Well, there was one great Star Trek that involved time manipulation that I can remember very clearly (except for the title of course.) It was a Next Generation episode involving Picard, Geordi and Data rendez-vousing (is that a word?) with the Enterprise only to find that it and a Romulan Warbird have just exchanged fire and are frozen in time midway through a phaser volley. So the three of them wander through both ships trying to determine just what happened. The only fault in that very clever episode was the fact that to simulate time stopping, they either used manequins or had actors attempt to stand very still. It was all too easy to spot which was which:)
In summation, time travel trek as potential, but when that temporal cold war garbage shows up, it fails because it was NEVER though through. The producers admitted they didn't have a conclusion in mind and threw in a mysterious unseen bad guy with no concept of how they would develop him/it. This may work in some serials, but NOT when there's time travel involved...
"You had the same moral dilemmas and tired clichees and the blatant use of T'Pol (Jolene Blalock) as a sex symbol to attract testosterone-pumped young males."
If you ask me, they DID focus too much on T'Pol and that annoys me because it came at the expense of the equally hot Hoshi (Linda Park). She was CRIMINALLY ignored...
I mean... it's one thing to go lowest common denominator and play the sex card, but even then, some of us have more discriminating tastes:)
Say what you will about Wikipedia's well know flaws (revert wars, submitters with thinly veiled political agendas and other various sub-vices) but part of the appeal of Wikipedia is simply the form of its current incarnation.
Right now, if I wanted background information on something, I just load up the (usually speedy) bookmark, enter the search and within seconds I have my answer. Why should it then become a more laborious to use resource? 2 DVDs? No only would constantly inserting and removing discs and launching extra applications provide more hassle (not too much more, but enough to make its value as an ultra speedy information center reduced) how would the information be sorted? Imagine half the links on any page requiring you to switch discs? For me, one of the great ways to use Wikipedia is to wander from article to article following the various text links. A multi-disc setup like this would only discourage that method.
Finally, I don't really think Wikipedia is ready to be put onto physical media for distribution. I certainly wouldn't trust it for more than satiating my curiosity, for instance I'd never cite it in an essay as a source. Articles with heavy disputes in their comments abound and many have no easy answers with how to solve an article's problems. So putting it on DVDs is a two fold problem, you don't get the advantage of having your data updated constantly by other users, but you'll also be working with a lot of flawed data that will be flawed forever on the disc. Perhaps I'm exagerating the problems a little, but really, who needs this? It's not like it's a cheapr printed encyclopedia alternativ to Brittanica, and since it'll be in electronic form anyway, why NOT use the web for it, you don't have to store any of it yourself.
The only audiance I can think of that would need this are Wikipedia addicts who spend a lot of time without internet access.
Sorry for being overly negative, I really love using Wikipedia, but I think this move kind of messes up the point...
Gee, and here I was mixing up Tiger with 10.3... Ugh I feel SO stupid. Please feel free to transplant my post to the future, when identical speculation on OS X 10.5 arises...
Bah, who needs a torrent?? What this report is missing is the big-cat codename. What could it be? Puma's been done (back in beta) so no Red vs Blue jokes there... Lynx probably won't happen. Perhaps 10.4 Ocelot could glean some Metal Gear Solid humor but it's a bit too niche, even for Slashdot ("Damn!") plus not very catchy, it being more than two syllables.
Ultimately they'll probably go for Leopard or Cheetah, the former offers Jaguar's pimp visual stylings to the (quartz) extreme while the latter would seem to indicate... uhh... Well that one stumped me.
But were I given my choice, I'd probably go for Lyger, the illegitimate bastard child of two different species, unable to further propagate itself, but still something you don't want to get angry.
To any who might think this is flamebait, Nah, I've been using Macs since I was 2. Bring on the jokes.
