Polygraphs have not, in fact, been "barred" from the courtroom as evidence.
This may or may not be true in the United States. I suspect that it varies by state.
I know that in Canada they are unequivocally inadmissible in court proceedings. Many other nations have similar policies. Remember,/. readers come from many different jurisdictions.
If you read the whole article (it's two or three pages in, which is longer than the/. attention span) you'll find that Vector plans to market cigarettes that contain blends of regular tobacco and the genetically modified nicotine-free stuff. There will be three types: one with 58% of the regular nicotine dose, one at 17% (IIRC) and one that is nicotine-free.
It's sort of like the patch, except that you get to keep smoking. The ritual is part of the habit--it's often a big part of the addiction. This stuff lets you wean yourself off tobacco and then wean yourself off the ritual of smoking itself. You don't have to go cold turkey with either the powerful nicotine addiction or the delightfully Freudian oral fixation. Divide and conquer.
Makes a lot of sense, really, as long as people don't start thinking that these cigarettes are "healthier". The benzo[a]pyrene will get you, not the nicotine. In that sense, you're quite right--if someone switches brands with no intention of quitting, they might well start smoking more cigarettes. Though these particular cancer sticks are likely to be more expensive, so probably only people interested in quitting will buy them...
I'm one of those people that need something to do with their hands and so out in a bar, or social situation, its comforting to smoke.
Have you considered taking up drinking?
Re:The proliferation of video cameras.
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The motion was not "apparent" and this is very easy to test by measuring the motion on multiple video footage. For example when the object went behind a cloud all the recorders recorded the same thing, when the object came back out into view all the cameras recorded the same thing.
Spacecraft aren't the only things that move. Clouds do, too. And high clouds will appear quite similar to observers spread over a large area. If you can point me to some footage from the eclipse date that was filmed by a camera held reasonably steadily that shows both the UFO and the ground (or some other fixed object) in the frame for reference, then I'll revisit my tentative conclusion.
I'm curious, actually--are we discussing the same event? I'm referring to sightings before and during the solar eclipse visible from Mexico City on July 11, 1991. There have been other sightings reported in the same area, from around that time, and in the years since.
I am open to any "reasonable" explanation but venus is not a reasonable explanation. Venus does not move, venus does not disappear suddenly after appearing suddenly.
I reiterate my requests for additional information as stated above. Show me some good footage, with a solid reference point in it. (And make sure we're talking about the same day.)
Like I said there have been many incidents all over the world that have been videotaped. Most of them by people who have no means of faking videotapes (which is very hard to do and require lots of money) not all of them are venus, not all of them are swamp gas, and no matter how hard they try the skeptics can not explain all of them. Which leaves the question. What are they?
As I have stated before, I'm not addressing all the reports of UFOs. Many will quite probably turn out to be misinterpretation of subjective evidence, or hithero unknown natural phenomena (very exciting in itself--many UFO sightings can now be attributed to recently discovered exotic forms of lighting). Some incidents are quite intriguing and warrant additional study.
I don't pretend to have an explanation for all UFO sightings, and I would be thrilled if there existed an unambiguous case for one or more of them being visitors from another world. Nevertheless, in this case, for this one group of sightings, even pro-UFO groups like MUFON tend to accept the Venus hypothesis. The fact that there exist sightings for which no good explanation exists does not mean that all sightings represent alien visitations. Such a conclusion would be a most regrettable "logical fallacy".
If you want to discuss some of the other sightings in Mexico or elsewhere, that might be more fruitful. I also look forward to any further evidence that you might have regarding the July 11 events.
Re:The proliferation of video cameras.
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Most of the of the UFO debunkers pretty much take the same approach and if I may paraphrase they say either "it could have been venus so therefore it was venus" or "it could have been faked so therefore it was faked". Both of those are logical fallacies.
Both of those are reasonable interpretations of events. When you have a lot of people looking at the sky who don't usually look at the sky, they can make errors of interpretation. Incidentally, I didn't make the absolute statement that the object was Venus. I stated that it was "very likely". Don't accuse people of committing logical fallacies when they make qualified statements based on reasoning and available evidence.
As for the event itself I saw the videos (more then one) and the object was definately moving in a back and forth manner. I minored in astronomy and have spent many a night staring at the sky with both the naked eye and telescopes of varying sizes and have never seen any planet move in that fashion. Whatever that thing was it was not venus.
