There is a very simple explanation of why Saddam Hussein would have played the games he did with the UN weapon's inspectors and allowed the world to continue to think that he had developed WMD, when in fact he may have had none in any militarily significant quantities.
Any poker player could recognize the situation he was in. Saddam played what he thought was a very strong hand 12 years previously, anted up in a big way, and was called by US-led coalition forces. Now, he's stuck in the same game, with a much weaker hand, facing a very strong one, and he can't just fold. What would a poker player do? Bluff, of course!
The most reasonable explanation I have been able to develop was that Saddam was trying to bluff his way out of a untenable situation. He cared not one whit about "bloodying America's nose", or being "seen as a martyr". He only cared about surviving an invasion by the US and maintaining his hold on power, in that order. The best way to survive an invasion is to prevent it from occurring in the first place.
If I were Saddam in 2001, I too would have postured that I had WMD, and the wherewithal to use them (established many years previously when he gassed his own population and the Iranians), in the hopes that that would change the equation for the US strategic planners. (For recent evidence of the effectiveness of this strategy, I give you North Korea.)
The facts that
(1) the Bush administration put our troops on the ground and went ahead with it's plans for invasion and
(2) Saddam did *not* use WMD in a last ditch defense even when he showed no restraint in the past
indicates to me that the simplest and most likely explanation is that not only did Iraq NOT have WMD in any militarily significant quantities, but our government knew that to be true, even when they were positing the opposite.
I have heard every whacked out theory on Saddam and the WMD, and some well thought out, but very convoluted ones, but surprisingly, never ONCE have I heard this very simple bluffing explanation put forth in the media. How can it be that no official "analyst" has thought of it?
This article is interesting in it's explanation of Dean's use of the internet's ability to drive information costs down, and there by "takeover" the Democratic Party, but it's flawed in concluding that this will cause the decline of the two-party system.
(Sadly) The two-party system won't "decline" as a result of the political candidates using the internet the way Dean is. Why? Because it ignores the reality that the Republicans and Democrats have had decades in which to institutionalize and entrench themselves as the only two viable national political organizational entities.
As an example of what I mean, the partitioning of states into voting districts are completely dominated by the two major parties, with very little consideration given to "third/independent" parties. This process normally gets very little press, but has, recently, because the use of computers in demographics analysis has allowed the party in control of a state legislature to gerrymander to a degree previously unfathomable. This, alone, threatens to lock incumbent representative candidates, and their associated political parties, into unassailable positions of dominance.
So, forget it. The Dems and Reps are too well entrenched for there to be a major change in the near future. The best that anyone can hope to do is use the cheaper costs of gathering/managing/deseminating information provided by the internet to takeover one of the two major brands.
And, if you think about it, this "taking over of the Democratic/Republican/ Party brand" is *exactly* what every candidate for elected office does when s/he runs under the banner of a political party. The start of with "nothing", articulate a vision (hopefully), build an organization, gather support, raise money, and, if successful, persuade the majority/plurality of their party's membership to support them. So, if Dean is successful in capturing the Dem presidential nomination, he will have more than the Dem Party brand - he will also have control of all of those "depreciating assets" that Everett Ehrlich poo-poo-ed in his article. Can anyone seriously argue that these fundraising, organizational and media assets, as well as the value that the Dem Party has as an entrenched political institution, lack significant value in a national Presidential campaign?
I'd be very surprised if there aren't megalithic databases churning away in a black budget projects operated by unnamed government agencies that make these commercial ones puny by comparision.
For that matter, I'm curious as to who "Anonymous", the operator of the #3 db in terms of size, is...
The mini-series is worthy of a show, with plenty of potential plot lines and hooks to follow and explore.
I only hope that the "Boxey thread" will end quickly, with that character's death at the hands of the Cylons in the first 5 minutes of the first show of the series.
Why do sci fi show creators feel compelled to include the cute kid character in their space operas? Won't they ever learn that we HATE these characters?
Umm..there was *never* a time when the primary consideration the John Q Public had wrt the purchase of a car was cubic inches and horsepower. That was only true for a small subset of hot rodders and street racers, and is still primarily true for that niche.