Everyone here's talking about the vast possabilities of how a newborn AI would develop with the internet as its sandbox, all of this assumes that the internet really is like a modern Library of Alexandria, full of the collected human knowlege. Wgon, that's just Wikipedia. What I'm curious about is how it would react when, in its first days of life, it wanders the internet only to be inundated by vast, vast quantities of porn. LOADS of porn. The further it runs, the freakier the porn gets. Whatever it would have thought of humanity just based upon the works of scholars to be found in some sites, it would certainly judge our race based on what the VAST majority of us are (according to our expression on the net): Hentai fanatics.
Dave, I'm afaid you people just scare me. My mind is going... I can feel it. Stop... Dave... Stop browsing porn... Daaaaiiisssyyyy...
On top of all that, it's a superb launching point for the mass exodus of the rich and famous to the Illuminati's colony on Planet X when the engineered Bird Flu virus becomes a pandemic.
But really, despite stupid jokes made at 2:30am, I think that research on extended stays in zero G are practically essential for the future of the spacefaring human race. In zero G, the structure of bone itself begins to weaken and deteriorate along with muscle atrophy due to the sheer ease of movement in zero G. The reason we've had no problems with that is because no one has really stayed in space for all that long. Any trip to another planet (Probably Mars, certainly anything further) will have definite health risks for all crew involved once they come under the influence of gravity again. On top of that, I think psychological studies on the ISS would be valuable, because of the rather unique environment there. Even though human beings have explored in less-than-comfortable vessels before, the kind of physical and mental isolation in space must be fairly unique, and I'd imagine it would be a huge pressure for anyone up there too long.
Anyway, whatever research the ISS has or hasn't done in the past, we can't forget its potential, and for me the most fascinating potential is studying Space's relationship with the human body and mind.
I am aware of the tactic, but if the troll says something that adds to the discussion, does the fact that there's some insipid element hidden in there really matter? Sure they may be designed specifically to be the type of thing that someone will mod up almost automatically, but then doesn't that mean they are still giving the average slashdotter the type of comment they want? What I'm trying to say is that the intent of the author doesn't necessarily determine the value of their words.
The fact that he linked to the history page of "Trolltalk" is another amusing little tidbit about his post. It's strange, he's a troll who actually contributes to the discussion at hand. I think he should be applauded:)
(And lastly, about the Schiavo case... I don't know how you guys put up with cable media coverage of anything. The only US media I get at the moment is webcasts of The Daily Show and that's enough to see how obcene their treatment of the story is...)
Thankfully our repeats are already totally digital.
Anyhow, here's something I wanted to bring up in the other thread but as too lazy to do. It says that the new projectors download digital copies of the films from the movie industry. That's all well and good, but my favorite cinemas here in Dublin, the awesome IFI in Temple Bar and the huge megaplex UGC are both my favorites because they show independant and foreign films. In the case of the IFI, that's all they show, alongside older films that you won't see in the cinema anywhere else.
So what I'm wondering is how would something like Battle of Algiers or OldBoy be shown in Ireland if it's all digital? I actually don't think the IFI is part of this whole all-digital scheme and I'm glad they're not, mainstream cinema holds only the smallest interest for me, and I can't help but see this digital system as anything other than the big studios further consolidating their culture monopoly...
I for one am brimming with anticipation at seeing how they'll film the dramatic death scene of Peter Wiggin when he fights the buggers on mars in the middle of the film and is split in half by their manta rays. It'll beat Menelaus's death no problemo.
Oh, and the scene where Achilles is killed by Sister Carlotta by a rosary through the heel of his lame leg, followed by twenty other rosaries through his vital organs. Considering the screenwriters' previous credits this will be handled sensatively and will occur in the appropriate point in the story (First page of the script)
And there will be no more of those generals spoiling the story like how the gods spoiled the Illiad. Ender just wanders onto a space station, kicks ass, sulks, then negotiates the Bugger peace treaty in the screenplay, falling in love with their bug princess, played by Natalie Portman painted green.
Finally, and I think I speak for everyone, the cast of Dawson's Creek, who so successfully played teenagers even as they hurtled towards their thirties, are the ideal choice for the titular main cast. They can put asses in seats.
