* Microsoft tries to sell you newer 'firmware' upgrades without fixing the existing problems * Both meanings of Crash converge. * Viruses will drive into buildings burn them with their Sony batteries;-) * Insurance: Thats not a bug its a feature! No coverage. * "Warning Please Step Away From The Car." can be followed with an actual threat * Road kill goes UP * Eventually NO stop signs or street lights * Bikes and humans finally have the actual right of way * No traffic cops (lost 'funds' made up from the above) * In Russia: You drive the car (were those ever funny?) * Finally passengers can sit backwards!!! (its safer) * Some American cars hit foreign cars because of misunderstanding over metric distances * mp3 buffer overflow makes you drive to the Sony Store * Gated communities prevent you from even driving within sight of them * Hands-free drive byes! * Google maps takes daily photos of your front yard, keeps all of them. Some nerds come up with uses for that you don't want to think about * McDonalds sells iBurger which picks up food from their warehouse, but only if you are not in the car to witness it * Cliff sensor recall after people have troubles in Montana * Some cities experiment with free ride cars; Taxi cab drivers revolt * Cars alternate the part of the road they drive on, spreading wear on the road * Insecure men buy sports AI so they could feel like a race car driver although not actually driving * Americans still buy oversized cars out of fear of a EMP "bomb" * The system involves TONS of unnecessary GM parts that do not last for any length of time * GM creates more hype about something they are not really making to distract us from them being behind the others
The primary system in the USA is a kind of run off system. The primaries are the 1st phase vote and the main election is between the two parties. The 3rd parties don't get a fair shot and they may have primaries as well; although, I suspect many 3rd parties have little relative trouble in picking their candidates.
If had the primary elections merged into a single one you'd have a run off system. In which case we'd be better off because none of the republicans would make it to the #2 spot. (they are all nuts except ron paul who might have a better shot in a merged primary.)
People blame the public school system in the USA for everything. It will never please everybody and neither will having multiple private systems. American parents blame everybody but themselves and their children and that is a BIG problem. The culture has also degraded as well.
American kids want to consume, play games, play sports, watch TV AS ADULTS; not much different from their parents. TV has done so much harm and gets next to no blame.
Letting people choose school systems will not stop the complaints and sadly while test scores might get better (not much when you average everything) the core problem there is the focus on narrow minded measurements and "accountability". Education is unlike everything else and should be modeled around the human brain's development not how to run an organization or train employees. (Either system could do that; however, parents think they are expert educators and will send their kid to McDonald's school because it offers daycare, free food and makes them feel they are good parents.)
Einstein didn't think much of school, but he did make it thru the system and it did still impact him (do you really think he'd be all that much smarter if the system harmed him? one could think it helped him since he came out so well. The brain is not understood so you can't really take a solid position either way.) The USA did quite well before and had public education (with some of the big inventions involving help from former german students.)
Teachers today are thought of as daycare, therapists, and pseudo parents-- parents freak when their kids stay home and not buried in home work or calmed down with drugs. They want their morals taught but none of the morals they disagree with or that make the kid hard to manage. Bad parenting is far more common than Americans will admit and teachers have to deal with it. Most parents are divorced and both parents work, which doesn't help. There is also no more community outside perhaps a weekly church activity. My relative's kids hardly even visit friends, can't bike down the street, go to the park alone or be left in the house alone at double the age I was when I was allowed to do so. The dangers are no less real than back in my childhood.
The local high school around here used to have a shooting range in the basement; a gun in the locker was normal. A bad kid who needed a smack got it without a lawsuit; and parents had authority over their children. Children now also have diminished responsibility. In addition, we teach a lot of useless information (which grows in volume each year) we want them trained and not educated-- heaven forbid them think for themselves (because that makes them hard to manage in school and at home. Hell much of pre-school is just training them to salivate at the bell.)
A well supported student doesn't even need a school system.
Me, I think this is Y2K over again but far larger and we can't just stay up over night to get it done by the deadline. We saw Y2K coming and it wasn't an issue until a few years before the deadline. Naturally, when we averted most problems the activists got no glory and instead were thought of as confirmed alarmists.
The world will not get it this time and we will just be lucky if the nicer projections become the future instead of the worst case ones. We shouldn't have gotten this close to the wire in the first place... Naturally, I'm sure some have been waiting or procrastinating (like consultants waiting so they can charge more; management procrastinating or just uninterested.)
A crisis is a great opportunity and the powerful people of the world are talented at exploiting such situations; they don't need to create them most of the time. Just because its exploited does not mean it doesn't exist. Now the US SS system going under, that is a manufactured crisis (FYI its just fine even if you don't fix any of it; going into national debt for a while is an option nobody dares to mention.)
Governments are guilty until proven innocent and any well designed government is based upon that precept; problem is that the citizens foolishly apply the opposite precept which is for the criminal justice system not for government.
Remember when man landed on the moon and it went so extremely well that we extended the mission by years?
Oh, that was mars... humans can't do that!
Fact: Bush has been hurting NASA and science and one of the tricks has been curtailing NASA's earth and planetary science and even TRASHING a completed satellite for global warming work the second he stepped in office the other trick has been the Mars.
