Interesting...okay so let me try for a bit more here before karma gets modded to hell for off topic. You are talking about how society needs to be driven by the rule of the law, which, so far as I can tell, says that the law is absolute and no men, man, or group of people is above or beyond that law that is written. Furthermore, this is distinguished by the rule of men which says that people abide to any set of behaviors and that may be safe or unsafe depending on what those around them (whom are more powerful) decide to let slide.
I guess my conundrum is that even the rule of law, that nobody lives outside the scope of the law, derives its power from a society deciding that is the way things should be. Essentially, the rule of the law states that all members of a society shall be treated equally with respect to the law. However, the enforcement of that rule is still derived from whoever holds the power. In other words, it only works as long as those in power want it to work. As you said, at that point, you are no longer operating within the rule of law, but it doesn't seem like the rule of the law, in any way, protects those who are less powerful, from those who are more powerful any more effectively than the rule of men does. It's justice is only derived from the power holders self-imposed, "I must be held accountable to the law," doctrine. So it doesn't really seem like it protects anyone or anything. It just seems like it gives the illusion of protection.
As a personal side-note, I still take exception to the implication that I hate the rule of law. I agree that the rule of law is a good way to run a society. However, my statement that I don't think the law must be followed, does not imply that I expect any exception from the punishments of such action. I feel that the law itself can and should be breached in certain circumstances. I also think that those doing the breaching should be held accountable for the breach. The reason I wanted to make this point is that, when the law itself is wrong, I think breaking said law, and then fessing up to the fact that you did break it because it was wrong, is an entirely suitable way to change a bad law. That said, the rule of law is still being applied as the necessary punishment will still be levied. The idea is simply that the punishment carried by the criminal is worth the greater gain of shining a light on a bad law. In the context of the FCC case, this would be like the FCC deliberately breaching the law, in order to show that the law is unjust or flawed. At which point, the FCC admits to having broken the law and agrees to pay whatever fine or sentence is levied upon them for said transgression with the hope that the law will now be questioned so that it may be changed later. So saying that I hate the rule of law still seems disingenuous to me.
I understand what your definition of prove is. That wasn't what I was getting at. What I was getting at is that the burden of evidence is supposed to lie on the prosecution. That said, unless the prosecution has proven beyond reasonable doubt that the accused committed a crime, the defense shouldn't need an fMRI or any sort of lie detector in the first place to prove anything. The man is, according to our society, supposed to be presumed innocent. Now, supposing the prosecution has, indeed, shown a large amount of evidence that seems to indicate a man did whatever he is supposed to have done, then the evidence burden should fall to the defense to show, precisely, how the evidence presented against the accused is either flawed or incomplete. I don't see how an fMRI can be used to perform such a task. Essentially, all an fMRI is saying is that the subject it is being used on considers whatever he or she is saying to be the truth. That has absolutely no resemblance to evidence and, so far as I can tell, cannot, in any meaningful way debunk a supposed proof beyond reasonable doubt of guilt.
So your point was that it doesn't prove he is innocent but adds weight to the defense's argument. My point was that trying to prove innocence is not something that is necessary. What is necessary is for the defense to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that the prosecutions evidence is flawed. The defense's role should not have to be to prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, innocence. That's how our justice system is supposed to work.
I may decide to break the speed limit so I can get someone to the hospital, but that's irrelevant to my point. I am talking about executive policies and judicial decisions.
I understand it's a separate point, which is why I posted this with a reference to rambling. I am not necessarily trying to argue your position on the FCC's actions, which really makes this all offtopic. I was just curious what your personal take on the law was.
OK. Then you hate the rule of law, and prefer the rule of men, which means our liberties have no serious protections and no guarantees, but are subject to the whims of whoever happens to be in power.