I too have studied astronomy and spent many nights (and days) looking at the sky. Unfortunately, neither you nor I attended the Mexico City event (pity--it would have been something to see, UFO or not) so our qualifications as observers are moot. If you shoot video of Venus (or any small, stationary, bright object) using a camera zoomed in close, you will get apparent motion. Even if you use a tripod, wind often introduces some vibration. This problem is exacerbated when the video is digitized and further enlarged.
Of course the that was but one event that was videotaped. There must be hundreds of hours of videotapes of UFOs are you seriously claiming that all of them were venus? Surely not. For example does this [jman5.com] look like venus?
Don't get all bent out of shape. I was addressing this one incident. Each video of each event should be evaluated on its merits. Based on the accounts that I have read, it seems that on the balance of probabilities the object seen was likely Venus. For the record, I would be thrilled to find evidence of other life in the Universe. (I've said as much on another recent thread. I'd like to see a large space-based interferometer built so we can do spectroscopy of distant planetary atmospheres--look for signs of life. I think that the search for extraterrestrial life (and intelligence!) is worthwhile and interesting.
But I also think, based on the evidence presented, that the bright spot over Mexico a decade ago was Venus. Refusing to consider that some UFO incidents have reasonable explanations makes you no more credible than those who refuse to consider that any incidents may have something to do with extraterrestrial life.
In 2001, a 21-year-old Michigan man named Brian Baltutat was successfully prosecuted under the NET Act for posting a mere 142 software programs on the "Hacker Hurricane" Web site.
'Mere'?
I didn't even know that there were 142 software programs out there worth stealing...
I went to that link and it requires that you indicate a sponsoring agency. Since none of us have one, registering a domain would require entering false information into a DoD computer in order to gain unauthorized access. That is just a very bad idea.
You could get away with it if you happen to be reading/. from a country that (a) doesn't have an extradition treaty with the United States or (b) doesn't extradite people who do things that are secretly amusing to members of your own government.
That said, I agree that Joe Sixpack from Detroit probably shouldn't register his own.mil domain.
Not that I by any means believe that the SOHO artifacts are alien craft, but couldn't aliens (hypothetically speaking) build flying tubes? A long cylinder would like a straight line (just like the edge of a saucer) from almost all angles.
Re:Aren't the pictures from SOHO exciting enough?!
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Yes, I'm a scientist by training, and do find this stuff genuinely awe-inspiring and have no time for those who refuse to learn and chase after UFOs.
Won't you feel silly if they actually ever do find one? Or rather, an Identified FO--one that can be verified as being alien in origin. (I'm a hard scientist, if you're wondering--physical chemistry, with segues into medical physics and tissue optics.)
Sure, I see UFO hunting as something that people can pursue as a hobby rather than as a "real" job, but then, a lot of important astronomical discoveries are made by amateurs.
Hunting UFOs is sort of like Linux (calm down--it's a very loose analogy). There are zealots, skeptics, and people in between. There are groups that try to make money from the phenomenon, and people that just report on it. There are people that contribute a little bit to the community now and than, there are those that view it with a benign disinterest--and there are those that pour hours into it with singleminded determination with no expectation of reward.
Me, I love the (real, useful, unmassaged) SOHO imagery, and I think we should be putting tons of funding into materials science so we can build a space elevator. I'd also like to build a big space-based visual/near IR interferometer so we can do spectroscopy of planetary atmospheres around other stars.
Meanwhile, I run a SETI@Home unit every so often, and I don't begrudge them the cycles. I also am waiting patiently to see good evidence of a genuinely unidentified flying object--not Venus--and I will weigh any claims on their merits. I mean, sure the SOHO data are exciting, but wouldn't evidence of extraterrestrial life tickle you, too?
Re:The proliferation of video cameras.
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I have not been able to verify this (I don't have access to paper copies of the document) but it has been reported that even a group that would quite like to see a substantiated sighting of an alien craft (MUFON - the Mutual UFO Network) agrees that this sighting is bogus. (Citation is Abercrombie, Andy. No Title. The Lone Star (TX) MUFON Reporter. 15 May 1993)
The still pictures on this site are less than impressive. They could very easily be the result of the planet Venus, plus some artifacts due to camera motion, image enlargement, and smoothing. (Only this first image is unenlarged--and I'm not overly excited.) I can't seem to play their first video, but the second one is not from the eclipse; it is another event. To be fair, this second video is more interesting (it has a moving object), and represents either better evidence (on its face) or a hoax requiring more effort.
