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User: caliburngreywolf

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  1. Two centuries of job destruction on Tower To Be Built By Flying Robots · · Score: 2

    aaaaaand we move one step closer to a world where everything is done by machines. What do we do when anything that isn't "art" is doable by (non-human) automotons? The good answer would be "relax and let our robot slaves do everything" but realistically, with our current social, political, and economic systems, soemonwe would own the machines and make all the money while the masses would be left to pursue an ever-diminishing job pool. Name a job that cannot be done by robots and software....one day your answer will be wrong. MIlitary? nope. we have predator-like systems that are automated and even use facial recognition software to pre-authorize a "kill-shot" Manufacturing? 3d printers. CAD design? not too l.ong before computer-aided becomes computer-run. Not that this is the best topic to rant on, but the japanese have nurse and childcare robots, right? If I recall, there's even a programming language written by a computer. politicians are talking about job creation when nearly every scientific and business researcher out there is actively engaged in the pursuit of job destruction and has been for nearly two centuries. How can we continue to base an economy off the idea that everyone should attempt to be gainfully employed when we continue to replace every possible job with automation?

  2. Re:Exploitation is the most prized product on When Libertarians Attack Free Software · · Score: 1

    The purest form of economic freedom exists when all forms of robbery are "legal" *f it is economic freedom to pay-for-wages what will not allow existance, it is economic freedom to secure life-sustaining goods by ANY means. The economic freedom posited by those with econmic "means" is simply an excuse to use force-of-law to procure goods via economic "violence" while other forms of procuring goods are made illegal. If it is accepted to use law to force the poor to starve their children, that becomes legally sanctioned economic violence. Just as we have laws to protect the goods of the wealthy agaist "gun barrel economics", we can and should have laws to protect the lives of the poor against "pocketbook violence". The ultimate result of prolonged economic violence is physical violence, in the form of bloody revolt. Just ask Marie Antoinette.

  3. Camel what? on A Twitter Client For the Commodore 64 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Hey now, every COOL C64 user ran f-15 strike eagle or arctic fox. Now GEOS just made me scratch my head until we got an actual PC. I jsut wish I'd had a modem and used the BBSs back then.

  4. Re:is it infringement? on Lawsuit Says Google's Sale of Keywords Is Illegal · · Score: 1

    Not at all what was/is done...what is done is akin to paying the telephone company so that when someone calls 411 looking for dave's car repair, the operator is paid to say "I can give you the number to joe's car repair if you like, they're really good, it's 555-1234...oh, and if you still want dave's the nubmer is 555-1357." It's a bit shady, and to be honest, it does strike me as a misuse of a trademark...one company is profiting from the use of a trademark, and it is not the company using it.

  5. It's the money, stupid! on Why Is It So Difficult To Fire Bad Teachers? · · Score: 1

    Whereas a master's degree in business administration if often enough for a $200,000 per-year job in the private setor, a PhD in education rarely nets $80,000. We have an "industry" of low pay. When the argument is made that CEOs must be paid 10 million per year to attract the best, is it less reasonable to assume that low pay attracts lower quality educators? We have a relative shortage of teachers. If schools were flooded by applicants, bad teachers could be fired. As it is, we spend so little on education my child's kindergarten teacher asked us to donate crayons so the kids could color. No business will ever look to fire bad apples when they are already short on manpower. I worked in such an industry, and the sad fat was that the easy work was given to the incompetant, and the competant looked forward to starting their own business and getting out as soon as possible.

  6. Re:2% were lost... on Finnish Court Dismisses E-Voting Result · · Score: 5, Insightful

    In the USA, there is often a dramatic difference between early morning voters (usually elderly or thos who work in schools) Mid-day voters (usually unemployed or work non-standard hours) and evening voters (usually work a regular day job) if the 2% was spread out evenly over space and time, representing a random sample, inference is acceptable, but if it represents, let's say, the several thousand factory workers who voted right after work in a district that is abuzz with fervor for a new labor-friendly candidate...yeah, you can't base that 2% of the other 98%

  7. Re:Summary is hopelessly wrong... on North Korea Launches "Communication Satellite" Rocket · · Score: 1

    What's annoying to any non-jingoist is that people are condemning this as an evil agressive act....yet USSR and USA did the same thing 50+ years ago. It is obvious that the USA won't invade any nation actually capable of fighting a decent war. So long as the USA picks on weak nations and attempts to keep them down, then the first goal of any reasonable small nation will be to get their military capacity to the point that the USA won't have absolute imperial control if they so wish. The only way to achieve that parity for most small nations is a nuclear program. Once they have their nukes they will simmer down and be less agressive.

  8. Grape juice on Censorship By Glut · · Score: 1

    In 2nd grade we did "surveys and graphs" on juice preferences. While most kids followed the assignment (asking favorite juce and then marking it down) I added another column based on my observations, because half the kids I asked asked me "which one is winning" and then chose whatever I told them was winning as their favorite. The drive to conform exists in social animals. And as Steve-o (not fron jackass) learned of punky clothing in "SLC Punk"... It's just another uniform.

  9. Re:Are they nuts? on 18% of Consumers Can't Tell HD From SD · · Score: 1

    or why $100 a year is somehow worse than $9.95 a month... Math really isn't that hard, and $119.40 is more than $100

  10. Re:Its worth noting on 18% of Consumers Can't Tell HD From SD · · Score: 1

    Nope. I have seen people who, confronted with a choice between stretched, grainy SD, and beautiful HD with bars on the side... at least 10% insist that the grainy, stretched picture is the HD one, and the tight, clear picture with bars to fill it in is the standard version.

