I think the AC may really have intended his comment as funny or sarcastic. I mean, c'mon, could someone really be that stupid? Anyway, you are obviously quite correct. I like your explanation. Well stated for the clueless non-techies out there.
Oh god. It's not the radium itself that glows (emits visible light). It's the phosphors in the paint that are excited by the radium.
Do you really imagine that you could find a naturally occuring rock containing radium in the mountains that glowed a bright green?
Look up phosphorescence some time. Your computer monitor probably uses it. It really annoys me when someone who doesn't have the faintest clue what they're talking about corrects someone else.
$3800 is not much more than the cost of a regular dog in Japan. The Japanese have a lot of money and even the women love gadgets of all kinds. So I think these could become very popular, just like AIBO. Even here in the U.S. they'd probably sell quite a few at that price. This is a big jump from those larger $20-30k models.
When you say "lose atmosphere to space", what space are you referring to exactly? Are you saying that individual water vapor molecules actually attain escape velocity and launch toward interstellar space (or into another gravity well)?
I've always been puzzled at how games in the so called "adventure" genre were all about puzzles. Why not just call them Puzzle Games then. An "Adventure" game should be about exploring some kind of interesting game world, not about twisting levers in a certain way. I always hated the puzzles in Zork. Those stupid dam controls. Give me a break. I think CRPGs were what adventure games were intended to be.
IMO, all computer games should contain an element of interactive fiction. At least until virtual reality has reached near holodeck levels, we will need text descriptions. Even a holodeck uses lots of text in terms of character dialogue. It's just spoken instead of written. When you combine good modern game design with interactive fiction you end up with something like Planescape:Torment, a computer game that some believe to be the best ever made. It was the interactive fiction aspect of the game that made it stand out from the competition.
Next someone will be posting a script to change whitespace and punctuation around every 5 minutes. Once a day is nothing. Once every half hour is a major PITA. Especially if it takes 20-30 years for a response.
I am impressed that you would reply with such restraint to such an obviously angry post. It makes it so difficult when the enemy is nice. I just want to say that, although I do wish that all police in the world would just cease to exist, this is not personal. I do not know you at all. I do realize that there may be some POs who are genuinely nice people who have ethical standards they would not act against regardless of how unjust or cruel the laws were. Most blanket generalizations against any "group" of people are usually wrong. It is an unfortunate human tendency to generalize about such groups.
The real problem is not the police per se, it is the citizens and politicians who put them up on a pedestal as better than the rest of us and give them so much power. In the US at least our now very old constitution and bill of rights was supposed to protect us from not only power-mad cops but power-mad politicians and even a majority that may want to curtail the rights of a minority.
All of this is has been steadily disappearing over many years as the next generation regards whatever the current laws are as "normal". While the protection of our rights is steadily given up, the "rights" of one particular class of citizens known as the police are continually increased in the name of safety, of reducing "crime".
Police are "where the rubber meets the road" in any government and as a government grows towards a tyranny, as individual rights are eroded, it seems natural for these armed agents of said government to be hated and feared.
The more the US becomes like Soviet Russia, the more the police become thought of as the internal secret police (GPU) declaring war against citizens of their own country in the name of some political ideal (or just an exciting job).
I am willing to admit that the vast majority of POs that I have had interactions with seemed like nice people. Most of my interactions have been for minor traffic offenses (speeding tickets mostly). Very few of them seemed to fear for their life when interacting with me or treat me like a serious criminal in any way.
I haven't had any nightmare scenarios like my NY friend who was tackled and beaten for merely walking down the wrong street in Brooklyn.
I have always been polite and even meek (since so many of them want some emotional domination) in my interactions with cops. I don't even really resent them for pulling me over. I know all too well that to them the whole speeding thing is just a revenue game.
In fact, I have never really been ill-treated by the police in any way, although I have encountered my share of mentally challenged individuals. They usually just enforce their laws and go on their merry way.
