Actually, there is a very good philosophical reason to suspect exoplanets should exists: the mediocrity principle.
That is, we are not a very special and unique snowflake. We're not in a privileged position in the universe. There are billions of planets just like ours.
Maybe it's the favorable ranking Slashdot has in my Firefox awesome bar. Maybe it's the arbitrary and Skinnereque reinforcement that comes from being modded up. Perhaps it's just a bad habit. Regardless, arguing here is like wrestling a fifth grader. Between the ultra-individual libertarian ideologues and the clueless teenagers (never mind the considerable overlap), it's hard to find anything challenging.
As another poster mentioned a few weeks ago, Slashdot has become a site for "computer janitors" --- i.e, the bored and easily amused who have no real ideas, power, or authority. The comments section has become a showcase for naivety. Oh, there's sound and funny and fury, but there's no creativity, even among the trolls: does anyone remember OOG_THE_CAVEMAN? Now we're left with copypasta that aims to offend in the most superficial way.
Frankly, reading Slashdot has become an embarrassment. I mention it with the same tone and trepidation I might use to admit I'd purchased a Big and Rich album. Remember when we used to talk about technology? Now we mainly argue about people talking about technology.
You are forgetting to consider the waste problem. The other life threatening issues pale in comparison
You have got to be kidding me. On the one hand, we're talking about climate change causing hundreds of trillions of dollars and ending our civilization as we know it, and on the other, there's the remote possibility of a few people being poisoned if they ignore multiple layers of warning signs written in multiple languages.
You're really telling me that the latter is the greater danger?
Why Does Interpol Need Immunity from American Law? [nationalreview.com]
Obama exempts INTERPOL from search and seizure on US lands [patriotroom.com]
Frankly, I wouldn't trust anything on either of those sites: The National Review of William Buckley's old magazine, which these days is just a neoconservative mouthpiece. As for patriotroom: sorry, but the word "patriot" is forever tainted with teabagger idiocy.
To me, those sites have as much credibility as Sesame Street.
First of all, the tired old trope that somehow the wealthy will avoid a tax if we raise it is obviously specious. If that were so, why did the rich push so hard for Reagan and Bush's tax cuts?
Also, the reason you'll want to give everyone else the vote is that if we're denied the vote, and you get to sit pretty in your mansions while we starve due to neglect, we will kill you. Without legitimacy, a government is nothing more than a collection of thugs.
Look at what you're writing! You're more concerned about some abstract notion of national debt than your own suffrage. If that isn't being brainwashed to disregard one's own interests, I don't know what is.
instate some correlation (but not an absolute one) between voting and tax paying, so non-taxpaying voters cannot establish claims on other people's tax money
Are you seriously proposing that the rich (who pay more taxes) have more votes than ordinary people?
Are you out of your blasted mind? Concentration of power in the hands of a monied few is the root cause of our present political disease.
I too think that structural deficits need to go away eventually. But that's where our agreement ends.
The way to end these deficits is to increase government revenue by raising top-end incoming taxes to just levels. For the past 40 years, real wages for real people have stagnated, while the rich have gotten richer on our backs. If we took that wealth back, we'd have more than enough to cover the deficit.
That's the lesson Microsoft taught the world: being perceived as evil is bad for business. Apple, Google, and so on all invest heavily in public relations in order to avoid the fate of Microsoft. That doesn't mean that the substance of their business methods is any different.
Since when has every desktop computer OS been able to run every piece of software written for every other OS? Since when has every desktop computer been able to run every OS?
You're engaging in semantic shifting. There's a difference between being able to run third party programs written for your operating system and being able to run programs written for other operating systems.
Indeed, and the comparison is apt. Fundamentally, China is practicing mercantilism, but we've hamstrung ourselves by making it politically impossible to fight back.
Thus the world's present measured resources of uranium (5.5 Mt) in the cost category somewhat below present spot prices and used only in conventional reactors, are enough to last for over 80 years
That's actually amazingly good. Consider 1) we're likely to explore for more reserves as we deplete current ones (and that we've done very little exploration so far), 2) nuclear fuel is such a small part of a reactor's operating budget that its price can increase tenfold with no impact on price of electricity at the meter, we're in good shape.
