"So I for one hope more attention is focused on our little commensural buddies."
We should do for them what we should do for any life form we wish to preserve, which is breed them.
There is no shortage of domestic cattle, but elephants are endangered because humans want to use and eat them yet make little effort to preserve them in quantity.
"You come within a hair's breadth of the astonishingly-obvious-yet-no-one-sees-it fact that the problem is not religion, it is extremism, "
What is obvious is that religion INHERENTLY facilitates "extremism"/orthodoxy (and relies on it for expansion, which is another matter) in the same way Communism facilitated Bolshevism. Both constructs ensure that "extremism"/orthodoxy will triumph in the struggle for power, and that moderation will only happen during DECAY of belief!
"My theory is lovely but everyone keeps fucking up the practice" is a hypocritical dodge.
The problem with religion is they are all primitive constructs of primitive people which reinforce primitive behaviors.
"the modern forms of any of those denounce using the sword as a tool to convert unbelievers. "
No, the weak and hypocritical forms denounce open use of the sword and seek other methods when they bother at all.
One is either an honest Fundamentalist or a hypocrite who likes their little social club and wants to pretend the choppy/hacky/stabby/rapey bits of their adopted belief system aren't real. Best bullshit phrase: "Religion of Peace".
"Unfortunately, many seem unwilling to distinguish between a religion and those who seek to abuse a religion to persecute others."
That's what religion is, although religious belief inoculates believers against appreciating the fact. If what one does is the work of god, than those who do differently don't share that delectable exaltation and may be dispensed with.
I judge religion by practice and practical effects, not propaganda marketed by its sales force.
Me too. I was an open atheist through my 26 years in the USAF, found plenty of agreement, and when I pointed out to the questioning theists that I was volunteering to serve to protect _our_ freedom they promptly chilled out.
Atheists don't have imaginary playmates to delude us into doing what we prefer to do anyway (affirmation is the purpose of religion) yet we manage to function quite well.
"In movies and the like you always see a bad outcome to toying with human genes and a purely rational people are seen as almost evil - but I think that we can do a lot better than we are now if we head in that direction."
Popular entertainment (including religion) succeeds because it is directed at people who are not intelligent, and plays on fears they find delectable.
The people who openly despise bright children in the schoolyard grow into adults who feel the same way but express it differently. What's amusing is that the studios who make movies must use intelligent people to create marketable, popular propaganda.
It would be quite easy to make a bomb that fit into a functioning laptop and passed X-ray. Not all the cells in a multi-cell battery need to be batteries,and wiring changes need not be obvious.
Terrorists are a creative bunch:
A "booty bomb" might fail to pass X-ray depending on shape, but an inventive maker could easily shape it to not look out of place as the OSS did with explosives that looked like lumps of coal during WWII. Thanks to the internet we know that smuggling grenade-sized objects this way is practical albeit nasty.
"I do not drink and drive any more, as I can see the logic of not, buts it mainly to avoid fines and job risk."
DUI kills thousands of people every year (about 10K in the US in 2008). This is down 44 percent from 1982. Both casual drinkers and some drunks understand punishment, it work, so I favor more of it.
My generation drank and drove, but now the same folks party at their homes and have places for their guests to crash until they are sober.
"I, for one, look forward to the day that police put their arrest archives online, in an easily searchable format, with mugshots."
Same here. All criminal records and arrest records should be online. Recently, we were prompted to look closer at our student population after a student murdered his mother and her SO. Turned out he was a convicted child molester too. Some folks need to be shunted away from the rest of us.
The person who knowingly sells parts or software or equipment to the government is attempting sabotage. We need to return to the quite legal custom of executing saboteurs.
We don't need to "get people excited", they just need to pay for launches.
Since a manned program is not a matter of need, send probes, perfect robots, and concentrate on science instead of the wasteful drama involved in manned travel. Men will go into space wether or not the US sends them, and there is no reason we cannot mooch off the progress of others instead of pissing away money in what is a hangover of Cold War rivalry.
Space is a hostile place, and an expensive place to send humans, so why should we not take advantage of our ability to pave the way build remote-manned systems WE WILL REQUIRE ANYWAY???
They'd freak out since Americans are rarely smart enough to understand "unintended consequences" of international law.
International law is surrender of sovereignty and should be viewed as such.
The idea of regulation and micro-management of nations by laws their publics didn't vote for is quite popular with politicians, but treaties work both ways.
"Most people you know who you say "do drugs" are probably doing pot, which yeah, is not very conducive to doing much productive in most fields anyway."
Don't smoke before or at work. In the 1970s I smoked like a steam locomotive and so did nearly every young person I knew. That's what evenings and weekends were for, just as with recreational drinking. What's impressive is the LACK of negative effects in such a multi-million consumer pool.
I have ample outdoor room to mount such a beast on a skid in a vented enclosure (think "Abrams tank-style blowoff plates") where it could short and burn to a crisp, but for what the setup will cost (several thousand easy) I can buy more useful things like an industrial welder/generator (designed for abuse and easy to get parts for) that runs on LPG tanks I can fill from my home tank.
