Mine was high-end, actually built in Eastern Germany, so it *was* possible for it to run on time -- but when power supply cranked all the way up it was also relatively easy for it to derail, depending on how track was assembled...
This article is an excellent example of the types of future-energy storage that we'll need to rely on.
FTFY
I also hoped that that would be some fancy catalyst to convert sunlight + water into O2 and H2 -- sadly, it's just improvement in electrolysis catalist.
This is total BS (from the article): The electrolysis of water, or splitting water (H2O) into oxygen (O2) and hydrogen (H2), requires external electricity and an efficient catalyst to break chemical bonds while shifting around protons and electrons.
Hell no!!! I remember as a kid, after overgrowing joys of running around electric toy trains, I repurposed pretty heavy-duty DC current supply (couple of Amps up to 24 volts, I think) to doing much neater experiments, and water electrolysis using just a pair of steel nails was the simplest one. If a 8-10 year old in Soviet Russia could do it withouot fancy Pt-based catalyst, I would expect BNL geeks to know how to do it as well -- but no, I would not expect green-washed hyped-up "science" journalists in this country to have a slightest clue!:(
prevent employers from accessing information on any computer that isn't owned or controlled by an employee...
So, they are trying to prevent employers from asking for my Facebook/Gmail/etc. password, because it's there in the magical "cloud" and not owned/controlled by me; but it is totally OK for my employer to insist on having a password to my *home* computer, just because it is owned and controlled by me??? Which, by the way, likely has a cookie to authorize accessing my identity "out there"... Or should I say that it's actually my wife's computer?
Or my reading comprehension is really bad today, unlikely though!
1. See my post above Re: gold standard (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2829841&cid=39894635) -- if you read Ron's proposals yourself (I think Rand has similar positions, might differ in minor details), and not let media give you a soundbite version, you would know that he is for elimination of legal tender laws, not for immedaite return to govenment-assured gold standard. Also, "the vast majority of economists" also thought that trading 5th derivatives of bubbling housing market is a good idea, so I would take their assurances with a grain of salt.
2. Maybe *phasing out* Social Security (as in, allowing young kids not to pay into it, if they do not want to, and not to expect to be paid back when they are old) is not the same as *eliminating*. Ron (again, for obvious reasons I know of his positions in much better detail than of Rand's) stated numerous times that he considers that it is both moral and legal govenment's responsibility to pay back SS funds to people who have contributed. Read his economics "Plan to Restore America", you will find this:
ENTITLEMENTS: Honors our promise to our seniors and veterans, while allowing young workers to opt out. Block grants Medicaid and other welfare programs to allow States the flexibility and ingenuity they need to solve their own unique problems without harming those currently relying on the programs.
Such as? Not bailing out private banks at the (future) taxpayer's cost? Limiting government ability to inflate at will (robbing any remaining savers or people on fixed income in the process)? Supporting competing currencies and eliminating legal tender laws (which force you to take govenment-issued paper under threat or prosecution)? -- by the way, contrary to media soundbites, Pon and Rand do not advocate immediate return to gold standard, just allowing people to be able to trade in whatever they want (including gold- and silver-backed certificates, or physical metal).
I know it is getting off-topic, but how does those other guys' econiomic policies work for you so far? OK, maybe you think that we needed to have massive influx of cash to "jump-start the markets", why do you think all that cash was sent to politically connected banks, and not, say, directly to people to spend (maybe in the form of not having to have income tax deducted from their paychecks)? End result would be the same, Govt. would get further into deficit, but at least it looks like much fairer way to accomplish the same *stated* end result (infusion of cash), but it would not have the *unstated* result (banks getting richer)...
The TSA has no jurisdiction over you in a private car...
How long do you think we'f have to wait until you have to qualify the statement above by "unless you are driving on a public road" -- after all, driving is "a privilege" as well, and TSA is not just A(viation)SA -- they have been operating on train stations, public transport, etc.
