People must be willing to stand-up for their freedom, not just buckle under, and if that means spending a little time in jail because you refuse to comply with an unconstitutional law, so be it.
It appears the US government's solution to prisoners of conscience was the institution of for-profit prisons...
I have two questions, Marxist Hacker 42: Have you ever mis-judged someone, and influenced others accordingly? Have you ever failed at any task despite striving to the best of your ability?
If you're trying to power even half the US electricity grid though, you're looking at around 10 million acres. Quite a feat.
('pedia check: sizes of continental United States, New York City urban area)
So to power the entire US grid, you'd have to cover roughly 0.82% of its landmass with 20% efficient S-T plants. Or to put it another way, four New York Cities, minus the smog, people and skyscrapers.
Well, there is the "tried and true" technology called a "national grid" which could be used to support states which can't fully supply their own needs.
You may also wish to look at other solar-thermal technologies such as solar towers, that are not dependant on direct sunlight yet still can scale to the degree required for grid use.
And I think we should strongly focus on solar-thermal technologies, at least long enough to Get It Done. Time enough for more fancy methods when we've got ourselves sorted.
(as for nuclear, all I'll say about it is that at this point in time it still suffers far too much from the Hindenberg Effect)
Ok, IRTFA. Sheesh, talk about using bazookas to swat flies. Is this anything more than FUD to scare people back to coal? Let me spell it out:
Solar-thermal plants using mirrors, steam turbines, and if you want 24/7, underground heat reservoirs. Completely buildable using some of the more common materials on the planet: sand, steel, concrete, copper, salt, etcetera. Who cares if they're inefficient compared to the super-fancy super-rare stuff in TFA, just build lots of them.
Maintenance? Bugger all in comparison to a coal plant, the bloody things run on sunshine. There's no toxic+radioactive coal dust/ash/soot getting into everything, no gas-guzzling trucks and trains leaving said dust billowing in their wake over nearby towns and farms as they go between mine and plant... blah blah bloody blah.
There are only three real reasons that the countries with plenty of sunshine (e.g. my own) haven't gone this route long ago: vested greed, common ignorance, short-term thinking.
Sometimes the problem is between keyboard and chair, but sometimes that chair was the developer's. If the system had been designed properly in the first place...
I've seen enough machines where bloody Windows Updates has silently failed (or pegged the CPU) that I'd love to hit the idiots responsible for releasing it into the wild with a clue by four.
I mean, seriously. If you were responsible for Windows Update, knowing it would be integral to the safe and proper operation of millions of computers worldwide, how would you bloody well not feel criminally negligent for the piece of crap that actually came out of your department?
Thus my position is that the doctrine of self defense is actually antithetical to the best interests of all individuals in the real world.
Once you arm yourself, you ARE by definition now a threat to everyone else.
Anyone who's ever noticed that a swift kick to the groin will incapacitate most males and some females has armed themselves. You can't NOT arm yourself in some fashion, given the usual set of working appendages and enough brain cells to rub together.
The doctrine of self-defence is actually a pretty good stance to take in the real world, which has other threats besides civilised humans. When was the last time you sat down with a rabid dog, hungry crocodile or maddened wasp and discussed the merits of absolute pacifism?
Where this can break down is when people lose sight of the goal for the goalposts - but that's not a failing of the doctrine but rather its implementation.
The whole issue of "bad security" is a red herring. [...] There's no requirement that you make your car hard to steal before stealing it becomes a crime.
On the other hand, if you work for the military and regularly leave a briefcase full of classified information in your unlocked car, your ass should be held to account too.
Of course there is conditioning by the anti-smoking industry. If one is trying to sway the populace via mass advertising to realise that they've been swayed via previous mass advertising, it is hard to avoid!:)
That external conditioning, however, is not the only explanation. We humans are already conditioned by our natures to react in certain ways. One is to - upon realising a certain "fact" we accepted is wrong - swing right past rational response to the other side. Thus straight from "smokers are heroes" to "smokers are villains" without pause for thought.
The other is we humans want to be right, regardless of whether it fits the facts or if the facts have changed since. Thus the people who insist smoking will always be evil even if all negatives were removed. We're right, you're wrong, and if you're lucky we won't torture and kill you for the godforsaken heretic you obviously are.:)
As for "and annoying the hell out of everyone around you", you are just conditioned to that view now from modern marketing from government and medical institutions who now realise that smoking costs them money.
As opposed to the old conditioning from the tobacco companies, that smokers were somehow better than other people?
Fact is, smoking stinks. What's weakened is the conditioning against pointing that out.
