"Are you trying to say that there might be dilithium crystals there?"
Actually, there are "real" dilithium crystals somewhat nearby, found deep in Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico, in the dilithium pool.
They were discovered over 20 years ago, and I never made it to that part of the cave, but a buddy of mine has photographed them, apparently they are quite difficult to image.
I looked on line for an image to no avail, but they can be seen in the beautiful book: "Lechuguilla, Jewel of the Underground"
"Why not send light-weight robots that have been disinfected? It's not like we don't have the technology.
You obviously aren't a caver, and have never been deep in a "wild" cave.
Perhaps you think that caves have BIG "Hollywood" entrances, and have floors that are boulevard flat, and perhaps there is a little "ambient" light like in caves in the movies.
I can safely say that there is currently no robot in existence that can fully navigate most caves (worth exploring) on the planet.
Perhaps small portions of a few, but not deep into them.
I've been exploring in caves where I'm literally two hours from the entrance, and a 150 foot climb up a rope to exit the cave, yet I'll squeeze through a body tight hole just to see where it "goes".
So I'll exhale and push forward an inch, and then do it again, and repeat until I'm through.
And then after exploring around I have to come back through, but a robot would have been stopped by this "tight spot".
Cavers sometimes need to "move rocks" to progress down the (hopefully virgin) cave passage, and I can't see any cave navigable robot being able to move a 100 pound rock, let alone the hundreds of pounds of rock like I've moved many times in less sensitive caves.
Many "serious" caves require a rope drop of a hundred feet or more to enter, and a climb to exit, and how many robots can do that?
Oh, none.
Now lets talk energy... it takes a great deal of energy to navigate a cave environment, and unless you have a looong extension cord no robot is going very far into any wild cave.
And nobody is going to carry a heavy robot deep into a cave so it can "scoop booty"... no way.
It may be decades before humans are replaced as cave explorers on Earth.
Mars is a different story, and all the caves targeted have huge Hollywood entrances, and the "robots" likely won't be entering very far into them at all.
And "big up" to Jim Goodbar, he took us deeeep into Cottonwood 20 years ago.
"I can't speak for "most fundamentalists of any stripe," but I am a Mormon..."
And many folks will be happy to point out the incongruities in your special brand of propaganda posing as religion.
Like this example of my friend who's wife taught at BYU, in SLC.
He was on campus one day to meet her for lunch, and was accosted by an LDS'er and told to leave because he wasn't allowed on campus wearing a beard!
Beards are evil according to that guy.
So my friend attempted to reason with this individual, but he wasn't into listening, just preaching his version of the LDS beliefs on how beards are evil.
Finally, my friend just pointed to a statue of Joseph Smith sporting a big beard, and asked just why it was fine that he had a beard.
You all are actually arguing about a collective fantasy written so loooong ago, by soooo many different men, compiled from various other fantasy's that there are no records that can prove anything to back up any of your assertations.
I can't wait until "they" rewrite "the bible" (it doesn't deserve capitals) with george bush and dick cheney (and neither do they deserve capitals) as "great prophets".
It's only a matter of time, and I'm sure that in a thousand years many fools will believe that nonsense as "the truth" too (it's out there man...).
Perhaps you have no experience with Usenet, but I do, and I've seen plenty of naked children "mis posted" in "erotica" newsgroups over the years as SPAM, and NONE of them were erotic or even suggestive poses.
And no problem deleting them either, my day wasn't "ruined" in any way because they were merely small naked humans, no big deal.
Just because someone else "thinks" they are erotic doesn't mean I do.
It really takes a sick mind to sexualize those images.
"Check out the alt.binaries.pictures.erotica hierarchy sometime -- there are some groups with very suspicious-looking names.
(alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.child? Gee, I wonder what that could contain?)"
I agree... it likely contains "thousands of SPAM messages".
Do you honestly believe that pedophiles are that open about their openly illegal activities?
YOU are off you rocker if you believe that child porn is a "problem" in our society.
While certainly repugnant, I don't see how BANNING all the.alt.binaries newsgroups is going to help stop child porn.
