After owning a 2006 Prius for a little over a year, I can say that a hybrid is about more than just miles per gallon. Yes, the mpg is good but that isn't the only good thing about them. Some other good things:
1) The electric/hybrid drive is nicer to drive in traffic because the electric drive makes it pull away from a stop much more cleanly and strongly than a non-hybrid drive with no revving-up motor.
2) The wear-and-tear stuff like like brake pads, mufflers, batteries, starter motors, clutch, transmission, starter motor, etc. is either gone or morphed into a much longer lifespan due to reduced wear. The only significant maintenance items on the Prius are oil changes and tire replacement.
3) The battery gives you a backup power source. I've already managed to run out of gas and the battery lets you keep on going for a couple of more miles to the freeway exit which was very cool.
4) The car can run a lot of electrical gear (if you get an inexpensive inverter) if you go car camping since it is basically a very quiet, efficient 60 hp generator. Toyota should offer an inverter option and a built-in outlet plug on the side for RV owners who tow one behind the RV.
5) The Prius is very cheap to drive.
6) The Prius has a very nice interior space layout (for a small car) with much more legroom than is typical thanks to its small transverse motor.
1) During a recent 1-week power failure, my neighbors needed my old-fashioned landline to make a phone call since they suffered from some combination of unavailable cell service and/or dead batteries.
2) Landlines show your location to the dispatcher if you call 9-1-1 while cell phones show the address of the cell tower you're using at that moment or your billing address or both.
3) There is no risk of brain tumors or cognitive effects with landlines.
4) Landlines can be used with a 'dial-up' connection for internet access.
I'm getting rid of the landline for good next week.
...they just want to kill Linux. Not a "good faith" manouver, but who cares? It's "Legal", so they will be able to win in court and then use that to get a national crackdown on all Linux distributions that aren't under the umbrella of firms that they have patent license agreements with.
That national crackdown is EXACTLY what will happen...and sooner rather than later. Microsot will sue some easy and vulnerable target, then get an injunction against distributions of ALL Linux distributions that are not under their licensing umbrella. Then they'll selectively use that to hammer on users. Then it won't be long before the BSA will be scanning for the presence of non-conforming linux during their 'audits' and disgruntled employees will be turning in their employers for having linux somewhere. If you want to buy Linux pre-installed on a pc, it will have to be Novell...and so on.
People here are underestimating the financial power, the tenacity and the absolute desperation of Microsoft. Microsoft will stop at nothing to keep their monopoly franchise.
1) The earth is warming due to an increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere 2) Humans are causing the atmospheric carbon dioxide increase 3) Humans can control the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration 4) A warming earth will cause bad things for humankind
You have to fervently believe in all four of these to be a true believer. If you don't, you're just another mindless neanderthal who doesn't care about the planet. The article questions No. 4 and should be ridiculed and banned, of course.
Every time a new versions of Windows appears, the spin machines crank up about problems with it and how great the old version was. This happens so consistently that it seems like the M$ pr/astroturfing machinery is behind it. Windows is a monopoly and Vista will be a sales success and that's all there is to say about Vista...until the next version of Windows appears and then everyone waxes nostalgic about the goodness of Vista.
They're doing better than MS or Sony right now, and selling more units, so I'm not saying this is all completely overhyped. But I would argue that any game manufacturer that can't make more than 259,000 units a month - especially one that's as relatively simple as the Wii, and especially one that's been on the market for six months now - has some serious problems.
Call the wii a lot of things...but it is most definitely not a simple machine. For example, just one of the 'wiimote' controllers with audio output, wireless connectivity, two-axis accelerometers, and onboard processor is more complex than an entire console was a few years ago. Nintendo's problem is obvious. They grossly underestimated the demand. They are selling 259,000 units a month because that was the most wildly optimistic forecast of their production needs based on anticipated sales. The problem of a shortage of wii game titles is obvious, too. The software game producers thought the wii would sell like the game cube and they put all of their resources into ps3 and xbox 360 titles. It will take another 6 months but then there is likely to be some absolutely killer titles for wii, from someone anyway.
The AMD/Intel dogfight is about way more than x86 market share...it's about the future of the hardware platform. Intel has always been restrained by competitors who will offer us a user-friendly alternative to whatever Intel and Microsoft are dreaming up. When Intel and Microsoft were pushing the CPUID, AMD refused to go along and Microsoft had to make do with a hardware profile they whip up from the onboard devices and serial numbers. If it was not for AMD, every web site you visit today would be able to read your cpu serial number and log your machine in as a unique visitor. Instead of the RIAA grabbing IP addresses and attempting to identify the user with some cumbersome legal process, they would just log your cpuid and subpoena the corresponding machine. Microsoft is still working to that end with whatever tools they can and they know that they need amd and intel completely and irrevocably in bed with them which they know cannot happen when amd and intel are still bitter competitors. So Microsoft has never done anything to help AMD and hopes that AMD is finally sinking for good.
