I assumed anyone at slashdot could take the math the rest of the way and apply it to their situation but apparently you need some help with yer figuring.
Lets use your figure of $15K for an econobox. We will leave out interest (hell, everybody is doing zero interest financing every other week anyway....) to keep the numbers simple. Besides, it doesn't make much difference because it hits both sides about equally. And we are ignoring insurance, and not putting numbers on maintaince, etc.
So lets do the 60 month deal and pay $250/month plus $200 a month for gas. Total cost is $450/month to commute in an econobox.
Now the electric will run about $26.5K, or $441/month plus $20/month for electricity . If you go for the hybrid version you are looking at $500 + electricity AND gas.... probably between $520 and $560 per month. You won't know for sure until you actually drive it a few months. And no you won't be getting anywhere the stated mpg, those are always a lie (marketing 'facts' if you don't like the word lie) on hybrids.
On a 48 month note the math gets worse at $512 vs $562 electric or $645-$685 for hybrid. And remember that a small difference in the assumptions will make a big difference in the math. Make it thirty miles to work instead of thirty-five and the gap opens up about $28/month. Gas at $4/gal instead of $5 rips open a $40/month gap.
On the plus side the electric car has 'kewl factor' in it's favor up against insane cost to repair as a negative because exotic always equals expensive when you roll into a garage. Being an untested design you can forget those dreams of saving on maintaince. You probably shouldn't count on a long service life either, whereas you can consult consumer reports when buying an econobox and buy one that will have a good chance of having a service life longer than the notes and/or extended warranty.
What do ya think you will do with that car? This is the question I have for most of these exotic vehicles.
Based on their own numbers you get a 120 mile distance to dead so you wouldn't want to get more than forty or fifty miles afrom home and that is going to be with the climate control off. From their webpage it looks like you can get a hybrid drive as an option but they don't have any details as to how much cargo space you sacrifice for the gas engine/generator.
Do the math. A basic el cheapo econobox will set you back less than half the (almost certain to increase when they finally get ready to ship) prelim pricetag on this plastic car and that will buy a LOT of gas, even it it hits $5/gallon. Unless you are planning on putting a lot of miles on it (and unless you are going for the hybrid option you can't) you are better off with a regular vehicle. Or just go buy a Harley.
Lets run the numbers. Assume a commute that runs 35 miles, 70 both ways. On a good econobox you can get 35mpg so it works out to two gallons per day or assuming gas hits $5/gal you pay $10/day for gas. Average of about twenty work days per month and ya get $200 for gas to commute. Now compute the difference in the monthly note for the econobox and the savings on the light bill from not plugging in every night and gulping down a few KWH (remember it takes more than 10KWH to charge a 10KWH battery) and it's probably a wash. If your commute is less the economics get worse pretty fast.
> Among the 100-mpg vehicles that Detroit (and Japan) have claimed impossible to build...
I know it is fun to rip on 'evil' corporations and all, but there is a bit of difference between some glorified go-cart some kids cobble together and what will pass the Dept of Transportation crash tests. Detroit and Tokyo live in the world where trial lawyers will rip ya a fresh asshole if a jury can be convinced your design wasn't 'perfectly safe.'
Sigh. Stop worshiping at the altar of Darwin for a few minutes. Evolution only holds when discussing the development of life in the ABSENCE OF INTELLIGENT DIRECTION. Once H. Sapiens crossed the line into sentience Darwin went right the hell out of the window because whether or not "Intelligent Design" is part of our past doesn't matter because it IS our future.
We already live in a world where most of the organisms we see are the products of design... genetic engneered by US to serve OUR needs. We already possess the knowledge to do the same thing to our own species but are rightly reluctant to employ the currently known methods. It would be foolish to believe this situation will last much longer. We WILL create Human 2.0 in our own image. Let us pray we design it wisely. Odds are this upcoming event is one of those 'Filters' under discussion.
> the author is basically expanding the Drake equation to possibly > include something past our current tech level..
Except most instances of the Drake Equation I have seen ialready included the possibility of blowing up.
About the only real insight this guy has is instead of pondering the implications of the Drake Equation regarding little green men he is asking what the implications of the size of the various improbabilities might mean for US.
But like all attempts to make sense of the Drake Equation it is pointless. We are suffering from an almost total lack of data which makes it all but impossible to get a grip on any of the numbers we need to start filling in the Drake Equation. And we will continue to lack information until we actually get our butts out there and look around.
If we fly through and examine ten thousand star systems and find nada we still won't know all that much. What if some event wiped out most life in our neck 'o the woods? Put down real teams and look hard at ten or a hundred thousand systems and we will know pretty good bit about the probability of life in our galaxy. One of a few billion such galaxies.
The guy dismisses the possibility that most civilizations evolve in some direction other than midlessly colonizing every star they can reach.
After all our own civilization has pretty much lost interest in anything beyond putting up more geostationary TV transmitters.
What if most evolve beyond physical forms? What if most lose themselves in virtual realities. What if many simply don't bother leaving their own solar system because the speed of light proves to be unbreakable and they aren't interested in planting colonies that will have little or no contact or impact on their own civilization?
Or what if we just got lucky and got a galaxy to ourselves?
This one is simple. Everyone just blackholes the IP range and game over. Better if the backbones drop the route. Best if we all drop the IP space of whoever is directly connecting to a known spam network.
> Others might say "you can be the crazy old coot out in the woods who's > afraid of society, but we recognise that humanity is a family - we take > care of each other and recognise that we're interdependent".
In other words YOU are deciding the crazy old coot is WRONG and by virtue of your superior morality/reasoning/whatever you claim the right to make another your slave and force him to obey your will.
