Well, how's that for irony? [answers.com] Mr. Potts, meet ms. Black. What I would call an argument from ignorance [wikipedia.org] is the fact that people mention this "90% of matter is missing" without any idea of what it means. No, matter isn't "missing". What happens is that *VISIBLE STARS* account for only 10% or so of the matter that *WE KNOW* exists in galaxies.
Wow. You're a little touchy, you know that? However, even though all you seem interested in doing is splitting hairs, you've demonstrated my point by accident quite well.
What happens is that *VISIBLE STARS* account for only 10% or so of the matter that *WE KNOW* exists in galaxies.
So, we know that the other 90% is definitely matter that we cannot see? Sounds like there's been a breakthrough I haven't heard about. Hmmm. Let me check Wikipedia. That's usually a good place to start.
A proposed alternative to physical dark matter particles has been to suppose that the observed inconsistencies are due to an incomplete understanding of gravitation. To explain the observations, the gravitational force has to become stronger than the Newtonian approximation at great distances or in weak fields. One of the proposed models is Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND), which corrects Newton's laws at small acceleration. However, constructing a relativistic MOND theory has been troublesome, and it is not clear how the theory can be reconciled with gravitational lensing measurements of the deflection of light around galaxies. The leading relativistic MOND theory, proposed by Jacob Bekenstein in 2004 is called "TeVeS" for Tensor-Vector-Scalar and solves many of the problems of earlier attempts. A similar theory proposed by John W. Moffatt is Nonsymmetric Gravitational Theory.
In another class of theories one attempts to reconcile gravitation with quantum mechanics and obtains corrections to the conventional gravitational interaction. In scalar-tensor theories, scalar fields like the Higgs field couples to the curvature given through the Riemann tensor or its traces. In many of such theories, the scalar field equals the inflaton field, which is needed to explain the inflation of the universe after the Big Bang, as the dominating factor of the quintessence or Dark Energy. Using an approach based on the exact renormalization group, M. Reuter and H. Weyer have shown [7] that Newton's constant and the cosmological constant can be scalar functions on spacetime if one associates RG scales to the points of spacetime.
Well! What do you know. Looks like that one is still up for debate. And that demonstrates my original point quite well.
There is a lot out there that we just don't know yet. Just the simple fact that 90% of the matter in the universe is (ok, I won't say missing - that upsets you) unaccounted for and up for debate as to where or even what it is (better?), then it is supremely arrogant to say that no mechanism exists for telepathy. Mankind doesn't understand the universe all that well, the human mind very well, and even consciousness itself hardly at all.
Don't shut down lines of inquiry just because you don't perceive them as possible. The universe still has surprises in store for us. I'm sure of that much at least.
Back In The Day(tm) you bought Hot Wheels and it was up to you to determine what they did. Could you make a track that would make them do a loop? Make it all the way down into the basement without jumping the track? And along the way you learned a lot about how the world worked. Notice how the car can never get higher than its starting point without a push? When I read about potential and kinetic energy in high school first thing I thought was "Aha! The Hot Wheels problem! I've seen this before."
But nowadays (opposite of BITD, see above) the sets only do one thing. The idea is to maximize revenue. A kid gets hooked on Hot Wheels and they buy set A. They do everything set A can do, then they have to buy set B. And of course, sets A and B are not compatible.
And that's what is wrong with todays sets. No room to grow with them. Of course they get boring quick - that's part of the revenue model. They're designed not to hold your interest very long - you can only do one thing per set. Don't confuse poor toy design with ADHD or video game addiction. You are making a more boring product these days. Your revenue-maximizing model you've fallen in love with is the broken part. Go back to making general sets as well as your special kits and you'll see interest in Hot Wheels perk back up I'll bet.
Two hundred years ago such questions would have made sense. Today we know there isn't any mechanism for that.
This is an argument from ignorance. You're saying that you haven't seen a mechanism, therefore one doesn't exist.
Can you honestly tell me that in a universe where 90% of the matter is, by our best science, missing - there is no possibility that we may have overlooked something?
Remember, less than a hundred years ago we thought radio traveled through the luminiferous ether. And at the time, it made sense.
In response to stiff competition from AMD, the company is laying off 1000 managerial positions.
And
Chief Executive Paul Otellini vowed to spend the next 90 days identifying underperforming business groups and cost inefficiencies in an effort to save the company $1 billion a year.
$1,000,000,000 / 1000 = $1,000,000
Managers at Intel make an average of a million a year!