There is tons of video tape UFO evidence so I don't understand why you claim there is none.
There is tons of video tape evidence of an unidentified flying object, yes. Unless it is Venus. Millions of people were watching the eclipse that day--Mexico City is not exactly a small community. Where was the panic in the streets? The frantic news reports?
The clincher for me is that there were tens of thousands of astronomers present, both amateur and professional. The object is described in most reports as stationary and quite bright (visible even during daylight), and it was not far in the sky from a highly observed phenomenon (the Sun during an eclipse). Astronomers unable to indentify a very bright stationary object that suddenly appeared in the sky would not hestitate to report it. Why? Not because they're thinking aliens--but rather, because they're thinking supernovae. Discover a nearby one and you're famous for the rest of your life in astronomical circles. So where were the reports to the International Astronomical Union? Actually, since the object faded to invisibility much more rapidly than a supernova, it would be even more interesting--a hitherto undiscovered class of astronomical object, worthy of discussion and analysis. A quick review of the literature reveals nothing--not even a "Gee, that's weird" type note in an astronomical journal.
Unless all the atronomers are in on the conspiracy of silence. But there's nothing in it for them. A lot of them would be thrilled to have proof of other life in the Universe--it would help them get more funding.
...Slashdot's moderation system has been horribly broken (mismatch of scores reported to me versus what's in the actual thread)...
What's happening is that when a comment moderation is reported to you (and also immediately after you submit a comment) the moderation total will reflect the +1 score that you get for being logged in, but the +1 (for a total of +2) karma bonus doesn't show up.
The moderation tallies are actually correct when you look at the lists of comments--you get the bonuses to which you're entitled. If you check your user profile, the correct values are reported there as well. So the system isn't really 'horribly broken', it's just a bit flaky. Someone will fix it eventually. In the meantime, you're not just here for the karma, are you? You just want to contribute in a positive way to the discussion, so don't sweat the totals.
...and doing any kind of a submit takes several retries and usually takes minutes to complete.
I've noticed this as well. Perhaps the ol' Slashcode isn't up to snuff anymore? Or maybe the number of users is starting to put a strain on the system. I don't have to make multiple retries; I find that waiting a minute for the submission to go through works. If it's not worth waiting a minute to say, it's not worth saying, right?
Aside: I know this is offtopic. I am posting without karma bonus so I'm a smaller target for moderators.;)
When state Governors are sworn in they USUALLY take an oathe to uphold the US Constitution and to defend it.
*snip*
The whole idea is UNCONSTITUTIONAL. And ammednig the constitution is a dangerous action, once it starts the constitution is open for modification until closed and ANYTHING can happen during the debate.
Right, because it would be inappropriate for a Governor to urge constitutional change if he or she felt it in the best interests of his or her people. If we let that sort of thing happen, Congress could do something really dumb, like abolish slavery, or protect people from self-incrimination, or worse.
Operating within the Constitution includes making suggestions that it be changed--not through violent revolution, but through the mechanisms that were built into the document for that very purpose.
Whether or not the taxation considered is unconstitutional (IANAL), and if it is, whether or not the hassle of an amendment should be pursued (IMHO not), are side issues. Politicians should be free to urge changes that are (on their face) unconstitutional, if they are prepared to follow through with an amendment. If a question falls into a gray area, that is a matter for the courts--that's why the judiciary exists.
Why would a company provide the framework of digital cash without charging any fees? Simple! You get people to pay you in real money and you give them digital money. You don't have to offer to convert digital money back into real money if you have enough customers that it is practical to buy and sell everything in digital money. Other people would step in to convert currencies if there was enough demand. Therefore you suddenly have a money funnel filling your own bank accounts. Invest that money in land, gold, precious gems, or whatever is pretty stable and you have a fortune and your fortune makes your digital money more valuable thus creating a nice cycle. Just issue yourself whatever paychecks you want and live like kings.
Wow! This was tried in many nations--including the United States--in the nineteenth century. Some countries still use a similar system, wherein banks are allowed to issue currency. Very tight regulation is required, or else you end up with problems--similar to those in the United States--where organizations issue currency without assets to back it up, make it difficult to redeem their "cash" for real dollars, or just the money and run, leaving customers with worthless paper.
