Agreed - Bad vision is a large problem especially if its not caught at a young age. It can cause the child to be very behind in reading and other skills.
However other various genetic disorders are not that rare. Asthma and allergies which I got from my parents and will probably pass on to my kids (though I hope not). Diabities which my grandfather has and which I am always on the look out for in myself. susceptably to breast cancer and heart problems which my wife has to look out for.
I can't wait for genetic alterations. Though I doubt my Wife and I will be able to utilize it I hope our childen will be able for their children.
Fusion will hopefully happen someday, some recent reactors have almost hit the break-even point with their energy output, but it's gonna be the sort of thing that comes as a complete surprise to the research community and the world.
Though no one can truely predict what will happen more then ten years from now. Any Scientist can tell you what will happen in their field a year from now. Nothing as compleax as fusion will happen as a surprise to the research community.
I agree with the fact that those who do not know the issues will turn to those who do. In fact thats what Congressmen do all the time. They turn to lobbyists and political thinktanks to give them the information. Which of course leads to biased info but most congressmen don't really care since they are to busy trying to raise money for their next campaign to really research the issues.
However a full democracy has the same problems since most corperations and "grass-roots" organization would be more then happy spend lots of money to advertise their views on the issues. This leads to great things like:
"Humm... well Bill #3448 is fully indorsed by the great taste of Pepsi II Opaque! But My favorite cereal Toasted Twig Sticks is against it... Then I guess it must be a No vote."
Before we can have an effective full democracy the problems with the real ones must be approached or they will be doomed to be repeated.
having read Starship Troopers my impression was that Heinlein's point was that you have to be a citizen to vote and that that was the crux of the idea - it just so happened that citizenship was only granted to those who had served in the military
I too have read starship troopers and I find it very very hard to distance the military side of the issue. The military aspect was hammered home again and again and again through out the book. If there was crux to the idea it was the idea that a perfect citizen (ie. perfect person) was a person who risked his/her (or other soldiers) lives for the "commen good." Thus the perfect citizen was either a person who treated others like cattle or was cattle themselves. This brainwashed bovinish mob as perfect society idea was approached again in Stranger in a Strange Land in the form of a religious cult.
I don't really want DVD either. for several reasons.
You still can't record simply on DVD and DVD can't play or record full HDTV. DVD can only hold about 18gigs of data max and you need more like 40+gigs for HDTV quality. Digital VHS can already record and play back all 18 ATSC digital formats, including all variations of HDTV and SDTV with 1080 active lines of resolution. And of course it is backward compatible to normal VHS. It will be several years until they create a new version of DVD that can hold that much let alone allow you to record too.
if you want to see one - panasonic makes a digital VHS player http://www.panasonic.com/consumer_electronics/vide o/pv_hd1000.htm
p.s. there is also the fact that the only non-hollywood movies that ever come out on dvd are porn (hummm? faux grunting and moaning in Dolby digital surround sound)
Do you really need to have upgradability anymore? ie. today: - imac $1200 (333mhz) - tower g3 (350mhz) w/monitor $2100+
what do you get for that $900? - a bigger harddrive and very slightly faster processer (whoopie!?!) - firewire only good if you do digital video
5 years from now: imac - sell it for a few hundred and take that $900 you saved and buy the latest version of the imac tower g3 - spend another $1000+ on a bigger hardrive, video card, more ram and upgraded processer. All this extra money and you still won't have a machine as fast or as good as the lastest version of the imac because you will be running with slower ram and bus speeds.
I don't think the Movie industry is going to be shaking in it's boots over a few irate kids going out and buying DVD players. Since they are going to be purchasing or at least renting the movies anyway. And once they buy the DVD player and sound system they will go right out and buy some DVDs. They probably will buy a bunch that they normally would never have owned just so they could make there home theater system "worth the $". And since independant stuff doesn't appear on DVD the kids will be permenantly hooked on hollywoods media barrage of (mostly) shit.
HIV (or any other virus for that matter) has very little chance of killing off the human race. a virus would not survive long enough to evolve if it killed off its host. The main goal of evolution is to survive and replicate. Any evolved organism (that includes viruses) will never compleately destroy where it lives (ie. the human species).
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Agreed - Bad vision is a large problem especially if its not caught at a young age. It can cause the child to be very behind in reading and other skills.
