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User: f3rret

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  1. Re:Cool but what use are the humans? on NASA's ARM Will Take a Boulder From an Asteroid and Put It In Lunar Orbit · · Score: 1

    Honestly, its a wicked idea however the use of Humans to execute the material retrieval for analysis does make much sense unless they are doing active and repetitive analysis at the captured space boulder.

    Its seems more intuitive to just fly some robots up to do the capture and send back the samples back to Earth as needed?

    I have a feeling the human participation in this mission is just as much for the sake of science/engineering. It's been a long time since we had humans any further out than the ISS.

  2. Re: Just what the Moon always wanted on NASA's ARM Will Take a Boulder From an Asteroid and Put It In Lunar Orbit · · Score: 1

    Earth tugs on the Sun as well. Does the Sun rotate around Earth?

    All depends on your frame of reference, yo.

  3. Re:Good points, bad points on Ford's New Car Tech Prevents You From Accidentally Speeding · · Score: 1

    I dont have a speed limiter and have no trouble keeping my speed in check. As such, I've never understood this excuse.

    Always thought it was more of a comfort thing, to have the limiter in I mean. Like, you set your limiter to whatever you want, then just slam your foot to the floor and newer go faster than whatever speed you set the limiter to.
    I (sometimes) prefer this over cruise control, because you can always lift if you need to go slower, you can do it with cruise control, I know, but doing it with your foot just feels more responsive.

    Of course, this does not touch on the fact that at least here (Europe) cars over 3500KG tend to be limited to 90 km/h, so many cars over that limit (or close to it) will have limiters too.

  4. Re:Good points, bad points on Ford's New Car Tech Prevents You From Accidentally Speeding · · Score: 1

    So we need to arm police cars with guided missile launchers? Would cut down on police pursuits...

    Yeah, a Javelin missile, or hell, even an AT-4 would stop a high speed chase pretty quickly.
    I mean, you might kill a few civvies now and then, but hey, collateral damage yo,

  5. Re:it always amazes me on Feds Attempt To Censor Parts of a New Book About the Hydrogen Bomb · · Score: 1

    Remember, these guys get about one shot to get their test explosion right, because in about an hour after a successful test of an H-bomb by anyone the US considers a threat the USAF is going to be raining actual working H-bombs on their entire nuclear program

    The US isn't going to open up on anyone with nuclear weapons, don't be silly.

  6. Re:What good is this? on Finland To Fly "Open Skies" Surveillance Flight Over Russia · · Score: 1

    Really? Surveillance flights along predetermined routes, with people from the country being surveilled on board the aircraft? Besides wasting fuel, what does this accomplish?

    It's called "inspections" and agreements about this stuff has been in place since the Cold War.

  7. Re:spying for peace. on Finland To Fly "Open Skies" Surveillance Flight Over Russia · · Score: 1

    Transparent [s]pying is so useful that sometimes nations agree to it.

    FTFY.

    It's the secret, plausibly deniable, no-no-we-are-not-spying spying that is causing the present hubbub.

    Strictly speaking, this stuff is inspection not "spying"

  8. Re:that's sad on NASA's Abandoned Launch Facilities · · Score: 1

    Demolishing them would actually free up the land so something useful could be done with it and any metal would be taken to a scrap yard. Just abandoning this stuff is a waste of resources.

    Most these old sites are smack dab in the middle of nowhere, it's not exactly highly desired land.

  9. Re:Star Wars? on Boeing Patents Star Wars Style Force Field Technology · · Score: 1

    ERROR- They "stabilize rear deflectors". The double front is only for the approach. The script calls for flak. Maybe the shield blocked that.

    We never see a shield defend against ANY energy attack, at any point in the original three. We routinely see physical objects (sometimes entire ships) crash and explode versus shielded targets, doing no damage to the shielded objects. The one time a fighter crashing into a capital ship destroys it, they have just lost their shield generator... to incoming laser fire.

    Well, given we can't actually *see* the shields, they are obviously transparent, and since the blasters in Star Wars obviously use visible lights (we can see them no screen), stands to reason that the deflector shields would be transparent to the blasters.

  10. Re:Free market will sort it out on Evolution Market's Admins Are Gone, Along With $12M In Bitcoin · · Score: 1

    Yeah because as alcohol demonstrates, easy access to brain stimulants never causes any problems... .

    Alcohol sure as fuck isn't a "brain stimulant".

  11. Re:Really? on Education Company Monitors Social Media For Test References · · Score: 1

    Apparently, Pearson is cutting corners by selling the same test to all the schools no matter what time zone they're located in, or on what day the test is administered, which is the real problem here

    The testing wouldn't be very standardized if they gave everyone different versions of the test, would it?

  12. Re:Still American so NSL on Yahoo Debuts End-To-End Encryption Email Plugin, Password-Free Logins · · Score: 1

    Is that right? I assumed that US law was like UK law - there is no law against using strong encryption but you can be compelled to give the encryption keys to the security services.

    You always have the right to remain silent. You cannot be compelled to give testimony, although they might try to slap you with an obstruction of justice rap.

  13. Re:Fewer bug fixes? on NTP's Fate Hinges On "Father Time" · · Score: 5, Informative

    NTP doesn't just 'return a string of numbers'.

    No, sometimes it returns A lot of strings of numbers.

  14. Re:As if SMTP were ever secure... on Clinton Regrets, But Defends, Use of Family Email Server · · Score: 1

    It doesn't have the NSA as their IT Security team. If it did we wouldn't get the reports of so many government servers being unsecure. Each department has their own IT and is responsible for their own security. So the State Dept. manages their IT and security which can lead to real issues.

