I was pleasantly surprised, however, by the depiction of the alien invasion troops - they acted like actual troops, using hand signals to communicate and pulling back wounded comrades - in no other film have I seen this done, and it did add some aspect of realism to them thats missing in most alien invasion films.
Parts of the film felt really hokey (like the redemption of Aaron Eckhart's disgraced character). But you're right, the aliens were really really well modeled. They really did look like like realistic alien soldiers.
I expected to the film to be a gritty modern Independence Day. Instead it felt more like Blackhawk Down with aliens. It was a good flick.
I have to respectfully disagree on Pushing Ice. So much of my enjoyment of that story was his depiction of the tech that the colony develops and the environment that they are stranded in. Unless they're willing to commit to special effects budget on the scale of Avater they would have a difficult time of doing the story justice.
But I do think that a lot of Alastair Reynolds' short stories would make for great feature length films. Nightengale and Glacial spring to mind.
I would also love to see a film from the Foundation series, or a Riverworld film that doesn't suck.
I wouldn't have taken that comment sarcastically at all.
Seriously, one of the major functions of school systems is to allow kids to socialize and learn social behaviors. It is unfortunate when the social pressure to homogenize is unchecked, that socialization experience is really really important. Kids need to be able to express themselves, but they also need to learn when to keep their mouths shut and conform to social norms. The real world isn't a Breakfast Club utopia, kids need to learn when socially deviant behavior (bullying included) is inappropriate.
Anyway, a decent home school education is definitely valuable -- but there's something to be said for not spending most of your life stuck indoors with mommy.
100% agree with you there. I was fortunate to have a combination of a fairly normal/tolerant school and parents that kept teaching when I was at home. There's no reason to dichotomize home schooling or school schooling.
Because those different education methodologies will almost by nature have different costs per student. As a taxpayer, people feel like they have a right to expect that their kids have the same chance at the "better" education. And if their kid is in the regular old public school they shouldn't have to pay for the advanced education that the gifted students are receiving.
It's a bit of an issue right now in Massachusetts (US). Our public school system includes a number of publicly funded charter schools. Some of these schools are really great learning environments. The problem is that these schools are selective, and cost more per student to run than the public school system. Parents of kids who have been rejected from these schools are campaigning to eliminate these special schools or to bring their funding in line with the public system, which will effectively close them.
Unless we can guarantee that there will be an appropriate teaching tool for all the kids in the system, there will be resistance from the parents whose kids don't receive the specialized education.
If kids go home and spouting off facts like the earth does not rotate around the sun, parents tend to get really upset and start complaining.
One of my most profound insights into my (American) education came when my high school physics teacher explained that to me. Teachers don't just teach kids facts; they have to teach kids truths that their parents accept, or be very prepared to explain gravitation to an well-meaning but under informed parent.
The laser is $0.8 million. The tracking and optics needed to point the laser in the right direction were described as costing millions to tens of millions.
Basically there is a piece of COTS tech that will kind of do what the laser broom would have done. Just much cheaper on a much smaller scale. Also we still don't quite know how to do it yet.
The older I get and the more I learn, the more I appreciate straightforward explanations of things in laymans terms.
My noggin only has so much storage. Having to remember the academically approved (sometimes obscure) technical terms for every phenomena in physics is a burden.
That's a fascinating point that I've never heard put in quite that fashion. I'm unsure how much of this is your words or Gates', but "basic health" and "safety" sound very much like the more basic needs described by Maslows Hierarchy (of Needs!).
Maslow described a hierarchy of human needs that went something along the lines of: Physiological --> Safety --> Love/Belonging --> Esteem --> Self-Actualization. We (humans) need to address each of these needs in order to learn and grow. An understanding of this hierarchy is generally a required component of child and adult education theory. Broadband deployment and internet access clearly won't help poverty stricken countries address physiological or safety needs, but most certainly can help people join and establish communities and self-actualize for their own development.