By MY moral code that crazy old coot has every right to give you a 2x4 response applied directly to the forehead when you try it.
The right to be wrong is THE fundamental human right. It's fair game to reason with someone you think is making a bad decision but the second you use force to impose your will on them you have lost the argument. (Cases of extreme mental illness being an obvious exception. The moral argument being that the person isn't a free moral agent and will probably be grateful once they are sane.)
Yet. I'll bet ya dollars to navy beans the socialists in Canada didn't tell their victims what they had in store for em either.... until it was far too late to unwind the system back to a free market outside of a revolution.
But the iron logic that drives these unwholesome urges dictate it. You see, the whole point of the exercise is rationing scarce resources, not according to the free market but according to the misbegotten notions of a self selected elite. Once that reality hits, those with the resources to afford more than the universal rationed services will want to buy more. But that undermies the whole system because those getting the smaller and smaller rationed services (as the whole system goes to hell) become jealous again and new demands for 'fairness' go out from the usual suspects.
Boo hoo. Food is a fundamental necessity. So I guess the only solution is to nationalize the means of production, distribution etc of foodstuffs?
Shelter in much of the country is a fundamental necessity and pretty damned useful everywhere else. So do we nationalize housing and ration it too?
Outside of cities with mass transit, a car is now a fundamental necessity. See where your reasoning goes?
> Sure, you're "Free", but is the guy who lives on the street "Free"?
Yup. Freedom that doesn't include the possibility of failure isn't Freedom. Freedom includes the right to do things you (and me) think are dumb/wrong/etc. or it isn't Freedom.
If some guy uses their freedom to screw their life up I see no reason for you (using the power of government) to seize the product of my labor to help the asshole out. Now, being a civilized person, I might help the guy out if he is in my neighborhood (and he is ready to BE helped) but that is MY decision.
NO karma is granted for 'helping' with other people's money. Since the victim (taxpayer) didn't give it willingly they don't get any either. And since the target usually doesn't actualy get helped when some nitwit social worker tries to manage their life it is a loss all around. If you guys would get that fundamental truth into yer heads the world would be a better place.
The problem with wanting stuff for free is TANSTAFL. Somebody pays. And any system of distributing goods and services beyond voluntary exchange quickly leads to lowering production and thus to rationing.
Our current mixed free/socialist medical system offers ample examples of this in action, comparing and contrasting it with full socialist systems and with the historical record of a fully free system should be enough to convince any person capable of rational thought as to the more desirable direction we should be attempting to seek reform toward.
> You seem to be under the impression that the US has the best health care in the world.
We do by every metric that matters.
In America, ambulances to not sit in the hospital parking lot for as long as hours because the ER won't accept patients. If they accepted them it would hose their waiting time stats ya see, while if they stay outside in the ambulance they aren't counted as being in line. Of course it sucks if somebody needs an ambulance during that wait..... This actually happens in the UK.
In America people do not wait months for basic services. They do in Canada... unless they have cash, then they drive to America.
Should I continue? Nah, you aren't going to give up on socialism.
> Instead, modern medical insurance has degenerated into a sort of payment plan for routine medical expenses.
Exactly. What we call 'insurance' in the medical world is more like a maintaince agreement or extended warranty anywhere else.
Your homeowner's policy doesn't pay every home repair AND routine maintaince expense. Your auto policy, even 'comprehensive' coverage, only covers accidents and serious unexpected damage. Extended warranties for cars are a routine thing these days but nobody confuses it with insurance.
This sort of blurring of terms is dangerous because we are on the brink of doing something really stupid, nationalizing the entire medical industry. As if the outright socialism of it doesn't scare ya, or the drop in quality that has occurred EVERY time it has been tried around the world doesn't disuade you from supporting this BS then I got one last argument.
Look at the latest (but totally predictable) development in countries that have gone this way. Because they pay for your poor decisions they are claiming the power to totally control your life. Diet police ascendent. In AU they are actually sitting around and talking like civilized people (when they are nothing but, as this is pure fascism) about mandatory assessment of everyone and taxing people differently based on their results as a way to enforce norms of behaviour less stressful on their overloaded nationalized health system. Britain is talking about denying people access to medical care if their BMI exceeds government limits, they smoke, etc.
And the sick part is it actually makes perfect sense if one accepts the premise. If the government is responsible for your care then they should be able to tell you how you can live. The downside of being a 'dependent' is that you aren't Free.
Given a choice I'd rather live a short life as a Free man than a long healthy one as a slave but the whole idea is that Democrats want to make the decision for me at gunpoint. There won't BE any opt out, accepting payment for medical services outside of Hillarycare will be a felony. They already TRIED it in Canada, thankfully a few judges weren't quite ready to go there yet. Yet.
> The truth is, who knows what's going on in Negroponte's head? He isn't > being all that forthcoming, even with the recent statement.
Exactly. It wouldn't do to admit that he knew he would have to eventually get Microsoft onboard from day one.
> So maybe countries are demanding it...
Of course. If any doubt remained as to Microsoft's political influence and their ruthlessness in using it the latest sad business at the ISO should have dispelled it. I'm arguing that NN was smart enough to have known that doing a deal with Microsoft was eventually going to be a requirement and that he planned around that.
Exactly. If Microsoft is happy then a lot of obstacles vanish. If Microsoft isn't happy a lot of obstacles appear, deals never finalize, etc. They are the 800lb gorilla in the room and you can't ignore them.
My guess is this outcome was planned from the start. My guess OLPC got from us (us being the OS/FS crowd) exactly what they wanted. Which was exactly what Asus got. Microsoft's attention.