In the United States between 1837 and 1863 roughly five thousand different types of bills were issued by more than a thousand different banks. Counterfeiting, fraud, and just plain bad customer service ran rampant. Of course, none of a bank's holdings were insured by the federal government as they are today (FDIC in the U.S., CDIC in Canada; similar bodies in other developed countries.)
You're asking us to cavalierly give thousands or millions of dollars to essentially anonymous individuals on the internet and endow them with the powers of what amounts to a central bank, while letting unfettered free market forces work things out? Go ahead--Ask Slashdot: Is everyone happy with the PayPal customer service department?* Don't think so.
If it walks like a bank and quacks like a bank, it damn well ought to be regulated and insured like a bank. Until then, credit cards will reign.
*Trick question: it's already been addressed on/. The answer is 'no'.
The downside of 12 inch fabrication is that a 32 meg DIMM will have to be sixteen feet across, and will weigh seven tons. On the other hand, traces can be laid by monkeys with paint rollers. Leave me my 0.18 micron processes, thank you.
what is less obvious is why the cats have different colored fur. After all, human twins are often physically indistinguishable.
Humans usually have uniformly coloured hair on top of their heads--but even then, identical twins with different hair colour are sometimes seen (Lancet353 (1999) 562). Cats often have mottled, striped, or otherwise nonuniform coats.
The splotches on a cat are the result some rather interesting processes, one of which is described here. Essentially, cats receive genes determining the colour of their coats from both parents. Within the cat embryo at the stage where it contains a few dozen or fewer cells, one set of genes for colour is deactivated in each cell--but it is not necessarily the same set in different cells.
This random deactivation of genes mean that parts of the cat that develop from one cell within the embryo will show orange fur, while bits from other cells may turn up with black fur. Overall, the effect is mottled fur, in a random pattern--just as is seen with Cc.
I have heard stories of human twins leading very similar lives. Genese definitely do have a big effect on personality and behaviour.
I'm glad that your detailed anecdotal study has reached such enlightening conclusions.
Twins are usually raised in the same home, under the same circumstances, by the same parents. Even then, there are usually marked differences once you get to know them. (Sure, they look mostly the same, but they're not identical.) I don't think your research properly separates environmental and genetic effects.
For identical twins raised independently, there is certainly a strong correlation betweent their susceptibilities to certain diseases, just as we would expect. Though there might be some similarities in temperament, the correlation isn't much bettter than between two random individuals. (I lump most mental illnesses under diseases, not temperament.)
Psychologists (and legions of statisticians) have made careers of studies of identical twins. Just because you've heard about cases where twins are similar, doesn't mean that dissimilar cases don't exist. There's a confirmation bias at work, because similar behaviour supports our subconscious belief that people who look alike ought to be alike.
For those who don't know, boffin is a slang term for a scientist. Sometimes it also is applied more generally to people who are very bright, technically adept, and slightly odd. It might be used in a cotext similar to 'nerd' or 'geek', though it has a friendlier tone.
The term is most popular in the United Kingdom and some of its former colonies (not Canada, however.) In the United States, the only place you're likely to hear it is on imported television, particularly the series Junkyard Wars (a.k.a. Scrapheap Challenge in the U.K.; it runs on Wednesday nights on TLC.) On that note, host Cathy Rogers can call me whatever she wants. Junkyward Wars also exposes the world to words like bodge (v., n., syn. kludge) and brill (adj. syn. Awesome! Derived from 'brilliant'). For further Britishisms, refer to the British-American Dictionary.
To close, then. I'm a boffin, and proud of it. If the Australians are too uptight to recognize a compliment when they hear one--well, they can sod off.
Wow. That's the most blatant karma whoring I've seen in quite a while.
People, it's fine to mirror the article content to the comments if the original site is getting hammered. But come on--the Wall Street Journal? As important as we of/. think we are, the WSJ can handle our brutal onslaught. Really. It can.
Mirroring the WSJ content (or that of any other major news outlet or high-traffic site) is pointless. For the NYT, post a link to the Google (no registration required) version. Quite frankly, these sites can handle more load than/. can--so it makes sense to have them supply the articles.
The sole advantage of mirroring content from these large sites on/. is that maybe--maybe--a few more posters will read the original article before posting. Tagging posts that are at best 0, Redundant as +5, Informative is playing to the whores.