Style, passenger comfort, features, etc. have always been part of the equation, even going back to the earliest days of the automobile. Evidence: Remember that Ford's Model T was available in "any color you want, so long as it's black"? Well, holding on to that sort of thinking opened the door for other companies to eat into Ford's dominant market share, and eventually let the GM companies supplant Ford as the #1 producer of cars. And Ford has yet to reclaim the top spot back.
What has changed is the consumer added fuel economy and safety to the list of things they consider when purchasing a car. Fuel economy only became a consideration due to outside market forces (the price of petroleum in the '70s), and safety was due to consumer advocacy (Ralph Nader's "Unsafe at Any Speed" testimony), as well as some pressue from the insurance agencies.
Computer manufacturers are operating under similar market forces. Power consumption, die size and noisey fans fall far short on John Q. Public's list of considerations when purchasing a computer. I'd say at the top of the list, in no particular order, is cost of acquisition, cost of transition (compatibility), and perceived speed. The only time power consumption/efficiency becomes a factor is when one is purchasing laptops, and that metric is only reported as "battery life", which doesn't really capture power consumption/efficiency.
Even large companies, purchasing electricity to operate hundred/thousands/tens of thousands of computers 24/7, frequently fail to consider whether their computers are "green". No. It's not until the price of electricity becomes a significant line item on someone's bottom line, that anyone really considers efficiency as an important feature to track on a decision making matrix.
It is you who is mistaken about a great many things. Your post poses so simplistic and slanted an argument that it can't help but draw the wrong conclusion.
It is clear from your post that you don't believe in the value of the patent, trademark and copyright system that we have in the US. You started with that premise, and refactored everything to fit the conclusion that you wanted to make.
I will grant you that the current system has been abused, and that MS (and other corporations) has been able to manipulate this IP protection. But to ascribe MS's achievement of monopoly status solely to the government "granting it these priviledges" is ridiculous.
A brief study of history and economics will reveal a simple truth - a capitalist free market, without an inpartial entity with the authority, power and will to maintain a level playing field, will trend towards consolidation and bigness. Capitalism (free market or not) rewards those who are the most profitable, and the economy of scale is so natural in that system it may as well be a law of capitalism. And once a company gets big enough, it tends to do whatever required to eliminate competition and maintain its 800lb gorilla status. Look at the timeline of development of any industry (or subindustry), and you will see this to be true. It was true for railroads, petroleum, automotive, steel, aerospace, and it's true for computer hardware AND software.
The only way such a gorilla dies in such a situation is when there is a fundamental sea-change in its industry, and the gorilla fails to notice it in time to institute changes. Example, United Buggy Whip (read "IBM") must recogize the horseless carriage (or "PC") as a threat to its future, and either use it's size to stifle the automobile's adoption or jump into the automotive business. Failure to do any of these things spells trouble for UBW.
But, it is also true that there has only been one entity capable of acting as a counter-agent to the overall natural tendency towards the establishment of a monopoly. If one values the free market in capitalism, one would recognize the role that government HAS to play in maintaining a "level playing field", to ensure that no one company gets so big as to stifle innovation and competition, and to ensure that the public interest, overall, is served, and not just the botton line.
The government is the only entity with the authority and power to counteract a monopoly/potential monopoly. Where the government *failed* wrt Microsoft is that it lacked the will to use that authority and power.
Now, one could argue that the computer software industry is different from other industries, in that, especially wrt software, there is nothing physical being produced, and that the IP laws provide undue protection over basically ether, instead of something tangible. There is merit *some* in this. But, the system was devised to do two thing. The first was to provide protection to an inventor so that s/he can profit from his/her research and development. This is incredibly important in industries where substantial money has to be invested in production facilities, and arguably less so in industries like software, where production can be as simple as owning a CD-ROM burner.
But the second benefit of the IP system, and one frequently forgotten, is that the system fully discloses how an invention works, revealing it to all so that it can be substantially improved. Again, this is incredible value for this in industries where something is manufactured.