Yet I'm not one of you douchebags who walks through a parking lot, sees a smoker 60 feet away, downwind, and starts coughing, which I'm guessing would be the category you fall into.
Dunno about the OP, but I usually don't see a smoker 60 feet away until after I've had a lungful of polluted air and looked around to find the addict.
I do know my heightened chemical sensitivity means I'm the proverbial canary in the coal mine. That doesn't mean nobody should pay attention to the fact the canary's getting sick...
(and re the cars - I'm so looking forward to electric cars)
That's besides the point. I'm talking about the stability of ecosystems here.
Er, what? Maybe I need to rephrase my reply.
What's more likely to be bad for the ecosystem:
(A) randomly mutating bacteria with UV to create an unknown set of mutations X containing what may or may not be desired mutation Y, but which is considered "close enough" to be approved for mass-manufacture without further FDA testing because the process was "natural", or
(B) precision editing to create desired mutation Y, which the FDA will scream about because the process was "artificial".
But doesn't that ignore the fact that bacteria have probably been exposed to UV light for millions of years (even if it's at a lower dose, and not all the time)
There's plenty of natural bacteria that I wouldn't want anywhere remotely near me.
whereas your precision editing may be completely untested?
Um, the whole point of doing it precisely means you can test it. What's easier, testing the results of a single mutation you specifically put there yourself, or testing the results of an unknown number of mutations you induced by throwing a switch and hoping for the best?
Here's a transcript of a October 2008 hearing on net filtering involving Conroy (the Minister) and Ludlam (a Senator questioning him). I can actually understand the guy's point of view, but I'd still have to peg him as Lawful Obstinate - I'm thinking of Judge Dredd - obeying the law and using technology to ice the perps is more important than what else the government might use the technology for.
"Nuclear is the only power source with a virtually unlimited source of fuel and that can be brought online without a massive new power grid and is nearly as cheap as gas powered generation."
So close, yet so far. You left out the human factor. Let me explain:
See the problem? Industry might be swayed towards solar/wind with a sufficiently enticing powerpoint presentation, but the masses require real education to understand nuclear - try getting that through government...
So cynical idealist that I am, I think nuclear isn't going to win short of somebody inventing a Mr Fusion device (most likely with a politician there to cut the ribbon and an industry faction claiming the patents).
Note that the article is about Australia; one Aussie dollar currently equals 66 US cents and after the various middlemen get their markup the value of a computer in AUD is often double its USD value.
(funny how every time the AUD approaches the USD, something happens to the stock market to bring it back down:p)
re #1 - others are already arguing the legalities to flaming rubble.
re #2 - there's a difference between (a) casually flaming someone, (b) stalking them, pretending to be their friend and repeatedly attacking their... "essential desire to live" (english?) under the guise of said friendship.
re #3 - see re #1
re #4 - "I am sure she didn't really think that this girl would kill herself. Even if she did, that isn't a crime.".... uh, what? Evidence of deadly intent would've made it a murder case. Instead we got this mess.
The community? You mean the tiny subset of the game's playerbase with the free time and coding skills to devote to hacking the game rather than just playing it?
Total Annihilation: official map editor eventually released, as a beta, and so buggy and unstable that this "community" had to write their own version (which while more stable, had even less features). No official unit editor at all; "community" had to write their own.
Supreme Commander: official map editor (described as pre-alpha!) eventually released in a style that reminds this Hitch-Hiker's fan of signs saying "beware of the leopard". No official unit editor; "community" has written scripts and things which might vaguely be considered collectively a unit editor.
Perhaps the community's efforts have progressed since I last was involved; however I hope you can understand why I wrote "I no longer care".
I no longer care how good it is. Unless they include decent unit and map making tools as part of the game, I'm not going to buy it. I'm sick of hearing "they'll be released later" and then getting crap or nothing.
You hear me, GPG? Unit and map tools. Good ones. No more excuses.
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You don't eat because you realize that if don't various mechanisms in your body are going to fail. You eat because you are hungry.
I occasionally do have to realise just that - my "hunger sense" is glitchy and doesn't always work.
I wonder if we humans evolved planning (and the whole self-aware ball of wax) at least in part due to insufficiently evolved instincts?
People must be willing to stand-up for their freedom, not just buckle under, and if that means spending a little time in jail because you refuse to comply with an unconstitutional law, so be it.
It appears the US government's solution to prisoners of conscience was the institution of for-profit prisons...
I have two questions, Marxist Hacker 42: Have you ever mis-judged someone, and influenced others accordingly? Have you ever failed at any task despite striving to the best of your ability?