I found this part of your response particularly interesting. I am not sure that you can make the leap from "I don't consider the law to be something that must be followed..." to "...you hate the rule of law..." I actually think the law has a place in society. It serves a very particular function in that it gives folk a basic framework from which to derive their ideas on what is appropriate in a particular society and what is not. I also think that it serves a very important function in that it gives a society the power to eliminate diseased cells (dangerous people) from the rest of the body. That said, I think the law needs to have its roots in some form of basic rights in order to have any teeth. Once you start moving beyond that, the law starts becoming an entity which no longer serves its original function of protecting the body (society) from diseased cells (dangerous individuals), but rather becomes an entity that serves the subjective agenda of whatever particular subgroup of people control the law at that point. That's a problem. However, that's also a different discussion to have. In my opinion, the law is a very necessary and beneficial part of society, so making the leap to say that I hate it, and prefer the rule of men seems odd odd to me...Furthermore, the law is handed down by men, so I am not sure where the distinction comes from. I guess the part of your claim that I find most intriguing is the following:
...which means our liberties have no serious protections and no guarantees, but are subject to the whims of whoever happens to be in power.
That, to me, is precisely what defines the concept of law. Our liberties are simply our liberties because they were handed down to us by folk that claimed power years ago. The only reason the law is shaped the way it is today is because, at some time in the past, a particular group of humans that were in power declared that these liberties are essential, and these are the means by which they could be protected. If a different group of humans were in power at the time the law, our liberties, and the protection of those liberties available to us, the people, would be quite different. I suppose I don't see how the law is in any meaningful way distinguishable from men with power. When it comes down to it, the most powerful humans, be it through violence, or money, or charisma, or whatever, are the ones that will, inevitably, influence and determine the law. It is through their power that the law is enforced (even if that means giving a small amount of controllable power to some other subset of people). So I fail to see how the rule of law is in any way distinguishable from the rule of man.... Perhaps you could expand upon that?
...because rejecting the law for your subjective view of what is right gives us precedent where it is essentially arbitrary whether or not we follow the law.
Regarding this it seems that it is already arbitrary whether or not we follow the law. There is nothing keeping me from breaking the law at my will. If I want to do something illegal, I can. It's that simple. Of course, I do so knowing, full well, that I will have to take responsibility for that decision, even if it means prosecution by the powers that be. If I deter
For the details, you can head on over to The FCC's site and read their headlines released on today's (5/6/2010) date. Also, the general counsel of the FCC gives a decent explanation of what the FCC is trying to achieve here and you can read the chairman's remarks on the matter here. The rest of the headlines are in pdf format and I haven't bothered to read them yet as I prefer HTML.
The approach the FCC seems to want to take is applying very select sections of Title II regulations to Comcast while still keeping all ISP's classified in the manner they are. They seem to think this is the best approach because it will give the FCC the authority to step in on ISP business when necessary, without giving the FCC sweeping authority to over-regulate the internet as some 'dotters have worried about. All in all, it seems like, theoretically, a nice approach to take. Of course, there was so much legal jargon in the statements made that I am certain both sides in the Comcast case will find all sorts of loopholes to exploit if things don't go their way in the future. Then again, this kind of political maneuvering really isn't my field so I am not one to judge the matter particularly well.
Perhaps slash-editors should cease the practice of putting hard timestamps in summaries if they can't manage to get a summary to the front page in a timely manner...
can offer nearly fiber speeds to third world nations,
I wonder if I can fill out an application to have my condo classified as a third world nation...It is ruled by an over-powered, belligerent aristocracy (HOA) after all....
The rule of law must be followed, because if we don't follow it here, we can't rely on it later.
What if the law is wrong? What if the law is outdated? What if the law is discriminatory or unjust?
I don't mean to imply that is necessarily the case with this particular matter. I am just curious if your hard line faith in the law is absolute or not. Frankly, I don't consider the law to be something that must be followed, at all times, in all cases. I don't feel that any hard-coded rule can appropriately account for the plethora of various situations that arise in the real world. The way I see it, the law is a best fit guideline to follow most of the time. However, in extreme circumstances, or even just unaccounted ones, it is perfectly appropriate and just to circumvent or even outright break the law. I figure that's a good part of why we have the executive and judicial branches in our government. The executive branch determines when it is appropriate to enforce the law, and when it is not. The judicial branch interprets what situations, exactly, the written laws are meant to apply to and which they are not. Having an undying faith in the law, in my opinion, gives far too much power to the legislative branch of our government.
Anyways, all ramblings aside, I am curious, do you feel that the rule of the law must, truly, always be followed?
