Why spend even $199 when you can get a perfectly good tablet with an IPS screen for only $129? Spending $500 for an iPad 3 is crazy enough. Spending any more than $500 for a tablet is completely ridiculous.
It is also worth noting that the introductory price for the [Bugatti Veyron Super Sport] - [1.65 million Euros] - has yet to be significantly challanged by any Veyron-killer coming to market. If it's really "overpriced" at that point, where are the host of competitors that offer the same (or better) features for a lower price?
I am guessing that your income is orders of magnitude higher than my own. For me $500 is a lot of money. I can buy a perfectly good 7" Chinese tablet for $150. Why should I spend more than 3 times that for features which in practice are probably not all that noticeable? Even $150 is hard to justify for an ultraportable product that I know I am going to drop and break eventually. For a product that just sits on a desk at home it is easy to justify $500. For a product that you carry around with you, it's strictly a rich man's luxury product. Similar to an iPhone.
You really only think "yuppies" can afford a $399 iPad?
Only rich people can afford to replace their $499 device every time they drop it. Tablets are in the ultra-portable category which means it's going to get dropped and/or stolen at regular intervals. I might be able to afford a $499 device every few years, but not every few months. That's why people like me would not even consider a tablet which costs more than $200. In fact, $200 is pushing it. There are loads of (Chinese) 7" tablets with many of the features of the iPad and the Nexus for $150 - $170 USD including shipping from China. And for $200 you can easily find a nice 9.7" tablet. Of course I'd rather have an iPad, but not for 2-3 times the price. Only people who are rich or who have some kind of intense burning need for the portability of a screen-only device are going to consider $500 a reasonable price.
A DUI/DWI checkpoint exists to catch drunk drivers, and they tend to be fairly effective at it. The cops also don't harass you, they check to make sure you don't smell like you took a bath in a martini, and let you go. They don't force you to get out, grope your genitals and then take naked photos of you. They don't give a crap if you bring a bag of candy with you - they just don't want you to drive drunk (which we can all agree is reasonable).
Actually that hasn't been my experience. I don't drink and I most certainly did not smell from alcohol and I was attacked and severely beaten and then arrested on a whole bunch of false charges including a felony charge at a DUI checkpoint. I was even charged with a DUI until I finally begged a cop at the station to let me take the breathalyzer test to prove my innocence. When it did they dropped the DUI charge but left all the others. I wouldn't play their reindeer games. I chose to remain silent and refused to answer any of their questions and did not sufficiently respect the authority of one particular angry cop who nearly killed me because of it.
Even though I was badly beaten with my face and head covered in blood and arrested and thrown in jail no one touched my genitals at any time. The part about the TSA patdown being the same as a police patdown is utter BS. Probably because the cops don't relish the idea of fondling your genitals. At least if you're male. Unlike the TSA agents who probably applied for the job because it turns them on.
I think at first you would have been correct that most people support the TSA, but I believe public opinion has changed now to the point that I think there is a slight majority who are against the TSA. As more and more people get violated at the airport public opinion has nowhere to go but further against the TSA. If there were a national referendum so that people could vote directly for or against the TSA, I believe the TSA would lose.
As far as marches go, they don't work anymore. The government would send in riot police who would get the chance to beat the shit out of protestors and maybe even shoot some. Such protests just aren't tolerated anymore. There were huge protests against the Iraqi invasion in both the US and the UK and it did absolutely nothing. Public opinion polls are a lot more useful. In a majority rules society like ours politicians only care about what the majority of voters think and even then the influence is quite limited.
I dislike the scanners as much as most other normal people, and it seems the evidence suggests they are ineffective. But the constant complaining about being seen naked puts me off and I don't care to be associated people who are obviously either overacting the part or have legit mental issues related to their body.
You realize that nearly the same argument could be made about a cavity search. Just like we all have genitals which look similar, we all have intestines which look similar. No need to be shy about it when national security is at stake. So bend over and allow yourself to be fully searched. Anyone who objects to that clearly has serious mental issues and can be safely ignored.
Emotionally I object to being seen naked by anyone I am not about to have sex with. Intellectually/philosophically I greatly object to any society where a government agent is allowed to strip search innocent people who just want to exercise the basic human right to move about freely. Notice how I didn't use the term "constitutional" right. The constitution may or may not protect a citizen's freedom to move about freely, but basic human rights most certainly do. Personally I would rather die than allow a TSA agent to see me naked.
You seem to believe that I am pro-ID. As I have stated in each and every post, I am not . My point was only that your argument against ID was silly. Who cares what a judge says? Argument from Authority is always silly, but using a judge as an authority is totally ridiculous. You may respect their authority, but that doesn't mean that everyone does, and even if we all did it isn't any kind of a rational argument.
