Oh, I think you can take it quite a bit further. If well done, this could be a quite excellent "critical thinking" class that could be actually interesting to the students. Think about it - the process that transforms an "unidentified flying object" into an "identified flying object" is pure scientific method. The analysis of rumors, urban legends, popular beliefs and conspiracy theories is, apart from the anthropological value, an excellent exercise in critical thinking. Once you find that kernel of truth that actually spawned the rumor, belief or theory, you have thoroughly demystified it. It could teach the students not only to, but how to question such spurious theories in a fun, interesting and challenging setting. I like it.
In the end, it comes down to a matter of taste anyway. I am just an analog guy, so I guess I kinda projected my tastes a bit there. If someone wants to focus on digital stuff and start with fiddling around with arduinos, more power to them. Me, I am as happy as a pig in the mud with a handful of tubes and a tesla coil;)
Actually, the village was debt free from the beginning - everyone owed someone else $100 and was owed $100 by someone different in a circular fashion, balancing to $0 for everyone. The story only works under the assumption that there is zero liquid cash in town, so the balancing can't actually be realized.
That is actually an essential safety tip, especially when it comes to working with higher voltages. Always be wary of the capacitors - The high capacity ones in power supplies, CRT monitors and the like can hold dangerous, even lethal charges, even when the device is unplugged. Always discharge them in a controlled manner to be sure.
Let em come... I am on file anyway for "knowledge in handling and access to chemical, radioactive and biological hazardous substances", since I last applied for a visa to the US. I expected to get bothered about it after I filled out that form, but there was not a single question asked at the embassy or at customs and immigration later. One has to wonder what they actually do with that data.
Arduinos sure are nice, but if the guy wants to start into electronics from complete scratch, I think he shold hold that off for a bit. Get into soldering first, build some very basic stuff like some small amplifier, some oscillators for blinkenlights, heck, a radio, perhaps something in the high-voltage area when you are more sure about what are you doing. Tesla coils are fun...
You are right in localizing me. I suppose it can indeed be a nuisance to foreigners, and I could very well go without it. As to the rest of your post - first, ACTA will not have any effect on cellphones, as far as I can glean from the leaked text. Regarding data retention laws coming in via the EU - the constitutional court has made it very clear that it has the last say on any matter which has a stronger constitutional protection in Germany than in the EU, so, after the last ruling of the BVerfG, data retention cannot be slipped in via the EU without first taking away power from the constitutional court. If that happens, I'll be on the streets and will protest with all that I have.
Real life bullying can result in teen suicide - and you can't monitor your child 24/7. Do you want to put surveillance gear on them, too? A kid doesn't kill itself after bullied one single time. If you as a parent don't realize something is disturbing your child, you have to be goddamn disconnected from the kid. At this point, it is the parents fault. On the second point, yeah, young kids seeing a beheading can be disturbing, but hardly as dangerous as using a table saw unsupervised. Besides, have you ever seen a beheading on the net without explicitly searching for it? I haven't, so gimme a break here.
Where I live, you gotta register your cellphone (or rather your SIM card) on purchase, using your national ID card. I am generally fine with the idea - under one provision: a decent constitution in combination with a functional constitutional court that regularly kicks the arse of some politico who wants to abuse the data for the sake of "anti-terrorism", "anti-childpornography" or whatever the buzzword of the day is. Thankfully, this seems to work around here, at least for now.
I am not implying that the kids should vote on the mode of their internet use. But if you do not give them any freedom, including the freedom to violate the agreed upon rules, you do not give them any trust. How should they ever learn responsible behaviour without experiencing trust and freedom?
Hehe, well, true - that might actually the best use for a setup like the one asked for. They might be more motivated in learning proper hacking techniques if they can use it to circumvent your controls.
Why would you need to hover over them all the time when they use the computer? It is a damn computer, not a table saw - think that 13 year old will be scarred for life if he finds a porn site? If he won't find it on the net due to the great firewall of the parents, he'll get it on a USB stick on the schoolyard anyway.