Both wanted XP really really cheap. Both knew that the most reliable way to get it was to wave the Linux flag and prove viability. As long as OLPC looked like vaporware Microsoft was perfectly content to allow RedHat and a bunch of idealistic volunteers to waste their time developing software to run on it. Once they shipped working hardware and showed every sign of shipping a lot of units Microsoft had no choice but to offer up XP to keep their monopoly position. OLPC knew this would happen and almost certainly planned on this outcome from day one. Had they really planned on staying with the Penguin they would have used an ARM based one chip solution and saved a lot on the 'ol power budget. The ONLY[1] reason to insist on x86 compatibility is keeping the door open to Windows.
Note that most of the same applies to Asus except they were producing in partnership with Intel as a flagship for their new low power chipsets so using an ARM wasn't an option. From day one they were including all of the drivers for XP with each unit with the expectation many/most would be reloaded after purchase. And note that just as soon as they demonstrated volume sales[2] they used that to negotiate a really sweet deal for XP. I kinda doubt even Dell got prices on XP so low they could sell Windows and Linux for the exact same price except they toss in 8GB of flash as a bone to the poor saps who buy soon to be abandoned Linux version.
[1] Remember that OLPC lacks the excuse of needing the x86 only Flash plugin since they don't ship it.
[2] To be fair, the original plan was to retail for $199. When that didn't work it probably made business sense to rethink the Linux decision since $500 machines do have the margin to cover a Windows license.
> So in theory we could be seeing this with $2 or $3 a gallon gas fairly soon...
No. Even assuming that at 50% efficiency they can produce a gallon of fuel for $2 we still need to figure in a profit for the manufacturer, transportation and a profit for the retailer. Now add in taxes at each level, regulations, polution controls, etc. Might squeek in at $4 by the time it hits the pump. Of course in five years there might be a market for a $4/gallon alternative fuel.
If you want to understand the overhead involved look at gas. When oil was selling for $15-25/barrel gas was retailing between $1 and $1.50/gallon. Oil is now selling for >$110/barrel and gas is averaging $3.50/gallon. Kinda gives you an idea how much of the gas you are pumping goes to the terrorists in the middle east and how much is being eaten up in refining, taxes, profit and misc overhead.
Not a problem. Buy the addionics dual CF to laptop hdd adapter for a few bucks, add in a pair of 32GB CF cards and you should be able to get it all delivered for just a few dollars over the $300 mark. Either take them as is and have a pair of volumes or do a LVM or RAID0 and make one 64GB volume.
Now if you want a shiny SATA drive, those are in major demand and carry a premium. So be smart and think outside the box and you can win.
Ya, but that is the price they paid to partner with Intel. Find a subnote that gets good battery life and it will be a marketing lie. i.e. either it WON'T actually run over three hours OR it isn't a subnote anymore after they strap the hi-cap battery to it's ass.
If they wanted battery life they should have ditched the Intel Inside sticker and stuck an ARM in, even one fabbed by Intel. Escept for leaning really hard on Adobe to give them a Flash Player port everything else they shipped on the original eeepc would have rebuilt with few problems.
This one has some things going for it, although the original WOW feature in the first product announcement for me last year was that $200 pricetag. I said at the time that smelled of bait and switch, looks like I was right. Can't argue too much though since they are selling every unit they can build and ship at these higher prices for now. Perhaps they will go for the low end of the market when production capacity catches up to demand. Or perhaps they will leave that segment for someone else.
The best reason to go after the $250 market is that with luck we won't get bait/switched on Linux. Oh course we now know that the real price a large OEM pays for Windows is about the same as the wholesale price of a single 8GB flash chip.
> The only thing worse than heavy taxes and heavy spending is light taxes and heavy spending..
No argument from me on that one.
> At the risk of getting burned at the stake, I do see a problem with > the mentality that it's "our money" implying we deserve to pay no taxes
It is MY money, if you don't want YOUR money the Department of the Treasury accepts donations. I lean Libertarian but not so much I think all taxes (and by extension all government) is wicked. Call me a Constituitionalist. So I think taxes are morally acceptable, but we should never lose sight of the fact that is OUR money they government is seizing by force. Keep that in mind and it makes the whole 'is this program worth the money' question a whole different kettle of fish.
> We drive on the roads, we expect the fire dept and police to show up > if necessary, we cheer on the troops - then we expect it all to be free.
And I don't have a problem with paying for those things. Arguments about the proper level of government which should be responsible, what forms of taxation are most efficent, etc. are of course patrotic.
> Could we disband public education and save a few bucks in tax money? > Sure, in the short run, but about 20 years later the GDP would fall > by many times the amount "saved."
Here, I'll argue with ya. If we burned down every Government school and lined out the budget of the Dept of Education I suspect it would lead to a new golden age. Allowing the current system to get near a child should be considered child abuse.
> I think we need a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.
That is one solution, and one we should consider in the short term. Enforcing the 9th and 10th Amendments would be my preferred solution.
> We've proven that tax cuts are not a fiscally responsible way to > balance a budget or stimulate an economy.... This isn't opinion. > It is cold, hard fact.
No exactly. Go look up the numbers after you jot off a flame at me for being a neocon fool. But the 'cold hard fact' is that revenue to the Federal Government, measured in total or just from the Income Tax is up bigtime. The problem is spending rose even faster than revenue.
And it can't be blamed on the War either. The revenue increase easily covers the War, the problem is we went on a spending binge. While a partisan could try to fuzz the issue with whinging about the razor thin majorities of the Republicans or the RINO problem I won't.
