I object to the use of the word 'bragging' in the summary. I went to grad school with Darren (his office was 3 doors down from mine) and he was a great all-around guy. He was someone you could joke around with and I never saw any indication of him being a braggard. It's possible that he's changed significantly in the last 10 years, but I see nothing in TFA that would suggest this. He made what is potentially a significant contribution. Why shouldn't he be aloud to be proud of it?
1) go to expensive Landmark Forum weekend.
2) be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only take bathroom breaks when allowed. Be berated.
3) once you're remade in their image call all your friends and family up inviting them to your "graduation" (read: "sales pitch")
4) be told that this expensive weekend was only the beginning of your Enlightenment.
5) be sold on countless other expensive "courses" led by salespeople and marketers, not educators.
6) keep going or you're "not getting it" and "living stories"
1) Go to gym and hire personal trainer for a month
2) Be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only eat foods that your trainer allows. Be berated by trainer when you don't give the workout your all.
3) Once you see some results and start to look a little like your fit trainer, show off your new body to friends and family and tell them about how much you've gotten out of your trainer.
4) Be told that this month was only the beginning of your odyssey to physical fitness.
5) Be sold on countless other fitness accessories by trainer (e.g., elastic bands, heart-rate monitor), who does not possess a Ph.D. in physiology.
6) Keep going to gym or you slip back to your old self.
GMD
P.S.: By the way, the "only take bathroom breaks when allowed" is not true; it's an urban myth. If you don't like Landmark, that's fine. But don't be spreading misinformation. You're depriving people of the opportunity to make a choice for themselves.
Scientology and all its offshoot cults like The Landmark Forum are brainwashing users of people. Money money money.
How exactly does this warrant an Insightful moderation? What keen insights are we supposed to obtain from reading this sentence? How has this stimulated our thinking in new ways? The fact that this is given an Insightful mod and is currently at a score of 4 shows how horribly broken the moderation system here on slashdot really is.
I could see giving this an Informative moderation since there is a link to criticism of Landmark Education, although the sentence doesn't seem to really emphasize that this was the purpose. The "money money money" is a personal judgment made by the AC; personal judgments do not warrant Insightful moderations. If someone tells me "I like peanut butter", that's informative (assuming I gave a shit) but certainly not insightful.
But since the AC raised the topic of "money money money", let's think about this. Landmark Education has a program called the Self-Expression and Leadership Program (SELP). It costs $200 and runs for three months. They also feature the Introduction Leaders Program (ILP), a seven-month program that goes for $400. These cost about as much as a membership to a high-end gym. You would think that if Landmark was truly brainwashing people who take their courses, they ought to be able to get away with charging a hell of a lot more than that.
The problem with all the criticisms and exposes of Landmark that I see is that no honest attempt has been made to evaluate their programs in an unbiased format. The Skepdic's Dictionary entry on Landmark is pretty typical. The last paragraph lists the prices for the expensive courses but oddly seems to have forgotten to mention SELP and ILP. The write-up starts with "I have never attended a session of either est or Landmark but..." and then the author proceeds to write authoritatively about a topic he openly confesses he knows nothing about. It's not exactly hard to find a way to attend a Landmark session; these things are all over the friggin' place. The author cites a "Christian cult-watch group" as evidence that Landmark is bad, but neglects to mention a Harvard Business School study that had positive things to say about Landmark's management consulting arm.
If you don't like The Landmark Forum, that's fine. But a statement claiming that Landmark brainwashes people (BTW, the wikipedia entry on Brainwashing indicates that term and the theory are not supported by The American Psychological Association) to make money is just plain not deserving of an Insightful moderation.
Indeed. Even looking at Orosz's website, his most recent publication regarding traffic that appeared in Proc. Royal Soc. London was in 2006. Sounds like this work is old, even for him.
Apparently there are those that have forgotten the old computer law of "Garbage In, Garbage Out". Even if we had a perfect model to predict these sort of things, we don't have any way of supplying the required data to model the prediction. What's the computer going to do, go undercover in secret groups? Read the web sites? Listen to radio chatter and analyze their conversations?