Time to explore for new deposits. If the price of rare earth elements increases enough, it'll be worthwhile. Australia, the American west, and Africa still have vast unexploited mineral wealth.
Also, installing *any* software on a device is extreme.
Desktop computers have been "extreme" for 25 years then?
*Any* software could potentially allow the "user" to reverse engineer some of Apple's multi-touch programming etc
There's nothing stopping them now. When you outlaw debuggers, only crackers will have debuggers.
I'm sure you'd love it if someone managed to do this
Jailbreak. The world hasn't ended.
and there was an actual iPhone clone out there that could be had for $50 without a 2 year commitment
There are plenty of touchscreen devices out there now. Competition is a good thing. If Apple really has something unique, it can work within the patent and copyright system. Restricting software installation doesn't help defend Apple's works, and hurts users. All it does is pad Apple's bottom line.
but that's still IP theft.
"Intellectual property" isn't property, and violating copyright and patent law isn't "theft".
Animals mean nothing. We are people. We ought to care about people. As long as we have enough animals to ensure that we can eat, and that the ecosystem doesn't collapse, worrying about the world from mother nature's perspective is just handwringing that is a luxury of those living in privileged first-world societies that are lucky enough to benefit from the back-breaking work of their ancestors.
No manufacturer has the right to prohibit person A from installing on a device he owns software written by person B: any legal or technological measures to this end are immoral, and ought to be barred by consumer protection laws.
Good regulation is a bargain. In return for mandating strict safety standards, the government ought to provide assistance in meeting these standards. That's how it would work in an honest system, anyway. To some extent, we have that today, through government-subsidized insurance for nuclear power plants.
But really, most regulation has been used to bludgeon the nuclear power industry into impracticality. It'd be like the San Francisco anti-car lobby getting congress to pass a bill requiring all new cars to have eight redundant disc brakes per wheel. It's not honest regulation.
I'm all for holding the nuclear power industry to strict safety standards, but there is a point when additional regulation simply makes the whole exercise more expensive without an increase in safety.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, there is a very good philosophical reason to suspect exoplanets should exists: the mediocrity principle.
That is, we are not a very special and unique snowflake. We're not in a privileged position in the universe. There are billions of planets just like ours.
I don't know why I bother reading the comments.
Maybe it's the favorable ranking Slashdot has in my Firefox awesome bar. Maybe it's the arbitrary and Skinnereque reinforcement that comes from being modded up. Perhaps it's just a bad habit. Regardless, arguing here is like wrestling a fifth grader. Between the ultra-individual libertarian ideologues and the clueless teenagers (never mind the considerable overlap), it's hard to find anything challenging.
As another poster mentioned a few weeks ago, Slashdot has become a site for "computer janitors" --- i.e, the bored and easily amused who have no real ideas, power, or authority. The comments section has become a showcase for naivety. Oh, there's sound and funny and fury, but there's no creativity, even among the trolls: does anyone remember OOG_THE_CAVEMAN? Now we're left with copypasta that aims to offend in the most superficial way.
Frankly, reading Slashdot has become an embarrassment. I mention it with the same tone and trepidation I might use to admit I'd purchased a Big and Rich album. Remember when we used to talk about technology? Now we mainly argue about people talking about technology.
If I want interesting stories, fair and timely news, or probing analysis, I know where to find it. Still, there's nothing that can replace the Slashdot of yore.
You have got to be kidding me. On the one hand, we're talking about climate change causing hundreds of trillions of dollars and ending our civilization as we know it, and on the other, there's the remote possibility of a few people being poisoned if they ignore multiple layers of warning signs written in multiple languages.
You're really telling me that the latter is the greater danger?
Frankly, I wouldn't trust anything on either of those sites: The National Review of William Buckley's old magazine, which these days is just a neoconservative mouthpiece. As for patriotroom: sorry, but the word "patriot" is forever tainted with teabagger idiocy.
To me, those sites have as much credibility as Sesame Street.
First of all, the tired old trope that somehow the wealthy will avoid a tax if we raise it is obviously specious. If that were so, why did the rich push so hard for Reagan and Bush's tax cuts?
