In my experience, tailgaters will tailgate even if it's impossible for the person they're tailgating to change lanes. I've been ticketed for speeding up enough to get away from a tailgater; why should I pay hundreds of dollars (possibly thousands over the lifetime of my car insurance policy) just because some asshole is in a hurry and doesn't care if he dies today?
Also, if someone is tailgating me, that makes the chances of a collision much higher, so it only makes sense to slow down. If they get even closer after I've slowed down, then it makes sense for me to slow down even more.
I'll try to get out of the way, but if I can't do so without risking an accident squeezing between cars in the next lane or a speeding ticket for doing 85 or 90 to get out of your way, I'm going to slow down until you back off or I have an opportunity to change lanes safely.
My understanding is that KWord is a frames-based word processing program; it is probably a better candidate for Publisher replacement than any product that is designed with commercial printing and pre-press in mind.
Back off of the US Postal Service. 37 cents to send a letter from San Diego to Boston is an unreal bargain. They routinely deliver letters addressed by functional illiterates, usually within 3 to 5 days. I have never had anything lost in the mail and I have never heard a personal account of anyone who has. I have never received a package through the USPS that appeared to have been put through the Samsonite test. Say what you will about your local DMV, but don't disrespect the postal service.
"Sam Hiser writes"? Huh. More like "Sam Hiser cuts and pastes". The story submission is a direct rip-off of Eugenia Loli-Queru's story on OSNews.
To be fair to Sam, he may have noted this in his submission and the editor may have neglected to mention that Slashdot is trailing OSNews on this story. Either way, I think credit should be given to Eugenia and OSNews for writing the blurb if not for breaking the story.
I'm reasonably certain that this comment will be poorly received here (at Slashdot as well as OSNews), but I just can't keep it to myself, so oh well.
Truly, the author does a good job of dispelling one piece of FUD kicking around regarding open source software, specifically the belief that most open source software is written by wild-eyed loners without any concept of planning or design.
Other than that, the article is, umm, not so good. Nearly everything he says about closed source processes describes "big company" closed source processes. I work for a small closed source shop and his description of the open source development process is very *very* close to our process. It sounds as if his only closed source experience was with IBM, which is quite possibly the most extreme example of a process-bound company one could imagine.
Since analogies and similes are so popular on this thread, I would suggest that he what he is saying is like saying that vehicles made in Japan are more responsive than those made in America, using as examples a Japanese sports car and an American diesel locomotive.
Anybody who has worked in or with a smaller, more nimble closed source shop will see his description of the "closed source process" as bullshit. Many of these people will conclude that the author is a crank and proceed to ignore the good point he does make about the professionalism of many open source projects and companies.
The same applies to the stuff about standards. Closed source shops can and do adhere to open standards; I know we make every effort to do so in my shop. Many many open standards were originally developed by closed source shops cooperating to facilitate communication between closed source products and to offer the market choices in how to combine them. I know this is hard for some open source zealots to believe, but many closed source shops know that offering products based on open standards can help improve adoption of new technologies; when the tide comes in, all boats rise, ours and the competition's both.
Don't get me wrong, I think open source software is a Good Thing; I use it daily (Mozilla, OpenBSD, Knoppix, blah blah blah) and push it whenever I get the chance. I just don't think this article is about what the author says it's about and I don't think it will appear convincing to anybody that isn't already convinced.
PS - It also doesn't help that in an article about professionalism in the open source world he flubs "stock in trade" and "give way" in the opening sections.
With OSS if there are problems with an abandoned product, maintaining the existing codebase is an option. It may be that maintaining the abandoned codebase is not the best or most cost-effective option for all users at all times, but it is the best option for some users some of the time. This option is not available to users of closed-source products.
Multi-occupant vehicles can already drive in the HOV lanes, so your *hypothetical* Excursion with 8 passengers doesn't need to buy a special sticker.
