Most of the complaints people have about Chrome are gone in Iron (or, as your esthetic complaints) don't matter enough to me to want to go back to Firefox (which was almost as bloated and slow as IE by the time I departed using it after many years of happy use) or *shudder* IE.
I've heard that too, but here's my very naive point of view: - sure, CRU 'lost'/threw out/deleted the data THAT THEY HAD COLLECTED, back in the 1980s. - I'm nearly certain that CRU wasn't collecting the data for temperatures since forever...ie, they collected it from SOMEWHERE ELSE. - if you're going to draw conclusions that call for massive changes in government policy, etc on the order of decades and centuries, wouldn't it be worth revisiting those sources, and RE-gathering the raw data that can be found? - this process could be very open-source, allowing everyone and their brother to error-check, reality-check (ie to correct the Russian data sets that CRU rec'd that later turned out to have been bogus), etc. from the START - this could be a huge opportunity for climate researchers to save face; certainly the data set that they'd gather today wouldn't be identical to the set that they'd gathered previously, even for historical data. That the results would be in any way different could just be explained/rationalized by 'different data', meaning nobody gets lynched, pilloried, or otherwise run on a rail.
Wipe the slate, start from zero. The idea that the weather stations somehow gave their historical temp data to CRU and somewise then deleted their own records seems...unlikely.
"...No one is going to release their data before they have published..."
I don't think anyone is/was asking for that. I DO think that releasing the raw data once you've made dire, earth-shaking conclusions might make some sense, however.
I mean look: - faith in the belief that a certain prescribed ritual will result in a specific, predictable outcome? If that doesn't describe coding, I don't know what does. - ability to spend their entire lives without sex, or really female companionship of any kind, except for a worshipful adulation of an image (think geeks and a picture of Megan Fox) - ability to endlessly pontificate (see what I did there?)
Hell, all they have to do is say "priests get to live in their mom's basement" and the slashvertisment practically writes itself.
No, what we need is a BioSphere that's sponsored and run as a science experiment, not as a faux-scientific arthouse project by post-hippie dilettantes.
First, let me point out that yes, I've been involved with scouting, both as a scout myself and as a parent of two Life scouts working on Eagle projects in May.
Second, there's a difference between an organizations' formally stated aims and what they mean in practical terms. Yes, there has been a 'political' distancing of the military and Boy Scouts for a while; starting in the Vietnam era, the 'militarism' thing was seen to be distasteful by BSA, and in more recent administrations the absolute stance by BSA against homosexual scoutmasters has been distasteful to the Left. So the US gov't and the BSA have formally grown further apart. Let's remember however - there remains a very strong, possibly unique connection between the military and scouting: Eagle Scout rank still gives you a better starting rank and pay grade in the military (the ONLY non-military award/rank that they so honor).
Further, look at the history - Baden-Powell's Scouting for Boys was a juvenile rewrite of his Scouting for NCOs, and grew directly out of his use of 12-15 yr old boys at Mafeking (the Mafeking Cadet Corps) in the Boer War. To suggest that military utility to the country wasn't the original and primary motivation is utterly naive; certainly it's been overlaid with many decades of 'touchy-feely' reinterpretation (as well as program changes, such as the elimination of marching training), but don't mistake the frosting for the cake itself.
People seem to forget that scouting was originally seen as a way to train BETTER SOLDIERS. (Could be because Scouting worked so hard to camoflage it in the 70s)
This is clearly still on that path, as far as the US military in the 21st century is concerned.
No, what CONSUMERS "should" do is to QUIT buying software that's subject to such prone-obsolescence systems. If consumers are too stupid or unable to resist buying the latest and greatest despite such issues, then companies will continue to find it in their financial best interests to do so.
At least with a PC, there are methods to hack around this (even WoW has private servers, illegal but they're there), but now you see part of the actual total-cost-of-ownership for that console.
"Anytime someone warns about moral relativism, it's because they want you to follow their values and sense of right and wrong, instead of your own."
This is glib, but quite wrong.
Ever-increasing communications and globalization is causing us to be confronted ever more often with questions of moral relativism. In ancient times, when few people traveled more than a handful of miles from home, it was less of an issue.