Also, the reason you'll want to give everyone else the vote is that if we're denied the vote, and you get to sit pretty in your mansions while we starve due to neglect, we will kill you. Without legitimacy, a government is nothing more than a collection of thugs.
Look at what you're writing! You're more concerned about some abstract notion of national debt than your own suffrage. If that isn't being brainwashed to disregard one's own interests, I don't know what is.
Also,
Are you seriously proposing that the rich (who pay more taxes) have more votes than ordinary people?
Are you out of your blasted mind? Concentration of power in the hands of a monied few is the root cause of our present political disease.
I too think that structural deficits need to go away eventually. But that's where our agreement ends.
The way to end these deficits is to increase government revenue by raising top-end incoming taxes to just levels. For the past 40 years, real wages for real people have stagnated, while the rich have gotten richer on our backs. If we took that wealth back, we'd have more than enough to cover the deficit.
Why? The burden is on your users to not remote your safety features. If they do so, you're absolved of liability, so why should you care?
No it doesn't. Software installation still requires A's consent.
So you propose lowing our standards to those of China?
That's not fighting back. That's capitulation.
Define "solved". The goalposts keep moving.
Isn't that exactly what we used to criticize the Soviet Union for doing? We stared into the abyss all right, but the abyss stared right back into us.
We have enough uranium for centuries. Don't lie. At ten times the current price, it even becomes economical to extract it from seawater.
And guess what? Even with uranium at ten times the current price, nuclear power would be cheap.
That's the lesson Microsoft taught the world: being perceived as evil is bad for business. Apple, Google, and so on all invest heavily in public relations in order to avoid the fate of Microsoft. That doesn't mean that the substance of their business methods is any different.
You're engaging in semantic shifting. There's a difference between being able to run third party programs written for your operating system and being able to run programs written for other operating systems.
Also, intellectual property really isn't property.
But amazingly enough, they're also a developing nation and deserve favorable trade and carbon treatment. Go figure.
Indeed, and the comparison is apt. Fundamentally, China is practicing mercantilism, but we've hamstrung ourselves by making it politically impossible to fight back.
Nice selective reading.
That's actually amazingly good. Consider 1) we're likely to explore for more reserves as we deplete current ones (and that we've done very little exploration so far), 2) nuclear fuel is such a small part of a reactor's operating budget that its price can increase tenfold with no impact on price of electricity at the meter, we're in good shape.
Time to explore for new deposits. If the price of rare earth elements increases enough, it'll be worthwhile. Australia, the American west, and Africa still have vast unexploited mineral wealth.
Desktop computers have been "extreme" for 25 years then?
There's nothing stopping them now. When you outlaw debuggers, only crackers will have debuggers.
Jailbreak. The world hasn't ended.
There are plenty of touchscreen devices out there now. Competition is a good thing. If Apple really has something unique, it can work within the patent and copyright system. Restricting software installation doesn't help defend Apple's works, and hurts users. All it does is pad Apple's bottom line.
"Intellectual property" isn't property, and violating copyright and patent law isn't "theft".
What's the problem with that?
Animals mean nothing. We are people. We ought to care about people. As long as we have enough animals to ensure that we can eat, and that the ecosystem doesn't collapse, worrying about the world from mother nature's perspective is just handwringing that is a luxury of those living in privileged first-world societies that are lucky enough to benefit from the back-breaking work of their ancestors.
No manufacturer has the right to prohibit person A from installing on a device he owns software written by person B: any legal or technological measures to this end are immoral, and ought to be barred by consumer protection laws.
Bullshit. People visit it all the time, and wildlife in the area is thriving. It's turned into a wonderful nature preserve.
Good regulation is a bargain. In return for mandating strict safety standards, the government ought to provide assistance in meeting these standards. That's how it would work in an honest system, anyway. To some extent, we have that today, through government-subsidized insurance for nuclear power plants.
But really, most regulation has been used to bludgeon the nuclear power industry into impracticality. It'd be like the San Francisco anti-car lobby getting congress to pass a bill requiring all new cars to have eight redundant disc brakes per wheel. It's not honest regulation.
I'm all for holding the nuclear power industry to strict safety standards, but there is a point when additional regulation simply makes the whole exercise more expensive without an increase in safety.