Java dangerous on the desktop, middleware app servers play directly to Java's big strengths: speed, ease of development, and massive library support, plus a framework which helps discourage the types of coding flaws that hurt middleware computing the most. Java will likely remain king of middlewhere for a long time, and deservedly so.
On the desktop or as a downloadable app, well, yes, Java is simply never going to measure up to the better cross-platform alternatives.
-Erik
To a certain extent, you're correct.
However, part of the social contract that exists to support Copyright, is the implicit agreement that "We (society) allow you to protect your item, and in return you make more of them so we can use them". Failure to live up to that implicit contract (i.e. sequestering I.P.) on the content provider's end voids the social contract (i.e. consumer's promise to respect Copyright).
I'm not a big fan of many of the justifications for copyright infringement, but in cases of "lost" authorship or abandonware or failure to publish or deliberate removal of a product from market, the I.P. author has effectively forfeited any rights they have.
Simple:
I worked at Sun for 6 years in the JVM group before the acquisition. I stayed on for another 1.5 years before I left. I only know a handful of people there anymore, and they're staying simply to ride it out to retirement (all are in their 50s). Over three dozen people I used to work with are gone, and there's no decent replacements.
Basically, people used to working "the Sun Way" detested the new "Oracle Way" and decamped en masse between 2009 and 2011. The whole Java division is a shadow of itself, and won't ever recover.
You missed the point of my comment.
"Small Government" Republicans don't want any restrictions on businesses, and think all "services" (as you point out) should be either individual contribution or charity, but they're big into legislated morality.
Hence, the concept that all they want to regulate (or have the government care about) is what kind of sex you're having.
At some point in the (now distant) past, "small government" republicans actually were for responsible spending, and that included basic services and some thing that a Tea Party person would rage at as "socialist". I haven't see a GOP candidate actually advocate that (and mean it) for at least two decades, and now going on three.
Actually, the Republican ideal of small government is just enough government that will fit in your bedroom.
RTFA indicates that this is almost identical to the ballistic computer (aka gunsight computer) found in practically any modern MBT or IFV. They've shrunk it down and merged it with a rifle. However, they've once again failed the "Just because we CAN, doesn't mean we SHOULD" question.
I saw this once before: Objective Individual Combat Weapon
It's what taking a $400 M-16 and mating it with a new 25mm grenade launcher, then running it through the Military Industrial Complex gets you: a $800,000 weapon that's too bulky to use, of marginal benefit, and of questionable utility.
Honestly, the Marine Corp and British Marines have a solution that works far better than either the OICW or this new gadget: it's called PRACTICE. I'm willing to bet that putting in a couple of dozen hours at a local shooting range would do the potential buyer of this gadget far more good. Not to mention saving them $15k or more. I also seriously doubt this "system" is rugged enough to be used (and abused) in the field for any length of time, even just for hunting. Even by pampered super-rich hunting dilettantes.
Sometimes, technology just gets in the way of getting things done.
The bad part is the "recommended" graphics card is now the upper level of the mid-range, the Nvidia 560 or 660, and the ATI 5870.
This is becoming a real big issue for Graphics cards, far more than video RAM or any other part of the system.
The problem is that the upper-mid-range cards now require *very* significant power. The 560/660 and 5870 above really require TWO 6-pin supplemental power connectors, since they're now pulling 200W under load. The problem there is that this means a 500W+ power supply, and ONLY high-end workstations or custom gaming rigs have those, so you're inherently cutting out the section of the population which games, has a pretty beefy rig, but got a pre-made system from HP/Dell/whomever, none of which have more than a 400W (and usually a 300W) power supply.
I'm a excellent example: I happen to have a HP Z210 workstation - that's a Xeon E3-1200-class CPU (which kicks the crap out of everything consumer-class, including the i7 series), 16GB of RAM, and an SSD. Yet, it was only designed with a 400W power supply, as it was targeted for mid-level pro graphics. I've been looking, and the absolutely fastest GPU I can use is the Nvidia 650 Ti; everything else draws too much power. Consumer PCs are in an even worse situation, since they might have a high-end i5 Ivy bridge CPU, but they've only got 350W power supplies, which probably can't even drive my 650 Ti, let alone a 660. So, you're looking at having to buy a system for $1500 (sans graphics card) rather than $500 to play these games.
Realistically, game makers need to target the lower-mid-range cards - at least, they have to be able to play very well at around 1680x1050 or 1440x900 on one of those lower-power-draw cards (e.g. Nvidia 650 or AMD 7850).
Frankly, I think this is going to be a *big* drag on the PC Gaming industry, since unless they can convince Nvidia/AMD to cut down on the power-draw requirements, or somehow get PC makers to beef up their PS more, new games won't be able to run reasonably on ANYTHING not a custom gaming rig. And that's a *tiny* portion of the market.
-Erik
And, EVERYONE else has to do it, so why should software get a free pass?