Today, we have regular and constant conflicts between moral systems, held by their adherents to be equally "good".
Simple example: We (in Western Humanist societies) believe that women are equal to men in capability and opportunity. Certain societies don't believe this. Does this mean that the women there are 'oppressed' and should be 'rescued'? Would they even agree? Should we aggressively evangelize our beliefs, because we're 'certain' they're better in an absolute sense? Aside from the fact that other cultures may be JUST as certain of their superiority, how does this jibe with the (current) Western opinion frowning on the actions of 16-19th century colonialist missionaries, who were JUST as certain at the time that they needed to do what they were doing to SAVE the souls of the 'poor little ignorant fuzzy-wuzzies'?
On the other hand, from the point of a true moral relativist, would you have any right to criticize an Arab society for jailing and/or beating a woman for going out in public without a male escort? Or for an Indonesian man selling his daughter into prostitution because needs some cash and after all, she's just a girl? Or Chinese families drowning newborns because they have a vagina and not a penis?
My personal answers to these questions make people uncomfortable. What're yours?
First, the dirty non-secret of the last 30+ years is that naval vessels are FAR more vulnerable to missile attack than most people think. Since the 1960's era of big 'shipkiller' missiles with 300kg warheads that could critically damage even the most heavily armored ship, naval designers essentially 'gave up' on defeating attacks by using armor. Instead, it was felt that better c3i systems, higher speeds both strategically and tactically, and better intercommunications between fleet units would be a better 'investment' in vessel loading.
Witness the major damage suffered by the HMS Sheffield during the Falklands war, the USS Cole, or the USS Stark.
Ironically, this has then empowered missile designers to downsize warheads for the same effectiveness, allowing them to make smaller, faster missiles that are harder to defend against.
Secondly, in any case, a carrier group needs time and space to deploy its defenses. Outer ring vessels detect the inbound attack, and the groups electronic and weapons systems are deployed against it.
The danger of the 'shipping container' missile is stealth. The shipping lanes are sometimes very crowded, even well away from port. If a vessel that looks like a shabby container feeder vessel can get within a mile before launching, it may be a suicide mission, but with modern hypersonic shipkillers (dunno if that's the scale of missile involved in this system) a range of 5 miles is probably a guaranteed hit on the carrier.
Further, "Google needs to understand that not every country holds the same values as may be common in other countries"...more clearly, AMERICANS need to understand that not every country holds the same values. We have to come to some sort of philosophical comprehension of this, and try to set aside the natural native ego involved.
(American values) != (everyone else) in the same sense that (Western humanism) != (everyone else)
This doesn't mean that American values are BETTER either. (Or WORSE either, Democrats.) Different.
How does a liberal society cope with other societies that aren't as liberal? We believe that women are equal to men in capability and opportunity. Certain societies don't believe this. Does this mean that the women there are 'oppressed' and should be 'rescued'? Would they even agree? Should we aggressively evangelize our beliefs, because we're 'certain' they're better in an absolute sense? Aside from the fact that other cultures may be JUST as certain of their superiority, how does this jibe with the (current) Western opinion frowning on the actions of 16-19th century colonialist missionaries, who were JUST as certain at the time that they needed to do what they were doing to SAVE the souls of the 'poor little ignorant fuzzy-wuzzies'?
My personal answer to this makes people uncomfortable. What's yours?
Like any resource, as it becomes rarer the price will go up.
Ultimately, the price will reach a point where people start a) reviewing "do I really need all the addresses I'm asking for/have, or can I get by with less?"...like most physical projects, this sort of review is usually healthy for long-run efficiency. b) reviewing the costs.consequences of switching to IPv6 architecture
We'll enter a long twilight where you'll have hardware designed to run IPv6 but back-compatible with v4 becoming common. As people replace old stuff, IPv6 will become more commmon.
And not one single bureaucrat had to mandate anything, nor raise a government bureaucracy to implement it. Huh. Imagine that!
...unless we actually went out of our way to bother them.
Hypothesis:
The universe is roughly 15 billion years old.
