On NASA's capacity to produce results, please list the other organizations which have made several manned round trips to the moon. I'm sure that that list will grow, and will include private interests, but just now it's mighty short.
Why have a state-run organization at all? Sure. Let's just pile the money on a streetcorner with a sign saying, "for space colonization". Surely the major private space companies will see it and use it wisely to colonize space. Surely nobody else will touch it. Surely?
Well, we put a plaque up there saying that the moon is for everyone. "We came in peace for all mankind." Making those fine words stick might take more than lofty intentions, though. Having lots of interests up there is probably the best way to keep *any* of them from taking exclusive ownership.
Didn't the U.S. sign some U.N. declaration about the status of the moon?
My property taxes have been increasing by leaps and bounds, so there must be *some* more money for science and math education. If your kids aren't getting what you expect, talk to your school board. Or win an election and take over your school board.
"Any way you look at it, it seems hypocritical to put weapons in space to support free access to space..."
Ask any merchant sailor how he feels about the navies of the world as opposed to pirates, to have your eyes opened. There is no free access to anything without the ability to protect it.
"Significant power, perhaps, but not in any position to guarantee continued, stable, adequate funding for such a project."
It's important to keep that in mind. Also keep in mind, however, that there's nobody else in such a position either. Promises of funding only last until the next Congress amends or repeals them. Believe this one if you will, but believe it will make a difference only when you see the footprints in the dust.
"Does it not seem like space venture is only good for one class of people: the filthy rich?"
Said someone sitting at a personal computer, a thing which likely would not yet exist had not the space program of the 1960s needed significant automatic computation power in a tiny, lightweight package.
Well, a big part of exploration is exploring how to do it. Nobody's going to have all the details until some exploration's been *done*.
"We choose to go to the moon" was short on specifics too, but it set us on the road to the moon, and a decade later we knew how to do it.
And if (as I agree) there's really a lot of money to be made in space, in time the biggest problem with government vis a vis space travel will be getting it out of the way of the businesses which are trying to get into space. Just keep that road open long enough and the traffic will become great enough to keep it open.
If the Congress is going to take my money anyway, I'm glad to see them spending some of it on things I care about.
I notice that privacy and rights and whatnot are being fully discussed, but I haven't seen any discussion of the fact that we're talking eeeevil killer unclean RADIATION. Maybe that's a hopeful sign, but at the same time I do want to know that it'll be darned difficult to accumulate a significant dose from these scans if I ever become a frequent flyer.
I *thought* so. I've seen photos of this knife driven through a thick slab of plywood. The tip appeared undamaged.
I wanted to mention this before, but then thought that maybe I had it confused with that Bic pen ad. where they shot a pen through a board and the remains still wrote.
Sounds like we agree. You want a *policy* by which passengers may know what employees may and may not do with passengers' personal information. That is necessary (though not sufficient) to implementing what I want, which is power to remove and/or punish violators of the policy.
Think of it as an economical compromise. By simply flipping a switch twice a week they get maybe 70-80% of the effect that they'd really like for essentially no effort. I think it's a clever solution. They'll lose a few actual customers, but apparently not as many as they had had to turn away when some seats were filled by moochers.
Golly, haven't you heard? Batch is dead. Everything must be interactive and real-time, even if it doesn't need to be, even if it makes no sense for it to be, even if you could do it better the other way.
Too bad *Linksys* didn't do this in the first place. It's not as though the IPv6 spec.s were released only last week.
The vendors had better be getting ready. Assuming Longhorn ever makes it out the door, one thing I'm confident of is that it will at last have IPv6 as standard equipment (properly firewalled, I hope) rather than an extra download (Win2k) or packaged manual add-on (XP). And then, because it's Microsoft, everybody will suddenly think it's kool and they must have it.
I too would like to see how effective various measures are, but notice that if they are working well the number of terrorists caught recently should be zero, because nobody with hostile intent would dare try to pass the procedures.