I highly doubt you drive your wife and six kids to work with you every day, which is when there is a real need for HOV lanes. I see a lot of SUVs during rush hour with one person in them. I see very very few with more than two.
Heavier vehicles cause much more wear on the roads.
People driving alone in SUVs routinely act like they are the only ones on the road; the increased safety they feel makes them a danger to others who can't afford/don't want to buy SUVs. Sounds to me like you're one of these get-out-of-my-way-my-car-weighs-three-times-what-y our-car-weighs-you-smelly-little-tree-hugger types. Hope I don't run into you (or more likely you run into me) on the roads. Good to know you're watching out for number one! Don't roll over now, it would be a real loss to the rest of us.
The story is about people buying stickers to get in the high occupancy vehicle lane. HOV lanes are available to anyone with 3 or more passengers in their car. So, at most, the highest-occupancy SUV needing a sticker will have twice as many people in it as the lowest occupancy Honda Insight. I would be willing to bet good money that the one-occupant Insight gets more than twice the mileage of the two-occupant SUV, especially on the highway. If you need help with the math, just let me know.
I'm all for people who go off-road or have large families/lots of friends having SUVs. I just don't think they make good commuter vehicles. For all the extra gas money a typical SUV owner sends to the Saudis and their terrorist friends driving to work alone, most of them could afford a second, smaller car for the commute.
Go ahead, take a risk and pass in a half-length but well thought-out paper. I routinely did so and my grades did not suffer; most professors were grateful that I didn't drone on and on like the other students. If you're lucky, you'll get a chance to do this when add/drop is still available. In any case, if you do this early in the term, you will probably still have time to make up any penalty you incur.
Windows 2000 identifies itself to programs as "NT 5" and Windows XP as "NT 5.1", so I suspect lots of people will still be using NT for years to come.
Re:next breakthrough: buddhism
on
Tai Chi Robots
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
You're comparing the Buddhist ideal to the realities of other religions. *Professing* Buddhism doesn't preclude making war on others any more than *professing* any other religion does. There are pacifists within all or nearly all religious groups, and typically those pacifists claim that they are following the true teachings of that religion.
*Maybe* the pacifist element of Buddhism is currently more influential than the pacifist elements of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. Even so, Buddhist countries have made war on each other and others at many times in history, for example the two wars fought between Siam and Burma in the late 16th century.
I can't see how Jesus', Rabbi Akiba's, or Ibn Hallaj's (any pacifist Hindus out there pitch in) teachings are any less anti-war than the Buddha's. Frankly, you have already taken the first few steps onto the slippery slope by implying that Buddhism is the only way to peace. It's only a few short steps from there to the statement that all non-Buddhists should be destroyed as threats to peace.
In short, the virtuous in each religious group have more in common with each other than the wicked within each group have in common the virtuous. None of the world's major religions is inherently more or less virtuous than another and they have all been used as excuses for atrocities.
Trademarks and company names are really entirely different beasts. A trademark grants the holder exclusive rights to use the trademark for a given product line and protection from competitors' use of product names that are easily confused with the trademarked name. A company name doesn't grant the company protection from confusion created by competitors with similar names, unless the company name is itself trademarked.
The PTO is not supposed to grant trademarks for generic terms for the items sold under the trademark, as in the example of "wiper blades". "International Business Machines" is not trademarked, but "IBM" is, because "IBM" is not a generic term while the full name is. Both "AMD" and "Advanced Micro Devices" are trademarked, perhaps because "Micro Devices" is two words; I doubt a trademark would have been granted for the name "Advanced Microdevices".
You can use a trademarked name for a product that is totally unrelated to the trademarked product; in fact you can trademark a trademarked name for a non-competing product. If you wanted to start a bread company and call it "Cisco French Bread", that would not infringe on Cisco's trademark. However, if you were to start a networking hardware company and call it Cisco, Sysco, Sis-Co, or anything like it, you would be in trouble.