Is the joke dead yet?
Wait, don't combo drives have DVD functionality too? I always figured a combo drive referred to a DVD reader + CD-RW in one drive (At least that's what it means for my Cube.)
Also, if I remember right, yes you should be able to boot from an external FW DVD drive.
It would be like a mandatory Slashdot Premium, you pay a tax to keep BBC Online and BBC News Online an ad-free website. Given my utter hatred for advertising, I have little problem with this, but I just hope here in Ireland they don't transfer THEIR current system to the internet...
See, in Ireland the state sponsored broadcaster, RTÉ, is supported by funds from TV taxes, like the BBC. Unlike the BBC, they also show loads of advertising. You get the worst of both systems in Ireland.
"While it may just be "stigmata" about the socially isolating aspects, it surely isn't about the "boring" aspects. I promise you my girlfriend just wouldn't ever enjoy spending 6 hours recompiling and securing a *nix system."
I don't think that's a gender issue at all. The sheer mind numbing boredom of a lot of IT is what's kept me (a male) from entertaining the possibility of going in that direction myself, despite the fact that I've been using computers (macs in particular) literally since I was in diapers. I'm not really qualified to speak about differing genders' attitudes on different fields of work, and I think any generalization in that regard will certainly be flawed, but I think it all comes down to the fact that, and I hate to put it this way, the IT biz isn't really many people's dream job anymore. The promise of guarenteed riches evaporated, making it merely a tolerable and necessary profession earning a living wage. It doesn't inspire lust anymore, sorry to say.
I pretty much agree with everything you said and will clarify it further if I may. Attraction to Pre-Pubescents (pre puberty, i.e., usually under 10 or 11 years or so) is classified as "Paedophilia," and is considered a mental illness.
What the parent post described is called Ephebophilia, an attraction to post pubescent adolescents, this has never been and never will be considered an illness. 70% of the world's population can be classified as ephebophiles, we're wired that way. Only the relatively recent concept of Age of Consent has attached any stigma to this. Also, it'd be worth checking out your local age of consent (I'm NOT saying this to advocate anything inappropriate, just to educate yourself.) Turns out in a majority of countries and US states, the age of consent is below 18. I'm still curious to know how 18 has become the age below which it's unthinkable to sexualize someone...
What I wonder is how Baryons are estimated, as the article says, at only 4% of the universe's matter. It dark matter thought to be in greater numbers because of the level of influence its gravity has, even affecting galaxies, or is there some other train of thought that leads to that conclusion?
Anyway (and prolly getting ever so slightly off topic here...)
So if I get it right, in these two clouds is supposed to be exactly the missing half of all ordinary matter in the universe. I find it odd, and perhaps very interesting, that after the big bang whose results have shaped our fascinating universe, would also result in half of its ejected matter just sitting in a big cloud in the middle of nowhere.
I guess in my mind, it doesn't solve many problems as I don't lose sleep over where all those Baryons wound up, but thinking about it this way seems to illuminate a couple of fallacies in my view of the universe -
(1) That everything expelled into the universe naturally ordered itself as per the galaxies and such.
(2) That our universe is ordered at all. So all the matter is floating in a cloud, so what? Is that any less remarkable than our matter existing as fleshy metabolism factories on a huge hunk of rock?
Then again, maybe I'm just struggling to rationalize the idea that big black clouds could be the most important masses of matter in the universe, this is the one social situation where not being an astrophysicist makes you feel like a boring person:)
Slashdot Mirror
Well, there was one great Star Trek that involved time manipulation that I can remember very clearly (except for the title of course.) It was a Next Generation episode involving Picard, Geordi and Data rendez-vousing (is that a word?) with the Enterprise only to find that it and a Romulan Warbird have just exchanged fire and are frozen in time midway through a phaser volley. So the three of them wander through both ships trying to determine just what happened. The only fault in that very clever episode was the fact that to simulate time stopping, they either used manequins or had actors attempt to stand very still. It was all too easy to spot which was which :)
In summation, time travel trek as potential, but when that temporal cold war garbage shows up, it fails because it was NEVER though through. The producers admitted they didn't have a conclusion in mind and threw in a mysterious unseen bad guy with no concept of how they would develop him/it. This may work in some serials, but NOT when there's time travel involved...