So...I hear there are a few openings. I promise for a million a year MY unit won't be underperforming. Whaddya say? Anyone still left at Intel after the purge who may be reading this...call me!
At work I use the player version to install temp software. For example, on a daily basis I have to use Microsoft Windows Platform Builder 5.0. We recently got the CE6 beta. For a project, I'm supposed to learn about it and use it to make a few demo images.
So rather than risking having the CE6 beta pooch my whole install, I just make a 20GB disk image using qemu, edit a vmx file and make a system. Load XP SP2 on that, Visual Studio and the beta and I'm ready to rock. Runs like a champ.
Another thing I do is have a VMware virtual machine on my external 40GB USB2 hard drive. It's a Mandriva Linux 10 image, and I use that for personal programming during down time at work. Or if I want to read web pages and dodge the spyware. I have another image that I'm using to design simple circuit boards using the freeware Eagle software. I can start an autoroute job, then simply move the whole machine out of my way and keep working. This is extra great at home, since I'm on a Athlon X2 dual core 4400. The virtual machine runs at full tilt on one processor, and I can play Mechwarrior 4 on the other one. With no lag or skipping. It's a blast.
At home, another good use is their browser appliance. It's a virtual machine running Linux that dodges practically all spyware. I'm going to hook my wife up with it sometime here soon. She likes to visit song lyric sites and they keep loading crap on her Windows install.
Time-varying constants of nature violate Einstein's equivalence principle, which says that any experiment testing nuclear or electromagnetic forces should give the same result no matter where or when it is performed.
Maybe there is a hidden assumption in there. Maybe space itself isn't constant.
We're already thinking that space may have an energy to it. If it has energy, then space would have an equivalent mass. Possibly you could describe that as a density of sorts.
So if space itself has a sort of density, then maybe the slight differences you see in the constants are caused by the varying density of different regions of space they are traveling through to be measured.
IANAP, YMMV, etc. But I think it might be at least possible. Einstein's principle above would have to be edited to say "in equivalent spaces".
That always seems to be the way of scientific progress. You create a set of equations describing what you see, like Newton did. Then someone can see a little farther, and amend them like Einstein did. Another amendment wouldn't be "questioning the laws of nature", it would just simply be understanding them a little better.
Well, it seems to me that if space itself has a nonzero energy, you may be able to stop looking for that extra matter/energy that is missing from the big bang. Most of the universe is...well, space. That might account for that missing 90%, right?
Lebanese authorities captured an Al Qaeda member who confessed to the plot, and stated that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had pledged financial and other support for the operation.
One counter-terrorism source told the Daily News it was doubtful a plot to blow it up would be feasible, saying huge amounts of explosives and a detailed knowledge of blast effect would be necessary.
Ok, so all I have to do is hang out in chatrooms until I find some Al Qaeda guy and tell him some off-the-wall plan for a plot. And they'll fund me!
Old and busted, 419 scam baiting. New hotness: Al Qaeda scam baiting.
First one to get a picture of some Al Qaeda guy holding up a sign that says "I traded my 72 virgins for a pulled pork sandwich" wins.
It would be a lot of work, if you did it manually. The print screen button is really just a proof of concept idea. Remember that the device is a computer and they excell at repetition.
For example, it wouldn't be too hard to write a DirectX driver for a virtual display device that simply passes every frame it sees into a filter for recording. Same should work for audio, really. Just take the inbound stream and stash it somehwere. As long as you've got the bandwidth inside the machine to move the data and the space to store it, why not?
This is why MS is pushing so hard for that "driver verification" thing. User created drivers can bypass the DRM just before the media gets pushed out to the hardware. The Windows box simply isn't built for DRM level trust at all points in a broadcast. Yet, anyways. It's still possible to break the chain somewhere and extract content. I'm guessing that'll always be the case too, at least for a good long while. Only way to get around that with what we have today would be if MS started selling PCs that are welded shut.
I don't think it's that people don't trust their stuff being on other people's computers so much. Look at what most people are willing to send through email, for example. I think the larger issue is visibility. With all your files on someone else's computer, they are no longer private.
And people's computers are actually more private than the diary books of old. They hold more private info.
I worked for years as a computer tech back when I was in college. One of the things I'd do if I was bored was to do the Windows equivalent of a "find | grep jpg" on someone else's pc. First time I did it I was looking to free up hard drive space. From there on out, it was so darn entertaining I'd do it as a matter of course. You'd be surprised what the people around you are really like.