Well, the first flaw I see with your plan is that there is no way to clean the screens on the centrifuge. Over a given amount of time, depending on the contamination levels of the water, those screens are going to eventually clog and the system will stop working. That may not be a terrible thing, if a few of those craft could be made for cheap, then it could work out I suppose. But it's important to remember that you don't get to fix things once they are in space, so if if you have any sort of filtering device, its pretty much a one shot deal until the filter needs to be changed. At which point, the spacecraft's useful life is over since swapping a filter hardly justifies the cost of the trip to space.
Of course it is. It produced a machine that is absolutely incredible at self-replication and survival in harsh environments. In fact, that particular creature even managed to out-do it's own planet and land a few members of its species on the nearby moon.... Nature made men. And if you ask me, that's proof enough for how awesome nature is.;)
Cars cant move without oil, planes cant fly without oil, ships never even existed before oil....
As someone who has worked on aircraft design projects, I am curious, just what fuel source do you propose for heavy cargo aircraft that does not involve oil-derived products? Frankly, there's not a lot of products out there that provide the energy density necessary to lift multiple tons of cargo into the sky that I am aware of.
So you are basically saying that nothing can change anyone's opinion and that the efforts of this panel is wasted.
I don't think he was making that claim. I think, more than anything, he was just pointing out that slashdot, like so many other discussion venues, has become so polarized that hot-button issues like climate change bring out a lot of dubious claims and ego-stroking on both sides of the debate. I know I've heard some 'dotters older than myself talk about the good ol' days of this website like folk used to have level-headed, rational, discussions in comment threads. I don't know if that was ever the case, but it seems like the OP was simply pointing out that, for some topics, that most certainly is not the case anymore, if it ever was. I don't know that the parent was posting anything about whether or not this inquiry was a wasted effort or not. I think he was just making an anthropological observation of the state that a particular group of his peers (slashdotters) are in right now.
If nothing else, it's an interesting claim to make as polarization tends to be the mode that so many folk in society adopt when discussing certain topics. For some reason, it seems like a lot of folk always buy into a dichotomy-model of politics/religion/philosophy/whatever where they act like discussion has to take the form of, "If you say black, I say white, and there is no grey!"
In a forum like slashdot, where many of the members claim that the general population of the website is, in some way, more scientifically or intellectually capable than the average social population, it is an interesting note to make that, on some topics, said capable population also adopts a dichotomy black vs. white mentality. Personally, I find it fascinating and have observed the same trend myself.
That said, I don't think the parent was trying to claim that nothing should be done about climate science or inquiries regarding climate science. I think he was simply making an observation of the general mentality of the forum. I appreciated the comment.
Because it may not have a payload attached to it to fulfill it's objectives. It may be cheaper to send a few small satellites up, together, as one bundle, that can be selectively placed on orbit than to send them up separately or with their own orbital maneuvering facilities. Those are just a couple advantages that stem from having a reusable, standard interface for launching. If all you want to do is place a few 5 kg cameras on orbit, there is no sense in bootstrapping a few hundred kgs of maneuvering fuel and machinery on each one to get them there when you have a space plane that they can all hitch a ride with.
Meh, I've seen facebook groups that are, quite literally dedicated to not liking facebook. I've also seen facebook groups decrying the horrors of social networking sites. Causes on facebook, in general, are one big steaming pile of hypicrisy, irony, stupidity, and mob mentality. It stopped soliciting a reaction from me months ago.
Meh, I usually used those classes to catch up on the sleep time I missed doing my math problems until 6 AM the night before. Discriminatory time management: a skill that is necessary to survive in an unfair world.
Okay, so their familes got screwed 50 - 60 years ago. In the last five decades they have been absolutely incapable of doing anything with themselves? My dad grew up as a member of the poor lower class in the 50's and 60's. He busted his chops to go to community college, which he paid for, so he could get into the middle class. Once there, he decided to raise a family, and invest his money on furthering the prospects for his family. As such, my sister and I were taught to work our asses off and were afforded the opportunity to attend four year schools and earn our degrees. We are both paying off that debt now and my sister has started a family. Currently, I am investing my assets in my nieces' futures. So while the vast majority of poor people in your area came from families that lost all of their money during the 50's and 60's, I don't think you can blame their current lifestyle on those particular years. Frankly, the most successful middle class kids I know today grew up in the same backwards town that I did and their families went through very similar periods of poverty and growth. Fifty years is a long time, full of a lot of opportunity. Capable people tend to find ways to capitalize on those opportunities in my experience.