I'm sick of Coal's numbers being twisted. Coal plants get public money to help build the plants, public money to meet new regulations, public money & resources to get and collect the coal, devise schemes to not have to pay for the lack of large scale long term planning, occasionally need financial help for business problems, and finally the worst of all: they can mess up OUR AIR for free! I'm sure I missed a few.
Take most of that away and they will not look as great.
Solar's "problem" is that it takes most the long term cost and some of the externalized cost and puts it right upfront in the beginning. I hear panels today claim a 25-40 lifespan. You can measure output, reasonably predict output and lifespan so add interest to a loan and you have a relatively solid long term business model.
Half the power is used is to HEAT or COOL buildings. Geothermal can be used for that TODAY without a lot of extra setup cost. Ever hear of a heat pump?
Not to mention better buildings would cut it even more. There is no reason a Canadian can't heat most or all their house with solar powered Geothermal.
So its not centralized Geothermal, big deal. It helps address a huge part of the whole problem.
Nobody has yet to make a profitable nuke plant; I dare you to find one. You won't because they externalize costs plus get tons of government handouts. I'm so skeptical of nukes; I never minded it being dangerous. I don't mind gov funded electricity; but I hate the sanctioned monopolies that exploit gov which is what we have today. (even the 'cheap' coal plants are subsidized!)
US has officially jumped the shark many times. If I were to pick 1 time as the defining moment when everybody realized the USA wasn't the country it once was I would say its when the torcher in Iraq came out. (Combined with the policy supporting it, the continued support, the raping of children, and how it was NOT isolated.) That single policy and major leak was a defining moment.
Perhaps 2nd would be the 2004 election, where some foreign media actually had open criticism on the intelligence of the american public for the 1st time. That result affirmed everything the government did represented the american public's will or at least they thought the good out weighed the bad (or their elections don't work and they are a banana republic.) Or perhaps 2nd was the Iraq war for oil scam.
Oh, certainly you are allowed to insult and insinuate as much as you want. It's not that I'm thin skinned, but that your almost immediate recourse to it shows fundemental weaknesses in your arguments. (And that you are either aware of them, or are merely a habitual jackass who is also ignorant. The evidence now supports the latter conclusion.) Again you point out a criticism while doing the same thing your criticizing about! Somebody who doesn't want to be polite does in no way undermine their argument when they offend you. You are applying a stereotype to me while illogically associating that stereotype with the argument. Then you miss the point and get argumentative on side issues before finally saying its not clear how many unmanned missions == manned missions. took you long enough.
Its my speculation that by the time its cost effective (when its relatively easy) to send humans that robots will likely surpass the cost to benefit ratio. The reality is that NOW robots ARE the winner and will be for decades. Getting to mars in 20 years means leaving early and not doing it cheaply or likely as safely as waiting 50 years. Its your speculation that humans will be better in the future and likely your wrong. Even if I'm ignorant (hypothetical) I can still be correct. If you think robots lose now, your so wrong its not funny.
This is/was not a conversation. no more time for you! -logic nazi
Dvorak has such a wonderful track record and I actually feel a little bit better now he opposes OLPC.
Forget AIDS, people are starving! Forget cancer, people are starving! Forget USA schools, USA has starving people! Dvorak: "3rd World" countries are not all in the same shape.
POLITICS are the real MAJOR problem to world hunger and too many people with the power to help are too clueless or 'evil'. Over population I'd maybe place a close second. Bankers/etc I'd place under politics since they are heavily entrenched in politics.
My hammer is better than my nail gun because it can pull out nails and the nail gun can not; therefore, I should use my hammer on everything. I can out jog the mars rovers...
I can NOT walk in -50F without oxygen,food,shelter and I won't sacrifice myself after I stop walking. I can NOT be transported (alive) to mars at this time. I can NOT be transported as cheaply as a robot.
It depends upon the task at hand what tool is best. Robots, machines, and computers have and continue to replace humans at specific tasks. You do not have a valid comparison when you IGNORE the job being performed: which IS NOT walking on earth (thats YOUR comparison task.) Robots do not need to be humanoid to be advanced enough to outperform a human for the required tasks.
#2: perhaps numbering wasn't the best route, but #2 is not much of an argument as it is supporting facts for #3 with a little computer analogy which was put in there hoping to make a reference with something possibly familiar with geeks wasting time reading this
POINT: COST TO BENEFIT RATIO. Advancement in robotics means better probes sent to places we can NOT go or are not cost effective to bother going in person (thats a benefit.) Cost to Benefit ratio will drive the military to use more robots (and to just spend our money.)
Facts wrong? nope. See #1.
FYI: I'm allowed to insult and insinuate as much as I want, sorry if your thin skinned; but it is never relevant to the argument, it is just politics. If that was so horrible then you shouldn't post comments online. (Its fun to vent at strangers online, in real life youre expected to be 'respectful' no matter how stupid. Oh, btw, your argument sounded frustratingly stupid to me.) Your pious counter insult/insinuation amuses with its hypocrisy.
1) We couldn't send humans to mars 3 years ago. They've been talking about 20 years before we can get on mars starting from now--- so you're saying if we went back in time 23 years and told them to start working on it then humans would out do the robots we sent 3 years ago? Don't tell me you seriously thought about it before you wrote that hypothetical 'argument'? That perspective is in fairy tale land.