When they coined the term "personal computer", I'm betting they didn't know exactly how personal they would wind up being. This is why IMHO the remote OS thing will never work. Nobody wants the world to know these kinds of details about themselves.
I'm doing tech support and office networking for a small office of a half a dozen lawyers. They order new PCs from me. I buy parts, assemble, install Win98, run the cable - the works. They are now a nice neat networked office. I test the daylights out of everything, and head home satisfied.
After a few days, one of the lawyers calls me. "I can't get on the network."
So zap, off I go to the office. I boot his machine and sure enough, no net. My first thought is to re-seat the network card. I crawl under his desk and slide the machine out of the cubby. Take the cover off and set that aside. Reseat the card, reboot for a test, and we're back on the net. Put it all back together and make a final test once it's all back where it belongs.
And it's off the net again. I assume I bumped the cord putting the thing back in the cubby and wiggled the card back loose. So I repeat the procedure. Three times.
And each time it repeats. Soon as it's back together in the cubby, no net.
On the fourth pass, I happened to run my hand down the far side of the case cover. I hadn't looked there before. Each time I would take the case cover off, I'd grab it by the front and back and just set it aside. But on that particular try, I felt something there.
He had lined the side of his case in strip refrigerator magnets to hold post-it notes.
...they should be suing ROMS first, to get the money that AllofMP3 and presumably other organisations are paying which isn't being paid to the artists.
Do we know that the ROMS aren't paying their dues? I'm betting that they are. As lawsuit-happy as the RIAA and their ilk happen to be, if the ROMS didn't uphold their legal end of the bargain these guys would be all over them. But as of today - they aren't.
Could the lack of a lawsuit imply that what they are doing is legal - and the RIAA knows that?
Slashdot Mirror
Well, how's that for irony? [answers.com] Mr. Potts, meet ms. Black. What I would call an argument from ignorance [wikipedia.org] is the fact that people mention this "90% of matter is missing" without any idea of what it means. No, matter isn't "missing". What happens is that *VISIBLE STARS* account for only 10% or so of the matter that *WE KNOW* exists in galaxies.
Wow. You're a little touchy, you know that? However, even though all you seem interested in doing is splitting hairs, you've demonstrated my point by accident quite well.
What happens is that *VISIBLE STARS* account for only 10% or so of the matter that *WE KNOW* exists in galaxies.
So, we know that the other 90% is definitely matter that we cannot see? Sounds like there's been a breakthrough I haven't heard about. Hmmm. Let me check Wikipedia. That's usually a good place to start.
A proposed alternative to physical dark matter particles has been to suppose that the observed inconsistencies are due to an incomplete understanding of gravitation. To explain the observations, the gravitational force has to become stronger than the Newtonian approximation at great distances or in weak fields. One of the proposed models is Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND), which corrects Newton's laws at small acceleration. However, constructing a relativistic MOND theory has been troublesome, and it is not clear how the theory can be reconciled with gravitational lensing measurements of the deflection of light around galaxies. The leading relativistic MOND theory, proposed by Jacob Bekenstein in 2004 is called "TeVeS" for Tensor-Vector-Scalar and solves many of the problems of earlier attempts. A similar theory proposed by John W. Moffatt is Nonsymmetric Gravitational Theory.
In another class of theories one attempts to reconcile gravitation with quantum mechanics and obtains corrections to the conventional gravitational interaction. In scalar-tensor theories, scalar fields like the Higgs field couples to the curvature given through the Riemann tensor or its traces. In many of such theories, the scalar field equals the inflaton field, which is needed to explain the inflation of the universe after the Big Bang, as the dominating factor of the quintessence or Dark Energy. Using an approach based on the exact renormalization group, M. Reuter and H. Weyer have shown [7] that Newton's constant and the cosmological constant can be scalar functions on spacetime if one associates RG scales to the points of spacetime.
Well! What do you know. Looks like that one is still up for debate. And that demonstrates my original point quite well.
There is a lot out there that we just don't know yet. Just the simple fact that 90% of the matter in the universe is (ok, I won't say missing - that upsets you) unaccounted for and up for debate as to where or even what it is (better?), then it is supremely arrogant to say that no mechanism exists for telepathy. Mankind doesn't understand the universe all that well, the human mind very well, and even consciousness itself hardly at all.
Don't shut down lines of inquiry just because you don't perceive them as possible. The universe still has surprises in store for us. I'm sure of that much at least.