If you're trying to power even half the US electricity grid though, you're looking at around 10 million acres. Quite a feat.
('pedia check: sizes of continental United States, New York City urban area)
So to power the entire US grid, you'd have to cover roughly 0.82% of its landmass with 20% efficient S-T plants. Or to put it another way, four New York Cities, minus the smog, people and skyscrapers.
I think that's doable. Easily.
Well, there is the "tried and true" technology called a "national grid" which could be used to support states which can't fully supply their own needs.
You may also wish to look at other solar-thermal technologies such as solar towers, that are not dependant on direct sunlight yet still can scale to the degree required for grid use.
And I think we should strongly focus on solar-thermal technologies, at least long enough to Get It Done. Time enough for more fancy methods when we've got ourselves sorted.
(as for nuclear, all I'll say about it is that at this point in time it still suffers far too much from the Hindenberg Effect)
Ok, IRTFA. Sheesh, talk about using bazookas to swat flies. Is this anything more than FUD to scare people back to coal? Let me spell it out:
Solar-thermal plants using mirrors, steam turbines, and if you want 24/7, underground heat reservoirs. Completely buildable using some of the more common materials on the planet: sand, steel, concrete, copper, salt, etcetera. Who cares if they're inefficient compared to the super-fancy super-rare stuff in TFA, just build lots of them.
Maintenance? Bugger all in comparison to a coal plant, the bloody things run on sunshine. There's no toxic+radioactive coal dust/ash/soot getting into everything, no gas-guzzling trucks and trains leaving said dust billowing in their wake over nearby towns and farms as they go between mine and plant... blah blah bloody blah.
There are only three real reasons that the countries with plenty of sunshine (e.g. my own) haven't gone this route long ago: vested greed, common ignorance, short-term thinking.
Sometimes the problem is between keyboard and chair, but sometimes that chair was the developer's. If the system had been designed properly in the first place...
I've seen enough machines where bloody Windows Updates has silently failed (or pegged the CPU) that I'd love to hit the idiots responsible for releasing it into the wild with a clue by four.
I mean, seriously. If you were responsible for Windows Update, knowing it would be integral to the safe and proper operation of millions of computers worldwide, how would you bloody well not feel criminally negligent for the piece of crap that actually came out of your department?
Because that would make sense.
Thus my position is that the doctrine of self defense is actually antithetical to the best interests of all individuals in the real world.
Once you arm yourself, you ARE by definition now a threat to everyone else.
Anyone who's ever noticed that a swift kick to the groin will incapacitate most males and some females has armed themselves. You can't NOT arm yourself in some fashion, given the usual set of working appendages and enough brain cells to rub together.
The doctrine of self-defence is actually a pretty good stance to take in the real world, which has other threats besides civilised humans. When was the last time you sat down with a rabid dog, hungry crocodile or maddened wasp and discussed the merits of absolute pacifism?
Where this can break down is when people lose sight of the goal for the goalposts - but that's not a failing of the doctrine but rather its implementation.
The whole issue of "bad security" is a red herring. [...] There's no requirement that you make your car hard to steal before stealing it becomes a crime.
On the other hand, if you work for the military and regularly leave a briefcase full of classified information in your unlocked car, your ass should be held to account too.
Name me one other household weapon besides a gun where you can fatally injure two people in 1 second.
Poison their food. It takes about a second to swallow.
Quite. Because as we all know from watching Wild West movies, when two people try to draw their guns at once, it can only end in a stalemate.
Depends, some of the Wild West movies I saw, both guys ran out of ammo without even managing to hit each other. I hear it happens in Real Life, too.
Besides, substitute "fists" for "guns". Think nobody can die in a fistfight when at least one wants the other dead?
Of course there is conditioning by the anti-smoking industry. If one is trying to sway the populace via mass advertising to realise that they've been swayed via previous mass advertising, it is hard to avoid! :)
That external conditioning, however, is not the only explanation. We humans are already conditioned by our natures to react in certain ways. One is to - upon realising a certain "fact" we accepted is wrong - swing right past rational response to the other side. Thus straight from "smokers are heroes" to "smokers are villains" without pause for thought.
The other is we humans want to be right, regardless of whether it fits the facts or if the facts have changed since. Thus the people who insist smoking will always be evil even if all negatives were removed. We're right, you're wrong, and if you're lucky we won't torture and kill you for the godforsaken heretic you obviously are. :)
As for "and annoying the hell out of everyone around you", you are just conditioned to that view now from modern marketing from government and medical institutions who now realise that smoking costs them money.