Unfortunately, the computer revolution occurred so fast (relatively speaking), the USPTO never (or perhaps incorrectly) analyzed the nature of the industry to realize it's different from those that came before it, and began granting patents on processes and fundamental knowledge, instead of actual inventions. And once it started doing that, it couldn't arbitrarily stop. A similar timeline is re-occurring wrt genetic research & development. (Patents on human genes? For rea
No one is arguing that there is no advantage to NOT floating. What these scientists did was find evidence that dinosaurs may have floated (anomolous footprints, spinal air sacs, etc.), then ran models/simulations to show that the evidence allows for brachiopods being able to float. This does not constitute *proof*, btw, just an credible assimilation of the gathered evidence to form a likely explanation.
FYI, certain primates (chimps and orangutans, I think) will not float. So your logical argument of "it's advantageous, therefor it's obviously true" is false. Just as false as some future palentologist making the argument that "Eagles flew. Bats flew. Butterflies flew. Therefore humans must have flown - there are too many advantages for survival in flying that humans won't fly." wouldn't fly. Thankfully, scientists are a bit more rigourous in their thinking (hopefully).
Also, FYI, the ability to float does not have anything to do with the size or mass of the object, only its displacement. Anything will float as long as it weighs less than the matter it displaces.
Positive buoyancy = floaty Negative buoyancy = sinky Neutral buoyancy = balanced between being floaty and sinky
That is why battleships float. Oil tankers float. Aircraft carriers float. Submarines float (even when they are underwater they're floating, just not on the surface).
An even bigger "waste of time" is porting Linux to the PS2 or XBox.
Aero-testing a model of good ol' NC-1701 is at least unique and interesting in that it hadn't been done before.
At the very least, we learned that Scottie was right! Contrary to Klingon proclamations in the affirmative, the Enterprise is in fact NOT a garbage skow. It couldn't even handle a single piece of space junk!
I'm not a doctor (but I play one on TV), and I'm confused by a seeming contradiction in the article.
One paragraph states "The product is a powder made from blood that has been stored for more than six weeks and can not be used for transfusion." Later in the article, the following statement is made "The powder can be mixed into liquid when required, and transfused into patients regardless of their blood type."
Was the intent of the first statement to indicate that Hemospan is necessary, but not sufficient, in that it lacks the functionality of the platelets and plasma?
It's obvious that Stonehenge is the world's first optical storage media. Anyone have the.mp3 of the Stonehenge recording? I hear that a band called Spinal Tap has covered it, but I'm interested in hearing the original Druidic version.
What's really needed is a MARITAL arts robot. That would be waaaaay more useful around the ol' homestead.
Though, since these are Japanese companies doing the research, such a robot would be sold only in shades of bubblegum, and come with a "Hello Kitty" face.
Well, I did a Google search for "invisible lasers", and found the following excerpt from what must have been the minutes of a Top Secret NASA planning committee meeting...
"...Right. Ok, people you have to tell me these things, alright. I've been frozen for 30 years ok. Throw me a freakin bone here. I'm the boss, I need the info. Ok, no problem. Here's my second plan. Back in the '60's, I developed a weather changing machine, which was, in essence, a sophisticated heat beam which we called a "laser". Using these "lasers", we punch a hole in the protective layer around the world which we called the "ozone layer". Slowly, but surely, ultraviolet rays would pour in, increasing the risk of skin cancer. That is, unless the world pays us a hefty ransom."
Thanks, Google! BTW, does anyone know anything about this "Dr. Evil" guy? When did he get put in charge of NASA?
I'm surprised no one has posted a "Code should be free" response. Isn't Valve developing a proprietary, closed-source game? And are they not going to charge the public money to buy a license for said game? I expected to see a flurry of posts to the tune of "THAT CODE SHOULD HAVE BEEN OPEN SOURCED TO BEGIN WITH!!!"
But, I guess there are some sacred code cows for this crowd. Or at least, a lack of internal consistancy. Perhaps the "real" Slashdotters too busy file sharing archival copies of music to make the arguments anymore.
I can think of a perfectly valid reason why one company may automatically blacklist (ex)employees of another. Namely, if it's known that every employee of the "blacklisted" company has had to sign an NDA or a non-compete that would restrict their actitivities, that would be a sufficiently valid reason to not even consider those resumes.