Thank you for your post, I have not heard an argument for the deployment of internet access that fits so nicely into education theory.
IME from my younger days, jobs sites like that are the exception. Unless you're working for a really shitty contractor you probably have foremen that know how dangerous working in rigging can be and make sure their guys are happy, comfortable, and safe. Nobody likes seeing anyone get hurt at a job site. And nobody who works for a living would want to see a job shut down (and people out of work) because someone else was cutting corners and being unsafe.
Of course I have no personal knowledge of what the conditions are like for NASA shuttle techs, but I have a hard time believing that really specialized technicians like that have any motivation to cut corners.
There's some evidence of maltreatment. Though I don't that it qualifies as torture.
For example, for a period of time he was on a suicide watch that required his guards to query him every 5 minutes to see if he was ok. AFAIK he has been ordered to keep his face and hands visible to his guards at all times. He's not allowed to exercise and has been kept in solitary confinement. Again probably not torture, but IMHO not appropriate treatment for a prisoner who has not yet been tried.
For what it's worth I wish the Military would just get on with the trial. There's little doubt they will secure a conviction and we can finally move on. He clearly intentionally violated the UCMJ. As much as I dislike the way he's been treated I still don't grasp how people are calling for his release.
So if we lower the risk maybe we get to know about more than the absolutely most heinous corruption.
We also get a whole lot more noise from leaks leaked by other cranky disaffected soldiers that have absolutely nothing to do with exposing corruption. Not to mention the wealth of legitimately classified information that had no business being leaked in the first place.
But having the remote backup eliminates the risk of, for example, a housefire destroying the physical media.
Obviously I have no idea of how likely either of those problems are to strike the average gamer. Statistics on remote library loss vs. local library loss might be informative.
'cause I don't ever hear flight attendants telling people to disable their wifi (or bluetooth, etc.). Just to "turn off" cell phones. Which itself is weird, 'cause I can leave mine on and put it in airplane mode, right?
Every time I fly I hear the flight attendants tell us to power down the device completely, they usually specify that airplane mode is not ok. I've always assumed this was because they have no way if knowing of anyone actually put the thing into airplane mode or not.
Of course I don't know that that has anything to do with wireless transmission interference. They might just do it to make sure people aren't distracted by their electronic gadgets and actually listen the safety briefing.
I don't know that I would call John Locke a historical random. His philosophies have had a pretty significant impact on a lot of modern thinking.
And just so my opinion is clear, if people are allowed through an education system without knowledge and understanding of history then it's pretty clear that the education system failed. That would almost be the definition of a failed education system.
The fact that you call fetuses babies shows why your claims are false. They are not babies and not amount of hand waving will change that fact.
Whoa there friend. I used the term babies specifically to highlight the huge leaps that some people make in the defense of a pro-life stance. And, to be frank, your highly charged reaction kind of underscores my point. My point was that the crux of the debate is the major disagreement of when a fetus can medically and philosophically be considered "alive".
Even if I fail to convince you of that, I will hope that your casual dismissal of an opinion that differs from your own is illuminating to other readers. Abortion is a complex and sensitive issue, responses like "nuh-uh your wrong they're fetus' not babies" does very little to further the conversation.
God does not exist because you can't prove it and the ONUS OF PROOF IS ON YOU.
As an open minded skeptic, I do want to point out that our ability to provide proof (for or against) God's existence has absolutely no bearing God's existence. As scientists we like to assume the null hypothesis until it is disproved. That's just good science. But simply because we make the assumption doesn't make it true.
Pro-lifers get lumped in with creationists because they tend to be busy bodies.
Pro-lifers and Creationists both are all about "I don't like this choice and I won't let you make it either".
I'm not sure that's a fair characterization. I can imagine a reasonable person, having come to the conclusion that abortion is wrong, would be motivated to prevent what they consider to be murder of unborn fetuses. It doesn't require being an overbearing puritan to seek to stop the murder of babies.