Back In The Day(tm) you bought Hot Wheels and it was up to you to determine what they did. Could you make a track that would make them do a loop? Make it all the way down into the basement without jumping the track? And along the way you learned a lot about how the world worked. Notice how the car can never get higher than its starting point without a push? When I read about potential and kinetic energy in high school first thing I thought was "Aha! The Hot Wheels problem! I've seen this before."
But nowadays (opposite of BITD, see above) the sets only do one thing. The idea is to maximize revenue. A kid gets hooked on Hot Wheels and they buy set A. They do everything set A can do, then they have to buy set B. And of course, sets A and B are not compatible.
And that's what is wrong with todays sets. No room to grow with them. Of course they get boring quick - that's part of the revenue model. They're designed not to hold your interest very long - you can only do one thing per set. Don't confuse poor toy design with ADHD or video game addiction. You are making a more boring product these days. Your revenue-maximizing model you've fallen in love with is the broken part. Go back to making general sets as well as your special kits and you'll see interest in Hot Wheels perk back up I'll bet.
Two hundred years ago such questions would have made sense. Today we know there isn't any mechanism for that.
This is an argument from ignorance. You're saying that you haven't seen a mechanism, therefore one doesn't exist.
Can you honestly tell me that in a universe where 90% of the matter is, by our best science, missing - there is no possibility that we may have overlooked something?
Remember, less than a hundred years ago we thought radio traveled through the luminiferous ether. And at the time, it made sense.
This is an interesting article about the NFL and the collection of facts known as sports scores. It seems appropriate to the topic.
"I demand my nude picture be removed from the internet immediately!"
Well. Good luck with that.
Its scary just how much over the salary someone costs.
Apparently the world agrees with you. I thought my post was teh funny, but *damn* did I get downmodded hard.
Ah well. Sometimes you get some seriously grouchy modding here. =)
Seriously! From TFB:
In response to stiff competition from AMD, the company is laying off 1000 managerial positions.
And
Chief Executive Paul Otellini vowed to spend the next 90 days identifying underperforming business groups and cost inefficiencies in an effort to save the company $1 billion a year.
$1,000,000,000 / 1000 = $1,000,000
Managers at Intel make an average of a million a year!
So...I hear there are a few openings. I promise for a million a year MY unit won't be underperforming. Whaddya say? Anyone still left at Intel after the purge who may be reading this...call me!
OSWeekly.com talks about net neutrality and how it would impact the world of operating systems, both online and offline
First thought about that was WTF - how would this impact an offline system? Scanned the article and there isn't any mention of it.
Any takers, anyone?
Go to CompUSA and look on the shelves. Tell me what you see.
Stat.
At work I use the player version to install temp software. For example, on a daily basis I have to use Microsoft Windows Platform Builder 5.0. We recently got the CE6 beta. For a project, I'm supposed to learn about it and use it to make a few demo images.
So rather than risking having the CE6 beta pooch my whole install, I just make a 20GB disk image using qemu, edit a vmx file and make a system. Load XP SP2 on that, Visual Studio and the beta and I'm ready to rock. Runs like a champ.
Another thing I do is have a VMware virtual machine on my external 40GB USB2 hard drive. It's a Mandriva Linux 10 image, and I use that for personal programming during down time at work. Or if I want to read web pages and dodge the spyware. I have another image that I'm using to design simple circuit boards using the freeware Eagle software. I can start an autoroute job, then simply move the whole machine out of my way and keep working. This is extra great at home, since I'm on a Athlon X2 dual core 4400. The virtual machine runs at full tilt on one processor, and I can play Mechwarrior 4 on the other one. With no lag or skipping. It's a blast.
At home, another good use is their browser appliance. It's a virtual machine running Linux that dodges practically all spyware. I'm going to hook my wife up with it sometime here soon. She likes to visit song lyric sites and they keep loading crap on her Windows install.
"You'll be missed."
From the blurb:
Time-varying constants of nature violate Einstein's equivalence principle, which says that any experiment testing nuclear or electromagnetic forces should give the same result no matter where or when it is performed.
Maybe there is a hidden assumption in there. Maybe space itself isn't constant.
We're already thinking that space may have an energy to it. If it has energy, then space would have an equivalent mass. Possibly you could describe that as a density of sorts.
So if space itself has a sort of density, then maybe the slight differences you see in the constants are caused by the varying density of different regions of space they are traveling through to be measured.
IANAP, YMMV, etc. But I think it might be at least possible. Einstein's principle above would have to be edited to say "in equivalent spaces".