I accept your story, but here's another. We arrived at the airport with the recommended 90min. lead time. There were maybe eight people in line at the screening station -- we were through in two minutes with no flashing lights or physical inspections. We sat in the departure lounge for 80 minutes until boarding time, showed our boarding passes, got on the plane, and were taken to our destination without incident. Same story on the return flight. It does happen.
"I think that the most important thing the governments of the world need to do is to make sure the data used for securing passenger flights can not be abused"
This is where it always falls apart. There is no way to prevent 100% of abuse. Never has been. Never will be.
What *is* possible is that abusers can be removed from positions where they have abused their power, and otherwise punished if appropriate. There is no possible technology which can prevent a sufficiently determined abuser, but if I can have him fired, even jailed, then abuse should be infrequent, and I don't have to feel helpless (because I'm not).
Not urban legend, however, is a little knife I saw advertised maybe 30 years ago, made entirely of plastic and glass fiber. The catalog (P&S Sales, a fairly trustworthy outfit) said it would take a shaving-sharp edge as I recall. It was dubbed the "CIA Letter Opener".
Dunno how you'd detect one of those without X-ray imaging or physical contact.
The problem to date is that MS Windows doesn't use it. Even XP requires you to install it after you get the rest of XP set up.
When they start shipping MS Windows with IPv6 turned on and start talking it up in the Help, then the corporate deep thinkers will start telling us to Make It So.
BTW it works fine here, on WinXP and Linux. IPsec too.
Lots of other things seem to break IE's XML too. I haven't been able to get the PSDK Update pages to work for months on this other box over here. It's been so long that I don't recall what installation zapped it, if indeed I ever knew.
And I'm not going to blow away an *entire OS* and *thousands of settings* just to replace one lousy.DLL.
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On NASA's capacity to produce results, please list the other organizations which have made several manned round trips to the moon. I'm sure that that list will grow, and will include private interests, but just now it's mighty short.
Why have a state-run organization at all? Sure. Let's just pile the money on a streetcorner with a sign saying, "for space colonization". Surely the major private space companies will see it and use it wisely to colonize space. Surely nobody else will touch it. Surely?
Well, we put a plaque up there saying that the moon is for everyone. "We came in peace for all mankind." Making those fine words stick might take more than lofty intentions, though. Having lots of interests up there is probably the best way to keep *any* of them from taking exclusive ownership.
Didn't the U.S. sign some U.N. declaration about the status of the moon?
You've been reading "The Marching Morons" again, haven't you.
My property taxes have been increasing by leaps and bounds, so there must be *some* more money for science and math education. If your kids aren't getting what you expect, talk to your school board. Or win an election and take over your school board.
"Any way you look at it, it seems hypocritical to put weapons in space to support free access to space..."
Ask any merchant sailor how he feels about the navies of the world as opposed to pirates, to have your eyes opened. There is no free access to anything without the ability to protect it.
"Significant power, perhaps, but not in any position to guarantee continued, stable, adequate funding for such a project."
It's important to keep that in mind. Also keep in mind, however, that there's nobody else in such a position either. Promises of funding only last until the next Congress amends or repeals them. Believe this one if you will, but believe it will make a difference only when you see the footprints in the dust.
"Does it not seem like space venture is only good for one class of people: the filthy rich?"
Said someone sitting at a personal computer, a thing which likely would not yet exist had not the space program of the 1960s needed significant automatic computation power in a tiny, lightweight package.
Well, a big part of exploration is exploring how to do it. Nobody's going to have all the details until some exploration's been *done*.
"We choose to go to the moon" was short on specifics too, but it set us on the road to the moon, and a decade later we knew how to do it.
And if (as I agree) there's really a lot of money to be made in space, in time the biggest problem with government vis a vis space travel will be getting it out of the way of the businesses which are trying to get into space. Just keep that road open long enough and the traffic will become great enough to keep it open.
If the Congress is going to take my money anyway, I'm glad to see them spending some of it on things I care about.
