It seems like the happy medium would be to just stick these things in the category of "Unproven Quackery" and be done with it.
Wikipedia DOES already have topics like Energy Medicine, from which I excerpt:
Early reviews of the scientific literature on energy healing were equivocal and recommended further research,[9][10] but more recent reviews have concluded that there is no evidence supporting clinical efficacy....
Edzard Ernst, lately Professor of Complementary and Alternative Medicine at the University of Exeter, has warned that "healing continues to be promoted despite the absence of biological plausibility or convincing clinical evidence... that these methods work therapeutically and plenty to demonstrate that they do not."[13] Some claims of those purveying "energy medicine" devices are known to be fraudulent[29] and their marketing practices have drawn law-enforcement action in the U.S.[29]
So it's not like this stuff is taboo on Wikipedia. But the snake-oil salesman don't want wikipedia to say the truth about it. Think what a huge disservice wikipedia would be doing to people who might turn to it for information if wikipedia didn't stick to its guns.
The most significant transition of a unix-style OS to the desktop is OSX. The most significant transition of a unix-style OS to handhelds is Android. X was left behind both times. Why did they re-invent the wheel if there was no need to do so?
They would be smart to make the VR games entirely separate by requiring the VR, and not displaying to the TV (except some little "preview" window so it will be less weird for onlookers). The rendering horsepower required for 3d is part of it, but beyond that VR games will also need to be different in other ways, such as head/viewer motion allowed, reliance on depth perception, field of view, and certainly other stuff that I can't think of ahead of time, some of which will be particular to Sony's implementation and not VR in general.
It's like gamepad vs. keyboard/mouse. In some sense they are equivalent, but not really. The game needs to be designed for one or the other. Likewise, all games for which Kinect can be used, but is optional, are not worth using it on.
What does a smartphone do that a laptop cannot do? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Quite a bit less, in fact.
As miniaturization proceeded past simply being portable (laptops), it has become all about convenience instead - saving a few seconds at a time. So, does saving a few seconds on something you could do with a smartphone matter at all? Well, it does, if there's anything you want to do 3,500 times per month.
I think that depends on the market they are targeting. In the US, a 100KG moped will never sell, because it cannot have enough protection to make it reasonably safe. The per-mile death rate on motorcycles is about 35 times that of cars. That is out of the question to the vast majority of people who can afford something safer.
Really it would be interesting to see how light you could make a reasonably safe vehicle, e.g. using a titanium frame with a carbon-fiber shell, then working backwards to make it cheaper from there. And by "reasonably safe," I mean putting it through the standard battery of NHTSA and insurance institute for highway safety tests.
I disagree, I think it looks nice. Certainly nicer than a Smart Car.
As a motorcyclist (including daily commuting), an enclosed motorcycle doesn't seem at all absurd to me. It addresses the main disadvantages that prevent most people from riding motorcycles - higher safety (if it is adequately constructed, obviously) and protection from the elements.
What vehicle do you drive? Direct injection has caused some excitement among motorcycle riders for the possibility of bringing back 2-stroke power/weight ratios, while also passing emissions regulations... but I haven't noticed any reach the market?
No, because it's a ONE DAY BAN, and the first one since 1997. Even-numbered plates today, odd tomorrow. It's a specific measure for specific atmospheric conditions that made things smoggy in Paris at the moment.
99% of the responses below (and above) are irrelevant because they ignore that very simple fact.
I think you are really mis-characterizing what happened there. $250M is for the entire shuttle exhibit, including a new building to house it - not just this restoration. And here's the passage on the bolt:
One of the most critical items, the 30-pound bolt that attaches the nose of the shuttle to the external tank, was one of the most difficult to track down. Jenkins couldn't find any in Florida; they had either been scrapped or sent back to Texas, where they were made.
Creating a replacement would have been a "major undertaking," Jenkins said. The bolt was manufactured with specialized metals and equipment. Extra bolts would have been needed for engineering and seismic testing. All in all, he guessed, it probably would have been a six-figure project.