That always seems to be the way of scientific progress. You create a set of equations describing what you see, like Newton did. Then someone can see a little farther, and amend them like Einstein did. Another amendment wouldn't be "questioning the laws of nature", it would just simply be understanding them a little better.
...a spacewalk that hasn't been risky?
Well, it seems to me that if space itself has a nonzero energy, you may be able to stop looking for that extra matter/energy that is missing from the big bang. Most of the universe is...well, space. That might account for that missing 90%, right?
From the blurb:
Lebanese authorities captured an Al Qaeda member who confessed to the plot, and stated that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had pledged financial and other support for the operation.
One counter-terrorism source told the Daily News it was doubtful a plot to blow it up would be feasible, saying huge amounts of explosives and a detailed knowledge of blast effect would be necessary.
Ok, so all I have to do is hang out in chatrooms until I find some Al Qaeda guy and tell him some off-the-wall plan for a plot. And they'll fund me!
Old and busted, 419 scam baiting. New hotness: Al Qaeda scam baiting.
First one to get a picture of some Al Qaeda guy holding up a sign that says "I traded my 72 virgins for a pulled pork sandwich" wins.
You're right, with the 360 that was exactly what MS was trying to do.
Unfortunately for them, they don't know how to weld a box closed very well. =)
It would be a lot of work, if you did it manually. The print screen button is really just a proof of concept idea. Remember that the device is a computer and they excell at repetition.
For example, it wouldn't be too hard to write a DirectX driver for a virtual display device that simply passes every frame it sees into a filter for recording. Same should work for audio, really. Just take the inbound stream and stash it somehwere. As long as you've got the bandwidth inside the machine to move the data and the space to store it, why not?
This is why MS is pushing so hard for that "driver verification" thing. User created drivers can bypass the DRM just before the media gets pushed out to the hardware. The Windows box simply isn't built for DRM level trust at all points in a broadcast. Yet, anyways. It's still possible to break the chain somewhere and extract content. I'm guessing that'll always be the case too, at least for a good long while. Only way to get around that with what we have today would be if MS started selling PCs that are welded shut.
I don't think it's that people don't trust their stuff being on other people's computers so much. Look at what most people are willing to send through email, for example. I think the larger issue is visibility. With all your files on someone else's computer, they are no longer private.
And people's computers are actually more private than the diary books of old. They hold more private info.
I worked for years as a computer tech back when I was in college. One of the things I'd do if I was bored was to do the Windows equivalent of a "find | grep jpg" on someone else's pc. First time I did it I was looking to free up hard drive space. From there on out, it was so darn entertaining I'd do it as a matter of course. You'd be surprised what the people around you are really like.
When they coined the term "personal computer", I'm betting they didn't know exactly how personal they would wind up being. This is why IMHO the remote OS thing will never work. Nobody wants the world to know these kinds of details about themselves.
I'm doing tech support and office networking for a small office of a half a dozen lawyers. They order new PCs from me. I buy parts, assemble, install Win98, run the cable - the works. They are now a nice neat networked office. I test the daylights out of everything, and head home satisfied.
After a few days, one of the lawyers calls me. "I can't get on the network."
So zap, off I go to the office. I boot his machine and sure enough, no net. My first thought is to re-seat the network card. I crawl under his desk and slide the machine out of the cubby. Take the cover off and set that aside. Reseat the card, reboot for a test, and we're back on the net. Put it all back together and make a final test once it's all back where it belongs.
And it's off the net again. I assume I bumped the cord putting the thing back in the cubby and wiggled the card back loose. So I repeat the procedure. Three times.
And each time it repeats. Soon as it's back together in the cubby, no net.
On the fourth pass, I happened to run my hand down the far side of the case cover. I hadn't looked there before. Each time I would take the case cover off, I'd grab it by the front and back and just set it aside. But on that particular try, I felt something there.
He had lined the side of his case in strip refrigerator magnets to hold post-it notes.
Do we know that the ROMS aren't paying their dues? I'm betting that they are. As lawsuit-happy as the RIAA and their ilk happen to be, if the ROMS didn't uphold their legal end of the bargain these guys would be all over them. But as of today - they aren't.
Could the lack of a lawsuit imply that what they are doing is legal - and the RIAA knows that?
At press time, Earthworm Jim was unavailable for comment.
"Stop! Or I shall say 'stop' again!"
Wrong-o, dipshit troll. The calculator says if you pound 3 decent 5% beers you're at .08%, as long as your weight is under 240. Which mine is.
Nice try though. Now back under your bridge.
My friend, I could pound 3 beers and write code that'll do long division. In assembly. ;^)