As soon as Mike accepted Patrick's money, it was no longer a rhetorical challenge. It was a bet. Patrick, at that point, had caught Mike proffering a reverse sucker bet. Mike says "I bet you $100 at 50:1 odds that you can't do X." Patrick, confident that he could do X, accepted the bet and then did X. Mike says "Oh, I really meant for you to do X.1. I only tricked you into trying to do X because it's impossible." Patrick, in a really amazing display of good sportsmanship, declined to have his money refunded. (Which Mike wisely proffered...otherwise, he'd be in serious danger of fraud...)
My momma told me never to take a sucker bet. Mike got caught by his OWN sucker bet...which takes a) greed and b) foolishness. He got lucky that the person who took him was such a good sport about it.
It'd be really nice to see Mike donate the money to ACM or EFF or somebody like that...that'd be a pretty classy way of taking care of this.
The only person who provably ENJOYED the second half of the Clinton administration was Mr. Clinton. Just look at that pretty blue dress his little friend was wearing.
As for your second point, yes, Global Hawk is cool, but Darkstar gets the real cool toy points.
Considering how expensive it is to train pilots, and the PR fiasco when they get shot down and/or captured, damn skippy humans are more expensive than technology.
Unless you live in China...then you're worth about -$2.50 to the gov't.
Air breathing engines have one killer drawback: the air intake. It needs to be very large, which drives up the cross-sectional area of the craft, which drives up the wave drag of the airframe. The air breathing engine has a very low impulse (thrust per unit drag) because its cross-sectional area is huge relative to that of a similar-thrust rocket.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Air breathing engines are a bad way to get into orbit. Full stop. The math just doesn't work. It's a pretty idea, but it's impractical with anything like today's technology. We can make MUCH better rockets (aerospike engines have potential) but air-breathers are not the way to go.
And yes, I am a rocket scientist. Thanks for askin'. : )
Dryden's photo archive is supremely bad ass. When I first stumbled across it six years ago, I had no idea what anybody could ever do with a 3000x1800 pixel JPEG. Now I can get one out of a digicam the size of a pack of smokes. I love technology!
You've got it backwards. The spaghetti westerns (Magnificent Seven &c) lifted EVERYTHING from Kurosawa (Seven Samurai &c). I believe Kurosawa returned the favor with some of his movies.
I like the Japanese versions MUCH better than the Italian ones...regardless of which came first.
New Zealand may well have the luxury of a low enough population density to not suffer from the same political problems of other countries. It's also on my list of places I'd like to move. : )
Your point about Italy is interesting. Do you really think the organized crime heads are going to allow themselves to be monitored all the time? I'm assuming for the sake of argument that they will want to "police" the people, whether for good or ill I don't know...
Switzerland is a pretty small country too. Their politics are sufficiently contrarian that they may be the exception that proves every rule. : )
In Japan, those ministers may grovel, but they exercise unified economic power like no other government on Earth. The public face and the private face of the Japanese government couldn't be more different, and I guarantee that private face will not suffer itself to be revealed.
It IS a big world, but humans aren't THAT different. They hunger for power, as measured relative to other people. They want MORE power than their neighbor has. Until we break that little habit, organizations (frequently governments) will always try to enforce their will on The Masses.
I can't speak for any other country (never having lived in one) but I for one am pretty disappointed in the efficacy of grassroots activism. I'm thinking specifically about social security. The only people who support the system as it's currently chartered are 1) the people who are currently drawing from it and 2) Congress. 2) is particularly pernicious because Congress members are not required to pay into social security, and they have a VERY VERY lucrative retirement package of their own. This is a PERFECT example of the government thinking itself above the law..."Do as I say not as I do". However, the average taxpayer is likely not even aware of this situation...and the ones that are have been totally unsuccessful at getting the system changed (because the people who benefit from the current system are the only ones that can change it...)
I believe that pervasive surveillance would be exactly the same way. The wealthy and powerful would be able to secure privacy for themselves, and they would then be able to persecute the rest of us based on what we do in our bedrooms.
Neat thesis. Was it Larry Niven or David Brin who wrote the "Transparent Society" essay? Neat take on utopia. However, listen close:
This.
Will.
Never.
