Nothing in the concept of free speech or the founding fathers enjoins us to subsidize reprehensible ideas.
But that is where you miss the point. You are not giving him $20 to fund his reprehensible ideas. You are giving him $20 (or really a small fraction of that) to buy a book he wrote. At what point did purchasing a book imply that you agreed with the author's political ideas?
"Creative clouds" is not an oxymoron: clouds up here in Canada are extremely creative with their unique individual snowflake designs. In fact any good snow job clearly needs a creative cloud.
Just remember that Card is a person motivated by what he thinks is right not a corporation motivated by money. While you have the right to legally spend your money as you want what you are effectively saying is that you are trying to do is to force someone to change their beliefs or lose their job. So, while you might be acting within your rights, just remember that by doing so you are going against those ideals of free speech and belief that the US was founded on...and if you can't follow them is is any wonder that your government can't either.
By all means disagree with the guy but disagreeing, even vehemently, with him does not mean that you can't admire his skills as an author (although to be honest I'm not impressed with those either).
You never took physics in school? Unless you feed it energy, it cannot increase vibrations. What it can do is reduce vibration, but increase amplitude.
I did - and if you did too perhaps you may remember something called "resonance". With the same rate of energy input I can easily increase the amount of vibration by tweaking the system so that it's resonant frequency is close to the drive frequency or by reducing the damping (I'll let you figure out how that works in terms of energy conservation). Also vibration, in common usage, means amplitude. If I say "the vibration has increased" I mean the amplitude of the vibration has increased so you cannot "reduce vibration, but increase amplitude". If you are talking about the frequency, as I suspect you are, the common expression is to say "vibrating faster" to indicate an increased frequency.
Now you could argue (as we might have expected for one so learned in physics that they feel that they can criticize others) that the arm decreases the frequency of vibration and that the acceleration, which is the important factor for laptops, is decreased with decreasing frequency. However this is only true for Simple Harmonic Motion and I very much doubt that such a complex system will follow that type of oscillation. As a result you might well find that the increased amplitude does indeed lead to an increased acceleration by the laptop. To be certain you'd need to know the details of the system or, easier and more accurate, just measure it. However there is no law of physics which guarantees that the acceleration will be less, or more, than sticking the laptop on a seat and so absolutely no reason to call into question the OP's physics background.
That solves it for the phone but how far away is the cable company's equipment that your cable modem is talking to? My understanding is that this equipment was typically on the same street as the house so a local power cut will probably kill it too rather than a telephone exchange which is probably a few kilometres away and probably has UPS and generators. Presumably if you use DSL you'll have the same reliability as a phone but, where I live, the DSL service is nowhere near as good as the cable internet.
From looking at the story, it seems like some prosecutor here wants to come off as tough on crime and terrorists to further their political career.
...and that is the problem right there. Prosecutors should not have a political career, except in rare circumstances. The US system where practically all public jobs are directly elected just does not work well at all. Apart from the fact that most of the electorate don't even know what some of the jobs are let alone who will do them well it results in people who want to look competent more than they want to be competent...like most politicians.
You really need to try the system most of the rest of the democratic world uses: have your elected officials appoint/hire people for lower public offices like the attorney general. This provides enough insulation from political concerns while still having the electorate ultimately in charge. Politically bad but nevertheless correct decisions (like not prosecuting someone) can then be made without the prosecutor fearing for his/her career.
Regardless of whether it is fibre or wireless the one problem that seems to have been overlooked is what happens in a power cut? The only reason we still have a landline is because of its reliability in an emergency. If local phone companies cut the copper link - which provides external power to a non-cordless phone - I'll dump them and switch to a cheaper net-based alternative.
Wow, why are you so closed minded towards other ideas?
As the saying goes: "Keep an open mind – but not so open that your brain falls out". Even if you accept that his "vision" really happened, and was not the product of a mentally unfit mind, he acknowledges that it is not science and then argues that because sometimes non-scientific methods work it means that science education should contain non-science. That's as logical as arguing that because meteorology sometimes works all music classes should now contain content on predicting the weather..
I think the easiest way to start to fix this would to be to hire masters of different fields to handle patents of said field.