Note: I am NOT saying this is what is occuring in this particular instance. I have no particular insight on why Damage Studios would take this position, only that it's not necessarily a childish one. If I had to, though, I'd bet that their rationale is, in fact, childish, and not rational. *GRYNN*
Well, I guess they technically aren't "depth control *planes*", but by altering the angle thru which the various flippers oscillate in relation the the body, the roach can be made to level, dive, rise, roll, etc.
Watch the whole clip and prepare to be amazed.
Having participated in a previous life in the building of underwater robots to test system, designs, and procedures related to space station maintenance, I can tell you that making a robot (even a large robot) neutrally buoyant (and "attitudinally/orientationally neutral") may be a real pain in the ass, but it's hardly rocket science. Especially when that robot is being operated in a controlled environment like a neutral bouyancy facility (ie "swimming pool").
I had high hopes to read something *really* interesting based on the lead up, only to be sorely disappointed once the article actually unfolded.
Before anyone can hope to write an article on the nature of programming languages 20 years into the future (let alone 100 years into the future) that stands a chance of being insightful, one should pick up an advanced applied physics book, brush up on quantum mechanics, and then move on to researching the state of development in the area of quantum computing.
This article will prove to be as prescient as an article titled "100 Year Buggy Whip" would have been in 1903....anactofgod...
I think that everyone is missing the point. This doodz design hides the engine, drivetrain and fuel supply within the frame of what looks like a normal road bike. Now, that *is* kindda kewl.
Whether it's a significant enough improvement over other more conventional designs, and whether the two-stroke engine design can be improved enough to overcome its short-comings (pollution & noise controls, etc.) remains to be seen. But remember, this is basically still just a prototype....anactofgod...
Blind enforcement of Rule 7 would prevent the forward progress of theortical sciences.
Simple example (maybe too simple):
The "discovery" that the Earth revolves around the Sun could not possibly have been true, because it contradicted the laws of nature as they were known at the time by Europeans. (Forget that the helio-centric model was an ancient idea for non-Christians/non-Europeans, and the geo-centric model was a throwback enforced by the Catholic church for its own purposes.)
For another, perhaps better, even simpler, historical example, refer to Charles Siefe's book "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea".
I guess that in many cases, it is a good rule of thumb for the educated layperson.
"My perpetual motion machine works because the Laws of Thermodynamics don't apply to it." "Really? Can you explain *why* the LoT don't apply to your particular machine?" "Ahhh...no...."
But scientists frequently fall back on this argument when presented with novel theories/developments. In fact, it is very rare that a new theory NOT have to overcome overwhelming opposition until it's accepted. This is not an inditment of scientists or the scientific method, its just the way "real" science works.
That's not to say that there aren't things that science can't explain Yet. After all, these "laws" that most people throw around as absolutes are really just the best mathematical abstractions and models that we are able to create to understand that which we observe. That is why the Newtonian "Law" of gravity is mostly right, and works just fine to explain many physical phenomina, even though a "better", more complicated, more comprehensive law was proposed by Einstein.
I can't improve on Jacob Bronowski's words ("The Origins of Knowledge and Imagination", p69) "...none of our explanations can be true, that in some sense there is no ultimate truth accessible to us for the simple reason we have to make a cut in the universe in order to do the experiment at all. We have to decide what is relevant and what is irrelevant." _aside_ We called this the "framing problem" when I was doing AI/robotics research. _continuing_ "Since I hold that the universe is totally connected, that every fact has some influence on every other fact, then it follows that any cut you make at all is a convenient simplification. But in essence it is a distortion, and you are now decoding only a part of the total..."
This seeming limit to human comprehension, and the inability to remove oneself from the universe in order to understand it, is why so many theoretical physicists turn to religion, particularly Eastern religions, seemingly in contridiction to their scientific training.
Slashdot Mirror
There is a very simple explanation of why Saddam Hussein would have played the games he did with the UN weapon's inspectors and allowed the world to continue to think that he had developed WMD, when in fact he may have had none in any militarily significant quantities.
Any poker player could recognize the situation he was in. Saddam played what he thought was a very strong hand 12 years previously, anted up in a big way, and was called by US-led coalition forces. Now, he's stuck in the same game, with a much weaker hand, facing a very strong one, and he can't just fold. What would a poker player do? Bluff, of course!