Happen.
The politicians and demagogues will NEVER permit themselves to be subjected to the degree of scrutiny they are levying on The People. They have no reason to! They believe themselves to be Above The Law. They think that They Know What's Best. In the best case, they're idealistic and naive...in the worst, they're greedy and power-hungry.
The transparent society idea is based on the flawed premise that The People have equal power with The Government. Not so. The only country that comes CLOSE to this ideal is the US, where the Constitution used to specifically limit the sorts of power that Government could use. (Good thing they got rid of all that mess, huh?)
I wouldn't mind living in that world...but Orwell was a lot closer to the mark.
"cosmology" differing from "astrology" only by the caliber of intellects that engage in mental masturbation on the topic. Don't get me wrong...Mr. Hawking and his peers think more before breakfast than I do in an average year, but without falsifiable hypotheses, a lot of cosmology has more to do with faith than with fact. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but one has to realize it for what it is.
Ah. So the DEA and FBI are different from every law enforcement entity in HISTORY, and they're only going to go after the "bad guys". They're not going to harass any innocent people. They're not going to hound anybody until that person is caught doing something inappropriate. They're not going to take every scrap of power they can lay their hands on in order to extend their authority. Of course not...that'd be wrong.
...what exactly led you to believe that I was unaware of AMD's recent successes? I think they're doing FINE. I was pointing out that making stockholders happy is not the same thing as making good processors.
As long as AMD remains profitable and remains competitive, I don't give one of my Black & White ape's poos about which company makes the most money. I don't care about whether they're "winning" or not. I don't care who sells more processors. I think it's GREAT that AMD's brand is so "weak" that they can sell insane fast processors for small amounts of money. I'd just as soon have my processor dollars funneled into R&D, not another goddamn commercial with people in bunny suits.
(and I'm really annoyed that Blue Man Group sold out and is now doing the Intel commercials. I LOVE BMG and I'm sad to see them shilling for these Intel jerks. However, if Intel brought me a wheelbarrow full of money, I'd have probably done the same thing. : )
Old, low end hardware? Are you mad? U7 was the first game EVER to REQUIRE a 386. U6 was the first game I ever saw in 256 color VGA. (Amiga users need not chime in. I know your computer was cool back in the day.) U8 had people lining up for new computers. Then it sucked. U9 did the same, and sucked (although not QUITE as much. Almost...but not QUITE).
The earliest Ultimas were running on low-end hardware...but that's all there WAS. Ever since, Ultima has been pushing the technology envelope until it shredded.
Until now, Gainax has not wanted my support badly enough to release a product I'd like to buy. The media industry is fish or cut bait...if you don't make your product available, people WILL get it.
You have to carry your landing fuel up into orbit as payload, though.
If you're going to do this, why not have a parachute/airbag landing, or a parachute/rocket landing? Steerable canopies work really well as far as aiming goes...
Rotary Rocket was an autogyro. Good idea. The problem is, accelerating with a rocket at greater than 9.8m/s^2 for a long time takes a metric asston of fuel...you need fuel to decelerate the fuel you haven't used yet, and your crew, and their consumables, and whatever they're bringing back with them. It's the worst way I can think of to slow down!
At the cost of increasing your required fuel mass by a factor of about four. I mean, if you're trying to do an insertion of troops from a sub-orbital shuttle, fine, but for ferrying cargo or people to LEO? It just doesn't seem to make a lot of sense.
It was an amazing feat. However, I never really understood why you'd want to do it. Why would you EVER want to land a rocket vertically, under engine power, on a planet with an atmosphere? Parachutes are one hell of a lot lighter than fuel for decelerating.
However, until NASA took it over, DC-X was a resounding success. Under-budget, and over-performing at every test. It's a masterful piece of engineering.
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Hell, he probably has a Lucas refrigerator. No wonder he thinks things haven't gotten better in 50 years. Poor sod.
As soon as Mike accepted Patrick's money, it was no longer a rhetorical challenge. It was a bet. Patrick, at that point, had caught Mike proffering a reverse sucker bet. Mike says "I bet you $100 at 50:1 odds that you can't do X." Patrick, confident that he could do X, accepted the bet and then did X. Mike says "Oh, I really meant for you to do X.1. I only tricked you into trying to do X because it's impossible." Patrick, in a really amazing display of good sportsmanship, declined to have his money refunded. (Which Mike wisely proffered...otherwise, he'd be in serious danger of fraud...)