My hatred does not come from individual encounters in my own life, but from the unjust nature of the laws they are enforcing. I am sure there were "nice" GPU officers in the USSR, and nice SS officers in Nazi Germany. Again, those people were also just following orders, enforcing laws that they themselves had no responsibility for creating.
Some people may cringe at such comparisons because clearly we are not(yet) talking about taking people from their homes in the middle of the night and imprisoning them or killing them for "political" offenses (although some of the drug laws could be interpreted as such). I think the point remains however. Enforcing unjust laws that violate a citizen's basic rights as a human being is wrong. It is a kind of crime. Perhaps the worst kind.
I once had a somewhat lengthy conversation with a cop (after a traffic stop) about victimless crimes, and I almost had him agreeing with me that the lack of a victim did present a bit of a problem. He seemed unusually thoughtful, although when push came to shove he admitted that his job was to enforce all laws regardless of how silly or unjust they might seem to him. He (rightfully) blamed the politicians and encouraged me to vote.
I do appreciate that you would be willing to save the life of a s
Actually in some cases it's enough for a conviction, but in this case it was bogus. He could simply have arrested the man based on this accusation. He chose not to for whatever reason.
At that point, the issue of the ID was irrelevant. This cop chose to make it an issue because he wanted to, because cops don't like being defied.
I agree. The safest course of action is simply to arrest every male over the age of 10 (since women are innocent until proven innocent). Needless to say this would stop 95% of all crime, including murderers. Why bother to wait for evidence. After all we are all potential criminals and should be treated as such.
Actually, an even better idea would be to simply kill all humans ASAP. Clearly this would reduce crime considerably. People cannot commit crimes when they are dead. I believe that this may also give us a solution to our nuclear stockpile issues. Perhaps it's time to just use it. All of it. And let's face it. We need to get this done ASAP, maybe even before the next/. news article.
Instead of hating [the Gestapo] out of turn, why don't you research your opinion and present the problems as you see them to the local [SS/GPU/NKVD/KGB offices]? They will listen, especially if you do your research. OR better yet, become an [SS officer] and do the job better than the current [SS officers].
We need good [SS officers], and if you are able to develop that ability to see and treat [potential perps] as individuals you would probably make an effective [SS officer] yourself. However, it sounds like you don't view the [SS officers] as individuals though, so you might have a problem in this redguard.
Guess they were lucky they werent arrested for "cursing in the presence of a peace officer". You just know that such a law has got to be on the books. I would love to see those kinds of laws (and there are many) get to the supreme court. Not that the supreme court gives a rats a$$ about the first amendment when "peace officers" may be in the area.
I live in Spain, and we also have an ID and the obligation to show it to a police officer when required.
I guess we must seem like a bunch of crazy gun-toting anarchists to you. Order is always enhanced by government power. From what I have seen of Spaniards, they could definitely use a strong government hand to keep them in line.
Just remember the difference in our histories. In the past we were anarchists compared to your country. Clearly things have changed a lot in the past 50 to 100 years and our systems are more equal now, but that doesn't change history.
Your country has a long history of all powerful father-like dictators. Well, at least you weren't fighting on the EVIL side in WW2, like the Italians. It wouldn't surprise me if there are even some Spanish who would like to go back to the old ways.
If it was the "vehicle" who was stopped, why not ask the "vehicle" for its ID and why it had kidnapped all those people inside of it?
Since when does merely being a passenger in a vehicle constitute a crime? If a city bus hits a pedestrian, would you encarcerate all the passengers until you could "verify their identity"? This just gets better and better.
If Mr. Hiibel loses in the USSC, it is giving the police carte blanche to violate our rights for pretty much any reason and refusing to give ID is, in fact, one of our (US) Constitutional rights. It's called the Fourth Amendment and I am personally kind of fond of it.