However other various genetic disorders are not that rare. Asthma and allergies which I got from my parents and will probably pass on to my kids (though I hope not). Diabities which my grandfather has and which I am always on the look out for in myself. susceptably to breast cancer and heart problems which my wife has to look out for.
I can't wait for genetic alterations. Though I doubt my Wife and I will be able to utilize it I hope our childen will be able for their children.
Though no one can truely predict what will happen more then ten years from now. Any Scientist can tell you what will happen in their field a year from now. Nothing as compleax as fusion will happen as a surprise to the research community.
I agree with the fact that those who do not know the issues will turn to those who do. In fact thats what Congressmen do all the time. They turn to lobbyists and political thinktanks to give them the information. Which of course leads to biased info but most congressmen don't really care since they are to busy trying to raise money for their next campaign to really research the issues.
However a full democracy has the same problems since most corperations and "grass-roots" organization would be more then happy spend lots of money to advertise their views on the issues. This leads to great things like:
"Humm... well Bill #3448 is fully indorsed by the great taste of Pepsi II Opaque! But My favorite cereal Toasted Twig Sticks is against it... Then I guess it must be a No vote."
Before we can have an effective full democracy the problems with the real ones must be approached or they will be doomed to be repeated.
I too have read starship troopers and I find it very very hard to distance the military side of the issue. The military aspect was hammered home again and again and again through out the book. If there was crux to the idea it was the idea that a perfect citizen (ie. perfect person) was a person who risked his/her (or other soldiers) lives for the "commen good." Thus the perfect citizen was either a person who treated others like cattle or was cattle themselves. This brainwashed bovinish mob as perfect society idea was approached again in Stranger in a Strange Land in the form of a religious cult.
I don't really want DVD either. for several reasons.
e o/pv_hd1000.htm
You still can't record simply on DVD and DVD can't play or record full HDTV. DVD can only hold about 18gigs of data max and you need more like 40+gigs for HDTV quality. Digital VHS can already record and play back all 18 ATSC digital formats, including all variations of HDTV and SDTV with 1080 active lines of resolution. And of course it is backward compatible to normal VHS. It will be several years until they create a new version of DVD that can hold that much let alone allow you to record too.
if you want to see one - panasonic makes a digital VHS player http://www.panasonic.com/consumer_electronics/vid
p.s. there is also the fact that the only non-hollywood movies that ever come out on dvd are porn (hummm? faux grunting and moaning in Dolby digital surround sound)
Solitaire is the first thing this will be used for.
And when we get head installed systems Solitaire will also be the first thing this will be used for.
The most used software for head based PCs...
would be Solitare.
when you see someone break out there laptop or palm or whatever 80% of the time they with play a game or two of Klondike before doing any "Real" work.
Do you really need to have upgradability anymore?
ie.
today:
- imac $1200 (333mhz)
- tower g3 (350mhz) w/monitor $2100+
what do you get for that $900?
- a bigger harddrive and very slightly faster processer (whoopie!?!)
- firewire only good if you do digital video
5 years from now:
imac - sell it for a few hundred and take that $900 you saved and buy the latest version of the imac
tower g3 - spend another $1000+ on a bigger hardrive, video card, more ram and upgraded processer. All this extra money and you still won't have a machine as fast or as good as the lastest version of the imac because you will be running with slower ram and bus speeds.
The point was to laugh. If you don't like reading humor articles don't click on them or just change your preferences to exclude them.
>Teenage males are the worst drivers according to insurance records. They make stupid decisions.
People with above average IQs also tend to be worse drivers then people with average IQs - so maybe the decisions aren't so stupid?
>What does helping retarded children have to do with watching erotica (Kidman's butt)?
A camp counselor who helped mentally disabled would have the patience to sit though Cruise's pitiful acting ability.
I don't think the Movie industry is going to be shaking in it's boots over a few irate kids going out and buying DVD players. Since they are going to be purchasing or at least renting the movies anyway. And once they buy the DVD player and sound system they will go right out and buy some DVDs. They probably will buy a bunch that they normally would never have owned just so they could make there home theater system "worth the $". And since independant stuff doesn't appear on DVD the kids will be permenantly hooked on hollywoods media barrage of (mostly) shit.
HIV (or any other virus for that matter) has very little chance of killing off the human race. a virus would not survive long enough to evolve if it killed off its host. The main goal of evolution is to survive and replicate. Any evolved organism (that includes viruses) will never compleately destroy where it lives (ie. the human species).
because many people in so many places are so dumb