With the President willing (yeah, right) to veto the Republicans had sufficient numbers to have reigned in spending. Democrats would have howled bloody murder, slung the usual accusations about Republicans being uncaring monsters...blah blah the children! blah blah. but they could have made it stick. The problem was they went native, becoming the thing they went to Washington to fight.... they became Incumbents. They discovered the POWER of spending other people's money and they discovered they liked it.
> And he's willing to continue it for up to 100 years if that's what it takes.
I wasn't exhorting the dishonest lefty trolls to consider the virtues of divided government, I was asking the more moderate ones to think on it. The material below is for them, btw.
> Seriously, most of the federal deficits of the last 30 years have been under/due to spending under Republican administrations.
Agreed. But dig in a bit and notice Clinton went crazy taxing and spending and trying to socialize 1/7th of the economy his first two years and suddenly became the 'third way' triangulator we were promised when he was campaigning... just as soon as Newt took the House away from him.
Bush II was much less spend happy in the years when Repubs didn't have both ends of Penn. Ave. Heck, just as soon as San Fran Nan took charge in the House he got so much religion on reigning in spending he found his long lost veto pen. He even waves it around from time to time... too bad he still doesn't actually USE it much.
The exception is Reagan. In his case deficits seem to have been the price he was required to pay to win the Cold War. Democrats would agree to let him build up the military, research DSI, etc. so long as he would go along with them continuing to spend to buy votes. Odds are most folk posting on/. don't remember just how things were before the Wall fell. If ya think the GWOT and Islamic goons wanting to cut heads off is a bit scary, that wasn't nuttin' compared to the Soviets hellbent on conquering the world, tens of thousands of H bombs on a hair trigger and the whole MAD Doctrine thing. It was different times.
But in summart, divided government is good. Less gets done with divided government, and I can live with that a lot more than what we have seen the last decade or so when one side reigns supreme. Because sometimes the best action is inaction.
> The only reason a lot of tax "cuts" are considered giveaways to the > rich are because they often times have a bias to help lower the burden > on rich people, but have little to no positive effects on the poor.
Care to explain how the fsck a tax cut CAN help 'the poor' since they already 'pay' negative tax rates? The 'evil rich' pay the vast majority of the taxes so how can you have a tax cut that doesn't, at least from an absolute dollars p.o.v. in the first year, favor the rich?
And that still leaves the huge elephant in the room, the almost universal language of the left/msm where alowing people to keep THEIR MONEY is called a giveaway and/or counted as an expense on the Feral Governments books.
The benefit to the poor from lowering taxes is in the general economic stimulus, which tends to create jobs and upwards mobility. Some of the poor rise up the ladder enough to become taxpayers themselves. I.E. what liberals sneeringly refer to as 'trickle down economics. But it works. Rich people aren't stupid, they know how to work the tax system so they worry more about sheltering their loot when rates are high. If ya don't beleive me, next time you are job hunting try asking a homeless guy for a job.
And if you are an lefty income redistributionist there is the inescapable fact that lowering income tax rates has increased revenue to the government every time it has been tried since the establishment of the income tax. We can probably whack the rates several more times before we risk finding ourselves on the lower tax rates == lower revenue side of the Laffer Curve. So decide which you want more, more income to redistribute according to your superior moral sensibilities or to punish the 'evil rich'.
> I thought that was in the constitution... nothing supersedes constitutional law.
1. Ah the joy of watching a young idealist's faith dashed. Our rulers ain't been bound by that old yellowed parchment for at least a century. Me, I say it was Lincoln who first really and truly wiped his arse with it, others put the exact point +/- fifty years from him depending how cynical they are But it is worse these days, if a day goes by now without a Congresscritter, Federal Judge or POTUS violating his Oath it means the bastard is on vacation.
2. But they usually pay at least lip service to the Constituition if they can, and it actually gives Congress the power to regulate commerce between the several states and even I'd say that so long as it is equally applied they can indeed tax it. And unless every block grant is struck down they would have the power to give the money to the States. So they could probably save a step and just let the states collect it through some big federal clearing house.. after giving Congress a taste.
> Isn't this illegal, since only the feds can regulate interstate commerce?
Which is why Congress is trying to pass a law. You are right that the antics of NY are obviously illegal but they probably aren't dumb enough to think it will actually pass or not get shot dwon in court. But as a PR stunt it will help get Congress to make it legal.
> not so long as there's any citizen's assets left untaxed at a rate lower than 100%:(
Oh of course not! And why should they when they consider it their money in the first place. How else to explain the mind set that calls every tax cut 'a giveaway to the rich', refers to how much a tax cut will 'cost' the government, how much it will 'cost' the government to implement a tax cut, etc. In their evil brains it is ALL theirs and they begrudge each and every cent they are forced to 'spend' when they allow a taxpayer to have a dollar with no strings attached.
And the summary is spot on folks. Since the Internet becane bigtime either Congress of the White House has been outside the control of Democrats so the net was safe. Divided government is usually the best kind. Something the Dem leaning slashdot users might want to keep in mind come November. Congress is almost a statistical certainty to remain in Dem hands so ask yourself, Is Maverick really THAT bad?
Apple didn't use TPM or this discussion would be moot. I probably should not discuss it in detail due to the DMCA but I suspect that reminding people that Google is your friend is safely on the legal side of the DMCA.
And being a little more bold I'll narrow your searching and just mention that there is a fairly radioactive set of patches for Qemu to allow unmodified copies of OS X to boot.
Slashdot Mirror
I assumed anyone at slashdot could take the math the rest of the way and apply it to their situation but apparently you need some help with yer figuring.