In a very direct way, ID stifles learning and progress in society, and I have serious problems with that.
Amen, so to speak.
ID offers an apparent final and unquestionable solution to the issue, that "We are this way because god made us so". Even if it happens to be correct, it is an infuriating position because it effectively ends the conversation. If we accept the ID premise it means that further research is unnecessary, because evolution works the way it does because God/FSM set it up that way for whatever reason. There is nothing to be gained in the study of Intelligently Designed evolution because it's processes are not generalizable, and offer no insight into the nature of life. Evolution, even if it is an incomplete understanding, allows us to question it. Through questioning and investigation we learn more science.
I find myself reiterating many of your points. I'll summarize by saying that I like the cut of your jib. Accepting evolution as an intellectual exercise makes us a better educated society.
The current evidence doesn't seem to point that way though.
There are people that would disagree with that perspective though. The problem is that these people cite "evidence" from sources other than empirical science, which makes most educated people not take them seriously. As you say, our current understanding of evolution is not 100%. We think we have a pretty good handle on it, but we don't know.
From an objective standpoint, it's hard for a science-y minded person not to see the value of teaching all sides of a hotly contested issue. The disagreement is what spurs us to seek out more evidence and expand our understanding.
And from a student's perspective (for Gods sake think of the Children!), they can either take their "evidence" from a preacher with a bible or a science teacher with a textbook. Either source comes with a fair amount of indoctrination and ridicule of the opposing viewpoint.
The US Constitution overrides State law though, doesn't it? My understanding has been that States are able to provide additional freedoms beyond what the Federal government allows, but they can't restrict any freedoms that the Federal Constitution protects.
Otherwise what would be the purpose of a US Constitution and Bill of Rights if the individual states could override them?
Slashdot Mirror
I was pleasantly surprised, however, by the depiction of the alien invasion troops - they acted like actual troops, using hand signals to communicate and pulling back wounded comrades - in no other film have I seen this done, and it did add some aspect of realism to them thats missing in most alien invasion films.
Parts of the film felt really hokey (like the redemption of Aaron Eckhart's disgraced character). But you're right, the aliens were really really well modeled. They really did look like like realistic alien soldiers.
I expected to the film to be a gritty modern Independence Day. Instead it felt more like Blackhawk Down with aliens. It was a good flick.
It'll get your hopes up.
I have to respectfully disagree on Pushing Ice. So much of my enjoyment of that story was his depiction of the tech that the colony develops and the environment that they are stranded in. Unless they're willing to commit to special effects budget on the scale of Avater they would have a difficult time of doing the story justice.
But I do think that a lot of Alastair Reynolds' short stories would make for great feature length films. Nightengale and Glacial spring to mind.
I would also love to see a film from the Foundation series, or a Riverworld film that doesn't suck.
I wouldn't have taken that comment sarcastically at all.
Seriously, one of the major functions of school systems is to allow kids to socialize and learn social behaviors. It is unfortunate when the social pressure to homogenize is unchecked, that socialization experience is really really important. Kids need to be able to express themselves, but they also need to learn when to keep their mouths shut and conform to social norms. The real world isn't a Breakfast Club utopia, kids need to learn when socially deviant behavior (bullying included) is inappropriate.
Anyway, a decent home school education is definitely valuable -- but there's something to be said for not spending most of your life stuck indoors with mommy.
100% agree with you there. I was fortunate to have a combination of a fairly normal/tolerant school and parents that kept teaching when I was at home. There's no reason to dichotomize home schooling or school schooling.
Because those different education methodologies will almost by nature have different costs per student. As a taxpayer, people feel like they have a right to expect that their kids have the same chance at the "better" education. And if their kid is in the regular old public school they shouldn't have to pay for the advanced education that the gifted students are receiving.
