Hollywood needs to start coming up with its own ideas again.
Huh? Where have you been for last century plus? Hollywood has never been about coming up with it's own ideas - it's been all about adapting since Day One.
Given that all good security must be based on rigorous unbreakability, not secrecy
That's commonly held belief of security amateurs. In reality, obscurity is a valuable tool in the arsenal of the security professional - because an attacker cannot be prepared to address a measure that he does know the existence of beforehand. For example - a visible set of VCR's in a place equipped with visible cameras... but they are dummies with the real ones (or a backup set) behind a nondescript door.
the analytical powers of many eyes would have been useful
The analytical power of many experienced and knowledgeable eyes - sure. But those eyes have clearances and access to the document. Just because the general public doesn't see it, doesn't mean that a lot of qualified people haven't.
But let's not delude ourselves that the new kids will be that much better/cheaper, while retaining the same performance & safety factors.
This is an interesting belief. Do you have any support for it? Do you disagree with NASA's readiness evaluation that SpaceX and Orbital are capable of doing this? Also, why does performance inherently matter, rather than cost/kg? And how much of a factor is safety on a cargo ship?
Lets take those in order:
There are a lot of reasons to believe SpaceX will have a hard time meeting their commitments and to disagree with NASA's assesment - take their success rate to date. Or take the fact that both the booster and capsule being contracted for are nearly completely vaporware. (The article summary misleads you somewhat - yes, NASA has in the past contracted for new rockets from companies with established track records. A quality SpaceX lacks in spades.)
Why does performance matter rather than raw cost/kg, are you kidding me? Do you buy a computer by using only raw cost? Or anything else of significant value? If nothing else, a key performance metric is meeting schedule goals because the ISS requires resupply and crew rotation on a regular basis - and meeting schedule goals is again something that SpaceX has demonstrated an inability to do. (To be fair, that's only so far as we know - because after the first launch, they stopped announcing them significantly in advance. To me, that's an ominous sign.)
Safety - again, you have to be kidding me. These are manned ships. And even if they weren't, safety matters on launch, and again on docking with the ISS.
Compared to the shuttle, it's a pretty damn good deal.
Only if you make the most simplistic of comparisons. The Shuttle's cargo capacity is 24k kg, while the Falcon 9's total capacity is 27k kg. Which means the amount delivered by Falcon will less than you think because you haven't accounted for the cargo delivery vehicle. For reference (dry weights), Progress weighs 7k kg, HTV weighs about 10k kg, ATV comes in at a whopping 20k kg. (Which means even the simplest existing delivery vehicle eats just over a quarter of your raw capacity, not to mention you have to account for it's cost as well.)
When you compare the Dragon to Shuttle, the numbers again aren't pretty - Dragon can deliver 7 people and 2.5k kg of cargo, while Shuttle delivers 7 people and 24k kg of cargo.
Not to mention that Dragon cannot support spacewalks, and Falcon (or Falcon+Dragon) cannot deliver or return ISS racks.
[Rant] I get dammed tired of people comparing spacecraft just on cost or raw payload weight. You don't buy computers, cars, or practically anything else without comparing features - why do people fail to do so when it comes to spacecraft? [/Rant]
It's pretty silly to expect that everyone is going to change their behavior immediately due to increased availability of a larger variety of goods. When cable came along and people were given a larger amount of choice of television programming viewing habits didn't change overnight, they changed over decades.
Hint: It's 2008 - and that increased availability has been around since 1996 or so (a decade plus). You'd expect the effect to be showing even if it's not yet general - but it isn't.
Not quite. The most important real impact of a stock price is that impacts the ability of the company to borrow and raise capital.
Not quite. The ability to raise capital by borrowing is tied to their credit rating and financials - I.E. cash flow.
They will also be unable to raise new capital with a share offering -- because at low share prices they have to issue a LOT of shares to raise any capital, and the more shares they issue, the more they dilute the existing shareholds, which pushes the price down further...
Which is why few companies raise significant capital that way - and when they do, smart and seasoned investors worry more about cash flow and their ability to meet their obligations (I.E, is the stock price likely to go up).
