"Ruthless exploitation at both ends is the big deal."
Ruthless competition is how China moved into being an economic powerhouse. The pollution and body count for the US was pretty high too (and so long ago it is largely forgotten) but that was the price of "progress".
"or economists have the necessary education to see the big picture and vote for policies that increase the health of the entire economy rather then fatten their personal wallets in the short term."
There is no reason that they could not work for the wealth of the entire economy while investing wisely to "fatten their personal wallets".
" If you insult (not "state something that conflicts with", but actually insult) something that they regard as part of their culture, it becomes a political conflict."
To the dedicated religionist, there is no difference between disagreement and blasphemy.
"Hydrogen-Hydrogen-Oxygen, plenty of it before and after, and the pre-arrainged setup to create it is under US $75, so what the FUCK keeps you from trying it?"
"Conservation of energy, motherfucker, do you speak it?"
Bosch make excellent stuff, as do DeWalt (their improvement in recent years IMO puts them up there with Milwaukee), Makita, and (expensive but tough and fapworthy to use) Metabo. I maintain power tools for a vo-tech school shop so I get lots of hands-on time.
The Milwaukee 28-volt cordless are so good I grab them for junkyard runs too. The Sawzall is capable of cutting the front end off a Ford F150 body off using one battery!
Testing for other jobs ensures a basic skill level and are a normal part of industry.
For example, pipe welders are expected to pass a test or tests before each hiring. They weld a sample, it is then bend-tested and sometimes X-rayed. The test doesn't lie, and ensures the candidate can do the work. There is no way to cheat.
Weldors are not insulted by testing, and the better ones use their performance to impress the company hiring them.
Buy COMMERCIAL quality basic power tools. The insane money you will save more than pays for them and they are a joy to use.
Buy tools as you need them for a given task, and check prices/vendors on the net just as you would for computer parts.
28-volt Milwaukee cordless tools are excellent. Set prices are much cheaper than "one at a time".
Use a digital camera to take MANY before/during/after photos so you KNOW where the stuff you cover up in the walls is located! You'll have an owners manual for your home.
Screws are usually better than nails, because you can (drumroll) UNscrew them and they hold much better. I don't use drywall screws even for drywall because they are brittle. Deck screws are rustproofed, tough, and trivially more expensive.
"Creationism can profitably be seen not as a simple misconception that careful science teaching can correct. Rather, a student who believes in creationism has a non-scientific way of seeing the world, and one very rarely changes one's world view as a result of a 50-minute lesson, however well taught."
In that case, don't try. Religion is the bitter enemy of science.
We should try to educate those who want to learn science, and let the rest opt-out so they won't get in the way. Allow them to take the time otherwise devoted to science off so they can go to church instead. Let the rednecks go to their Christian Masrassas while the rest of us go to school to learn.
"Is it just me or is Mozilla becoming rather user hostile of late?"
They can get hostile, then we can dump them for many other browsers.
Epiphany, Opera, and of course Konqueror work fine on my system. It's no problem to run a variety of browsers, and I don't own anything to a product that ceases to serve me.
"Instead of having thousands of trucks carrying goods from LA to Phoenix, we need to be able to have a big diesel 'rig' truck be able to be loaded in Long Beach from ship containers, drive to the rail terminal, and drive right onto the high speed train car and be secured. Then the train will carry the entire truck to Phoenix rail central. The truck will then be driven off the train (by a local driver) and the contents be delivered to their local destinations."
You just described a bad version of a good old idea called Intermodal Freight.
Transporting a truck for every trailer is a huge waste, which is why we don't do it. Transporting the wheels and landing gear under the trailer also uses up valuable cargo space.
A university IS a business. Why should the adult clients of that business be encourages to treat everything in it as if it was their personal property as opposed to the property of the business they are paying for education?
I argue that it's sick to raise infantile young adults who don't respect what belongs to others, because they will eventually run into someone who does not regard use of their property by someone who does not own it as amusing play.
"Breaking and entering to prove a point != Whitehat hacking"
So sayeth the self-describes Whitehats who by their l33tness think they have special rights to anything they want.
Don't expect people whose property (systems) you don't own to be sympathetic. If reasoned argument won't work, then system owners will (logically) support punishing people who don't get the hint that everyone elses computers are not their playpens.
"Just that the Republicans have the religious thing figured out."