I hope they sell lots of batteries, but they won't sell one to me.
"If you want to see how this turns out, look at America's school system, for example, where there's been at least a 20-year focus on giving every child a computer for the sake of it. Granted, some school systems use technology in an excellent fashion. But how many billions were spent on computers that did nothing more than, on occasion, provide a replacement for typewriters when students needed to type a proper paper?"
US students have no real economic incentive to learn (being poor here is inconvenient but tolerable) while African students do.
Not every African will make good use of computers, but the point is to expose enough of them that some of the bright and motivated ones change the future.
"What's next? A body-movement powered (or better, heat & movement hybrid power), fully functional stillsuit? "
This could prove useful in the US. A heat-powered liposuction pump could harvest fat to be pyrolized into lipo-diesel, ensuring a limitless supply of fuel for our SUVs.
An accumulator bladder could be worn off-vehicle, with a quick QD on the seatbelt to harvest each each time the vehicle is driven. Passenger connections and harvester plumbing on children's car seats would ensure efficient collection.
Most gas engines are not designed to last that long, but that is no fault of the fuel type.
When gas and diesel engines share common design (the 8-valve liquid cooled Rabbit/Golf engines are a classic example) they get similar longevity.
OTOH, when diesels are designed like consumer car engines. they can have similar problems. The Navistar-built Ford Powerstroke was the subject of lawsuits and cost both companies millions.
Dodge got diesels right by using Cummins, which are designed along the lines of Cummins commercial offerings. Unfortunately, one has to buy the Dodge to get the engine...
U-hauls are in long-term fleet use, rented by people who are diesel-illiterate and beat the shit out of them. A diesel injector pump can cost as much as a big block engine. Idiot customer is much less likely to hurt the big block, especially the common 6.0/366.
Diesels are good in certain applications, but as they get more complex, more delicate, and more expensive their economic advantage is not universal.
Slashdot Mirror
"So I for one hope more attention is focused on our little commensural buddies."
We should do for them what we should do for any life form we wish to preserve, which is breed them.
There is no shortage of domestic cattle, but elephants are endangered because humans want to use and eat them yet make little effort to preserve them in quantity.
"You come within a hair's breadth of the astonishingly-obvious-yet-no-one-sees-it fact that the problem is not religion, it is extremism, "
What is obvious is that religion INHERENTLY facilitates "extremism"/orthodoxy (and relies on it for expansion, which is another matter) in the same way Communism facilitated Bolshevism. Both constructs ensure that "extremism"/orthodoxy will triumph in the struggle for power, and that moderation will only happen during DECAY of belief!
"My theory is lovely but everyone keeps fucking up the practice" is a hypocritical dodge.
The problem with religion is they are all primitive constructs of primitive people which reinforce primitive behaviors.
"the modern forms of any of those denounce using the sword as a tool to convert unbelievers. "
No, the weak and hypocritical forms denounce open use of the sword and seek other methods when they bother at all.
One is either an honest Fundamentalist or a hypocrite who likes their little social club and wants to pretend the choppy/hacky/stabby/rapey bits of their adopted belief system aren't real. Best bullshit phrase: "Religion of Peace".
"Unfortunately, many seem unwilling to distinguish between a religion and those who seek to abuse a religion to persecute others."
That's what religion is, although religious belief inoculates believers against appreciating the fact. If what one does is the work of god, than those who do differently don't share that delectable exaltation and may be dispensed with.
I judge religion by practice and practical effects, not propaganda marketed by its sales force.
"Man I fucking hate that phrase. "
Me too. I was an open atheist through my 26 years in the USAF, found plenty of agreement, and when I pointed out to the questioning theists that I was volunteering to serve to protect _our_ freedom they promptly chilled out.
Atheists don't have imaginary playmates to delude us into doing what we prefer to do anyway (affirmation is the purpose of religion) yet we manage to function quite well.
"In movies and the like you always see a bad outcome to toying with human genes and a purely rational people are seen as almost evil - but I think that we can do a lot better than we are now if we head in that direction."
Popular entertainment (including religion) succeeds because it is directed at people who are not intelligent, and plays on fears they find delectable.
The people who openly despise bright children in the schoolyard grow into adults who feel the same way but express it differently.
What's amusing is that the studios who make movies must use intelligent people to create marketable, popular propaganda.
It would be quite easy to make a bomb that fit into a functioning laptop and passed X-ray. Not all the cells in a multi-cell battery need to be batteries,and wiring changes need not be obvious.
Terrorists are a creative bunch:
A "booty bomb" might fail to pass X-ray depending on shape, but an inventive maker could easily shape it to not look out of place as the OSS did with explosives that looked like lumps of coal during WWII. Thanks to the internet we know that smuggling grenade-sized objects this way is practical albeit nasty.
http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090902_aqap_paradigm_shifts_and_lessons_learned
"How do I turn a whore into a housewife?"
Some things are only solved by replacment.
They'd just get snuffed for having OLPCs. Taliban routinely bomb schools, education being the enemy of religion.
I agree, but at least they kickstarted the netbook craze which will help accomplish their goal without their direct participation.