It works in much the same way that a significant housing price slump can screw with your mortgage. For example if your house loses 35% of its value, and your mortgage comes up for renewal, and you now have 'negative equity', the bank is either going to want a pile more collateral, a big lump sum payment, or will foreclose on the loan, and it will probably raise your rates too -- even if you would have had no trouble continuing with your payments the way they were.
That, by the way, is pretty much exactly how the current housing price collapse is screwing with a lot of people right now.
You have no fucking clue what you are talking about. Mortgages don't "come up for renewal".
Companies face a similar situation, and its one of the reasons for the 'credit crunch'. Companies can't get credit (or even keep the credit they had) because they no longer have the share valuation that would collateralize that credit.
You have no fucking clue what you are talking about. The credit crunch predates the stock market drop by months.
The stock market's "guesstimate" of a companies value has about zip point zilch to do with a companies financial health - as the latter is determined by cash flow. (I.E. income greater than outgo, the ability to meet obligations, etc.. etc...) Google's stock could drop to $.01/share tomorrow without impacting their income, or ability to meet their obligations.
That a companies stock value serves as some kind of 'score' by which one can judge a companies performance is one of the bigger scams ever perpetrated upon the American public.
What the stock price does serve well as, is as an indicator of the stockholders confidence in their ability to resell the stock at a profit. And no more.
Um, the problem isn't a lack of repairmen Mr Malkin - it's a lack of electricity. A problem which this incubator doesn't fix. (No, the motorcycle battery isn't a fix. It's a backup. With no electricity, this incubator dies just as dead as a high tech one.)
ROTFLMAO. Her 'complaints' sure sound impressive - until you actually read them and think about them while sober. Or with a working knowledge of accounting.
That's $45,000 to live on for a year until the record gets released.
'Just' $45K after taxes to live on for a year? That's actually pretty damm good money - unless you have a drug habit like hers.
Don't try and bullshit me. Even a brief survey of the topic will show how the system works - get of your ass and educate yourself. (Or "You again make it obvious why your question was modded down".)
If nothing else, the technical challenges of transferring that energy from space down through a thick atmosphere to the surface of the Earth should warrant a discussion of just moving us all closer to the source in the first place.
Given that the technical challenge is all but non-existent - why does that warrant such a discussion? (Or, "Even though your question was articulate, it is obvious that it was nonsensical".)
Except - he didn't say he'd already done the analysis. Nor did he say that *he* was aware of the cost savings. Or to put it shortly, your whole rebuttal depends entirely on assumptions, rather than facts.
Recently my boss reviewed my schematic and asked me to replace 1% resistors with 2 or 5% "because they are cheaper". Yes true, but I spend most of the day doing that, so he spent about $650 on the task, thereby spending MORE not less.
Which [potentially] shows why he's a boss - and you aren't. That $650 (overpaid in salary to you) is a one time cost - but it can also represent considerably savings, in setup time if 2 or 5% resistors are the standard wherever you circuits are manufactured, in total cost (of hardware) across a large production run (even more so if your design contains many resistors), etc... etc...
Any engineer worth a damn knows enough accounting to be able to figure this stuff out.
Re:To modern *Western* medicine
on
Trick or Treatment
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· Score: 3, Insightful
The problem with Acupuncture is that the practitioners still prescribe to the theory that the needles redirect a person's Chi and whatnot. To modern Western medicine this is about as useful as describing a treatment that restores balance to the four bodily humors.
Without adding that key word "Western" in there, you're missing an important point -- the whole concept of Chi is based on a complete medical theory independent of Western medical thought. So basically yes, describing Chi flows to someone trained only in Western medicine would be about as productive as talking in Chinese to someone who only understands English.
Horseshit. Either Chi flows are susceptible to the scientific method - or they are not. Period.
Both languages deal with information, but in radically different ways. Both may be perfectly valid, but analyzing the one from the perspective of the other is going to be an arduous affair.
Again, horseshit. The language of science is independent of spoken language. Either Chi theory is susceptible to analysis using 'Western' methods (controlled studies, statistics, etc...) or it isn't.
Re:I agree. But that's a different problem
on
Trick or Treatment
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· Score: 2, Interesting
But that doesn't discount findings
Then why can't you actually provide any links to any findings? Your first link isn't a finding - it's a suggestion that further study may be warranted. Your second is to an abstract study which indicates that the alternative treatment *may* produce results - but only when combined with existing (non alternative) treatments.