So Microsoft is funding the Baystar investment in SCO that's behind all of this. Microsoft drops chump change and casts a 5-year cloud over IP FUD over Linux at the same time that Microsoft is ramping up their licensing fees, releasing a new DRM-crippled version of Windows called 'vista', and generally consolidating their worldwide windows franchise. In a normal marketplace, doing all of those customer-unfriendly things at once would cost you your customers. But with the SCO cloud hanging over Linux, it's value as a serious alternative to Windows for corporate and government customers has been severely compromised. Imagine for a moment that there had never been a SCO lawsuit. Maybe then HP, Dell, and Lenovo would be successfully hawking Linux desktops and laptops to rapidly growing corporate, government, and personal markets and Linux would be on magazine covers everywhere instead of...vista. So...you can call the SCO lawsuit a lot of things but you what you can NOT call it is a stupid move on Microsoft's part.
...is wrong. Should be the "Oh Sh*t!" department. Seems like the same kind of situation as when the Hubble Telescope was launched with the bad mirror and it's likely just as bad news for the forward progress of scientific knowledge. Says the article: "failure to account for the asymmetric loads in the engineering design of the magnet appears to be a likely cause..."
If your contention is that diseases are mistakes, then can you explain the ones that aren't our fault? Did your God accidentally create them? And if so, doesn't that put the lie to his supposed infallibility?
My contention is that creating cross-species life between sheep and humans is an unbelievably reckless thing to do that could only be done by arrogant people who do not respect all life as God's creation.
The disease called 'E. Coli' disease in the media is caused by a strain of Escherichia coli (0157:H7) created in the laboratory and accidently released into the wild that produces a deadly toxin causing severe illness in humans. Deaths and illness from the strain were first observed in 1982.
Humans create enormous amounts of disease every day by poor sanitation, inadequate nutrition, poor living conditions, war, exotic species migration, releasing toxic substances into the environment, letting greed guide our use of antibiotics, etc. The reckless creation of cross-species life between humans and sheep is just one more in a long list of human-caused misery driven by our failure to love our neighbors.
We know, of course, that the universe exploded into existence by accident, that life arose spontaneously in a primordial soup and that all life on Earth is ours to use in any way we can possibly conceive of. Our arrogance knows no limits. We don't just think there is no God, we know there is no God. We laugh with our unbridled contempt at anyone who would even think about the very idea of God as our creator. Only such people would create cross-species life between humans and sheep and we deserve everything that happens to us. That 'E. Coli' disease stuff that we will now live with forever that resulted from our late-70s recombinant DNA experiments with a ubiquitous bacterium was just a very minor warmup. We do it because we can.
This guy makes all sorts of conclusions and sweeping statements based on nothing more than...his opinion. His general implication is that there is some sort of innate 'biological' morality in all of us...which seems counter intuitive at best. For example, most pagan pre-Christian cultures have practiced human sacrifice, cannibalism, infanticide, genocide, euthanasia, slavery, murder for entertainment, etc. These are all things that the Christian gospels are opposed to and the widespread practice of these types of things has gradually declined over the last two thousand years with the spread of Christianity. Yet Hauser would have us think that this decline is due to some sort of genetic code kicking in. All of us are 'bloodthirsty' savages at heart and there is no avoiding that. Hauser needs to get out of the cocoon of the academic environment and travel a bit.
Over the next few days, as the department, the division and consultants from Microsoft Corp. and Dell Inc. labored to retrieve the data, it became obvious the worst-case scenario was at hand.
2) Always make sure the backup really works.
3) Better procedures are needed if a single tech can reformat both hard drives in the same session
4) Much better hardware and software are needed for data worth $38 billion.
5) Paper backups are a good last resort and as a check on data integrity
Kudos to the guy for standing up to the global warming fanatics. "Global Warming' is a subject where demagoguery prevails over reason. Talk shows, magazines, newspapers, and bloggers insist that everyone knows global warming is real, 'most scientists' agree that we are the cause, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is obviously ignorant, unenlightened, uncaring, selfish, and not very bright. The truth is that the earth has been warming for 10,000 years since the last ice age and no one actually KNOWS why. When some tiny intellect trots out the latest mumbo jumbo about CO2 levels and the greenhouse effect, they are attempting to claim (though they don't know it) that some computer model somewhere shows that the measured increase in CO2 over the last 40 years will increase global surface temperatures. The models are so poor and filled with so many assumptions that any such claim is meaningless. Things that affect global surface temperatures include variations in the sun's output, particulates in the atmosphere, cloud cover, atmospheric composition, variations in energy released from thermonuclear reactions in the earth's core, ocean circulation patterns, tectonic plate movements, and movements of the earth's magnetic pole. We can't possibly predict the future direction of ANY of these with our present knowledge. The next time someone starts talking about methane emissions from cows leading to global warming and rising sea levels, walk away. The earth may be warming but we are just going along for the ride.
we don't know what the effect of CO2 increases on surface temperatures will be. The temps may increase by 0.4F, 4F, 40F, 0.004F, or they may decrease by 4F. The predicted increase is based on computer modeling that is simply not good enough to predict this with the information available. Computer models have gotten better and better. We routinely get weather forecasts, based on the models, that are fairly accurate to 3 and 4 days into the future. But predictions 10 years out based on changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations, are far beyond the ability of the modelling. And 100 years out...laughable.