Software has gotten completely away from this, to its detriment. I'm not talking about being bug-free. I'm not even talking about being able to prevent "evil exploits", though programs which fail basic standards of secuity should be held to the same standards that any other product should. What I am talking about is that the program (let's say a word processor) doesn't crash repeatedly when run on OSes it is sold as "compatible" with, doesn't randomly delete your data, or doesn't read your on-line cookies and insert your name, SSN, and credit card number into the file format when you save the document. That is, software should have to do EXACTLY what it says it does, and nothing more. Any deviation from that should require a FREE FIX from the manufacturer, in a short amount of time, and manufacturers should be liable for unreasonable (in the legal sense) damage that it causes (e.g. in the case of a word processor, if it decided to erase your system drive, that's unreasonable, and the mfg owes you damages, but deleting a saved file, while requiring a fix, shouldn't trigger damages).
It's time we quite treating software as something so horribly unique and different than any other possible thing that humankind has ever developed that NONE of the prior rules on warranties, fitness of purpose, or consumer protection should ever apply.
All other manufacturers manage to deal quite well with product liability, so why is software supposed to be so different? Remember, product liability is about things that are unreasonably broken, or that the manufacturer knew about, and refused to fix and still cause damage. It's not about being able to hunt down all the heisenbugs ever possible.
-Erik
As the VFA (Very Fine Article) points out, detail is nice, up until it interferes with gameplay. Naturally, where that line is depends entirely on the the style of gameplay and the actual mechanics of the game in question. Therefore, there can be no general answer to this question. However, the intelligent answer is "Detail level should be part of the Requirements Process"; that is, the level of detail should be explicitly set to not interfere with gameplay, and it should be a QA requirement to make sure it doesn't (and appropriate feedback should go to the development team to dial detail back when it does).
Personally, I play mostly 4X and RTS games these days (my 40-year-old reflexes doom (no pun intended) me in any FPS, and I hate RPGs). I've noticed that 4X/RTS games are now very much at (or over) the line where detail interferes with gameplay. Take Civ5 for example: the ability to zoom down and see in great model-like rendering your units and cities "feels" really cool, but (a) it's completely orthogonal to playing the game, and (b) it places serious limits on the size and scope of the game itself. Frankly, I'm much happier with non-infinitely-zoomable 4X/RTS games, since the point isn't to watch the equivalent of a FPS happening, it's too conquer the universe/world, and micromanaging (or viewing) individual units is actually anathema to something that is supposed to be Strategic in viewpoint. For these genres, bitmapped icons are effectively the minimum necessary detail, and everything else is Eye Candy. Eye Candy should never interfere with the point of the whole game.
Detail for detail's sake is stupid. Frankly, game mechanics matter far more than detail; game reviewers also need to adjust their reviews to penalize game developers when detail interferes with gameplay.
Firstly, TFA is dead wrong in stating that human population has been relatively stable throughout most human history. This is blatantly false, for anyone who has bothered to look at the historical record. In pre-history, human populations have varied wildly, from up to several dozen million to possibly as low as several tens of thousands. Likewise, once "civilization" has started, human populations have obeyed a rather steadily increasing geometric curve. We notice now because we're finally at the heel portion of the hockeystick curve where the numbers start increasing quickly.
Secondly, the decline in number of children per woman is primarily tied to increasing Woman's Rights in a society. The closer women are treated like property (both culturally and legally), the higher the number of children borne, and the inverse when women and men are treated equally. Women's Rights is also closely correlated (and, likely a causative factor) in development of a significant middle class. Religion only has an impact in so far as it affects Women's Rights (which, it certainly can have a very negative impact).
Also, there are two major factors that aren't really addressed in TFA: lack of energy, and water. Advanced civilizations require ludicrously larger amounts of power than low-tech societies, and, even with conservation, this isn't going to change. We need power to run our 1st world countries, and the more everyone else tries to emulate us, power requirements will be exponential (probably high exponential) in growth. Until we have real clean energy, this energy demand and the side effects of providing energy is going to be the number one environmental pressure. On the other hand, (decreasing) access to clean water for both drinking and agriculture is something that is radically reshaping societies, as we can't really de-salinize enough to make a difference at this point, and we're well on our way to draining many historical water sources out of existence. Water will be the new oil which people fight over, likely very, very soon. It's already a major friction point in the Middle East and Indian subcontinental areas.
To quote the old Chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times."
While the effects you describe are definitely real and a huge issue, significant-footprint EMP really requires a thermonuclear device, not a "small" fission one.
For maximum EMP damage, 10,000 feet is far too low an altitude. You want a minimum of 50km altitude. So, to do a EMP, you must have orbital launch capability (i.e. Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile or better capability). Loading a nuke onboard a plane and detonating it at 40,000 feet won't work for producing an EMP of any effect.
Maximum area of the EMP is limited to "line of sight" to the detonation point. So, detonating higher in the atmosphere gives a larger potential EMP radius. However, the higher the altitude, the lower the total amount of radiated energy from the blast converted into EMP. This is primarily due to the atmosphere absorbing a significant amount of the energy before it reaches ground level. And, of course, EMP is not some binary works-or-not; it's a power level, and each device has a different level of interference that it can withstand before frying. So, you're faced with a tradeoff: the higher you detonate the warhead, the larger the potential area of the EMP, but the weaker the EMP is throughout the entire area.