So, to review: Trademarks must not be generic terms for the trademarked products. Company names may be generic terms for the products sold by those companies. In order to avoid "crowding" of your company name, make sure it is not a generic term for the products you sell and then trademark it.
You seem to be missing an important part of how cabbies make money, i.e., tipping. A cabbie who has the benefit of nice music may make a modest amount more than a cabbie who doesn't, by virtue of tips. A cabbie who asks you what station or genre of music you want to listen to may make even more.
Did you just miss this, are you intentionally ignoring it because it doesn't support your position, or are you one of those jerks who always stiffs the poor sap who's driving the cab 16 hours a day to feed the family?
I find it hard to believe that coffee could be hot enough to cause charring of flesh without evaporating first. I'm a bit clumsy at times and have burned myself pretty badly on a few occasions. The only time I've managed to give myself third-degree burns was when I rested my hand on a soldering iron. I can believe that the woman had severe second-degree burns, which cause blistering, but third-degree burns (flesh turned to ash) just doesn't seem at all plausible.
Leaving the CD surface completely unprotected and open to scratches and fingerprints just seems like a bad idea to me, no matter how much error correction you have.
It's only a bad idea if you want them to last a long time... Remember back in the 80's how you could use your CDs as sled runners and they would still play? Back then, putting a protective case around the CD would have seemed silly; why put a protective case around an indestructible CD?
Once CDs became widely adopted, the recording industry hipped to the fact that unlike LPs and cassettes (and 8-tracks, and reel-to-reel tapes), CDs didn't wear out. This cut into their ability to sell hardcore fans replacements for their favorite records. Solution? Make the coating on CDs so fragile that just putting it into and taking it out of the jewel case enough times will ruin it.
I'm sure whoever revived this market segment by reducing the durability of CDs thought it was a good idea. I'm pretty sure his/her boss thought it was the best idea since the CD itself. ("Wow, cheaper to make than LP/Cassette, saleable for 50% more, and less durable? Perfect! How's it feel to be the newest executive on the team, Simpson?")
The Post Office most certainly can assign multiple municipalities to a single zip code. Do a search at the usps on ZipCode 01002. You'll find that it is valid for Amherst, Cushman, and Pelham, and known to be in use (incorrectly) for South Amherst.
You could not be so naive as to believe that every product of the other engineering disciplines is subjected to peer review. Some civil engineering products might fit your characterization, but you can't deny there's a non-trivial number of trade secrets being hidden from competitors/customers in every engineering discipline.
I suppose you've never heard of a forged header. Anything can be made to lie, if you try hard enough. Forging a header is not rocket science, and is (as the story linked to points out, just above the heading "Corporate headaches getting worse") a tactic already in widespread use by spammers.
I guess you're also shocked that Sarah Michelle Gellar and Gillian Anderson have posed for so many nude photos. Here's a tip: those are fake, too.
Bluetooth is a very short-range protocol meant for eliminating wires in a Personal Area Network (e.g., between your handheld and your cell phone) and replacing USB for synching your palmtop to your desktop. Comparing bluetooth to 802.11b is a bit like comparing IR to Fixed-beam Laser networking.
Your attitude that AIDS-infected people are guilty until proven innocent is appalling.
In some parts of Africa, it is believed that a man can cure himself of AIDS infection by having sex with a virgin.
In China, huge numbers of people whose government never bothered to tell them anything about AIDS have contracted the disease from blood-donation clinics that used unsanitary practices.
Are 13-year-old girls who have been raped to blame? Are poor farmers from rural China who sell blood without any awareness of the risks to blame? Are the hundreds of thousands of the infected who live beyond the reach of AIDS educators to blame? Are the children of AIDS-infected mothers to blame?
The Recording Industry Ass. of America and Motion Picture Ass. of America seem to have stepped in it here. Going after people's ability to make mix CDs may finally wake up the general public to their game. The.23 cent royalties on downloaded songs give the lie to their mission to "protect the artists". Saying that music piracy is more important than AIDS makes them look like the self-absorbed pricks that they are.
