Yeah, exactly. I'm on Android, and within the last year our standard connection to our work Exchange server required me to accept some basic management settings (remote wiping included) just to be able to pull my mail down, no extra software needed.
You shouldn't have signed away your rights like that. Maybe you are comfortable giving your employer access to all the data on your phone, including photos, passwords and everything else. Most people probably would think the pictures you took in Vegas aren't any of your employer's business. Out of curiousity, if you change those basic management settings, does your email still work? If not, then something more than just settings was done to your phone, maybe software was installed remotely?
Personally, if my employer feels I need access to email or to be reached 24/7, it is their responsibility to provide the means for that. They do not have the right to takeover my personal property or data just because I work there. Put differently, if there is a business reason for them needing me to receive emails/texts/calls outside of normal working hours, then they should provide a business solution. If I want to do it for my own convenience on my own device, well, then I would have to weigh the convenience against all the privacy issues involved.
I expect to get the living hell modded out of me when I say the iPhone has been a secure platform for BYOD for awhile now (I don't remember if it's the 3GS or 4 where security was tightened up). Besides the Configurator, something as humble as ActiveSync can manage them. Same goes for many of the latest Android devices. The point is it's easy to natively get strong security on a mobile device. How good it meets your needs depends on your needs.
Did Apple and all of the Android makers get rid of the cameras? As long as cell phones have built in cameras, if your concern is about corporate data falling into the wrong hands, your data is at risk. So called spy cameras were around long before cell phones and were quite effective in both corporate and government espionage. Basically, if your employee can see it, whether on the screen or in print, a smart phone can capture the data.
I consulted for a certain government contractor that was very security conscious and provided cell phones. However on each of them the camera had been physically disabled.
I have a separate hard drive on my personal computer to boot from when I work from home, and I would love to be able to seamlessly use my phone to connect to work as well. Given the choice between my employer's giving me a non-android device (Given that my current phone is android based) and my bringing my own device, I would much rather bring my own device.
Would you have that same feeling if your employer insisted on being able to monitor your calls, texts, data and other uses of your personal phone plus have the capabilities to wipe it? That is what the OP is saying his company does.
Yeah, there's software out there to do exactly that, that a lot of employers (I'm in the network security field) already require to be installed if you want to connect to work resources.
Whether it can be done and whether it can be done legally are two different things. If I understand you correctly, your company is installing software on employee's phones that can monitor and access their communications. That would seem to violate a number of federal laws. Of course one can argue that the employee is not required to have the software installed, but without it they cannot access corporate resources, so it is up to them. That is fine until you do what the article is talking about by requiring them to provide their own mobile device to have their job. Basically, if they must provide their own mobile device to do their work AND you require them to install corporate spyware, I mean security software on their phone, then effectively you are back to square one where you are monitoring and accessing their communications. If you further go and wipe their phone, you have now destroyed their personal data, or should I say IP? If you wipe their phone after they have terminated employment, then not only have you been monitoring and accessing a private citizens communications, but now you have destroyed their personal data and IP.
You cannot mandate that employees must provide their own devices and that you, as employer, have free reign to all of their personal data and communications. Well, you can, but plan on spending a lot of time in court.
One thing I've been saying for a long time is that we will never literally run out of oil. What we will run out of is cheap oil. As I understand it there is much more oil in tar sands and oil shale than liquid crude. The liquid crude we are discovering and developing now is far more difficult and expensive to recover than the oil we enjoyed 50 years ago. 50 years from now will fossil fuels still be cheap enough for many people to be able to drive a 6000 lb SUV 100 miles to work and back every day? I don't know. Will they be able to afford to heat and cool a 6000 ft^2 home? I don't know that either. Our high standard of living is fueled by cheap fossil fuels. As the price of energy rises our standard of living drops. Without incentives or a carbon tax I don't see renewables being a bigger energy source in the near future. Unfortunately a carbon tax by making energy more expensive would lower our standard of living which few Americans would tolerate.
Actually, a carbon tax only lowers the standard of living for the few percentage of the people who have a standard of living capable of being lowered. Even in the US, for the poor and the homeless, a carbon tax would have very low impact. For most of the world's population, it would be the same thing. On the other hand, it is the 1% to 2% who would feel the impact.
If you are on the bottom rung of the ladder, you don't have very far to fall. It is the people at the top who cling on desperately.
Peak oil happened in 2008. Whatever baggage you attach to a line on a curve is not my problem, especially is you pretend it's measuring something other than crude oil production over time.
