In the worst case scenario for both examples, one is far worse.
Let's say a busload of nuns, a busload of blind pre-schoolers, a busload of puppies and a busload of apple pies all manage, through some freak accident, to collide with a propane truck -- doing the math, that's a lot of dead nuns, kids, puppies and delicious apple pie, plus a blue collar propane truck driver.
On the other hand, half a dozen guys with nuke components and you end up with all that and maybe a million more?
And yes, I think nuclear terrorism is overstated, and yes the "mushroom cloud" imagery is just a political hot button.
But we're talking worst case scenarios here. And besides, wasn't it, "Could they fly planes into.....naaaaaaah" that got us into this mess to begin with?
However, not knowing much about NASA in general, I wouldn't know where you should draw the line. Dude, are you new here? You don't need to know anything to spout off! Mix in some quote about the tree of liberty, a mishmash Benjamin Franklin quote, an Orwell reference and then finish with soapbox, ballotbox, ????, profit!
Bingo! Instant Karma baby!
Bonus points if you can mix in a "IN SOVIET RUSSIA" somewhere.
Ok, climate change, acid rain, extinction of species, water resources, peak oil, blah blah blah -- I'll grant that's the domain of science.
But international peace?
The Israelis and Palestinians hate one another -- what role does science play in that?
"Well, after looking under the microscope, we now see that they don't hate one another."
Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for science!
Let me know when science can solve the problem of people hating one another for generations upon generations -- oh, and when they can go MMORPG cheater and dupe Taiwan so that China finally will shut up -- then I'll be impressed.
If I swing at your face, and hit you hard enough to swell your eye shut, is that an attack? After all, I'm just disabling your eye -- temporarily at that.
I'm pretty sure the authorities would disagree with me when they hauled me off to the pokey as I screamed, "It wasn't an attack! I was just disabling him, or perhaps blinding would be more fitting!"
Come on -- get the political terminology right Right wingers are wingnuts -- left wingers are moonbats.
I expect some sort of fascist blast from an AC -- but for someone who puts together a well-reasoned couple of paragraphs afterward it seems a bit disappointing. But it's slashdot, what are ya gonna do....
You're right that at some point everyone thinks, "Oh, I'm gonna kill this person." We all test just how dark we can be, where our most private of thoughts can lead -- that is part of normality and growing up.
I guess the question I have is where do you draw that line? If the kid takes a picture of himself with his parents' gun, and says this is what I'm going to use, does that count? How long a hike is it from fantasy to reality?
If you had a kid in the school who ends up dead because everyone was waiting to see if some miscreant was going to cross this most blurry of lines would you be content? When we found out just how screwed up the Columbine kids were -- what if we could have stopped them before they started stockpiling an arsenal? Should we?
And for God's sake, can you afford to start lumping every kid in with those two freaks of nature? Like the one guy said, he made game levels like his school -- it didn't mean he planned on gunning down teachers.
I do maintain, that if kids did go on some killing spree, the media, society and the rest would absolutely have a field day with a blog that spouted off about it. We would hear about the red flags, warnings, all the signs that were missed.
Seems like a damned if you do, damned if you don't kinda thing.
Under your logic, the officials at Columbine High School shouldn't have done anything unless the kids were drawing up the plans to stage a full-scale assault while they were in art class.
What a child does outside of class that impacts the campus should rightfully be a concern of the district, even if its not under their direct "authority."
If a kid on myspace -- aka the backwater of the web where HTML from 1995 is still popular -- is talking about plans to take out a group of students, or running drugs onto campus to sell during lunch, then I think the district not only has a duty, but an obligation, to try and make sure neither happens.
If they didn't, and tragedy struck we'd all be in here tsk, tsking about the obvious warning signs that were missed.
It's Venus after all -- and according to the book, that's where women are originally from.
The runaway global warming was probably caused by all their yaps going nonstop, a stream of hot air about "doing the dishes," "mowing the lawn," and "come look at this cute house I built in 'The Sims.'"