I think it's safe to say that a professor remembers something from Comp Sci 101. The article makes it difficult to know what they are truly doing, but their use of genetic algorithms and game theory indicates that they are hardly trying to build a "perfect" prediction model. I don't understand what your phrase "model the prediction" means, but it seems you are concerned about lack of data. The article specifically mentioned that there is way too much data for any individual or team of individuals to completely analyze. As far as how this data is obtained, the article doesn't go into too much detail but I think it's reasonable to assume that the inputs are going to be a combination of human intelligence (HUMINT -- "go undercover"), natural language processing ("read the web sites"), and communications inteligence (COMINT -- "listen to radio chatter", ala eschelon). Even if this cannot be done automatically, a human intelligence analyst can process the raw data and file a report with the system. The article doesn't sound like they are building lower-level analysis modules but something that will perform at a higher-level on exploited data.
One concern I have about the system is whether it will be effective against adversaries that rapidly change tactics. The insurgents in Iraq are quite clever in learning from their mistakes and are also quite innovative in trying new stuff. We may have a wealth of data on what they were trying last month, but it's not clear that this will help us predict their new tactic du jour.
Maybe someday when we have a real science of A.I. something like this might be possible, but all it shows is that this university professor will happily take government money for delivering absolutely nothing.
That's a pretty awful thing to say about someone based on a press release. It's reasonable to state you don't know how this would work. It's another thing to accuse someone of dishonesty. It truly saddens me that bold, baseless insults like this get modded up so quickly.
There was a real boon of these in the late 1990s. By 2006 they were mostly gone.
At least the DoD ones we looked at/for. What used to take us weeks to look over were down to 5 or 6 listings.
I don't know what the hell you are talking about. The 3rd round of 2007 DoD SBIRs closed last month and there were hundreds of topics. The only thing I can guess is that either you were looking at a specific agency that typically doesn't release many topics (e.g., National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency) or you were looking at a rare round in which there were few topics. But the Army, Air Force, and Navy always release tons of topics. I've never seen a SBIR round that only had 5 or 6 total listings. I'll be the first to admit that competition for these awards is very fierce, but that's a separate issue from the number of total topics.
So, stuff like this that touches the private sector is always good. Government contracts can keep a small private R&D company in business. Enabling technological competition is a good idea as long as it's done without prejudice. All the problems that were proposed are specific concise things, which is good in that it eliminates the bureaucracy of a large complex project. NASA may have it's problems, but I feel fine spending my tax dollars on this.
Disclaimer: I work for one of the companies that won two awards listed on the website.
If you like the idea of your tax dollars going to smaller companies, then please let your congressional representative know! The SBIR program has been targeted in recent years by lawmakers who feel that it's a waste of money. Just as worrisome, in the last month they managed to fast-track the passing of a bill letting a "small" company owned by a venture capital firm compete for SBIR dollars. The whole point of the SBIR program was to provide funding for small, innovative firms that didn't have deep pockets.
The SBIR program has become very competitive in the last few years and it's not surprising that big-money is looking for ways to grab that away from smaller, independent companies. If you like the idea of your tax dollars supporting lean, innovative companies, please let your rep know. The SBIR program is a valuable source of funding to allow small companies to develop technology that will let them one day compete with the sluggish, established behemoths (e.g., Microsoft).
I'm glad they are restricting the sensors to monitor brain blood flow while I'm at the computer. When my employeer starts automatically monitoring blood flow below my waist when I'm surfing online, that's when I'll start to get a bit worried.:)
While that may be obvious for slashdot readers, it's news to the general public. I remember an endless number of conversations, even as recent as a few years ago, in which people would ask "Can you do anything with that degree other than teach?" upon learning that I was a mathematician. I think it's great that the public is starting to realize that math makes the world go around. God forbid, the gradual public awareness of the power of math might even lead to kids wanting to pay attention in class. While there are drawbacks to this (e.g., the deluge of college kids taking business-oriented mathematics programs with the expectation of a six-figure salary once they graduate), I'm generally happy to see math and computer science get their days in the sun.
It wasn't the slave girl costume. It was the girl! The girl was built like a girl: not some emaciated waif. Carry Fisher had this cute tummy and hips and real boobs - not a body by Joe Schmoe, MD, Hollyweird, CA!
My personal opinion is that this was so iconic because of how dignified Leia remained even in such a degrading and revolting situation. This is a princess and leader of the rebel alliance. A gangster has essentially stripped her naked, put her in chains, and routinely licks his lips with his revolving, rotten tongue. And through all of this, she remains cool headed, keeping her mind of the mission and playing her part. When Luke shows up at Jabba's lair, Leia gives him a look that doesn't convey embarrassment or anger but almost a sense of amusement as though only she and Luke are in on the joke that Jabba's about to fall for.