I argue that because religious people can be manipulated by using their superstition as a tool, they have abdicated any right not to be used. The surrender of critical thinking deserves exploitation by smarter beings.
"I'm not saying Democrats are much better."
They need to figure out how to do the same things to mobilize their supporting demographic(s) if they want to take power.
There should be no rush to send meat into space when we can send robots whose development cycle will be MUCH quicker than that of systems designed to support human activity.
We want to learn about space, we want resources from it, but we don't necessarily need to send humans up while our technology is still primitive.
"and I'm so bitter about KDE trashing my machine that I'm about ready to say screw Linux and just format the whole dang thing to Vista, if only I can find the signed drivers."
A nice thing about Linux is that when something barfs, you can boot with your live CD, rescue your home directory, reinstall and update easily. (An external DVD drive allows booting from the main CD/DVD drive and burning to the external if you don't have another machine to copy to.)
A "nuke and pave" is MUCH faster than with Windows.
No matter what OS you use, it is time well spent learning to quick-turn a hosed system back to service.
"bit shamefull to abuse this day, on which the world remembers the victims of this horrible disaster to make these statements how usefull it could be for science."
Every such calamity is worthy of study, because we learn things we do not expect and might miss otherwise. Had the Twin Towers been an accident instead of murder, their study would have been just as important (but with less emotional baggage).
Slashdot Mirror
"Ruthless exploitation at both ends is the big deal."
Ruthless competition is how China moved into being an economic powerhouse. The pollution and body count for the US was pretty high too (and so long ago it is largely forgotten) but that was the price of "progress".
"I've had virtual sex so many times I'm desensitized to that now, too."
It's the calluses. Switch hands.
"They dropped out, Lehman went under, people lost their jobs, a company was destroyed."
Barclays had no moral obligation to save an enemy firm when it could stand clear then buy the useful bits of the wreckage.
Lehman deserved to die because it failed.
"Must... justify... high priced... lawyers..."
In Soviet Russia (and other countries one might name), high priced lawyers justify themselves!
"You're going to have a License Agreement presented to the End User.. Maybe call it LAEU?"
I prefer Hapless User License Agreement (HULA).
"or economists have the necessary education to see the big picture and vote for policies that increase the health of the entire economy rather then fatten their personal wallets in the short term."
There is no reason that they could not work for the wealth of the entire economy while investing wisely to "fatten their personal wallets".
"Did you also notice that all our Caucasian presidents have been white?"
If Obama is elected that will change.
"I feel most of the scientific community are closet Militant Atheists,"
Logic and reason might well make one antagonistic to superstition.
" If you insult (not "state something that conflicts with", but actually insult) something that they regard as part of their culture, it becomes a political conflict."
To the dedicated religionist, there is no difference between disagreement and blasphemy.
"That's "Hadron". I'm trying not to imagine what a Large Hardon Collider would do..."
Tear open a Black Hole that would swallow the Earth?
"Hydrogen-Hydrogen-Oxygen, plenty of it before and after, and the pre-arrainged setup to create it is under US $75, so what the FUCK keeps you from trying it?"
"Conservation of energy, motherfucker, do you speak it?"
"I have a Bosch impact driver,"
Bosch make excellent stuff, as do DeWalt (their improvement in recent years IMO puts them up there with Milwaukee), Makita, and (expensive but tough and fapworthy to use) Metabo. I maintain power tools for a vo-tech school shop so I get lots of hands-on time.
The Milwaukee 28-volt cordless are so good I grab them for junkyard runs too. The Sawzall is capable of cutting the front end off a Ford F150 body off using one battery!
If you need to repair your tools,
http://www.ereplacementparts.com/
has nice exploded drawings (downloadable as pdfs) for most common power tools.
Testing for other jobs ensures a basic skill level and are a normal part of industry.
For example, pipe welders are expected to pass a test or tests before each hiring. They weld a sample, it is then bend-tested and sometimes X-rayed. The test doesn't lie, and ensures the candidate can do the work. There is no way to cheat.
Weldors are not insulted by testing, and the better ones use their performance to impress the company hiring them.
Worked for me, three times!
Buy COMMERCIAL quality basic power tools. The insane money you will save more than pays for them and they are a joy to use.
Buy tools as you need them for a given task, and check prices/vendors on the net just as you would for computer parts.