Lets use your figure of $15K for an econobox. We will leave out interest (hell, everybody is doing zero interest financing every other week anyway....) to keep the numbers simple. Besides, it doesn't make much difference because it hits both sides about equally. And we are ignoring insurance, and not putting numbers on maintaince, etc.
So lets do the 60 month deal and pay $250/month plus $200 a month for gas. Total cost is $450/month to commute in an econobox.
Now the electric will run about $26.5K, or $441/month plus $20/month for electricity . If you go for the hybrid version you are looking at $500 + electricity AND gas.... probably between $520 and $560 per month. You won't know for sure until you actually drive it a few months. And no you won't be getting anywhere the stated mpg, those are always a lie (marketing 'facts' if you don't like the word lie) on hybrids.
On a 48 month note the math gets worse at $512 vs $562 electric or $645-$685 for hybrid. And remember that a small difference in the assumptions will make a big difference in the math. Make it thirty miles to work instead of thirty-five and the gap opens up about $28/month. Gas at $4/gal instead of $5 rips open a $40/month gap.
On the plus side the electric car has 'kewl factor' in it's favor up against insane cost to repair as a negative because exotic always equals expensive when you roll into a garage. Being an untested design you can forget those dreams of saving on maintaince. You probably shouldn't count on a long service life either, whereas you can consult consumer reports when buying an econobox and buy one that will have a good chance of having a service life longer than the notes and/or extended warranty.
What do ya think you will do with that car? This is the question I have for most of these exotic vehicles.
Based on their own numbers you get a 120 mile distance to dead so you wouldn't want to get more than forty or fifty miles afrom home and that is going to be with the climate control off. From their webpage it looks like you can get a hybrid drive as an option but they don't have any details as to how much cargo space you sacrifice for the gas engine/generator.
Do the math. A basic el cheapo econobox will set you back less than half the (almost certain to increase when they finally get ready to ship) prelim pricetag on this plastic car and that will buy a LOT of gas, even it it hits $5/gallon. Unless you are planning on putting a lot of miles on it (and unless you are going for the hybrid option you can't) you are better off with a regular vehicle. Or just go buy a Harley.
Lets run the numbers. Assume a commute that runs 35 miles, 70 both ways. On a good econobox you can get 35mpg so it works out to two gallons per day or assuming gas hits $5/gal you pay $10/day for gas. Average of about twenty work days per month and ya get $200 for gas to commute. Now compute the difference in the monthly note for the econobox and the savings on the light bill from not plugging in every night and gulping down a few KWH (remember it takes more than 10KWH to charge a 10KWH battery) and it's probably a wash. If your commute is less the economics get worse pretty fast.
> Among the 100-mpg vehicles that Detroit (and Japan) have claimed impossible to build...
I know it is fun to rip on 'evil' corporations and all, but there is a bit of difference between some glorified go-cart some kids cobble together and what will pass the Dept of Transportation crash tests. Detroit and Tokyo live in the world where trial lawyers will rip ya a fresh asshole if a jury can be convinced your design wasn't 'perfectly safe.'
> You can't evolve beyond a physical form.
Sigh. Stop worshiping at the altar of Darwin for a few minutes. Evolution only holds when discussing the development of life in the ABSENCE OF INTELLIGENT DIRECTION. Once H. Sapiens crossed the line into sentience Darwin went right the hell out of the window because whether or not "Intelligent Design" is part of our past doesn't matter because it IS our future.
We already live in a world where most of the organisms we see are the products of design... genetic engneered by US to serve OUR needs. We already possess the knowledge to do the same thing to our own species but are rightly reluctant to employ the currently known methods. It would be foolish to believe this situation will last much longer. We WILL create Human 2.0 in our own image. Let us pray we design it wisely. Odds are this upcoming event is one of those 'Filters' under discussion.
> the author is basically expanding the Drake equation to possibly
> include something past our current tech level..
Except most instances of the Drake Equation I have seen ialready included the possibility of blowing up.
About the only real insight this guy has is instead of pondering the implications of the Drake Equation regarding little green men he is asking what the implications of the size of the various improbabilities might mean for US.
But like all attempts to make sense of the Drake Equation it is pointless. We are suffering from an almost total lack of data which makes it all but impossible to get a grip on any of the numbers we need to start filling in the Drake Equation. And we will continue to lack information until we actually get our butts out there and look around.
If we fly through and examine ten thousand star systems and find nada we still won't know all that much. What if some event wiped out most life in our neck 'o the woods? Put down real teams and look hard at ten or a hundred thousand systems and we will know pretty good bit about the probability of life in our galaxy. One of a few billion such galaxies.
The guy dismisses the possibility that most civilizations evolve in some direction other than midlessly colonizing every star they can reach.
After all our own civilization has pretty much lost interest in anything beyond putting up more geostationary TV transmitters.
What if most evolve beyond physical forms? What if most lose themselves in virtual realities. What if many simply don't bother leaving their own solar system because the speed of light proves to be unbreakable and they aren't interested in planting colonies that will have little or no contact or impact on their own civilization?
Or what if we just got lucky and got a galaxy to ourselves?
This one is simple. Everyone just blackholes the IP range and game over. Better if the backbones drop the route. Best if we all drop the IP space of whoever is directly connecting to a known spam network.
> Others might say "you can be the crazy old coot out in the woods who's
> afraid of society, but we recognise that humanity is a family - we take
> care of each other and recognise that we're interdependent".
In other words YOU are deciding the crazy old coot is WRONG and by virtue of your superior morality/reasoning/whatever you claim the right to make another your slave and force him to obey your will.