That was an unusual amount of strength for a woman to show in the 80s. Hell, even nowdays the movies show tough women as having a huge chip on their shoulder. Leia simply got the job done without worrying how she looks and she was willing to sit through anything. It's a bit interesting to compare how she faces adversity in this situation versus the trip to trash compactor in the original movie where she's nowhere near as calm and confident. Everyone focuses on how much Luke changes during the original trilogy, but Leia changes just as much.
Sure, there's a sexual aspect to the entire situation as well, but I don't think that has much to do with Leia's body. Quite frankly, it's fairly unremarkable. It's the fact that Leia remains calm and collected even in such an awful situation that makes her sexy, not her body. You can see better looking women every day just walking down the street. But how many everyday women would be able to act as heroic as Leia did?
'I think women in that regard are at a real disadvantage,' said Dot Brunette, network and storage manager at Meijer Inc., a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based retailer and a 30-year IT veteran.
What a stupid name. Too bad she didn't get married to Jeff Matrix instead.
Has ANYTHING Nuclear related not taken flak from green groups?
You've obviously never watched "Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster". Those Japanese hippies partying on the side of Mt. Fuji get damn near wiped out by Hedorah before Godzilla saves their grubby, unwashed, marijuana-reeking asses. By the end of the movie, they're so damn happy they've lived to smoke another joint that they'd probably OK the installation of a Chernobyl-style reactor right next to the free-love commune where they all live.
Funny you should post this story about the educational value of the web today. I just watched a video of an Atlanta public access TV show in which the woman gives a very insightful explanation of the evils of men who are good in bed. Before online video, only the good folks of Atlanta would be able to enjoy this material. Today, you can all watch and learn by clicking this link.
Watch the video before modding me down, guys. I think you'll find it very Informative and perhaps even Insightful.
Ah, but see, the beauty is that this is exactly my point! I perceived hostility and elitism in your post and immediately stop listening and giving your point of view a fair evaluation. And guess what? That's what (almost) everyone does! I'm saying that we as scientists need to start paying as much attention to how we get out message across as what that message is. We like to believe that the truth will be so amazing that the public will accept it, no matter how terribly it's delivered. That's just not realistic.
Getting the word out in a compelling manner seems like it would be a good answer, but that strategy has to fight apathy and indoctrination, both of which are much stronger. For better or worse, there is no way to replicate the techniques of what I'll call the dark side (for lack of a desire to think of a better phrase) without walking the dark path.
I agree with your first sentence ("apathy and indoctrination are stronger") but disagree with your second. Yes, the onus is on us to take a complex subject and make it understandable to a public that lacks very basic scientific and mathematical knowledge and skills. It's a tough challenge. But if we're really so smart, we should be able to tackle this! Fuck, we can send someone to the moon using spacecraft equipped with computers that pale in comparison to modern cell phones, but we can't teach most people the basics of evolution? I don't believe that and this gets to your second sentence. The ID proponents probably aren't as truly, deeply intelligent as scientists are so they have to fall back on "dark side" techniques to make their case. It's quicker, easier, and more seductive. We are (supposedly) better so we ought to be able to make our case while still staying in the light. The dark side isn't more powerful, it's just easier. For those of you who think science has to be boring, I would encourage you to check out some of the graphs in Edward Tufte's books. Many of those are so well done that they communicate very powerful information in a manner that is intuitively understandable and aesthetically pleasing to the common man.
We need to start paying attention to how we get the word out about evolution. What we're doing now isn't working. I'm not calling for scientists to use the techniques of the ID hooligans. But I am saying that we can't just throw the data out there and expect it to do the work for us.
For many reasons, we--the scientist and scientifically minded--kind of gave up on trying to explain our understanding and objectives to the "layman" and now the rift between us just keeps growing...
First of all, speak for yourself. Lisa Randall is currently on tour giving lectures on cosmology. Stephen Hawking always has a sell-out crowd. You may personally have given up trying to explain science to laymen, but not everyone has. Some are actually taking time out of their very busy research schedules to present the material to the public because they feel it is sufficiently important.
...this is bad because sheeple they may be, but they elect those who set the rules and decide where funding goes (think stem cell research, etc.).
"Sheeple" is such an offensive word, no wonder the public gives the ID folks a listen. You don't see them openly referring to the common man as "sheeple". The public is ignorant, yes, but describing them as some kind of sub-human species is way out of line. You make it sound like understanding science is simply not possible for them. If the material was presented in an interesting and persuasive manner (e.g., we stop referring to the audience as "sheeple"), I think you'd be surprised at how much they'd grasp and appreciate.