2) Robots last longer, are less fragile, and require a LOT less resources to operate. This is not exploring some island. This isn't even deep sea diving. Its just the most habitable place besides earth and getting there and back is a massive expense. The probes are made cheaply for specific tasks because its smarter than a giant monolithic robot that does everything. The same reasoning extrapolates to humans.
3) Cost to benefit ratio will always favor robots. As technology makes humans cheaper it also makes robots more effective. They easily WIN today and tomorrow.
If you still don't get it, your probably hopelessly blinded by emotions. If your going to make robots, high tech tools, a ship and a jeep for humans to operate on mars, why not slap the tools onto a smaller cheaper jeep trash the ship and eventually trash all the gear and put your money on that tiny niche where the human performs well.
Sorry, but Star Trek isn't going to happen like that, most the exploration will be by robots -- which doesn't make for good dramas about exploring our humanity in an ironic way.
Man on Mars timelines are so long that robots will be much better at that time. We can out perform human exploration NOW! Its only a waste of money to do it before it gets cheap. We can send dozens of robots for the cost of 1 human. Its not cost effective and will not be for sometime (if ever.) When we are ready to build bases to live on then we can send humans (not exactly exploration at that point.) We NEED advances in robotics on earth more than methods for space travel. Everybody keeps neglecting how cold and O2 free mars is and the traveling problems; which are best saved for solving later.
Its a DISTRACTION, didn't anybody notice how Bush has been trying to slow or stop climate science? He has NASA refocused on mars and neglecting other areas that he doesn't want or care about moving forward. Remember, he stopped a climate science probe that other countries would have paid to launch (it was already built) just because he didn't want any climate science probe backing this vast conspiracy of climate scientists scamming people about global warming. (we know he tried to censor government climate scientists, even after the public woke up.)
I've said it before; won't waste time doing it again even if I'd get mod up like I did before.
I talked to a MN state employee who told me it was easily over 100 million per mile for new freeway and in the downtown its over a billion per mile. This was about 5 years ago during a discussion about the lack of funding for bridge repair and how we were 10 years behind on funding and it would take a disaster before the idiots fixed it. (fyi: MN was the state who's downtown bridge collapsed earlier this year; which will likely cost over 300 million to build without lightrail support.)
One also has to keep in mind that costs are hard to compare because of math differences: LANES (quotes are often for 1 lane), contractors, unions, graft, bridges, maintenance, quality/type, CO2, and often buying the LAND is left out... that could be the most expensive part too.
I suggest curious people look into the chess match. I did at the time and I had a little A.I. experience and gained a little more since then. Chess is an interesting test because the problem is so vast that brute force attacks are unrealistic; although, still used by computers since it helps and they can out calculate humans. In terms of actually learning to play chess well, computers have a long way to go.
I'll consider computers as better at chess when they can honestly beat someone at Kasparov's peak WITHOUT unfair advantages such as a whole team of engineers tweaking the system DURING AND IN BETWEEN MATCHES!
The purpose of the chess exercise is to develop Applied Intelligence so it can be approximately as good as a human and hopefully learn enough to apply the discovered concepts to other areas. Any advancement in Applied Intelligence is a win since that is the true purpose for the game. Actually, 'winning' is actually a loss for Applied Intelligence as well as A.I. and sadly IBM was only thinking of themselves when they got lucky. They dare not risk losing again-- after all, they LOST ALL THE TIME until they finally beat a top human once.
If our alien Adam or Eve ancestors mated with dumb animals that would explain that recessive gene humans have that causes some of the rural humans to mate with dumb animals...;-)
Or perhaps our curiosity or arrogance in placing human genes into dumb animals and plants for experimentation has an inherited source or is simply characteristic of our level of development?
I'm for whatever story gets the scientists funding to do real work.
You can't arrest a computer, nor does it care if you dump water on it. Computers (especially government bought ones) cost more than the volunteers and you can have double-blind inspired counting systems using humans without much added cost. You can also archive raw data for further review.
FYI: banks were run by humans for most their existence. Not everybody had an abacus. Its cheaper to use computers now; they still make errors. Aside from your absurd comparison, banks are a false analogy to this problem. THINK ABOUT IT while you READ your bank statement verifying how much you have in your account...(that was a free hint)
Furthermore, I can't believe some people think its too much work to count ballots by hand. Anybody who says that should be banned from voting because voting is too much work for their tiny brains. Oh, election results were not quickly known 'instantly' for most the country's existence and exit polls are reliable enough to use for initial results if you don't want to wait for official confirmation (they are actually used to point out corruption in other countries where 'conspiracies' are given rational consideration.)
I was cranky after doing grading too! I hate grading.
Everybody here probably knows grammar and spelling are not the same. I was trying to be nice by raising it to grammar nazi instead of a petty spelling nazi. I suspected... yet I did it anyway. I'm sure a grammar nazi would jump on a context related spelling error.
My 'authority' status is relevant because I'm on the inside and has nothing to do with any extra status of the particular job. I wouldn't mention it otherwise. I actually try to undo the misconceptions much to the disapproval of some faculty who like being placed on a pedestal... Making that point on me wasn't beneficial but it could undermine the points being made in my post (or strengthen them.)