  11. Re:Many variables on 18% of Consumers Can't Tell HD From SD · · Score: 1

    Hogwash! CRT is actually excellent. Apples and oranges, because most people are comparing SD CRT to HD LCD/Plasma. Additionally, most idiot consumers thing digital = HD, and also that widescreen = HD. I cannot tell you how often I have seen HD programming with the sidebars, and then have someone complain about it being SD, then switch over to a grainy widescreen picture and say "ahhh, that's better" ...and how often I hear people who think that february '09 is "HD DAY"

  12. Re:Ban them altogether on WV Voters Say Machines Are Switching Votes · · Score: 1

    Touch screens are so unreliable when used heavily that they are not appropriate for an election. I agree firmly that actual buttons are the correct approach. A button does not need calibration, and buttons exist that are guaranteed for millions of presses. They are also far cheaper to replace, and pressing them hard does not lead to a broken screen.

  13. Re:Recent discussion/interview with SpaceX's CEO on On Fourth Launch Attempt, SpaceX Falcon 1 Reaches Orbit · · Score: 1

    The only reason government agencies like NASA are more expensive is that they get bilked by the private companies they rely on. If we had a TRULY government agancy for space, one that wasn't beholden to give money to for-profit companies, we would see far more efficiency than any private enterprise could ever achieve. The reason private enterprise works better is that it is not required to rely on private enterprise.

  14. It ends here... on YouTube Bans Gun and Knife Videos In the UK · · Score: 1

    The problem with successfully banning guns is that knives become just as bad a problem within a few years. Of course, the problem with banning knives is that bricks become just as bad a problem within a few years. OF course, the problem with banning bricks is that boards with nails become just as bad a problem within a few years. Of course, the problem with banning boards, nails, and bricks, is that everyone is homeless.

  15. Provident? on Second Snag This Week Could Delay LHC for Weeks · · Score: 1

    End of the earth put off for another few months? but hey, the mayan calender of whatnot said 2012, right?

  16. No Way, Dude...antimatter went the other way. on Hubble Finds Unidentified Object In Space · · Score: 1

    In a flash of (non pot inspired)insight, I began to wonder...why would antimatter go "forward" in time? Why wouldn't it behave exactly the opposite and go "backward" in time. That sure would explain its absence in our spacetime. Then I googled it and found it was proposed by the Feynman-Stueckelberg Interpretation. Ah well. It was too obvious to be an original thought.

  17. Truth: on The Electronic Bastille · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Public order is antithetical to democracy. Democracy can only be effective in a system where some social disorder is present.

  18. It can actually work on Smilin' Bob Not Smilin' Anymore · · Score: 1

    I have read scientific studies that indicate that any substance which destroys testosterone can, in moderate quantities, cause the testes to produce more testosterone. (body percieves a deficiency and orders more) Over time, this can result in slightly larger genitalia (the testosterone local to the penis is greater due to proximity to the testes)...but the change would be fairly insignificant.

  19. Re:Tea Party redux on Diebold Admits Ohio Machines May Lose Votes · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...ask them what they would do if they were REQUIRED BY LAW to use it.

  20. Re:why do these machines remain certified? on Diebold Admits Ohio Machines May Lose Votes · · Score: 1

    Firmly agreed. I could have written a voting program 20 years ago in third grade with applesoft basic...In fact, thinking back, I probably did.

  21. Re:Tea Party redux on Diebold Admits Ohio Machines May Lose Votes · · Score: 1

    Small groups are required. And as for the defense? Ask the jury that when they are deliberating, they should consider how the justice system would work if half thier "guilty" or "not guilty" votes in deliberations were inaccurately counted. Then hand them a machine and ask them if they would use it.

  22. The real future on Western Digital Working On a 20,000 RPM Drive · · Score: 2, Interesting

    HP has the patent on the memsistor...which is set to revolutionize memory/storage in a big way. Imagine packing a computer away for 2 years, then turning it on, and in half a second, the youtube video you had buffered begins playing. Hard drives will always need to spin up.

  23. Another state of matter? on New Results Contradict Long-Held Chemistry Dogma · · Score: 1

    WOuldn't this lead us to another state of matter, since molecules/atoms woudl interact in an entirely different way than they do when their non-valence electrons pretty much keep it in the family?

  24. Apples? Oranges? on Virgin Galactic Shows the Finished WhiteKnight Two · · Score: 1

    Much has been made of the cheap nature of the flights compared to the shuttle...I'm glad to see none of that lunacy here. What we have here are 1 day motorbike rides, compared to the shuttle's three-week fully-loaded-both-ways tractor trailer haul. Two entirely different animals. Can a private citizen build and operate a motor bike for touring rental cheaper than MACK can build and operate a semi truck (with trailer) hauling huge loads of cargo from coast to coast? Well duh.

  25. We have met the terrorists, and they is us! on Wikileaks Gets Hold of Counterinsurgency Manual · · Score: 1

    We have met the terrorists, and they is us! ...Proof that our 1980's tax dollars went to fund South American "anti-communist" testicle-in-a-vice training. Ahhh, freedom.