Intelligent design is by far the less probable hypothesis. If you are going to make an argument make it with logic and/or empirical observation or the results of experiments, not by claiming that some Important Person said something so it must be true.
The point about atheism is that you seemed to be under the impression that I was arguing that some kind of supernatural creature created life. Since I am in fact an atheist that is clearly not the case. As to whether you believe I am atheist. Well that is funny. It is hard to imagine a religious person claiming to be an atheist. For what reason? To win some kind of argument on the internet?
I agree that what most people call "intelligent design" is not science. It is not based purely on logic and rational thought. Actually what it really is is a rationalization. In the end evidence would make no difference. Their belief in a supernatural creator being is absolute. There is no form of 'evidence' that would convince them otherwise.
Other people in the discussion have been talking about various 'ancient alien' hypothesis. I don't believe in those either simply because there is no evidence for them and their lack is a simpler hypothesis, but neither is there any specific evidence that our planet was not the pet project of some alien life form a million years or so more advanced than us. It is unlikely, but certainly not impossible.
I have no idea how anyone can attack Kickstarter unless they make their money in some competing paradigm (like a game or book publisher) or are just jealous or they are a lawyer hoping to buy a new Porsche this year. Yes. Kickstarter can be used to scam people out of money, and yes, if they had no intention of completing the project then it is a form of fraud. But I don't understand why you blame Kickstarter. It is totally not their fault. No one is forcing anyone to 'contribute' to a project.
If you want to blame someone blame the scammer himself I won't shed any tears for them if they get prosecuted for fraud. Although I do think the state should have to show intent. No point in filling the already fit to burst jails with people who are merely incompetent, but don't realize it. Just because the system runs on the 'honor system' does not mean there is anything wrong with it. Some people really are honest and sincere. It is unfortunate that some people are good at appearing honest and sincere when they are not, but that's the nature of life.
The US was mainly known as a country of merchants, of traders. Never a country of intellectuals and scientists. The space program had more to do with the cold war, with military applications, than with science or even exploration for its own sake.
Arguing for a space program because it will lead to more scientists is just a pathetic argument even if it were true, which it probably isn't. A space program should stand or fall on its own merits. If the majority of Americans don't care about space or lacks curiosity about what might be 'out there' then perhaps what's left of the US space program should be ended. Who cares about "boldly going" anywhere when American Idol or a football or baseball game is on?
I suppose they could put the money saved from NASA toward furthering the police state and security theatre. Americans may not like spending money on space exploration, but I suppose they are quite content with spending billions to be able to pretend that they are safe from bogeyman terrorists. We'll lose some astronauts, but gain more TSA agents or, if we're lucky even more invasive xray machines that will 'protect us' from body bombs. That way the majority can have the society that they so richly deserve.
I am an atheist. I do not believe in a god or magic fairies or ghosts or goblins. I believe what there is evidence for. I am not aware of any evidence that the earth was 'seeded' by anyone. If someone were to present such evidence I would be open to it however. It is not impossible. I assume by calling it 'bunk' you are attempting to claim that it is impossible. An absurd position to maintain and one for which you have presented no evidence.
Nevertheless it seems quite clear to me that the idea that life on earth started on its own is the most 'likely' hypothesis. It cannot actually be proven, but it is a much simpler hypothesis. So I guess it comes down to Occam's Razor. A very useful rule of thumb.
You seem religious in your certainty. Science is not about certainty. It is about evidence. There really isn't a great deal that science can actually say about the origin of life on this planet. Some questions are nearly unanswerable. It's too bad that people find that so hard to accept. I don't think such people should become scientists. Uncertainty, the state of simply not knowing something, is essential to science. Religion evolved as a substitute for uncertainty. For people who were so afraid of uncertainty, of something that is simply unknown, that they are willing to give up rational thought and substitute fairy tales.
We will never know if there is an 'edge' to the "universe". We will never know whether there are other "universes" outside of our own or what things were really like before the big bang. Science cannot answer such questions. Some or all of those questions may even be unknowable.
So you think a civil war is the answer to global warming then? What makes you think they will not just rebuild the old plants, but hire a well trained army to defend them? I think what will happen is the brainwashed Facebook generation will finally vote in some kook who starts the process of shutting down fossil fuel plants and replacing them with nuclear ones (the only 'solution' that would actually work at least for a while), but the rest of the world who didn't have the benefit of the brainwashing will just keep on keeping on. Of course if you nuke enough countries, at least all the major cities, there might be so few people that the problem solves itself.