Perhaps they shouldn't teach spelling by phonics; although, english is a "devolving" language so I don't see why the school system couldn't make us progress towards something better or at least consistent. Its moving towards newspeak and rather than oppose any change I'd say why not move in better directions? Hell, I had a phase where I removed k and c from a lot of my writing (k=c or s=c) just to be that way:-p
How about some relevant kommentary using your experiense? Do you see things going down hill or hear others saying it? How much is merely a perspektive differense? ("I used to walk 10 miles in snow to skhool as a kid." I'm starting to see where that stuff develops.) I think there IS a downward trend going on. If teknology sukseeds at making life easy (boy has it failed so far) would/should we degrade into a bunch of paris hiltons?
English is not my area of expertise; don't see why you feel smug pointing out minor errors in a language with so many design flaws. Perhaps your boosting your own self esteem by finding fault in people with a higher status? (Hint: I am not up on a pedestal. Status is what you/we make it to be.) Posting on a forum is arguably already a waste of time.
I am a product of this system; we were not taught grammar and my school taught spelling by phonetics - largely as result of the high test scores for relatively little effort. We were taught reading using verbalization which creates speed problems later on (when its not their problem anymore...)
FYI: You'd have an obsessive fit if you read the output from the dean of an engineering school around here! Sadly his writing makes more sense than writing from others who use so called 'proper' English. The PURPOSE is communication!
I've used macs for a long time and I rarely was stuck when non-recursively merging two folders: Open folder A Open folder B Select all Drag into folder A Pick Replace
Recursive merging, thats what rsync, psync, pax, or ssync are for.
My expectations are such that I never was surprised by the folder replace option; same name files replace why wouldn't same name folders? Its consistent (plus I learned to read dialog boxes.) A non-recursive merge is manually possible in a few intuitive steps. A recursive merge that doesn't complicate the GUI for beginners I'd like to see. Now if you learned conventions from other systems I don't see how you can expect a 'beginner friendly' system to follow those conventions when their target user is not you.
1) As a member of the higher education system, I can tell you the MOST common thing I hear from older faculty is that the whole system is degrading and not just at our university. Personally, I've only seen a slight decrease in student work ethic and ability to actually think but that may be because I'm looking for this trend everybody speaks of; and as time passes I get more removed from my experience as a student so it alters my perspective as well.
2) The source is a Think Tank created by and for politicians, one should be skeptical of any of the many "non-partisan" organizations out there like this. Especially the ones with this much corporate and world trade connections. A great institution has largely only one direction to go over time and it only takes a few bad eggs to send it downward. I've been a part of non-profits who collapsed from minority who spread like a cancer. (Note: I didn't say this was ever a great institution, I don't know.)
3) Engineering students are not even getting hands on experience that previously was available. They don't even know their CAD drawings are impossible to make because they lack the experience with the devices that make them. The movement is towards outsourcing all the real engineering of the university and replace it all with 'virtual engineering' because China is just going to make everything for everybody anyways. Some of the top guys in our state do their work hands-on combined with theory because they know in the real world the problems are too difficult to even simulate in a computer unless you have a level of understanding which has been ignorantly case aside by far too many institutions who's faculty should or does know better.
4) There is a trend in the USA towards 3rd world educational techniques at all levels. I have students who want it to degrade into 'learn by wrote' because it involves less work/thought. I know public school teachers who see the government/politics forcing these lesser methods upon their classrooms. Other countries churn out people too, but the all want to get into the USA because our college system is(was) different -- the funding and immigration benefits are a big factor-- but that will likely decline after the rest falls too low for too long.
5) colleges are turning into trade schools. Trade schools are just fine and deserve respect but they are different and should stay that way and not dilute colleges simply because the market wants pre-trained worker drones. A CS major should not get credit towards their major for learning to make websites (in a class that is nearly the same to one at a graphic design trade school.) A college education should be more valuable than trade school to the student; the employer has a whole different perspective. One can expect the increase in income from a college degree to decrease as the trend continues.
There is no such thing as a free market except perhaps total anarchy. Anything less is shades of gray. Government defines and enforces the rules of any market therefore making it NOT a free market.
The USA can NOT compete with China and India. Americans need to wake up now before they end up too far behind and can no longer lie to themselves; how BAD will it have to get before people admit the truth? When the USA is 3rd world be enough?
Its NOT ludicrous treating CO2 as a pollutant. Animal shit is a pollutant. Just because you can't see or smell it does not mean too much of it is a bad thing. I suggest you sit in your garage with the engine running and post your comments. May your neighbor's dogs visit your lawn... You pay to dispose of shit and there are health regulations that control that-- in your free market corps and people could just 'dump' where it was cheapest. Do we provide services to prevent that? NO. We pass laws for proper disposal which end up resulting in most people paying for disposal.
Innovate? Anybody sick of that over-used word yet? Its used as much as revolutionary and both have become meaningless.
Necessity is the mother of invention. "The market" will compete for the cheapest most profitable solution: bribing officials and suckering people like yourself to deregulate them.
Slashdot Mirror
My post was in response to a high ranked equally off topic post
Parent with a mod of 5 said:
>Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the American public-school education.