And, yeah, that dark vortex? That costs $15.99 a month, billed to your credit card under the name "OMFGSONOTPR0N.COM"
Thankfully my wife doesn't read slashdot or I could so get my ass...
I know it's a "clever" turn of a phrase, but by not being tolerant of intolerance wouldn't they then be intolerant themselves and by virtue of that intolerance of their intolerance because of their ability to be tolerant and on and on until the universe itself unravels?
Because while I would love everyone to be tolerant, I'm rather intolerant of those space time thingies that will destroy the universe.
"That's a real nice desktop picture of a naked Britney Spears -- and a very nice 250gb drive full of carefully labeled and cross referenced pr0n. Hey Vito, wouldn't it be a shame if something -- ya know -- bad was to happen to it? Yeah, a real shame."
Someone drop me a line when we can use this knowledge to do that Quantum Leap thing and jump around in our own lifetime.
Then I can go back and warn myself not to: Write articles about how Apple is dying Buy a DIVX player from Circuit City Open the red door in that Choose Your Own Adventure book that ended in me being killed by that vampire that on the cover sort of looks like Boy George.
I don't want to get in the way of the "OMFG CHIMPY MCSHRUB HITLER BUSH INVADED IRAQ WHILE NORTH KOREA MADE NUKES" discussion, but if memory serves me right, didn't the Clinton administration strike an agreement with the NoKos in 1994 where they were going to stop their nuclear program, but I'll be damned, they just kept doing it anyway?
All the time we thought they were sort of whistling and saying, "Oh boy, I'm sure glad we aren't developing nuclear weapons" while all the while deep inside Kim Jong Il's mountain fortress they really were.
So, isn't it possible that NK had nuclear weapons already when the whole Iraq thing started?
Could we have known that and that possibly be why we didn't invade or attack NK because Tokyo and Seoul would be faced with a Radioactive Zerg Rush they couldn't possibly stop?
Could the NK situation be why we don't want Iraq and Iran to get to that point -- because we're essentially powerless if they do?
Nahh...more likely it was "OMFG, BUSHITLER TAKING OVER THE WORLD FOR THE RIAA!!"
As easy as it is to fall back on the, "Radio sucks, too much commercials" line, and as much as I despise radio, most of the stations in my area play between 40-45 minutes of non-commercial crap.
It's just different crap. DJs with their stupid jokes, stupid callers with their stupid jokes, etc. etc. In fact, I'd rather listen to commercials than that junk.
We do have several stations that play 45 minutes of music without commercial interruption, unless of course you count the interruption to tell you that you're listening to 45 minutes of music without commercial interruption.
Even though, it's till not 80-20 by any stretch of the imagination...although those screaming car ads do seem to last hours.
Finally, Microsoft warns that installing SP2 on a spyware-infested PC is a bad idea.
So basically, you don't want to install it on any computer running a Microsoft operating system that has been using a Microsoft browser or a Microsoft e-mail client.
Slashdot Mirror
Dude, it would just fail.
The only thing more prone to failure on a Galaxy Class starship than the holodeck safeties was that useless friggin core ejection system.
Come on feds, spend the extra little bit of money and track these guys using something other than your unlimited "Nights and Weekends."
In the worst case scenario for both examples, one is far worse.
Let's say a busload of nuns, a busload of blind pre-schoolers, a busload of puppies and a busload of apple pies all manage, through some freak accident, to collide with a propane truck -- doing the math, that's a lot of dead nuns, kids, puppies and delicious apple pie, plus a blue collar propane truck driver.
On the other hand, half a dozen guys with nuke components and you end up with all that and maybe a million more?
And yes, I think nuclear terrorism is overstated, and yes the "mushroom cloud" imagery is just a political hot button.
But we're talking worst case scenarios here. And besides, wasn't it, "Could they fly planes into.....naaaaaaah" that got us into this mess to begin with?