It's fine and dandy if you want to say that a lot of poor folk have been given the short end of the stick. I think that's probably true. But don't sit there and pretend that just because they got the short end of the stick, they are completely incapable of doing anything with that stick. Back in the 50's and 60's, possibly more than any other time in history, if you wanted to work hard, you could make something of yourself. Countless members of the generation before mine did that. So I don't know how you can argue that the poor folk that you know were completely incapable of doing that themselves.
American Idiot poses a particular political viewpoint that is, interestingly enough, very relevant to the particular discussion you are having. (Seriously, read the lyrics). More importantly, it expresses said viewpoint in a very popular, accessible manner that rings relevant in young kids who are a few years to hitting 18, the legal voting age. That said, American Idiot (along with many other popularly distributed songs) actually does give you information regarding what you will vote upon. Now, it doesn't give you any hard data, but it does give you an opinion and philosophy which you may not have had access to before. I'm not a Greenday fan myself, but I am just saying, you're drawing a line between political information and information stored in popular cultures seems arbitrary.
Well lying has its uses from time to time. If you said, "no lying," on news programs, then news programs couldn't really comment on or even mention any military operations or classified data. I am not saying they leak such data already. They actually don't. However, they do mention that the American military is planning to move into this country and such and such etc. It's possible that some of that info they have is, in fact, lies. However, by even mentioning it, it gives active observers the opportunity to do more digging on the topic mentioned and, maybe, find out some more reliable information. Without the ability to mention such things, the active observer may not have noticed the operation or what have you in the first place thus preventing any further research. I guess what I am getting at is that, while being dishonest is mostly detestable, at the very least it gives a person the ability to say, "No, operation falcon-ford-thunderbird is NOT being conducted... *wink wink.*" Which may be a lie, but most certainly is a good thing is operation falcon-ford-thunderbird is something that the public should know about.
Lying isn't always completely evil in my opinion.
P.S. I am not saying that Fox News, or any other news currently fulfills this role. I am just saying that making lying on public broadcasts illegal seems like short-sighted absolutionism to me.
That seems like a stretch of capabilities considering that enemy satellites don't exactly have open, 'insert here,' interfaces on them where you could easily mount something like that. If the X-37 is going to be used for space militarization, I imagine it is much less about blowing things up and far more about interfacing with things on orbit. The X-37 has a decently sized cargo bay and a manipulator arm. It may well be capable of snagging certain classes of enemy satellites for reverse engineering. It also could probably be used for some sort of autonomous repair/maintenance of friendly satellites which is a field that is currently being researched significantly for both civilian and military purposes. Also, if the X-37 turns out to be fairly cheap and easy to reuse (like the space shuttle was supposed to be) it may become a good deployment mechanism for small scale recon sats in a hot environment. If it can sit on orbit for multiple weeks with a cargo bay full of five or so small orbital cameras, it could deploy those cameras when and where necessary to track enemy movement.
Then again, this is all just conjecture on my part. It may be something as simple as the air force wanting the ability fly up to a Chinese satellite and poke it inappropriately hard with the manipulator arm to break its camera or send it spinning uncontrollably out of its intended orbit.
You know, he was just a man. He may have been an exceptionally powerful man, but if he really was as evil and terrible as many of his constituents thought he was, what stopped everyone from just arranging a convenient accident for him? Or even taking the more obvious approach and shooting him? I mean, don't get me wrong, I am not a particular advocate of murder but everyone acts like Ted Kennedy was some sort of immortal god that couldn't be challenged. I think that reputation was a bit overstated. I mean hell, even a tricky lawyer should have been able to come up with some way to get his ass jailed. It seems that we give some men far too much power based on their reputation alone.
California is less lucky: the Pacific gets quite deep quite quickly as you head away from the shore.
True, but our tidal power capacities could be tapped pretty effectively considering that we have an open coast facing the largest body of water on the planet. Of course, convincing anyone to do anything intelligent in this state is about as likely as convincing WoW addict to go outside and play baseball...
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting...okay so let me try for a bit more here before karma gets modded to hell for off topic. You are talking about how society needs to be driven by the rule of the law, which, so far as I can tell, says that the law is absolute and no men, man, or group of people is above or beyond that law that is written. Furthermore, this is distinguished by the rule of men which says that people abide to any set of behaviors and that may be safe or unsafe depending on what those around them (whom are more powerful) decide to let slide.