I don't think that is entirely the problem. The other issue is that it is far easier for a patent office to say 'yes' to patents because if they refuse an application this sort of thing happens and, if the lawyer is backed by a large multinational you will probably end up with a major legal battle on your hands. It's essentially intimidation with lawyers to approve the application.
To be fair to the IRS, it is American Business that stops the IRS from providing help and services.
The IRS is part of the US government and the US government makes the laws in the US. How can a business stop them from helping citizens if that is what they _want_ to do?
the tripod junction unit comprises a first leg, a second leg, and a hose conduit;
...or to put it in a way consistent with that: we cable tied the hose to one of the legs (or perhaps threaded it through one of the hollow legs). At that makes it patent worthy? Isn't there some requirement that patents not be incredibly obvious?
No because then you put in considerable labour and you'll likely need to pay self-employment income tax on that. With BitCoin mining I suppose that you could argue that there was labour to generate the coins. However it will be hard to split the profit due to the "labour" from the profit due to the value appreciating over time.
Actually this is Canada - you can ring up Revenue Canada and ask them for free. Unlike the IRS they will tell you what rules they will apply to your situation and what you need to do (unlike the IRS who will never tell you anything other than "do it yourself" and "we'll fine you or take you to court if we think you got it wrong"). If you follow their instructions there will be no issues and if you think that they are wrong you can then talk to an accountant and/or lawyer. They were incredible helpful when I first moved to Canada so I'd definitely talk to them first and potentially save yourself a lot of money in accountant/lawyer fees.
GP is right, the idea that somehow the Government needs a cut of every transaction (rather than just income tax) is absurd.
Yes...and no. I agree that, as someone who pays Canadian income tax, it seems like the government is getting a cut out of everything. However imagine that they did away with capital gains tax. At that point every rich person would be able to get away without paying tax. They would just live off the capital appreciation of their assets. There is a reason why the government has to get it's grubby paws on many transactions - its to ensure that everyone pays some share of the tax. The more things which are exempted the easier it is for the incredibly rich to hire lawyers and avoid paying their share.
For example there are expensive houses in London which are owned by companies whose only purpose in life is to own that house. Instead of selling the house you sell the company because this avoids the stamp duty when properties change ownership. So we are left with a conundrum: allow the rich to get away without paying a fair share of tax or the have the government getting a cut of everything neither of which is a great option.
I for one completely understand the rage.... It enraged my otherwise calm, quiet reserved patent attorney...
Perhaps it's time that patent lawyers got used to having patents rejected if they think that putting a sprinkler on a tripod is patent-worthy. I've no idea whether rejecting this patent was legal but, given the available details, common sense indicates that it should not be. Of course the law has no regard for common sense but still it is refreshing to see at least one stupid patent getting rejected.
It is not every transaction it is just capital gains tax. If you 'mined' BitCoins then the cost was the electricity needed to generate them. If you then sell them for money (or exchange them for goods which have a value) and get more than the cost of mining them then the government taxes you on the capital gain. This is exactly the same as any currency speculation. If BitCoins want to be treated as a real currency then there real tax rules which apply.
I tried to explain it without maths in the post above - the more energy you have the easier it is to make a W or Z boson which is how the neutrino interacts with matter. Think of it like a the neutrino being trapped in a valley and in order to interact it has to get over the valley sides. Fortunately it can tunnel so it does not have to clear the peak but the more energy it has, the higher up the valley side it can get and the easier it is to tunnel through. If it does have enough energy to clear the peak then no tunnelling is required and interactions become very easy.
For a fully detailed, mathematical explanation as to why you need to be able to do simple Feynman diagram calculations. I don't know of a webpage with this on it but Griffiths has an excellent book "Introduction to Elementary Particle Physics" aimed at the senior physics undergrad level and Perkins has a similar one which is slightly lower level.
How was "as we currently assume it" not careful enough?
We do not assume that the Big Bang was asymmetric under translation in time: it might have been or it might not have been. There is no data to justify an assumption one way or the other hence "careful".
Slashdot Mirror
Nothing in the concept of free speech or the founding fathers enjoins us to subsidize reprehensible ideas.
