That is similar to the Boeing 747. The old blue prints could never be used to build the crafts. The guys on the line would make parts slightly different from the specs.
For those of you thinking "...hell, there's been interchangeable parts since the British mass-produced the Brown Bess in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars..." and wanting to call bullshit, he's right. Gun mechs have been swapping parts in the field to keep things working for centuries and interchangeable parts were needed and used, but big aircraft get fixed in similar factories to the ones that built them where parts can be custom fabricated; had to, as most of the bolt holes didn't line up. Just like a friend of mine used to do--on 747's. And a lot of the knowledge to make and fix them was based on building similar things and adapting to what was in front of you.
989 Studios went through a lot of names, but they were almost always an internal studio of Sony.....
Wow! The history of SOE sounds better than their MMO's...wait, how about a Matrix MMO where you go into the Matrix and set up a company to run an MMO in the Matrix? All I have to figure out now is why.:)
Bicycle! You were lucky to have a bicycle. Punching cards by hand for 12 hours a day. But two lumps of coal at night with 8 of us in a bed. And half a watch on the bilge pump.
Machine code! Bloody luxury! Plugboards and patch cords, we had, day in, day out.! 'cept when you had to push the trolly around and replace the blown tubes. Uphill. Both ways. In winter.
Last weekend, I looked at the Dell.ca website for an Ubuntu computer and found the same crap. Off of their main pages you are offered computers with manditory Windows. To find otherwise I had to search for "Ubuntu".
Using the website, the cheapest Inspiron 530 cost CAN $569 including an unwanted 19" LCD monitor. (I also couldn't drop an unwanted 3.5" hard drive as I'm going with only 2.5" in the future.) I can buy easily parts and build a better computer at a better price.
Maybe you can phone in and get a Dell rep to make a special order the way you like it, but I'm not going to waste time on the phone having wasted enough wading through their website.
From the Wikipedia entry on Operation Downfall, the Allied plan to invade the Japanese islands to force surrender:
Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in anticipation of the casualties resulting from the invasion of Japan. To the present date, all the American military casualties of the sixty years following the end of World War II -- including the Korean and Vietnam Wars -- have not exceeded that number. In 2003, there were still 120,000 of these Purple Heart medals in stock.[45] There are so many in surplus that combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan are able to keep Purple Hearts on-hand for immediate award to wounded soldiers on the field.[45]
My parents lived through World War 2. I've heard it from them and I've read a lot of accounts and history. It wasn't like anything before and I hope we never see anything like it again.
At that point, in July 1945, what would you have done? The world isn't a blank slate and doing nothing has millions of Japanese starving and other world powers wondering. What do you do? Sure, better to have never come to that point of picking between situations of how many die. But imagine you're there now. You're Harry S. Truman. What do you do? Let the enemy starve, with whatever fallout for the post-war world? Invade and have that butcher's bill from both sides? Or use the Bomb and crush 2 cites and their people?
In the years since the bombings, however, questions about Truman's choice have become more pointed. Supporters of Truman's decision to use the bomb argue that it saved hundreds of thousands of lives that would have been lost in an invasion of mainland Japan. Eleanor Roosevelt spoke in support of this view in 1954, saying that Truman had "made the only decision he could," and that the bomb's use was necessary "to avoid tremendous sacrifice of American lives."[65] Others, including historian Gar Alperovitz, have argued that the use of nuclear weapons was unnecessary and inherently immoral.[66] Truman himself wrote later in life that, "I knew what I was doing when I stopped the war... I have no regrets and, under the same circumstances, I would do it again."[67]
The Hubble didn't need the Shuttle to be launched--an ELV could have been used. And it could have been serviced by a smaller manned spacecraft. Both would have been cheaper. And Hubble would have flown sooner.
I would like to think I'm not a fatalist but it is my opinion that if the human race died off the Earth and galaxy probably wouldn't care much and may be better off for it. If evolution is to be believed then there will surely come something behind us that is better than we are.
Sure sounds fatalist to me. And the galaxy can't care any more than the sentient beings in it. As far as we know (re likelihood of habitable star systems), we're it--and if we die, there may never be another. And it it wouldn't be better, just empty of any thought, good or bad.
For now, we have to assume that it's up to us and there is no other.
Or rather, could be accomplished with less money using the knowledge we gained from the shuttle.