By MY moral code that crazy old coot has every right to give you a 2x4 response applied directly to the forehead when you try it.
The right to be wrong is THE fundamental human right. It's fair game to reason with someone you think is making a bad decision but the second you use force to impose your will on them you have lost the argument. (Cases of extreme mental illness being an obvious exception. The moral argument being that the person isn't a free moral agent and will probably be grateful once they are sane.)
> That's not true.
Yet. I'll bet ya dollars to navy beans the socialists in Canada didn't tell their victims what they had in store for em either.... until it was far too late to unwind the system back to a free market outside of a revolution.
But the iron logic that drives these unwholesome urges dictate it. You see, the whole point of the exercise is rationing scarce resources, not according to the free market but according to the misbegotten notions of a self selected elite. Once that reality hits, those with the resources to afford more than the universal rationed services will want to buy more. But that undermies the whole system because those getting the smaller and smaller rationed services (as the whole system goes to hell) become jealous again and new demands for 'fairness' go out from the usual suspects.
> medical care is a fundamental necessity
Boo hoo. Food is a fundamental necessity. So I guess the only solution is to nationalize the means of production, distribution etc of foodstuffs?
Shelter in much of the country is a fundamental necessity and pretty damned useful everywhere else. So do we nationalize housing and ration it too?
Outside of cities with mass transit, a car is now a fundamental necessity. See where your reasoning goes?
> Sure, you're "Free", but is the guy who lives on the street "Free"?
Yup. Freedom that doesn't include the possibility of failure isn't Freedom. Freedom includes the right to do things you (and me) think are dumb/wrong/etc. or it isn't Freedom.
If some guy uses their freedom to screw their life up I see no reason for you (using the power of government) to seize the product of my labor to help the asshole out. Now, being a civilized person, I might help the guy out if he is in my neighborhood (and he is ready to BE helped) but that is MY decision.
NO karma is granted for 'helping' with other people's money. Since the victim (taxpayer) didn't give it willingly they don't get any either. And since the target usually doesn't actualy get helped when some nitwit social worker tries to manage their life it is a loss all around. If you guys would get that fundamental truth into yer heads the world would be a better place.
The problem with wanting stuff for free is TANSTAFL. Somebody pays. And any system of distributing goods and services beyond voluntary exchange quickly leads to lowering production and thus to rationing.
Our current mixed free/socialist medical system offers ample examples of this in action, comparing and contrasting it with full socialist systems and with the historical record of a fully free system should be enough to convince any person capable of rational thought as to the more desirable direction we should be attempting to seek reform toward.
> You seem to be under the impression that the US has the best health care in the world.
We do by every metric that matters.
In America, ambulances to not sit in the hospital parking lot for as long as hours because the ER won't accept patients. If they accepted them it would hose their waiting time stats ya see, while if they stay outside in the ambulance they aren't counted as being in line. Of course it sucks if somebody needs an ambulance during that wait..... This actually happens in the UK.
In America people do not wait months for basic services. They do in Canada... unless they have cash, then they drive to America.
Should I continue? Nah, you aren't going to give up on socialism.
> Instead, modern medical insurance has degenerated into a sort of payment plan for routine medical expenses.
Exactly. What we call 'insurance' in the medical world is more like a maintaince agreement or extended warranty anywhere else.
Your homeowner's policy doesn't pay every home repair AND routine maintaince expense. Your auto policy, even 'comprehensive' coverage, only covers accidents and serious unexpected damage. Extended warranties for cars are a routine thing these days but nobody confuses it with insurance.
This sort of blurring of terms is dangerous because we are on the brink of doing something really stupid, nationalizing the entire medical industry. As if the outright socialism of it doesn't scare ya, or the drop in quality that has occurred EVERY time it has been tried around the world doesn't disuade you from supporting this BS then I got one last argument.
Look at the latest (but totally predictable) development in countries that have gone this way. Because they pay for your poor decisions they are claiming the power to totally control your life. Diet police ascendent. In AU they are actually sitting around and talking like civilized people (when they are nothing but, as this is pure fascism) about mandatory assessment of everyone and taxing people differently based on their results as a way to enforce norms of behaviour less stressful on their overloaded nationalized health system. Britain is talking about denying people access to medical care if their BMI exceeds government limits, they smoke, etc.
And the sick part is it actually makes perfect sense if one accepts the premise. If the government is responsible for your care then they should be able to tell you how you can live. The downside of being a 'dependent' is that you aren't Free.
Given a choice I'd rather live a short life as a Free man than a long healthy one as a slave but the whole idea is that Democrats want to make the decision for me at gunpoint. There won't BE any opt out, accepting payment for medical services outside of Hillarycare will be a felony. They already TRIED it in Canada, thankfully a few judges weren't quite ready to go there yet. Yet.
> The truth is, who knows what's going on in Negroponte's head? He isn't
> being all that forthcoming, even with the recent statement.
Exactly. It wouldn't do to admit that he knew he would have to eventually get Microsoft onboard from day one.
> So maybe countries are demanding it...
Of course. If any doubt remained as to Microsoft's political influence and their ruthlessness in using it the latest sad business at the ISO should have dispelled it. I'm arguing that NN was smart enough to have known that doing a deal with Microsoft was eventually going to be a requirement and that he planned around that.
> I guess the intent is to make Microsoft happy
Exactly. If Microsoft is happy then a lot of obstacles vanish. If Microsoft isn't happy a lot of obstacles appear, deals never finalize, etc. They are the 800lb gorilla in the room and you can't ignore them.