Hardly ringing endorsements. More like damming with faint praise.
How is making the government accessible to the people overkill? How is it the wrong solution to your (undefined) problem? How is adding additional channels for people to get involved in their community not going to help?
The world is going is going digital and online - and the supposedly technically savvy and net literate Slashdot community does nothing but sit and make snarky and unsupported comments.
There is something wrong but interesting about the idea that a computer simulation can explain what happened in a real-life incident. In the normal usage of "explain", only causally-related events can explain other events.
Huh? The dictionary definition of explain pretty much matches how I've used it and seen it used all my life - and bears no relation to your "definition".
'Nobody' watches C-SPAN? Hyperbole at best. I know for a fact that people watch our city council on the public access channel. (Town of 40k or so.)
I love how Slashdot, supposedly the home of those eager to explore the 'new frontier' of the digital world - spends so much time scorning pretty much every attempt to use the internet to create a virtual world. Unless that virtual world is dedicated to file sharing.
Ah yes - like believing in a god who polymorph at will into multiple animal forms (Zeus) didn't require gullibility? Not to mention the things gods of other contemporary religions got up. Despite what your nakedly displayed bias and ignorance would have you believe, all religions require gullibility.
Slashdot Mirror
Huh? Where have you been for last century plus? Hollywood has never been about coming up with it's own ideas - it's been all about adapting since Day One.
Lots of people had to work Christmas Eve - including my wife (an accountant). So what? Christmas Eve isn't a holiday.
Oh, I realized that. I just couldn't resist the chance to set the record straight.
That's commonly held belief of security amateurs. In reality, obscurity is a valuable tool in the arsenal of the security professional - because an attacker cannot be prepared to address a measure that he does know the existence of beforehand. For example - a visible set of VCR's in a place equipped with visible cameras... but they are dummies with the real ones (or a backup set) behind a nondescript door.
The analytical power of many experienced and knowledgeable eyes - sure. But those eyes have clearances and access to the document. Just because the general public doesn't see it, doesn't mean that a lot of qualified people haven't.
Lets take those in order:
There are a lot of reasons to believe SpaceX will have a hard time meeting their commitments and to disagree with NASA's assesment - take their success rate to date. Or take the fact that both the booster and capsule being contracted for are nearly completely vaporware. (The article summary misleads you somewhat - yes, NASA has in the past contracted for new rockets from companies with established track records. A quality SpaceX lacks in spades.)
Why does performance matter rather than raw cost/kg, are you kidding me? Do you buy a computer by using only raw cost? Or anything else of significant value? If nothing else, a key performance metric is meeting schedule goals because the ISS requires resupply and crew rotation on a regular basis - and meeting schedule goals is again something that SpaceX has demonstrated an inability to do. (To be fair, that's only so far as we know - because after the first launch, they stopped announcing them significantly in advance. To me, that's an ominous sign.)
Safety - again, you have to be kidding me. These are manned ships. And even if they weren't, safety matters on launch, and again on docking with the ISS.
I dunno, I used to beat my boss regularly at bowling, and that's saying something as I am an absolutely shitty bowler, never caused a problem.
Only if you make the most simplistic of comparisons. The Shuttle's cargo capacity is 24k kg, while the Falcon 9's total capacity is 27k kg. Which means the amount delivered by Falcon will less than you think because you haven't accounted for the cargo delivery vehicle. For reference (dry weights), Progress weighs 7k kg, HTV weighs about 10k kg, ATV comes in at a whopping 20k kg. (Which means even the simplest existing delivery vehicle eats just over a quarter of your raw capacity, not to mention you have to account for it's cost as well.)
When you compare the Dragon to Shuttle, the numbers again aren't pretty - Dragon can deliver 7 people and 2.5k kg of cargo, while Shuttle delivers 7 people and 24k kg of cargo.
Not to mention that Dragon cannot support spacewalks, and Falcon (or Falcon+Dragon) cannot deliver or return ISS racks.
[Rant]
I get dammed tired of people comparing spacecraft just on cost or raw payload weight. You don't buy computers, cars, or practically anything else without comparing features - why do people fail to do so when it comes to spacecraft?