    Do you even know how security compliance is handled in Enterprise IT? The NSA would have send out security assessment after security assessment and the administrators that got them, will have read them, then ignored them.
    So unless you expect the NSA to also function as the government's IT service line, the NSA has got nothing to do with gov't servers being insecure, that's down to lazy admins.

  15. Re:what about depth of field on Developers Race To Develop VR Headsets That Won't Make Users Nauseous · · Score: 1

    It isn't motion sickness, it is much deeper than that. Motion sickness is part of VR sickness. But VR sickness includes all sorts of mismatched input that your brain can't cope with. It isn't just nausea, it is a headache and feeling of illness. I've spent many hours in the Rift and still get decompression sickness with VR..

    The Occulus Rift makes nitrogen bubbles form in your soft tissue?

  16. Re:There might be hope for a decent adaptation on 'The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress' Coming To the Big Screen · · Score: 1

    p>Anything that would leave spaceflight-capable civilization standing would also leave Earth better suited for food production than the Moon. It's an absurd premise....

    To be fair, the human race in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is barely spaceflight capable, the can do bulk travel to the moon, but that is about it.

  17. Re:There might be hope for a decent adaptation on 'The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress' Coming To the Big Screen · · Score: 1

    IIRC parts of Earth were - notably India (and China?), where the populations were too large to otherwise sustain.

    The Lunar colonies began as a ginormous prison, but the expense of sending parolees and ex-cons home was too onerous; so they stayed, formed their own society, and grew on their own.

    I think the premise is still quite doable, especially if there were some condition on Earth which prevented agricultural production from reaching its current capacity.

    The "Lunies" couldn't return home because of physiological changes brought on by the Lunar gravity.

  18. Re:There might be hope for a decent adaptation on 'The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress' Coming To the Big Screen · · Score: 1

    I understood the society that Heinlein was trying to convey in Starship Troopers and A Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, but I also see they're completely impossible. The notion that they're militaristic or fascist is the most logical jump people make in order to make the society fit in with reality. It's a disconnect that breaks suspension of belief, so in order to restore the suspension of belief people's brain makes the connection to systems of governance that do fit. This is pretty much the only thing that turns me off reading more Heinlein.

    I'll grant you that the society depicted in SST was, in many ways, rather incredible (as in "not credible"), but I always found the society depicted The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress rather credible, given the circumstances it happened in. I mean the "We either make this work, or we all die"-angle on the whole thing, makes it more credible than the SST society.

  19. Re:Not all libertarians against safety net ... on 'The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress' Coming To the Big Screen · · Score: 1

    "The libertarians advocate electing people who are more modest in those determination, who provide for actual needs of citizens, who don't provide mere wants as a mechanism to win favor and re-election."

    Not only that, but libertarian leaders all have perfect pitch, play multiple musical instruments, speak multiple languages, can sing, dance, paint, juggle, know higher math, engineering (civil, electrical, chemical, computer), farming, veterinary science, medicine, surgery, and psychiatry. They're also perfect physical specimens, have movie star good looks, excel at all sports, know martial arts, ride horses, are expert with all kinds of guns, know how to build and use archaic weapons, and know military tactics and strategy. They are gourmet chefs. They never have bad breath, body odor, or fart.

    In fact, their shit doesn't even stink. Perfect humans, just like you.

    You seem angry dude.

  20. Re:There might be hope for a decent adaptation on 'The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress' Coming To the Big Screen · · Score: 1

    Many of his books also featured communal living, with many people living together and freely sharing resources, and even sharing sexual partners. Usually this was not part of the main plot, but just happened to be the way the characters were living.

    This sorta thing was actually quite common in sci-fi from that era, Clarke's works also commonly included references to alternative versions of marriage. "Rendevouz With Rama" has numerous references to polygamy and triplet marriages.

  21. Re:I developed this crap when I hit 35 on Ubisoft Has New Video Game Designed To Treat Lazy Eye · · Score: 1

    when i used to go raving / clubbing, tons of people had really dodgy eyes the next morning..

    That's because of all the drugs, mate, lazy eye ain't got nothing to do with it.

  22. Re:Politics aside for a moment. on Hillary Clinton Used Personal Email At State Dept., Possibly Breaking Rules · · Score: 1

    ...She can completely cover her trail on any and all issues....

    Just ask the NSA for all her e-mails, or are they somehow unable to read her e-mails?

  23. Re:So this is why I've been wanting to write ... on Google Backs Off Default Encryption on New Android Lollilop Devices · · Score: 1

    And then you're required to hand over the password, or they arrest you.

    "You have the right to remain silent", you cannot be compelled into testifying or giving testimony.

    I think it's the Fifth constitutional amendment, but what do I know. We have the same rights here in Denmark.
    Granted a refusal to testify might be construed as an indication of guilt in and of itself.

  24. Re: Canada on 20-Year-Old Military Weather Satellite Explodes In Orbit · · Score: 1

    ...already to the point that it's being considered for anti-ICBM systems...

    The ABL Project was killed years ago, and that was the main anti-ICBM laser system.

  25. Re:When did facebook become a right? on EFF: Hundreds of S. Carolina Prisoners Sent To Solitary For Social Media Use · · Score: 1

    I don't see why inmates need access to it at all. They can find plenty of other ways to not be productive.

    It's not a question of Facebook or whatever being a "right", it is about the punishment for using Facebook is out of proportion to the violation.