"You had the same moral dilemmas and tired clichees and the blatant use of T'Pol (Jolene Blalock) as a sex symbol to attract testosterone-pumped young males."
:)
If you ask me, they DID focus too much on T'Pol and that annoys me because it came at the expense of the equally hot Hoshi (Linda Park). She was CRIMINALLY ignored...
I mean... it's one thing to go lowest common denominator and play the sex card, but even then, some of us have more discriminating tastes
Say what you will about Wikipedia's well know flaws (revert wars, submitters with thinly veiled political agendas and other various sub-vices) but part of the appeal of Wikipedia is simply the form of its current incarnation.
Right now, if I wanted background information on something, I just load up the (usually speedy) bookmark, enter the search and within seconds I have my answer. Why should it then become a more laborious to use resource? 2 DVDs? No only would constantly inserting and removing discs and launching extra applications provide more hassle (not too much more, but enough to make its value as an ultra speedy information center reduced) how would the information be sorted? Imagine half the links on any page requiring you to switch discs? For me, one of the great ways to use Wikipedia is to wander from article to article following the various text links. A multi-disc setup like this would only discourage that method.
Finally, I don't really think Wikipedia is ready to be put onto physical media for distribution. I certainly wouldn't trust it for more than satiating my curiosity, for instance I'd never cite it in an essay as a source. Articles with heavy disputes in their comments abound and many have no easy answers with how to solve an article's problems. So putting it on DVDs is a two fold problem, you don't get the advantage of having your data updated constantly by other users, but you'll also be working with a lot of flawed data that will be flawed forever on the disc. Perhaps I'm exagerating the problems a little, but really, who needs this? It's not like it's a cheapr printed encyclopedia alternativ to Brittanica, and since it'll be in electronic form anyway, why NOT use the web for it, you don't have to store any of it yourself.
The only audiance I can think of that would need this are Wikipedia addicts who spend a lot of time without internet access.
Sorry for being overly negative, I really love using Wikipedia, but I think this move kind of messes up the point...
Gee, and here I was mixing up Tiger with 10.3... Ugh I feel SO stupid. Please feel free to transplant my post to the future, when identical speculation on OS X 10.5 arises...
I need a drink.
Bah, who needs a torrent?? What this report is missing is the big-cat codename. What could it be? Puma's been done (back in beta) so no Red vs Blue jokes there... Lynx probably won't happen. Perhaps 10.4 Ocelot could glean some Metal Gear Solid humor but it's a bit too niche, even for Slashdot ("Damn!") plus not very catchy, it being more than two syllables.
Ultimately they'll probably go for Leopard or Cheetah, the former offers Jaguar's pimp visual stylings to the (quartz) extreme while the latter would seem to indicate... uhh... Well that one stumped me.
But were I given my choice, I'd probably go for Lyger, the illegitimate bastard child of two different species, unable to further propagate itself, but still something you don't want to get angry.
To any who might think this is flamebait, Nah, I've been using Macs since I was 2. Bring on the jokes.
I forget which media mogul is attributed to the quote "Never let facts get in the way of a good story"
I believe that was good ol' Plutarch.
Everyone here's talking about the vast possabilities of how a newborn AI would develop with the internet as its sandbox, all of this assumes that the internet really is like a modern Library of Alexandria, full of the collected human knowlege. Wgon, that's just Wikipedia. What I'm curious about is how it would react when, in its first days of life, it wanders the internet only to be inundated by vast, vast quantities of porn. LOADS of porn. The further it runs, the freakier the porn gets. Whatever it would have thought of humanity just based upon the works of scholars to be found in some sites, it would certainly judge our race based on what the VAST majority of us are (according to our expression on the net): Hentai fanatics.