I am not asking to outsource parent responsibility to society, on the contrary. If the kids are to learn responsible behaviour, you can't just exert total control over their actions. You don't learn without the possibility to make mistakes. That's why you give them the rules, let them do their thing and occasionally check up on compliance - if they don't keep to the rules, you find out why, talk to them about that and give em a proper ass-chewing if necessary. You don't need total computer access control to teach them to use the things responsibly.
Yes - and you exert that control by talking to them, occasionally looking over their shoulder and showing them some amount of trust, not by installing a totalitarian regime in your home. Technology does not substitute for parenting.
For the amount of control you want to exert over your kids there, I'd suggest you ask some former Stasi or KGB man, I am sure they can give you all information you need about totalitarian control of resource usage and information flow. Don't just ask slashdot - go to the pros. You gotta think of the children after all.
And there are still single-pilot operated planes around, where said prioritizing is even more important. Besides, it is not like that in airliner operations the non-flying pilot is free to jabber away on the radio or to the flying pilot (unless he wants to miss Minneapolis by an hour...;)
The pilot, however, is trained on how to use the radio. The rule of aviate-navigate-communicate in exactly this order is hammered into everyone in that business. Communication has the lowest priority and is only done when no significant plane-control or navigation task is performed. Apart from that, pilots tend not to jabber on about utter nonsense to their controller, but use a highly formalized and short language. So, this does not strengthen the opposing argument in any way at all.
You are probably correct in that we do not have the flat-earthers around here - and, true - I've been in California, and mostly in academic circles around there, so I didn't meet too many of those in the US. We have our own brand of idiots around here, though, and those are not the overt neo-nazis. On the economic side, our focus on export is not perfect either. Our economic policy neglects the German markets for export numbers, which hurts the local workers. On the topic of test equipment, Tektronix ain't the worst brand after all - while I worked at university here, we used Tektronix scopes, and they did their job quite well. Incidentally, I am in the patent business now, and the firm I am working with is doing some of the European applications for Tektronix network analyzers - they ain't dead yet, at least I hope so, as they are paying a bit of my paycheck:)
Oh, I am not questioning the "scientific" nature of the name - just wondering how it came to be named like it. It is not like scientist are dead earnest in naming stuff. You should have a look at the names for certain drosophila mutations... "tinman" - having no heart; "lost in space" - abnormal axon projection; "ken and barbie" - no external genitalia"; "tribbles" - uncontrolled cell division; "smaug" - gene that represses the "dwarf" gene, "ring" - the Really Interesting New Gene.... It is a nerdy business, doing science.
Well, you take the centrist position, I'll be the extremist on the opposite site of the Koreans then. Haven't met a cheese too... biologically active... for me. Although I'd draw the line at casu marzu. Can't see why you don't like Limburger if you like Muenster, though - both are red-culture cheese with a thriving Brevibacterium culture on it. I generally don't find it necessary to halt the culture in any way - for certain kinds of cheese you just need a decent dealer who knows how to store them and who sells them too you at the exactly correct point of ripeness. Take it home, eat it. Stopping the culture by heating would not work with some sorts. Anyway, too each his own, de gustibus non est disputandum.
If you find the grilled squid skewers on that picture tasty, I can only recommend to try it the Mediterranean way. Just grill the whole squid over charcoals, occasionally applying olive oil with garlic to it. Salt and pepper to taste, serve with a bowl of good, dark-green, fruity olive oil and a dash of lemon. Exquisite stuff.
What exactly is "rotten" about blue cheese? The fact that it contains a microorganism? Can as well say goodbye to beer, bread and yogurt too, then. Some red-culture cheese like Munster might border on "rotten" if you go after the smell of a *really* ripe one - still damn tasty stuff, though.
We usually drown it in beer during consumption around here;) On the serious side, as with most innards, preparation is anything - if done wrong, sour lung can be a gristly, vile gruel, if done done right, an absolute delicacy.
Well, "sophia" translates to "wisdom", "phorein" to "to carry" - I can't come up with any other translation than "the dark-bellied bearer of wisdom" myself, which admittedly seems a bit odd to me. Gotta ask the local greek-geek at work on Monday if I missed any other root for "sopho-".
Slashdot Mirror
Hmm... by the last count in this thread, there's three of us. I shall dispose of the usurper and set things right.