This is a good point. This case could actually make things worse, reassuring in the minds of all cops of their right to your ID (or anything else they want which may have been previously prohibited by that old, ignored, document, that greatest enemy of law enforcement). I have no doubt the already eroded right not to be searched will soon be abolished entirely. It's only a matter of time. More power to the police!! Hooray!!
2.Georgia, and probably the rest of the United People's Republic of America is now officially a "Police State". The police are always right. Civilians are always wrong. The Police are all-powerful and may kill or imprison at their discretion and whim.
3.To anyone who does not see this as an obscene (and completely pointless) abuse of power, please renounce your citizenship and move to China ASAP.
4. Would giving the cop the finger, making pig noises, and speaking in intimate terms about his mother, constitute a crime as well?
Actually, I already know the answer to this. Cops are treated as Special Citizens in our republic. While it is legal to tease, insult, or be disrespectful of a regular citizen, to do so to a POLICE OFFICER is a serious, serious crime.
5. Although I do appreciate your comments, you are a member of the US Gestapo. Please die as soon as possible. Thank you. Near the end of my life, I plan to kill as many pigs (not the smart kind) as I can manage to do before being killed myself. Hopefully explosives will have advanced by that time. I consider killing police in a police state to be as noble an act as killing members of the SS (Germany) or GPU (USSR).
6. I am not posting this as an AC, but hopefully the Georgia Police do not have jurisdiction in my state. If you do then come and get me you f**ng pig!
Having to spike a drink or inject someone is not the most practical strategy. What we need is an easily atomized form of Pitocin. Is there any plant that possesses a natural form of this chemical? If so, drying the leaves, and rolling them up with tobbaco might serve as a means of dispersal. Getting it into a smoke form would be ideal.
Another delivery system could be transdermal if the oxycotin molecule is small enough to make it through the dermal layers. You could combine some of it with chapstick for more powerful kisses. If you could get it to evaporate with a solvent while retaining its efficacy, cologne could also be an option. I wonder if oxycotin has it's own distinctive smell though. That could be a give-away.
My thoughts exactly. I am already thinking of emailing Mexican pharmacies etc. about this stuff. Actually Vasopressin is already easily available through that British online pharmacy (although it's not cheap).
While I don't think that just spiking a drink with this stuff will get a girl to love you. Seems like it can't hurt, especially when combined with other strategies.
How long before Oxytocin/Pitocin attains the same reputation as those "date rape drugs". Time to stock up before it becomes a "scheduled" substance.
*sigh* If it was "love" you would have let her live.
This makes me wonder if you have ever been in love. While you are in the relationship love can rarely have negative consequences for the one who is loved. In the relationship we do a good job of convincing ourselves that we want them to be happy etc.
But love is the most powerfully motivating emotion that our species can experience. Those same intense feelings can lead to murder (and often do) when one is "betrayed" and/or abandoned by the loved one.
Like the experience of love itself, one cannot relate to it until they have been through the appropriate circumstances. No, I have not actually killed anyone, but my desire to do so was almost as strong as my previous desire to nurture her. That's why I sometimes tell people that, while loving someone is a totally safe experience (except for the risk of suicide), being truly loved intensely enough is one of the most dangerous experiences we can have.
Most of us never know the risks we take in these situations. Losing a love is one of the most painful experiences possible to us and the former lover is the one wielding the red hot poker and electric prods etc. Think about how people who have actually been tortured feel about their former torturers (who were usually just following orders--it wasn't even personal) and how much they would love to get payback. Watch Roman Polanski's, Sigourney Weaver's and Ben Kingsley's Death and the Maiden for a well made fictional account of this kind of experience.
Nice Incredible Connection pattern. Mind if I use that? Actually I seriously am going to write that down. If you can come up with any other descriptive language I'd appreciate that too. Not bad at all. I'll just combine it with my microminiature oxytocin atomizer. Love at First Sight (tm).
BTW, what you don't yet realize (you won't have the perspective until your current relationship is over) is that your feelings for her are mostly something you have done to yourself. Love is like a form of self-hypnosis. You must jump through some fairly well predefined steps in order to get where you are. This doesn't discount that she may be a better target than some other girls though.