The point is that with current (paper) systems, the ballots are genuinely secret--there is no way to link a specific person to a specific ballot after his or her vote has been cast. Also, you have to vote alone--nobody gets to see how you vote. You can lie about it if you want. Or not. You can keep it to yourself. You can spoil your ballot.
With this new electronic system, there is no polling place where returning officers (title varies with jurisdiction) monitor the voting process, and ensure that no supervision, campaigning, or coercion take place within the polling place.
What's to protect her from being beat up nomatter how she votes?
With polling stations outside the home and secret ballots, she can lie about how she voted. I won't run through the remainder of your arguments, because they are all similar cases.
As far as I'm concerned, you gave no real reason why this is a "bad idea" - nothing unique to this implementation.
We would be back to the bad old days when votes were bought with whiskey or a cudgel. This is why all the elaborate mechanisms of a secret ballet were developed in the first place. Clear enough for you?
Ok, what ithe heck...is with the quotes around president?
I don't think any slight was intended. The President of the United States (for at least the last few administrations) has always had the email address president@whitehouse.gov.
So for any sitting President of the United States the people have the option of sending an email to 'president'. Perhaps the legitimacy of Bush's Presidency deserves to be challenged and perhaps not--but this time the quotes were legitimate and had nothing to do with the mess in Florida.
Slashdot Mirror
This may or may not be true in the United States. I suspect that it varies by state.
I know that in Canada they are unequivocally inadmissible in court proceedings. Many other nations have similar policies. Remember, /. readers come from many different jurisdictions.
It's sort of like the patch, except that you get to keep smoking. The ritual is part of the habit--it's often a big part of the addiction. This stuff lets you wean yourself off tobacco and then wean yourself off the ritual of smoking itself. You don't have to go cold turkey with either the powerful nicotine addiction or the delightfully Freudian oral fixation. Divide and conquer.
Makes a lot of sense, really, as long as people don't start thinking that these cigarettes are "healthier". The benzo[a]pyrene will get you, not the nicotine. In that sense, you're quite right--if someone switches brands with no intention of quitting, they might well start smoking more cigarettes. Though these particular cancer sticks are likely to be more expensive, so probably only people interested in quitting will buy them...
Have you considered taking up drinking?
Spacecraft aren't the only things that move. Clouds do, too. And high clouds will appear quite similar to observers spread over a large area. If you can point me to some footage from the eclipse date that was filmed by a camera held reasonably steadily that shows both the UFO and the ground (or some other fixed object) in the frame for reference, then I'll revisit my tentative conclusion.
I'm curious, actually--are we discussing the same event? I'm referring to sightings before and during the solar eclipse visible from Mexico City on July 11, 1991. There have been other sightings reported in the same area, from around that time, and in the years since.
I am open to any "reasonable" explanation but venus is not a reasonable explanation. Venus does not move, venus does not disappear suddenly after appearing suddenly.
I reiterate my requests for additional information as stated above. Show me some good footage, with a solid reference point in it. (And make sure we're talking about the same day.)
Like I said there have been many incidents all over the world that have been videotaped. Most of them by people who have no means of faking videotapes (which is very hard to do and require lots of money) not all of them are venus, not all of them are swamp gas, and no matter how hard they try the skeptics can not explain all of them. Which leaves the question. What are they?
As I have stated before, I'm not addressing all the reports of UFOs. Many will quite probably turn out to be misinterpretation of subjective evidence, or hithero unknown natural phenomena (very exciting in itself--many UFO sightings can now be attributed to recently discovered exotic forms of lighting). Some incidents are quite intriguing and warrant additional study.
I don't pretend to have an explanation for all UFO sightings, and I would be thrilled if there existed an unambiguous case for one or more of them being visitors from another world. Nevertheless, in this case, for this one group of sightings, even pro-UFO groups like MUFON tend to accept the Venus hypothesis. The fact that there exist sightings for which no good explanation exists does not mean that all sightings represent alien visitations. Such a conclusion would be a most regrettable "logical fallacy".
If you want to discuss some of the other sightings in Mexico or elsewhere, that might be more fruitful. I also look forward to any further evidence that you might have regarding the July 11 events.
Don't squeeze the Sharman!
That's a terrible thing to say about your mother.