The most reasonable explanation I have been able to develop was that Saddam was trying to bluff his way out of a untenable situation. He cared not one whit about "bloodying America's nose", or being "seen as a martyr". He only cared about surviving an invasion by the US and maintaining his hold on power, in that order. The best way to survive an invasion is to prevent it from occurring in the first place.
If I were Saddam in 2001, I too would have postured that I had WMD, and the wherewithal to use them (established many years previously when he gassed his own population and the Iranians), in the hopes that that would change the equation for the US strategic planners. (For recent evidence of the effectiveness of this strategy, I give you North Korea.)
The facts that
(1) the Bush administration put our troops on the ground and went ahead with it's plans for invasion and
(2) Saddam did *not* use WMD in a last ditch defense even when he showed no restraint in the past
indicates to me that the simplest and most likely explanation is that not only did Iraq NOT have WMD in any militarily significant quantities, but our government knew that to be true, even when they were positing the opposite.
I have heard every whacked out theory on Saddam and the WMD, and some well thought out, but very convoluted ones, but surprisingly, never ONCE have I heard this very simple bluffing explanation put forth in the media. How can it be that no official "analyst" has thought of it?
---anactofgod---
This article is interesting in it's explanation of Dean's use of the internet's ability to drive information costs down, and there by "takeover" the Democratic Party, but it's flawed in concluding that this will cause the decline of the two-party system.
(Sadly) The two-party system won't "decline" as a result of the political candidates using the internet the way Dean is. Why? Because it ignores the reality that the Republicans and Democrats have had decades in which to institutionalize and entrench themselves as the only two viable national political organizational entities.
As an example of what I mean, the partitioning of states into voting districts are completely dominated by the two major parties, with very little consideration given to "third/independent" parties. This process normally gets very little press, but has, recently, because the use of computers in demographics analysis has allowed the party in control of a state legislature to gerrymander to a degree previously unfathomable. This, alone, threatens to lock incumbent representative candidates, and their associated political parties, into unassailable positions of dominance.
So, forget it. The Dems and Reps are too well entrenched for there to be a major change in the near future. The best that anyone can hope to do is use the cheaper costs of gathering/managing/deseminating information provided by the internet to takeover one of the two major brands.
And, if you think about it, this "taking over of the Democratic/Republican/ Party brand" is *exactly* what every candidate for elected office does when s/he runs under the banner of a political party. The start of with "nothing", articulate a vision (hopefully), build an organization, gather support, raise money, and, if successful, persuade the majority/plurality of their party's membership to support them. So, if Dean is successful in capturing the Dem presidential nomination, he will have more than the Dem Party brand - he will also have control of all of those "depreciating assets" that Everett Ehrlich poo-poo-ed in his article. Can anyone seriously argue that these fundraising, organizational and media assets, as well as the value that the Dem Party has as an entrenched political institution, lack significant value in a national Presidential campaign?
---anactofgod---
I'd be very surprised if there aren't megalithic databases churning away in a black budget projects operated by unnamed government agencies that make these commercial ones puny by comparision.
For that matter, I'm curious as to who "Anonymous", the operator of the #3 db in terms of size, is...
---anactofgod---
Duh! This question was deliberately left unanswered so that it can be explored, in depth, if a show is launched.
---anactofgod---
The mini-series is worthy of a show, with plenty of potential plot lines and hooks to follow and explore.
I only hope that the "Boxey thread" will end quickly, with that character's death at the hands of the Cylons in the first 5 minutes of the first show of the series.
Why do sci fi show creators feel compelled to include the cute kid character in their space operas? Won't they ever learn that we HATE these characters?
---anactofgod---
"MIT Graduates Can't Find Jobs to Pay Back Student Loans"
---anactofgod---
Umm..there was *never* a time when the primary consideration the John Q Public had wrt the purchase of a car was cubic inches and horsepower. That was only true for a small subset of hot rodders and street racers, and is still primarily true for that niche.