Is it just me, or do they seem more and more desperate with every passing day?
I didn't say genetic engineering was "wrong", I merely stated that natural selection is still operating.
You may be right that there are checks on its operation, but it *is* still operating. For instance, you say that smarter people reproduce at a lower rate than others. That leads to the conclusion that natural selection currently favors those who have lots of children without thought to the economic or social consequences.
I know several women who would like to have children, but are incredibly picky about their mates: either he's not interesting enough (read: he's a nice boy) or he's an asshole (read: he's not a nice boy). These women are old enough now that their chances of finding mates and reproducing are pretty low; they are being selected against for their inability to (a) have respect for men that show them respect, (b) put up with men that don't show them respect, or (c) take the risk of having children without the aid of a co-parent.
Considering the severity of the AIDS epidemic in Africa, not to mention other diseases (TB, West Nile, drug-resistant Flu strains, etc., etc.), it would seem to me that humankind is still locked in an evolutionary race with various pathogens. If half of sub-Saharan Africa dies of AIDS, those who were exposed to but never contracted HIV will have been selected for.
Another example is the steady decline in sperm count. Some couples that have trouble conceiving have the money for expensive fertility treatments, but they are the minority even in the developed world, moreso when you include the rest of humanity. So, those men with low sperm counts are being selected against.
You don't offer any evidence that we are genetically identical to the Ancient Egyptians, and even if we were, a few thousand years is as nothing to the process of natural selection. Using this argument would be tantamount to saying that the continents haven't drifted considerably since then so therefore tectonic theory is a crock.
Stephen Jay Gould and others have amply demonstrated that evolution operates in fits and starts; the idea that evolution proceeds at a steady pace is at odds with the best science we've produced on the subject. It may be that we are not currently evolving at a rapid rate, but to infer from that that natural selection has ceased operating is hubris in the highest degree.
Face it, natural selection is here to stay. Until we have eliminated murder, accidental death, and all diseases from the world, and legislated that couples will be paired randomly, that all couples will have exactly two children (this will necessitate advances in fertility medicine to allow sterile individuals to have children), that is. You let me know when all of this has taken place, and I will concede the point.
Slashdot Mirror
In my experience, tailgaters will tailgate even if it's impossible for the person they're tailgating to change lanes. I've been ticketed for speeding up enough to get away from a tailgater; why should I pay hundreds of dollars (possibly thousands over the lifetime of my car insurance policy) just because some asshole is in a hurry and doesn't care if he dies today?
Also, if someone is tailgating me, that makes the chances of a collision much higher, so it only makes sense to slow down. If they get even closer after I've slowed down, then it makes sense for me to slow down even more.
I'll try to get out of the way, but if I can't do so without risking an accident squeezing between cars in the next lane or a speeding ticket for doing 85 or 90 to get out of your way, I'm going to slow down until you back off or I have an opportunity to change lanes safely.
My understanding is that KWord is a frames-based word processing program; it is probably a better candidate for Publisher replacement than any product that is designed with commercial printing and pre-press in mind.
Back off of the US Postal Service. 37 cents to send a letter from San Diego to Boston is an unreal bargain. They routinely deliver letters addressed by functional illiterates, usually within 3 to 5 days. I have never had anything lost in the mail and I have never heard a personal account of anyone who has. I have never received a package through the USPS that appeared to have been put through the Samsonite test. Say what you will about your local DMV, but don't disrespect the postal service.
Sh*t. What a jerk I am. Sam submitted the same story to both sites. Pardon me while I bash my own head with a clipboard.....
Pie Iesu Domine
Donna eis requiem
[whack]
Pie Iesu Domine
Donna eis requiem
[whack]
There, that's better.
Good point, but this would only happen once. So if the account was monitored, the ISP could quickly dismiss it and move along...
If you know of a way to sign into a new account for the first time more than once, I'd like to hear it...