This is about respect for the truth, not about some politicized rush to action, based on false information. That never leads to a good result. There is no question that atmospheric co2 concentrations have increased from.00315 percent to.00375 percent since measurements began in 1958...but there is a LOT of question about whether that has any effect on global surface temperatures or what those levels are in relation to historical levels prior to when measurement began. The evidence that the earth is warming seems fairly solid as well as the evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have increased since measurements began in 1958. What is troubling are all of the people who want to connect those two things together as cause and effect. For example, there seems to be an assumption that co2 levels have increased solely due to the burning of fossil fuels by humans. There may be massive natural releases of carbon into the atomosphere occurring all over the planet that we are simply unaware of. For example, crustal plates contain a lot of the relatively light carbon that is likely to ultimately be released as a gas into the atmosphere by tectonic plate subduction processes that occur daily. Or massive natural gas seeps may be occurring on the ocean floor somewhere. Or massive deposits of carbonate rock may be dissolving. The co2 data actually suggests that some sort of natural process is at least contributing since the increase since 1958 is linear with a nearly constant slope while global fossil fuel consumption has increased dramatically since 1958. If we assume that co2 increases are entirely due to human fossil fuel use and that natural uptake of co2 is relatively constant, then the atmospheric co2 concentration should be increasing non-linearly to reflect the increased fossil fuel consumption since 1958. In fact, though, the measured global co2 concentration has increased completely linearly since 1968 and only slightly non-linearly between 1958 and 1968.
The evidence for global warming is strong, but I personally do not find it overwhelming, and the issue has become very politicized.
The evidence that the earth is warming seems fairly solid as well as the evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have increased since measurements began in 1958. What is troubling are all of the people who want to connect those two things together as cause and effect. For example, there seems to be an assumption that co2 levels have increased solely due to the burning of fossil fuels by humans. There may be massive natural releases of carbon into the atomosphere occurring all over the planet that we are simply unaware of. For example, crustal plates contain a lot of the relatively light carbon that is likely to ultimately be released as a gas into the atmosphere by tectonic plate subduction processes that occur daily. Or massive natural gas seeps may be occurring on the ocean floor somewhere. Or massive deposits of carbonate rock may be dissolving. The co2 data actually suggests that some sort of natural process is at least contributing since the increase since 1958 is linear with a nearly constant slope while global fossil fuel consumption has increased dramatically since 1958. If we assume that co2 increases are entirely due to human fossil fuel use and that natural uptake of co2 is relatively constant, then the atmospheric co2 concentration should increase very non-linearly to reflect the increased fossil fuel consumption since 1958. In fact, though, the measured global co2 concentration has increased completely linearly since 1968 and only slightly non-linearly between 1958 and 1968.
Is your stance that CO2 doesn't affect temperatures? The point is environmental factors normally balance out so change is gradual. this change is very sudden.
My 'stance' is that we don't know what the effect of CO2 increases on surface temperatures will be. The temps may increase by 0.4F, 4F, 40F, 0.004F, or they may decrease by 4F. The predicted increase is based on computer modeling that is simply not good enough to predict this with the information available. Computer models have gotten better and better. We routinely get weather forecasts, based on the models, that are fairly accurate to 3 and 4 days into the future. But predictions 10 years out based on changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations, are far beyond the ability of the modelling. And 100 years out...laughable.
This is about respect for the truth, not about some politicized rush to action, based on false information. That never leads to a good result. There is no question that atmospheric co2 concentrations have increased from.00315 percent to.00375 percent in 45 years of measurement...but there is a LOT of question about whether that has any effect on global surface temperatures or what those levels are in relation to historical levels prior to when measurement began.
It's a great idea for people to use less fossil fuel, ride bicycles, walk, drive hybrids, use renewable power, etc. Those are great things to do as obviously there is a limited supply of fuels. But don't ask people to believe that doing that will have even the slightest effect on global temperatures. That undermines respect for the scientific process and its integrity.
Every gram of antibiotics administered is one more gram released into the environment where it will create resistant microbes. The microbes do not care if the antibiotic was administered in tiny doses to a 2-year-old with an ear infection or in massive doses to a 600 pound cow as a feed supplement to make it grow faster and bigger. EVERY antibiotic given to cattle in massive doses has quickly lost its effectiveness in the human population to the point that resistant microbes are now very common. The cow excretes most of the antibiotics into the environment where they create new resistant microbe populations that then migrate worldwide. The public health people hector doctors to avoid giving antibiotic prescriptions unless absolutely necessary and then the FDA does something like this. This is criminally negligent and irresponsible and some people at the FDA need to be brought to trial and thrown into prison.