I notice that privacy and rights and whatnot are being fully discussed, but I haven't seen any discussion of the fact that we're talking eeeevil killer unclean RADIATION. Maybe that's a hopeful sign, but at the same time I do want to know that it'll be darned difficult to accumulate a significant dose from these scans if I ever become a frequent flyer.
Briefly. That event demonstrated that there's no reason to believe inaction will get you a better fate than action.
I *thought* so. I've seen photos of this knife driven through a thick slab of plywood. The tip appeared undamaged.
I wanted to mention this before, but then thought that maybe I had it confused with that Bic pen ad. where they shot a pen through a board and the remains still wrote.
Glass is only invisible when submerged in a medium of the same refractive index. I've seen glass bottles show up clearly on X-ray.
Sounds like we agree. You want a *policy* by which passengers may know what employees may and may not do with passengers' personal information. That is necessary (though not sufficient) to implementing what I want, which is power to remove and/or punish violators of the policy.
Think of it as an economical compromise. By simply flipping a switch twice a week they get maybe 70-80% of the effect that they'd really like for essentially no effort. I think it's a clever solution. They'll lose a few actual customers, but apparently not as many as they had had to turn away when some seats were filled by moochers.
Golly, haven't you heard? Batch is dead. Everything must be interactive and real-time, even if it doesn't need to be, even if it makes no sense for it to be, even if you could do it better the other way.
I'll turn it around, then: why sit around drinking expensive coffee when your purpose was to meet people?
Too bad *Linksys* didn't do this in the first place. It's not as though the IPv6 spec.s were released only last week.
The vendors had better be getting ready. Assuming Longhorn ever makes it out the door, one thing I'm confident of is that it will at last have IPv6 as standard equipment (properly firewalled, I hope) rather than an extra download (Win2k) or packaged manual add-on (XP). And then, because it's Microsoft, everybody will suddenly think it's kool and they must have it.
I'd say that even 20 UNarmed people would be able to reduce a bad guy to bloody shreds.
I too would like to see how effective various measures are, but notice that if they are working well the number of terrorists caught recently should be zero, because nobody with hostile intent would dare try to pass the procedures.
I accept your story, but here's another. We arrived at the airport with the recommended 90min. lead time. There were maybe eight people in line at the screening station -- we were through in two minutes with no flashing lights or physical inspections. We sat in the departure lounge for 80 minutes until boarding time, showed our boarding passes, got on the plane, and were taken to our destination without incident. Same story on the return flight. It does happen.
"I think that the most important thing the governments of the world need to do is to make sure the data used for securing passenger flights can not be abused"
This is where it always falls apart. There is no way to prevent 100% of abuse. Never has been. Never will be.
What *is* possible is that abusers can be removed from positions where they have abused their power, and otherwise punished if appropriate. There is no possible technology which can prevent a sufficiently determined abuser, but if I can have him fired, even jailed, then abuse should be infrequent, and I don't have to feel helpless (because I'm not).
Not urban legend, however, is a little knife I saw advertised maybe 30 years ago, made entirely of plastic and glass fiber. The catalog (P&S Sales, a fairly trustworthy outfit) said it would take a shaving-sharp edge as I recall. It was dubbed the "CIA Letter Opener".
Dunno how you'd detect one of those without X-ray imaging or physical contact.
There's too much innovation and not enough improvement. Just stirring things to create unnecessary new releases is not interesting.
There's no point anyway.
The problem to date is that MS Windows doesn't use it. Even XP requires you to install it after you get the rest of XP set up.
When they start shipping MS Windows with IPv6 turned on and start talking it up in the Help, then the corporate deep thinkers will start telling us to Make It So.
BTW it works fine here, on WinXP and Linux. IPsec too.
Lots of other things seem to break IE's XML too. I haven't been able to get the PSDK Update pages to work for months on this other box over here. It's been so long that I don't recall what installation zapped it, if indeed I ever knew.
.DLL.
And I'm not going to blow away an *entire OS* and *thousands of settings* just to replace one lousy
Um, the Senate is part of the Congress. The other part is the House of Representatives.