Don't underestimate the passion of people on the other side of things. Perhaps the US could split into two countries. One that wants everything to be powered by water wheels and horses and the other that continues burning fossil fuels along with most other countries on the planet. You could fight to try to force everyone to stop burning. If you decided to use nuclear weapons you might even succeed. But even if you did conquer every country in the world, it would be awfully hard to enforce a ban on burning. Conquering a country is one thing. Ruling it with an iron fist is quite another.
Are you an attorney? I don't believe in intelligent design, but I don't particularly care what some judge thinks. Why even mention it? It isn't evidence for anything. Judges are not arbiters of truth.
Last I read (somewhere), statistics indicated life probably did NOT get created on earth, but more and likely arrived on an asteroid or something similar, possibly a space craft, but that was just one of the possibilities.
Last you read? If you cannot remember the source, you should at least present the evidence. If you can't at least remember the evidence then you could be accused of not having any idea what you are talking about.
Why does everything have to be measured by how well it serves "science"? What makes science so special? Fuck science. Seriously. If you want to perform some boring experiment that no one would care about besides someone in your field then pay for it yourself. Or get your university to pay for it. Those $50,000/year tuitions should pay for something. Of course if you happen to work for a private company then you can probably guess who I think should pay for it. Especially when any engineering that results from the science is immediately patented and the results are withheld behind an absurdly expensive pay wall.
IMO, NASA shouldn't be about science. We already have the NSF and god knows how much grant money for tax-funded science. NASA should be about space exploration and I'm disappointed with their progress in this regard. I would happily donate more than I pay in taxes for a truly sexy space mission. Particularly one where I could see recent video footage from a helmet-cam or from ship mounted cameras and see interviews of the astronauts etc. For a geek all of that is high entertainment. On the rare occasion that NASA actually does something interesting.
What do I consider interesting?
1. Anything involving a mission to Alpha Centauri. Even just early paper planning.
2. A manned mission to Mars would be nice. Especially if the aim is to do the groundwork for building a habitat there. They might even carry building and life support supplies and start setting up a skinned geodesic dome or whatever. Eventually we really should send humans there or at least a robot with something close to the ability of a human. And not just to walk on Martian soil, but to stay for a while exploring. Sorry. I keep using that dirty word.
3. The Jovian moons. Manned or unmanned we should be spending more time there. Now that would be exploration. How about a long lived RTG powered rover on Titan and Io and Europa and Ganymede. And how about a plan to keep the rover powered and exploring for decades? NASA should have a website that streams all of the different rover video live, or as close to live as you can get with that kind of distance.
Once we have explored and visited all of the interesting places in our own system we should switch gears into interstellar mode and spend 100% of NASA's funding toward that end. What would that involve?
1. A permanent manned lunar base complete with its own nuclear and solar generators.
2. Lunar mining and a lunar smelter. Perhaps using a solar furnace to at least get aluminum to its melting point and hopefully iron as well.
3. Some kind of more cost effective Earth-Moon launching system. Or at least more research into possibilities like that Heinlein-esque rail-gun launcher that we all read about not too long ago.
4. An Earth-Moon Lagrange point base for final assembly and launch of prototype and scale model craft. An excellent place to continue Freeman Dyson and Ted Taylor's excellent work on nuclear pulse propulsion with Earth-made and hopefully some lunar-made parts.
Actually, I wouldn't mind if we just skipped all the interplanetary stuff and started immediately on humanities first step to the stars. Our species has walked on the moon which used to be just a light in the sky. In the next few centuries I hope we can find the will to start building toward finally seeing what another sun looks like and possibly a whole new set of planets to explore. You never know. We might even find something interesting. Artifacts or fossils or even some form of life, but not as we know it.
OTOH we could all just stay home and watch American Idol. Space exploration is too difficult and expensive and dangerous for cowardly and lazy homo sapiens. If aliens ever do land here I can only imagine the contempt they would feel for our pathetic efforts at space exploration. "You haven't even traveled further than your own moon?"
What do you have against Kickstarter? It's not fundamentally different from gambling or the stock market? Of course some people are going to use Kickstarter for take-the-money-and-run scams. That's just the nature of the beast. When you gamble sometimes you lose. An excellent reason to only invest in projects run by people you are familiar with and who you feel you can trust to complete the project and not just take the money. And before you complain about the word 'investment' the returns are not monetary. The return on the investment is some kind of creative project getting completed that would not otherwise have been.
I believe that Kickstarter is a new paradigm. People are overly optimistic now. I think as more and more people get burned they will be far more cautious about which projects they choose to invest in. It won't kill the crowdfunding paradigm. It will just remind people not to be so stupid and gullible. And some dishonest people are going to make enough money to move to an island somewhere and never work another day in their life. People hold up liquor stores for a few hundred bucks. A Kickstarter scam is more like robbing a bank. So, yeah, there are going to be scams and they will get more and more sophisticated as time goes on. Caveat emptor.