"Global Warming' is a subject where demagoguery prevails over reason. Talk shows, magazines, newspapers, and bloggers insist that everyone knows global warming is real, 'most scientists' agree that we are the cause, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is obviously ignorant, unenlightened, uncaring, selfish, and not very bright. The flat earth society has returned.
The truth is that the earth has been warming for 10,000 years since the last ice age and no one actually KNOWS why. When some tiny intellect trots out the latest mumbo jumbo about CO2 levels and the greenhouse effect, they are attempting to claim (though they don't know it) that some computer model somewhere shows that the measured increase in CO2 over the last 40 years will increase global surface temperatures. The models are so poor and filled with so many assumptions that any such claim is meaningless. Things that affect global surface temperatures include variations in the sun's output, particulates in the atmosphere, cloud cover, atmospheric composition, variations in energy released from thermonuclear reactions in the earth's core, ocean circulation patterns, tectonic plate movements, and movements of the earth's magnetic pole. We can't possibly predict the future direction of ANY of these with our present knowledge. The next time someone starts talking about methane emissions from cows leading to global warming and rising sea levels, walk away. The earth may be warming but we are just going along for the ride.
The first military application of this might be air defense and it seems possible that it could neutralize all of the military aircraft systems currently deployed. There might be effective armor systems against it such as mirrors or ceramic tiles (like the space shuttle) but those would take quite a while to develop and deploy. In the meantime, the balance would tip away from air offense and towards air defense which would have a big effect on US military power which heavily depends on aircraft to project force into the battlefield.
IBM has been trying to convince people for years to use 'alternatives' to Windows but they always do a really bad job of saying why anyone should use the alternative and then the alternatives die a horrible drawn-out painful death in the arms of the early adopters. The only real alternatives to Windows are Linux and Apple and both of those will make much better cases to prospective adopters without any 'help' from IBM. IBM does not really want anyone to use Apple because they don't play in that space and IBM has never gone anywhere with Linux even though at one time they said they were going to switch a substantial portion of their worldwide desktops over to it, which they never did.
The diaper-wearing long-haul killer was unbelievably selfish and self-centered...to the point of being infantile. Someone with that kind of psychopathic personality should have never made it into the NASA manned spaceflight program, where people have to depend on each other. Someone who would drive 900 miles in diapers to kill someone to satisfy some selfish itch is not going to make any sacrifices for the good of the mission or her fellow space travelers.
Don't mean to minimize the landfill impact of vista but by far the worst effect of Vista will be its increased electrical power needs for DRM. All over the planet, computers will be spending power-hungry cpu cycles to encrypt and deencrypt "Back to the Future 3" or "Superman 3" to protect their digital rights. That is a real and enormous impact on worldwide power use that, all by itself, should make governments move to ban such schemes. By far the lesser of two evils is for power-sucking copy protection schemes to be eliminated. In that case, the worst thing that could happen would be that someone might not realize enough revenue from viewings of their movie and perhaps would curtail future productions. In the other case, worldwide power consumption will increase significantly leading to further planetary disruption. This DRM crap is for 'entertainment', not for peoples lives.
"That's what a steganographic filesystem is for: plausible deniability. You have multiple layers of data encryption, none of which know about the lower layers..."
This misses the point, though. The government is searching your private records and you are talking about hiding them more carefully. The point, though, is to stand up and oppose the illegal searching, not find ways to evade it.
Flash is a proprietary software app that uses proprietary protocols that are becoming ubiquitous on the internet. The new Linux 'Flash 9' will just help to further cement flash as the mainstream format for video content distribution. The linux support can be (and will be) easily dropped at some point in the future when Windows moves to 'flash 14' and Linux is hopelessly stuck on the obsolete 'Flash 13' standard. Seems like this is bad news for OSS, net neutrality, and protocols that are freely available for everyone to use anywhere.
1) Extremely high executive compensation attracts people for management who are extraordinarily greedy and selfish. These traits lead them to make business decisions that are both self-serving and short term in outlook; exactly the opposite of what any business needs to grow and prosper.
2) A top management receiving pay that is so much higher than most of the people working in the business allows them to live in ways far beyond the means of most other employees. As a result, they lose touch with the day-to-day problems and issues of their workforce and consequently make poor decisions.
3) People who are paid far above others soon begin to think that they are somehow wiser, more intelligent, more creative, harder working, etc than others and begin to devalue their contributions and opinions. This can have disastrous consequences for any organization.
4) Extremely high compensation usually carries a built-in obligation for a 100 percent time and life commitment, something that is unimportant to selfish people but critically important to many talented people who might otherwise seek higher positions.
The most talented top managers often seem to stumble into their positions by chance after the organization has been nearly destroyed by the self-seeking opportunistic managers to the point that those types no longer find the position attractive.