Vast methane hydrates
That isn't oil or anything remotely like it so it appears you are retrospectively twisting other people's words to mean something other than they meant at the time.
Actually, every few years they adjust when Peak Oil happened. Eventually, one of these days, they will be right, but it's pretty certain, that unless there are no more new oil reserves to be found on the planet, that 2008 is not the correct year.
Well the calorific value of cheese would give us a virtually limitless energy supply. With a supply of liquid oxygen burning cheese could probably be used to power moon to mars missions.
Then again, as the mass of the moon is decreased by its use as a fuel source, the environmental impact on the earth will be severe.
I don't know about you, but I buy rechargeable batteries, not one time use batteries. One time use batteries are not "tremendously good batteries".
But your rechargeable batteries only have the appearance of being multi-use. Everytime you recharge them, you are draining the same single use oil battery (using the original poster's analogy).
And if it cost > 1 joule of energy to extract oil that gives 1 joule, it's not worth it.
it isn't that simple. Oil makes a tremendously good battery. it is highly portable and has a very high energy density. It is better than any other battery we currently have. So even if it begins costing >1 joule of energy to extract 1 joule worth of oil, it will still be in high demand for its energy storage capability unless we invent a better battery. if it takes more energy to pull out of the earth than we get from it, then we will just find other means to pull it out of the earth, such as powering our oil rigs with solar or wind power.
Uranium makes an even better battery using that reasoning.
I've got the perfect renewable energy source. They are called "carbs" They come mainly from grains, but other food sources, too. People consume them and then do things for them self like walk or ride a bike or open the garage door or climb the steps or use a push mower or any number of things that people a few generations ago did instead of consuming large amounts of fossil fuels.
Somehow, in the 1950s, the average family of six got by with one vehicle. Today, the average family of three has two vehicles. Somehow in the 1950s, if you were bored, you either read a book or got up and went outside to do something. Today, chances are, you use an electronic device. Somehow in the 1950s, the local market was a couple blocks away and people walked to get their groceries. Today, we drive an extra 20 miles to save three cents at Walmart. Somehow in the 1950s, if you were hot, you turned on a fan, if you were cold, you put on a sweater. Today, we run air conditioners and wear sweaters in the house and furnaces while we wear shorts.
I'm not proposing we turn the clock back and return to the 1950s. However, if we want to use less energy, there are a number of things we could learn from what people did, not too long ago.
Just because there are hobby grade milling machines, like there are hobby grade 3d printers, does not mean the market is taking off. On the other hand, thanks for the link, I might have a use for it. I wish it produced a final product a little bigger, though.
The one application for 3D printing would be to produce forms for lost wax casting. The work one needs to put into building up a form is more involved, plus I could take advantage of CAD app extensions specific to designing molds. Casting eliminates issues of 3D printing material limitations, the object's strength being a function of the casting material.
I definitely agree with the lost wax castings, or even prototyping for an injection mold in the hobby realm. I've seen these uses for instance in the model railroad hobby. However, even here, unless you are planning on producing hundreds of unique parts, it is more economical to prepare your drawings and ship it off to another company than to purchase the 3D printer yourself.
Maybe the problem is that 3D printing is mainly for prototyping products. How many consumers are going to do that? Probably very few, particularly at today's price points. Hobbyists may, but even then, it is often cheaper, faster and better quality to send the design off to a specialty house than purchase the equipment yourself, unless the hobbyist is going to be doing a lot of work.
In short 3D printing isn't taking off in the consumer market for the same reason that CNC machines aren't. There really isn't a consumer need.
So many points, so little time. I am not sure why you think theology said the world was flat. The ancient Jews, along with the the ancient Greeks (pre-Socrates) believed it was, but the early Christians, being heavily influenced by the Greeks, thought it spherical from very early in their religion. But by the Middle Ages, much of Europe thought it was flat and the catholic church was pushing against that falsehood. So in this case, religion was on the side of science.
I agree that there is no immutable barrier separating religion from science and never has been. However, your Bob and Alice ancedote is meaningless and contrived. But, using your question, would that mean a cure that medical science could not explain after somebody prayed would be proof of divine intervention? If not, why not? I am not proposing that as the case, by the way, but only that the case presented doesn't show anything as there are limitations on science, the biggest being we can only test for those things we already know of or have an idea about. Did gravity exist before Newton? Of course. The same is true for the Higgs boson that was verified not too long ago. But if we never expected there was a Higgs boson,we would never had devised a test to find it and it would still be unknown.