As opposed to the old conditioning from the tobacco companies, that smokers were somehow better than other people?
Fact is, smoking stinks. What's weakened is the conditioning against pointing that out.
Yet I'm not one of you douchebags who walks through a parking lot, sees a smoker 60 feet away, downwind, and starts coughing, which I'm guessing would be the category you fall into.
Dunno about the OP, but I usually don't see a smoker 60 feet away until after I've had a lungful of polluted air and looked around to find the addict.
I do know my heightened chemical sensitivity means I'm the proverbial canary in the coal mine. That doesn't mean nobody should pay attention to the fact the canary's getting sick...
(and re the cars - I'm so looking forward to electric cars)
Prisoners should be allowed to vote.
That's besides the point. I'm talking about the stability of ecosystems here.
Er, what? Maybe I need to rephrase my reply.
What's more likely to be bad for the ecosystem:
(A) randomly mutating bacteria with UV to create an unknown set of mutations X containing what may or may not be desired mutation Y, but which is considered "close enough" to be approved for mass-manufacture without further FDA testing because the process was "natural", or
(B) precision editing to create desired mutation Y, which the FDA will scream about because the process was "artificial".
But doesn't that ignore the fact that bacteria have probably been exposed to UV light for millions of years (even if it's at a lower dose, and not all the time)
There's plenty of natural bacteria that I wouldn't want anywhere remotely near me.
whereas your precision editing may be completely untested?
Um, the whole point of doing it precisely means you can test it. What's easier, testing the results of a single mutation you specifically put there yourself, or testing the results of an unknown number of mutations you induced by throwing a switch and hoping for the best?
Here's a transcript of a October 2008 hearing on net filtering involving Conroy (the Minister) and Ludlam (a Senator questioning him). I can actually understand the guy's point of view, but I'd still have to peg him as Lawful Obstinate - I'm thinking of Judge Dredd - obeying the law and using technology to ice the perps is more important than what else the government might use the technology for.
"Nuclear is the only power source with a virtually unlimited source of fuel and that can be brought online without a massive new power grid and is nearly as cheap as gas powered generation."
So close, yet so far. You left out the human factor. Let me explain:
"cheap and simple nuclear power" + { "ignorant masses" + "self-aggrandizing governments" + "entrenched industries" + "fanatic fringes" + "looney fringes" } = "expensive and complicated nuclear power".
See the problem? Industry might be swayed towards solar/wind with a sufficiently enticing powerpoint presentation, but the masses require real education to understand nuclear - try getting that through government...
So cynical idealist that I am, I think nuclear isn't going to win short of somebody inventing a Mr Fusion device (most likely with a politician there to cut the ribbon and an industry faction claiming the patents).
Note that the article is about Australia; one Aussie dollar currently equals 66 US cents and after the various middlemen get their markup the value of a computer in AUD is often double its USD value.
(funny how every time the AUD approaches the USD, something happens to the stock market to bring it back down :p)
When has it ever worked? When have the people ever used their guns to stop the executive?
American War of Independance, 1775-1783. The result was apparently good enough to have it written down.
Whether it would still work now is debatable... but if more people remembered why the 2nd is there to begin with, we shouldn't need to find out.
re #1 - others are already arguing the legalities to flaming rubble.
re #2 - there's a difference between (a) casually flaming someone, (b) stalking them, pretending to be their friend and repeatedly attacking their... "essential desire to live" (english?) under the guise of said friendship.
re #3 - see re #1
re #4 - "I am sure she didn't really think that this girl would kill herself. Even if she did, that isn't a crime." .... uh, what? Evidence of deadly intent would've made it a murder case. Instead we got this mess.
The community? You mean the tiny subset of the game's playerbase with the free time and coding skills to devote to hacking the game rather than just playing it?
Total Annihilation: official map editor eventually released, as a beta, and so buggy and unstable that this "community" had to write their own version (which while more stable, had even less features). No official unit editor at all; "community" had to write their own.
Supreme Commander: official map editor (described as pre-alpha!) eventually released in a style that reminds this Hitch-Hiker's fan of signs saying "beware of the leopard". No official unit editor; "community" has written scripts and things which might vaguely be considered collectively a unit editor.
Perhaps the community's efforts have progressed since I last was involved; however I hope you can understand why I wrote "I no longer care".
I no longer care how good it is. Unless they include decent unit and map making tools as part of the game, I'm not going to buy it. I'm sick of hearing "they'll be released later" and then getting crap or nothing.
You hear me, GPG? Unit and map tools. Good ones. No more excuses.