I guess my conundrum is that even the rule of law, that nobody lives outside the scope of the law, derives its power from a society deciding that is the way things should be. Essentially, the rule of the law states that all members of a society shall be treated equally with respect to the law. However, the enforcement of that rule is still derived from whoever holds the power. In other words, it only works as long as those in power want it to work. As you said, at that point, you are no longer operating within the rule of law, but it doesn't seem like the rule of the law, in any way, protects those who are less powerful, from those who are more powerful any more effectively than the rule of men does. It's justice is only derived from the power holders self-imposed, "I must be held accountable to the law," doctrine. So it doesn't really seem like it protects anyone or anything. It just seems like it gives the illusion of protection.
As a personal side-note, I still take exception to the implication that I hate the rule of law. I agree that the rule of law is a good way to run a society. However, my statement that I don't think the law must be followed, does not imply that I expect any exception from the punishments of such action. I feel that the law itself can and should be breached in certain circumstances. I also think that those doing the breaching should be held accountable for the breach. The reason I wanted to make this point is that, when the law itself is wrong, I think breaking said law, and then fessing up to the fact that you did break it because it was wrong, is an entirely suitable way to change a bad law. That said, the rule of law is still being applied as the necessary punishment will still be levied. The idea is simply that the punishment carried by the criminal is worth the greater gain of shining a light on a bad law. In the context of the FCC case, this would be like the FCC deliberately breaching the law, in order to show that the law is unjust or flawed. At which point, the FCC admits to having broken the law and agrees to pay whatever fine or sentence is levied upon them for said transgression with the hope that the law will now be questioned so that it may be changed later. So saying that I hate the rule of law still seems disingenuous to me.
I understand what your definition of prove is. That wasn't what I was getting at. What I was getting at is that the burden of evidence is supposed to lie on the prosecution. That said, unless the prosecution has proven beyond reasonable doubt that the accused committed a crime, the defense shouldn't need an fMRI or any sort of lie detector in the first place to prove anything. The man is, according to our society, supposed to be presumed innocent. Now, supposing the prosecution has, indeed, shown a large amount of evidence that seems to indicate a man did whatever he is supposed to have done, then the evidence burden should fall to the defense to show, precisely, how the evidence presented against the accused is either flawed or incomplete. I don't see how an fMRI can be used to perform such a task. Essentially, all an fMRI is saying is that the subject it is being used on considers whatever he or she is saying to be the truth. That has absolutely no resemblance to evidence and, so far as I can tell, cannot, in any meaningful way debunk a supposed proof beyond reasonable doubt of guilt.
So your point was that it doesn't prove he is innocent but adds weight to the defense's argument. My point was that trying to prove innocence is not something that is necessary. What is necessary is for the defense to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that the prosecutions evidence is flawed. The defense's role should not have to be to prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, innocence. That's how our justice system is supposed to work.
Capiche Snarky?
It doesn't prove he's innocent,
Why the hell is anyone trying to prove he is innocent? Shouldn't he need to be proven guilty while being presumed to be innocent?
I may decide to break the speed limit so I can get someone to the hospital, but that's irrelevant to my point. I am talking about executive policies and judicial decisions.
I understand it's a separate point, which is why I posted this with a reference to rambling. I am not necessarily trying to argue your position on the FCC's actions, which really makes this all offtopic. I was just curious what your personal take on the law was.
OK. Then you hate the rule of law, and prefer the rule of men, which means our liberties have no serious protections and no guarantees, but are subject to the whims of whoever happens to be in power.
I found this part of your response particularly interesting. I am not sure that you can make the leap from "I don't consider the law to be something that must be followed..." to "...you hate the rule of law..." I actually think the law has a place in society. It serves a very particular function in that it gives folk a basic framework from which to derive their ideas on what is appropriate in a particular society and what is not. I also think that it serves a very important function in that it gives a society the power to eliminate diseased cells (dangerous people) from the rest of the body. That said, I think the law needs to have its roots in some form of basic rights in order to have any teeth. Once you start moving beyond that, the law starts becoming an entity which no longer serves its original function of protecting the body (society) from diseased cells (dangerous individuals), but rather becomes an entity that serves the subjective agenda of whatever particular subgroup of people control the law at that point. That's a problem. However, that's also a different discussion to have. In my opinion, the law is a very necessary and beneficial part of society, so making the leap to say that I hate it, and prefer the rule of men seems odd odd to me...Furthermore, the law is handed down by men, so I am not sure where the distinction comes from. I guess the part of your claim that I find most intriguing is the following:
...which means our liberties have no serious protections and no guarantees, but are subject to the whims of whoever happens to be in power.