How is it offtopic if the moderators are saying it is on topic?? Unfortunately the meta-mod system won't likely catch it.
* Microsoft tries to sell you newer 'firmware' upgrades without fixing the existing problems ;-)
* Both meanings of Crash converge.
* Viruses will drive into buildings burn them with their Sony batteries
* Insurance: Thats not a bug its a feature! No coverage.
* "Warning Please Step Away From The Car." can be followed with an actual threat
* Road kill goes UP
* Eventually NO stop signs or street lights
* Bikes and humans finally have the actual right of way
* No traffic cops (lost 'funds' made up from the above)
* In Russia: You drive the car (were those ever funny?)
* Finally passengers can sit backwards!!! (its safer)
* Some American cars hit foreign cars because of misunderstanding over metric distances
* mp3 buffer overflow makes you drive to the Sony Store
* Gated communities prevent you from even driving within sight of them
* Hands-free drive byes!
* Google maps takes daily photos of your front yard, keeps all of them. Some nerds come up with uses for that you don't want to think about
* McDonalds sells iBurger which picks up food from their warehouse, but only if you are not in the car to witness it
* Cliff sensor recall after people have troubles in Montana
* Some cities experiment with free ride cars; Taxi cab drivers revolt
* Cars alternate the part of the road they drive on, spreading wear on the road
* Insecure men buy sports AI so they could feel like a race car driver although not actually driving
* Americans still buy oversized cars out of fear of a EMP "bomb"
* The system involves TONS of unnecessary GM parts that do not last for any length of time
* GM creates more hype about something they are not really making to distract us from them being behind the others
The primary system in the USA is a kind of run off system. The primaries are the 1st phase vote and the main election is between the two parties. The 3rd parties don't get a fair shot and they may have primaries as well; although, I suspect many 3rd parties have little relative trouble in picking their candidates.
If had the primary elections merged into a single one you'd have a run off system. In which case we'd be better off because none of the republicans would make it to the #2 spot. (they are all nuts except ron paul who might have a better shot in a merged primary.)
People blame the public school system in the USA for everything. It will never please everybody and neither will having multiple private systems. American parents blame everybody but themselves and their children and that is a BIG problem. The culture has also degraded as well.
American kids want to consume, play games, play sports, watch TV AS ADULTS; not much different from their parents. TV has done so much harm and gets next to no blame.
Letting people choose school systems will not stop the complaints and sadly while test scores might get better (not much when you average everything) the core problem there is the focus on narrow minded measurements and "accountability". Education is unlike everything else and should be modeled around the human brain's development not how to run an organization or train employees. (Either system could do that; however, parents think they are expert educators and will send their kid to McDonald's school because it offers daycare, free food and makes them feel they are good parents.)
Einstein didn't think much of school, but he did make it thru the system and it did still impact him (do you really think he'd be all that much smarter if the system harmed him? one could think it helped him since he came out so well. The brain is not understood so you can't really take a solid position either way.) The USA did quite well before and had public education (with some of the big inventions involving help from former german students.)
Teachers today are thought of as daycare, therapists, and pseudo parents-- parents freak when their kids stay home and not buried in home work or calmed down with drugs. They want their morals taught but none of the morals they disagree with or that make the kid hard to manage. Bad parenting is far more common than Americans will admit and teachers have to deal with it. Most parents are divorced and both parents work, which doesn't help. There is also no more community outside perhaps a weekly church activity. My relative's kids hardly even visit friends, can't bike down the street, go to the park alone or be left in the house alone at double the age I was when I was allowed to do so. The dangers are no less real than back in my childhood.
The local high school around here used to have a shooting range in the basement; a gun in the locker was normal. A bad kid who needed a smack got it without a lawsuit; and parents had authority over their children. Children now also have diminished responsibility. In addition, we teach a lot of useless information (which grows in volume each year) we want them trained and not educated-- heaven forbid them think for themselves (because that makes them hard to manage in school and at home. Hell much of pre-school is just training them to salivate at the bell.)
A well supported student doesn't even need a school system.
Me, I think this is Y2K over again but far larger and we can't just stay up over night to get it done by the deadline. We saw Y2K coming and it wasn't an issue until a few years before the deadline. Naturally, when we averted most problems the activists got no glory and instead were thought of as confirmed alarmists.
The world will not get it this time and we will just be lucky if the nicer projections become the future instead of the worst case ones. We shouldn't have gotten this close to the wire in the first place... Naturally, I'm sure some have been waiting or procrastinating (like consultants waiting so they can charge more; management procrastinating or just uninterested.)
A crisis is a great opportunity and the powerful people of the world are talented at exploiting such situations; they don't need to create them most of the time. Just because its exploited does not mean it doesn't exist. Now the US SS system going under, that is a manufactured crisis (FYI its just fine even if you don't fix any of it; going into national debt for a while is an option nobody dares to mention.)
Governments are guilty until proven innocent and any well designed government is based upon that precept; problem is that the citizens foolishly apply the opposite precept which is for the criminal justice system not for government.
Remember when man landed on the moon and it went so extremely well that we extended the mission by years?
Oh, that was mars... humans can't do that!
Fact: Bush has been hurting NASA and science and one of the tricks has been curtailing NASA's earth and planetary science and even TRASHING a completed satellite for global warming work the second he stepped in office the other trick has been the Mars.
