And until we figure out, how to travel with even the.1c speed, we don't even need to know, which one can be terraformed — easily or otherwise. Sure, the pursuit of abstract knowledge is valuable in itself, but more than that is needed to justify extending the effort and the resources needed for "telescopes, on and around earth".
Heck, we haven't even colonized Antarctica yet — which can already be reached in a few hours and is known to have breathable air and plenty of water...
Then what? What's the point without a destination?
The point of my posting was that we already have — using the old imperfect methods — compiled a list of destinations. We can continue looking for them, but studding the entire globe with uber-telescopes, as NotingHere insisted, seems pointless until we can (or, at least, come close to being able to) reach any of them in reasonable time.
We need telescopes, on and around earth. lots of them.
What for? We've already determined, a vast variety of planets exist — including those, which can be human-habitable. What good is known, that there is a billion rather than a mere million of them "nearby", if we can't get to even the nearest star anyway?
Except what will happen is Uber will come out and say that after an internal investigation, they found a few rogue employees had the program up on their own time, and Uber has now put a stop to it, etc..
This only works for government agencies, who are "investigated" by legislatures with all of the concomitant political theater — not private companies, who have to work with courts.
One more good illustration, why government should be responsible for as little as at all possible, BTW.
My local service provider is Cogeco for instance, and I switched to Teksavvy without having a single piece of coax changed in my house. Teksavvy pays Cogeco, Cogeco still maintains the wire, and I pay Teksavvy instead of Cogeco.
Does this fix all the problems? No, but it does mean that ISPs have to deal with customer service or simply be switched off by users.
Sounds like Cogeco is still being paid — even if not directly by you — and they also remain the "last mile" provider able to control, shape, and prioritize the traffic to each customer... Thus, I don't think, what you've described would be particularly useful. The US has tried that — with various DSL-providers dealing with incumbent telcos (owners of the copper wire to each house) — it was a major pain for both the ISPs and the end-users and still kept the incumbent behemoths in control. Except for the most determined customers, people chose to buy their DSL service from the same behemoth that owned the wire — if only to have to make fewer tech-support calls, when anything goes wrong.
There should, of course, be no prohibitions against ISPs sharing cables with each other, but they should be able to run their cables to any block, if they so please. Yes, it will mean duplicating efforts (and wasting cables), but in the greater scheme of things these aren't a big deal.
The solution to this, however, is not creating more rules for them to follow (with more boards and commissions to — ineffectively — ensure compliance) — these only make it harder for a would-be newcomers to appear — but to make this market properly competitive.
So screw the Koch Brothers and their idiot shilling.
It's one they are granted when evidence is presented to a court for a warrant. In a public hearing.
That's not how things are spelled-out in the Constitution. And it does not make any sense. A public hearing will alert the suspect.
I'm pretty sure that the past decade has taught us that government does not respect this constitutional requirement.
No, we've known it for much longer.
So, they should get a time out from those powers until they can demonstrate that they know how to behave.
They are not children, to whom such an approach may be applicable. Nor will the criminals be willing to join the "cease-fire" you propose... Bad as government's intrusions into privacy are, they have neither killed nor raped many people.
Not even the scariest abuses — when police get a "hint" obtained with unwarranted search and perform "parallel reconstruction" — have targeted innocent people. Not yet. The time will surely arrive, but for the time being it is the IRS — not the NSA — that is used to suppress opposition. Them and the government's power to audit. But not the eavesdropping.
We have the Constitution, we just need the government to obey it. The previous President was often accused of "shredding" the document, but the current one is actually doing it.
In other words, we have the laws already — we just aren't following them. Creating new laws will not help that...
I would rather take my chances with the armies of terrorists and child molesters
How about fraudsters, thieves, rapists and murderers, embezzlers of public funds and bribe-takers? I don't think, I'm willing to have even a 10% higher rate of those things in exchange for unbeatable https.
Two and a half centuries ago we allowed the government those powers
No, actually. All governments before that have always asserted the right to search anyone and everywhere. We didn't "allow our government" to do this or that — we explicitly disallowed everything else. This may seem like hairsplitting, but it is historical truth — and you seem like you need refreshing of your perspective...