They need "reasonable suspicion" to perform a terry stop. And it must be something specific that the cop can point to. Being black and American is not sufficient. Why is how you react to it important? The smartest thing to do is just to STFU because talking to the police is always stupid, but I did that and was still arrested on contempt of cop charges which included a felony. Even though some things are legal doesn't mean the police are going to like it, and if they get angry with you you'll be lucky if all that happens is you spend the night in jail and have to hire a lawyer for contempt of cop charges and go to trial. They may also decide to teach you a lesson in a more physical way that leaves you in the hospital or a body bag.
So what do you think a fair punishment would be for "being a loudmouth"? Death? Just a broken nose? Some broken ribs as well? How about some trumped up felony charges? Clearly you believe it should be punished somehow.
Would it surprise you to hear about the police harassing or beating a quiet, shy person whose only crime was to remain silent when questioned? Your experience with the police is not universal. My experience is very different, and I draw some very different conclusions. Some people might even say that filming the police while carrying a gun is an idiotic thing to do and that you deserve whatever happens to you including getting shot. I'm not saying that, and I don't believe that of course, but quite a few people would. If the cop claims you drew on him it would be difficult to prove him wrong and you would have to.
It goes further than that. If the police are telling the truth about what happened. If their story is not made up. Then the video would help the prosecution with its case. Not hurt it. As I've said before, my state used to have a policy of video taping every DUI roadblock, but they stopped because it hurt the prosecution more than it helped them. The videos tended to corroborate the story of the defendant. It is contemptible that we as a society do not force the police to record every interaction they have with the public. If they are obeying the law themselves and are making legitimate, by-the-book arrests then the video will help them. If they just want to beat or kill someone for mouthing off to them or calling them a pig or giving them the finger or just disrespecting them then it does tend to restrict their 'freedom'. It might even dissuade some sadists from becoming cops in the first place. They might actually be forced to join a private criminal gang instead of a state sponsored one in order to engage in violence like they watch on TV.
I believe a simple solution that would prevent a lot of police brutality and sometimes even murder would be to require every police officer to record every encounter they have with a suspect. If there is no recording and no unbiased witnesses (as in someone who isn't a cop or other government agent) then the suspect is presumed 100% innocent without a trial. Full stop. And the recording should be immediately uploaded to a police server which no police officer has any direct access to without the presence of a witness representing the people. Ideally someone who was themselves a victim of police brutality. Or it could be uploaded somewhere public where anyone can watch the footage and where the police don't have any ability to remove or delete it. Time after time the police have shown that they cannot be trusted, that they will abuse their power if given half a chance, and that many are willing to act as badly as the most violent criminal. Any search for "police brutality" on youtube can tell you that. It's idiotic that we still treat them like they are some kind of angel impervious to even so much as an impure thought. They are just people. People who in many cases used to beat up other kids for their lunch money. Now they have a badge and a gun and no real limits on their actions. To them it's like heaven. To us, a nightmare.
They really do want to catch bad guys while not trampling civil rights, believe it or not.
Uh. No they don't. Believe it or not. They are not there for any kind of philosophical reason. Most cops don't know or care about philosophy any more than any members of a street gang. What they do know is what to say in order to fool gullible people like you into believing their bullshit. They are there because they love their job, which from their point of view is to beat the shit out of as many people as possible and maybe even occasionally get to shoot some. Don't ever, ever forget that they are not on your side, that they are not nice, and not your friend, and that they will turn on you as unpredictably as any wild animal.
And, unlike you, I actually have specific evidence for this. I was attacked and nearly killed by a cop in front of 20-30 other heavily armed and body armored cops and not only did not a single one try to protect me, but they all backed up the psycho-sadist cop's story. A story that could have resulted in my going to prison for many years in addition to ending up in the hospital with severe injuries even though I had not broken a single law and was just minding my own business. Not a single one stood up to do what's right and tell the truth about what happened. After this happened, I noticed that nearly everyone I told my story to had at least one story of their own of police abuse, sadism, and dishonesty. Your attitude to the police as at least as dangerous as the people who believe grizzly bears and polar bears are like cuddly stuffed animals. With predictable results when they actually face one. The majority of police are violent, angry, sadistic thugs certainly no better than members of the most violent street gangs and that is how they should be treated if you value your life even a little.
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.merimobiles.com/HAIPAD_I7_IPS_1024_600_Multitouch_Screen_with_Andr_p/meri4253.htm
Why spend even $199 when you can get a perfectly good tablet with an IPS screen for only $129? Spending $500 for an iPad 3 is crazy enough. Spending any more than $500 for a tablet is completely ridiculous.