"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is not a virtue" (Cicero, used by Barry Goldwater in his '64 acceptance speech).
Again, which of his positions do you find extreme? Protecting the Bill of Rights? Not bombing random countries willy-nilly? Supporting Internet freedom?
Or are you conditioned to have a knee-jerk reaction that any pol with an (R) next to his name is too extreme?
Also, why not go one more step and put the video itself on some server, then he would only need to remember URL and password to decrypt it -- when was the last time you have tried to assume that random porn flick on youtube is steg-hiding Al-Qaeda docs and tried to brute-force the password? Of course there are people whose jobs is to assume that, thus, hide it a bit better, but terrorist would have to be Really Stupid to think that carrying a porn disk with hidden plans in your underpants would not invite further scrutiny -- or it is a made-up story, or there is more to it...
I do agree that "More important IMO to use our nukes as a nuke deterrent than a general deterrent", but I thought we were talking about worst-case scenario when functional nuclear-tipped missile is launched against US mainland, in which case "glass parking lot" might be an appropriate (over-)reaction (not that I would advocate that personally, before exhausting all other means). But, think, if someone would be lauching a missile at the US, wouth they really put just a little conventional bomb in it? (big conventional bomb is much better delivered by a bomber).
Saddam, Iran, NoKo??? Come on! Saddam could not treaten US mainland; yes, he could strike against US bases over there (Saudi Arabia), but what are we doign there in the first place? Iran has not attacked another state for couple hundred years (Iran-Iraq war was started by Iraq). For bonus points, read what really was (deliberately mis-) "translated" as "Israel must be wiped off the map" here: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=4527 NoKo? Again, crazy regime, which can barely feed their own people, and initially had interest in US only because US got itself in that Korean war.
"stated reason for some of the international dislike for us right now"? Hmm, do you honestly believe that "stated" reasons by the governments of the world would be their real reasons? Rhetorics of "US is The Great Satan" works great to unify, say, Iranian population to stay behind their government (or, at least, not owerthrow it), but it has little to do with what is really going on. From what I hear (and from personal experience, having grown up in Soviet Russia;) ), normal people are not turned into suicide bombers after watching a Hollywood movie, moreover, majority probably like it and even go to great lenght to hide the fact that they watch those "evil" things if local Gov't position is hostile -- except, maybe, in France -- wait, they have lots of nukes too, let's point our missile shield at France then!;-)
"Also, some people are really just assholes" -- agreed! And US helps keeping them in power by providing a convenient external enemy image too... Can assholes really deliver a nuke on an ICBM *despite* knowing that they will be annihilated is totally different question though.
Again, how do you propose to pay for that shield, in the light of what your signature says? I do not think I would have replied to you if I have not noticed that contradiction and got curious how do you manage to have two conflicting views simultaneously...
For the record, I do think that strong defence is a legitimate function of Federal government (one of very few), and if your proposal is to downsize everything else (move it to individual state level) and spend 50% of Defence budget on building impenetrable missile shield, I would be fine with that. Building that shield *in addition* to empire building, meddling all over the world, and provoking people to test just how good your shiled is -- well, you will find soon enough that it is not affordable and not wise.
What you are saying can be said to be good and reasonable, but, hmm, does not really mesh well with your signature, or does it?
How about letting all our state-based smaller-power enemies know that we can make their homeland a glass parking lot many times over, I do not know, send them a telegram, or some such?;-)
How about acknowledging that some small al Qaeda group does not really have technical sophistication to even maintain, much less to build a working ICBM?
Even better, how about trying not to make enemies with all those people, and, maybe, just maybe, try to trade with them and slowly become friends? Or course, it can start when we get the heck out of Middle East militarilly... And NK will implode by itself, if not, it will be SK/China's problem, not ours! Their reason for aggressive stance is to go against the biggest bully in the world, what if bully decides to play nice and just ignore them?