The sort of crimes the NSA catches have nothing to do with you and I in our daily lives.
NSA is not going to ask for a warrant any more than Alan Turing was asking for one, when he monitored all radio traffic he could — in an attempt to catch the enemy's transmissions. That organization's activities are beside the point, really — as long as they don't prosecute in US courts.
There are, unfortunately, a large number of other crimes, which the bad old eavesdropping helps solve/prevent — whenever the bad guys need to communicate, law enforcement has a legitimate need to be able to listen. Few of these crimes are Internet-specific — the same things we are discussing with regards to the Internet have been said back and forth decades ago about telephone.
They protect megacorps [...]
Oh, sorry, I didn't notice, you are an "anticorp" sort — I wouldn't have bothered with such an idiot. One percent much?
But now that I typed most of the answer anyway, you may as well have it. Remember to logout and, please, don't hate.
We should. But, unless you are going to suggest, the government ought not to have such powers at all (as pla argues below) — ever — then this is not the place for this discussion.
Because if, in your opinion, sometimes they do legitimately need this capability, then they ought to remain able to circumvent https — without spooking the subject.
If the state can forge certs, the state can redirect your traffic to their youtube proxy and insert the malware just behind the fake thing you authenticated with.
And that is, how things ought to be — unless we want to strip the state off their power to search us (and trail us).
Yes, the state ought to need a proper warrant to exercise that power. But, without the described capabilities, police would not be able to do, what the warrant allows (and their job demands!) them to do.
I can't be the only one shocked, SHOCKED to discover, the government is inefficient and wastes money. I mean, after the staggering success of everything else it operates — things like US Postal Service or Amtrak — it is certainly most disappointing to encounter a government program, that fails to live-up to our high expectations.
Nay, this may even chill our collective enthusiasm for making food and shelter a government's responsibility too — you can't be healthy without nutrition and a roof above your head, can you, so it only would've seem natural to further expand the government's omniscient and benevolent control into that direction. But not any more... Not quite...
And unless social networks, media sites and governments come up with some innovative way of defeating online troublemakers, the digital world will never be free of the trolls' collective sway.
Theft, rape, and murder are still with us despite millenniums worth of efforts to get rid of them...
Why would trolling be any easier to dispense with?
Aliens are remarkably hard to find, actually. Even in that Science Fiction book there was only one race encountered.
it seems that mankind keeps track of its history this way
Possibly. But that's irrelevant — unless you are arguing, humanity should punish its war-mongering self with suicide so that "better" species can develop and take over.
Does anyone else remember when "America's Army" came out, just before the Iraq 'war'? It was a free first person shooter, and a very advanced game (for the time). Coincidence? I think not...
Well, in that case, what is the meaning of the new game, where you shoot members of the Tea Party? Celebration of tolerance? Respect for other people's opinions?
That's only accurate if you ignore the cost incurred by the child-soldiers themselves, as elaborated even more in the subsequent books.
Compared to saving the human race that "cost" is a pebble in the Universe. For even if humanity prevailed through other means, it would have taken longer — meaning (much) higher losses and expenses. Many more children would've suffered the loss of their parents and older siblings, for example.
Well, in "Ender's Game" the plan resulted in a wonderful victory for our side... It is a sad story because of the genocide of the enemy, but not because children's abilities were creatively used by the military.
A "bump" born and raised in America — the land of milk and honey, where millions of immigrants (legal and otherwise) not only do well despite the culture-shock and the disadvantages of having to learn a new language, but also manage to support their extended families back home — such a bump has no one but himself to blame for lacking anything he wants, but can not afford.
waive certain parts of the nearly half-century-old California Environmental Quality Act
This seems to affirm the giant elephant in the "save the Earth" room: Tesla (as well as other products relying on highly-capable batteries) aren't all that "green". It may be a great car to drive, but if one needs violates environmental regulations — and not the recent ones — to make it, then green it is not.