28-volt Milwaukee cordless tools are excellent. Set prices are much cheaper than "one at a time".
Use a digital camera to take MANY before/during/after photos so you KNOW where the stuff you cover up in the walls is located! You'll have an owners manual for your home.
Screws are usually better than nails, because you can (drumroll) UNscrew them and they hold much better. I don't use drywall screws even for drywall because they are brittle. Deck screws are rustproofed, tough, and trivially more expensive.
"Creationism can profitably be seen not as a simple misconception that careful science teaching can correct. Rather, a student who believes in creationism has a non-scientific way of seeing the world, and one very rarely changes one's world view as a result of a 50-minute lesson, however well taught."
In that case, don't try. Religion is the bitter enemy of science.
We should try to educate those who want to learn science, and let the rest opt-out so they won't get in the way.
Allow them to take the time otherwise devoted to science off so they can go to church instead. Let the rednecks go to their Christian Masrassas while the rest of us go to school to learn.
"Is it just me or is Mozilla becoming rather user hostile of late?"
They can get hostile, then we can dump them for many other browsers.
Epiphany, Opera, and of course Konqueror work fine on my system. It's no problem to run a variety of browsers, and I don't own anything to a product that ceases to serve me.
"Instead of having thousands of trucks carrying goods from LA to Phoenix, we need to be able to have a big diesel 'rig' truck be able to be loaded in Long Beach from ship containers, drive to the rail terminal, and drive right onto the high speed train car and be secured. Then the train will carry the entire truck to Phoenix rail central. The truck will then be driven off the train (by a local driver) and the contents be delivered to their local destinations."
You just described a bad version of a good old idea called Intermodal Freight.
Transporting a truck for every trailer is a huge waste, which is why we don't do it. Transporting the wheels and landing gear under the trailer also uses up valuable cargo space.
"This is a University, not a business."
A university IS a business. Why should the adult clients of that business be encourages to treat everything in it as if it was their personal property as opposed to the property of the business they are paying for education?
I argue that it's sick to raise infantile young adults who don't respect what belongs to others, because they will eventually run into someone who does not regard use of their property by someone who does not own it as amusing play.
"Breaking and entering to prove a point != Whitehat hacking"
So sayeth the self-describes Whitehats who by their l33tness think they have special rights to anything they want.
Don't expect people whose property (systems) you don't own to be sympathetic. If reasoned argument won't work, then system owners will (logically) support punishing people who don't get the hint that everyone elses computers are not their playpens.
"Indeed. This would mean official support and official drivers on a wide range of machines, even if they're only HP-branded ones."
We can also look forward to the usual bundled crapware.
"Will it have a porn, I mean, privacy mode?"
At last, the perfect way to enjoy my endoscope porn collection!
"Can I reinstall over myself? If I could just nuke and pave I would be immensely happier, for sure."
You sure can. You can use "guided partitioning" and take over the whole disk if you want an easy, complete fresh start.
Here is a good place to get help:
http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=326
"Just that the Republicans have the religious thing figured out."
I argue that because religious people can be manipulated by using their superstition as a tool, they have abdicated any right not to be used. The surrender of critical thinking deserves exploitation by smarter beings.
"I'm not saying Democrats are much better."
They need to figure out how to do the same things to mobilize their supporting demographic(s) if they want to take power.
There should be no rush to send meat into space when we can send robots whose development cycle will be MUCH quicker than that of systems designed to support human activity.
We want to learn about space, we want resources from it, but we don't necessarily need to send humans up while our technology is still primitive.
"and I'm so bitter about KDE trashing my machine that I'm about ready to say screw Linux and just format the whole dang thing to Vista, if only I can find the signed drivers."
A nice thing about Linux is that when something barfs, you can boot with your live CD, rescue your home directory, reinstall and update easily. (An external DVD drive allows booting from the main CD/DVD drive and burning to the external if you don't have another machine to copy to.)
A "nuke and pave" is MUCH faster than with Windows.
No matter what OS you use, it is time well spent learning to quick-turn a hosed system back to service.
"bit shamefull to abuse this day, on which the world remembers the victims of this horrible disaster to make these statements how usefull it could be for science."
Every such calamity is worthy of study, because we learn things we do not expect and might miss otherwise. Had the Twin Towers been an accident instead of murder, their study would have been just as important (but with less emotional baggage).