Science, like religion, changes based on the experience of those who came before us. The difference in the change is related to the difference in the experience. Science can explain many things, but there are many things that it cannot. Science may be able to explain how I was born, but it cannot explain who I am or what is my purpose in life. Religion, as a form of philosophy, tries to explain those things. Religion isn't the only way to explain those things. It is just one way, one form of philosophy.
Modern religion is not anti-science, at least not the catholics, anglicans, orthodox, and a host of other mainstream religious groups (there are some though that are). It does seem that to be accepted in academia, modern science most be anti-religion and that is a shame. Religion may not have anything to help with our understanding of science, but then again, neither does philosophy or ethics and yet one would hope our scientific community would not be opposed to those subjects, either.
It might be humorous on TV when Sheldon Cooper derides people who have a faith, but when it happens in the real world it is still bigotry. It doesn't mean those people are correct, but again, most of what we hold as correct in science today, will be wrong tomorrow, at least if history is our guide.
Again, I am not a theist nor am I a proponent of prayer, but doesn't the Harvard Study negate confirmation bias? The study does not show that prayer works, but it does show that there are some tangible benefits to it for those who believe in it.
This has nothing to do with your dragon rock unless you have evidence of dragons existing. Having a correlation between those who pray/practice a faith and a positive outcome does not proof the existence of a deity. It could be some other mechanism at work, no different, than say, having a positive mental attitude. But the correlation is there.
Likewise while its possible for people who experience a positive experience through their belief system to have confirmation bias, that doesn't mean all people do. Statistically, 12 step programs are more successful for more people than other programs. One of the things they have in common is the belief in a higher power. Again, that does not prove the existence of a higher power, only that there is a correlation. It could be something as simple as anything that forces one to look outside their own selfish center can produce those results and prayer and faith is one way that people do that.
If one removes the religion aspect from prayer, is it not just another form of meditation? Or are you saying that the stress reducing effects of meditation are also just confirmation bias? Why is it so hard for people to step back and look at the practices of people who profess faith in a sociological/psychological way and leave religion out of it? Catholics bear their soul to a priest and that is superstitious while everybody else does it to a therapist and that is different.
People who practice a faith do so by choice. People who do not practice a faith do so by choice. In a society that espousing freedom of expression, it seems that we should be able to tolerate people expressing their choices.
The republicans have a super majority and the governor's office in my state. The voucher bill passed in a procedural maneuver in committee where at the very last minute of the committee meeting the bill was introduced and forwarded to the house. The super majority and governor took over from there.
It doesn't change the fact that if the majority of the people don't like it they can vote them out. Unfortunately, for those opposed to the bill, it sounds like the majority of the people in the state are satisfied with how the system is working, so it is unlikely that change will occur. Right now it happens to be the Republican party causing the turmoil, however, it could just as easily be the Democratic party.
Unfortunately, with only two parties it is possible to effectively have the equivelant of a one party system as is the case in your state right now. To combat that some states have enacted term limits, however, that just allows a bunch of people to be elected who can push their own agenda and not have to worry about the long term consequences, so it isn't a good solution, either.
The best solution is for the populus to be engaged in the political process. It is voter apathy that has allowed this situation to occur and as long as the apathy continues among the majority of the citizens who don't even vote, then it will continue. In otherwords, people (collectively speaking) get the government they ask for. It's easy to blame big money or this party or that party, but ultimately, by the time you cast a ballot, it is just the individual and the ballot, assuming they even vote.
It sounds like the legislative process in your state sucks, but that is not what is going on with this bill in West Virginia. You simply cannot compare one state's process to another as they have different constitutions, different departments and different people involved.
Ultimately, however, we get the elected officials that we chose to elect. So, if we don't like how they are governing, we can allways chose somebody else. However, if our discontent is in the minorty, then even if we don't like what they are doing, the people of whatever state you are in do and that is how the political system works.
As for the specific voucher issue in your state that was rushed through with little or no debate, the question to ask is why? Either both sides were in agreement on it or opponents didn't show up to represent their constituents. If the former, then the system worked as designed. If the latter, then there is the ballot box.
My mother's state, Missouri, just pushed through a bill making it a crime for federal agents to enforce gun laws in the state. If I still was there, I'd vote them all out of office, every one who voted for the bill (and I am not opposed to fire arms). Why? They intentionally wasted time and money voting on a bill that they even admitted was unconstitutional from the start. Unfortunately, I am not a resident of that not so fair state any more, so I don't have a say.
But, the recourse is the same. When elected officials don't carry out your wishes, you elect officials who will, or at least claim to do so. If they don't, repeat until satisfied.