It is also worth noting that the introductory price for the [Bugatti Veyron Super Sport] - [1.65 million Euros] - has yet to be significantly challanged by any Veyron-killer coming to market. If it's really "overpriced" at that point, where are the host of competitors that offer the same (or better) features for a lower price?
I am guessing that your income is orders of magnitude higher than my own. For me $500 is a lot of money. I can buy a perfectly good 7" Chinese tablet for $150. Why should I spend more than 3 times that for features which in practice are probably not all that noticeable? Even $150 is hard to justify for an ultraportable product that I know I am going to drop and break eventually. For a product that just sits on a desk at home it is easy to justify $500. For a product that you carry around with you, it's strictly a rich man's luxury product. Similar to an iPhone.
You really only think "yuppies" can afford a $399 iPad?
Only rich people can afford to replace their $499 device every time they drop it. Tablets are in the ultra-portable category which means it's going to get dropped and/or stolen at regular intervals. I might be able to afford a $499 device every few years, but not every few months. That's why people like me would not even consider a tablet which costs more than $200. In fact, $200 is pushing it. There are loads of (Chinese) 7" tablets with many of the features of the iPad and the Nexus for $150 - $170 USD including shipping from China. And for $200 you can easily find a nice 9.7" tablet. Of course I'd rather have an iPad, but not for 2-3 times the price. Only people who are rich or who have some kind of intense burning need for the portability of a screen-only device are going to consider $500 a reasonable price.
A DUI/DWI checkpoint exists to catch drunk drivers, and they tend to be fairly effective at it. The cops also don't harass you, they check to make sure you don't smell like you took a bath in a martini, and let you go. They don't force you to get out, grope your genitals and then take naked photos of you. They don't give a crap if you bring a bag of candy with you - they just don't want you to drive drunk (which we can all agree is reasonable).
Actually that hasn't been my experience. I don't drink and I most certainly did not smell from alcohol and I was attacked and severely beaten and then arrested on a whole bunch of false charges including a felony charge at a DUI checkpoint. I was even charged with a DUI until I finally begged a cop at the station to let me take the breathalyzer test to prove my innocence. When it did they dropped the DUI charge but left all the others. I wouldn't play their reindeer games. I chose to remain silent and refused to answer any of their questions and did not sufficiently respect the authority of one particular angry cop who nearly killed me because of it.
Even though I was badly beaten with my face and head covered in blood and arrested and thrown in jail no one touched my genitals at any time. The part about the TSA patdown being the same as a police patdown is utter BS. Probably because the cops don't relish the idea of fondling your genitals. At least if you're male. Unlike the TSA agents who probably applied for the job because it turns them on.
I think at first you would have been correct that most people support the TSA, but I believe public opinion has changed now to the point that I think there is a slight majority who are against the TSA. As more and more people get violated at the airport public opinion has nowhere to go but further against the TSA. If there were a national referendum so that people could vote directly for or against the TSA, I believe the TSA would lose.
As far as marches go, they don't work anymore. The government would send in riot police who would get the chance to beat the shit out of protestors and maybe even shoot some. Such protests just aren't tolerated anymore. There were huge protests against the Iraqi invasion in both the US and the UK and it did absolutely nothing. Public opinion polls are a lot more useful. In a majority rules society like ours politicians only care about what the majority of voters think and even then the influence is quite limited.
You go first, AC. Full disclosure. Do you in fact work for the DHS or TSA?
I dislike the scanners as much as most other normal people, and it seems the evidence suggests they are ineffective. But the constant complaining about being seen naked puts me off and I don't care to be associated people who are obviously either overacting the part or have legit mental issues related to their body.
You realize that nearly the same argument could be made about a cavity search. Just like we all have genitals which look similar, we all have intestines which look similar. No need to be shy about it when national security is at stake. So bend over and allow yourself to be fully searched. Anyone who objects to that clearly has serious mental issues and can be safely ignored.
Emotionally I object to being seen naked by anyone I am not about to have sex with. Intellectually/philosophically I greatly object to any society where a government agent is allowed to strip search innocent people who just want to exercise the basic human right to move about freely. Notice how I didn't use the term "constitutional" right. The constitution may or may not protect a citizen's freedom to move about freely, but basic human rights most certainly do. Personally I would rather die than allow a TSA agent to see me naked.
Terahertz wave scanners, while perhaps dry it's the correct technical term
Citation badly needed. AFAIK those scanners do not operate anywhere near Thz frequencies. More like 27 - 30 Ghz.
You seem to believe that I am pro-ID. As I have stated in each and every post, I am not . My point was only that your argument against ID was silly. Who cares what a judge says? Argument from Authority is always silly, but using a judge as an authority is totally ridiculous. You may respect their authority, but that doesn't mean that everyone does, and even if we all did it isn't any kind of a rational argument.