Let people be ignorant. It's not like bringing people of below average intelligence or fundamentalist mindset into the scientific fold is going to make them valuable contributors. It'll just be a new type of ignorance to deal with.
First you call them ignorant (which is true). Then you call them stupid. Then you call them religious fundamentalists. Then back to ignorant. These are all very separate categories, which you would understand if you had the above-average intelligence that you probably believe you possess. Given the large percentage of the population that is being cited, I think it's unlikely they are all below-average in intelligence. I didn't RTFA so I don't know about their religious beliefs. I submit to you that these are probably people of average intelligence who are ignorant. That means that we as scientists are not getting the word out in a manner that most people find compelling. The problem is not with them, it is with us.
Perhaps you should check out the film Flock of Dodos before you start pointing fingers at who is to blame. (Hint: the dodos are not the intelligent design folks, it's the scientists who are in danger of becoming extinct because they can't communicate simple facts to the mainstream audience.) Elitist attitudes like yours ("hey, if they can't keep up, fuck 'em!") is partially what drives the mainstream to give ID folks a listen.
The fired workers have a chance to apply for lower-paying positions after a 10-week wait, the company said.
However, that circuit city feels that they can exercise their lack of loyalty so egregiously is disgusting.
Recently, my girlfriend dumped me but said I was encouraged to reapply for the position of "friend" instead. I told her that if she upgraded the offer to "friends with benefits" that we could consider that a severance package for my being so loyal to her. She told me rather sternly to take or leave her original offer.
I found this story doing a Google search. From TFA:
The tone of the hearing shifted when Van Valkenburg said that he had proposed the amendments because of a "gut feeling" that Missoula voters were not "detail-oriented" enough to understand the complete scope of the initiative.
I think the only ones who failed the "detail-oriented" test are the slashdot editors who posted a story that references an article and a blog but failed to provide any links.
Thank you for letting us know and even providing a link to the tech report.
Here's one that that really bugs me about online news articles: they rarely take advantage of the medium! Why the hell couldn't New Scientist provide a link to this paper? As the parent mentioned, the very least they could have done would be to mention that it was related to A*. Yes, I realize that the "average reader" (whatever that means) may not want to know such details, but why couldn't they include a simple "(details...)" link right next to the mention of D*? An interested reader could click on the "details" link and expanded text would create a brand-new paragraph describing more details of the algorithm and providing a link to the tech report. Click again, and the detail paragraph collapses and you go back to reading the basic-version of the story. Simple!
These publishers haven't grasped the power of the new media. For them, online articles simply mean that it's faster, easier, and cheaper to publish stories. Basically, they embrace web publishing for their own selfish reasons. With just a modicum of thought, they could make their products much more valuable to the consumer. But I suppose that would require them to give a damn about their work.
Remember that just because a simulated fluid flow "looks" more accurate, that doesn't mean that it is. The article isn't very technical at all so it's difficult to tell what's going on here. But the way it is phrased leads me to believe that they are solving new equations rather than using new techniques to solve the well-known traditional equations (e.g., Navier-Stokes, Euler, vorticity evolution equation, etc.). The result may be that the new equations are less accurate in a point-wise sense but the resulting gross observable features of the flow may look more natural. Your eye can't tell the difference between errors O(h) and O(h^2) where h is the grid spacing, but it can certainly tell if artificial viscosity from the numerical scheme causes obvious features of the flow, such as shock waves or density discontinuities, to diffuse with time.
The applications you list require that the estimates of velocity, pressure, etc. come out accurately, and not that the resulting animated fluid flow passes the "looks plausible" test. When you're doing computational fluid dynamics solely for graphics, however, the pointwise accuracy doesn't mean squat; you want something that looks nice. I'm guessing that they've come up with a method that is optimized to make pretty movies at the expense of true numeric accuracy of the flowfield. But, again, the article is worded so generically, it's hard to tell what's going on.
apan will now scrap the mission but finish development of the penetrator probes and offer the technology to other space programs, including Russia's, Kanazawa said.
Ten bucks says they're tentacle-like in appearance.
Oops, they can't, can they ?
Maybe the RIAA should stick to going after defenseless single mothers, because it's just
not smart to fuck with the Russkis. They have their own rules : there ARE no rules.
Don't believe me ? Ask Mr. Markov...