If you actually take the time to understand more about the science of love, you may have a better chance of keeping her in that state and even increasing her feelings over time.
It is nice to convince yourself that you have found the one and to idolize everything about her, but in the back of your mind you should not forget that such beliefs themselves will increase your oxytocin levels and allow you to get an even better "high".
It can be a very tempting circular reinforcement pattern. The more you believe she is special and idolize her, the stronger those euphoric, addictive feelings of love, the stronger those feelings of love, the more tempting it is to reinforce the beliefs, etc. Nothing wrong with that. It's the best feeling in the world. But a reality check from time to time on the euphoria can be a nice safety net when things go wrong.
Just be aware of how tempting it can be to ignore reality in order to increase the intensity of your experience. I find that females are less prone to this trap for some reason, probably having to do with their greater selection of potential mates. They always know in the back of their mind that there is someone even "better" (by whatever standards she uses) out there who she might meet at any time.
I really liked the pilot (miniseries my ash). As scifi goes, it was pretty damn good, despite the gaping holes. The ones like how the cylons have all those special communication abilities and glow-in-the-dark spinal cords when they are indistinguishable from us "down to our blood".
Also Starbuck is incredibly annoying and ugly to boot. As much as I liked the pilot, I don't know if I could stand watching her so much. They really should have left her as a man. Or, if they are going to leave her female, at least they could go all the way and make her a lesbian. Or better yet kill her off early in the show. Now that would be a 24-like kind of surprise.
OTOH, I could watch the hot Asian "Boomer" all day long. I really like her face. I like Trisha's performance. She's very intense. I like that she's just a virtual person.
So what's good about the show? The eerie, almost spooky feeling of floating in space alone, forever, with everyone else in your entire species, your whole civilization just gone. I thought they were pretty successful at pulling off those kinds of subtle feelings. The blade runner-esque music certainly helps with this.
It is kind of Blade Runner meets Terminator (I wonder if it was pitched that way), but both were classic SciFi movies, the more mature and powerful of the two being Blade Runner of course. Makes me wonder if Edward J. Olmos will end up being a Cylon in the end. It seems apparent to me that the director was really moved by Blade Runner, by the whole kind of world created in that film.
To question the difference between humans and intelligent machines, of which is which, to see our own machines become so succesfull as organisms that they destroy us.
These are wonderful ideas to explore. No they are not completely original anymore. But, as long as the miniseries retains its own unique feel and is not blatantly imitative with its storylines there is a great deal of potential here.
I like the idea of machines coming to worship their own emotions (like "love"). A lot could be done with this material. That's for sure.
Maybe Ebola is not the best example. It seems that we already have a very promising vaccine candidate. I have lost all respect for that wimpy virus. I think we need a new box jellyfish of the virus world.
Have you forgotten about the Dmitri incident? It's true that they tried to backpedal a bit to make themselves look good due to the bad publicity (took them long enough to figure that one out), but they obviously knew it was too late for that.
I am still boycotting Adobe. I won't use any of their products unless I absolutely have no choice, and I will certainly not buy any. I will also continue to advise my less technical associates not to buy any of their products. If necessary I will supply such people with a cracked/pirated version.
Did those bastards ever even apologize for their despicable behavior? Did they admit that they were wrong and that they regretted what they had done. If an important exec at that company (preferably the CEO) were to abjectly apologize with what seems like sincerity I might reconsider.
Speaking of which, maybe some high-ups at Real should offer some specific, sincere apologies over their abusive and sleazy behavior as well.
I don't mean to be a nag, but can you give us a bit more info on that VCR? Two years and Panasonic are good clues, but why make us work for it? Do you remember what they called that feature? Did it have one of those TM feature names?
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I think the AC may really have intended his comment as funny or sarcastic. I mean, c'mon, could someone really be that stupid? Anyway, you are obviously quite correct. I like your explanation. Well stated for the clueless non-techies out there.