As I understand it, our solar system is approximately 5 billion years old, and was generated from a molecular cloud that would itself have been created by a previous star exploding, which would have had a lifespan (to be nova-likely) of something under 1 billion years. So VERY roughly speaking, our entire existence cycle is roughly 6 billion years or so.
Even granting that the universe didn't really settle into its current state for the first 5 billion years, that would give the first civilizations - if there are any, and to me it's likely - as much as a 5 billion year head-start on us.
So extant civilizations in the universe would be anywhere from 0 (just reached sentience) to 5 billion years old. Given that on such a scale, we're just on the verge of reaching starflight ourselves, we don't really have to worry about encountering any races YOUNGER than us...they won't be starfaring.
Which means that anyone we meet is going to be anywhere from 0 to 5 BILLION years more advanced.
Look at Earth, and ask yourself what chance a civilization would have against a group only 1000 years more advanced. And then consider the increasing PACE of development - the next 1000 years' tech will be a MUCH greater step than, for example 0 AD to 1000 AD, or 1000 AD-2000 AD.
And then figure out how 'troubling' we'd be to someone 100,000, a million, or a billion years more advanced?
By their scale, really, we'd be insects (minus perhaps the ability to actually annoy). If they want something we have, they'd just take it and probably not even notice our objections.
So no, I'd like to HOPE that they are also ethically advanced, but I wouldn't stake humanity on it. I'd much prefer that they didn't even know we were here (aside from the chance of accidental obliteration due to construction of a hyperspace bypass...), and that we have absolutely nothing they want.
Further, my thought experiment would also suggest that yes, if they DID care to observe us out of some curiosity, we'd have absolutely no clue, even if they were right here. A billion years more advanced? Do ants notice you watching them? I doubt it. Hell, events that we take to be logically-explainable processes like volcanoes could just be the equivalent of the finger of a bored supersentient adolescent.
Since Brazil is allegedly a democracy, let the people decide.
Due to the risks of being held liable for this, tomorrow, block all access from Brazilian IP's to Google or any Google-owned property (youtube, etc.)
Simple.
My guess is that relatively quickly, public groundswell would force Brazil to confront the fact that I believe people are not allowed to be anonymous in any context there.
"Besides, there were allegations here that went beyond the meat of the science and into workplace ethics. If some rag says you sexually harassed your coworkers or embezzled money, and you didn't, you sue. That is what is happening here."
If some rag says you sexually harassed your coworkers, and you DID, you STILL sue. (You might, for example, recall a certain president who categorically 'did not have sexual relations with this woman!'? He then promptly mobilized the massive public-relations engine that worked for him as well as energizing political fellow-travelers to work on his behalf - all to 'defend' himself from scurrilous and scandalous accusations that were PERFECTLY TRUE.)
The tactics of the accused, when they know they're guilty seem to be (in no particular order): deny, obfuscate, attack the accusers, semantically marginalize the accusation, strawman argument, and finally plead for sympathy.
Allegations are not proof. Then again, arguing against the allegations is ALSO not proof. That too may be what is happening here.
I'd turn the question around: at what point would YOU consider it settled?
I agree with you - I don't really have any preconceptions about it, and I'm certainly not an electroneurologist or whomever would be an expert in this field. I use cell phones all the time, and am frankly glad that such an issue is at least part of the design consideration.
But as far as I can tell, every study I've seen has shown no issue. Since pretty much every study's objectivity today appears to be in doubt (somehow, somewhere, someone in the line can be proven to have shown a bias on the issue one way or another) then will another study tell us anything useful? Are 8 negative studies not enough, we need 12? 26? 100?
Getting hyperbolic language from the game's lead programmer is...unconvincing.
"Everything being destructible" isn't much of a goal, particularly in their example. Shooting through a box to give yourself cover? Um, if I can shoot through it and destroy it, how much value does it provide as COVER?