And also could have been accomplished with less money using other launch vehicles used before the shuttle.
The shuttle wasn't intended to be a research vehicle, like an X-plane. It was intended to be 'operational' and much cheaper--which the expense of its launch cycle defeated. It was intended to be so reliable that it didn't need a escape system--which the complexity of its failure modes defeated.
A pre-shuttle research program should have been done. As a pre-CEV test program should be going on now (not to mention being open to more things besides "big-Apollo-with-Shuttle-tech"). Else limitations and problems in the design and operation of the CEV will almost certainly caused problems.
...You can't separate human evolution from dating rituals; evolution is mostly about sex.
Spot on!
A woman who says "no" when she means "yes" isn't as likely to reproduce as one who will say "yes" when she means yes, and even less likely to reproduce than one who almost always says "yes".
Evolution is about *successful* reproduction, where success is having children with the most likely successful set of traits (which genes partly determine) who grow to sexual maturity and have children of their own. And yes, this is a inductive definition.
Women always have a high investment (and risk) in having any child and thus have a high threshold of what they need in a mate. Starting with a reliable partner to help bear the cost of raising a child. And she's not going to be always sure.
This is a complex thing to filter into just "yes" and "no".
Slashdot Mirror
That is similar to the Boeing 747. The old blue prints could never be used to build the crafts. The guys on the line would make parts slightly different from the specs.
For those of you thinking "...hell, there's been interchangeable parts since the British mass-produced the Brown Bess in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars..." and wanting to call bullshit, he's right. Gun mechs have been swapping parts in the field to keep things working for centuries and interchangeable parts were needed and used, but big aircraft get fixed in similar factories to the ones that built them where parts can be custom fabricated; had to, as most of the bolt holes didn't line up. Just like a friend of mine used to do--on 747's. And a lot of the knowledge to make and fix them was based on building similar things and adapting to what was in front of you.
...the racketeers are better at paying their taxes.
...and getting their taxes reduced before they even pay them.
Really, Santorum's pandering towards Accuweather was shameful, even for an ethics-free Republican.
Indeed. He should have held out for more...lubricant.
The RIAA is just a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes...
Depends on who's running the revolution...Comrade!
Word.
Hey, I like Obama, but if...
...Obama's just JFK and Clinton reborn.
...then the tabloids are going to have a field-day. What's Ken Starr doing these days?
he flushed money down the bankster hole... okay, that might have been smart or dumb, not sure yet.
It's not just dumb, but accord to William K. Black, it's illegal and wrong: just watch or read.
But healthcare reform? Seriously, THAT'S what you'd fight to STOP?
I fear like the previous attempt in 1993 this one will fail and the US will still be saddled with its current mess.
989 Studios went through a lot of names, but they were almost always an internal studio of Sony. ....
Wow! The history of SOE sounds better than their MMO's...wait, how about a Matrix MMO where you go into the Matrix and set up a company to run an MMO in the Matrix? All I have to figure out now is why. :)
Wow! Change the game names to people names and you've got the seed of a Hollywood blockbuster!
Bicycle! You were lucky to have a bicycle. Punching cards by hand for 12 hours a day. But two lumps of coal at night with 8 of us in a bed. And half a watch on the bilge pump.
Machine code! Bloody luxury! Plugboards and patch cords, we had, day in, day out.! 'cept when you had to push the trolly around and replace the blown tubes. Uphill. Both ways. In winter.
No no. Stallman is crazy and mellow. Pagliacci is crazy and sad.
Well, as long as the Doctor didn't (although he can be absent minded, especially with what's in his pockets). BTW, who is this "Doctor Who"?
...they'll unlease an inferno!
Hey man, didn't someone already tell you about that bad acid that's going 'round?
T-1000?!? Damn, we'd put a T-800 in there and now Skynet's gone and substituted our substitute!
,,,and thanks, Dave. Well played. :)
Last weekend, I looked at the Dell.ca website for an Ubuntu computer and found the same crap. Off of their main pages you are offered computers with manditory Windows. To find otherwise I had to search for "Ubuntu".
Using the website, the cheapest Inspiron 530 cost CAN $569 including an unwanted 19" LCD monitor. (I also couldn't drop an unwanted 3.5" hard drive as I'm going with only 2.5" in the future.) I can buy easily parts and build a better computer at a better price.