My guess is this outcome was planned from the start. My guess OLPC got from us (us being the OS/FS crowd) exactly what they wanted. Which was exactly what Asus got. Microsoft's attention.
Both wanted XP really really cheap. Both knew that the most reliable way to get it was to wave the Linux flag and prove viability. As long as OLPC looked like vaporware Microsoft was perfectly content to allow RedHat and a bunch of idealistic volunteers to waste their time developing software to run on it. Once they shipped working hardware and showed every sign of shipping a lot of units Microsoft had no choice but to offer up XP to keep their monopoly position. OLPC knew this would happen and almost certainly planned on this outcome from day one. Had they really planned on staying with the Penguin they would have used an ARM based one chip solution and saved a lot on the 'ol power budget. The ONLY[1] reason to insist on x86 compatibility is keeping the door open to Windows.
Note that most of the same applies to Asus except they were producing in partnership with Intel as a flagship for their new low power chipsets so using an ARM wasn't an option. From day one they were including all of the drivers for XP with each unit with the expectation many/most would be reloaded after purchase. And note that just as soon as they demonstrated volume sales[2] they used that to negotiate a really sweet deal for XP. I kinda doubt even Dell got prices on XP so low they could sell Windows and Linux for the exact same price except they toss in 8GB of flash as a bone to the poor saps who buy soon to be abandoned Linux version.
[1] Remember that OLPC lacks the excuse of needing the x86 only Flash plugin since they don't ship it.
[2] To be fair, the original plan was to retail for $199. When that didn't work it probably made business sense to rethink the Linux decision since $500 machines do have the margin to cover a Windows license.
> So in theory we could be seeing this with $2 or $3 a gallon gas fairly soon...
No. Even assuming that at 50% efficiency they can produce a gallon of fuel for $2 we still need to figure in a profit for the manufacturer, transportation and a profit for the retailer. Now add in taxes at each level, regulations, polution controls, etc. Might squeek in at $4 by the time it hits the pump. Of course in five years there might be a market for a $4/gallon alternative fuel.
If you want to understand the overhead involved look at gas. When oil was selling for $15-25/barrel gas was retailing between $1 and $1.50/gallon. Oil is now selling for >$110/barrel and gas is averaging $3.50/gallon. Kinda gives you an idea how much of the gas you are pumping goes to the terrorists in the middle east and how much is being eaten up in refining, taxes, profit and misc overhead.
Not a problem. Buy the addionics dual CF to laptop hdd adapter for a few bucks, add in a pair of 32GB CF cards and you should be able to get it all delivered for just a few dollars over the $300 mark. Either take them as is and have a pair of volumes or do a LVM or RAID0 and make one 64GB volume.
Now if you want a shiny SATA drive, those are in major demand and carry a premium. So be smart and think outside the box and you can win.
Ya, but that is the price they paid to partner with Intel. Find a subnote that gets good battery life and it will be a marketing lie. i.e. either it WON'T actually run over three hours OR it isn't a subnote anymore after they strap the hi-cap battery to it's ass.
If they wanted battery life they should have ditched the Intel Inside sticker and stuck an ARM in, even one fabbed by Intel. Escept for leaning really hard on Adobe to give them a Flash Player port everything else they shipped on the original eeepc would have rebuilt with few problems.
This one has some things going for it, although the original WOW feature in the first product announcement for me last year was that $200 pricetag. I said at the time that smelled of bait and switch, looks like I was right. Can't argue too much though since they are selling every unit they can build and ship at these higher prices for now. Perhaps they will go for the low end of the market when production capacity catches up to demand. Or perhaps they will leave that segment for someone else.
The best reason to go after the $250 market is that with luck we won't get bait/switched on Linux. Oh course we now know that the real price a large OEM pays for Windows is about the same as the wholesale price of a single 8GB flash chip.
> The only thing worse than heavy taxes and heavy spending is light taxes and heavy spending..
No argument from me on that one.
> At the risk of getting burned at the stake, I do see a problem with
> the mentality that it's "our money" implying we deserve to pay no taxes
It is MY money, if you don't want YOUR money the Department of the Treasury accepts donations. I lean Libertarian but not so much I think all taxes (and by extension all government) is wicked. Call me a Constituitionalist. So I think taxes are morally acceptable, but we should never lose sight of the fact that is OUR money they government is seizing by force. Keep that in mind and it makes the whole 'is this program worth the money' question a whole different kettle of fish.
> We drive on the roads, we expect the fire dept and police to show up
> if necessary, we cheer on the troops - then we expect it all to be free.
And I don't have a problem with paying for those things. Arguments about the proper level of government which should be responsible, what forms of taxation are most efficent, etc. are of course patrotic.
> Could we disband public education and save a few bucks in tax money?
> Sure, in the short run, but about 20 years later the GDP would fall
> by many times the amount "saved."
Here, I'll argue with ya. If we burned down every Government school and lined out the budget of the Dept of Education I suspect it would lead to a new golden age. Allowing the current system to get near a child should be considered child abuse.
> I think we need a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.
That is one solution, and one we should consider in the short term. Enforcing the 9th and 10th Amendments would be my preferred solution.
> We've proven that tax cuts are not a fiscally responsible way to ... This isn't opinion.
> balance a budget or stimulate an economy.
> It is cold, hard fact.
No exactly. Go look up the numbers after you jot off a flame at me for being a neocon fool. But the 'cold hard fact' is that revenue to the Federal Government, measured in total or just from the Income Tax is up bigtime. The problem is spending rose even faster than revenue.