I've been on Usenet for well over a decade, and I also have never seen child porn.
It's total knee jerk emotional hysteria, and you sir are are being used as a "tool" to censor the internet.
I was on Usenet two nights ago looking for a song in my vinyl collection that's in deep storage, and all the.alt.binaries groups I'm subscribed to were there (yes... even those, so stop with the jokes).
And yesterday AM when I logged on, they were gone, and and "Alt- 411 no such group" error appears instead.
All the other groups I'm subscribed to are still functioning.
I spent four hours on the phone attempting to "complain", and got the "standard" troubleshooting script more than a few times, before I politely interrupted one woman, and asked firmly to speak to her supervisor.
The bitch (oh, did I say that? Why YES, I did, in retrospect) put me on looooooong hold, then came back on the line and said with dripping sarcasm: "I'm so sorry for the loooong wait, here's your extension."... click...
After calling back I was again transferred several times by clueless people, dropped a couple more, and finally vented (nicely) on a poor 611 tech guy, the only human I could speak to who actually had technical knowledge.
And yes, dear friends, he was also completely clueless about the attacks on Usenet.
I'm now more angry that they have "insulated" themselves from humans with the endless phone tree.
dlgeek said: "Huh? Fort Bragg is in central North Carolina on the east coast (about 4 hours by car from the Atlantic Ocean, several days from the Pacific)"
Wellllllllllll, sonny boy...
I live in the firstFort Bragg, the one in California.
Well, just so you know, they do set fireworks off over the ocean in America.
In California, at Point Arena, they blast them off of the public pier, and in Fort Bragg, they shoot them off of the bluff top and right into the Pacific Ocean.
Oh, and they pollute the ocean with toxic chemicals from the abandoned lumber mill around here also.
"The mostly likely replacement for the Blackbird is the Aurora project. Sometimes caught by seismologists and observers. Rumored to use a a pulsating scramjet and being the mach 5-8 range."
Well, whatever it's called, I've likely seen "it" three times, but it was back in the '80's.
I used to spend a week camping around Mono Lake in Nevada during the August Perseid's meteor shower.
I was with my girlfriend at the time who was an engineer for Lockheed, and we subscribed to Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine (pricey!) so we were pretty "up" on our aircraft identification.
So anyhow, the first time we saw it was late one afternoon, when an aircraft at very high altitude appeared on the scene moving at a rate of speed like I had never seen before.
It appeared to be directly over the summit ridges of the East side of the Sierra Nevada mountains, going south, and it went from horizon to horizon before I could get my camcorder started!
It was FAST!!!.
It had a solid contrail, and I checked to see if any space craft had reentered but found nothing.
The next year, we saw it twice, and this time it had a pulsed contrail, and it made a sound like no other aircraft I'd ever heard.
It was like a regular jet sound, but it sounded like it was ripping, or tearing, it was really weird sounding as it pulsed along at the same high rate of speed.
Same trajectory, right along the summits of the Sierras going South (toward Groom Lake?).
My Father, Mother, Aunt & Uncle all worked for Kelly Johnson at the Skunk Works many years ago, and I remember my dad taking the red flight regularly out of Edwards, so I grew up with plenty of exposure to exotic aircraft in the late 50's, early 60's.
And when I met her, I was surprised to discover that my (now) wife used to build F-117's in Burbank (in the same hanger that my dad worked in 10 years before), so she'll be sad about this news, because she never got the chance to see one fly (she went to one air show, but the F-117 flyby was canceled).
She has several interesting/funny/scary (not classified) stories about her 7 years working on "the article".
And man... can she ever use a rivet set, Damn... I'm gonna get her to build me a nice stealth aluminum camp trailer.
Oh... I just figured out that you've likely been using a computer for a couple of years now, and figured out a few "geeky" things, and now you feel compelled to show us "minions" what a power user you are.
And you are one RUDE and CALLOW person, you must have no power at all in your life.
Pity you have to take it out on us.
Why not call someone a "dumbass" in person and see what happens, instead of safely behind your/. user name?
Wait! Let me answer that one, it's because you're afraid to.