"Sam Hiser writes"? Huh. More like "Sam Hiser cuts and pastes". The story submission is a direct rip-off of Eugenia Loli-Queru's story on OSNews.
To be fair to Sam, he may have noted this in his submission and the editor may have neglected to mention that Slashdot is trailing OSNews on this story. Either way, I think credit should be given to Eugenia and OSNews for writing the blurb if not for breaking the story.
Copied my post on the same topic at OSNews...
I'm reasonably certain that this comment will be poorly received here (at Slashdot as well as OSNews), but I just can't keep it to myself, so oh well.
Truly, the author does a good job of dispelling one piece of FUD kicking around regarding open source software, specifically the belief that most open source software is written by wild-eyed loners without any concept of planning or design.
Other than that, the article is, umm, not so good. Nearly everything he says about closed source processes describes "big company" closed source processes. I work for a small closed source shop and his description of the open source development process is very *very* close to our process. It sounds as if his only closed source experience was with IBM, which is quite possibly the most extreme example of a process-bound company one could imagine.
Since analogies and similes are so popular on this thread, I would suggest that he what he is saying is like saying that vehicles made in Japan are more responsive than those made in America, using as examples a Japanese sports car and an American diesel locomotive.
Anybody who has worked in or with a smaller, more nimble closed source shop will see his description of the "closed source process" as bullshit. Many of these people will conclude that the author is a crank and proceed to ignore the good point he does make about the professionalism of many open source projects and companies.
The same applies to the stuff about standards. Closed source shops can and do adhere to open standards; I know we make every effort to do so in my shop. Many many open standards were originally developed by closed source shops cooperating to facilitate communication between closed source products and to offer the market choices in how to combine them. I know this is hard for some open source zealots to believe, but many closed source shops know that offering products based on open standards can help improve adoption of new technologies; when the tide comes in, all boats rise, ours and the competition's both.
Don't get me wrong, I think open source software is a Good Thing; I use it daily (Mozilla, OpenBSD, Knoppix, blah blah blah) and push it whenever I get the chance. I just don't think this article is about what the author says it's about and I don't think it will appear convincing to anybody that isn't already convinced.
PS - It also doesn't help that in an article about professionalism in the open source world he flubs "stock in trade" and "give way" in the opening sections.
With OSS if there are problems with an abandoned product, maintaining the existing codebase is an option. It may be that maintaining the abandoned codebase is not the best or most cost-effective option for all users at all times, but it is the best option for some users some of the time. This option is not available to users of closed-source products.
The story is about people buying stickers to get in the high occupancy vehicle lane. HOV lanes are available to anyone with 3 or more passengers in their car. So, at most, the highest-occupancy SUV needing a sticker will have twice as many people in it as the lowest occupancy Honda Insight. I would be willing to bet good money that the one-occupant Insight gets more than twice the mileage of the two-occupant SUV, especially on the highway. If you need help with the math, just let me know.
I'm all for people who go off-road or have large families/lots of friends having SUVs. I just don't think they make good commuter vehicles. For all the extra gas money a typical SUV owner sends to the Saudis and their terrorist friends driving to work alone, most of them could afford a second, smaller car for the commute.
Go ahead, take a risk and pass in a half-length but well thought-out paper. I routinely did so and my grades did not suffer; most professors were grateful that I didn't drone on and on like the other students. If you're lucky, you'll get a chance to do this when add/drop is still available. In any case, if you do this early in the term, you will probably still have time to make up any penalty you incur.
Windows 2000 identifies itself to programs as "NT 5" and Windows XP as "NT 5.1", so I suspect lots of people will still be using NT for years to come.
You're comparing the Buddhist ideal to the realities of other religions. *Professing* Buddhism doesn't preclude making war on others any more than *professing* any other religion does. There are pacifists within all or nearly all religious groups, and typically those pacifists claim that they are following the true teachings of that religion.