Make a coil of either metal, cool it down to 0.4K (Ti) or 1.1K (Al, which is probably what you would use), apply some current -- here is your superconducting magnet, sucking in Iron, Chrome, Nickel, etc... -- unfortunately, not Al or Ti, which satellites are usually made of...;-(
While I am at that, can I suggest that new-fangled mid-80s thing, called hight-Tc superconductor?:-)
Yep, you caught me there, I was thinking about ion drives, but typed solar sails... Ion drives are supposed to be slowwwwwwwwww acccccelllerraatttiing ones, which could, in principle, accelerate/decelerate spacecraft over several generation's lifetimes to reach a star or two.
Yes, I guess you need to make frame pretty solid if you are attaching, say, Orion (atomic bombs) propulsion system to that!;-)
Solar sails could hang off light threads though, but they were proposed more for (multi-generational) start-to-star travel, not for actually exploring Solar system (or taking joyrides to Saturn;) ).
But, actually, AC you were replying to did have a point: from libertarian standpoint (and, apparently, his too, though he was trying to distance himself from "those crazy guys";-) ), money is what *people* choose to trade with. If all gold is hoarded by the "King", they *will* use silver, or copper, pelts, or cigarettes...
Where "Kings" and governments can do real harm is when they use force to introduce "legal tender laws" -- Take my clipped coin, or piece of paper with my name on it, which also mentions "This is legal tender for all debts, public and private" (note that old-old USD did not have that, when they were still backed by gold), OR ELSE!
Also, I did cringe a bit reading "To make sure its technology meets the gold standard in a world where digital transactions are gaining steam..." in a summary about completely fiat digital currency. Some figures of speech just should not be used in the areas where they still have their, hmm, original meaning!
Well, then there is at least one republican in this election cycle whom you could vote fore, at least in the primary, or write him in... Why choose the lesser of two evils?
These were quite popular in Soviet Union back when I was growing up (80s), and the name for the hobby of photographing wildlife was actually (fotookhota), literally "photo hunting"...
I think that the problem with FPGAs is how many times can they be reprogrammed. For this (banking) application probably not that many, but if you have to re-program your in-PC FPGA every time you decide to check your encrypted e-mail while watching streaming video, you will run out of programming cycles pretty quickly.
Besides, if task is well-defined (as in, has a standard, like MPEG, or SSL), if it probably more cost-effective to have a special chip doing it (you can definitely get cheap stand-alone chips for tasks like this), and just add it in the corner of motherboard.
But, in light of "the book every American needs to read right now" on Huck's show, your should have plugged http://mises.org/books/thelaw.pdf , which dissects the point you were making perfectly!
Thanks for this and you other comments below, let's keep up the good fight (stalemate in RF today, hope for a win in USA next year).
As someone currently working for a high-tech start-up in Vancouver, BC, I can assure you that, as nice as it is here in the Summer, it's no Silicon Valley -- and when you have to make a trip there it's like $800 in plane tickets and a whole day of travel.
But then, Valley is not exactly on the shore, so it's not just 12 miles boat ride, add another hour or so to get across the hills -- still beats air travel!
.. as, say, gasoline refineries, I bet they would not be "blowing up at alarming rate" -- and no, I do not use their end product, and do not even intend to use it!
Slashdot Mirror
;-)
Mine was high-end, actually built in Eastern Germany, so it *was* possible for it to run on time -- but when power supply cranked all the way up it was also relatively easy for it to derail, depending on how track was assembled...
Satisfied your curiosity? ;-)
Paul B.
This article is an excellent example of the types of future-energy storage that we'll need to rely on.
FTFY
I also hoped that that would be some fancy catalyst to convert sunlight + water into O2 and H2 -- sadly, it's just improvement in electrolysis catalist.
This is total BS (from the article):
The electrolysis of water, or splitting water (H2O) into oxygen (O2) and hydrogen (H2), requires external electricity and an efficient catalyst to break chemical bonds while shifting around protons and electrons.