Maybe you can phone in and get a Dell rep to make a special order the way you like it, but I'm not going to waste time on the phone having wasted enough wading through their website.
From the Wikipedia entry on Operation Downfall, the Allied plan to invade the Japanese islands to force surrender:
Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in anticipation of the casualties resulting from the invasion of Japan. To the present date, all the American military casualties of the sixty years following the end of World War II -- including the Korean and Vietnam Wars -- have not exceeded that number. In 2003, there were still 120,000 of these Purple Heart medals in stock.[45] There are so many in surplus that combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan are able to keep Purple Hearts on-hand for immediate award to wounded soldiers on the field.[45]
My parents lived through World War 2. I've heard it from them and I've read a lot of accounts and history. It wasn't like anything before and I hope we never see anything like it again.
At that point, in July 1945, what would you have done? The world isn't a blank slate and doing nothing has millions of Japanese starving and other world powers wondering. What do you do? Sure, better to have never come to that point of picking between situations of how many die. But imagine you're there now. You're Harry S. Truman. What do you do? Let the enemy starve, with whatever fallout for the post-war world? Invade and have that butcher's bill from both sides? Or use the Bomb and crush 2 cites and their people?
From Wikipedia again. :
In the years since the bombings, however, questions about Truman's choice have become more pointed. Supporters of Truman's decision to use the bomb argue that it saved hundreds of thousands of lives that would have been lost in an invasion of mainland Japan. Eleanor Roosevelt spoke in support of this view in 1954, saying that Truman had "made the only decision he could," and that the bomb's use was necessary "to avoid tremendous sacrifice of American lives."[65] Others, including historian Gar Alperovitz, have argued that the use of nuclear weapons was unnecessary and inherently immoral.[66] Truman himself wrote later in life that, "I knew what I was doing when I stopped the war... I have no regrets and, under the same circumstances, I would do it again."[67]
Hmmm...you're quite right. Defeatist is much more appropriate. Misanthropic even more so.
The Hubble didn't need the Shuttle to be launched--an ELV could have been used. And it could have been serviced by a smaller manned spacecraft. Both would have been cheaper. And Hubble would have flown sooner.
I would like to think I'm not a fatalist but it is my opinion that if the human race died off the Earth and galaxy probably wouldn't care much and may be better off for it. If evolution is to be believed then there will surely come something behind us that is better than we are.
Sure sounds fatalist to me. And the galaxy can't care any more than the sentient beings in it. As far as we know (re likelihood of habitable star systems), we're it--and if we die, there may never be another. And it it wouldn't be better, just empty of any thought, good or bad.
For now, we have to assume that it's up to us and there is no other.
Or rather, could be accomplished with less money using the knowledge we gained from the shuttle.
And also could have been accomplished with less money using other launch vehicles used before the shuttle.
The shuttle wasn't intended to be a research vehicle, like an X-plane. It was intended to be 'operational' and much cheaper--which the expense of its launch cycle defeated. It was intended to be so reliable that it didn't need a escape system--which the complexity of its failure modes defeated.
A pre-shuttle research program should have been done. As a pre-CEV test program should be going on now (not to mention being open to more things besides "big-Apollo-with-Shuttle-tech"). Else limitations and problems in the design and operation of the CEV will almost certainly caused problems.
Expect this discussion to be full of astroturf, red herrings and trolls
Ah, no problem. Just give the red herring to the troll and he'll let you pass the bridge :)
...and save the astroturf for the knights in the forest! Yes, it's not a shrubbery, but it's all we have. :)
...You can't separate human evolution from dating rituals; evolution is mostly about sex.
Spot on!
A woman who says "no" when she means "yes" isn't as likely to reproduce as one who will say "yes" when she means yes, and even less likely to reproduce than one who almost always says "yes".
Evolution is about *successful* reproduction, where success is having children with the most likely successful set of traits (which genes partly determine) who grow to sexual maturity and have children of their own. And yes, this is a inductive definition.
Women always have a high investment (and risk) in having any child and thus have a high threshold of what they need in a mate. Starting with a reliable partner to help bear the cost of raising a child. And she's not going to be always sure. This is a complex thing to filter into just "yes" and "no".
But what if its a low-altitude test of an orbital mind control laser?!?