*Maybe* the pacifist element of Buddhism is currently more influential than the pacifist elements of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. Even so, Buddhist countries have made war on each other and others at many times in history, for example the two wars fought between Siam and Burma in the late 16th century.
I can't see how Jesus', Rabbi Akiba's, or Ibn Hallaj's (any pacifist Hindus out there pitch in) teachings are any less anti-war than the Buddha's. Frankly, you have already taken the first few steps onto the slippery slope by implying that Buddhism is the only way to peace. It's only a few short steps from there to the statement that all non-Buddhists should be destroyed as threats to peace.
In short, the virtuous in each religious group have more in common with each other than the wicked within each group have in common the virtuous. None of the world's major religions is inherently more or less virtuous than another and they have all been used as excuses for atrocities.
Trademarks and company names are really entirely different beasts. A trademark grants the holder exclusive rights to use the trademark for a given product line and protection from competitors' use of product names that are easily confused with the trademarked name. A company name doesn't grant the company protection from confusion created by competitors with similar names, unless the company name is itself trademarked.
The PTO is not supposed to grant trademarks for generic terms for the items sold under the trademark, as in the example of "wiper blades". "International Business Machines" is not trademarked, but "IBM" is, because "IBM" is not a generic term while the full name is. Both "AMD" and "Advanced Micro Devices" are trademarked, perhaps because "Micro Devices" is two words; I doubt a trademark would have been granted for the name "Advanced Microdevices".
You can use a trademarked name for a product that is totally unrelated to the trademarked product; in fact you can trademark a trademarked name for a non-competing product. If you wanted to start a bread company and call it "Cisco French Bread", that would not infringe on Cisco's trademark. However, if you were to start a networking hardware company and call it Cisco, Sysco, Sis-Co, or anything like it, you would be in trouble.
So, to review: Trademarks must not be generic terms for the trademarked products. Company names may be generic terms for the products sold by those companies. In order to avoid "crowding" of your company name, make sure it is not a generic term for the products you sell and then trademark it.
You seem to be missing an important part of how cabbies make money, i.e., tipping. A cabbie who has the benefit of nice music may make a modest amount more than a cabbie who doesn't, by virtue of tips. A cabbie who asks you what station or genre of music you want to listen to may make even more.
Did you just miss this, are you intentionally ignoring it because it doesn't support your position, or are you one of those jerks who always stiffs the poor sap who's driving the cab 16 hours a day to feed the family?
For a five-year-old, you have excellent writing skills!
So... all I need to do to legally prevent my neighbor from using WLAN is to use it myself? This is great. I hate that guy.
I find it hard to believe that coffee could be hot enough to cause charring of flesh without evaporating first. I'm a bit clumsy at times and have burned myself pretty badly on a few occasions. The only time I've managed to give myself third-degree burns was when I rested my hand on a soldering iron. I can believe that the woman had severe second-degree burns, which cause blistering, but third-degree burns (flesh turned to ash) just doesn't seem at all plausible.
Once CDs became widely adopted, the recording industry hipped to the fact that unlike LPs and cassettes (and 8-tracks, and reel-to-reel tapes), CDs didn't wear out. This cut into their ability to sell hardcore fans replacements for their favorite records. Solution? Make the coating on CDs so fragile that just putting it into and taking it out of the jewel case enough times will ruin it.
I'm sure whoever revived this market segment by reducing the durability of CDs thought it was a good idea. I'm pretty sure his/her boss thought it was the best idea since the CD itself. ("Wow, cheaper to make than LP/Cassette, saleable for 50% more, and less durable? Perfect! How's it feel to be the newest executive on the team, Simpson?")
The Post Office most certainly can assign multiple municipalities to a single zip code. Do a search at the usps on ZipCode 01002. You'll find that it is valid for Amherst, Cushman, and Pelham, and known to be in use (incorrectly) for South Amherst.
Unadulterated bullshit.