Intelligent design is by far the less probable hypothesis. If you are going to make an argument make it with logic and/or empirical observation or the results of experiments, not by claiming that some Important Person said something so it must be true.
The point about atheism is that you seemed to be under the impression that I was arguing that some kind of supernatural creature created life. Since I am in fact an atheist that is clearly not the case. As to whether you believe I am atheist. Well that is funny. It is hard to imagine a religious person claiming to be an atheist. For what reason? To win some kind of argument on the internet?
I agree that what most people call "intelligent design" is not science. It is not based purely on logic and rational thought. Actually what it really is is a rationalization. In the end evidence would make no difference. Their belief in a supernatural creator being is absolute. There is no form of 'evidence' that would convince them otherwise.
Other people in the discussion have been talking about various 'ancient alien' hypothesis. I don't believe in those either simply because there is no evidence for them and their lack is a simpler hypothesis, but neither is there any specific evidence that our planet was not the pet project of some alien life form a million years or so more advanced than us. It is unlikely, but certainly not impossible.
I have no idea how anyone can attack Kickstarter unless they make their money in some competing paradigm (like a game or book publisher) or are just jealous or they are a lawyer hoping to buy a new Porsche this year. Yes. Kickstarter can be used to scam people out of money, and yes, if they had no intention of completing the project then it is a form of fraud. But I don't understand why you blame Kickstarter. It is totally not their fault. No one is forcing anyone to 'contribute' to a project.
If you want to blame someone blame the scammer himself I won't shed any tears for them if they get prosecuted for fraud. Although I do think the state should have to show intent. No point in filling the already fit to burst jails with people who are merely incompetent, but don't realize it. Just because the system runs on the 'honor system' does not mean there is anything wrong with it. Some people really are honest and sincere. It is unfortunate that some people are good at appearing honest and sincere when they are not, but that's the nature of life.
The US was mainly known as a country of merchants, of traders. Never a country of intellectuals and scientists. The space program had more to do with the cold war, with military applications, than with science or even exploration for its own sake.
Arguing for a space program because it will lead to more scientists is just a pathetic argument even if it were true, which it probably isn't. A space program should stand or fall on its own merits. If the majority of Americans don't care about space or lacks curiosity about what might be 'out there' then perhaps what's left of the US space program should be ended. Who cares about "boldly going" anywhere when American Idol or a football or baseball game is on?
I suppose they could put the money saved from NASA toward furthering the police state and security theatre. Americans may not like spending money on space exploration, but I suppose they are quite content with spending billions to be able to pretend that they are safe from bogeyman terrorists. We'll lose some astronauts, but gain more TSA agents or, if we're lucky even more invasive xray machines that will 'protect us' from body bombs. That way the majority can have the society that they so richly deserve.
Do you truly speak for all of the UK? Are you their spokesperson?
I am an atheist. I do not believe in a god or magic fairies or ghosts or goblins. I believe what there is evidence for. I am not aware of any evidence that the earth was 'seeded' by anyone. If someone were to present such evidence I would be open to it however. It is not impossible. I assume by calling it 'bunk' you are attempting to claim that it is impossible. An absurd position to maintain and one for which you have presented no evidence.
Nevertheless it seems quite clear to me that the idea that life on earth started on its own is the most 'likely' hypothesis. It cannot actually be proven, but it is a much simpler hypothesis. So I guess it comes down to Occam's Razor. A very useful rule of thumb.
You seem religious in your certainty. Science is not about certainty. It is about evidence. There really isn't a great deal that science can actually say about the origin of life on this planet. Some questions are nearly unanswerable. It's too bad that people find that so hard to accept. I don't think such people should become scientists. Uncertainty, the state of simply not knowing something, is essential to science. Religion evolved as a substitute for uncertainty. For people who were so afraid of uncertainty, of something that is simply unknown, that they are willing to give up rational thought and substitute fairy tales.
We will never know if there is an 'edge' to the "universe". We will never know whether there are other "universes" outside of our own or what things were really like before the big bang. Science cannot answer such questions. Some or all of those questions may even be unknowable.
So you think a civil war is the answer to global warming then? What makes you think they will not just rebuild the old plants, but hire a well trained army to defend them? I think what will happen is the brainwashed Facebook generation will finally vote in some kook who starts the process of shutting down fossil fuel plants and replacing them with nuclear ones (the only 'solution' that would actually work at least for a while), but the rest of the world who didn't have the benefit of the brainwashing will just keep on keeping on. Of course if you nuke enough countries, at least all the major cities, there might be so few people that the problem solves itself.
