I'd say the fundamental difference is one of rigour. If you could say common sense is the collection of things most people know from casual observation, then I guess hard science would be things that you thoroughly test in properly controlled conditions to isolate and analyze results of a test of a hypothesis. No?
I can't even begin to imagine the colossal nightmare of trying to figure what should and shouldn't be on the.xxx domain, and policing it. Such a rule probably won't ever happen, but if it does, it'll be either a damned mess, totally fail in its intended purpose, or both.
Jesus, man... xanax./. is precisely as it's always been (no, this isn't my first uid). Everyone is a contrarian, or else they'd have little to say.
And for my part, I'll add that I've seen very useful things come out of these printers (not just the silly low-res busts we see too many of) and there are better, cheaper designs all the time.
So yeah, we're not exactly ending scarcity in manufactured goods any time this decade, but they're useful tools.
I'm not sure if this is true, but I've read that publishers seed phone books with fictitious information so they can copyright the work and identify future infringement.
I guess it's fair to say there's more than one reason companies will abuse the legal system. Patent trolling is just one. Apple appears to be hyper-protective of their business at the expense of even their biggest fans. And as you pointed out, less interested in looking for compensatory damages to make up for any kind of lost revenue than just keeping everything secret and dissimilar from their own products.
I'd argue that trolling as a business model is nastier, in that it usually manifests as a fishing with dynamite approach. But I could certainly be wrong.
I have no idea what you're getting at with the first half of that. But as for the second, I guess they'd probably say they have every kind of diversity you can think of, among smart people. Which is to say, every kind except being dumb.
I guess I just don't see why, of all the groups out there, you'd pick Mensa to hate on. It seems like a pretty benign group.
Or they just like the company of reasonably intelligent people once in awhile and the various social events they hold.
I'm not a member, nor would I likely qualify, but I don't see a problem with people joining a group based on something they all have in common. That's what most groups are, after all.
If it makes you feel any better, there's an investigation pending for Darpa surrounding this (and presumably other) contracts. I guess the woman that heads up the agency is in bed with one of their major outside contractors, RedX. Better details here...
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/16/nation/la-na-defense-contracts-20110817
"Well, it turns out he has two extra chromesomes somehow, smokes like a chimney. And his house got foreclosed on during the test, so he probably had a massive increase in stress. He eats mostly cheeze-wiz, and I strongly suspect he does heroin."
This is bullshit. I was assured my participation would remain confidential. Also, I'm feeling much better now.
I think SA has been a Cisco company for years now. They write crap systems because they can. It's not like you're going to go buy someone else's cable box.
Lol. As I write this, further down, we have people flipping their shit over spelling and grammar, how stupid all Americans are, Halliburton, the tyranny of Obama/unions/campaign financing, military spending, and of course the evils of nuclear power generation.
I spent some time over the course of my life, embarrassingly enough, steeped in pseudo-scientific, religiously motivated nay-saying. So I can say (with only anecdotal authority) that it was common practice to seek out minor aberrations, and prop them up before the masses as serious, mitigating evidence. It bothered me even then, and now it really irritates me.
Something was carbon dated and the results came back silly-short? See! Radiocarbon dating is bullshit... except when it suggests we're right.
Someone found a teapot in rock strata that should date it at 500 million years? Well I'm not surprised or suspicious. The earth is really only 10k years old.
Now I'm not properly schooled in geology, archaeology, climatology, biology, etc. But the glaringly amateurish arguments I've seen make your glacier examples seem almost tame and inquisitive by comparison. When you're willing to throw out the conclusions of all the people who do know more about something than you do, unless it comfortably fits your world view, any wacky conclusion becomes entirely plausible.
You don't want to use OpenDNS. They don't function like proper DNS (which they ARE honest about). It causes a number of problems besides just hijacking bad browser requests. If you're concerned about the Google addresses above (which do work properly) you can search for a list of public dns servers. There are lots.
However there are those of us that still remember that it was much better than it is today. It's only a matter of time.
Oh I dunno. I'm no historian, but I see plenty of examples of domestic spying, nasty foreign politics, corporate greed, etc. from well before I was born that make today's US look like a hippie love-in. Not that I'm complaining.
I'd say we're getting better all the time, just like most every other place. We're just more likely to be pissed about current events... so we perceive things as worse, even when they're not.
Which brings up an interesting question... is there such a thing as a computing experience that serves "non-geek needs"? It seems like such a varied thing.
It would be hard enough to design a computing experience that's very usable for, say, my mother. But assuming you could, it would have to change quite a bit for my dad. Too simplistic, and the user is aggravated. Too complicated... well, we know how that ends.
Maybe trying to make a universal user experience that works well for all non-geeks is a fools errand. I know some would say Apple has gotten as close as anyone ever has with IOS... they might be right. And yet there are times when it doesn't do what my folks would expect.
I dunno. It's a noble pursuit, but I'm not sure there's a working, universal spectrum of right and wrong to be found there.
Well, there's also the bit that if it starts going into cars, demand will go up, and so it will be more expensive.
Could we also assume that the process of acquiring and refining it would go down as demand dramatically increases, or are we already pulling thorium out of the earth pretty efficiently?
Slashdot Mirror
I'd say the fundamental difference is one of rigour. If you could say common sense is the collection of things most people know from casual observation, then I guess hard science would be things that you thoroughly test in properly controlled conditions to isolate and analyze results of a test of a hypothesis. No?
I'd guess those men and women already have all the drones they need, and aren't worried about coming in under cost of a courier.