Jenkins traveled to Texas a few times to look for the bolt but had no luck. About a year after he began his search, he got a call. Someone in Houston had found a spare. It was sitting in a desk.
He hunted down the bolt and finally found it. How is this bad?
Actually it does not cost a lot of money to dispose properly of a li-ion battery. Unlike a lead acid battery, li-ion are non-toxic and can be dumped in a landfill. But of course since there is value in getting additional service from them, and then recycling them, why not?
You are completely misrepresenting the point. It is not claimed or supposed to be cheaper than Big Ag. Read the summary - the stated appeal is: "access to open space, verdant fields and fresh food...To be able to walk down the street with my kids and get fresh, healthy food is amazing." Where did you pull "cheaper" out of that? This one-track mindset is so pervasive we have become blinded to it.
The Guardian link is reporting on a likely confirmation of gravitational waves. But the seismograph study seems to be ruling them out, at least near the frequency of 1 hz. They made a new, more sensitive detection mechanism and found nothing, thus ruling out the existence of any wave above a very low energy level. Am I missing the point?
I have always wondered how they handle heavy users, like if they allow commercial use, or if there is an unpublished cap. You could imagine somebody running a rural general store on it, or one kid at a dorm charging hundreds of others to use his Prime account for $2 a pop.
I do order quite a bit from Amazon using my Prime account. The thing is, it wouldn't hurt me to wait a couple extra days for most of it. The basic problem with Prime is you are (pre-)paying for fast shipping for every Prime order, even when you don't really want it enough to pay for it.
Good info. For a video player I am an absolute believer in hardware acceleration; even if the CPU load is 100%, software playback always causes stuttering. That is a definite hurdle in the "old laptop" route for that application, since the GPUs tend to be sub-par.
I like the idea of these cheap little boxes! But it should be noted that the $180 one you linked does not include an HDD/SSD, nor an ethernet port(!?) (No USB3 either, though it does have high-speed expandability via a Thunderbolt port).
I know it's not really the same, but I've had good luck with used laptops. Even if I use them primarily headless or with an external keyboard/mouse, you get low power consumption, built-in battery backup, and a built-in screen which is handy sometimes. The only trick is finding cheaper used laptops that have some sort of digital video out, not just a VGA port.
Sure, when the ratio of unproductive old people to productive young people increases, the burden on the young people increases. This is true whether your accounting of chits uses dollars, entitlement programs, social customs (obliging children to support their parents directly), or anything else. There is no avoiding it. The only real questions are how to distribute the burden among the able-bodied, and how quickly the assets of the old are transferred to the young.
Who is that said democracies fail when the population discovers they can vote themselves bread and circuses?
I largely agree. I just wish people would quit blaming politicians for everything, when those same people keep voting to keep their benefits and not paying enough taxes to fund those benefits. This surge in payouts to retiring Boomers has been predicted as long as I have been alive. And yet still this belief in some mythical solution involving only cuts to "waste" and "inefficiency" persists.
Slashdot Mirror
Wikipedia DOES already have topics like Energy Medicine, from which I excerpt:
So it's not like this stuff is taboo on Wikipedia. But the snake-oil salesman don't want wikipedia to say the truth about it. Think what a huge disservice wikipedia would be doing to people who might turn to it for information if wikipedia didn't stick to its guns.
The most significant transition of a unix-style OS to the desktop is OSX. The most significant transition of a unix-style OS to handhelds is Android. X was left behind both times. Why did they re-invent the wheel if there was no need to do so?
Is that true? You can only buy insurance through the government website and can't just get it straight from the insurance company like before?
A website is a single relatively minor issue.
It's like gamepad vs. keyboard/mouse. In some sense they are equivalent, but not really. The game needs to be designed for one or the other. Likewise, all games for which Kinect can be used, but is optional, are not worth using it on.
Guy Fawkes has pretty much cornered that market.