If you can't contribute to the signal on/. then all you are is noise.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, you're in science fiction land if you believe there are ANY robots capable of exploring most Earth based caves.
Go take a "wild cave" tour sometime, and see for yourself what challenges a robot would have to overcome.
I've hauled dive tanks deep into a cave to push a sump, and NO WAY I'm taking in a HEAVY robot.
I'll bet you've never backpacked, have you?
Every ounce matters when it's you carrying it.
In a cave that's multiplied because we have to save the energy to climb out of the cave (as in up a rope, try it, real easy... HA!).
You carry the robot, and we'll rescue you after you've exhausted yourself.
"Ahh, a caver's favorite phrase... "It goes!!"
Yup...
Just follow the air...
"Are you trying to say that there might be dilithium crystals there?"
Actually, there are "real" dilithium crystals somewhat nearby, found deep in Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico, in the dilithium pool.
They were discovered over 20 years ago, and I never made it to that part of the cave, but a buddy of mine has photographed them, apparently they are quite difficult to image.
I looked on line for an image to no avail, but they can be seen in the beautiful book: "Lechuguilla, Jewel of the Underground"
"Why not send light-weight robots that have been disinfected? It's not like we don't have the technology.
You obviously aren't a caver, and have never been deep in a "wild" cave.
Perhaps you think that caves have BIG "Hollywood" entrances, and have floors that are boulevard flat, and perhaps there is a little "ambient" light like in caves in the movies.
I can safely say that there is currently no robot in existence that can fully navigate most caves (worth exploring) on the planet.
Perhaps small portions of a few, but not deep into them.
I've been exploring in caves where I'm literally two hours from the entrance, and a 150 foot climb up a rope to exit the cave, yet I'll squeeze through a body tight hole just to see where it "goes".
So I'll exhale and push forward an inch, and then do it again, and repeat until I'm through.
And then after exploring around I have to come back through, but a robot would have been stopped by this "tight spot".
Cavers sometimes need to "move rocks" to progress down the (hopefully virgin) cave passage, and I can't see any cave navigable robot being able to move a 100 pound rock, let alone the hundreds of pounds of rock like I've moved many times in less sensitive caves.
Many "serious" caves require a rope drop of a hundred feet or more to enter, and a climb to exit, and how many robots can do that?
Oh, none.
Now lets talk energy... it takes a great deal of energy to navigate a cave environment, and unless you have a looong extension cord no robot is going very far into any wild cave.
And nobody is going to carry a heavy robot deep into a cave so it can "scoop booty"... no way.
It may be decades before humans are replaced as cave explorers on Earth.
Mars is a different story, and all the caves targeted have huge Hollywood entrances, and the "robots" likely won't be entering very far into them at all.
And "big up" to Jim Goodbar, he took us deeeep into Cottonwood 20 years ago.
"If you're going to bash, at least get your facts straight. Otherwise you just look foolish."
What "facts" are you referring to?
Did I get the mormon cult leaders name wrong?
So sorry, I can't keep up with all of them.
And yes, I'm the biggest fool on the planet simply because I believe there may be intelligent life on Slash Dot other than knee jerk reactionaries.
And I still see little evidence of any.
"Personally it's not God I dislike, it's his fan club I can't stand."
I'm with you, many of them come off as complete nut cases.
Logic never enters into their thought process, it's completely Pavlovian behavior when it comes to xtians "defending" "their" religion.
If their "special" religion is the "best" then why do they feel the need to defend it?
It's the best right?
Tossers.
"I can't speak for "most fundamentalists of any stripe," but I am a Mormon..."
And many folks will be happy to point out the incongruities in your special brand of propaganda posing as religion.
Like this example of my friend who's wife taught at BYU, in SLC.
He was on campus one day to meet her for lunch, and was accosted by an LDS'er and told to leave because he wasn't allowed on campus wearing a beard!
Beards are evil according to that guy.
So my friend attempted to reason with this individual, but he wasn't into listening, just preaching his version of the LDS beliefs on how beards are evil.