Oh god. It's not the radium itself that glows (emits visible light). It's the phosphors in the paint that are excited by the radium.
Do you really imagine that you could find a naturally occuring rock containing radium in the mountains that glowed a bright green?
Look up phosphorescence some time. Your computer monitor probably uses it. It really annoys me when someone who doesn't have the faintest clue what they're talking about corrects someone else.
$3800 is not much more than the cost of a regular dog in Japan. The Japanese have a lot of money and even the women love gadgets of all kinds. So I think these could become very popular, just like AIBO. Even here in the U.S. they'd probably sell quite a few at that price. This is a big jump from those larger $20-30k models.
When you say "lose atmosphere to space", what space are you referring to exactly? Are you saying that individual water vapor molecules actually attain escape velocity and launch toward interstellar space (or into another gravity well)?
I've always been puzzled at how games in the so called "adventure" genre were all about puzzles. Why not just call them Puzzle Games then. An "Adventure" game should be about exploring some kind of interesting game world, not about twisting levers in a certain way. I always hated the puzzles in Zork. Those stupid dam controls. Give me a break. I think CRPGs were what adventure games were intended to be.
IMO, all computer games should contain an element of interactive fiction. At least until virtual reality has reached near holodeck levels, we will need text descriptions. Even a holodeck uses lots of text in terms of character dialogue. It's just spoken instead of written. When you combine good modern game design with interactive fiction you end up with something like Planescape:Torment, a computer game that some believe to be the best ever made. It was the interactive fiction aspect of the game that made it stand out from the competition.
Next someone will be posting a script to change whitespace and punctuation around every 5 minutes. Once a day is nothing. Once every half hour is a major PITA. Especially if it takes 20-30 years for a response.
I am impressed that you would reply with such restraint to such an obviously angry post. It makes it so difficult when the enemy is nice. I just want to say that, although I do wish that all police in the world would just cease to exist, this is not personal. I do not know you at all. I do realize that there may be some POs who are genuinely nice people who have ethical standards they would not act against regardless of how unjust or cruel the laws were. Most blanket generalizations against any "group" of people are usually wrong. It is an unfortunate human tendency to generalize about such groups.
The real problem is not the police per se, it is the citizens and politicians who put them up on a pedestal as better than the rest of us and give them so much power. In the US at least our now very old constitution and bill of rights was supposed to protect us from not only power-mad cops but power-mad politicians and even a majority that may want to curtail the rights of a minority.
All of this is has been steadily disappearing over many years as the next generation regards whatever the current laws are as "normal". While the protection of our rights is steadily given up, the "rights" of one particular class of citizens known as the police are continually increased in the name of safety, of reducing "crime".
Police are "where the rubber meets the road" in any government and as a government grows towards a tyranny, as individual rights are eroded, it seems natural for these armed agents of said government to be hated and feared.
The more the US becomes like Soviet Russia, the more the police become thought of as the internal secret police (GPU) declaring war against citizens of their own country in the name of some political ideal (or just an exciting job).
I am willing to admit that the vast majority of POs that I have had interactions with seemed like nice people. Most of my interactions have been for minor traffic offenses (speeding tickets mostly). Very few of them seemed to fear for their life when interacting with me or treat me like a serious criminal in any way.
I haven't had any nightmare scenarios like my NY friend who was tackled and beaten for merely walking down the wrong street in Brooklyn.
I have always been polite and even meek (since so many of them want some emotional domination) in my interactions with cops. I don't even really resent them for pulling me over. I know all too well that to them the whole speeding thing is just a revenue game.
In fact, I have never really been ill-treated by the police in any way, although I have encountered my share of mentally challenged individuals. They usually just enforce their laws and go on their merry way.
My hatred does not come from individual encounters in my own life, but from the unjust nature of the laws they are enforcing. I am sure there were "nice" GPU officers in the USSR, and nice SS officers in Nazi Germany. Again, those people were also just following orders, enforcing laws that they themselves had no responsibility for creating.