Oh, and then comes the problem of disposing of those wonderful batteries — or recycling them...
Had the Wright brothers, Henry Ford, or Nicola Tesla fallen to something like "How to live United" propaganda and gone to "help the poor", how much longer would it have taken for the affordable air-travel, mass-produced cars, and the numerous other wonders to appear?
Especially, if they traveled to the Third World and caught something nasty?
Thankfully, such "sacrifice" was not very popular 100 years ago. Unfortunately, it seems to be all the rage nowadays...
Slashdot Mirror
Heck, we haven't even colonized Antarctica yet — which can already be reached in a few hours and is known to have breathable air and plenty of water...
The point of my posting was that we already have — using the old imperfect methods — compiled a list of destinations. We can continue looking for them, but studding the entire globe with uber-telescopes, as NotingHere insisted, seems pointless until we can (or, at least, come close to being able to) reach any of them in reasonable time.
What for? We've already determined, a vast variety of planets exist — including those, which can be human-habitable. What good is known, that there is a billion rather than a mere million of them "nearby", if we can't get to even the nearest star anyway?
This only works for government agencies, who are "investigated" by legislatures with all of the concomitant political theater — not private companies, who have to work with courts.
One more good illustration, why government should be responsible for as little as at all possible, BTW.
I suppose, this was another example of the sophisticated argument exquisitely worded in order to convince an opponent, rather than shout him down...
Can I subscribe to your newsletter? Thank you!
It certainly is a big deal to those, whose salaries and authority depends on it being a big deal. To the rest of us — not so much...
Nor anybody else, who do things, rather than try to force others to do them the way an actress or a politician said they should be done.
Sounds like Cogeco is still being paid — even if not directly by you — and they also remain the "last mile" provider able to control, shape, and prioritize the traffic to each customer... Thus, I don't think, what you've described would be particularly useful. The US has tried that — with various DSL-providers dealing with incumbent telcos (owners of the copper wire to each house) — it was a major pain for both the ISPs and the end-users and still kept the incumbent behemoths in control. Except for the most determined customers, people chose to buy their DSL service from the same behemoth that owned the wire — if only to have to make fewer tech-support calls, when anything goes wrong.
There should, of course, be no prohibitions against ISPs sharing cables with each other, but they should be able to run their cables to any block, if they so please. Yes, it will mean duplicating efforts (and wasting cables), but in the greater scheme of things these aren't a big deal.
They certainly are — thanks to the monopoly-power once given to them by the government.
The solution to this, however, is not creating more rules for them to follow (with more boards and commissions to — ineffectively — ensure compliance) — these only make it harder for a would-be newcomers to appear — but to make this market properly competitive.
While the public anger is (somewhat clumsily, but still effectively) once again redirected against the Koch Brothers, "Big Cable" donates to the ruling party en masse, CEOs play golf with the President and otherwise do the ruling party's bidding. Is it likely, that further monopolization will be blocked?
That's not how things are spelled-out in the Constitution. And it does not make any sense. A public hearing will alert the suspect.
No, we've known it for much longer.
They are not children, to whom such an approach may be applicable. Nor will the criminals be willing to join the "cease-fire" you propose... Bad as government's intrusions into privacy are, they have neither killed nor raped many people.
Not even the scariest abuses — when police get a "hint" obtained with unwarranted search and perform "parallel reconstruction" — have targeted innocent people. Not yet. The time will surely arrive, but for the time being it is the IRS — not the NSA — that is used to suppress opposition. Them and the government's power to audit . But not the eavesdropping.
We have the Constitution, we just need the government to obey it. The previous President was often accused of "shredding" the document, but the current one is actually doing it.
In other words, we have the laws already — we just aren't following them. Creating new laws will not help that...
How about fraudsters, thieves, rapists and murderers, embezzlers of public funds and bribe-takers? I don't think, I'm willing to have even a 10% higher rate of those things in exchange for unbeatable https.