My point is that once you allow a state legislature dictate what should be taught in class, you open the door for another state legislature to dictate what should not be taught in class.
And that is different than providing the budget for the department that dictates what should be taught in class in what way? Besides, this bill was sponsored by the department of eduction through the committee on education.
Congress has no business deciding what students should read in school. Leave that decision to:
students
parents
professional educators
Ummm, the guy is in the state legislature encouraging the state board of education, which is supposed to be made up of proffesional educators, to add sci fi books to the reading curriculums of the state to promote interest in math and science. It has nothing to do with congress or government over-reach.
there's also the logic that if you don't believe in someone watching over what you do then you're going to do bad things because damnation is the only thing keeping people from doing bad things in some peoples views, probably because that's the only thing that's keeping them from doing bad things...
you'd be amazed how many "god fearing" murderers there are though!
You don't need a god to prove/disprove that. Just ask any parent about their teenagers. What you describe seems to be pretty much human nature. Society has its laws to force behaviours because left to our own devices we will choose vices over virtues. Whether a deity exists or not, doesn't change that.
From so many prayers, one or two random (miraculous) healing is statistically insignificant. These events get more publicity than cases where all prayers fail, that's why you feel there is a higher power in works.
While I am not a theist, your argument fails as their is more evidence that prayer works than there is life on other worlds and yet people who believe that life exists on other planets, without any evidence to support that assertion whatsover are not subjected to the ridicule that people who believe in a higher power or deity. Because of that, the reactionary response must be based on something other than the foundation of their argument as neither one provable in the traditional scientific sense of the word.
That said, while I do not subscribe to the concept of a deity, I have seen the impact it has on the lives of those who do and whether such a deity exists or not does not change the positive aspects of it on their lives. Runners were releasing endorphans long before we knew what endorphans were or that excercise gave a cardio benefit. That doesn't mean that even without that knowledge, those people still didn't receive some benefit.
You would think that as fickle as the human person is, if all of those prayers and practices you mention continuously failed, people would simply cease to appeal to their deity and move on to something else. Yet that hasn't occurred. Maybe that belief helps them to cope with the dissapointment and move on or maybe there is some other reason, but evidently, it must be somewhat effective. Most likely, there is not a supernatural reason, but why beat up the proponents of it?
In the end, most of what the general population believes about science is not true. So, unless people are going to start their own scientific inquisition to eliminate error, it seems grossly injust for people to always bash the billions of people on the planet who think differently than you do.
You know, real science has enough to deal with trying to keep all of its own conflict shit together that it really doesn't have to go looking for areas, that by definition, are outside its realm of expertise. For religion and meta-physics, you will never have concrete verifiable data because those areas, by their very nature, are outside the current view of the scientific process.
I for one, can guarantee that my knowledge of science, and that of my collegues, must be far greater than that of your knowldege of the Iranian dating scene and you know what? In the scientific community, we don't care. We have our own projects to work on. Some of us have a religious background some of us don't, but it doesn't matter, because we are doing science, not theology.
People seem to think that science is this concrete thing that never changes and has all the answers. It is just as vague and ever changing as anything else is. 400 years ago, it was scienticially accepted that the world was flat and that the sun revolved around the earth. In the past 100 years ago, the scientific facts on the atom and matter have all change. Our laws of physics were shown to be inadequate. What we knew about biology and cellular structure has been shown to be if not outright wrong, dreadfully incomplete. In the 1970s there was this "new" theory call quantum mechanics (actually prior to the 70s, but that is when it hit mainstream). Now it is no longer hotly debated but more or less accepted. Chaos theory, another wonderful field of study that has vast implications but virtually impossible to test in real life. Even the proof of the Higgs boson now throws out decades of accepted theory on what occurred moments after the big bang.
So, people with narrow minds might want to mock those who say they believe in a deity or some other power or force, nobody can stop them from doing so. But real scientists are much too hard at work, regardless of their personal belief in such things, doing real science. Those discussions are in the real of philosophers and theologians.
That depends. Are you listening to it to verify that your hands free got it correct? If so, then your brain is occupied doing that instead of driving and it is not any safer than looking at the screen. It isn't the fact that your eyes left the road for a split second, it's that your brain quit the driving task and shifted to the texting task and has to shift back to driving again, meanwhile, your car has traveled a football field or so down the highway without you realizing it.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, exactly. I'm on Android, and within the last year our standard connection to our work Exchange server required me to accept some basic management settings (remote wiping included) just to be able to pull my mail down, no extra software needed.