And it can't be blamed on the War either. The revenue increase easily covers the War, the problem is we went on a spending binge. While a partisan could try to fuzz the issue with whinging about the razor thin majorities of the Republicans or the RINO problem I won't.
With the President willing (yeah, right) to veto the Republicans had sufficient numbers to have reigned in spending. Democrats would have howled bloody murder, slung the usual accusations about Republicans being uncaring monsters...blah blah the children! blah blah. but they could have made it stick. The problem was they went native, becoming the thing they went to Washington to fight.... they became Incumbents. They discovered the POWER of spending other people's money and they discovered they liked it.
> And he's willing to continue it for up to 100 years if that's what it takes.
/. don't remember just how things were before the Wall fell. If ya think the GWOT and Islamic goons wanting to cut heads off is a bit scary, that wasn't nuttin' compared to the Soviets hellbent on conquering the world, tens of thousands of H bombs on a hair trigger and the whole MAD Doctrine thing. It was different times.
I wasn't exhorting the dishonest lefty trolls to consider the virtues of divided government, I was asking the more moderate ones to think on it. The material below is for them, btw.
> Seriously, most of the federal deficits of the last 30 years have been under/due to spending under Republican administrations.
Agreed. But dig in a bit and notice Clinton went crazy taxing and spending and trying to socialize 1/7th of the economy his first two years and suddenly became the 'third way' triangulator we were promised when he was campaigning... just as soon as Newt took the House away from him.
Bush II was much less spend happy in the years when Repubs didn't have both ends of Penn. Ave. Heck, just as soon as San Fran Nan took charge in the House he got so much religion on reigning in spending he found his long lost veto pen. He even waves it around from time to time... too bad he still doesn't actually USE it much.
The exception is Reagan. In his case deficits seem to have been the price he was required to pay to win the Cold War. Democrats would agree to let him build up the military, research DSI, etc. so long as he would go along with them continuing to spend to buy votes. Odds are most folk posting on
But in summart, divided government is good. Less gets done with divided government, and I can live with that a lot more than what we have seen the last decade or so when one side reigns supreme. Because sometimes the best action is inaction.
> The only reason a lot of tax "cuts" are considered giveaways to the
> rich are because they often times have a bias to help lower the burden
> on rich people, but have little to no positive effects on the poor.
Care to explain how the fsck a tax cut CAN help 'the poor' since they already 'pay' negative tax rates? The 'evil rich' pay the vast majority of the taxes so how can you have a tax cut that doesn't, at least from an absolute dollars p.o.v. in the first year, favor the rich?
And that still leaves the huge elephant in the room, the almost universal language of the left/msm where alowing people to keep THEIR MONEY is called a giveaway and/or counted as an expense on the Feral Governments books.
The benefit to the poor from lowering taxes is in the general economic stimulus, which tends to create jobs and upwards mobility. Some of the poor rise up the ladder enough to become taxpayers themselves. I.E. what liberals sneeringly refer to as 'trickle down economics. But it works. Rich people aren't stupid, they know how to work the tax system so they worry more about sheltering their loot when rates are high. If ya don't beleive me, next time you are job hunting try asking a homeless guy for a job.
And if you are an lefty income redistributionist there is the inescapable fact that lowering income tax rates has increased revenue to the government every time it has been tried since the establishment of the income tax. We can probably whack the rates several more times before we risk finding ourselves on the lower tax rates == lower revenue side of the Laffer Curve. So decide which you want more, more income to redistribute according to your superior moral sensibilities or to punish the 'evil rich'.
> I thought that was in the constitution... nothing supersedes constitutional law.
1. Ah the joy of watching a young idealist's faith dashed. Our rulers ain't been bound by that old yellowed parchment for at least a century. Me, I say it was Lincoln who first really and truly wiped his arse with it, others put the exact point +/- fifty years from him depending how cynical they are But it is worse these days, if a day goes by now without a Congresscritter, Federal Judge or POTUS violating his Oath it means the bastard is on vacation.
2. But they usually pay at least lip service to the Constituition if they can, and it actually gives Congress the power to regulate commerce between the several states and even I'd say that so long as it is equally applied they can indeed tax it. And unless every block grant is struck down they would have the power to give the money to the States. So they could probably save a step and just let the states collect it through some big federal clearing house.. after giving Congress a taste.
> Isn't this illegal, since only the feds can regulate interstate commerce?
Which is why Congress is trying to pass a law. You are right that the antics of NY are obviously illegal but they probably aren't dumb enough to think it will actually pass or not get shot dwon in court. But as a PR stunt it will help get Congress to make it legal.
> not so long as there's any citizen's assets left untaxed at a rate lower than 100% :(
Oh of course not! And why should they when they consider it their money in the first place. How else to explain the mind set that calls every tax cut 'a giveaway to the rich', refers to how much a tax cut will 'cost' the government, how much it will 'cost' the government to implement a tax cut, etc. In their evil brains it is ALL theirs and they begrudge each and every cent they are forced to 'spend' when they allow a taxpayer to have a dollar with no strings attached.
And the summary is spot on folks. Since the Internet becane bigtime either Congress of the White House has been outside the control of Democrats so the net was safe. Divided government is usually the best kind. Something the Dem leaning slashdot users might want to keep in mind come November. Congress is almost a statistical certainty to remain in Dem hands so ask yourself, Is Maverick really THAT bad?
Apple didn't use TPM or this discussion would be moot. I probably should not discuss it in detail due to the DMCA but I suspect that reminding people that Google is your friend is safely on the legal side of the DMCA.
And being a little more bold I'll narrow your searching and just mention that there is a fairly radioactive set of patches for Qemu to allow unmodified copies of OS X to boot.