I'm sick of Coal's numbers being twisted. Coal plants get public money to help build the plants, public money to meet new regulations, public money & resources to get and collect the coal, devise schemes to not have to pay for the lack of large scale long term planning, occasionally need financial help for business problems, and finally the worst of all: they can mess up OUR AIR for free!
I'm sure I missed a few.
Take most of that away and they will not look as great.
Solar's "problem" is that it takes most the long term cost and some of the externalized cost and puts it right upfront in the beginning. I hear panels today claim a 25-40 lifespan. You can measure output, reasonably predict output and lifespan so add interest to a loan and you have a relatively solid long term business model.
Half the power is used is to HEAT or COOL buildings. Geothermal can be used for that TODAY without a lot of extra setup cost. Ever hear of a heat pump?
Not to mention better buildings would cut it even more. There is no reason a Canadian can't heat most or all their house with solar powered Geothermal.
So its not centralized Geothermal, big deal. It helps address a huge part of the whole problem.
Nobody has yet to make a profitable nuke plant; I dare you to find one. You won't because they externalize costs plus get tons of government handouts. I'm so skeptical of nukes; I never minded it being dangerous. I don't mind gov funded electricity; but I hate the sanctioned monopolies that exploit gov which is what we have today. (even the 'cheap' coal plants are subsidized!)
Offtopic name calling is all you can do and you attack my literacy?!
I'd rather be smart and poor at english than a stupid 'literate' anon coward.
US has officially jumped the shark many times. If I were to pick 1 time as the defining moment when everybody realized the USA wasn't the country it once was I would say its when the torcher in Iraq came out. (Combined with the policy supporting it, the continued support, the raping of children, and how it was NOT isolated.)
That single policy and major leak was a defining moment.
Perhaps 2nd would be the 2004 election, where some foreign media actually had open criticism on the intelligence of the american public for the 1st time. That result affirmed everything the government did represented the american public's will or at least they thought the good out weighed the bad (or their elections don't work and they are a banana republic.) Or perhaps 2nd was the Iraq war for oil scam.
Somebody who doesn't want to be polite does in no way undermine their argument when they offend you. You are applying a stereotype to me while illogically associating that stereotype with the argument. Then you miss the point and get argumentative on side issues before finally saying its not clear how many unmanned missions == manned missions. took you long enough.
Its my speculation that by the time its cost effective (when its relatively easy) to send humans that robots will likely surpass the cost to benefit ratio. The reality is that NOW robots ARE the winner and will be for decades. Getting to mars in 20 years means leaving early and not doing it cheaply or likely as safely as waiting 50 years. Its your speculation that humans will be better in the future and likely your wrong. Even if I'm ignorant (hypothetical) I can still be correct. If you think robots lose now, your so wrong its not funny.
This is/was not a conversation.
no more time for you!
-logic nazi
Find out how YOU are part of the problem in 20 minutes:
:-(
http://www.storyofstuff.com/
Dvorak has such a wonderful track record and I actually feel a little bit better now he opposes OLPC.
Forget AIDS, people are starving! Forget cancer, people are starving! Forget USA schools, USA has starving people!
Dvorak: "3rd World" countries are not all in the same shape.
POLITICS are the real MAJOR problem to world hunger and too many people with the power to help are too clueless or 'evil'. Over population I'd maybe place a close second. Bankers/etc I'd place under politics since they are heavily entrenched in politics.
Don't forget the debt relief scams which have only made things worse for many nations; thanks to "banker/investor" types with political connections. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=FC37F4B5EC10D27C
If you don't consume or produce goods YOU have NO value!
My hammer is better than my nail gun because it can pull out nails and the nail gun can not; therefore, I should use my hammer on everything.
I can out jog the mars rovers...
I can NOT walk in -50F without oxygen,food,shelter and I won't sacrifice myself after I stop walking. I can NOT be transported (alive) to mars at this time. I can NOT be transported as cheaply as a robot.
It depends upon the task at hand what tool is best. Robots, machines, and computers have and continue to replace humans at specific tasks. You do not have a valid comparison when you IGNORE the job being performed: which IS NOT walking on earth (thats YOUR comparison task.)
Robots do not need to be humanoid to be advanced enough to outperform a human for the required tasks.
#2: perhaps numbering wasn't the best route, but #2 is not much of an argument as it is supporting facts for #3 with a little computer analogy which was put in there hoping to make a reference with something possibly familiar with geeks wasting time reading this
POINT: COST TO BENEFIT RATIO.
Advancement in robotics means better probes sent to places we can NOT go or are not cost effective to bother going in person (thats a benefit.) Cost to Benefit ratio will drive the military to use more robots (and to just spend our money.)
Facts wrong? nope. See #1.
FYI: I'm allowed to insult and insinuate as much as I want, sorry if your thin skinned; but it is never relevant to the argument, it is just politics. If that was so horrible then you shouldn't post comments online. (Its fun to vent at strangers online, in real life youre expected to be 'respectful' no matter how stupid. Oh, btw, your argument sounded frustratingly stupid to me.)
Your pious counter insult/insinuation amuses with its hypocrisy.