I wouldn't waste your time. Mr. Markov has no memory whatsoever. All he knows is his current state; not how he got there. I doubt there is much benefit to asking some Russian dude with a bad-ass case of Alzheimer's about RIAA intimidation tactics.
Slashdot Mirror
I object to the use of the word 'bragging' in the summary. I went to grad school with Darren (his office was 3 doors down from mine) and he was a great all-around guy. He was someone you could joke around with and I never saw any indication of him being a braggard. It's possible that he's changed significantly in the last 10 years, but I see nothing in TFA that would suggest this. He made what is potentially a significant contribution. Why shouldn't he be aloud to be proud of it?
GMD
2) be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only take bathroom breaks when allowed. Be berated.
3) once you're remade in their image call all your friends and family up inviting them to your "graduation" (read: "sales pitch")
4) be told that this expensive weekend was only the beginning of your Enlightenment.
5) be sold on countless other expensive "courses" led by salespeople and marketers, not educators.
6) keep going or you're "not getting it" and "living stories"
1) Go to gym and hire personal trainer for a month
2) Be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only eat foods that your trainer allows. Be berated by trainer when you don't give the workout your all.
3) Once you see some results and start to look a little like your fit trainer, show off your new body to friends and family and tell them about how much you've gotten out of your trainer.
4) Be told that this month was only the beginning of your odyssey to physical fitness.
5) Be sold on countless other fitness accessories by trainer (e.g., elastic bands, heart-rate monitor), who does not possess a Ph.D. in physiology.
6) Keep going to gym or you slip back to your old self.
GMD
P.S.: By the way, the "only take bathroom breaks when allowed" is not true; it's an urban myth. If you don't like Landmark, that's fine. But don't be spreading misinformation. You're depriving people of the opportunity to make a choice for themselves.
Scientology and all its offshoot cults like The Landmark Forum are brainwashing users of people. Money money money.
How exactly does this warrant an Insightful moderation? What keen insights are we supposed to obtain from reading this sentence? How has this stimulated our thinking in new ways? The fact that this is given an Insightful mod and is currently at a score of 4 shows how horribly broken the moderation system here on slashdot really is.
I could see giving this an Informative moderation since there is a link to criticism of Landmark Education, although the sentence doesn't seem to really emphasize that this was the purpose. The "money money money" is a personal judgment made by the AC; personal judgments do not warrant Insightful moderations. If someone tells me "I like peanut butter", that's informative (assuming I gave a shit) but certainly not insightful.
But since the AC raised the topic of "money money money", let's think about this. Landmark Education has a program called the Self-Expression and Leadership Program (SELP). It costs $200 and runs for three months. They also feature the Introduction Leaders Program (ILP), a seven-month program that goes for $400. These cost about as much as a membership to a high-end gym. You would think that if Landmark was truly brainwashing people who take their courses, they ought to be able to get away with charging a hell of a lot more than that.
The problem with all the criticisms and exposes of Landmark that I see is that no honest attempt has been made to evaluate their programs in an unbiased format. The Skepdic's Dictionary entry on Landmark is pretty typical. The last paragraph lists the prices for the expensive courses but oddly seems to have forgotten to mention SELP and ILP. The write-up starts with "I have never attended a session of either est or Landmark but..." and then the author proceeds to write authoritatively about a topic he openly confesses he knows nothing about. It's not exactly hard to find a way to attend a Landmark session; these things are all over the friggin' place. The author cites a "Christian cult-watch group" as evidence that Landmark is bad, but neglects to mention a Harvard Business School study that had positive things to say about Landmark's management consulting arm.
If you don't like The Landmark Forum, that's fine. But a statement claiming that Landmark brainwashes people (BTW, the wikipedia entry on Brainwashing indicates that term and the theory are not supported by The American Psychological Association) to make money is just plain not deserving of an Insightful moderation.
GMD
Indeed. Even looking at Orosz's website, his most recent publication regarding traffic that appeared in Proc. Royal Soc. London was in 2006. Sounds like this work is old, even for him.
GMD
I think it's safe to say that a professor remembers something from Comp Sci 101. The article makes it difficult to know what they are truly doing, but their use of genetic algorithms and game theory indicates that they are hardly trying to build a "perfect" prediction model. I don't understand what your phrase "model the prediction" means, but it seems you are concerned about lack of data. The article specifically mentioned that there is way too much data for any individual or team of individuals to completely analyze. As far as how this data is obtained, the article doesn't go into too much detail but I think it's reasonable to assume that the inputs are going to be a combination of human intelligence (HUMINT -- "go undercover"), natural language processing ("read the web sites"), and communications inteligence (COMINT -- "listen to radio chatter", ala eschelon). Even if this cannot be done automatically, a human intelligence analyst can process the raw data and file a report with the system. The article doesn't sound like they are building lower-level analysis modules but something that will perform at a higher-level on exploited data.