No, actually. All governments before that have always asserted the right to search anyone and everywhere. We didn't "allow our government" to do this or that — we explicitly disallowed everything else. This may seem like hairsplitting, but it is historical truth — and you seem like you need refreshing of your perspective...
NSA is not going to ask for a warrant any more than Alan Turing was asking for one, when he monitored all radio traffic he could — in an attempt to catch the enemy's transmissions. That organization's activities are beside the point, really — as long as they don't prosecute in US courts.
There are, unfortunately, a large number of other crimes, which the bad old eavesdropping helps solve/prevent — whenever the bad guys need to communicate, law enforcement has a legitimate need to be able to listen. Few of these crimes are Internet-specific — the same things we are discussing with regards to the Internet have been said back and forth decades ago about telephone.
Oh, sorry, I didn't notice, you are an "anticorp" sort — I wouldn't have bothered with such an idiot. One percent much?
But now that I typed most of the answer anyway, you may as well have it. Remember to logout and, please, don't hate.
We should. But, unless you are going to suggest, the government ought not to have such powers at all (as pla argues below) — ever — then this is not the place for this discussion.
Because if, in your opinion, sometimes they do legitimately need this capability, then they ought to remain able to circumvent https — without spooking the subject.
And that is, how things ought to be — unless we want to strip the state off their power to search us (and trail us).
Yes, the state ought to need a proper warrant to exercise that power. But, without the described capabilities, police would not be able to do, what the warrant allows (and their job demands!) them to do.
Winning a war — especially that for your very survival — does justify risking the soldiers' well-being — and even lives.
I can't be the only one shocked, SHOCKED to discover, the government is inefficient and wastes money. I mean, after the staggering success of everything else it operates — things like US Postal Service or Amtrak — it is certainly most disappointing to encounter a government program, that fails to live-up to our high expectations.
Nay, this may even chill our collective enthusiasm for making food and shelter a government's responsibility too — you can't be healthy without nutrition and a roof above your head, can you, so it only would've seem natural to further expand the government's omniscient and benevolent control into that direction. But not any more... Not quite...
Theft, rape, and murder are still with us despite millenniums worth of efforts to get rid of them...
Why would trolling be any easier to dispense with?
Aliens are remarkably hard to find, actually. Even in that Science Fiction book there was only one race encountered.
Possibly. But that's irrelevant — unless you are arguing, humanity should punish its war-mongering self with suicide so that "better" species can develop and take over.
I see. Well, I wonder, if the "Battlefield Hardline" will be free/cheap too...
Well, in that case, what is the meaning of the new game, where you shoot members of the Tea Party? Celebration of tolerance? Respect for other people's opinions?
Please, don't hate.
Compared to saving the human race that "cost" is a pebble in the Universe. For even if humanity prevailed through other means, it would have taken longer — meaning (much) higher losses and expenses. Many more children would've suffered the loss of their parents and older siblings, for example.
Well, in "Ender's Game" the plan resulted in a wonderful victory for our side... It is a sad story because of the genocide of the enemy, but not because children's abilities were creatively used by the military.
You should also close your /.-account — and never come back, for all I care...
A "bump" born and raised in America — the land of milk and honey, where millions of immigrants (legal and otherwise) not only do well despite the culture-shock and the disadvantages of having to learn a new language, but also manage to support their extended families back home — such a bump has no one but himself to blame for lacking anything he wants, but can not afford.
This seems to affirm the giant elephant in the "save the Earth" room: Tesla (as well as other products relying on highly-capable batteries) aren't all that "green". It may be a great car to drive, but if one needs violates environmental regulations — and not the recent ones — to make it, then green it is not.
Oh, and then comes the problem of disposing of those wonderful batteries — or recycling them...
Had the Wright brothers, Henry Ford, or Nicola Tesla fallen to something like "How to live United" propaganda and gone to "help the poor", how much longer would it have taken for the affordable air-travel, mass-produced cars, and the numerous other wonders to appear?
Especially, if they traveled to the Third World and caught something nasty?
Thankfully, such "sacrifice" was not very popular 100 years ago. Unfortunately, it seems to be all the rage nowadays...