Finally, my friend just pointed to a statue of Joseph Smith sporting a big beard, and asked just why it was fine that he had a beard.
Shut that fool right up!
"You can start by noting that Slashdot contributors are 90% atheists..."
Really?
Just how did you come up with that figure pilgrim?
I call bullshit on your weak ass claim.
This is truly a slash dot moment.
You all are actually arguing about a collective fantasy written so loooong ago, by soooo many different men, compiled from various other fantasy's that there are no records that can prove anything to back up any of your assertations.
I can't wait until "they" rewrite "the bible" (it doesn't deserve capitals) with george bush and dick cheney (and neither do they deserve capitals) as "great prophets".
It's only a matter of time, and I'm sure that in a thousand years many fools will believe that nonsense as "the truth" too (it's out there man...).
Perhaps you have no experience with Usenet, but I do, and I've seen plenty of naked children "mis posted" in "erotica" newsgroups over the years as SPAM, and NONE of them were erotic or even suggestive poses.
And no problem deleting them either, my day wasn't "ruined" in any way because they were merely small naked humans, no big deal.
Just because someone else "thinks" they are erotic doesn't mean I do.
It really takes a sick mind to sexualize those images.
Wow... an emotionally mature individual, that can form a coherent response, how refreshing, after all the mindless nonsense I've been seeing here.
Not only is circletimessquare irrational, he's a trash talking cad.
Pity to see the droids out there modding me down for actually having the balls to point out the logical fallacies of the "child Porn" issue.
Weak dicks.
Unfortunately, you're a part of the problem because you haven't the balls to speak publicly about this important issue.
If you are truly afraid of "The Government" coming after you for downloading a mislabeled photo, then you have greater things to be concerned about.
Cowards never changed anything, citizens that speak out make the changes.
Oh, I'll bet you're fun at parties, aren't you?
And I'll bet your girlfriend/wife really enjoys it when you point out the "easy" answers for her problems in life.
Believe it or not... it doesn't all come down to "easy answers" or even money.
Consider that where many people live there is no alternative service, so where does that leave your suggestion?
Nowhere, because you apparently couldn't fathom that everyone's situation wasn't just like yours.
I usually don't feed the trolls, but you are a real hoot!
You know Mr. Trash Talking Low Budget HDV Filipino Horror Movie "man", you really ought to get some mental health help.
Your rabid attack behavior is clearly anti social.
Are you a sociopath?
You are clearly sexualizing innocent images, and rabidly defending your irrational behavior by attacking fellow posters.
It sure comes off as mental illness to me, you really ought to seek help.
"and there's a naked 7 year old...."
That's your example of child porn?
A naked 7 year old?!
Ever been to a public swimming pool?
Lots of topless 7 year old's running around.
Ever been to a nudist colony, lots on completely butt naked children of all ages just running around.
You sir, are referring to innocent images of children and sexualizing them, and that's the real child porn.
It has no bearing where the image/s are posted, you are the one making it sexual.
I've seen those photos you mention as well, and also deleted them, since I prefer adult women...
But I digress, none of those images were sexual, no suggestive poses, just naked girls.
You come off as a Pervert with that mindset.
"Check out the alt.binaries.pictures.erotica hierarchy sometime -- there are some groups with very suspicious-looking names. (alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.child? Gee, I wonder what that could contain?)"
I agree... it likely contains "thousands of SPAM messages".
Do you honestly believe that pedophiles are that open about their openly illegal activities?
YOU are off you rocker if you believe that child porn is a "problem" in our society.
While certainly repugnant, I don't see how BANNING all the .alt.binaries newsgroups is going to help stop child porn.
I've been on Usenet for well over a decade, and I also have never seen child porn.
It's total knee jerk emotional hysteria, and you sir are are being used as a "tool" to censor the internet.
I was on Usenet two nights ago looking for a song in my vinyl collection that's in deep storage, and all the .alt.binaries groups I'm subscribed to were there (yes... even those, so stop with the jokes).
And yesterday AM when I logged on, they were gone, and and "Alt- 411 no such group" error appears instead.
All the other groups I'm subscribed to are still functioning.