Both of those are reasonable interpretations of events. When you have a lot of people looking at the sky who don't usually look at the sky, they can make errors of interpretation. Incidentally, I didn't make the absolute statement that the object was Venus. I stated that it was "very likely". Don't accuse people of committing logical fallacies when they make qualified statements based on reasoning and available evidence.
As for the event itself I saw the videos (more then one) and the object was definately moving in a back and forth manner. I minored in astronomy and have spent many a night staring at the sky with both the naked eye and telescopes of varying sizes and have never seen any planet move in that fashion. Whatever that thing was it was not venus.
I too have studied astronomy and spent many nights (and days) looking at the sky. Unfortunately, neither you nor I attended the Mexico City event (pity--it would have been something to see, UFO or not) so our qualifications as observers are moot. If you shoot video of Venus (or any small, stationary, bright object) using a camera zoomed in close, you will get apparent motion. Even if you use a tripod, wind often introduces some vibration. This problem is exacerbated when the video is digitized and further enlarged.
Of course the that was but one event that was videotaped. There must be hundreds of hours of videotapes of UFOs are you seriously claiming that all of them were venus? Surely not. For example does this [jman5.com] look like venus?
Don't get all bent out of shape. I was addressing this one incident. Each video of each event should be evaluated on its merits. Based on the accounts that I have read, it seems that on the balance of probabilities the object seen was likely Venus. For the record, I would be thrilled to find evidence of other life in the Universe. (I've said as much on another recent thread. I'd like to see a large space-based interferometer built so we can do spectroscopy of distant planetary atmospheres--look for signs of life. I think that the search for extraterrestrial life (and intelligence!) is worthwhile and interesting.
But I also think, based on the evidence presented, that the bright spot over Mexico a decade ago was Venus. Refusing to consider that some UFO incidents have reasonable explanations makes you no more credible than those who refuse to consider that any incidents may have something to do with extraterrestrial life.
In 2001, a 21-year-old Michigan man named Brian Baltutat was successfully prosecuted under the NET Act for posting a mere 142 software programs on the "Hacker Hurricane" Web site.
'Mere'?
I didn't even know that there were 142 software programs out there worth stealing...
No, but all of the backend code will be written in C#.
You could get away with it if you happen to be reading /. from a country that (a) doesn't have an extradition treaty with the United States or (b) doesn't extradite people who do things that are secretly amusing to members of your own government.
That said, I agree that Joe Sixpack from Detroit probably shouldn't register his own .mil domain.
I think if you show up at the registrar's door with guns, then he'll accept that you deserve a .mil domain.
Not that I by any means believe that the SOHO artifacts are alien craft, but couldn't aliens (hypothetically speaking) build flying tubes? A long cylinder would like a straight line (just like the edge of a saucer) from almost all angles.
Won't you feel silly if they actually ever do find one? Or rather, an Identified FO--one that can be verified as being alien in origin. (I'm a hard scientist, if you're wondering--physical chemistry, with segues into medical physics and tissue optics.)
Sure, I see UFO hunting as something that people can pursue as a hobby rather than as a "real" job, but then, a lot of important astronomical discoveries are made by amateurs.
Hunting UFOs is sort of like Linux (calm down--it's a very loose analogy). There are zealots, skeptics, and people in between. There are groups that try to make money from the phenomenon, and people that just report on it. There are people that contribute a little bit to the community now and than, there are those that view it with a benign disinterest--and there are those that pour hours into it with singleminded determination with no expectation of reward.
Me, I love the (real, useful, unmassaged) SOHO imagery, and I think we should be putting tons of funding into materials science so we can build a space elevator. I'd also like to build a big space-based visual/near IR interferometer so we can do spectroscopy of planetary atmospheres around other stars.
Meanwhile, I run a SETI@Home unit every so often, and I don't begrudge them the cycles. I also am waiting patiently to see good evidence of a genuinely unidentified flying object--not Venus--and I will weigh any claims on their merits. I mean, sure the SOHO data are exciting, but wouldn't evidence of extraterrestrial life tickle you, too?
Done.
Here's an interesting link--be sure to read the skeptic's perspective on the second page. In short, the UFO very likely was the planet Venus.