You shouldn't have signed away your rights like that. Maybe you are comfortable giving your employer access to all the data on your phone, including photos, passwords and everything else. Most people probably would think the pictures you took in Vegas aren't any of your employer's business. Out of curiousity, if you change those basic management settings, does your email still work? If not, then something more than just settings was done to your phone, maybe software was installed remotely?
Personally, if my employer feels I need access to email or to be reached 24/7, it is their responsibility to provide the means for that. They do not have the right to takeover my personal property or data just because I work there. Put differently, if there is a business reason for them needing me to receive emails/texts/calls outside of normal working hours, then they should provide a business solution. If I want to do it for my own convenience on my own device, well, then I would have to weigh the convenience against all the privacy issues involved.
I expect to get the living hell modded out of me when I say the iPhone has been a secure platform for BYOD for awhile now (I don't remember if it's the 3GS or 4 where security was tightened up). Besides the Configurator, something as humble as ActiveSync can manage them. Same goes for many of the latest Android devices. The point is it's easy to natively get strong security on a mobile device. How good it meets your needs depends on your needs.
Did Apple and all of the Android makers get rid of the cameras? As long as cell phones have built in cameras, if your concern is about corporate data falling into the wrong hands, your data is at risk. So called spy cameras were around long before cell phones and were quite effective in both corporate and government espionage. Basically, if your employee can see it, whether on the screen or in print, a smart phone can capture the data.
I consulted for a certain government contractor that was very security conscious and provided cell phones. However on each of them the camera had been physically disabled.
I have a separate hard drive on my personal computer to boot from when I work from home, and I would love to be able to seamlessly use my phone to connect to work as well. Given the choice between my employer's giving me a non-android device (Given that my current phone is android based) and my bringing my own device, I would much rather bring my own device.
Would you have that same feeling if your employer insisted on being able to monitor your calls, texts, data and other uses of your personal phone plus have the capabilities to wipe it? That is what the OP is saying his company does.
Yeah, there's software out there to do exactly that, that a lot of employers (I'm in the network security field) already require to be installed if you want to connect to work resources.
Whether it can be done and whether it can be done legally are two different things. If I understand you correctly, your company is installing software on employee's phones that can monitor and access their communications. That would seem to violate a number of federal laws. Of course one can argue that the employee is not required to have the software installed, but without it they cannot access corporate resources, so it is up to them. That is fine until you do what the article is talking about by requiring them to provide their own mobile device to have their job. Basically, if they must provide their own mobile device to do their work AND you require them to install corporate spyware, I mean security software on their phone, then effectively you are back to square one where you are monitoring and accessing their communications. If you further go and wipe their phone, you have now destroyed their personal data, or should I say IP? If you wipe their phone after they have terminated employment, then not only have you been monitoring and accessing a private citizens communications, but now you have destroyed their personal data and IP.
You cannot mandate that employees must provide their own devices and that you, as employer, have free reign to all of their personal data and communications. Well, you can, but plan on spending a lot of time in court.
One thing I've been saying for a long time is that we will never literally run out of oil. What we will run out of is cheap oil. As I understand it there is much more oil in tar sands and oil shale than liquid crude. The liquid crude we are discovering and developing now is far more difficult and expensive to recover than the oil we enjoyed 50 years ago. 50 years from now will fossil fuels still be cheap enough for many people to be able to drive a 6000 lb SUV 100 miles to work and back every day? I don't know. Will they be able to afford to heat and cool a 6000 ft^2 home? I don't know that either. Our high standard of living is fueled by cheap fossil fuels. As the price of energy rises our standard of living drops.
Without incentives or a carbon tax I don't see renewables being a bigger energy source in the near future. Unfortunately a carbon tax by making energy more expensive would lower our standard of living which few Americans would tolerate.
Actually, a carbon tax only lowers the standard of living for the few percentage of the people who have a standard of living capable of being lowered. Even in the US, for the poor and the homeless, a carbon tax would have very low impact. For most of the world's population, it would be the same thing. On the other hand, it is the 1% to 2% who would feel the impact.
If you are on the bottom rung of the ladder, you don't have very far to fall. It is the people at the top who cling on desperately.
Peak oil happened in 2008. Whatever baggage you attach to a line on a curve is not my problem, especially is you pretend it's measuring something other than crude oil production over time.
That isn't oil or anything remotely like it so it appears you are retrospectively twisting other people's words to mean something other than they meant at the time.