But that is where you miss the point. You are not giving him $20 to fund his reprehensible ideas. You are giving him $20 (or really a small fraction of that) to buy a book he wrote. At what point did purchasing a book imply that you agreed with the author's political ideas?
"Creative clouds" is not an oxymoron: clouds up here in Canada are extremely creative with their unique individual snowflake designs. In fact any good snow job clearly needs a creative cloud.
Just remember that Card is a person motivated by what he thinks is right not a corporation motivated by money. While you have the right to legally spend your money as you want what you are effectively saying is that you are trying to do is to force someone to change their beliefs or lose their job. So, while you might be acting within your rights, just remember that by doing so you are going against those ideals of free speech and belief that the US was founded on...and if you can't follow them is is any wonder that your government can't either.
By all means disagree with the guy but disagreeing, even vehemently, with him does not mean that you can't admire his skills as an author (although to be honest I'm not impressed with those either).
You never took physics in school? Unless you feed it energy, it cannot increase vibrations. What it can do is reduce vibration, but increase amplitude.
I did - and if you did too perhaps you may remember something called "resonance". With the same rate of energy input I can easily increase the amount of vibration by tweaking the system so that it's resonant frequency is close to the drive frequency or by reducing the damping (I'll let you figure out how that works in terms of energy conservation). Also vibration, in common usage, means amplitude. If I say "the vibration has increased" I mean the amplitude of the vibration has increased so you cannot "reduce vibration, but increase amplitude". If you are talking about the frequency, as I suspect you are, the common expression is to say "vibrating faster" to indicate an increased frequency.
Now you could argue (as we might have expected for one so learned in physics that they feel that they can criticize others) that the arm decreases the frequency of vibration and that the acceleration, which is the important factor for laptops, is decreased with decreasing frequency. However this is only true for Simple Harmonic Motion and I very much doubt that such a complex system will follow that type of oscillation. As a result you might well find that the increased amplitude does indeed lead to an increased acceleration by the laptop. To be certain you'd need to know the details of the system or, easier and more accurate, just measure it. However there is no law of physics which guarantees that the acceleration will be less, or more, than sticking the laptop on a seat and so absolutely no reason to call into question the OP's physics background.
That solves it for the phone but how far away is the cable company's equipment that your cable modem is talking to? My understanding is that this equipment was typically on the same street as the house so a local power cut will probably kill it too rather than a telephone exchange which is probably a few kilometres away and probably has UPS and generators. Presumably if you use DSL you'll have the same reliability as a phone but, where I live, the DSL service is nowhere near as good as the cable internet.
From looking at the story, it seems like some prosecutor here wants to come off as tough on crime and terrorists to further their political career.
You really need to try the system most of the rest of the democratic world uses: have your elected officials appoint/hire people for lower public offices like the attorney general. This provides enough insulation from political concerns while still having the electorate ultimately in charge. Politically bad but nevertheless correct decisions (like not prosecuting someone) can then be made without the prosecutor fearing for his/her career.
Aren't all photons created equal?
No, that was the early black and white universe: for the last 13.8 billion years we've had colour.
Regardless of whether it is fibre or wireless the one problem that seems to have been overlooked is what happens in a power cut? The only reason we still have a landline is because of its reliability in an emergency. If local phone companies cut the copper link - which provides external power to a non-cordless phone - I'll dump them and switch to a cheaper net-based alternative.
No, you need house insurance for that.
Interested in an extended warranty on your tiles to cover cracking due to accidentally dropping your smart phone on them?
Perhaps Slashdot has some management issues they need to sort out! ;-)
Wow, why are you so closed minded towards other ideas?
As the saying goes: "Keep an open mind – but not so open that your brain falls out". Even if you accept that his "vision" really happened, and was not the product of a mentally unfit mind, he acknowledges that it is not science and then argues that because sometimes non-scientific methods work it means that science education should contain non-science. That's as logical as arguing that because meteorology sometimes works all music classes should now contain content on predicting the weather..
I think the easiest way to start to fix this would to be to hire masters of different fields to handle patents of said field.