Hell no!!! I remember as a kid, after overgrowing joys of running around electric toy trains, I repurposed pretty heavy-duty DC current supply (couple of Amps up to 24 volts, I think) to doing much neater experiments, and water electrolysis using just a pair of steel nails was the simplest one. If a 8-10 year old in Soviet Russia could do it withouot fancy Pt-based catalyst, I would expect BNL geeks to know how to do it as well -- but no, I would not expect green-washed hyped-up "science" journalists in this country to have a slightest clue! :(
Paul B.
prevent employers from accessing information on any computer that isn't owned or controlled by an employee...
So, they are trying to prevent employers from asking for my Facebook/Gmail/etc. password, because it's there in the magical "cloud" and not owned/controlled by me; but it is totally OK for my employer to insist on having a password to my *home* computer, just because it is owned and controlled by me??? Which, by the way, likely has a cookie to authorize accessing my identity "out there"... Or should I say that it's actually my wife's computer?
Or my reading comprehension is really bad today, unlikely though!
Paul B.
1. See my post above Re: gold standard (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2829841&cid=39894635) -- if you read Ron's proposals yourself (I think Rand has similar positions, might differ in minor details), and not let media give you a soundbite version, you would know that he is for elimination of legal tender laws, not for immedaite return to govenment-assured gold standard. Also, "the vast majority of economists" also thought that trading 5th derivatives of bubbling housing market is a good idea, so I would take their assurances with a grain of salt.
2. Maybe *phasing out* Social Security (as in, allowing young kids not to pay into it, if they do not want to, and not to expect to be paid back when they are old) is not the same as *eliminating*. Ron (again, for obvious reasons I know of his positions in much better detail than of Rand's) stated numerous times that he considers that it is both moral and legal govenment's responsibility to pay back SS funds to people who have contributed. Read his economics "Plan to Restore America", you will find this:
ENTITLEMENTS:
Honors our promise to our seniors and veterans, while allowing young workers to opt out. Block grants Medicaid and other welfare programs to allow States the flexibility and ingenuity they need to solve their own unique problems without harming those currently relying on the programs.
Paul B.
Such as? Not bailing out private banks at the (future) taxpayer's cost? Limiting government ability to inflate at will (robbing any remaining savers or people on fixed income in the process)? Supporting competing currencies and eliminating legal tender laws (which force you to take govenment-issued paper under threat or prosecution)? -- by the way, contrary to media soundbites, Pon and Rand do not advocate immediate return to gold standard, just allowing people to be able to trade in whatever they want (including gold- and silver-backed certificates, or physical metal).
I know it is getting off-topic, but how does those other guys' econiomic policies work for you so far? OK, maybe you think that we needed to have massive influx of cash to "jump-start the markets", why do you think all that cash was sent to politically connected banks, and not, say, directly to people to spend (maybe in the form of not having to have income tax deducted from their paychecks)? End result would be the same, Govt. would get further into deficit, but at least it looks like much fairer way to accomplish the same *stated* end result (infusion of cash), but it would not have the *unstated* result (banks getting richer)...
Paul B.
The TSA has no jurisdiction over you in a private car...
How long do you think we'f have to wait until you have to qualify the statement above by "unless you are driving on a public road" -- after all, driving is "a privilege" as well, and TSA is not just A(viation)SA -- they have been operating on train stations, public transport, etc.
Straight from the horse's mouth: http://www.tsa.gov/what_we_do/tsnm/highway/index.shtm
Also, google for VIPR teams, then come back to us, and, please, tell us how many other things are "just a privilege"...
Paul B.
"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice, and moderation in the pursuit of justice is not a virtue" (Cicero, used by Barry Goldwater in his '64 acceptance speech).
Again, which of his positions do you find extreme? Protecting the Bill of Rights? Not bombing random countries willy-nilly? Supporting Internet freedom?