No, as a longtime shooter fan what I'd like is more along the developmental lines: I'd like a 3d world engine in which you actually BUILD things from their pieces, like in the real world. If I build a wall of 3d-model planks using 3d-model nails, then each plank would have it's own destructiblity, however, the attachment points would also (for example) have their own strength, so if a grenade goes off or a character kicks the wall, that plank would respond appropriately. This would also make the world more intuitive to build, getting more people to mod.
Hasn't that been the general biological consensus recently?
Archaeo-lifeforms, being far less specialized seem to be able to both spread widely and cope with marginal or rapidly-changing conditions. Witness jellyfish, etc. When a biome's conditions are very stable over a long period of time, specialist organisms develop that are more efficient (at everything, really) and quickly outcompete the generalist, simpler older forms. As long as the older forms aren't completely extinguished (which logically I'd have to say is relatively unlikely, given their ability to occupy LOTS of niches simultaneously), when the environment again starts changing more rapidly, the specialist forms start to fail and the older generalists come again to the fore.
My guess would be that the location of this mat is otherwise fairly UNfriendly for more-developed forms, leaving it to happily churn away these millions of years without something discovering that it's tasty and nutritious (at least, not enough predators to outpace its reproductive rate).
What I MEANT was that the poles have multiple advantages that are unique to these two geographic points: 1) line-of-sight to earth 2) AND 24/7 solar power 3) AND visibility into the area behind the moon (which can never be observed from earth directly)
Yes, obviously the entire face of the moon has 24/7 los to earth. Sigh.
(extremophile evolved from life developed in mild, favorable environment) != (extremophile evolved in extreme environment)
But it IS great news, and is at least 'proof of concept' as to the sustainability of life in extreme conditions, even if ultimately we discover that life needs a perfect little petri dish of conditions to get STARTED.
Slashdot Mirror
Meh, I'll just wait for the SRWare Iron version.
Most of the complaints people have about Chrome are gone in Iron (or, as your esthetic complaints) don't matter enough to me to want to go back to Firefox (which was almost as bloated and slow as IE by the time I departed using it after many years of happy use) or *shudder* IE.
I've heard that too, but here's my very naive point of view:
- sure, CRU 'lost'/threw out/deleted the data THAT THEY HAD COLLECTED, back in the 1980s.
- I'm nearly certain that CRU wasn't collecting the data for temperatures since forever...ie, they collected it from SOMEWHERE ELSE.
- if you're going to draw conclusions that call for massive changes in government policy, etc on the order of decades and centuries, wouldn't it be worth revisiting those sources, and RE-gathering the raw data that can be found?
- this process could be very open-source, allowing everyone and their brother to error-check, reality-check (ie to correct the Russian data sets that CRU rec'd that later turned out to have been bogus), etc. from the START
- this could be a huge opportunity for climate researchers to save face; certainly the data set that they'd gather today wouldn't be identical to the set that they'd gathered previously, even for historical data. That the results would be in any way different could just be explained/rationalized by 'different data', meaning nobody gets lynched, pilloried, or otherwise run on a rail.
Wipe the slate, start from zero. The idea that the weather stations somehow gave their historical temp data to CRU and somewise then deleted their own records seems...unlikely.
"...No one is going to release their data before they have published..."
I don't think anyone is/was asking for that.
I DO think that releasing the raw data once you've made dire, earth-shaking conclusions might make some sense, however.
The reason people generally state that they want that much gameplay is because the games cost so frikkin much.
You want to make games with 3-4 hours of gameplay, fine, but don't expect people to pay more than $3-5 for it.
Thanks for getting me fired, you insensitive clod.
I mean look:
- faith in the belief that a certain prescribed ritual will result in a specific, predictable outcome? If that doesn't describe coding, I don't know what does.
- ability to spend their entire lives without sex, or really female companionship of any kind, except for a worshipful adulation of an image (think geeks and a picture of Megan Fox)
- ability to endlessly pontificate (see what I did there?)
Hell, all they have to do is say "priests get to live in their mom's basement" and the slashvertisment practically writes itself.
No, what we need is a BioSphere that's sponsored and run as a science experiment, not as a faux-scientific arthouse project by post-hippie dilettantes.
Considering the laughable failure that was Biosphere II, I'd say we have a LONG, LONG way to go before we
We can build habitable environments, but self-sustaining is at least a whole order of magnitude beyond us today.