I spent four hours on the phone attempting to "complain", and got the "standard" troubleshooting script more than a few times, before I politely interrupted one woman, and asked firmly to speak to her supervisor.
The bitch (oh, did I say that? Why YES, I did, in retrospect) put me on looooooong hold, then came back on the line and said with dripping sarcasm: "I'm so sorry for the loooong wait, here's your extension." ... click...
After calling back I was again transferred several times by clueless people, dropped a couple more, and finally vented (nicely) on a poor 611 tech guy, the only human I could speak to who actually had technical knowledge.
And yes, dear friends, he was also completely clueless about the attacks on Usenet.
I'm now more angry that they have "insulated" themselves from humans with the endless phone tree.
dlgeek said: "Huh? Fort Bragg is in central North Carolina on the east coast (about 4 hours by car from the Atlantic Ocean, several days from the Pacific)"
Wellllllllllll, sonny boy...
I live in the first Fort Bragg, the one in California.
Perhaps you ought to review your history lessons.
Well, just so you know, they do set fireworks off over the ocean in America.
In California, at Point Arena, they blast them off of the public pier, and in Fort Bragg, they shoot them off of the bluff top and right into the Pacific Ocean.
Oh, and they pollute the ocean with toxic chemicals from the abandoned lumber mill around here also.
It's the American way after-all.
Yeah!
I've been playing Eating Betty on my radio shows for years now.
I only have "in Dub", but it rocks!, nice to see newer music.
If you like DUB, then this is for you.
Listen up... I'll be announcing acts tonight (Sat, 06-21) at the Sierra Nevada World Musical Festival.
- Derek Dubwise on KZYX FM
"The mostly likely replacement for the Blackbird is the Aurora project. Sometimes caught by seismologists and observers. Rumored to use a a pulsating scramjet and being the mach 5-8 range."
Well, whatever it's called, I've likely seen "it" three times, but it was back in the '80's.
I used to spend a week camping around Mono Lake in Nevada during the August Perseid's meteor shower.
I was with my girlfriend at the time who was an engineer for Lockheed, and we subscribed to Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine (pricey!) so we were pretty "up" on our aircraft identification.
So anyhow, the first time we saw it was late one afternoon, when an aircraft at very high altitude appeared on the scene moving at a rate of speed like I had never seen before.
It appeared to be directly over the summit ridges of the East side of the Sierra Nevada mountains, going south, and it went from horizon to horizon before I could get my camcorder started!
It was FAST!!!.
It had a solid contrail, and I checked to see if any space craft had reentered but found nothing.
The next year, we saw it twice, and this time it had a pulsed contrail, and it made a sound like no other aircraft I'd ever heard.
It was like a regular jet sound, but it sounded like it was ripping, or tearing, it was really weird sounding as it pulsed along at the same high rate of speed.
Same trajectory, right along the summits of the Sierras going South (toward Groom Lake?).
My Father, Mother, Aunt & Uncle all worked for Kelly Johnson at the Skunk Works many years ago, and I remember my dad taking the red flight regularly out of Edwards, so I grew up with plenty of exposure to exotic aircraft in the late 50's, early 60's.
And when I met her, I was surprised to discover that my (now) wife used to build F-117's in Burbank (in the same hanger that my dad worked in 10 years before), so she'll be sad about this news, because she never got the chance to see one fly (she went to one air show, but the F-117 flyby was canceled).
She has several interesting/funny/scary (not classified) stories about her 7 years working on "the article".
And man... can she ever use a rivet set, Damn... I'm gonna get her to build me a nice stealth aluminum camp trailer.
Oh... I just figured out that you've likely been using a computer for a couple of years now, and figured out a few "geeky" things, and now you feel compelled to show us "minions" what a power user you are.
And you are one RUDE and CALLOW person, you must have no power at all in your life.
Pity you have to take it out on us.
Why not call someone a "dumbass" in person and see what happens, instead of safely behind your /. user name?
Wait! Let me answer that one, it's because you're afraid to.
If you can't contribute to the signal on /. then all you are is noise.