Oh, I think you can take it quite a bit further. If well done, this could be a quite excellent "critical thinking" class that could be actually interesting to the students. Think about it - the process that transforms an "unidentified flying object" into an "identified flying object" is pure scientific method. The analysis of rumors, urban legends, popular beliefs and conspiracy theories is, apart from the anthropological value, an excellent exercise in critical thinking. Once you find that kernel of truth that actually spawned the rumor, belief or theory, you have thoroughly demystified it. It could teach the students not only to, but how to question such spurious theories in a fun, interesting and challenging setting. I like it.
In the end, it comes down to a matter of taste anyway. I am just an analog guy, so I guess I kinda projected my tastes a bit there. If someone wants to focus on digital stuff and start with fiddling around with arduinos, more power to them. Me, I am as happy as a pig in the mud with a handful of tubes and a tesla coil ;)
Actually, the village was debt free from the beginning - everyone owed someone else $100 and was owed $100 by someone different in a circular fashion, balancing to $0 for everyone. The story only works under the assumption that there is zero liquid cash in town, so the balancing can't actually be realized.
That is actually an essential safety tip, especially when it comes to working with higher voltages. Always be wary of the capacitors - The high capacity ones in power supplies, CRT monitors and the like can hold dangerous, even lethal charges, even when the device is unplugged. Always discharge them in a controlled manner to be sure.
Let em come... I am on file anyway for "knowledge in handling and access to chemical, radioactive and biological hazardous substances", since I last applied for a visa to the US. I expected to get bothered about it after I filled out that form, but there was not a single question asked at the embassy or at customs and immigration later. One has to wonder what they actually do with that data.
Arduinos sure are nice, but if the guy wants to start into electronics from complete scratch, I think he shold hold that off for a bit. Get into soldering first, build some very basic stuff like some small amplifier, some oscillators for blinkenlights, heck, a radio, perhaps something in the high-voltage area when you are more sure about what are you doing. Tesla coils are fun...
You are right in localizing me. I suppose it can indeed be a nuisance to foreigners, and I could very well go without it. As to the rest of your post - first, ACTA will not have any effect on cellphones, as far as I can glean from the leaked text. Regarding data retention laws coming in via the EU - the constitutional court has made it very clear that it has the last say on any matter which has a stronger constitutional protection in Germany than in the EU, so, after the last ruling of the BVerfG, data retention cannot be slipped in via the EU without first taking away power from the constitutional court. If that happens, I'll be on the streets and will protest with all that I have.
Real life bullying can result in teen suicide - and you can't monitor your child 24/7. Do you want to put surveillance gear on them, too? A kid doesn't kill itself after bullied one single time. If you as a parent don't realize something is disturbing your child, you have to be goddamn disconnected from the kid. At this point, it is the parents fault. On the second point, yeah, young kids seeing a beheading can be disturbing, but hardly as dangerous as using a table saw unsupervised. Besides, have you ever seen a beheading on the net without explicitly searching for it? I haven't, so gimme a break here.
Where I live, you gotta register your cellphone (or rather your SIM card) on purchase, using your national ID card. I am generally fine with the idea - under one provision: a decent constitution in combination with a functional constitutional court that regularly kicks the arse of some politico who wants to abuse the data for the sake of "anti-terrorism", "anti-childpornography" or whatever the buzzword of the day is. Thankfully, this seems to work around here, at least for now.
I am not implying that the kids should vote on the mode of their internet use. But if you do not give them any freedom, including the freedom to violate the agreed upon rules, you do not give them any trust. How should they ever learn responsible behaviour without experiencing trust and freedom?
Hehe, well, true - that might actually the best use for a setup like the one asked for. They might be more motivated in learning proper hacking techniques if they can use it to circumvent your controls.
Why would you need to hover over them all the time when they use the computer? It is a damn computer, not a table saw - think that 13 year old will be scarred for life if he finds a porn site? If he won't find it on the net due to the great firewall of the parents, he'll get it on a USB stick on the schoolyard anyway.