Don't underestimate the passion of people on the other side of things. Perhaps the US could split into two countries. One that wants everything to be powered by water wheels and horses and the other that continues burning fossil fuels along with most other countries on the planet. You could fight to try to force everyone to stop burning. If you decided to use nuclear weapons you might even succeed. But even if you did conquer every country in the world, it would be awfully hard to enforce a ban on burning. Conquering a country is one thing. Ruling it with an iron fist is quite another.
Are you an attorney? I don't believe in intelligent design, but I don't particularly care what some judge thinks. Why even mention it? It isn't evidence for anything. Judges are not arbiters of truth.
Last I read (somewhere), statistics indicated life probably did NOT get created on earth, but more and likely arrived on an asteroid or something similar, possibly a space craft, but that was just one of the possibilities.
Last you read? If you cannot remember the source, you should at least present the evidence. If you can't at least remember the evidence then you could be accused of not having any idea what you are talking about.
Why does everything have to be measured by how well it serves "science"? What makes science so special? Fuck science. Seriously. If you want to perform some boring experiment that no one would care about besides someone in your field then pay for it yourself. Or get your university to pay for it. Those $50,000/year tuitions should pay for something. Of course if you happen to work for a private company then you can probably guess who I think should pay for it. Especially when any engineering that results from the science is immediately patented and the results are withheld behind an absurdly expensive pay wall.
IMO, NASA shouldn't be about science. We already have the NSF and god knows how much grant money for tax-funded science. NASA should be about space exploration and I'm disappointed with their progress in this regard. I would happily donate more than I pay in taxes for a truly sexy space mission. Particularly one where I could see recent video footage from a helmet-cam or from ship mounted cameras and see interviews of the astronauts etc. For a geek all of that is high entertainment. On the rare occasion that NASA actually does something interesting.
What do I consider interesting?
1. Anything involving a mission to Alpha Centauri. Even just early paper planning.
2. A manned mission to Mars would be nice. Especially if the aim is to do the groundwork for building a habitat there. They might even carry building and life support supplies and start setting up a skinned geodesic dome or whatever. Eventually we really should send humans there or at least a robot with something close to the ability of a human. And not just to walk on Martian soil, but to stay for a while exploring. Sorry. I keep using that dirty word.
3. The Jovian moons. Manned or unmanned we should be spending more time there. Now that would be exploration. How about a long lived RTG powered rover on Titan and Io and Europa and Ganymede. And how about a plan to keep the rover powered and exploring for decades? NASA should have a website that streams all of the different rover video live, or as close to live as you can get with that kind of distance.
Once we have explored and visited all of the interesting places in our own system we should switch gears into interstellar mode and spend 100% of NASA's funding toward that end. What would that involve?
1. A permanent manned lunar base complete with its own nuclear and solar generators.
2. Lunar mining and a lunar smelter. Perhaps using a solar furnace to at least get aluminum to its melting point and hopefully iron as well.
3. Some kind of more cost effective Earth-Moon launching system. Or at least more research into possibilities like that Heinlein-esque rail-gun launcher that we all read about not too long ago.
4. An Earth-Moon Lagrange point base for final assembly and launch of prototype and scale model craft. An excellent place to continue Freeman Dyson and Ted Taylor's excellent work on nuclear pulse propulsion with Earth-made and hopefully some lunar-made parts.
Actually, I wouldn't mind if we just skipped all the interplanetary stuff and started immediately on humanities first step to the stars. Our species has walked on the moon which used to be just a light in the sky. In the next few centuries I hope we can find the will to start building toward finally seeing what another sun looks like and possibly a whole new set of planets to explore. You never know. We might even find something interesting. Artifacts or fossils or even some form of life, but not as we know it.
OTOH we could all just stay home and watch American Idol. Space exploration is too difficult and expensive and dangerous for cowardly and lazy homo sapiens. If aliens ever do land here I can only imagine the contempt they would feel for our pathetic efforts at space exploration. "You haven't even traveled further than your own moon?"
Neal Stephenson is a multi-millionaire.
He's one of my favorite writers. So I'm happy if it's true, but how do you know this?
What do you have against Kickstarter? It's not fundamentally different from gambling or the stock market? Of course some people are going to use Kickstarter for take-the-money-and-run scams. That's just the nature of the beast. When you gamble sometimes you lose. An excellent reason to only invest in projects run by people you are familiar with and who you feel you can trust to complete the project and not just take the money. And before you complain about the word 'investment' the returns are not monetary. The return on the investment is some kind of creative project getting completed that would not otherwise have been.