One concern I have about the system is whether it will be effective against adversaries that rapidly change tactics. The insurgents in Iraq are quite clever in learning from their mistakes and are also quite innovative in trying new stuff. We may have a wealth of data on what they were trying last month, but it's not clear that this will help us predict their new tactic du jour.
Maybe someday when we have a real science of A.I. something like this might be possible, but all it shows is that this university professor will happily take government money for delivering absolutely nothing.That's a pretty awful thing to say about someone based on a press release. It's reasonable to state you don't know how this would work. It's another thing to accuse someone of dishonesty. It truly saddens me that bold, baseless insults like this get modded up so quickly.
GMD
I don't know what the hell you are talking about. The 3rd round of 2007 DoD SBIRs closed last month and there were hundreds of topics. The only thing I can guess is that either you were looking at a specific agency that typically doesn't release many topics (e.g., National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency) or you were looking at a rare round in which there were few topics. But the Army, Air Force, and Navy always release tons of topics. I've never seen a SBIR round that only had 5 or 6 total listings. I'll be the first to admit that competition for these awards is very fierce, but that's a separate issue from the number of total topics.
GMD
Disclaimer: I work for one of the companies that won two awards listed on the website.
If you like the idea of your tax dollars going to smaller companies, then please let your congressional representative know! The SBIR program has been targeted in recent years by lawmakers who feel that it's a waste of money. Just as worrisome, in the last month they managed to fast-track the passing of a bill letting a "small" company owned by a venture capital firm compete for SBIR dollars. The whole point of the SBIR program was to provide funding for small, innovative firms that didn't have deep pockets.
The SBIR program has become very competitive in the last few years and it's not surprising that big-money is looking for ways to grab that away from smaller, independent companies. If you like the idea of your tax dollars supporting lean, innovative companies, please let your rep know. The SBIR program is a valuable source of funding to allow small companies to develop technology that will let them one day compete with the sluggish, established behemoths (e.g., Microsoft).
GMD
I'm glad they are restricting the sensors to monitor brain blood flow while I'm at the computer. When my employeer starts automatically monitoring blood flow below my waist when I'm surfing online, that's when I'll start to get a bit worried. :)
GMD
While that may be obvious for slashdot readers, it's news to the general public. I remember an endless number of conversations, even as recent as a few years ago, in which people would ask "Can you do anything with that degree other than teach?" upon learning that I was a mathematician. I think it's great that the public is starting to realize that math makes the world go around. God forbid, the gradual public awareness of the power of math might even lead to kids wanting to pay attention in class. While there are drawbacks to this (e.g., the deluge of college kids taking business-oriented mathematics programs with the expectation of a six-figure salary once they graduate), I'm generally happy to see math and computer science get their days in the sun.
GMD
This has got to be the worst nightmare of every sexy, busty teenage green- or pink-haired schoolgirl, ninja, and swordswoman in Japan!
GMD
It wasn't the slave girl costume. It was the girl! The girl was built like a girl: not some emaciated waif. Carry Fisher had this cute tummy and hips and real boobs - not a body by Joe Schmoe, MD, Hollyweird, CA!
My personal opinion is that this was so iconic because of how dignified Leia remained even in such a degrading and revolting situation. This is a princess and leader of the rebel alliance. A gangster has essentially stripped her naked, put her in chains, and routinely licks his lips with his revolving, rotten tongue. And through all of this, she remains cool headed, keeping her mind of the mission and playing her part. When Luke shows up at Jabba's lair, Leia gives him a look that doesn't convey embarrassment or anger but almost a sense of amusement as though only she and Luke are in on the joke that Jabba's about to fall for.
That was an unusual amount of strength for a woman to show in the 80s. Hell, even nowdays the movies show tough women as having a huge chip on their shoulder. Leia simply got the job done without worrying how she looks and she was willing to sit through anything. It's a bit interesting to compare how she faces adversity in this situation versus the trip to trash compactor in the original movie where she's nowhere near as calm and confident. Everyone focuses on how much Luke changes during the original trilogy, but Leia changes just as much.