Style, passenger comfort, features, etc. have always been part of the equation, even going back to the earliest days of the automobile. Evidence: Remember that Ford's Model T was available in "any color you want, so long as it's black"? Well, holding on to that sort of thinking opened the door for other companies to eat into Ford's dominant market share, and eventually let the GM companies supplant Ford as the #1 producer of cars. And Ford has yet to reclaim the top spot back.
What has changed is the consumer added fuel economy and safety to the list of things they consider when purchasing a car. Fuel economy only became a consideration due to outside market forces (the price of petroleum in the '70s), and safety was due to consumer advocacy (Ralph Nader's "Unsafe at Any Speed" testimony), as well as some pressue from the insurance agencies.
Computer manufacturers are operating under similar market forces. Power consumption, die size and noisey fans fall far short on John Q. Public's list of considerations when purchasing a computer. I'd say at the top of the list, in no particular order, is cost of acquisition, cost of transition (compatibility), and perceived speed. The only time power consumption/efficiency becomes a factor is when one is purchasing laptops, and that metric is only reported as "battery life", which doesn't really capture power consumption/efficiency.
Even large companies, purchasing electricity to operate hundred/thousands/tens of thousands of computers 24/7, frequently fail to consider whether their computers are "green". No. It's not until the price of electricity becomes a significant line item on someone's bottom line, that anyone really considers efficiency as an important feature to track on a decision making matrix.
---anactofgod---
It is you who is mistaken about a great many things. Your post poses so simplistic and slanted an argument that it can't help but draw the wrong conclusion.
It is clear from your post that you don't believe in the value of the patent, trademark and copyright system that we have in the US. You started with that premise, and refactored everything to fit the conclusion that you wanted to make.
I will grant you that the current system has been abused, and that MS (and other corporations) has been able to manipulate this IP protection. But to ascribe MS's achievement of monopoly status solely to the government "granting it these priviledges" is ridiculous.
A brief study of history and economics will reveal a simple truth - a capitalist free market, without an inpartial entity with the authority, power and will to maintain a level playing field, will trend towards consolidation and bigness. Capitalism (free market or not) rewards those who are the most profitable, and the economy of scale is so natural in that system it may as well be a law of capitalism. And once a company gets big enough, it tends to do whatever required to eliminate competition and maintain its 800lb gorilla status. Look at the timeline of development of any industry (or subindustry), and you will see this to be true. It was true for railroads, petroleum, automotive, steel, aerospace, and it's true for computer hardware AND software.
The only way such a gorilla dies in such a situation is when there is a fundamental sea-change in its industry, and the gorilla fails to notice it in time to institute changes. Example, United Buggy Whip (read "IBM") must recogize the horseless carriage (or "PC") as a threat to its future, and either use it's size to stifle the automobile's adoption or jump into the automotive business. Failure to do any of these things spells trouble for UBW.
But, it is also true that there has only been one entity capable of acting as a counter-agent to the overall natural tendency towards the establishment of a monopoly. If one values the free market in capitalism, one would recognize the role that government HAS to play in maintaining a "level playing field", to ensure that no one company gets so big as to stifle innovation and competition, and to ensure that the public interest, overall, is served, and not just the botton line.
The government is the only entity with the authority and power to counteract a monopoly/potential monopoly. Where the government *failed* wrt Microsoft is that it lacked the will to use that authority and power.
Now, one could argue that the computer software industry is different from other industries, in that, especially wrt software, there is nothing physical being produced, and that the IP laws provide undue protection over basically ether, instead of something tangible. There is merit *some* in this. But, the system was devised to do two thing. The first was to provide protection to an inventor so that s/he can profit from his/her research and development. This is incredibly important in industries where substantial money has to be invested in production facilities, and arguably less so in industries like software, where production can be as simple as owning a CD-ROM burner.
But the second benefit of the IP system, and one frequently forgotten, is that the system fully discloses how an invention works, revealing it to all so that it can be substantially improved. Again, this is incredible value for this in industries where something is manufactured.