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After owning a 2006 Prius for a little over a year, I can say that a hybrid is about more than just miles per gallon. Yes, the mpg is good but that isn't the only good thing about them. Some other good things:
1) The electric/hybrid drive is nicer to drive in traffic because the electric drive makes it pull away from a stop much more cleanly and strongly than a non-hybrid drive with no revving-up motor.
2) The wear-and-tear stuff like like brake pads, mufflers, batteries, starter motors, clutch, transmission, starter motor, etc. is either gone or morphed into a much longer lifespan due to reduced wear. The only significant maintenance items on the Prius are oil changes and tire replacement.
3) The battery gives you a backup power source. I've already managed to run out of gas and the battery lets you keep on going for a couple of more miles to the freeway exit which was very cool.
4) The car can run a lot of electrical gear (if you get an inexpensive inverter) if you go car camping since it is basically a very quiet, efficient 60 hp generator. Toyota should offer an inverter option and a built-in outlet plug on the side for RV owners who tow one behind the RV.
5) The Prius is very cheap to drive.
6) The Prius has a very nice interior space layout (for a small car) with much more legroom than is typical thanks to its small transverse motor.
1) During a recent 1-week power failure, my neighbors needed my old-fashioned landline to make a phone call since they suffered from some combination of unavailable cell service and/or dead batteries.
2) Landlines show your location to the dispatcher if you call 9-1-1 while cell phones show the address of the cell tower you're using at that moment or your billing address or both.
3) There is no risk of brain tumors or cognitive effects with landlines.
4) Landlines can be used with a 'dial-up' connection for internet access.
I'm getting rid of the landline for good next week.
...they just want to kill Linux. Not a "good faith" manouver, but who cares? It's "Legal", so they will be able to win in court and then use that to get a national crackdown on all Linux distributions that aren't under the umbrella of firms that they have patent license agreements with.
That national crackdown is EXACTLY what will happen...and sooner rather than later. Microsot will sue some easy and vulnerable target, then get an injunction against distributions of ALL Linux distributions that are not under their licensing umbrella. Then they'll selectively use that to hammer on users. Then it won't be long before the BSA will be scanning for the presence of non-conforming linux during their 'audits' and disgruntled employees will be turning in their employers for having linux somewhere. If you want to buy Linux pre-installed on a pc, it will have to be Novell...and so on.
People here are underestimating the financial power, the tenacity and the absolute desperation of Microsoft. Microsoft will stop at nothing to keep their monopoly franchise.
The "big 4" global warming assumptions:
1) The earth is warming due to an increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
2) Humans are causing the atmospheric carbon dioxide increase
3) Humans can control the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration
4) A warming earth will cause bad things for humankind
You have to fervently believe in all four of these to be a true believer. If you don't, you're just another mindless neanderthal who doesn't care about the planet. The article questions No. 4 and should be ridiculed and banned, of course.
Every time a new versions of Windows appears, the spin machines crank up about problems with it and how great the old version was. This happens so consistently that it seems like the M$ pr/astroturfing machinery is behind it. Windows is a monopoly and Vista will be a sales success and that's all there is to say about Vista...until the next version of Windows appears and then everyone waxes nostalgic about the goodness of Vista.
They're doing better than MS or Sony right now, and selling more units, so I'm not saying this is all completely overhyped. But I would argue that any game manufacturer that can't make more than 259,000 units a month - especially one that's as relatively simple as the Wii, and especially one that's been on the market for six months now - has some serious problems.
Call the wii a lot of things...but it is most definitely not a simple machine. For example, just one of the 'wiimote' controllers with audio output, wireless connectivity, two-axis accelerometers, and onboard processor is more complex than an entire console was a few years ago. Nintendo's problem is obvious. They grossly underestimated the demand. They are selling 259,000 units a month because that was the most wildly optimistic forecast of their production needs based on anticipated sales. The problem of a shortage of wii game titles is obvious, too. The software game producers thought the wii would sell like the game cube and they put all of their resources into ps3 and xbox 360 titles. It will take another 6 months but then there is likely to be some absolutely killer titles for wii, from someone anyway.
The AMD/Intel dogfight is about way more than x86 market share...it's about the future of the hardware platform. Intel has always been restrained by competitors who will offer us a user-friendly alternative to whatever Intel and Microsoft are dreaming up. When Intel and Microsoft were pushing the CPUID, AMD refused to go along and Microsoft had to make do with a hardware profile they whip up from the onboard devices and serial numbers. If it was not for AMD, every web site you visit today would be able to read your cpu serial number and log your machine in as a unique visitor. Instead of the RIAA grabbing IP addresses and attempting to identify the user with some cumbersome legal process, they would just log your cpuid and subpoena the corresponding machine. Microsoft is still working to that end with whatever tools they can and they know that they need amd and intel completely and irrevocably in bed with them which they know cannot happen when amd and intel are still bitter competitors. So Microsoft has never done anything to help AMD and hopes that AMD is finally sinking for good.