That, to me, is precisely what defines the concept of law. Our liberties are simply our liberties because they were handed down to us by folk that claimed power years ago. The only reason the law is shaped the way it is today is because, at some time in the past, a particular group of humans that were in power declared that these liberties are essential, and these are the means by which they could be protected. If a different group of humans were in power at the time the law, our liberties, and the protection of those liberties available to us, the people, would be quite different. I suppose I don't see how the law is in any meaningful way distinguishable from men with power. When it comes down to it, the most powerful humans, be it through violence, or money, or charisma, or whatever, are the ones that will, inevitably, influence and determine the law. It is through their power that the law is enforced (even if that means giving a small amount of controllable power to some other subset of people). So I fail to see how the rule of law is in any way distinguishable from the rule of man.... Perhaps you could expand upon that?
...because rejecting the law for your subjective view of what is right gives us precedent where it is essentially arbitrary whether or not we follow the law.
Regarding this it seems that it is already arbitrary whether or not we follow the law. There is nothing keeping me from breaking the law at my will. If I want to do something illegal, I can. It's that simple. Of course, I do so knowing, full well, that I will have to take responsibility for that decision, even if it means prosecution by the powers that be. If I deter
For the details, you can head on over to The FCC's site and read their headlines released on today's (5/6/2010) date. Also, the general counsel of the FCC gives a decent explanation of what the FCC is trying to achieve here and you can read the chairman's remarks on the matter here. The rest of the headlines are in pdf format and I haven't bothered to read them yet as I prefer HTML.
The approach the FCC seems to want to take is applying very select sections of Title II regulations to Comcast while still keeping all ISP's classified in the manner they are. They seem to think this is the best approach because it will give the FCC the authority to step in on ISP business when necessary, without giving the FCC sweeping authority to over-regulate the internet as some 'dotters have worried about. All in all, it seems like, theoretically, a nice approach to take. Of course, there was so much legal jargon in the statements made that I am certain both sides in the Comcast case will find all sorts of loopholes to exploit if things don't go their way in the future. Then again, this kind of political maneuvering really isn't my field so I am not one to judge the matter particularly well.
>
The details should be released on Thursday."
What day is it where you're at CmdrTaco? =P....
Perhaps slash-editors should cease the practice of putting hard timestamps in summaries if they can't manage to get a summary to the front page in a timely manner...
can offer nearly fiber speeds to third world nations,
I wonder if I can fill out an application to have my condo classified as a third world nation...It is ruled by an over-powered, belligerent aristocracy (HOA) after all....
The rule of law must be followed, because if we don't follow it here, we can't rely on it later.
What if the law is wrong? What if the law is outdated? What if the law is discriminatory or unjust?
I don't mean to imply that is necessarily the case with this particular matter. I am just curious if your hard line faith in the law is absolute or not. Frankly, I don't consider the law to be something that must be followed, at all times, in all cases. I don't feel that any hard-coded rule can appropriately account for the plethora of various situations that arise in the real world. The way I see it, the law is a best fit guideline to follow most of the time. However, in extreme circumstances, or even just unaccounted ones, it is perfectly appropriate and just to circumvent or even outright break the law. I figure that's a good part of why we have the executive and judicial branches in our government. The executive branch determines when it is appropriate to enforce the law, and when it is not. The judicial branch interprets what situations, exactly, the written laws are meant to apply to and which they are not. Having an undying faith in the law, in my opinion, gives far too much power to the legislative branch of our government.
Anyways, all ramblings aside, I am curious, do you feel that the rule of the law must, truly, always be followed?