I don't agree with 'massive.' It will be more terse, compared to anonymous overrides which are currently used for that.
Basically the second line of code below is junk that could be removed, right?
button.addActionListener(new ActionListener() {
public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent e) {
System.err.println("Button pressed");
}});
As miniaturization proceeded past simply being portable (laptops), it has become all about convenience instead - saving a few seconds at a time. So, does saving a few seconds on something you could do with a smartphone matter at all? Well, it does, if there's anything you want to do 3,500 times per month.
Really it would be interesting to see how light you could make a reasonably safe vehicle, e.g. using a titanium frame with a carbon-fiber shell, then working backwards to make it cheaper from there. And by "reasonably safe," I mean putting it through the standard battery of NHTSA and insurance institute for highway safety tests.
As a motorcyclist (including daily commuting), an enclosed motorcycle doesn't seem at all absurd to me. It addresses the main disadvantages that prevent most people from riding motorcycles - higher safety (if it is adequately constructed, obviously) and protection from the elements.
What vehicle do you drive? Direct injection has caused some excitement among motorcycle riders for the possibility of bringing back 2-stroke power/weight ratios, while also passing emissions regulations... but I haven't noticed any reach the market?
99% of the responses below (and above) are irrelevant because they ignore that very simple fact.
It is often not obvious which is which. So save your "enhance!" jokes.
He hunted down the bolt and finally found it. How is this bad?
Actually it does not cost a lot of money to dispose properly of a li-ion battery. Unlike a lead acid battery, li-ion are non-toxic and can be dumped in a landfill. But of course since there is value in getting additional service from them, and then recycling them, why not?
Check out the 60 Minutes story on Luxottica. Oh man, what a racket.
You are completely misrepresenting the point. It is not claimed or supposed to be cheaper than Big Ag. Read the summary - the stated appeal is: "access to open space, verdant fields and fresh food...To be able to walk down the street with my kids and get fresh, healthy food is amazing." Where did you pull "cheaper" out of that? This one-track mindset is so pervasive we have become blinded to it.
The Guardian link is reporting on a likely confirmation of gravitational waves. But the seismograph study seems to be ruling them out, at least near the frequency of 1 hz. They made a new, more sensitive detection mechanism and found nothing, thus ruling out the existence of any wave above a very low energy level. Am I missing the point?
I have always wondered how they handle heavy users, like if they allow commercial use, or if there is an unpublished cap. You could imagine somebody running a rural general store on it, or one kid at a dorm charging hundreds of others to use his Prime account for $2 a pop.
I do order quite a bit from Amazon using my Prime account. The thing is, it wouldn't hurt me to wait a couple extra days for most of it. The basic problem with Prime is you are (pre-)paying for fast shipping for every Prime order, even when you don't really want it enough to pay for it.
I meant, ...even if the cpu load is NOT 100%...
Good info. For a video player I am an absolute believer in hardware acceleration; even if the CPU load is 100%, software playback always causes stuttering. That is a definite hurdle in the "old laptop" route for that application, since the GPUs tend to be sub-par.
I know it's not really the same, but I've had good luck with used laptops. Even if I use them primarily headless or with an external keyboard/mouse, you get low power consumption, built-in battery backup, and a built-in screen which is handy sometimes. The only trick is finding cheaper used laptops that have some sort of digital video out, not just a VGA port.
Sure, when the ratio of unproductive old people to productive young people increases, the burden on the young people increases. This is true whether your accounting of chits uses dollars, entitlement programs, social customs (obliging children to support their parents directly), or anything else. There is no avoiding it. The only real questions are how to distribute the burden among the able-bodied, and how quickly the assets of the old are transferred to the young.
I largely agree. I just wish people would quit blaming politicians for everything, when those same people keep voting to keep their benefits and not paying enough taxes to fund those benefits. This surge in payouts to retiring Boomers has been predicted as long as I have been alive. And yet still this belief in some mythical solution involving only cuts to "waste" and "inefficiency" persists.