Some people may cringe at such comparisons because clearly we are not(yet) talking about taking people from their homes in the middle of the night and imprisoning them or killing them for "political" offenses (although some of the drug laws could be interpreted as such). I think the point remains however. Enforcing unjust laws that violate a citizen's basic rights as a human being is wrong. It is a kind of crime. Perhaps the worst kind.
I once had a somewhat lengthy conversation with a cop (after a traffic stop) about victimless crimes, and I almost had him agreeing with me that the lack of a victim did present a bit of a problem. He seemed unusually thoughtful, although when push came to shove he admitted that his job was to enforce all laws regardless of how silly or unjust they might seem to him. He (rightfully) blamed the politicians and encouraged me to vote.
I do appreciate that you would be willing to save the life of a s
Actually in some cases it's enough for a conviction, but in this case it was bogus. He could simply have arrested the man based on this accusation. He chose not to for whatever reason.
At that point, the issue of the ID was irrelevant. This cop chose to make it an issue because he wanted to, because cops don't like being defied.
I agree. The safest course of action is simply to arrest every male over the age of 10 (since women are innocent until proven innocent). Needless to say this would stop 95% of all crime, including murderers. Why bother to wait for evidence. After all we are all potential criminals and should be treated as such.
/. news article.
Actually, an even better idea would be to simply kill all humans ASAP. Clearly this would reduce crime considerably. People cannot commit crimes when they are dead. I believe that this may also give us a solution to our nuclear stockpile issues. Perhaps it's time to just use it. All of it. And let's face it. We need to get this done ASAP, maybe even before the next
Instead of hating [the Gestapo] out of turn, why don't you research your opinion and present the problems as you see them to the local [SS/GPU/NKVD/KGB offices]? They will listen, especially if you do your research. OR better yet, become an [SS officer] and do the job better than the current [SS officers].
We need good [SS officers], and if you are able to develop that ability to see and treat [potential perps] as individuals you would probably make an effective [SS officer] yourself. However, it sounds like you don't view the [SS officers] as individuals though, so you might have a problem in this redguard.
Guess they were lucky they werent arrested for "cursing in the presence of a peace officer". You just know that such a law has got to be on the books. I would love to see those kinds of laws (and there are many) get to the supreme court. Not that the supreme court gives a rats a$$ about the first amendment when "peace officers" may be in the area.
I live in Spain, and we also have an ID and the obligation to show it to a police officer when required.
I guess we must seem like a bunch of crazy gun-toting anarchists to you. Order is always enhanced by government power. From what I have seen of Spaniards, they could definitely use a strong government hand to keep them in line.
Just remember the difference in our histories. In the past we were anarchists compared to your country. Clearly things have changed a lot in the past 50 to 100 years and our systems are more equal now, but that doesn't change history.
Your country has a long history of all powerful father-like dictators. Well, at least you weren't fighting on the EVIL side in WW2, like the Italians. It wouldn't surprise me if there are even some Spanish who would like to go back to the old ways.
If it was the "vehicle" who was stopped, why not ask the "vehicle" for its ID and why it had kidnapped all those people inside of it?
Since when does merely being a passenger in a vehicle constitute a crime? If a city bus hits a pedestrian, would you encarcerate all the passengers until you could "verify their identity"? This just gets better and better.
If Mr. Hiibel loses in the USSC, it is giving the police carte blanche to violate our rights for pretty much any reason and refusing to give ID is, in fact, one of our (US) Constitutional rights. It's called the Fourth Amendment and I am personally kind of fond of it.
This is a good point. This case could actually make things worse, reassuring in the minds of all cops of their right to your ID (or anything else they want which may have been previously prohibited by that old, ignored, document, that greatest enemy of law enforcement). I have no doubt the already eroded right not to be searched will soon be abolished entirely. It's only a matter of time. More power to the police!! Hooray!!