Well, the first flaw I see with your plan is that there is no way to clean the screens on the centrifuge. Over a given amount of time, depending on the contamination levels of the water, those screens are going to eventually clog and the system will stop working. That may not be a terrible thing, if a few of those craft could be made for cheap, then it could work out I suppose. But it's important to remember that you don't get to fix things once they are in space, so if if you have any sort of filtering device, its pretty much a one shot deal until the filter needs to be changed. At which point, the spacecraft's useful life is over since swapping a filter hardly justifies the cost of the trip to space.
So you're saying they would make good suicide booths?
Of course it is. It produced a machine that is absolutely incredible at self-replication and survival in harsh environments. In fact, that particular creature even managed to out-do it's own planet and land a few members of its species on the nearby moon. ... Nature made men. And if you ask me, that's proof enough for how awesome nature is. ;)
....And you Canadians always give us Yanks crap about thinking bigger is better....sheesh.
Cars cant move without oil, planes cant fly without oil, ships never even existed before oil....
As someone who has worked on aircraft design projects, I am curious, just what fuel source do you propose for heavy cargo aircraft that does not involve oil-derived products? Frankly, there's not a lot of products out there that provide the energy density necessary to lift multiple tons of cargo into the sky that I am aware of.
....What was that criticism you were using about false dichotomies again?.....
So you are basically saying that nothing can change anyone's opinion and that the efforts of this panel is wasted.
I don't think he was making that claim. I think, more than anything, he was just pointing out that slashdot, like so many other discussion venues, has become so polarized that hot-button issues like climate change bring out a lot of dubious claims and ego-stroking on both sides of the debate. I know I've heard some 'dotters older than myself talk about the good ol' days of this website like folk used to have level-headed, rational, discussions in comment threads. I don't know if that was ever the case, but it seems like the OP was simply pointing out that, for some topics, that most certainly is not the case anymore, if it ever was. I don't know that the parent was posting anything about whether or not this inquiry was a wasted effort or not. I think he was just making an anthropological observation of the state that a particular group of his peers (slashdotters) are in right now.
If nothing else, it's an interesting claim to make as polarization tends to be the mode that so many folk in society adopt when discussing certain topics. For some reason, it seems like a lot of folk always buy into a dichotomy-model of politics/religion/philosophy/whatever where they act like discussion has to take the form of, "If you say black, I say white, and there is no grey!"
In a forum like slashdot, where many of the members claim that the general population of the website is, in some way, more scientifically or intellectually capable than the average social population, it is an interesting note to make that, on some topics, said capable population also adopts a dichotomy black vs. white mentality. Personally, I find it fascinating and have observed the same trend myself.
That said, I don't think the parent was trying to claim that nothing should be done about climate science or inquiries regarding climate science. I think he was simply making an observation of the general mentality of the forum. I appreciated the comment.
Because it may not have a payload attached to it to fulfill it's objectives. It may be cheaper to send a few small satellites up, together, as one bundle, that can be selectively placed on orbit than to send them up separately or with their own orbital maneuvering facilities. Those are just a couple advantages that stem from having a reusable, standard interface for launching. If all you want to do is place a few 5 kg cameras on orbit, there is no sense in bootstrapping a few hundred kgs of maneuvering fuel and machinery on each one to get them there when you have a space plane that they can all hitch a ride with.
Meh, I've seen facebook groups that are, quite literally dedicated to not liking facebook. I've also seen facebook groups decrying the horrors of social networking sites. Causes on facebook, in general, are one big steaming pile of hypicrisy, irony, stupidity, and mob mentality. It stopped soliciting a reaction from me months ago.
Meh, I usually used those classes to catch up on the sleep time I missed doing my math problems until 6 AM the night before. Discriminatory time management: a skill that is necessary to survive in an unfair world.
Okay, so their familes got screwed 50 - 60 years ago. In the last five decades they have been absolutely incapable of doing anything with themselves? My dad grew up as a member of the poor lower class in the 50's and 60's. He busted his chops to go to community college, which he paid for, so he could get into the middle class. Once there, he decided to raise a family, and invest his money on furthering the prospects for his family. As such, my sister and I were taught to work our asses off and were afforded the opportunity to attend four year schools and earn our degrees. We are both paying off that debt now and my sister has started a family. Currently, I am investing my assets in my nieces' futures. So while the vast majority of poor people in your area came from families that lost all of their money during the 50's and 60's, I don't think you can blame their current lifestyle on those particular years. Frankly, the most successful middle class kids I know today grew up in the same backwards town that I did and their families went through very similar periods of poverty and growth. Fifty years is a long time, full of a lot of opportunity. Capable people tend to find ways to capitalize on those opportunities in my experience.