On current mars probes:
1) We couldn't send humans to mars 3 years ago. They've been talking about 20 years before we can get on mars starting from now--- so you're saying if we went back in time 23 years and told them to start working on it then humans would out do the robots we sent 3 years ago? Don't tell me you seriously thought about it before you wrote that hypothetical 'argument'? That perspective is in fairy tale land.
2) Robots last longer, are less fragile, and require a LOT less resources to operate. This is not exploring some island. This isn't even deep sea diving. Its just the most habitable place besides earth and getting there and back is a massive expense. The probes are made cheaply for specific tasks because its smarter than a giant monolithic robot that does everything. The same reasoning extrapolates to humans.
3) Cost to benefit ratio will always favor robots. As technology makes humans cheaper it also makes robots more effective. They easily WIN today and tomorrow.
If you still don't get it, your probably hopelessly blinded by emotions. If your going to make robots, high tech tools, a ship and a jeep for humans to operate on mars, why not slap the tools onto a smaller cheaper jeep trash the ship and eventually trash all the gear and put your money on that tiny niche where the human performs well.
Sorry, but Star Trek isn't going to happen like that, most the exploration will be by robots -- which doesn't make for good dramas about exploring our humanity in an ironic way.
Man on Mars timelines are so long that robots will be much better at that time. We can out perform human exploration NOW! Its only a waste of money to do it before it gets cheap. We can send dozens of robots for the cost of 1 human. Its not cost effective and will not be for sometime (if ever.) When we are ready to build bases to live on then we can send humans (not exactly exploration at that point.) We NEED advances in robotics on earth more than methods for space travel. Everybody keeps neglecting how cold and O2 free mars is and the traveling problems; which are best saved for solving later.
Its a DISTRACTION, didn't anybody notice how Bush has been trying to slow or stop climate science? He has NASA refocused on mars and neglecting other areas that he doesn't want or care about moving forward. Remember, he stopped a climate science probe that other countries would have paid to launch (it was already built) just because he didn't want any climate science probe backing this vast conspiracy of climate scientists scamming people about global warming. (we know he tried to censor government climate scientists, even after the public woke up.)
I've said it before; won't waste time doing it again even if I'd get mod up like I did before.
SPEED also matters in cost. From 50mph to 60mph a highway nearly doubles in cost.
One also has to keep in mind that costs are hard to compare because of math differences: LANES (quotes are often for 1 lane), contractors, unions, graft, bridges, maintenance, quality/type, CO2, and often buying the LAND is left out... that could be the most expensive part too.
Some googles:
Light Rail biased
Extremely car biased; almost crazy
AK State Estimated Costs, excluding land
I suggest curious people look into the chess match. I did at the time and I had a little A.I. experience and gained a little more since then. Chess is an interesting test because the problem is so vast that brute force attacks are unrealistic; although, still used by computers since it helps and they can out calculate humans. In terms of actually learning to play chess well, computers have a long way to go.
;-)
I'll consider computers as better at chess when they can honestly beat someone at Kasparov's peak WITHOUT unfair advantages such as a whole team of engineers tweaking the system DURING AND IN BETWEEN MATCHES!
The purpose of the chess exercise is to develop Applied Intelligence so it can be approximately as good as a human and hopefully learn enough to apply the discovered concepts to other areas. Any advancement in Applied Intelligence is a win since that is the true purpose for the game. Actually, 'winning' is actually a loss for Applied Intelligence as well as A.I. and sadly IBM was only thinking of themselves when they got lucky. They dare not risk losing again-- after all, they LOST ALL THE TIME until they finally beat a top human once.
Life is a non-linear approximation
If our alien Adam or Eve ancestors mated with dumb animals that would explain that recessive gene humans have that causes some of the rural humans to mate with dumb animals... ;-)
Or perhaps our curiosity or arrogance in placing human genes into dumb animals and plants for experimentation has an inherited source or is simply characteristic of our level of development?
I'm for whatever story gets the scientists funding to do real work.
You can't arrest a computer, nor does it care if you dump water on it.
Computers (especially government bought ones) cost more than the volunteers and you can have double-blind inspired counting systems using humans without much added cost. You can also archive raw data for further review.
FYI: banks were run by humans for most their existence. Not everybody had an abacus. Its cheaper to use computers now; they still make errors. Aside from your absurd comparison, banks are a false analogy to this problem. THINK ABOUT IT while you READ your bank statement verifying how much you have in your account...(that was a free hint)
Furthermore, I can't believe some people think its too much work to count ballots by hand. Anybody who says that should be banned from voting because voting is too much work for their tiny brains. Oh, election results were not quickly known 'instantly' for most the country's existence and exit polls are reliable enough to use for initial results if you don't want to wait for official confirmation (they are actually used to point out corruption in other countries where 'conspiracies' are given rational consideration.)
I was cranky after doing grading too! I hate grading.
:-p
Everybody here probably knows grammar and spelling are not the same.
I was trying to be nice by raising it to grammar nazi instead of a petty spelling nazi. I suspected... yet I did it anyway. I'm sure a grammar nazi would jump on a context related spelling error.
My 'authority' status is relevant because I'm on the inside and has nothing to do with any extra status of the particular job. I wouldn't mention it otherwise. I actually try to undo the misconceptions much to the disapproval of some faculty who like being placed on a pedestal... Making that point on me wasn't beneficial but it could undermine the points being made in my post (or strengthen them.)