First, let me point out that yes, I've been involved with scouting, both as a scout myself and as a parent of two Life scouts working on Eagle projects in May.
Second, there's a difference between an organizations' formally stated aims and what they mean in practical terms. Yes, there has been a 'political' distancing of the military and Boy Scouts for a while; starting in the Vietnam era, the 'militarism' thing was seen to be distasteful by BSA, and in more recent administrations the absolute stance by BSA against homosexual scoutmasters has been distasteful to the Left. So the US gov't and the BSA have formally grown further apart. Let's remember however - there remains a very strong, possibly unique connection between the military and scouting: Eagle Scout rank still gives you a better starting rank and pay grade in the military (the ONLY non-military award/rank that they so honor).
Further, look at the history - Baden-Powell's Scouting for Boys was a juvenile rewrite of his Scouting for NCOs, and grew directly out of his use of 12-15 yr old boys at Mafeking (the Mafeking Cadet Corps) in the Boer War. To suggest that military utility to the country wasn't the original and primary motivation is utterly naive; certainly it's been overlaid with many decades of 'touchy-feely' reinterpretation (as well as program changes, such as the elimination of marching training), but don't mistake the frosting for the cake itself.
Finally, you might want to watch this: http://www.bsalegal.org/tribute-to-the-military-293.asp
People seem to forget that scouting was originally seen as a way to train BETTER SOLDIERS. (Could be because Scouting worked so hard to camoflage it in the 70s)
This is clearly still on that path, as far as the US military in the 21st century is concerned.
No, what CONSUMERS "should" do is to QUIT buying software that's subject to such prone-obsolescence systems. If consumers are too stupid or unable to resist buying the latest and greatest despite such issues, then companies will continue to find it in their financial best interests to do so.
At least with a PC, there are methods to hack around this (even WoW has private servers, illegal but they're there), but now you see part of the actual total-cost-of-ownership for that console.
Meaningless question.
People will use the EASIEST.
"Anytime someone warns about moral relativism, it's because they want you to follow their values and sense of right and wrong, instead of your own."
This is glib, but quite wrong.
Ever-increasing communications and globalization is causing us to be confronted ever more often with questions of moral relativism. In ancient times, when few people traveled more than a handful of miles from home, it was less of an issue.
Today, we have regular and constant conflicts between moral systems, held by their adherents to be equally "good".
Simple example: We (in Western Humanist societies) believe that women are equal to men in capability and opportunity. Certain societies don't believe this. Does this mean that the women there are 'oppressed' and should be 'rescued'? Would they even agree? Should we aggressively evangelize our beliefs, because we're 'certain' they're better in an absolute sense? Aside from the fact that other cultures may be JUST as certain of their superiority, how does this jibe with the (current) Western opinion frowning on the actions of 16-19th century colonialist missionaries, who were JUST as certain at the time that they needed to do what they were doing to SAVE the souls of the 'poor little ignorant fuzzy-wuzzies'?
On the other hand, from the point of a true moral relativist, would you have any right to criticize an Arab society for jailing and/or beating a woman for going out in public without a male escort? Or for an Indonesian man selling his daughter into prostitution because needs some cash and after all, she's just a girl? Or Chinese families drowning newborns because they have a vagina and not a penis?
My personal answers to these questions make people uncomfortable. What're yours?
Then you've simply not been paying attention.
First, the dirty non-secret of the last 30+ years is that naval vessels are FAR more vulnerable to missile attack than most people think. Since the 1960's era of big 'shipkiller' missiles with 300kg warheads that could critically damage even the most heavily armored ship, naval designers essentially 'gave up' on defeating attacks by using armor. Instead, it was felt that better c3i systems, higher speeds both strategically and tactically, and better intercommunications between fleet units would be a better 'investment' in vessel loading.
Witness the major damage suffered by the HMS Sheffield during the Falklands war, the USS Cole, or the USS Stark.
Ironically, this has then empowered missile designers to downsize warheads for the same effectiveness, allowing them to make smaller, faster missiles that are harder to defend against.