1.Remind me not to move to Georgia.
2.Georgia, and probably the rest of the United People's Republic of America is now officially a "Police State". The police are always right. Civilians are always wrong. The Police are all-powerful and may kill or imprison at their discretion and whim.
3.To anyone who does not see this as an obscene (and completely pointless) abuse of power, please renounce your citizenship and move to China ASAP.
4. Would giving the cop the finger, making pig noises, and speaking in intimate terms about his mother, constitute a crime as well?
Actually, I already know the answer to this. Cops are treated as Special Citizens in our republic. While it is legal to tease, insult, or be disrespectful of a regular citizen, to do so to a POLICE OFFICER is a serious, serious crime.
5. Although I do appreciate your comments, you are a member of the US Gestapo. Please die as soon as possible. Thank you. Near the end of my life, I plan to kill as many pigs (not the smart kind) as I can manage to do before being killed myself. Hopefully explosives will have advanced by that time. I consider killing police in a police state to be as noble an act as killing members of the SS (Germany) or GPU (USSR).
6. I am not posting this as an AC, but hopefully the Georgia Police do not have jurisdiction in my state. If you do then come and get me you f**ng pig!
7. Do all cops vote Republican? Just curious.
Having to spike a drink or inject someone is not the most practical strategy. What we need is an easily atomized form of Pitocin. Is there any plant that possesses a natural form of this chemical? If so, drying the leaves, and rolling them up with tobbaco might serve as a means of dispersal. Getting it into a smoke form would be ideal.
Another delivery system could be transdermal if the oxycotin molecule is small enough to make it through the dermal layers. You could combine some of it with chapstick for more powerful kisses. If you could get it to evaporate with a solvent while retaining its efficacy, cologne could also be an option. I wonder if oxycotin has it's own distinctive smell though. That could be a give-away.
My thoughts exactly. I am already thinking of emailing Mexican pharmacies etc. about this stuff. Actually Vasopressin is already easily available through that British online pharmacy (although it's not cheap).
While I don't think that just spiking a drink with this stuff will get a girl to love you. Seems like it can't hurt, especially when combined with other strategies.
How long before Oxytocin/Pitocin attains the same reputation as those "date rape drugs". Time to stock up before it becomes a "scheduled" substance.
*sigh* If it was "love" you would have let her live.
This makes me wonder if you have ever been in love. While you are in the relationship love can rarely have negative consequences for the one who is loved. In the relationship we do a good job of convincing ourselves that we want them to be happy etc.
But love is the most powerfully motivating emotion that our species can experience. Those same intense feelings can lead to murder (and often do) when one is "betrayed" and/or abandoned by the loved one.
Like the experience of love itself, one cannot relate to it until they have been through the appropriate circumstances. No, I have not actually killed anyone, but my desire to do so was almost as strong as my previous desire to nurture her. That's why I sometimes tell people that, while loving someone is a totally safe experience (except for the risk of suicide), being truly loved intensely enough is one of the most dangerous experiences we can have.
Most of us never know the risks we take in these situations. Losing a love is one of the most painful experiences possible to us and the former lover is the one wielding the red hot poker and electric prods etc. Think about how people who have actually been tortured feel about their former torturers (who were usually just following orders--it wasn't even personal) and how much they would love to get payback. Watch Roman Polanski's, Sigourney Weaver's and Ben Kingsley's Death and the Maiden for a well made fictional account of this kind of experience.
Nice Incredible Connection pattern. Mind if I use that? Actually I seriously am going to write that down. If you can come up with any other descriptive language I'd appreciate that too. Not bad at all. I'll just combine it with my microminiature oxytocin atomizer. Love at First Sight (tm).
BTW, what you don't yet realize (you won't have the perspective until your current relationship is over) is that your feelings for her are mostly something you have done to yourself. Love is like a form of self-hypnosis. You must jump through some fairly well predefined steps in order to get where you are. This doesn't discount that she may be a better target than some other girls though.