Or are you conditioned to have a knee-jerk reaction that any pol with an (R) next to his name is too extreme?
Paul B.
My thought exactly!
Also, why not go one more step and put the video itself on some server, then he would only need to remember URL and password to decrypt it -- when was the last time you have tried to assume that random porn flick on youtube is steg-hiding Al-Qaeda docs and tried to brute-force the password? Of course there are people whose jobs is to assume that, thus, hide it a bit better, but terrorist would have to be Really Stupid to think that carrying a porn disk with hidden plans in your underpants would not invite further scrutiny -- or it is a made-up story, or there is more to it...
Paul B.
I do agree that "More important IMO to use our nukes as a nuke deterrent than a general deterrent", but I thought we were talking about worst-case scenario when functional nuclear-tipped missile is launched against US mainland, in which case "glass parking lot" might be an appropriate (over-)reaction (not that I would advocate that personally, before exhausting all other means). But, think, if someone would be lauching a missile at the US, wouth they really put just a little conventional bomb in it? (big conventional bomb is much better delivered by a bomber).
Saddam, Iran, NoKo??? Come on! Saddam could not treaten US mainland; yes, he could strike against US bases over there (Saudi Arabia), but what are we doign there in the first place? Iran has not attacked another state for couple hundred years (Iran-Iraq war was started by Iraq). For bonus points, read what really was (deliberately mis-) "translated" as "Israel must be wiped off the map" here: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=4527
NoKo? Again, crazy regime, which can barely feed their own people, and initially had interest in US only because US got itself in that Korean war.
"stated reason for some of the international dislike for us right now"? Hmm, do you honestly believe that "stated" reasons by the governments of the world would be their real reasons? Rhetorics of "US is The Great Satan" works great to unify, say, Iranian population to stay behind their government (or, at least, not owerthrow it), but it has little to do with what is really going on. From what I hear (and from personal experience, having grown up in Soviet Russia ;) ), normal people are not turned into suicide bombers after watching a Hollywood movie, moreover, majority probably like it and even go to great lenght to hide the fact that they watch those "evil" things if local Gov't position is hostile -- except, maybe, in France -- wait, they have lots of nukes too, let's point our missile shield at France then! ;-)
"Also, some people are really just assholes" -- agreed! And US helps keeping them in power by providing a convenient external enemy image too... Can assholes really deliver a nuke on an ICBM *despite* knowing that they will be annihilated is totally different question though.
Again, how do you propose to pay for that shield, in the light of what your signature says? I do not think I would have replied to you if I have not noticed that contradiction and got curious how do you manage to have two conflicting views simultaneously...
For the record, I do think that strong defence is a legitimate function of Federal government (one of very few), and if your proposal is to downsize everything else (move it to individual state level) and spend 50% of Defence budget on building impenetrable missile shield, I would be fine with that. Building that shield *in addition* to empire building, meddling all over the world, and provoking people to test just how good your shiled is -- well, you will find soon enough that it is not affordable and not wise.
Paul B.
What you are saying can be said to be good and reasonable, but, hmm, does not really mesh well with your signature, or does it?
How about letting all our state-based smaller-power enemies know that we can make their homeland a glass parking lot many times over, I do not know, send them a telegram, or some such? ;-)
How about acknowledging that some small al Qaeda group does not really have technical sophistication to even maintain, much less to build a working ICBM?
Even better, how about trying not to make enemies with all those people, and, maybe, just maybe, try to trade with them and slowly become friends? Or course, it can start when we get the heck out of Middle East militarilly... And NK will implode by itself, if not, it will be SK/China's problem, not ours! Their reason for aggressive stance is to go against the biggest bully in the world, what if bully decides to play nice and just ignore them?
Paul B.
Sure that would work!