It's a bit of an issue right now in Massachusetts (US). Our public school system includes a number of publicly funded charter schools. Some of these schools are really great learning environments. The problem is that these schools are selective, and cost more per student to run than the public school system. Parents of kids who have been rejected from these schools are campaigning to eliminate these special schools or to bring their funding in line with the public system, which will effectively close them.
Unless we can guarantee that there will be an appropriate teaching tool for all the kids in the system, there will be resistance from the parents whose kids don't receive the specialized education.
Surely you mean "most fucking versatile adjective"?
Unless he fucking literally meant that it fucking is the most fucking versatile adjective relating to sex acts.
If kids go home and spouting off facts like the earth does not rotate around the sun, parents tend to get really upset and start complaining.
One of my most profound insights into my (American) education came when my high school physics teacher explained that to me. Teachers don't just teach kids facts; they have to teach kids truths that their parents accept, or be very prepared to explain gravitation to an well-meaning but under informed parent.
the truth = troll.
Who let Charlie Sheen in here?
The laser is $0.8 million. The tracking and optics needed to point the laser in the right direction were described as costing millions to tens of millions.
Basically there is a piece of COTS tech that will kind of do what the laser broom would have done. Just much cheaper on a much smaller scale. Also we still don't quite know how to do it yet.
The older I get and the more I learn, the more I appreciate straightforward explanations of things in laymans terms.
My noggin only has so much storage. Having to remember the academically approved (sometimes obscure) technical terms for every phenomena in physics is a burden.
That's a fascinating point that I've never heard put in quite that fashion. I'm unsure how much of this is your words or Gates', but "basic health" and "safety" sound very much like the more basic needs described by Maslows Hierarchy (of Needs!).
Maslow described a hierarchy of human needs that went something along the lines of: Physiological --> Safety --> Love/Belonging --> Esteem --> Self-Actualization. We (humans) need to address each of these needs in order to learn and grow. An understanding of this hierarchy is generally a required component of child and adult education theory. Broadband deployment and internet access clearly won't help poverty stricken countries address physiological or safety needs, but most certainly can help people join and establish communities and self-actualize for their own development.
Thank you for your post, I have not heard an argument for the deployment of internet access that fits so nicely into education theory.
IME from my younger days, jobs sites like that are the exception. Unless you're working for a really shitty contractor you probably have foremen that know how dangerous working in rigging can be and make sure their guys are happy, comfortable, and safe. Nobody likes seeing anyone get hurt at a job site. And nobody who works for a living would want to see a job shut down (and people out of work) because someone else was cutting corners and being unsafe.
Of course I have no personal knowledge of what the conditions are like for NASA shuttle techs, but I have a hard time believing that really specialized technicians like that have any motivation to cut corners.
There's some evidence of maltreatment. Though I don't that it qualifies as torture.
For example, for a period of time he was on a suicide watch that required his guards to query him every 5 minutes to see if he was ok. AFAIK he has been ordered to keep his face and hands visible to his guards at all times. He's not allowed to exercise and has been kept in solitary confinement. Again probably not torture, but IMHO not appropriate treatment for a prisoner who has not yet been tried.
For what it's worth I wish the Military would just get on with the trial. There's little doubt they will secure a conviction and we can finally move on. He clearly intentionally violated the UCMJ. As much as I dislike the way he's been treated I still don't grasp how people are calling for his release.
So if we lower the risk maybe we get to know about more than the absolutely most heinous corruption.
We also get a whole lot more noise from leaks leaked by other cranky disaffected soldiers that have absolutely nothing to do with exposing corruption. Not to mention the wealth of legitimately classified information that had no business being leaked in the first place.
But having the remote backup eliminates the risk of, for example, a housefire destroying the physical media.
Obviously I have no idea of how likely either of those problems are to strike the average gamer. Statistics on remote library loss vs. local library loss might be informative.
Southwest. Maybe twice a year. Usually out of Logan (Boston, MA, United States).
'cause I don't ever hear flight attendants telling people to disable their wifi (or bluetooth, etc.). Just to "turn off" cell phones. Which itself is weird, 'cause I can leave mine on and put it in airplane mode, right?