Unfortunately, the computer revolution occurred so fast (relatively speaking), the USPTO never (or perhaps incorrectly) analyzed the nature of the industry to realize it's different from those that came before it, and began granting patents on processes and fundamental knowledge, instead of actual inventions. And once it started doing that, it couldn't arbitrarily stop. A similar timeline is re-occurring wrt genetic research & development. (Patents on human genes? For rea
No one is arguing that there is no advantage to NOT floating. What these scientists did was find evidence that dinosaurs may have floated (anomolous footprints, spinal air sacs, etc.), then ran models/simulations to show that the evidence allows for brachiopods being able to float. This does not constitute *proof*, btw, just an credible assimilation of the gathered evidence to form a likely explanation.
FYI, certain primates (chimps and orangutans, I think) will not float. So your logical argument of "it's advantageous, therefor it's obviously true" is false. Just as false as some future palentologist making the argument that "Eagles flew. Bats flew. Butterflies flew. Therefore humans must have flown - there are too many advantages for survival in flying that humans won't fly." wouldn't fly. Thankfully, scientists are a bit more rigourous in their thinking (hopefully).
Also, FYI, the ability to float does not have anything to do with the size or mass of the object, only its displacement. Anything will float as long as it weighs less than the matter it displaces.
Positive buoyancy = floaty
Negative buoyancy = sinky
Neutral buoyancy = balanced between being floaty and sinky
That is why battleships float. Oil tankers float. Aircraft carriers float. Submarines float (even when they are underwater they're floating, just not on the surface).
---anactofgod---
An even bigger "waste of time" is porting Linux to the PS2 or XBox.
Aero-testing a model of good ol' NC-1701 is at least unique and interesting in that it hadn't been done before.
At the very least, we learned that Scottie was right! Contrary to Klingon proclamations in the affirmative, the Enterprise is in fact NOT a garbage skow. It couldn't even handle a single piece of space junk!
---anactofgod---
I'm not a doctor (but I play one on TV), and I'm confused by a seeming contradiction in the article.
One paragraph states "The product is a powder made from blood that has been stored for more than six weeks and can not be used for transfusion." Later in the article, the following statement is made "The powder can be mixed into liquid when required, and transfused into patients regardless of their blood type."
Was the intent of the first statement to indicate that Hemospan is necessary, but not sufficient, in that it lacks the functionality of the platelets and plasma?
---anactofgod---
No no. Goering was the Reichsmarshall for the Luftwaffe.
Joseph Goebbels was the Minister of Propaganda.
---anactofgod---
It's obvious that Stonehenge is the world's first optical storage media. Anyone have the .mp3 of the Stonehenge recording? I hear that a band called Spinal Tap has covered it, but I'm interested in hearing the original Druidic version.
---anactofgod---
What's really needed is a MARITAL arts robot. That would be waaaaay more useful around the ol' homestead.
Though, since these are Japanese companies doing the research, such a robot would be sold only in shades of bubblegum, and come with a "Hello Kitty" face.
{{{shudder}}}
---anactofgod---
Well, I did a Google search for "invisible lasers", and found the following excerpt from what must have been the minutes of a Top Secret NASA planning committee meeting...
"...Right. Ok, people you have to tell me these things, alright. I've been frozen for 30 years ok. Throw me a freakin bone here. I'm the boss, I need the info. Ok, no problem. Here's my second plan. Back in the '60's, I developed a weather changing machine, which was, in essence, a sophisticated heat beam which we called a "laser". Using these "lasers", we punch a hole in the protective layer around the world which we called the "ozone layer". Slowly, but surely, ultraviolet rays would pour in, increasing the risk of skin cancer. That is, unless the world pays us a hefty ransom."
Thanks, Google! BTW, does anyone know anything about this "Dr. Evil" guy? When did he get put in charge of NASA?
---anactofgod---
I'm surprised no one has posted a "Code should be free" response. Isn't Valve developing a proprietary, closed-source game? And are they not going to charge the public money to buy a license for said game? I expected to see a flurry of posts to the tune of "THAT CODE SHOULD HAVE BEEN OPEN SOURCED TO BEGIN WITH!!!"
But, I guess there are some sacred code cows for this crowd. Or at least, a lack of internal consistancy. Perhaps the "real" Slashdotters too busy file sharing archival copies of music to make the arguments anymore.
*GRYNN*
---anactofgod---
Note: I am NOT saying this is what is occuring in this particular instance. I have no particular insight on why Damage Studios would take this position, only that it's not necessarily a childish one. If I had to, though, I'd bet that their rationale is, in fact, childish, and not rational. *GRYNN*
...anactofgod...