Make a coil of either metal, cool it down to 0.4K (Ti) or 1.1K (Al, which is probably what you would use), apply some current -- here is your superconducting magnet, sucking in Iron, Chrome, Nickel, etc... -- unfortunately, not Al or Ti, which satellites are usually made of... ;-(
While I am at that, can I suggest that new-fangled mid-80s thing, called hight-Tc superconductor? :-)
Paul B.
For people with signatures like ours? Unbelievable!
Or, even majority of mods suddenly become infuriated libertarians when the story is about cure 4 yo girl? ;-)
Paul B.
Did not you know that Luna's main export are grains, mainly wheat -- quite suitable for making Vodka, take it from this Russian! ;-)
Paul B.
Yep, you caught me there, I was thinking about ion drives, but typed solar sails... Ion drives are supposed to be slowwwwwwwwww acccccelllerraatttiing ones, which could, in principle, accelerate/decelerate spacecraft over several generation's lifetimes to reach a star or two.
Paul B.
Yes, I guess you need to make frame pretty solid if you are attaching, say, Orion (atomic bombs) propulsion system to that! ;-)
Solar sails could hang off light threads though, but they were proposed more for (multi-generational) start-to-star travel, not for actually exploring Solar system (or taking joyrides to Saturn ;) ).
Paul B.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2780763&cid=39660593
But, actually, AC you were replying to did have a point: from libertarian standpoint (and, apparently, his too, though he was trying to distance himself from "those crazy guys" ;-) ), money is what *people* choose to trade with. If all gold is hoarded by the "King", they *will* use silver, or copper, pelts, or cigarettes...
Where "Kings" and governments can do real harm is when they use force to introduce "legal tender laws" -- Take my clipped coin, or piece of paper with my name on it, which also mentions "This is legal tender for all debts, public and private" (note that old-old USD did not have that, when they were still backed by gold), OR ELSE!
Paul B.
Also, I did cringe a bit reading "To make sure its technology meets the gold standard in a world where digital transactions are gaining steam..." in a summary about completely fiat digital currency. Some figures of speech just should not be used in the areas where they still have their, hmm, original meaning!
Paul B.
Well, then there is at least one republican in this election cycle whom you could vote fore, at least in the primary, or write him in... Why choose the lesser of two evils?
Paul B.
These were quite popular in Soviet Union back when I was growing up (80s), and the name for the hobby of photographing wildlife was actually (fotookhota), literally "photo hunting"...
Paul B.
Anonymous operative Barrett Brown
Does not being Barret Brown contradicts beins Anonymous? ;)
Paul B.
I think that the problem with FPGAs is how many times can they be reprogrammed. For this (banking) application probably not that many, but if you have to re-program your in-PC FPGA every time you decide to check your encrypted e-mail while watching streaming video, you will run out of programming cycles pretty quickly.
Besides, if task is well-defined (as in, has a standard, like MPEG, or SSL), if it probably more cost-effective to have a special chip doing it (you can definitely get cheap stand-alone chips for tasks like this), and just add it in the corner of motherboard.
Paul B.
Still, no harm in PDF link towards the start of the discussion, right?
Sorry, did not go that deep down before deciding to thank you, and provide some constructive suggestion...
Paul B.
But, in light of "the book every American needs to read right now" on Huck's show, your should have plugged http://mises.org/books/thelaw.pdf , which dissects the point you were making perfectly!
Thanks for this and you other comments below, let's keep up the good fight (stalemate in RF today, hope for a win in USA next year).
In Liberty,
Pavel B.
As someone currently working for a high-tech start-up in Vancouver, BC, I can assure you that, as nice as it is here in the Summer, it's no Silicon Valley -- and when you have to make a trip there it's like $800 in plane tickets and a whole day of travel.
But then, Valley is not exactly on the shore, so it's not just 12 miles boat ride, add another hour or so to get across the hills -- still beats air travel!
Paul B.
.. as, say, gasoline refineries, I bet they would not be "blowing up at alarming rate" -- and no, I do not use their end product, and do not even intend to use it!
Paul B.