We don't need them any more and I could care less if they never do anything worthwhile again. Their business model is not my concern,
"I do not drink and drive any more, as I can see the logic of not, buts it mainly to avoid fines and job risk."
DUI kills thousands of people every year (about 10K in the US in 2008). This is down 44 percent from 1982.
Both casual drinkers and some drunks understand punishment, it work, so I favor more of it.
My generation drank and drove, but now the same folks party at their homes and have places for their guests to crash until they are sober.
http://www.totaldui.com/blog/dui-fatality-rate-has-fallen/
"I, for one, look forward to the day that police put their arrest archives online, in an easily searchable format, with mugshots."
Same here. All criminal records and arrest records should be online. Recently, we were prompted to look closer at our student population after a student murdered his mother and her SO. Turned out he was a convicted child molester too. Some folks need to be shunted away from the rest of us.
The person who knowingly sells parts or software or equipment to the government is attempting sabotage. We need to return to the quite legal custom of executing saboteurs.
Why should we rush to send people at all?
Is there some desperate need to concentrate most our limited resources on manned missions?
We don't need to "get people excited", they just need to pay for launches.
Since a manned program is not a matter of need, send probes, perfect robots, and concentrate on science instead of the wasteful drama involved in manned travel. Men will go into space wether or not the US sends them, and there is no reason we cannot mooch off the progress of others instead of pissing away money in what is a hangover of Cold War rivalry.
Space is a hostile place, and an expensive place to send humans, so why should we not take advantage of our ability to pave the way build remote-manned systems WE WILL REQUIRE ANYWAY???
The expenditure of energy will become affordable and efficient if we drop the manned space program for a few decades.
There is no rush, and we can learn far more per dollar spent if we focus on remote-manned systems.
For the romantics who crave a ride in space, pay a commercial outfit like any other tourist.
They'd freak out since Americans are rarely smart enough to understand "unintended consequences" of international law.
International law is surrender of sovereignty and should be viewed as such.
The idea of regulation and micro-management of nations by laws their publics didn't vote for is quite popular with politicians, but treaties work both ways.
"Why is a US Court adjudicating a case involving a Canadian citizen and his Canadian website?"
Canada will be assimilated sooner or later. Consider this a practice run. :)
"Most people you know who you say "do drugs" are probably doing pot, which yeah, is not very conducive to doing much productive in most fields anyway."
Don't smoke before or at work.
In the 1970s I smoked like a steam locomotive and so did nearly every young person I knew. That's what evenings and weekends were for, just as with recreational drinking. What's impressive is the LACK of negative effects in such a multi-million consumer pool.
I have ample outdoor room to mount such a beast on a skid in a vented enclosure (think "Abrams tank-style blowoff plates") where it could short and burn to a crisp, but for what the setup will cost (several thousand easy) I can buy more useful things like an industrial welder/generator (designed for abuse and easy to get parts for) that runs on LPG tanks I can fill from my home tank.
I hope they sell lots of batteries, but they won't sell one to me.
People who want to work for/shill for/suck up to Microsoft directly or indirectly should do that.
Those who don't support that sort of thing should work to cut them off at the knees by not using their software and discouraging others from doing so.
"If you want to see how this turns out, look at America's school system, for example, where there's been at least a 20-year focus on giving every child a computer for the sake of it. Granted, some school systems use technology in an excellent fashion. But how many billions were spent on computers that did nothing more than, on occasion, provide a replacement for typewriters when students needed to type a proper paper?"
US students have no real economic incentive to learn (being poor here is inconvenient but tolerable) while African students do.
Not every African will make good use of computers, but the point is to expose enough of them that some of the bright and motivated ones change the future.
"If there is a good reason to do this then companies will do it because it serves their own self interest."
That statement presumes enlightened self-interest on the part of those companies...
"What's next? A body-movement powered (or better, heat & movement hybrid power), fully functional stillsuit? "
This could prove useful in the US.
A heat-powered liposuction pump could harvest fat to be pyrolized into lipo-diesel, ensuring a limitless supply of fuel for our SUVs.
An accumulator bladder could be worn off-vehicle, with a quick QD on the seatbelt to harvest each each time the vehicle is driven. Passenger connections and harvester plumbing on children's car seats would ensure efficient collection.
Most gas engines are not designed to last that long, but that is no fault of the fuel type.
When gas and diesel engines share common design (the 8-valve liquid cooled Rabbit/Golf engines are a classic example) they get similar longevity.
OTOH, when diesels are designed like consumer car engines. they can have similar problems. The Navistar-built Ford Powerstroke was the subject of lawsuits and cost both companies millions.
Dodge got diesels right by using Cummins, which are designed along the lines of Cummins commercial offerings. Unfortunately, one has to buy the Dodge to get the engine...
"*Still surprised these aren't diesel."
U-hauls are in long-term fleet use, rented by people who are diesel-illiterate and beat the shit out of them. A diesel injector pump can cost as much as a big block engine. Idiot customer is much less likely to hurt the big block, especially the common 6.0/366.
Diesels are good in certain applications, but as they get more complex, more delicate, and more expensive their economic advantage is not universal.