Secondly, in any case, a carrier group needs time and space to deploy its defenses. Outer ring vessels detect the inbound attack, and the groups electronic and weapons systems are deployed against it.
The danger of the 'shipping container' missile is stealth. The shipping lanes are sometimes very crowded, even well away from port. If a vessel that looks like a shabby container feeder vessel can get within a mile before launching, it may be a suicide mission, but with modern hypersonic shipkillers (dunno if that's the scale of missile involved in this system) a range of 5 miles is probably a guaranteed hit on the carrier.
Absolutely agree.
Further, "Google needs to understand that not every country holds the same values as may be common in other countries"...more clearly, AMERICANS need to understand that not every country holds the same values. We have to come to some sort of philosophical comprehension of this, and try to set aside the natural native ego involved.
(American values) != (everyone else)
in the same sense that
(Western humanism) != (everyone else)
This doesn't mean that American values are BETTER either. (Or WORSE either, Democrats.) Different.
How does a liberal society cope with other societies that aren't as liberal? We believe that women are equal to men in capability and opportunity. Certain societies don't believe this. Does this mean that the women there are 'oppressed' and should be 'rescued'? Would they even agree? Should we aggressively evangelize our beliefs, because we're 'certain' they're better in an absolute sense? Aside from the fact that other cultures may be JUST as certain of their superiority, how does this jibe with the (current) Western opinion frowning on the actions of 16-19th century colonialist missionaries, who were JUST as certain at the time that they needed to do what they were doing to SAVE the souls of the 'poor little ignorant fuzzy-wuzzies'?
My personal answer to this makes people uncomfortable. What's yours?
Like any resource, as it becomes rarer the price will go up.
Ultimately, the price will reach a point where people start
a) reviewing "do I really need all the addresses I'm asking for/have, or can I get by with less?"...like most physical projects, this sort of review is usually healthy for long-run efficiency.
b) reviewing the costs.consequences of switching to IPv6 architecture
We'll enter a long twilight where you'll have hardware designed to run IPv6 but back-compatible with v4 becoming common. As people replace old stuff, IPv6 will become more commmon.
And not one single bureaucrat had to mandate anything, nor raise a government bureaucracy to implement it. Huh. Imagine that!
...unless we actually went out of our way to bother them.
Hypothesis:
The universe is roughly 15 billion years old.
As I understand it, our solar system is approximately 5 billion years old, and was generated from a molecular cloud that would itself have been created by a previous star exploding, which would have had a lifespan (to be nova-likely) of something under 1 billion years. So VERY roughly speaking, our entire existence cycle is roughly 6 billion years or so.
Even granting that the universe didn't really settle into its current state for the first 5 billion years, that would give the first civilizations - if there are any, and to me it's likely - as much as a 5 billion year head-start on us.
So extant civilizations in the universe would be anywhere from 0 (just reached sentience) to 5 billion years old. Given that on such a scale, we're just on the verge of reaching starflight ourselves, we don't really have to worry about encountering any races YOUNGER than us...they won't be starfaring.
Which means that anyone we meet is going to be anywhere from 0 to 5 BILLION years more advanced.
Look at Earth, and ask yourself what chance a civilization would have against a group only 1000 years more advanced. And then consider the increasing PACE of development - the next 1000 years' tech will be a MUCH greater step than, for example 0 AD to 1000 AD, or 1000 AD-2000 AD.
And then figure out how 'troubling' we'd be to someone 100,000, a million, or a billion years more advanced?
By their scale, really, we'd be insects (minus perhaps the ability to actually annoy). If they want something we have, they'd just take it and probably not even notice our objections.
So no, I'd like to HOPE that they are also ethically advanced, but I wouldn't stake humanity on it. I'd much prefer that they didn't even know we were here (aside from the chance of accidental obliteration due to construction of a hyperspace bypass...), and that we have absolutely nothing they want.
Further, my thought experiment would also suggest that yes, if they DID care to observe us out of some curiosity, we'd have absolutely no clue, even if they were right here. A billion years more advanced? Do ants notice you watching them? I doubt it. Hell, events that we take to be logically-explainable processes like volcanoes could just be the equivalent of the finger of a bored supersentient adolescent.