My momma told me never to take a sucker bet. Mike got caught by his OWN sucker bet...which takes a) greed and b) foolishness. He got lucky that the person who took him was such a good sport about it.
It'd be really nice to see Mike donate the money to ACM or EFF or somebody like that...that'd be a pretty classy way of taking care of this.
*looks*
*can't find any*
The only person who provably ENJOYED the second half of the Clinton administration was Mr. Clinton. Just look at that pretty blue dress his little friend was wearing.
As for your second point, yes, Global Hawk is cool, but Darkstar gets the real cool toy points.
Considering how expensive it is to train pilots, and the PR fiasco when they get shot down and/or captured, damn skippy humans are more expensive than technology.
Unless you live in China...then you're worth about -$2.50 to the gov't.
You're just bitter that you'd have lost World War II. Damn foreigners.
Sorry. You're very mistaken.
Air breathing engines have one killer drawback: the air intake. It needs to be very large, which drives up the cross-sectional area of the craft, which drives up the wave drag of the airframe. The air breathing engine has a very low impulse (thrust per unit drag) because its cross-sectional area is huge relative to that of a similar-thrust rocket.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Air breathing engines are a bad way to get into orbit. Full stop. The math just doesn't work. It's a pretty idea, but it's impractical with anything like today's technology. We can make MUCH better rockets (aerospike engines have potential) but air-breathers are not the way to go.
And yes, I am a rocket scientist. Thanks for askin'. : )
Good thing it's stuffed to the gills with telemetry. It's a one-shot drone...that's one reason they didn't put people in it. Or landing gear.
Not needing to figure out how to land an aircraft dramatically simplifies your design.
Dryden's photo archive is supremely bad ass. When I first stumbled across it six years ago, I had no idea what anybody could ever do with a 3000x1800 pixel JPEG. Now I can get one out of a digicam the size of a pack of smokes. I love technology!
You've got it backwards. The spaghetti westerns (Magnificent Seven &c) lifted EVERYTHING from Kurosawa (Seven Samurai &c). I believe Kurosawa returned the favor with some of his movies.
I like the Japanese versions MUCH better than the Italian ones...regardless of which came first.
New Zealand may well have the luxury of a low enough population density to not suffer from the same political problems of other countries. It's also on my list of places I'd like to move. : )
Your point about Italy is interesting. Do you really think the organized crime heads are going to allow themselves to be monitored all the time? I'm assuming for the sake of argument that they will want to "police" the people, whether for good or ill I don't know...
Switzerland is a pretty small country too. Their politics are sufficiently contrarian that they may be the exception that proves every rule. : )
In Japan, those ministers may grovel, but they exercise unified economic power like no other government on Earth. The public face and the private face of the Japanese government couldn't be more different, and I guarantee that private face will not suffer itself to be revealed.
It IS a big world, but humans aren't THAT different. They hunger for power, as measured relative to other people. They want MORE power than their neighbor has. Until we break that little habit, organizations (frequently governments) will always try to enforce their will on The Masses.
Throw it to me! I'll give it some good lovin'. I mean...uhhh...never mind.
I can't speak for any other country (never having lived in one) but I for one am pretty disappointed in the efficacy of grassroots activism. I'm thinking specifically about social security. The only people who support the system as it's currently chartered are 1) the people who are currently drawing from it and 2) Congress. 2) is particularly pernicious because Congress members are not required to pay into social security, and they have a VERY VERY lucrative retirement package of their own. This is a PERFECT example of the government thinking itself above the law..."Do as I say not as I do". However, the average taxpayer is likely not even aware of this situation...and the ones that are have been totally unsuccessful at getting the system changed (because the people who benefit from the current system are the only ones that can change it...)
I believe that pervasive surveillance would be exactly the same way. The wealthy and powerful would be able to secure privacy for themselves, and they would then be able to persecute the rest of us based on what we do in our bedrooms.