Realistically speaking, warheads under 100kt don't produce usable EMP. At the minimum effective EMP altitude of about 30km, 100kt produces a useful EMP (one which will fry unshielded simple commercial electronics) directly underneath the weapon detonation, perhaps in a hectare or so. A 200kt weapon (the maximum effective yield of a non-boosted, pure fission weapon) could produce a EMP with maybe a few km or so radius.
Effective EMP areas require 300-400kt or more, which requires, at minimum, a boosted fission/fusion weapon, which is much more difficult to build than a pure fission weapon. With these, you might be able to get an EMP radius of 50-100km or so. To get the really big EMP, you need a thermonuclear weapon, ideally in the low MT range (2-5MT). These are the weapons that were used in the USA and USSR's Fractional Orbital Bombardment systems you read about in fiction books. They can produce the 1000km+ radius effects.
Given all the above, to do any real EMP, you need BOTH orbital launch capability, AND boosted fission nuclear weapon ability. At this point, a total of 6 countries (USA, Russia, UK, France, China, India) have this ability, with two possibly working on it (Pakistan, North Korea), and nobody else getting there anytime soon (even Israel is unlikely to have the requisite missile capability). In the big scheme of things, not something that we really have to worry about more than general nuclear weapon use, as EMP use is far beyond the capabilities of any non-state actor, and fairly obvious if any state-level attempt is being made to produce one.
-Erik
All the above criticisms about unstable governments (and leaders) is valid, though the original article did have some interesting points about stability in international relations.
All the article's points are completely moot, however, as it doesn't discuss non-state actors at all. That is, organizations which are NOT governments tied to geographic locations. And, there is where the problem with nukes lie.
Proliferation means an increasing risk that non-state actors will get their hands on nukes. And, non-state actors are bound (and influenced by) none of the inhibiting factors that governments have, when dealing with possible use of nukes. Indeed, mere possession of a nuke by a non-state actor is something almost guarantied to start a war, instantly. Because, there is very little down side to using said nuke by that non-state actor.
-Erik
I'd be interested in seeing a good analysis of exactly WHY something like the Keystone XL pipeline (or the OP's huge number of railcars) is necessary for shipping crude to the Gulf Coast.
I realize that 80% of the US's refineries are on the Gulf, but, given a couple of things:
Something similar goes for the various Shale gas extractions - I would think that it would be far better to build power generation (since that's where 90% of the gas is going to go) right near the gas fields, and then spend money on an upgraded Power Grid, rather than try to ship the gas around to existing power stations.
Basically, I think we're falling into the trap where we just assume that transportation is less expensive than co-location of end use. I'd far rather pay for another refinery and gas power stations (added capacity) AND a better power grid, than cough up the same amount for just another couple of pipelines (which, frankly, all they add is environmental disaster potential).
-Erik
I didn't mean to imply that you could match a bullet to a gun to an owner via a gun's serial number. As maryland's experience shows, matching a bullet to some database of previously-fired bullets is very hard to do.
The "aid to investigation" from a gun's serial number is when the gun is actually found, the serial number gives a place to start investigating the ownership record (i.e. tracking).
That's exactly what the microstamping would do - once you found a case at the scene of a crime, police could look up the number in the database and figure out who registered the gun it was fired from, then start their investigation there as to where the gun was last seen, et al. Microstamping is significantly different than bullet ballistics matching.
-Erik
The "truth" I'm referring to is the societal sense of "truth" we seem to come to regarding a situation - that is, what we (as a society) tend to collectively assign as the "most likely probability" of what happened. Think of it as the "truth" that is arrived at in a courtroom - it's an imperfect picture at best, but one which we ascribe to as the actual event. "Truth" tends to be a social illusion, allowing us to feel confident that we understand the situation. It may or may not accurately reflect the actual event.
"What really happened" is hard to describe, but I'd say that it's what recording the entire scene, beginning to end, from all possible angles so nothing was missed would produce, plus being able to fully understand everyone's intentions and how actions reflected those intentions. That is, "what really happened" is the full, actual event.
-Erik
Just like any smart criminal will remember to scratch off the serial number on the gun he's using, so it can't be traced?
Oh, right, that doesn't actually happen for the vast majority of cases. The fact that someone might be able to circumvent this doesn't negate its usefulness.
In fact, all those schemes people present to collect or prevent brass from being lost are impractical at best, and highly unlikely to be implemented by the common criminal. Remember, gun crimes are almost exclusively crimes of passion or with no forethought, and even in crimes where planning is well-done, the actual crime tends to be a very high-stress situation, and people are extremely likely to make mistakes.
And, how does this hinder legit gun ownership more any more than having a serial number on the gun frame? Oh, that's right, it DOESN'T.
-Erik