Perhaps they shouldn't teach spelling by phonics; although, english is a "devolving" language so I don't see why the school system couldn't make us progress towards something better or at least consistent. Its moving towards newspeak and rather than oppose any change I'd say why not move in better directions? Hell, I had a phase where I removed k and c from a lot of my writing (k=c or s=c) just to be that way
How about some relevant kommentary using your experiense? Do you see things going down hill or hear others saying it? How much is merely a perspektive differense? ("I used to walk 10 miles in snow to skhool as a kid." I'm starting to see where that stuff develops.) I think there IS a downward trend going on. If teknology sukseeds at making life easy (boy has it failed so far) would/should we degrade into a bunch of paris hiltons?
Grammar nazi.
English is not my area of expertise; don't see why you feel smug pointing out minor errors in a language with so many design flaws. Perhaps your boosting your own self esteem by finding fault in people with a higher status? (Hint: I am not up on a pedestal. Status is what you/we make it to be.) Posting on a forum is arguably already a waste of time.
I am a product of this system; we were not taught grammar and my school taught spelling by phonetics - largely as result of the high test scores for relatively little effort. We were taught reading using verbalization which creates speed problems later on (when its not their problem anymore...)
FYI:
You'd have an obsessive fit if you read the output from the dean of an engineering school around here! Sadly his writing makes more sense than writing from others who use so called 'proper' English. The PURPOSE is communication!
I've used macs for a long time and I rarely was stuck when non-recursively merging two folders:
Open folder A
Open folder B
Select all
Drag into folder A
Pick Replace
Recursive merging, thats what rsync, psync, pax, or ssync are for.
My expectations are such that I never was surprised by the folder replace option; same name files replace why wouldn't same name folders? Its consistent (plus I learned to read dialog boxes.) A non-recursive merge is manually possible in a few intuitive steps. A recursive merge that doesn't complicate the GUI for beginners I'd like to see. Now if you learned conventions from other systems I don't see how you can expect a 'beginner friendly' system to follow those conventions when their target user is not you.
1) As a member of the higher education system, I can tell you the MOST common thing I hear from older faculty is that the whole system is degrading and not just at our university. Personally, I've only seen a slight decrease in student work ethic and ability to actually think but that may be because I'm looking for this trend everybody speaks of; and as time passes I get more removed from my experience as a student so it alters my perspective as well.
2) The source is a Think Tank created by and for politicians, one should be skeptical of any of the many "non-partisan" organizations out there like this. Especially the ones with this much corporate and world trade connections. A great institution has largely only one direction to go over time and it only takes a few bad eggs to send it downward. I've been a part of non-profits who collapsed from minority who spread like a cancer. (Note: I didn't say this was ever a great institution, I don't know.)
3) Engineering students are not even getting hands on experience that previously was available. They don't even know their CAD drawings are impossible to make because they lack the experience with the devices that make them. The movement is towards outsourcing all the real engineering of the university and replace it all with 'virtual engineering' because China is just going to make everything for everybody anyways. Some of the top guys in our state do their work hands-on combined with theory because they know in the real world the problems are too difficult to even simulate in a computer unless you have a level of understanding which has been ignorantly case aside by far too many institutions who's faculty should or does know better.
4) There is a trend in the USA towards 3rd world educational techniques at all levels. I have students who want it to degrade into 'learn by wrote' because it involves less work/thought. I know public school teachers who see the government/politics forcing these lesser methods upon their classrooms. Other countries churn out people too, but the all want to get into the USA because our college system is(was) different -- the funding and immigration benefits are a big factor-- but that will likely decline after the rest falls too low for too long.
5) colleges are turning into trade schools. Trade schools are just fine and deserve respect but they are different and should stay that way and not dilute colleges simply because the market wants pre-trained worker drones. A CS major should not get credit towards their major for learning to make websites (in a class that is nearly the same to one at a graphic design trade school.) A college education should be more valuable than trade school to the student; the employer has a whole different perspective. One can expect the increase in income from a college degree to decrease as the trend continues.
There is no such thing as a free market except perhaps total anarchy. Anything less is shades of gray. Government defines and enforces the rules of any market therefore making it NOT a free market.
The USA can NOT compete with China and India. Americans need to wake up now before they end up too far behind and can no longer lie to themselves; how BAD will it have to get before people admit the truth? When the USA is 3rd world be enough?
Its NOT ludicrous treating CO2 as a pollutant. Animal shit is a pollutant. Just because you can't see or smell it does not mean too much of it is a bad thing. I suggest you sit in your garage with the engine running and post your comments. May your neighbor's dogs visit your lawn... You pay to dispose of shit and there are health regulations that control that-- in your free market corps and people could just 'dump' where it was cheapest. Do we provide services to prevent that? NO. We pass laws for proper disposal which end up resulting in most people paying for disposal.
Innovate? Anybody sick of that over-used word yet? Its used as much as revolutionary and both have become meaningless.
Necessity is the mother of invention. "The market" will compete for the cheapest most profitable solution: bribing officials and suckering people like yourself to deregulate them.
Soylent Green is people.