Sure, there's a sexual aspect to the entire situation as well, but I don't think that has much to do with Leia's body. Quite frankly, it's fairly unremarkable. It's the fact that Leia remains calm and collected even in such an awful situation that makes her sexy, not her body. You can see better looking women every day just walking down the street. But how many everyday women would be able to act as heroic as Leia did?
GMD
'I think women in that regard are at a real disadvantage,' said Dot Brunette, network and storage manager at Meijer Inc., a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based retailer and a 30-year IT veteran.
What a stupid name. Too bad she didn't get married to Jeff Matrix instead.
GMD
Has ANYTHING Nuclear related not taken flak from green groups?
You've obviously never watched "Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster". Those Japanese hippies partying on the side of Mt. Fuji get damn near wiped out by Hedorah before Godzilla saves their grubby, unwashed, marijuana-reeking asses. By the end of the movie, they're so damn happy they've lived to smoke another joint that they'd probably OK the installation of a Chernobyl-style reactor right next to the free-love commune where they all live.
GMD
Funny you should post this story about the educational value of the web today. I just watched a video of an Atlanta public access TV show in which the woman gives a very insightful explanation of the evils of men who are good in bed. Before online video, only the good folks of Atlanta would be able to enjoy this material. Today, you can all watch and learn by clicking this link.
Watch the video before modding me down, guys. I think you'll find it very Informative and perhaps even Insightful.
GMD
You misconstrued my point.
Ah, but see, the beauty is that this is exactly my point! I perceived hostility and elitism in your post and immediately stop listening and giving your point of view a fair evaluation. And guess what? That's what (almost) everyone does! I'm saying that we as scientists need to start paying as much attention to how we get out message across as what that message is. We like to believe that the truth will be so amazing that the public will accept it, no matter how terribly it's delivered. That's just not realistic.
Getting the word out in a compelling manner seems like it would be a good answer, but that strategy has to fight apathy and indoctrination, both of which are much stronger. For better or worse, there is no way to replicate the techniques of what I'll call the dark side (for lack of a desire to think of a better phrase) without walking the dark path.
I agree with your first sentence ("apathy and indoctrination are stronger") but disagree with your second. Yes, the onus is on us to take a complex subject and make it understandable to a public that lacks very basic scientific and mathematical knowledge and skills. It's a tough challenge. But if we're really so smart, we should be able to tackle this! Fuck, we can send someone to the moon using spacecraft equipped with computers that pale in comparison to modern cell phones, but we can't teach most people the basics of evolution? I don't believe that and this gets to your second sentence. The ID proponents probably aren't as truly, deeply intelligent as scientists are so they have to fall back on "dark side" techniques to make their case. It's quicker, easier, and more seductive. We are (supposedly) better so we ought to be able to make our case while still staying in the light. The dark side isn't more powerful, it's just easier. For those of you who think science has to be boring, I would encourage you to check out some of the graphs in Edward Tufte's books. Many of those are so well done that they communicate very powerful information in a manner that is intuitively understandable and aesthetically pleasing to the common man.
We need to start paying attention to how we get the word out about evolution. What we're doing now isn't working. I'm not calling for scientists to use the techniques of the ID hooligans. But I am saying that we can't just throw the data out there and expect it to do the work for us.
GMD
For many reasons, we--the scientist and scientifically minded--kind of gave up on trying to explain our understanding and objectives to the "layman" and now the rift between us just keeps growing...
First of all, speak for yourself. Lisa Randall is currently on tour giving lectures on cosmology. Stephen Hawking always has a sell-out crowd. You may personally have given up trying to explain science to laymen, but not everyone has. Some are actually taking time out of their very busy research schedules to present the material to the public because they feel it is sufficiently important.
"Sheeple" is such an offensive word, no wonder the public gives the ID folks a listen. You don't see them openly referring to the common man as "sheeple". The public is ignorant, yes, but describing them as some kind of sub-human species is way out of line. You make it sound like understanding science is simply not possible for them. If the material was presented in an interesting and persuasive manner (e.g., we stop referring to the audience as "sheeple"), I think you'd be surprised at how much they'd grasp and appreciate.
GMD
Let people be ignorant. It's not like bringing people of below average intelligence or fundamentalist mindset into the scientific fold is going to make them valuable contributors. It'll just be a new type of ignorance to deal with.