Every time I fly I hear the flight attendants tell us to power down the device completely, they usually specify that airplane mode is not ok. I've always assumed this was because they have no way if knowing of anyone actually put the thing into airplane mode or not.
Of course I don't know that that has anything to do with wireless transmission interference. They might just do it to make sure people aren't distracted by their electronic gadgets and actually listen the safety briefing.
I don't know that I would call John Locke a historical random. His philosophies have had a pretty significant impact on a lot of modern thinking.
And just so my opinion is clear, if people are allowed through an education system without knowledge and understanding of history then it's pretty clear that the education system failed. That would almost be the definition of a failed education system.
Speak for yourself. I just can't relax and enjoy a meal without making sure my restaurant isn't trying to sneak away with me.
The fact that you call fetuses babies shows why your claims are false. They are not babies and not amount of hand waving will change that fact.
Whoa there friend. I used the term babies specifically to highlight the huge leaps that some people make in the defense of a pro-life stance. And, to be frank, your highly charged reaction kind of underscores my point. My point was that the crux of the debate is the major disagreement of when a fetus can medically and philosophically be considered "alive".
Even if I fail to convince you of that, I will hope that your casual dismissal of an opinion that differs from your own is illuminating to other readers. Abortion is a complex and sensitive issue, responses like "nuh-uh your wrong they're fetus' not babies" does very little to further the conversation.
God does not exist because you can't prove it and the ONUS OF PROOF IS ON YOU.
As an open minded skeptic, I do want to point out that our ability to provide proof (for or against) God's existence has absolutely no bearing God's existence. As scientists we like to assume the null hypothesis until it is disproved. That's just good science. But simply because we make the assumption doesn't make it true.
Pro-lifers get lumped in with creationists because they tend to be busy bodies.
Pro-lifers and Creationists both are all about "I don't like this choice and I won't let you make it either".
I'm not sure that's a fair characterization. I can imagine a reasonable person, having come to the conclusion that abortion is wrong, would be motivated to prevent what they consider to be murder of unborn fetuses. It doesn't require being an overbearing puritan to seek to stop the murder of babies.
In a very direct way, ID stifles learning and progress in society, and I have serious problems with that.
Amen, so to speak.
ID offers an apparent final and unquestionable solution to the issue, that "We are this way because god made us so". Even if it happens to be correct, it is an infuriating position because it effectively ends the conversation. If we accept the ID premise it means that further research is unnecessary, because evolution works the way it does because God/FSM set it up that way for whatever reason. There is nothing to be gained in the study of Intelligently Designed evolution because it's processes are not generalizable, and offer no insight into the nature of life. Evolution, even if it is an incomplete understanding, allows us to question it. Through questioning and investigation we learn more science.
I find myself reiterating many of your points. I'll summarize by saying that I like the cut of your jib. Accepting evolution as an intellectual exercise makes us a better educated society.
The current evidence doesn't seem to point that way though.
There are people that would disagree with that perspective though. The problem is that these people cite "evidence" from sources other than empirical science, which makes most educated people not take them seriously. As you say, our current understanding of evolution is not 100%. We think we have a pretty good handle on it, but we don't know.
From an objective standpoint, it's hard for a science-y minded person not to see the value of teaching all sides of a hotly contested issue. The disagreement is what spurs us to seek out more evidence and expand our understanding.
And from a student's perspective (for Gods sake think of the Children!), they can either take their "evidence" from a preacher with a bible or a science teacher with a textbook. Either source comes with a fair amount of indoctrination and ridicule of the opposing viewpoint.
The US Constitution overrides State law though, doesn't it? My understanding has been that States are able to provide additional freedoms beyond what the Federal government allows, but they can't restrict any freedoms that the Federal Constitution protects.
Otherwise what would be the purpose of a US Constitution and Bill of Rights if the individual states could override them?