Actually, every few years they adjust when Peak Oil happened. Eventually, one of these days, they will be right, but it's pretty certain, that unless there are no more new oil reserves to be found on the planet, that 2008 is not the correct year.
What if the moon is made of cheese?
Well the calorific value of cheese would give us a virtually limitless energy supply. With a supply of liquid oxygen burning cheese could probably be used to power moon to mars missions.
Then again, as the mass of the moon is decreased by its use as a fuel source, the environmental impact on the earth will be severe.
Oil makes a tremendously good battery.
I don't know about you, but I buy rechargeable batteries, not one time use batteries. One time use batteries are not "tremendously good batteries".
But your rechargeable batteries only have the appearance of being multi-use. Everytime you recharge them, you are draining the same single use oil battery (using the original poster's analogy).
And if it cost > 1 joule of energy to extract oil that gives 1 joule, it's not worth it.
it isn't that simple. Oil makes a tremendously good battery. it is highly portable and has a very high energy density. It is better than any other battery we currently have. So even if it begins costing >1 joule of energy to extract 1 joule worth of oil, it will still be in high demand for its energy storage capability unless we invent a better battery. if it takes more energy to pull out of the earth than we get from it, then we will just find other means to pull it out of the earth, such as powering our oil rigs with solar or wind power.
Uranium makes an even better battery using that reasoning.
I've got the perfect renewable energy source. They are called "carbs" They come mainly from grains, but other food sources, too. People consume them and then do things for them self like walk or ride a bike or open the garage door or climb the steps or use a push mower or any number of things that people a few generations ago did instead of consuming large amounts of fossil fuels.
Somehow, in the 1950s, the average family of six got by with one vehicle. Today, the average family of three has two vehicles. Somehow in the 1950s, if you were bored, you either read a book or got up and went outside to do something. Today, chances are, you use an electronic device. Somehow in the 1950s, the local market was a couple blocks away and people walked to get their groceries. Today, we drive an extra 20 miles to save three cents at Walmart. Somehow in the 1950s, if you were hot, you turned on a fan, if you were cold, you put on a sweater. Today, we run air conditioners and wear sweaters in the house and furnaces while we wear shorts.
I'm not proposing we turn the clock back and return to the 1950s. However, if we want to use less energy, there are a number of things we could learn from what people did, not too long ago.
Just because there are hobby grade milling machines, like there are hobby grade 3d printers, does not mean the market is taking off. On the other hand, thanks for the link, I might have a use for it. I wish it produced a final product a little bigger, though.
The one application for 3D printing would be to produce forms for lost wax casting. The work one needs to put into building up a form is more involved, plus I could take advantage of CAD app extensions specific to designing molds. Casting eliminates issues of 3D printing material limitations, the object's strength being a function of the casting material.
I definitely agree with the lost wax castings, or even prototyping for an injection mold in the hobby realm. I've seen these uses for instance in the model railroad hobby. However, even here, unless you are planning on producing hundreds of unique parts, it is more economical to prepare your drawings and ship it off to another company than to purchase the 3D printer yourself.
Maybe the problem is that 3D printing is mainly for prototyping products. How many consumers are going to do that? Probably very few, particularly at today's price points. Hobbyists may, but even then, it is often cheaper, faster and better quality to send the design off to a specialty house than purchase the equipment yourself, unless the hobbyist is going to be doing a lot of work.
In short 3D printing isn't taking off in the consumer market for the same reason that CNC machines aren't. There really isn't a consumer need.
So many points, so little time. I am not sure why you think theology said the world was flat. The ancient Jews, along with the the ancient Greeks (pre-Socrates) believed it was, but the early Christians, being heavily influenced by the Greeks, thought it spherical from very early in their religion. But by the Middle Ages, much of Europe thought it was flat and the catholic church was pushing against that falsehood. So in this case, religion was on the side of science.
I agree that there is no immutable barrier separating religion from science and never has been. However, your Bob and Alice ancedote is meaningless and contrived. But, using your question, would that mean a cure that medical science could not explain after somebody prayed would be proof of divine intervention? If not, why not? I am not proposing that as the case, by the way, but only that the case presented doesn't show anything as there are limitations on science, the biggest being we can only test for those things we already know of or have an idea about. Did gravity exist before Newton? Of course. The same is true for the Higgs boson that was verified not too long ago. But if we never expected there was a Higgs boson,we would never had devised a test to find it and it would still be unknown.
Science, like religion, changes based on the experience of those who came before us. The difference in the change is related to the difference in the experience. Science can explain many things, but there are many things that it cannot. Science may be able to explain how I was born, but it cannot explain who I am or what is my purpose in life. Religion, as a form of philosophy, tries to explain those things. Religion isn't the only way to explain those things. It is just one way, one form of philosophy.