First you call them ignorant (which is true). Then you call them stupid. Then you call them religious fundamentalists. Then back to ignorant. These are all very separate categories, which you would understand if you had the above-average intelligence that you probably believe you possess. Given the large percentage of the population that is being cited, I think it's unlikely they are all below-average in intelligence. I didn't RTFA so I don't know about their religious beliefs. I submit to you that these are probably people of average intelligence who are ignorant. That means that we as scientists are not getting the word out in a manner that most people find compelling. The problem is not with them, it is with us.
Perhaps you should check out the film Flock of Dodos before you start pointing fingers at who is to blame. (Hint: the dodos are not the intelligent design folks, it's the scientists who are in danger of becoming extinct because they can't communicate simple facts to the mainstream audience.) Elitist attitudes like yours ("hey, if they can't keep up, fuck 'em!") is partially what drives the mainstream to give ID folks a listen.
GMD
The fired workers have a chance to apply for lower-paying positions after a 10-week wait, the company said.
However, that circuit city feels that they can exercise their lack of loyalty so egregiously is disgusting.
Recently, my girlfriend dumped me but said I was encouraged to reapply for the position of "friend" instead. I told her that if she upgraded the offer to "friends with benefits" that we could consider that a severance package for my being so loyal to her. She told me rather sternly to take or leave her original offer.
Bitch.
GMD
I found this story doing a Google search. From TFA:
The tone of the hearing shifted when Van Valkenburg said that he had proposed the amendments because of a "gut feeling" that Missoula voters were not "detail-oriented" enough to understand the complete scope of the initiative.
I think the only ones who failed the "detail-oriented" test are the slashdot editors who posted a story that references an article and a blog but failed to provide any links.
GMD
Thank you for letting us know and even providing a link to the tech report.
Here's one that that really bugs me about online news articles: they rarely take advantage of the medium! Why the hell couldn't New Scientist provide a link to this paper? As the parent mentioned, the very least they could have done would be to mention that it was related to A*. Yes, I realize that the "average reader" (whatever that means) may not want to know such details, but why couldn't they include a simple "(details...)" link right next to the mention of D*? An interested reader could click on the "details" link and expanded text would create a brand-new paragraph describing more details of the algorithm and providing a link to the tech report. Click again, and the detail paragraph collapses and you go back to reading the basic-version of the story. Simple!
These publishers haven't grasped the power of the new media. For them, online articles simply mean that it's faster, easier, and cheaper to publish stories. Basically, they embrace web publishing for their own selfish reasons. With just a modicum of thought, they could make their products much more valuable to the consumer. But I suppose that would require them to give a damn about their work.
GMD
Remember that just because a simulated fluid flow "looks" more accurate, that doesn't mean that it is. The article isn't very technical at all so it's difficult to tell what's going on here. But the way it is phrased leads me to believe that they are solving new equations rather than using new techniques to solve the well-known traditional equations (e.g., Navier-Stokes, Euler, vorticity evolution equation, etc.). The result may be that the new equations are less accurate in a point-wise sense but the resulting gross observable features of the flow may look more natural. Your eye can't tell the difference between errors O(h) and O(h^2) where h is the grid spacing, but it can certainly tell if artificial viscosity from the numerical scheme causes obvious features of the flow, such as shock waves or density discontinuities, to diffuse with time.
The applications you list require that the estimates of velocity, pressure, etc. come out accurately, and not that the resulting animated fluid flow passes the "looks plausible" test. When you're doing computational fluid dynamics solely for graphics, however, the pointwise accuracy doesn't mean squat; you want something that looks nice. I'm guessing that they've come up with a method that is optimized to make pretty movies at the expense of true numeric accuracy of the flowfield. But, again, the article is worded so generically, it's hard to tell what's going on.
GMD
apan will now scrap the mission but finish development of the penetrator probes and offer the technology to other space programs, including Russia's, Kanazawa said.
Ten bucks says they're tentacle-like in appearance.
GMD
The Japanese probably figured they ought to spend the money on more pressing terrestrial concerns.
GMD
I doubt there is an equation involved. But I think one look at today's front page of slashdot justifies moving the hands a little closer to midnight:
If these aren't a sure sign of the apocalypse (especially the last item), I don't know what is.
GMD
Oops, they can't, can they ? Maybe the RIAA should stick to going after defenseless single mothers, because it's just not smart to fuck with the Russkis. They have their own rules : there ARE no rules. Don't believe me ? Ask Mr. Markov ...
I wouldn't waste your time. Mr. Markov has no memory whatsoever. All he knows is his current state; not how he got there. I doubt there is much benefit to asking some Russian dude with a bad-ass case of Alzheimer's about RIAA intimidation tactics.
GMD