It's fine and dandy if you want to say that a lot of poor folk have been given the short end of the stick. I think that's probably true. But don't sit there and pretend that just because they got the short end of the stick, they are completely incapable of doing anything with that stick. Back in the 50's and 60's, possibly more than any other time in history, if you wanted to work hard, you could make something of yourself. Countless members of the generation before mine did that. So I don't know how you can argue that the poor folk that you know were completely incapable of doing that themselves.
American Idiot poses a particular political viewpoint that is, interestingly enough, very relevant to the particular discussion you are having. (Seriously, read the lyrics). More importantly, it expresses said viewpoint in a very popular, accessible manner that rings relevant in young kids who are a few years to hitting 18, the legal voting age. That said, American Idiot (along with many other popularly distributed songs) actually does give you information regarding what you will vote upon. Now, it doesn't give you any hard data, but it does give you an opinion and philosophy which you may not have had access to before. I'm not a Greenday fan myself, but I am just saying, you're drawing a line between political information and information stored in popular cultures seems arbitrary.
Well lying has its uses from time to time. If you said, "no lying," on news programs, then news programs couldn't really comment on or even mention any military operations or classified data. I am not saying they leak such data already. They actually don't. However, they do mention that the American military is planning to move into this country and such and such etc. It's possible that some of that info they have is, in fact, lies. However, by even mentioning it, it gives active observers the opportunity to do more digging on the topic mentioned and, maybe, find out some more reliable information. Without the ability to mention such things, the active observer may not have noticed the operation or what have you in the first place thus preventing any further research. I guess what I am getting at is that, while being dishonest is mostly detestable, at the very least it gives a person the ability to say, "No, operation falcon-ford-thunderbird is NOT being conducted... *wink wink.*" Which may be a lie, but most certainly is a good thing is operation falcon-ford-thunderbird is something that the public should know about.
Lying isn't always completely evil in my opinion.
P.S. I am not saying that Fox News, or any other news currently fulfills this role. I am just saying that making lying on public broadcasts illegal seems like short-sighted absolutionism to me.
Yeah, I was thinking about that too. It would beat film canisters....kinda.
That seems like a stretch of capabilities considering that enemy satellites don't exactly have open, 'insert here,' interfaces on them where you could easily mount something like that. If the X-37 is going to be used for space militarization, I imagine it is much less about blowing things up and far more about interfacing with things on orbit. The X-37 has a decently sized cargo bay and a manipulator arm. It may well be capable of snagging certain classes of enemy satellites for reverse engineering. It also could probably be used for some sort of autonomous repair/maintenance of friendly satellites which is a field that is currently being researched significantly for both civilian and military purposes. Also, if the X-37 turns out to be fairly cheap and easy to reuse (like the space shuttle was supposed to be) it may become a good deployment mechanism for small scale recon sats in a hot environment. If it can sit on orbit for multiple weeks with a cargo bay full of five or so small orbital cameras, it could deploy those cameras when and where necessary to track enemy movement.
Then again, this is all just conjecture on my part. It may be something as simple as the air force wanting the ability fly up to a Chinese satellite and poke it inappropriately hard with the manipulator arm to break its camera or send it spinning uncontrollably out of its intended orbit.
You know, he was just a man. He may have been an exceptionally powerful man, but if he really was as evil and terrible as many of his constituents thought he was, what stopped everyone from just arranging a convenient accident for him? Or even taking the more obvious approach and shooting him? I mean, don't get me wrong, I am not a particular advocate of murder but everyone acts like Ted Kennedy was some sort of immortal god that couldn't be challenged. I think that reputation was a bit overstated. I mean hell, even a tricky lawyer should have been able to come up with some way to get his ass jailed. It seems that we give some men far too much power based on their reputation alone.
California is less lucky: the Pacific gets quite deep quite quickly as you head away from the shore.
True, but our tidal power capacities could be tapped pretty effectively considering that we have an open coast facing the largest body of water on the planet. Of course, convincing anyone to do anything intelligent in this state is about as likely as convincing WoW addict to go outside and play baseball...