You could not be so naive as to believe that every product of the other engineering disciplines is subjected to peer review. Some civil engineering products might fit your characterization, but you can't deny there's a non-trivial number of trade secrets being hidden from competitors/customers in every engineering discipline.
I suspect you're a troll, but here goes anyway:
I suppose you've never heard of a forged header. Anything can be made to lie, if you try hard enough. Forging a header is not rocket science, and is (as the story linked to points out, just above the heading "Corporate headaches getting worse") a tactic already in widespread use by spammers.
I guess you're also shocked that Sarah Michelle Gellar and Gillian Anderson have posed for so many nude photos. Here's a tip: those are fake, too.
Bluetooth is a very short-range protocol meant for eliminating wires in a Personal Area Network (e.g., between your handheld and your cell phone) and replacing USB for synching your palmtop to your desktop. Comparing bluetooth to 802.11b is a bit like comparing IR to Fixed-beam Laser networking.
Your attitude that AIDS-infected people are guilty until proven innocent is appalling.
In some parts of Africa, it is believed that a man can cure himself of AIDS infection by having sex with a virgin.
In China, huge numbers of people whose government never bothered to tell them anything about AIDS have contracted the disease from blood-donation clinics that used unsanitary practices.
Are 13-year-old girls who have been raped to blame? Are poor farmers from rural China who sell blood without any awareness of the risks to blame? Are the hundreds of thousands of the infected who live beyond the reach of AIDS educators to blame? Are the children of AIDS-infected mothers to blame?
The Recording Industry Ass. of America and Motion Picture Ass. of America seem to have stepped in it here. Going after people's ability to make mix CDs may finally wake up the general public to their game. The .23 cent royalties on downloaded songs give the lie to their mission to "protect the artists". Saying that music piracy is more important than AIDS makes them look like the self-absorbed pricks that they are.
Is it just me, or do they seem more and more desperate with every passing day?
I didn't say genetic engineering was "wrong", I merely stated that natural selection is still operating.
You may be right that there are checks on its operation, but it *is* still operating. For instance, you say that smarter people reproduce at a lower rate than others. That leads to the conclusion that natural selection currently favors those who have lots of children without thought to the economic or social consequences.
I know several women who would like to have children, but are incredibly picky about their mates: either he's not interesting enough (read: he's a nice boy) or he's an asshole (read: he's not a nice boy). These women are old enough now that their chances of finding mates and reproducing are pretty low; they are being selected against for their inability to (a) have respect for men that show them respect, (b) put up with men that don't show them respect, or (c) take the risk of having children without the aid of a co-parent.
Considering the severity of the AIDS epidemic in Africa, not to mention other diseases (TB, West Nile, drug-resistant Flu strains, etc., etc.), it would seem to me that humankind is still locked in an evolutionary race with various pathogens. If half of sub-Saharan Africa dies of AIDS, those who were exposed to but never contracted HIV will have been selected for.
Another example is the steady decline in sperm count. Some couples that have trouble conceiving have the money for expensive fertility treatments, but they are the minority even in the developed world, moreso when you include the rest of humanity. So, those men with low sperm counts are being selected against.
You don't offer any evidence that we are genetically identical to the Ancient Egyptians, and even if we were, a few thousand years is as nothing to the process of natural selection. Using this argument would be tantamount to saying that the continents haven't drifted considerably since then so therefore tectonic theory is a crock.
Stephen Jay Gould and others have amply demonstrated that evolution operates in fits and starts; the idea that evolution proceeds at a steady pace is at odds with the best science we've produced on the subject. It may be that we are not currently evolving at a rapid rate, but to infer from that that natural selection has ceased operating is hubris in the highest degree.
Face it, natural selection is here to stay. Until we have eliminated murder, accidental death, and all diseases from the world, and legislated that couples will be paired randomly, that all couples will have exactly two children (this will necessitate advances in fertility medicine to allow sterile individuals to have children), that is. You let me know when all of this has taken place, and I will concede the point.