So Microsoft is funding the Baystar investment in SCO that's behind all of this. Microsoft drops chump change and casts a 5-year cloud over IP FUD over Linux at the same time that Microsoft is ramping up their licensing fees, releasing a new DRM-crippled version of Windows called 'vista', and generally consolidating their worldwide windows franchise. In a normal marketplace, doing all of those customer-unfriendly things at once would cost you your customers. But with the SCO cloud hanging over Linux, it's value as a serious alternative to Windows for corporate and government customers has been severely compromised. Imagine for a moment that there had never been a SCO lawsuit. Maybe then HP, Dell, and Lenovo would be successfully hawking Linux desktops and laptops to rapidly growing corporate, government, and personal markets and Linux would be on magazine covers everywhere instead of...vista. So...you can call the SCO lawsuit a lot of things but you what you can NOT call it is a stupid move on Microsoft's part.
...is wrong. Should be the "Oh Sh*t!" department. Seems like the same kind of situation as when the Hubble Telescope was launched with the bad mirror and it's likely just as bad news for the forward progress of scientific knowledge. Says the article: "failure to account for the asymmetric loads in the engineering design of the magnet appears to be a likely cause..."
Sounds like it is a big problem, not a small one.
If your contention is that diseases are mistakes, then can you
explain the ones that aren't our fault? Did your God accidentally
create them? And if so, doesn't that put the lie to his supposed
infallibility?
My contention is that creating cross-species life between sheep and
humans is an unbelievably reckless thing to do that could only be done
by arrogant people who do not respect all life as God's creation.
The disease called 'E. Coli' disease in the media is caused by a
strain of Escherichia coli (0157:H7)
created in the laboratory and accidently released into the wild that
produces a deadly toxin causing severe illness in humans. Deaths and
illness from the strain were first observed in 1982.
Humans create enormous amounts of disease every day by poor sanitation,
inadequate nutrition, poor living conditions, war, exotic species
migration, releasing toxic substances into the environment, letting
greed guide our use of antibiotics, etc. The reckless creation of
cross-species life between humans and sheep is just one more in a long
list of human-caused misery driven by our failure to love our
neighbors.
We know, of course, that the universe exploded into existence by accident, that life arose spontaneously in a primordial soup and that all life on Earth is ours to use in any way we can possibly conceive of. Our arrogance knows no limits. We don't just think there is no God, we know there is no God. We laugh with our unbridled contempt at anyone who would even think about the very idea of God as our creator. Only such people would create cross-species life between humans and sheep and we deserve everything that happens to us. That 'E. Coli' disease stuff that we will now live with forever that resulted from our late-70s recombinant DNA experiments with a ubiquitous bacterium was just a very minor warmup. We do it because we can.
This guy makes all sorts of conclusions and sweeping statements based on nothing more than...his opinion. His general implication is that there is some sort of innate 'biological' morality in all of us...which seems counter intuitive at best. For example, most pagan pre-Christian cultures have practiced human sacrifice, cannibalism, infanticide, genocide, euthanasia, slavery, murder for entertainment, etc. These are all things that the Christian gospels are opposed to and the widespread practice of these types of things has gradually declined over the last two thousand years with the spread of Christianity. Yet Hauser would have us think that this decline is due to some sort of genetic code kicking in. All of us are 'bloodthirsty' savages at heart and there is no avoiding that. Hauser needs to get out of the cocoon of the academic environment and travel a bit.
1) No surprise reading this:
Over the next few days, as the department, the division and consultants from Microsoft Corp. and Dell Inc. labored to retrieve the data, it became obvious the worst-case scenario was at hand.
2) Always make sure the backup really works.
3) Better procedures are needed if a single tech can reformat both hard drives in the same session
4) Much better hardware and software are needed for data worth $38 billion.
5) Paper backups are a good last resort and as a check on data integrity
Kudos to the guy for standing up to the global warming fanatics. "Global Warming' is a subject where demagoguery prevails over reason. Talk shows, magazines, newspapers, and bloggers insist that everyone knows global warming is real, 'most scientists' agree that we are the cause, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is obviously ignorant, unenlightened, uncaring, selfish, and not very bright. The truth is that the earth has been warming for 10,000 years since the last ice age and no one actually KNOWS why. When some tiny intellect trots out the latest mumbo jumbo about CO2 levels and the greenhouse effect, they are attempting to claim (though they don't know it) that some computer model somewhere shows that the measured increase in CO2 over the last 40 years will increase global surface temperatures. The models are so poor and filled with so many assumptions that any such claim is meaningless. Things that affect global surface temperatures include variations in the sun's output, particulates in the atmosphere, cloud cover, atmospheric composition, variations in energy released from thermonuclear reactions in the earth's core, ocean circulation patterns, tectonic plate movements, and movements of the earth's magnetic pole. We can't possibly predict the future direction of ANY of these with our present knowledge. The next time someone starts talking about methane emissions from cows leading to global warming and rising sea levels, walk away. The earth may be warming but we are just going along for the ride.