Team Process Software? TPS"?
It's too contrived of a name for it to be a mere coincidence.
...anactofgod...
Quick and dirty with a nice attractive young lady.
...anactofgod...
Best of both worlds.
You don't see "depth control planes"?
...anactofgod...
Really? I see six of them. *g*
Well, I guess they technically aren't "depth control *planes*", but by altering the angle thru which the various flippers oscillate in relation the the body, the roach can be made to level, dive, rise, roll, etc.
Watch the whole clip and prepare to be amazed.
Having participated in a previous life in the building of underwater robots to test system, designs, and procedures related to space station maintenance, I can tell you that making a robot (even a large robot) neutrally buoyant (and "attitudinally/orientationally neutral") may be a real pain in the ass, but it's hardly rocket science. Especially when that robot is being operated in a controlled environment like a neutral bouyancy facility (ie "swimming pool").
I had high hopes to read something *really* interesting based on the lead up, only to be sorely disappointed once the article actually unfolded.
...anactofgod...
Before anyone can hope to write an article on the nature of programming languages 20 years into the future (let alone 100 years into the future) that stands a chance of being insightful, one should pick up an advanced applied physics book, brush up on quantum mechanics, and then move on to researching the state of development in the area of quantum computing.
This article will prove to be as prescient as an article titled "100 Year Buggy Whip" would have been in 1903.
I think that everyone is missing the point. This doodz design hides the engine, drivetrain and fuel supply within the frame of what looks like a normal road bike. Now, that *is* kindda kewl.
...anactofgod...
Whether it's a significant enough improvement over other more conventional designs, and whether the two-stroke engine design can be improved enough to overcome its short-comings (pollution & noise controls, etc.) remains to be seen. But remember, this is basically still just a prototype.
Simple example (maybe too simple):
The "discovery" that the Earth revolves around the Sun could not possibly have been true, because it contradicted the laws of nature as they were known at the time by Europeans. (Forget that the helio-centric model was an ancient idea for non-Christians/non-Europeans, and the geo-centric model was a throwback enforced by the Catholic church for its own purposes.)
For another, perhaps better, even simpler, historical example, refer to Charles Siefe's book "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea".
I guess that in many cases, it is a good rule of thumb for the educated layperson.
"My perpetual motion machine works because the Laws of Thermodynamics don't apply to it."
"Really? Can you explain *why* the LoT don't apply to your particular machine?"
"Ahhh...no...."
But scientists frequently fall back on this argument when presented with novel theories/developments. In fact, it is very rare that a new theory NOT have to overcome overwhelming opposition until it's accepted. This is not an inditment of scientists or the scientific method, its just the way "real" science works.
That's not to say that there aren't things that science can't explain Yet. After all, these "laws" that most people throw around as absolutes are really just the best mathematical abstractions and models that we are able to create to understand that which we observe. That is why the Newtonian "Law" of gravity is mostly right, and works just fine to explain many physical phenomina, even though a "better", more complicated, more comprehensive law was proposed by Einstein.
I can't improve on Jacob Bronowski's words ("The Origins of Knowledge and Imagination", p69)
"...none of our explanations can be true, that in some sense there is no ultimate truth accessible to us for the simple reason we have to make a cut in the universe in order to do the experiment at all. We have to decide what is relevant and what is irrelevant." _aside_ We called this the "framing problem" when I was doing AI/robotics research. _continuing_ "Since I hold that the universe is totally connected, that every fact has some influence on every other fact, then it follows that any cut you make at all is a convenient simplification. But in essence it is a distortion, and you are now decoding only a part of the total..."
This seeming limit to human comprehension, and the inability to remove oneself from the universe in order to understand it, is why so many theoretical physicists turn to religion, particularly Eastern religions, seemingly in contridiction to their scientific training.
Blaise...blaise...blaise...
That one can't learn from reading Dilbert and watching Office Space.
"Why didn't you put a cover sheet on the TPS report!" - "Terrible" Terry Tate.
Buy and read "HTML for Dummies" from cover-to-cover.
All the other steps are optional.