I don't think that is entirely the problem. The other issue is that it is far easier for a patent office to say 'yes' to patents because if they refuse an application this sort of thing happens and, if the lawyer is backed by a large multinational you will probably end up with a major legal battle on your hands. It's essentially intimidation with lawyers to approve the application.
To be fair to the IRS, it is American Business that stops the IRS from providing help and services.
The IRS is part of the US government and the US government makes the laws in the US. How can a business stop them from helping citizens if that is what they _want_ to do?
the tripod junction unit comprises a first leg, a second leg, and a hose conduit;
I can see it now: coming soon to a cinema near you "A Real Quantum of Solace" and "Ion Man"
No because then you put in considerable labour and you'll likely need to pay self-employment income tax on that. With BitCoin mining I suppose that you could argue that there was labour to generate the coins. However it will be hard to split the profit due to the "labour" from the profit due to the value appreciating over time.
Ask an accountant and tax attorney if possible.
Actually this is Canada - you can ring up Revenue Canada and ask them for free. Unlike the IRS they will tell you what rules they will apply to your situation and what you need to do (unlike the IRS who will never tell you anything other than "do it yourself" and "we'll fine you or take you to court if we think you got it wrong"). If you follow their instructions there will be no issues and if you think that they are wrong you can then talk to an accountant and/or lawyer. They were incredible helpful when I first moved to Canada so I'd definitely talk to them first and potentially save yourself a lot of money in accountant/lawyer fees.
GP is right, the idea that somehow the Government needs a cut of every transaction (rather than just income tax) is absurd.
Yes...and no. I agree that, as someone who pays Canadian income tax, it seems like the government is getting a cut out of everything. However imagine that they did away with capital gains tax. At that point every rich person would be able to get away without paying tax. They would just live off the capital appreciation of their assets. There is a reason why the government has to get it's grubby paws on many transactions - its to ensure that everyone pays some share of the tax. The more things which are exempted the easier it is for the incredibly rich to hire lawyers and avoid paying their share.
For example there are expensive houses in London which are owned by companies whose only purpose in life is to own that house. Instead of selling the house you sell the company because this avoids the stamp duty when properties change ownership. So we are left with a conundrum: allow the rich to get away without paying a fair share of tax or the have the government getting a cut of everything neither of which is a great option.
I for one completely understand the rage.... It enraged my otherwise calm, quiet reserved patent attorney...
Perhaps it's time that patent lawyers got used to having patents rejected if they think that putting a sprinkler on a tripod is patent-worthy. I've no idea whether rejecting this patent was legal but, given the available details, common sense indicates that it should not be. Of course the law has no regard for common sense but still it is refreshing to see at least one stupid patent getting rejected.
There is already a Disney World. ;-)
There may be a ecological concerns, but efficiency isn't even an issue.
It is if you want to have useful lighting. If the plant is too inefficient then it will not be able to produce enough enzyme to create a useful light.
It is not every transaction it is just capital gains tax. If you 'mined' BitCoins then the cost was the electricity needed to generate them. If you then sell them for money (or exchange them for goods which have a value) and get more than the cost of mining them then the government taxes you on the capital gain. This is exactly the same as any currency speculation. If BitCoins want to be treated as a real currency then there real tax rules which apply.
I tried to explain it without maths in the post above - the more energy you have the easier it is to make a W or Z boson which is how the neutrino interacts with matter. Think of it like a the neutrino being trapped in a valley and in order to interact it has to get over the valley sides. Fortunately it can tunnel so it does not have to clear the peak but the more energy it has, the higher up the valley side it can get and the easier it is to tunnel through. If it does have enough energy to clear the peak then no tunnelling is required and interactions become very easy.
For a fully detailed, mathematical explanation as to why you need to be able to do simple Feynman diagram calculations. I don't know of a webpage with this on it but Griffiths has an excellent book "Introduction to Elementary Particle Physics" aimed at the senior physics undergrad level and Perkins has a similar one which is slightly lower level.
How was "as we currently assume it" not careful enough?
We do not assume that the Big Bang was asymmetric under translation in time: it might have been or it might not have been. There is no data to justify an assumption one way or the other hence "careful".