.00315 percent to .00375 percent since measurements began in 1958...but there is a LOT of question about whether that has any effect on global surface temperatures or what those levels are in relation to historical levels prior to when measurement began. The evidence that the earth is warming seems fairly solid as well as the evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have increased since measurements began in 1958. What is troubling are all of the people who want to connect those two things together as cause and effect. For example, there seems to be an assumption that co2 levels have increased solely due to the burning of fossil fuels by humans. There may be massive natural releases of carbon into the atomosphere occurring all over the planet that we are simply unaware of. For example, crustal plates contain a lot of the relatively light carbon that is likely to ultimately be released as a gas into the atmosphere by tectonic plate subduction processes that occur daily. Or massive natural gas seeps may be occurring on the ocean floor somewhere. Or massive deposits of carbonate rock may be dissolving. The co2 data actually suggests that some sort of natural process is at least contributing since the increase since 1958 is linear with a nearly constant slope while global fossil fuel consumption has increased dramatically since 1958. If we assume that co2 increases are entirely due to human fossil fuel use and that natural uptake of co2 is relatively constant, then the atmospheric co2 concentration should be increasing non-linearly to reflect the increased fossil fuel consumption since 1958. In fact, though, the measured global co2 concentration has increased completely linearly since 1968 and only slightly non-linearly between 1958 and 1968.
we don't know what the effect of CO2 increases on surface temperatures will be. The temps may increase by 0.4F, 4F, 40F, 0.004F, or they may decrease by 4F. The predicted increase is based on computer modeling that is simply not good enough to predict this with the information available. Computer models have gotten better and better. We routinely get weather forecasts, based on the models, that are fairly accurate to 3 and 4 days into the future. But predictions 10 years out based on changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations, are far beyond the ability of the modelling. And 100 years out...laughable.
This is about respect for the truth, not about some politicized rush to action, based on false information. That never leads to a good result. There is no question that atmospheric co2 concentrations have increased from
The evidence for global warming is strong, but I personally do not find it overwhelming, and the issue has become very politicized.
The evidence that the earth is warming seems fairly solid as well as the evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have increased since measurements began in 1958. What is troubling are all of the people who want to connect those two things together as cause and effect. For example, there seems to be an assumption that co2 levels have increased solely due to the burning of fossil fuels by humans. There may be massive natural releases of carbon into the atomosphere occurring all over the planet that we are simply unaware of. For example, crustal plates contain a lot of the relatively light carbon that is likely to ultimately be released as a gas into the atmosphere by tectonic plate subduction processes that occur daily. Or massive natural gas seeps may be occurring on the ocean floor somewhere. Or massive deposits of carbonate rock may be dissolving. The co2 data actually suggests that some sort of natural process is at least contributing since the increase since 1958 is linear with a nearly constant slope while global fossil fuel consumption has increased dramatically since 1958. If we assume that co2 increases are entirely due to human fossil fuel use and that natural uptake of co2 is relatively constant, then the atmospheric co2 concentration should increase very non-linearly to reflect the increased fossil fuel consumption since 1958. In fact, though, the measured global co2 concentration has increased completely linearly since 1968 and only slightly non-linearly between 1958 and 1968.
Is your stance that CO2 doesn't affect temperatures? The point is environmental factors normally balance out so change is gradual. this change is very sudden.
.00315 percent to .00375 percent in 45 years of measurement...but there is a LOT of question about whether that has any effect on global surface temperatures or what those levels are in relation to historical levels prior to when measurement began.
My 'stance' is that we don't know what the effect of CO2 increases on surface temperatures will be. The temps may increase by 0.4F, 4F, 40F, 0.004F, or they may decrease by 4F. The predicted increase is based on computer modeling that is simply not good enough to predict this with the information available. Computer models have gotten better and better. We routinely get weather forecasts, based on the models, that are fairly accurate to 3 and 4 days into the future. But predictions 10 years out based on changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations, are far beyond the ability of the modelling. And 100 years out...laughable.
This is about respect for the truth, not about some politicized rush to action, based on false information. That never leads to a good result. There is no question that atmospheric co2 concentrations have increased from
It's a great idea for people to use less fossil fuel, ride bicycles, walk, drive hybrids, use renewable power, etc. Those are great things to do as obviously there is a limited supply of fuels. But don't ask people to believe that doing that will have even the slightest effect on global temperatures. That undermines respect for the scientific process and its integrity.
Every gram of antibiotics administered is one more gram released into the environment where it will create resistant microbes. The microbes do not care if the antibiotic was administered in tiny doses to a 2-year-old with an ear infection or in massive doses to a 600 pound cow as a feed supplement to make it grow faster and bigger. EVERY antibiotic given to cattle in massive doses has quickly lost its effectiveness in the human population to the point that resistant microbes are now very common. The cow excretes most of the antibiotics into the environment where they create new resistant microbe populations that then migrate worldwide. The public health people hector doctors to avoid giving antibiotic prescriptions unless absolutely necessary and then the FDA does something like this. This is criminally negligent and irresponsible and some people at the FDA need to be brought to trial and thrown into prison.