Bingo! Instant Karma baby!
Bonus points if you can mix in a "IN SOVIET RUSSIA" somewhere.
Ok, climate change, acid rain, extinction of species, water resources, peak oil, blah blah blah -- I'll grant that's the domain of science.
But international peace?
The Israelis and Palestinians hate one another -- what role does science play in that?
"Well, after looking under the microscope, we now see that they don't hate one another."
Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for science!
Let me know when science can solve the problem of people hating one another for generations upon generations -- oh, and when they can go MMORPG cheater and dupe Taiwan so that China finally will shut up -- then I'll be impressed.
If I swing at your face, and hit you hard enough to swell your eye shut, is that an attack?
After all, I'm just disabling your eye -- temporarily at that.
I'm pretty sure the authorities would disagree with me when they hauled me off to the pokey as I screamed, "It wasn't an attack! I was just disabling him, or perhaps blinding would be more fitting!"
[2. Trade] WTS Windows Vista Ultimate! 2600g OBO!
[2. Trade] You can't sell WVU! It's BOP! LRN2PLY!
Oh dear God -- way too much time on WoW
And consciously choose to STEAL the coffee!
Screw the big eyes -- bring back Terry Tate, office linebacker.
Come on -- get the political terminology right
Right wingers are wingnuts -- left wingers are moonbats.
I expect some sort of fascist blast from an AC -- but for someone who puts together a well-reasoned couple of paragraphs afterward it seems a bit disappointing. But it's slashdot, what are ya gonna do....
You're right that at some point everyone thinks, "Oh, I'm gonna kill this person." We all test just how dark we can be, where our most private of thoughts can lead -- that is part of normality and growing up.
I guess the question I have is where do you draw that line? If the kid takes a picture of himself with his parents' gun, and says this is what I'm going to use, does that count? How long a hike is it from fantasy to reality?
If you had a kid in the school who ends up dead because everyone was waiting to see if some miscreant was going to cross this most blurry of lines would you be content? When we found out just how screwed up the Columbine kids were -- what if we could have stopped them before they started stockpiling an arsenal? Should we?
And for God's sake, can you afford to start lumping every kid in with those two freaks of nature? Like the one guy said, he made game levels like his school -- it didn't mean he planned on gunning down teachers.
I do maintain, that if kids did go on some killing spree, the media, society and the rest would absolutely have a field day with a blog that spouted off about it. We would hear about the red flags, warnings, all the signs that were missed.
Seems like a damned if you do, damned if you don't kinda thing.
Under your logic, the officials at Columbine High School shouldn't have done anything unless the kids were drawing up the plans to stage a full-scale assault while they were in art class.
What a child does outside of class that impacts the campus should rightfully be a concern of the district, even if its not under their direct "authority."
If a kid on myspace -- aka the backwater of the web where HTML from 1995 is still popular -- is talking about plans to take out a group of students, or running drugs onto campus to sell during lunch, then I think the district not only has a duty, but an obligation, to try and make sure neither happens.
If they didn't, and tragedy struck we'd all be in here tsk, tsking about the obvious warning signs that were missed.
It's Venus after all -- and according to the book, that's where women are originally from.
The runaway global warming was probably caused by all their yaps going nonstop, a stream of hot air about "doing the dishes," "mowing the lawn," and "come look at this cute house I built in 'The Sims.'"
And, yeah, that dark vortex? That costs $15.99 a month, billed to your credit card under the name "OMFGSONOTPR0N.COM"
Thankfully my wife doesn't read slashdot or I could so get my ass...
Oh dear God -- CLOSE, CLOSE, CLOSE!!!
I know it's a "clever" turn of a phrase, but by not being tolerant of intolerance wouldn't they then be intolerant themselves and by virtue of that intolerance of their intolerance because of their ability to be tolerant and on and on until the universe itself unravels?