Neat thesis. Was it Larry Niven or David Brin who wrote the "Transparent Society" essay? Neat take on utopia. However, listen close:
This.
Will.
Never.
Happen.
The politicians and demagogues will NEVER permit themselves to be subjected to the degree of scrutiny they are levying on The People. They have no reason to! They believe themselves to be Above The Law. They think that They Know What's Best. In the best case, they're idealistic and naive...in the worst, they're greedy and power-hungry.
The transparent society idea is based on the flawed premise that The People have equal power with The Government. Not so. The only country that comes CLOSE to this ideal is the US, where the Constitution used to specifically limit the sorts of power that Government could use. (Good thing they got rid of all that mess, huh?)
I wouldn't mind living in that world...but Orwell was a lot closer to the mark.
"cosmology" differing from "astrology" only by the caliber of intellects that engage in mental masturbation on the topic. Don't get me wrong...Mr. Hawking and his peers think more before breakfast than I do in an average year, but without falsifiable hypotheses, a lot of cosmology has more to do with faith than with fact. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but one has to realize it for what it is.
Ah. So the DEA and FBI are different from every law enforcement entity in HISTORY, and they're only going to go after the "bad guys". They're not going to harass any innocent people. They're not going to hound anybody until that person is caught doing something inappropriate. They're not going to take every scrap of power they can lay their hands on in order to extend their authority. Of course not...that'd be wrong.
I sure wish I lived on your planet.
...what exactly led you to believe that I was unaware of AMD's recent successes? I think they're doing FINE. I was pointing out that making stockholders happy is not the same thing as making good processors.
Yep. I am aware. I saw 'em in Boston, and they were friggin' brilliant.
However, I bet you a dollar that the whole distributed troupe agreed to the marketing deal.
As long as AMD remains profitable and remains competitive, I don't give one of my Black & White ape's poos about which company makes the most money. I don't care about whether they're "winning" or not. I don't care who sells more processors. I think it's GREAT that AMD's brand is so "weak" that they can sell insane fast processors for small amounts of money. I'd just as soon have my processor dollars funneled into R&D, not another goddamn commercial with people in bunny suits.
(and I'm really annoyed that Blue Man Group sold out and is now doing the Intel commercials. I LOVE BMG and I'm sad to see them shilling for these Intel jerks. However, if Intel brought me a wheelbarrow full of money, I'd have probably done the same thing. : )
Old, low end hardware? Are you mad? U7 was the first game EVER to REQUIRE a 386. U6 was the first game I ever saw in 256 color VGA. (Amiga users need not chime in. I know your computer was cool back in the day.) U8 had people lining up for new computers. Then it sucked. U9 did the same, and sucked (although not QUITE as much. Almost...but not QUITE).
The earliest Ultimas were running on low-end hardware...but that's all there WAS. Ever since, Ultima has been pushing the technology envelope until it shredded.
Until now, Gainax has not wanted my support badly enough to release a product I'd like to buy. The media industry is fish or cut bait...if you don't make your product available, people WILL get it.
Umm, just at a guess, tents have more surface areas than laptops, and I betcha the power to surface area ratio on this fabric will suck monkey balls.
You have to carry your landing fuel up into orbit as payload, though.
If you're going to do this, why not have a parachute/airbag landing, or a parachute/rocket landing? Steerable canopies work really well as far as aiming goes...
Rotary Rocket was an autogyro. Good idea. The problem is, accelerating with a rocket at greater than 9.8m/s^2 for a long time takes a metric asston of fuel...you need fuel to decelerate the fuel you haven't used yet, and your crew, and their consumables, and whatever they're bringing back with them. It's the worst way I can think of to slow down!
At the cost of increasing your required fuel mass by a factor of about four. I mean, if you're trying to do an insertion of troops from a sub-orbital shuttle, fine, but for ferrying cargo or people to LEO? It just doesn't seem to make a lot of sense.
It was an amazing feat. However, I never really understood why you'd want to do it. Why would you EVER want to land a rocket vertically, under engine power, on a planet with an atmosphere? Parachutes are one hell of a lot lighter than fuel for decelerating.
However, until NASA took it over, DC-X was a resounding success. Under-budget, and over-performing at every test. It's a masterful piece of engineering.