"Global Warming' is a subject where demagoguery prevails over reason. Talk shows, magazines, newspapers, and bloggers insist that everyone knows global warming is real, 'most scientists' agree that we are the cause, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is obviously ignorant, unenlightened, uncaring, selfish, and not very bright. The flat earth society has returned.
The truth is that the earth has been warming for 10,000 years since the last ice age and no one actually KNOWS why. When some tiny intellect trots out the latest mumbo jumbo about CO2 levels and the greenhouse effect, they are attempting to claim (though they don't know it) that some computer model somewhere shows that the measured increase in CO2 over the last 40 years will increase global surface temperatures. The models are so poor and filled with so many assumptions that any such claim is meaningless. Things that affect global surface temperatures include variations in the sun's output, particulates in the atmosphere, cloud cover, atmospheric composition, variations in energy released from thermonuclear reactions in the earth's core, ocean circulation patterns, tectonic plate movements, and movements of the earth's magnetic pole. We can't possibly predict the future direction of ANY of these with our present knowledge. The next time someone starts talking about methane emissions from cows leading to global warming and rising sea levels, walk away. The earth may be warming but we are just going along for the ride.
The first military application of this might be air defense and it seems possible that it could neutralize all of the military aircraft systems currently deployed. There might be effective armor systems against it such as mirrors or ceramic tiles (like the space shuttle) but those would take quite a while to develop and deploy. In the meantime, the balance would tip away from air offense and towards air defense which would have a big effect on US military power which heavily depends on aircraft to project force into the battlefield.
IBM has been trying to convince people for years to use 'alternatives' to Windows but they always do a really bad job of saying why anyone should use the alternative and then the alternatives die a horrible drawn-out painful death in the arms of the early adopters. The only real alternatives to Windows are Linux and Apple and both of those will make much better cases to prospective adopters without any 'help' from IBM. IBM does not really want anyone to use Apple because they don't play in that space and IBM has never gone anywhere with Linux even though at one time they said they were going to switch a substantial portion of their worldwide desktops over to it, which they never did.
The diaper-wearing long-haul killer was unbelievably selfish and self-centered...to the point of being infantile. Someone with that kind of psychopathic personality should have never made it into the NASA manned spaceflight program, where people have to depend on each other. Someone who would drive 900 miles in diapers to kill someone to satisfy some selfish itch is not going to make any sacrifices for the good of the mission or her fellow space travelers.
Don't mean to minimize the landfill impact of vista but by far the worst effect of Vista will be its increased electrical power needs for DRM. All over the planet, computers will be spending power-hungry cpu cycles to encrypt and deencrypt "Back to the Future 3" or "Superman 3" to protect their digital rights. That is a real and enormous impact on worldwide power use that, all by itself, should make governments move to ban such schemes. By far the lesser of two evils is for power-sucking copy protection schemes to be eliminated. In that case, the worst thing that could happen would be that someone might not realize enough revenue from viewings of their movie and perhaps would curtail future productions. In the other case, worldwide power consumption will increase significantly leading to further planetary disruption. This DRM crap is for 'entertainment', not for peoples lives.
"That's what a steganographic filesystem is for: plausible deniability. You have multiple layers of data encryption, none of which know about the lower layers..."
This misses the point, though. The government is searching your private records and you are talking about hiding them more carefully. The point, though, is to stand up and oppose the illegal searching, not find ways to evade it.
Flash is a proprietary software app that uses proprietary protocols that are becoming ubiquitous on the internet. The new Linux 'Flash 9' will just help to further cement flash as the mainstream format for video content distribution. The linux support can be (and will be) easily dropped at some point in the future when Windows moves to 'flash 14' and Linux is hopelessly stuck on the obsolete 'Flash 13' standard. Seems like this is bad news for OSS, net neutrality, and protocols that are freely available for everyone to use anywhere.
1) Extremely high executive compensation attracts people for management who are extraordinarily greedy and selfish. These traits lead them to make business decisions that are both self-serving and short term in outlook; exactly the opposite of what any business needs to grow and prosper.
2) A top management receiving pay that is so much higher than most of the people working in the business allows them to live in ways far beyond the means of most other employees. As a result, they lose touch with the day-to-day problems and issues of their workforce and consequently make poor decisions.
3) People who are paid far above others soon begin to think that they are somehow wiser, more intelligent, more creative, harder working, etc than others and begin to devalue their contributions and opinions. This can have disastrous consequences for any organization.
4) Extremely high compensation usually carries a built-in obligation for a 100 percent time and life commitment, something that is unimportant to selfish people but critically important to many talented people who might otherwise seek higher positions.
The most talented top managers often seem to stumble into their positions by chance after the organization has been nearly destroyed by the self-seeking opportunistic managers to the point that those types no longer find the position attractive.