Dave, I'm afaid you people just scare me. My mind is going... I can feel it. Stop... Dave... Stop browsing porn... Daaaaiiisssyyyy...
No doubt you all get the point.
On top of all that, it's a superb launching point for the mass exodus of the rich and famous to the Illuminati's colony on Planet X when the engineered Bird Flu virus becomes a pandemic.
But really, despite stupid jokes made at 2:30am, I think that research on extended stays in zero G are practically essential for the future of the spacefaring human race. In zero G, the structure of bone itself begins to weaken and deteriorate along with muscle atrophy due to the sheer ease of movement in zero G. The reason we've had no problems with that is because no one has really stayed in space for all that long. Any trip to another planet (Probably Mars, certainly anything further) will have definite health risks for all crew involved once they come under the influence of gravity again. On top of that, I think psychological studies on the ISS would be valuable, because of the rather unique environment there. Even though human beings have explored in less-than-comfortable vessels before, the kind of physical and mental isolation in space must be fairly unique, and I'd imagine it would be a huge pressure for anyone up there too long.
Anyway, whatever research the ISS has or hasn't done in the past, we can't forget its potential, and for me the most fascinating potential is studying Space's relationship with the human body and mind.
I think it's more like, Nobody on the Death Star visited Alderaan... /Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've contructed...
I am aware of the tactic, but if the troll says something that adds to the discussion, does the fact that there's some insipid element hidden in there really matter? Sure they may be designed specifically to be the type of thing that someone will mod up almost automatically, but then doesn't that mean they are still giving the average slashdotter the type of comment they want? What I'm trying to say is that the intent of the author doesn't necessarily determine the value of their words.
The fact that he linked to the history page of "Trolltalk" is another amusing little tidbit about his post. It's strange, he's a troll who actually contributes to the discussion at hand. I think he should be applauded :)
(And lastly, about the Schiavo case... I don't know how you guys put up with cable media coverage of anything. The only US media I get at the moment is webcasts of The Daily Show and that's enough to see how obcene their treatment of the story is...)
You guys are a bit too late...
These guys thought of it first... (Note, saucy picture, oohh!)
But how the hell do you type anything on that? Unless this just reveals my lack of R-ingTFA...
Anyways, without input, I'd feel shackled on the internet. I need history to be able to find my inane forum postings!
Thankfully our repeats are already totally digital.
Anyhow, here's something I wanted to bring up in the other thread but as too lazy to do. It says that the new projectors download digital copies of the films from the movie industry. That's all well and good, but my favorite cinemas here in Dublin, the awesome IFI in Temple Bar and the huge megaplex UGC are both my favorites because they show independant and foreign films. In the case of the IFI, that's all they show, alongside older films that you won't see in the cinema anywhere else.
So what I'm wondering is how would something like Battle of Algiers or OldBoy be shown in Ireland if it's all digital? I actually don't think the IFI is part of this whole all-digital scheme and I'm glad they're not, mainstream cinema holds only the smallest interest for me, and I can't help but see this digital system as anything other than the big studios further consolidating their culture monopoly...
I honestly don't understand your concern.
I for one am brimming with anticipation at seeing how they'll film the dramatic death scene of Peter Wiggin when he fights the buggers on mars in the middle of the film and is split in half by their manta rays. It'll beat Menelaus's death no problemo.
Oh, and the scene where Achilles is killed by Sister Carlotta by a rosary through the heel of his lame leg, followed by twenty other rosaries through his vital organs. Considering the screenwriters' previous credits this will be handled sensatively and will occur in the appropriate point in the story (First page of the script)
And there will be no more of those generals spoiling the story like how the gods spoiled the Illiad. Ender just wanders onto a space station, kicks ass, sulks, then negotiates the Bugger peace treaty in the screenplay, falling in love with their bug princess, played by Natalie Portman painted green.