Modern religion is not anti-science, at least not the catholics, anglicans, orthodox, and a host of other mainstream religious groups (there are some though that are). It does seem that to be accepted in academia, modern science most be anti-religion and that is a shame. Religion may not have anything to help with our understanding of science, but then again, neither does philosophy or ethics and yet one would hope our scientific community would not be opposed to those subjects, either.
It might be humorous on TV when Sheldon Cooper derides people who have a faith, but when it happens in the real world it is still bigotry. It doesn't mean those people are correct, but again, most of what we hold as correct in science today, will be wrong tomorrow, at least if history is our guide.
Again, I am not a theist nor am I a proponent of prayer, but doesn't the Harvard Study negate confirmation bias? The study does not show that prayer works, but it does show that there are some tangible benefits to it for those who believe in it.
This has nothing to do with your dragon rock unless you have evidence of dragons existing. Having a correlation between those who pray/practice a faith and a positive outcome does not proof the existence of a deity. It could be some other mechanism at work, no different, than say, having a positive mental attitude. But the correlation is there.
Likewise while its possible for people who experience a positive experience through their belief system to have confirmation bias, that doesn't mean all people do. Statistically, 12 step programs are more successful for more people than other programs. One of the things they have in common is the belief in a higher power. Again, that does not prove the existence of a higher power, only that there is a correlation. It could be something as simple as anything that forces one to look outside their own selfish center can produce those results and prayer and faith is one way that people do that.
If one removes the religion aspect from prayer, is it not just another form of meditation? Or are you saying that the stress reducing effects of meditation are also just confirmation bias? Why is it so hard for people to step back and look at the practices of people who profess faith in a sociological/psychological way and leave religion out of it? Catholics bear their soul to a priest and that is superstitious while everybody else does it to a therapist and that is different.
People who practice a faith do so by choice. People who do not practice a faith do so by choice. In a society that espousing freedom of expression, it seems that we should be able to tolerate people expressing their choices.
The republicans have a super majority and the governor's office in my state. The voucher bill passed in a procedural maneuver in committee where at the very last minute of the committee meeting the bill was introduced and forwarded to the house. The super majority and governor took over from there.
It doesn't change the fact that if the majority of the people don't like it they can vote them out. Unfortunately, for those opposed to the bill, it sounds like the majority of the people in the state are satisfied with how the system is working, so it is unlikely that change will occur. Right now it happens to be the Republican party causing the turmoil, however, it could just as easily be the Democratic party.
Unfortunately, with only two parties it is possible to effectively have the equivelant of a one party system as is the case in your state right now. To combat that some states have enacted term limits, however, that just allows a bunch of people to be elected who can push their own agenda and not have to worry about the long term consequences, so it isn't a good solution, either.
The best solution is for the populus to be engaged in the political process. It is voter apathy that has allowed this situation to occur and as long as the apathy continues among the majority of the citizens who don't even vote, then it will continue. In otherwords, people (collectively speaking) get the government they ask for. It's easy to blame big money or this party or that party, but ultimately, by the time you cast a ballot, it is just the individual and the ballot, assuming they even vote.
It sounds like the legislative process in your state sucks, but that is not what is going on with this bill in West Virginia. You simply cannot compare one state's process to another as they have different constitutions, different departments and different people involved.
Ultimately, however, we get the elected officials that we chose to elect. So, if we don't like how they are governing, we can allways chose somebody else. However, if our discontent is in the minorty, then even if we don't like what they are doing, the people of whatever state you are in do and that is how the political system works.
As for the specific voucher issue in your state that was rushed through with little or no debate, the question to ask is why? Either both sides were in agreement on it or opponents didn't show up to represent their constituents. If the former, then the system worked as designed. If the latter, then there is the ballot box.
My mother's state, Missouri, just pushed through a bill making it a crime for federal agents to enforce gun laws in the state. If I still was there, I'd vote them all out of office, every one who voted for the bill (and I am not opposed to fire arms). Why? They intentionally wasted time and money voting on a bill that they even admitted was unconstitutional from the start. Unfortunately, I am not a resident of that not so fair state any more, so I don't have a say.
But, the recourse is the same. When elected officials don't carry out your wishes, you elect officials who will, or at least claim to do so. If they don't, repeat until satisfied.
My point is that once you allow a state legislature dictate what should be taught in class, you open the door for another state legislature to dictate what should not be taught in class.