If you actually take the time to understand more about the science of love, you may have a better chance of keeping her in that state and even increasing her feelings over time.
It is nice to convince yourself that you have found the one and to idolize everything about her, but in the back of your mind you should not forget that such beliefs themselves will increase your oxytocin levels and allow you to get an even better "high".
It can be a very tempting circular reinforcement pattern. The more you believe she is special and idolize her, the stronger those euphoric, addictive feelings of love, the stronger those feelings of love, the more tempting it is to reinforce the beliefs, etc. Nothing wrong with that. It's the best feeling in the world. But a reality check from time to time on the euphoria can be a nice safety net when things go wrong.
Just be aware of how tempting it can be to ignore reality in order to increase the intensity of your experience. I find that females are less prone to this trap for some reason, probably having to do with their greater selection of potential mates. They always know in the back of their mind that there is someone even "better" (by whatever standards she uses) out there who she might meet at any time.
Somehow I think the quality of the cuisine at this lodge has room for improvement.
I really liked the pilot (miniseries my ash). As scifi goes, it was pretty damn good, despite the gaping holes. The ones like how the cylons have all those special communication abilities and glow-in-the-dark spinal cords when they are indistinguishable from us "down to our blood".
Also Starbuck is incredibly annoying and ugly to boot. As much as I liked the pilot, I don't know if I could stand watching her so much. They really should have left her as a man. Or, if they are going to leave her female, at least they could go all the way and make her a lesbian. Or better yet kill her off early in the show. Now that would be a 24-like kind of surprise.
OTOH, I could watch the hot Asian "Boomer" all day long. I really like her face. I like Trisha's performance. She's very intense. I like that she's just a virtual person.
So what's good about the show? The eerie, almost spooky feeling of floating in space alone, forever, with everyone else in your entire species, your whole civilization just gone. I thought they were pretty successful at pulling off those kinds of subtle feelings. The blade runner-esque music certainly helps with this.
It is kind of Blade Runner meets Terminator (I wonder if it was pitched that way), but both were classic SciFi movies, the more mature and powerful of the two being Blade Runner of course. Makes me wonder if Edward J. Olmos will end up being a Cylon in the end. It seems apparent to me that the director was really moved by Blade Runner, by the whole kind of world created in that film.
To question the difference between humans and intelligent machines, of which is which, to see our own machines become so succesfull as organisms that they destroy us.
These are wonderful ideas to explore. No they are not completely original anymore. But, as long as the miniseries retains its own unique feel and is not blatantly imitative with its storylines there is a great deal of potential here.
I like the idea of machines coming to worship their own emotions (like "love"). A lot could be done with this material. That's for sure.
Maybe Ebola is not the best example. It seems that we already have a very promising vaccine candidate. I have lost all respect for that wimpy virus. I think we need a new box jellyfish of the virus world.
I like Adobe.
Have you forgotten about the Dmitri incident? It's true that they tried to backpedal a bit to make themselves look good due to the bad publicity (took them long enough to figure that one out), but they obviously knew it was too late for that.
I am still boycotting Adobe. I won't use any of their products unless I absolutely have no choice, and I will certainly not buy any. I will also continue to advise my less technical associates not to buy any of their products. If necessary I will supply such people with a cracked/pirated version.
Did those bastards ever even apologize for their despicable behavior? Did they admit that they were wrong and that they regretted what they had done. If an important exec at that company (preferably the CEO) were to abjectly apologize with what seems like sincerity I might reconsider.
Speaking of which, maybe some high-ups at Real should offer some specific, sincere apologies over their abusive and sleazy behavior as well.
I don't mean to be a nag, but can you give us a bit more info on that VCR? Two years and Panasonic are good clues, but why make us work for it? Do you remember what they called that feature? Did it have one of those TM feature names?
You had a VCR with commercial skip? Care to divulge the make and model?