I believe that Kickstarter is a new paradigm. People are overly optimistic now. I think as more and more people get burned they will be far more cautious about which projects they choose to invest in. It won't kill the crowdfunding paradigm. It will just remind people not to be so stupid and gullible. And some dishonest people are going to make enough money to move to an island somewhere and never work another day in their life. People hold up liquor stores for a few hundred bucks. A Kickstarter scam is more like robbing a bank. So, yeah, there are going to be scams and they will get more and more sophisticated as time goes on. Caveat emptor.
They need "reasonable suspicion" to perform a terry stop. And it must be something specific that the cop can point to. Being black and American is not sufficient. Why is how you react to it important? The smartest thing to do is just to STFU because talking to the police is always stupid, but I did that and was still arrested on contempt of cop charges which included a felony. Even though some things are legal doesn't mean the police are going to like it, and if they get angry with you you'll be lucky if all that happens is you spend the night in jail and have to hire a lawyer for contempt of cop charges and go to trial. They may also decide to teach you a lesson in a more physical way that leaves you in the hospital or a body bag.
So what do you think a fair punishment would be for "being a loudmouth"? Death? Just a broken nose? Some broken ribs as well? How about some trumped up felony charges? Clearly you believe it should be punished somehow.
Would it surprise you to hear about the police harassing or beating a quiet, shy person whose only crime was to remain silent when questioned? Your experience with the police is not universal. My experience is very different, and I draw some very different conclusions. Some people might even say that filming the police while carrying a gun is an idiotic thing to do and that you deserve whatever happens to you including getting shot. I'm not saying that, and I don't believe that of course, but quite a few people would. If the cop claims you drew on him it would be difficult to prove him wrong and you would have to.
It goes further than that. If the police are telling the truth about what happened. If their story is not made up. Then the video would help the prosecution with its case. Not hurt it. As I've said before, my state used to have a policy of video taping every DUI roadblock, but they stopped because it hurt the prosecution more than it helped them. The videos tended to corroborate the story of the defendant. It is contemptible that we as a society do not force the police to record every interaction they have with the public. If they are obeying the law themselves and are making legitimate, by-the-book arrests then the video will help them. If they just want to beat or kill someone for mouthing off to them or calling them a pig or giving them the finger or just disrespecting them then it does tend to restrict their 'freedom'. It might even dissuade some sadists from becoming cops in the first place. They might actually be forced to join a private criminal gang instead of a state sponsored one in order to engage in violence like they watch on TV.
I believe a simple solution that would prevent a lot of police brutality and sometimes even murder would be to require every police officer to record every encounter they have with a suspect. If there is no recording and no unbiased witnesses (as in someone who isn't a cop or other government agent) then the suspect is presumed 100% innocent without a trial. Full stop. And the recording should be immediately uploaded to a police server which no police officer has any direct access to without the presence of a witness representing the people. Ideally someone who was themselves a victim of police brutality. Or it could be uploaded somewhere public where anyone can watch the footage and where the police don't have any ability to remove or delete it. Time after time the police have shown that they cannot be trusted, that they will abuse their power if given half a chance, and that many are willing to act as badly as the most violent criminal. Any search for "police brutality" on youtube can tell you that. It's idiotic that we still treat them like they are some kind of angel impervious to even so much as an impure thought. They are just people. People who in many cases used to beat up other kids for their lunch money. Now they have a badge and a gun and no real limits on their actions. To them it's like heaven. To us, a nightmare.
They really do want to catch bad guys while not trampling civil rights, believe it or not.
Uh. No they don't. Believe it or not. They are not there for any kind of philosophical reason. Most cops don't know or care about philosophy any more than any members of a street gang. What they do know is what to say in order to fool gullible people like you into believing their bullshit. They are there because they love their job, which from their point of view is to beat the shit out of as many people as possible and maybe even occasionally get to shoot some. Don't ever, ever forget that they are not on your side, that they are not nice, and not your friend, and that they will turn on you as unpredictably as any wild animal.
And, unlike you, I actually have specific evidence for this. I was attacked and nearly killed by a cop in front of 20-30 other heavily armed and body armored cops and not only did not a single one try to protect me, but they all backed up the psycho-sadist cop's story. A story that could have resulted in my going to prison for many years in addition to ending up in the hospital with severe injuries even though I had not broken a single law and was just minding my own business. Not a single one stood up to do what's right and tell the truth about what happened. After this happened, I noticed that nearly everyone I told my story to had at least one story of their own of police abuse, sadism, and dishonesty. Your attitude to the police as at least as dangerous as the people who believe grizzly bears and polar bears are like cuddly stuffed animals. With predictable results when they actually face one. The majority of police are violent, angry, sadistic thugs certainly no better than members of the most violent street gangs and that is how they should be treated if you value your life even a little.
you probably deserved to be attacked.
What makes you say that? Neo-Nazi sympathies?