And that is different than providing the budget for the department that dictates what should be taught in class in what way? Besides, this bill was sponsored by the department of eduction through the committee on education.
Congress has no business deciding what students should read in school. Leave that decision to:
Ummm, the guy is in the state legislature encouraging the state board of education, which is supposed to be made up of proffesional educators, to add sci fi books to the reading curriculums of the state to promote interest in math and science. It has nothing to do with congress or government over-reach.
there's also the logic that if you don't believe in someone watching over what you do then you're going to do bad things because damnation is the only thing keeping people from doing bad things in some peoples views, probably because that's the only thing that's keeping them from doing bad things...
you'd be amazed how many "god fearing" murderers there are though!
You don't need a god to prove/disprove that. Just ask any parent about their teenagers. What you describe seems to be pretty much human nature. Society has its laws to force behaviours because left to our own devices we will choose vices over virtues. Whether a deity exists or not, doesn't change that.
From so many prayers, one or two random (miraculous) healing is statistically insignificant. These events get more publicity than cases where all prayers fail, that's why you feel there is a higher power in works.
While I am not a theist, your argument fails as their is more evidence that prayer works than there is life on other worlds and yet people who believe that life exists on other planets, without any evidence to support that assertion whatsover are not subjected to the ridicule that people who believe in a higher power or deity. Because of that, the reactionary response must be based on something other than the foundation of their argument as neither one provable in the traditional scientific sense of the word.
That said, while I do not subscribe to the concept of a deity, I have seen the impact it has on the lives of those who do and whether such a deity exists or not does not change the positive aspects of it on their lives. Runners were releasing endorphans long before we knew what endorphans were or that excercise gave a cardio benefit. That doesn't mean that even without that knowledge, those people still didn't receive some benefit.
You would think that as fickle as the human person is, if all of those prayers and practices you mention continuously failed, people would simply cease to appeal to their deity and move on to something else. Yet that hasn't occurred. Maybe that belief helps them to cope with the dissapointment and move on or maybe there is some other reason, but evidently, it must be somewhat effective. Most likely, there is not a supernatural reason, but why beat up the proponents of it?
In the end, most of what the general population believes about science is not true. So, unless people are going to start their own scientific inquisition to eliminate error, it seems grossly injust for people to always bash the billions of people on the planet who think differently than you do.
You know, real science has enough to deal with trying to keep all of its own conflict shit together that it really doesn't have to go looking for areas, that by definition, are outside its realm of expertise. For religion and meta-physics, you will never have concrete verifiable data because those areas, by their very nature, are outside the current view of the scientific process.
I for one, can guarantee that my knowledge of science, and that of my collegues, must be far greater than that of your knowldege of the Iranian dating scene and you know what? In the scientific community, we don't care. We have our own projects to work on. Some of us have a religious background some of us don't, but it doesn't matter, because we are doing science, not theology.
People seem to think that science is this concrete thing that never changes and has all the answers. It is just as vague and ever changing as anything else is. 400 years ago, it was scienticially accepted that the world was flat and that the sun revolved around the earth. In the past 100 years ago, the scientific facts on the atom and matter have all change. Our laws of physics were shown to be inadequate. What we knew about biology and cellular structure has been shown to be if not outright wrong, dreadfully incomplete. In the 1970s there was this "new" theory call quantum mechanics (actually prior to the 70s, but that is when it hit mainstream). Now it is no longer hotly debated but more or less accepted. Chaos theory, another wonderful field of study that has vast implications but virtually impossible to test in real life. Even the proof of the Higgs boson now throws out decades of accepted theory on what occurred moments after the big bang.
So, people with narrow minds might want to mock those who say they believe in a deity or some other power or force, nobody can stop them from doing so. But real scientists are much too hard at work, regardless of their personal belief in such things, doing real science. Those discussions are in the real of philosophers and theologians.
Apple will never get back to those windfall margins in the phone or tablet space, ever.
They don't need to. If you buy back shares, then the lower margin on the devices equates to an equivalent dividend per share.
http://www.techradar.com/us/news/phone-and-communications/mobile-phones/bluetooth-headsets-don-t-make-driving-safer-976296
That depends. Are you listening to it to verify that your hands free got it correct? If so, then your brain is occupied doing that instead of driving and it is not any safer than looking at the screen. It isn't the fact that your eyes left the road for a split second, it's that your brain quit the driving task and shifted to the texting task and has to shift back to driving again, meanwhile, your car has traveled a football field or so down the highway without you realizing it.