I can't even begin to imagine the colossal nightmare of trying to figure what should and shouldn't be on the .xxx domain, and policing it. Such a rule probably won't ever happen, but if it does, it'll be either a damned mess, totally fail in its intended purpose, or both.
Without enforcement, which won't exist and nobody wants anyways, the whole concept is useless anyway.
There's no utility in this besides the cash grab.
It was a character from the movie "Hackers", contemporary with the overblown "Free Kevin" craziness.
Jesus, man... xanax. /. is precisely as it's always been (no, this isn't my first uid). Everyone is a contrarian, or else they'd have little to say.
And for my part, I'll add that I've seen very useful things come out of these printers (not just the silly low-res busts we see too many of) and there are better, cheaper designs all the time.
So yeah, we're not exactly ending scarcity in manufactured goods any time this decade, but they're useful tools.
Wow... who pissed in your Cheerios this morning?
I'm not sure if this is true, but I've read that publishers seed phone books with fictitious information so they can copyright the work and identify future infringement.
When we do get horrible laws, they're generally based on "think of the children" or "terrorism".
Unfortunately, only that last part sounds familiar.
I guess it's fair to say there's more than one reason companies will abuse the legal system. Patent trolling is just one. Apple appears to be hyper-protective of their business at the expense of even their biggest fans. And as you pointed out, less interested in looking for compensatory damages to make up for any kind of lost revenue than just keeping everything secret and dissimilar from their own products.
I'd argue that trolling as a business model is nastier, in that it usually manifests as a fishing with dynamite approach. But I could certainly be wrong.
I'm not sure abusively litigious behavior is tied to failure. Apple, for example.
I have no idea what you're getting at with the first half of that. But as for the second, I guess they'd probably say they have every kind of diversity you can think of, among smart people. Which is to say, every kind except being dumb.
I guess I just don't see why, of all the groups out there, you'd pick Mensa to hate on. It seems like a pretty benign group.
Or they just like the company of reasonably intelligent people once in awhile and the various social events they hold.
I'm not a member, nor would I likely qualify, but I don't see a problem with people joining a group based on something they all have in common. That's what most groups are, after all.
If it makes you feel any better, there's an investigation pending for Darpa surrounding this (and presumably other) contracts. I guess the woman that heads up the agency is in bed with one of their major outside contractors, RedX. Better details here... http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/16/nation/la-na-defense-contracts-20110817
"Well, it turns out he has two extra chromesomes somehow, smokes like a chimney. And his house got foreclosed on during the test, so he probably had a massive increase in stress. He eats mostly cheeze-wiz, and I strongly suspect he does heroin."
This is bullshit. I was assured my participation would remain confidential. Also, I'm feeling much better now.
I think SA has been a Cisco company for years now. They write crap systems because they can. It's not like you're going to go buy someone else's cable box.
I think we call that, "intent". ;)
Lol. As I write this, further down, we have people flipping their shit over spelling and grammar, how stupid all Americans are, Halliburton, the tyranny of Obama/unions/campaign financing, military spending, and of course the evils of nuclear power generation.
Le sigh.
To be fair, if they stayed away from any topic that degrades into everyone screaming bloody murder at each other, we wouldn't have a /. at all.
People will argue about nearly anything, or brutally shoehorn [politically-charged-topic] into any discussion.
I spent some time over the course of my life, embarrassingly enough, steeped in pseudo-scientific, religiously motivated nay-saying. So I can say (with only anecdotal authority) that it was common practice to seek out minor aberrations, and prop them up before the masses as serious, mitigating evidence. It bothered me even then, and now it really irritates me.
Something was carbon dated and the results came back silly-short? See! Radiocarbon dating is bullshit... except when it suggests we're right.
Someone found a teapot in rock strata that should date it at 500 million years? Well I'm not surprised or suspicious. The earth is really only 10k years old.
Now I'm not properly schooled in geology, archaeology, climatology, biology, etc. But the glaringly amateurish arguments I've seen make your glacier examples seem almost tame and inquisitive by comparison. When you're willing to throw out the conclusions of all the people who do know more about something than you do, unless it comfortably fits your world view, any wacky conclusion becomes entirely plausible.
You don't want to use OpenDNS. They don't function like proper DNS (which they ARE honest about). It causes a number of problems besides just hijacking bad browser requests. If you're concerned about the Google addresses above (which do work properly) you can search for a list of public dns servers. There are lots.
However there are those of us that still remember that it was much better than it is today. It's only a matter of time.
Oh I dunno. I'm no historian, but I see plenty of examples of domestic spying, nasty foreign politics, corporate greed, etc. from well before I was born that make today's US look like a hippie love-in. Not that I'm complaining.
I'd say we're getting better all the time, just like most every other place. We're just more likely to be pissed about current events... so we perceive things as worse, even when they're not.
Which brings up an interesting question... is there such a thing as a computing experience that serves "non-geek needs"? It seems like such a varied thing.
It would be hard enough to design a computing experience that's very usable for, say, my mother. But assuming you could, it would have to change quite a bit for my dad. Too simplistic, and the user is aggravated. Too complicated... well, we know how that ends.
Maybe trying to make a universal user experience that works well for all non-geeks is a fools errand. I know some would say Apple has gotten as close as anyone ever has with IOS... they might be right. And yet there are times when it doesn't do what my folks would expect.
I dunno. It's a noble pursuit, but I'm not sure there's a working, universal spectrum of right and wrong to be found there.
I wanna know who has 42, and what that's worth on ebay. :)
Well, there's also the bit that if it starts going into cars, demand will go up, and so it will be more expensive.
Could we also assume that the process of acquiring and refining it would go down as demand dramatically increases, or are we already pulling thorium out of the earth pretty efficiently?