I am not asking to outsource parent responsibility to society, on the contrary. If the kids are to learn responsible behaviour, you can't just exert total control over their actions. You don't learn without the possibility to make mistakes. That's why you give them the rules, let them do their thing and occasionally check up on compliance - if they don't keep to the rules, you find out why, talk to them about that and give em a proper ass-chewing if necessary. You don't need total computer access control to teach them to use the things responsibly.
Yes - and you exert that control by talking to them, occasionally looking over their shoulder and showing them some amount of trust, not by installing a totalitarian regime in your home. Technology does not substitute for parenting.
For the amount of control you want to exert over your kids there, I'd suggest you ask some former Stasi or KGB man, I am sure they can give you all information you need about totalitarian control of resource usage and information flow. Don't just ask slashdot - go to the pros. You gotta think of the children after all.
And there are still single-pilot operated planes around, where said prioritizing is even more important. Besides, it is not like that in airliner operations the non-flying pilot is free to jabber away on the radio or to the flying pilot (unless he wants to miss Minneapolis by an hour... ;)
The pilot, however, is trained on how to use the radio. The rule of aviate-navigate-communicate in exactly this order is hammered into everyone in that business. Communication has the lowest priority and is only done when no significant plane-control or navigation task is performed. Apart from that, pilots tend not to jabber on about utter nonsense to their controller, but use a highly formalized and short language. So, this does not strengthen the opposing argument in any way at all.
You are probably correct in that we do not have the flat-earthers around here - and, true - I've been in California, and mostly in academic circles around there, so I didn't meet too many of those in the US. We have our own brand of idiots around here, though, and those are not the overt neo-nazis. On the economic side, our focus on export is not perfect either. Our economic policy neglects the German markets for export numbers, which hurts the local workers. On the topic of test equipment, Tektronix ain't the worst brand after all - while I worked at university here, we used Tektronix scopes, and they did their job quite well. Incidentally, I am in the patent business now, and the firm I am working with is doing some of the European applications for Tektronix network analyzers - they ain't dead yet, at least I hope so, as they are paying a bit of my paycheck :)
Oh, I am not questioning the "scientific" nature of the name - just wondering how it came to be named like it. It is not like scientist are dead earnest in naming stuff. You should have a look at the names for certain drosophila mutations... "tinman" - having no heart; "lost in space" - abnormal axon projection; "ken and barbie" - no external genitalia"; "tribbles" - uncontrolled cell division; "smaug" - gene that represses the "dwarf" gene, "ring" - the Really Interesting New Gene.... It is a nerdy business, doing science.
Well, you take the centrist position, I'll be the extremist on the opposite site of the Koreans then. Haven't met a cheese too... biologically active... for me. Although I'd draw the line at casu marzu. Can't see why you don't like Limburger if you like Muenster, though - both are red-culture cheese with a thriving Brevibacterium culture on it. I generally don't find it necessary to halt the culture in any way - for certain kinds of cheese you just need a decent dealer who knows how to store them and who sells them too you at the exactly correct point of ripeness. Take it home, eat it. Stopping the culture by heating would not work with some sorts. Anyway, too each his own, de gustibus non est disputandum.
If you find the grilled squid skewers on that picture tasty, I can only recommend to try it the Mediterranean way. Just grill the whole squid over charcoals, occasionally applying olive oil with garlic to it. Salt and pepper to taste, serve with a bowl of good, dark-green, fruity olive oil and a dash of lemon. Exquisite stuff.
What exactly is "rotten" about blue cheese? The fact that it contains a microorganism? Can as well say goodbye to beer, bread and yogurt too, then. Some red-culture cheese like Munster might border on "rotten" if you go after the smell of a *really* ripe one - still damn tasty stuff, though.
We usually drown it in beer during consumption around here ;) On the serious side, as with most innards, preparation is anything - if done wrong, sour lung can be a gristly, vile gruel, if done done right, an absolute delicacy.
Well, "sophia" translates to "wisdom", "phorein" to "to carry" - I can't come up with any other translation than "the dark-bellied bearer of wisdom" myself, which admittedly seems a bit odd to me. Gotta ask the local greek-geek at work on Monday if I missed any other root for "sopho-".