Because while I would love everyone to be tolerant, I'm rather intolerant of those space time thingies that will destroy the universe.
"That's a real nice desktop picture of a naked Britney Spears -- and a very nice 250gb drive full of carefully labeled and cross referenced pr0n. Hey Vito, wouldn't it be a shame if something -- ya know -- bad was to happen to it? Yeah, a real shame."
Someone drop me a line when we can use this knowledge to do that Quantum Leap thing and jump around in our own lifetime.
Then I can go back and warn myself not to:
Write articles about how Apple is dying
Buy a DIVX player from Circuit City
Open the red door in that Choose Your Own Adventure book that ended in me being killed by that vampire that on the cover sort of looks like Boy George.
Just got a press release in our newsroom that the Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott is suing Sony BMG.
Full release can be found at http://www.oag.state.tx.us/oagnews/
Don't mess with Texas.
But I like my car -- I don't want it burned to a crisp!
This gets modded insightful?
Poorly worded, spelled even worse and after reading it five times I still have no idea what the second sentence is even supposed to mean.
I guess "Fuck Bush" qualifies for an auto + Insightful modification now on Slashdot.
Maybe I'll go ask "Jow" Sixpack. I'm sure he'll know.
I don't want to get in the way of the "OMFG CHIMPY MCSHRUB HITLER BUSH INVADED IRAQ WHILE NORTH KOREA MADE NUKES" discussion, but if memory serves me right, didn't the Clinton administration strike an agreement with the NoKos in 1994 where they were going to stop their nuclear program, but I'll be damned, they just kept doing it anyway?
All the time we thought they were sort of whistling and saying, "Oh boy, I'm sure glad we aren't developing nuclear weapons" while all the while deep inside Kim Jong Il's mountain fortress they really were.
So, isn't it possible that NK had nuclear weapons already when the whole Iraq thing started?
Could we have known that and that possibly be why we didn't invade or attack NK because Tokyo and Seoul would be faced with a Radioactive Zerg Rush they couldn't possibly stop?
Could the NK situation be why we don't want Iraq and Iran to get to that point -- because we're essentially powerless if they do?
Nahh...more likely it was "OMFG, BUSHITLER TAKING OVER THE WORLD FOR THE RIAA!!"
Yeah, that damned conservative media always causing problems.
Remember that time CBS used forged documents to try and smear Kerry's military records?
Ooooh...wait...nevermind.
The whole terrorism thing is used by the american administration to manipulate the population...
Yeah, just like those terrorists manipulated the planes into the sides of buildings and manipulated those 3,000 people to their deaths.
Do you think that didn't happen? This "whole terrorism thing" happened and if we don't work to prevent it, it will keep on happening.
So, adjust your tinfoil hat, and get back to work Senator Kerry...
But we know it's you Bill just spouting the stats from microsoft.com...
Things that bad in the Big Apple? Are the commercials at least funny or somehow otherwise worth listening to?
Maybe the Apes were onto something dubbing it the "Forbidden Zone."
As easy as it is to fall back on the, "Radio sucks, too much commercials" line, and as much as I despise radio, most of the stations in my area play between 40-45 minutes of non-commercial crap.
It's just different crap. DJs with their stupid jokes, stupid callers with their stupid jokes, etc. etc. In fact, I'd rather listen to commercials than that junk.
We do have several stations that play 45 minutes of music without commercial interruption, unless of course you count the interruption to tell you that you're listening to 45 minutes of music without commercial interruption.
Even though, it's till not 80-20 by any stretch of the imagination...although those screaming car ads do seem to last hours.
How many of you read that as "stimulating the whole universe" and immediately thought of pr0n?
Oh...
just me...
Finally, Microsoft warns that installing SP2 on a spyware-infested PC is a bad idea.
So basically, you don't want to install it on any computer running a Microsoft operating system that has been using a Microsoft browser or a Microsoft e-mail client.
Huh..I think I'm starting to see a pattern.