I have not been able to verify this (I don't have access to paper copies of the document) but it has been reported that even a group that would quite like to see a substantiated sighting of an alien craft (MUFON - the Mutual UFO Network) agrees that this sighting is bogus. (Citation is Abercrombie, Andy. No Title. The Lone Star (TX) MUFON Reporter. 15 May 1993)
The still pictures on this site are less than impressive. They could very easily be the result of the planet Venus, plus some artifacts due to camera motion, image enlargement, and smoothing. (Only this first image is unenlarged--and I'm not overly excited.) I can't seem to play their first video, but the second one is not from the eclipse; it is another event. To be fair, this second video is more interesting (it has a moving object), and represents either better evidence (on its face) or a hoax requiring more effort.
There is tons of video tape UFO evidence so I don't understand why you claim there is none.
There is tons of video tape evidence of an unidentified flying object, yes. Unless it is Venus. Millions of people were watching the eclipse that day--Mexico City is not exactly a small community. Where was the panic in the streets? The frantic news reports?
The clincher for me is that there were tens of thousands of astronomers present, both amateur and professional. The object is described in most reports as stationary and quite bright (visible even during daylight), and it was not far in the sky from a highly observed phenomenon (the Sun during an eclipse). Astronomers unable to indentify a very bright stationary object that suddenly appeared in the sky would not hestitate to report it. Why? Not because they're thinking aliens--but rather, because they're thinking supernovae. Discover a nearby one and you're famous for the rest of your life in astronomical circles. So where were the reports to the International Astronomical Union? Actually, since the object faded to invisibility much more rapidly than a supernova, it would be even more interesting--a hitherto undiscovered class of astronomical object, worthy of discussion and analysis. A quick review of the literature reveals nothing--not even a "Gee, that's weird" type note in an astronomical journal.
Unless all the atronomers are in on the conspiracy of silence. But there's nothing in it for them. A lot of them would be thrilled to have proof of other life in the Universe--it would help them get more funding.
What's happening is that when a comment moderation is reported to you (and also immediately after you submit a comment) the moderation total will reflect the +1 score that you get for being logged in, but the +1 (for a total of +2) karma bonus doesn't show up.
The moderation tallies are actually correct when you look at the lists of comments--you get the bonuses to which you're entitled. If you check your user profile, the correct values are reported there as well. So the system isn't really 'horribly broken', it's just a bit flaky. Someone will fix it eventually. In the meantime, you're not just here for the karma, are you? You just want to contribute in a positive way to the discussion, so don't sweat the totals.
I've noticed this as well. Perhaps the ol' Slashcode isn't up to snuff anymore? Or maybe the number of users is starting to put a strain on the system. I don't have to make multiple retries; I find that waiting a minute for the submission to go through works. If it's not worth waiting a minute to say, it's not worth saying, right?
Aside: I know this is offtopic. I am posting without karma bonus so I'm a smaller target for moderators. ;)
*snip*
The whole idea is UNCONSTITUTIONAL. And ammednig the constitution is a dangerous action, once it starts the constitution is open for modification until closed and ANYTHING can happen during the debate.
Right, because it would be inappropriate for a Governor to urge constitutional change if he or she felt it in the best interests of his or her people. If we let that sort of thing happen, Congress could do something really dumb, like abolish slavery, or protect people from self-incrimination, or worse.
Operating within the Constitution includes making suggestions that it be changed--not through violent revolution, but through the mechanisms that were built into the document for that very purpose.
Whether or not the taxation considered is unconstitutional (IANAL), and if it is, whether or not the hassle of an amendment should be pursued (IMHO not), are side issues. Politicians should be free to urge changes that are (on their face) unconstitutional, if they are prepared to follow through with an amendment. If a question falls into a gray area, that is a matter for the courts--that's why the judiciary exists.
Wow! This was tried in many nations--including the United States--in the nineteenth century. Some countries still use a similar system, wherein banks are allowed to issue currency. Very tight regulation is required, or else you end up with problems--similar to those in the United States--where organizations issue currency without assets to back it up, make it difficult to redeem their "cash" for real dollars, or just the money and run, leaving customers with worthless paper.
In the United States between 1837 and 1863 roughly five thousand different types of bills were issued by more than a thousand different banks. Counterfeiting, fraud, and just plain bad customer service ran rampant. Of course, none of a bank's holdings were insured by the federal government as they are today (FDIC in the U.S., CDIC in Canada; similar bodies in other developed countries.)