Since Brazil is allegedly a democracy, let the people decide.
Due to the risks of being held liable for this, tomorrow, block all access from Brazilian IP's to Google or any Google-owned property (youtube, etc.)
Simple.
My guess is that relatively quickly, public groundswell would force Brazil to confront the fact that I believe people are not allowed to be anonymous in any context there.
But let's be completely honest, shall we?
"Besides, there were allegations here that went beyond the meat of the science and into workplace ethics. If some rag says you sexually harassed your coworkers or embezzled money, and you didn't, you sue. That is what is happening here."
If some rag says you sexually harassed your coworkers, and you DID, you STILL sue. (You might, for example, recall a certain president who categorically 'did not have sexual relations with this woman!'? He then promptly mobilized the massive public-relations engine that worked for him as well as energizing political fellow-travelers to work on his behalf - all to 'defend' himself from scurrilous and scandalous accusations that were PERFECTLY TRUE.)
The tactics of the accused, when they know they're guilty seem to be (in no particular order):
deny, obfuscate, attack the accusers, semantically marginalize the accusation, strawman argument, and finally plead for sympathy.
Allegations are not proof.
Then again, arguing against the allegations is ALSO not proof.
That too may be what is happening here.
I'd turn the question around: at what point would YOU consider it settled?
I agree with you - I don't really have any preconceptions about it, and I'm certainly not an electroneurologist or whomever would be an expert in this field. I use cell phones all the time, and am frankly glad that such an issue is at least part of the design consideration.
But as far as I can tell, every study I've seen has shown no issue. Since pretty much every study's objectivity today appears to be in doubt (somehow, somewhere, someone in the line can be proven to have shown a bias on the issue one way or another) then will another study tell us anything useful? Are 8 negative studies not enough, we need 12? 26? 100?
+1, we're going to keep studying this until it agrees with our preconceived ideas.
Getting hyperbolic language from the game's lead programmer is...unconvincing.
"Everything being destructible" isn't much of a goal, particularly in their example. Shooting through a box to give yourself cover? Um, if I can shoot through it and destroy it, how much value does it provide as COVER?
No, as a longtime shooter fan what I'd like is more along the developmental lines: I'd like a 3d world engine in which you actually BUILD things from their pieces, like in the real world. If I build a wall of 3d-model planks using 3d-model nails, then each plank would have it's own destructiblity, however, the attachment points would also (for example) have their own strength, so if a grenade goes off or a character kicks the wall, that plank would respond appropriately. This would also make the world more intuitive to build, getting more people to mod.
Hasn't that been the general biological consensus recently?
Archaeo-lifeforms, being far less specialized seem to be able to both spread widely and cope with marginal or rapidly-changing conditions. Witness jellyfish, etc. When a biome's conditions are very stable over a long period of time, specialist organisms develop that are more efficient (at everything, really) and quickly outcompete the generalist, simpler older forms. As long as the older forms aren't completely extinguished (which logically I'd have to say is relatively unlikely, given their ability to occupy LOTS of niches simultaneously), when the environment again starts changing more rapidly, the specialist forms start to fail and the older generalists come again to the fore.
My guess would be that the location of this mat is otherwise fairly UNfriendly for more-developed forms, leaving it to happily churn away these millions of years without something discovering that it's tasty and nutritious (at least, not enough predators to outpace its reproductive rate).
Sorry, was thinking beyond what I typed.
What I MEANT was that the poles have multiple advantages that are unique to these two geographic points:
1) line-of-sight to earth
2) AND 24/7 solar power
3) AND visibility into the area behind the moon (which can never be observed from earth directly)
Yes, obviously the entire face of the moon has 24/7 los to earth. Sigh.
(extremophile evolved from life developed in mild, favorable environment) != (extremophile evolved in extreme environment)
But it IS great news, and is at least 'proof of concept' as to the sustainability of life in extreme conditions, even if ultimately we discover that life needs a perfect little petri dish of conditions to get STARTED.