[/Rant]
And what makes you think this (releasing) isn't done? (Not to mention your comment is a complete non sequitur.)
Hint: It's 2008 - and that increased availability has been around since 1996 or so (a decade plus). You'd expect the effect to be showing even if it's not yet general - but it isn't.
Not quite. The ability to raise capital by borrowing is tied to their credit rating and financials - I.E. cash flow.
Which is why few companies raise significant capital that way - and when they do, smart and seasoned investors worry more about cash flow and their ability to meet their obligations (I.E, is the stock price likely to go up).
You have no fucking clue what you are talking about. Mortgages don't "come up for renewal".
You have no fucking clue what you are talking about. The credit crunch predates the stock market drop by months.
The stock market's "guesstimate" of a companies value has about zip point zilch to do with a companies financial health - as the latter is determined by cash flow. (I.E. income greater than outgo, the ability to meet obligations, etc.. etc...) Google's stock could drop to $.01/share tomorrow without impacting their income, or ability to meet their obligations.
That a companies stock value serves as some kind of 'score' by which one can judge a companies performance is one of the bigger scams ever perpetrated upon the American public.
What the stock price does serve well as, is as an indicator of the stockholders confidence in their ability to resell the stock at a profit. And no more.
Try reading TFA.
Um, the problem isn't a lack of repairmen Mr Malkin - it's a lack of electricity. A problem which this incubator doesn't fix. (No, the motorcycle battery isn't a fix. It's a backup. With no electricity, this incubator dies just as dead as a high tech one.)
ROTFLMAO. Her 'complaints' sure sound impressive - until you actually read them and think about them while sober. Or with a working knowledge of accounting.
'Just' $45K after taxes to live on for a year? That's actually pretty damm good money - unless you have a drug habit like hers.
Don't try and bullshit me. Even a brief survey of the topic will show how the system works - get of your ass and educate yourself. (Or "You again make it obvious why your question was modded down".)
Given that the technical challenge is all but non-existent - why does that warrant such a discussion? (Or, "Even though your question was articulate, it is obvious that it was nonsensical".)
Except - he didn't say he'd already done the analysis. Nor did he say that *he* was aware of the cost savings. Or to put it shortly, your whole rebuttal depends entirely on assumptions, rather than facts.
Which [potentially] shows why he's a boss - and you aren't. That $650 (overpaid in salary to you) is a one time cost - but it can also represent considerably savings, in setup time if 2 or 5% resistors are the standard wherever you circuits are manufactured, in total cost (of hardware) across a large production run (even more so if your design contains many resistors), etc... etc...
Any engineer worth a damn knows enough accounting to be able to figure this stuff out.
Horseshit. Either Chi flows are susceptible to the scientific method - or they are not. Period.
Again, horseshit. The language of science is independent of spoken language. Either Chi theory is susceptible to analysis using 'Western' methods (controlled studies, statistics, etc...) or it isn't.
Then why can't you actually provide any links to any findings? Your first link isn't a finding - it's a suggestion that further study may be warranted. Your second is to an abstract study which indicates that the alternative treatment *may* produce results - but only when combined with existing (non alternative) treatments.
Hardly ringing endorsements. More like damming with faint praise.
How is making the government accessible to the people overkill? How is it the wrong solution to your (undefined) problem? How is adding additional channels for people to get involved in their community not going to help?
The world is going is going digital and online - and the supposedly technically savvy and net literate Slashdot community does nothing but sit and make snarky and unsupported comments.
Huh? The dictionary definition of explain pretty much matches how I've used it and seen it used all my life - and bears no relation to your "definition".
'Nobody' watches C-SPAN? Hyperbole at best. I know for a fact that people watch our city council on the public access channel. (Town of 40k or so.)
I love how Slashdot, supposedly the home of those eager to explore the 'new frontier' of the digital world - spends so much time scorning pretty much every attempt to use the internet to create a virtual world. Unless that virtual world is dedicated to file sharing.
Ah yes - like believing in a god who polymorph at will into multiple animal forms (Zeus) didn't require gullibility? Not to mention the things gods of other contemporary religions got up. Despite what your nakedly displayed bias and ignorance would have you believe, all religions require gullibility.
You either need to stop taking drugs, or take the proper doses of your prescribed medication.