You're asking us to cavalierly give thousands or millions of dollars to essentially anonymous individuals on the internet and endow them with the powers of what amounts to a central bank, while letting unfettered free market forces work things out? Go ahead--Ask Slashdot: Is everyone happy with the PayPal customer service department?* Don't think so.
If it walks like a bank and quacks like a bank, it damn well ought to be regulated and insured like a bank. Until then, credit cards will reign.
*Trick question: it's already been addressed on /. The answer is 'no'.
Yes, that was a joke.
Humans usually have uniformly coloured hair on top of their heads--but even then, identical twins with different hair colour are sometimes seen (Lancet 353 (1999) 562). Cats often have mottled, striped, or otherwise nonuniform coats.
The splotches on a cat are the result some rather interesting processes, one of which is described here. Essentially, cats receive genes determining the colour of their coats from both parents. Within the cat embryo at the stage where it contains a few dozen or fewer cells, one set of genes for colour is deactivated in each cell--but it is not necessarily the same set in different cells.
This random deactivation of genes mean that parts of the cat that develop from one cell within the embryo will show orange fur, while bits from other cells may turn up with black fur. Overall, the effect is mottled fur, in a random pattern--just as is seen with Cc.
I'm glad that your detailed anecdotal study has reached such enlightening conclusions.
Twins are usually raised in the same home, under the same circumstances, by the same parents. Even then, there are usually marked differences once you get to know them. (Sure, they look mostly the same, but they're not identical.) I don't think your research properly separates environmental and genetic effects.
For identical twins raised independently, there is certainly a strong correlation betweent their susceptibilities to certain diseases, just as we would expect. Though there might be some similarities in temperament, the correlation isn't much bettter than between two random individuals. (I lump most mental illnesses under diseases, not temperament.)
Psychologists (and legions of statisticians) have made careers of studies of identical twins. Just because you've heard about cases where twins are similar, doesn't mean that dissimilar cases don't exist. There's a confirmation bias at work, because similar behaviour supports our subconscious belief that people who look alike ought to be alike.
Ah. We have achieved a badly-implemented Etch-a-Sketch solution.
Peachy.
The term is most popular in the United Kingdom and some of its former colonies (not Canada, however.) In the United States, the only place you're likely to hear it is on imported television, particularly the series Junkyard Wars (a.k.a. Scrapheap Challenge in the U.K.; it runs on Wednesday nights on TLC.) On that note, host Cathy Rogers can call me whatever she wants. Junkyward Wars also exposes the world to words like bodge (v., n., syn. kludge) and brill (adj. syn. Awesome! Derived from 'brilliant'). For further Britishisms, refer to the British-American Dictionary.
To close, then. I'm a boffin, and proud of it. If the Australians are too uptight to recognize a compliment when they hear one--well, they can sod off.
People, it's fine to mirror the article content to the comments if the original site is getting hammered. But come on--the Wall Street Journal? As important as we of /. think we are, the WSJ can handle our brutal onslaught. Really. It can.
Mirroring the WSJ content (or that of any other major news outlet or high-traffic site) is pointless. For the NYT, post a link to the Google (no registration required) version. Quite frankly, these sites can handle more load than /. can--so it makes sense to have them supply the articles.
The sole advantage of mirroring content from these large sites on /. is that maybe--maybe--a few more posters will read the original article before posting. Tagging posts that are at best 0, Redundant as +5, Informative is playing to the whores.
With this new electronic system, there is no polling place where returning officers (title varies with jurisdiction) monitor the voting process, and ensure that no supervision, campaigning, or coercion take place within the polling place.
What's to protect her from being beat up nomatter how she votes?
With polling stations outside the home and secret ballots, she can lie about how she voted. I won't run through the remainder of your arguments, because they are all similar cases.
As far as I'm concerned, you gave no real reason why this is a "bad idea" - nothing unique to this implementation.
We would be back to the bad old days when votes were bought with whiskey or a cudgel. This is why all the elaborate mechanisms of a secret ballet were developed in the first place. Clear enough for you?
I don't think any slight was intended. The President of the United States (for at least the last few administrations) has always had the email address president@whitehouse.gov.
So for any sitting President of the United States the people have the option of sending an email to 'president'. Perhaps the legitimacy of Bush's Presidency deserves to be challenged and perhaps not--but this time the quotes were legitimate and had nothing to do with the mess in Florida.