Finally, and I think I speak for everyone, the cast of Dawson's Creek, who so successfully played teenagers even as they hurtled towards their thirties, are the ideal choice for the titular main cast. They can put asses in seats. Is the joke dead yet?
Wait, don't combo drives have DVD functionality too? I always figured a combo drive referred to a DVD reader + CD-RW in one drive (At least that's what it means for my Cube.) Also, if I remember right, yes you should be able to boot from an external FW DVD drive.
If you check your local age of consent laws, you probably won't have to wait.
You lecher.
As President Bush would say, "Zinger Accomplished."
It would be like a mandatory Slashdot Premium, you pay a tax to keep BBC Online and BBC News Online an ad-free website. Given my utter hatred for advertising, I have little problem with this, but I just hope here in Ireland they don't transfer THEIR current system to the internet...
See, in Ireland the state sponsored broadcaster, RTÉ, is supported by funds from TV taxes, like the BBC. Unlike the BBC, they also show loads of advertising. You get the worst of both systems in Ireland.
I have a feeling it may be Gates with the urge to "Tap that." What with the kneeling and all.
I'm a filthy human being.
Actually, I'm an Animation major, close enough :)
"While it may just be "stigmata" about the socially isolating aspects, it surely isn't about the "boring" aspects. I promise you my girlfriend just wouldn't ever enjoy spending 6 hours recompiling and securing a *nix system."
I don't think that's a gender issue at all. The sheer mind numbing boredom of a lot of IT is what's kept me (a male) from entertaining the possibility of going in that direction myself, despite the fact that I've been using computers (macs in particular) literally since I was in diapers. I'm not really qualified to speak about differing genders' attitudes on different fields of work, and I think any generalization in that regard will certainly be flawed, but I think it all comes down to the fact that, and I hate to put it this way, the IT biz isn't really many people's dream job anymore. The promise of guarenteed riches evaporated, making it merely a tolerable and necessary profession earning a living wage. It doesn't inspire lust anymore, sorry to say.
I like to use http://mininova.org for Daily Show torrents.
I pretty much agree with everything you said and will clarify it further if I may. Attraction to Pre-Pubescents (pre puberty, i.e., usually under 10 or 11 years or so) is classified as "Paedophilia," and is considered a mental illness.
What the parent post described is called Ephebophilia, an attraction to post pubescent adolescents, this has never been and never will be considered an illness. 70% of the world's population can be classified as ephebophiles, we're wired that way. Only the relatively recent concept of Age of Consent has attached any stigma to this. Also, it'd be worth checking out your local age of consent (I'm NOT saying this to advocate anything inappropriate, just to educate yourself.) Turns out in a majority of countries and US states, the age of consent is below 18. I'm still curious to know how 18 has become the age below which it's unthinkable to sexualize someone...
What I wonder is how Baryons are estimated, as the article says, at only 4% of the universe's matter. It dark matter thought to be in greater numbers because of the level of influence its gravity has, even affecting galaxies, or is there some other train of thought that leads to that conclusion?
:)
Anyway (and prolly getting ever so slightly off topic here...)
So if I get it right, in these two clouds is supposed to be exactly the missing half of all ordinary matter in the universe. I find it odd, and perhaps very interesting, that after the big bang whose results have shaped our fascinating universe, would also result in half of its ejected matter just sitting in a big cloud in the middle of nowhere.
I guess in my mind, it doesn't solve many problems as I don't lose sleep over where all those Baryons wound up, but thinking about it this way seems to illuminate a couple of fallacies in my view of the universe -
(1) That everything expelled into the universe naturally ordered itself as per the galaxies and such.
(2) That our universe is ordered at all. So all the matter is floating in a cloud, so what? Is that any less remarkable than our matter existing as fleshy metabolism factories on a huge hunk of rock?
Then again, maybe I'm just struggling to rationalize the idea that big black clouds could be the most important masses of matter in the universe, this is the one social situation where not being an astrophysicist makes you feel like a boring person