CD-ROMs last only a fraction of the advertised time, right. But technology advances quick enough to not needing them around 30 years from now.
Your slides cannot be copied or viewed now without serious loss of quality compared to the original image. That's why the seventies look so "funny colored" when viewing images from back then. Digital images will be the same forever, can be multiplied and copied in an instant and I bet my keyboard we'll still be having jpeg-compatible viewing equipment even 20-30 years from now. There's a billion of photographs out there in that format and that will drive the industry for as long as it's necessary.
In short: your slides wear out slowly every day. My CD-ROMs wear out slowly every day.
My CD-ROMs have ECC error correction. digital 1, slides 0
My CDs can be backed up easily. digital 2, slides 0
My CDs hold 550 images in 10g acrylic plastic. digital 3, slides 0
My CDs can be transferred in a speed of 15 images per *second* onto the current up-to-date data archival medium, DVD-/+R. DVDs are supposed to outlast CDRs by orders of magnitude, because the data layer is embedded within plastic. digital 4, slides still 0
One DVD can hold 4200 of my images. That's more than a decade worth of hobbyist photography to me. Other's mileage may vary, but DVD-Rs are 50 cent a piece. digital 6, slides 0
Some keep photos on their harddiscs. I do. Linux software raid-5 secured harddrives, to be exact. Only a household fire threatens my photos now. digital 6.5, slides 0
Ten years from now there will be a digital medium, that will hold all photos my family, my friends, girlfriend(s), wife(s), employer(s) can ever produce. On one disk. At less than ten dollar apiece. Slides have no chance against that.
...and shoes, especially sneakers/running shoes and clothing. The real question, albeit flame war starting, should rather be: is this a phenomenon typical for male-dominated product categories? Computers, costly sports equipment, automobiles, bikes, electronic gadgets - male dominated consumer group I'd say.
Store clerks from these product categories tend to be overly aggressive, unfriendly, low-level, expert elitist and so on, so these could really be true gender specific marketing effects, who knows...
Damn right. Analog photography is retreating like oil paintings were a century ago. First they strive eons to get as real as possible, doing quite photorealistic paintings with great skill by hand and then, the instant a better, faster and cheaper technology is on the horizon, they switch instantly to "art". They knew they coulnd't compete with photography in terms of realism, so they added emotion and un-realism to their paintings. Their art died anyway.
Today it's pretty much similar and as soon as photographic quality became abundant (in a technical sense) they switched back some gears and declared that "emotional art". Took out the colors and shot in black and white again, washed out the sharpness, blurred the lens, jumped through hundreds of hoops and it didn't improve the art, it just added style.
It seems to me there's a regular pattern to it: if you're losing ground on one branch, if your product or profession is dying - add emotion and declare it art or lifestyle. Consumer products are marketed pretty much the same way once every other advantage is lost against the competition.
Photographers using traditional film have argued exactly the same for almost five years now and digital photography took off anyway.
Digital technology becomes cheaper every month, no matter what piece of equipment we're talking about - except digicams just before xmas of course - so at one point we might have gigapixel cameras in the consumer price range, who knows.
I must apologize for washing your detailed and insightful post away, but I think you have a narrow viewpoint from an elitist photographer's perspective. An incredibly old-school one at that, sorry to be so blunt. Analog cameras have intrinsic drawbacks that cannot be overcome and which are the reason for the digicam craze. I agree to you that digital photography is not the most efficient and not the cheapest way to do hoch resolution imaging at the moment. But Moore's Law will ensure it is in the future.
Advantages of a high-resolution digital imaging system, from an outsider's viewpoint not married to celluloid and chemicals:
- digital images can be previewed extremely fast. If a shot was wrong, retry without waste.
- digital images can be sent via networks around the globe extremely fast. Newscasts, distributed expert teams, peer review, you name it.
- digital images can be ported to any viewing equipment, instantly. Cinema-like projection equipment, large scale video walls, large printers, details on small handouts and laptop screens
- archival without color degradation
- catalogues are generated in an instant
- easy whitebalance, even after the shooting
- automatic recording of timestamps and used equipment, shutter times etc.
Sorry for bringing up the "dinosaur"-argument, but sooner or later analog photography will die and there's nothing you can do about it. For consumer cameras, analog's nearly dead and photo studios are following now, leading digital photos slowly but steadily up the quality/picture size ladder. You are not alone, as there are many audiophile vinyl and radio tube enthusiasts out there, that simply refuse to acknowlegde digital technology and its advantages.
To mimic your "sum up":
-Large-format cameras may be easier and cheaper, but prone to human error, slower and horribly unflexible in image presentation.
-A print may be the best way to judge image quality, but in case of a 10x10m image, it can take you days if not weeks to get it on paper.
A projected or backlighted image certainly is a thousand times more enticing and "real" to the viewer's eyes. Paper images are lacking vivid colors and real appearance in my opinion and there's no studio light full-spectrum or bright enough to concinve me otherwise. A paper photograph may induce different emotions or a more distand point of view, that's why black&white imaging is so intense - but paper is no accurate representation of reality and it's going the way of portrait oil painting soon, I think. More artsy, less real. Real viewing is luminous, paper is not.
People listening to you need a reliable authentication that they are listening to the right "wwest4" in your case, not someone imposturing you.
Speaking tongue-in-cheek, you better make sure everyone is listening to the correct "you" when giving out calls for revolutionary action or otherwise your followers might be guided by the wrong person and end up torching err I mean protesting at some other building or they'll be directed into an amsbush or directly into jail, without collecting $200.;)
Because cockroaches and bacteria have a hard time colonizing new habitats. Insects are not optimal for cold habitats and totally unsuitable for freezing habitats and/or times. Bacteria may not be good in spreading into new habitats.
Whatever the cause is, if something larger and more complex than bacteria and insects has evolved it means invariably that these two species are not sufficiently efficient or effective in using a given energy reservoir. Or other species are able to tap into other reservoirs unreachable to these two primal species. Or they are unable to defend against larger predators - that's the ticket if you ask me. "Surviving long enough to reproduce" is not an exhaustive measure of genetic fitness, I think. Even marginally intelligent lifeforms can adapt a million times quicker to a changing environment, new habitats and different systemic requirements than any "dumb" creature could. Simplistic: if the weather changes, birds and mammals can migrate - while 95% of all cockroaches die. They survive, but while it takes them millions of years to adapt, migrating animals eat their food during the warmer season. If the weather is too cold to survive, an ice bear can literally wait 500'000 years to grow a fur warm enough, while a human develops ceremonial burial, society, religion, government, currency, metal forging, mathematics, chemistry, physics and material sciences in a little less than 20'000 years. Yielding him micro fibre materials that beat anything a polar bear could ever dream of. Until that just wait 5'000 years to develop bow and arrow and then take it from the bear, Eskimo-style until you have those micro fibre clothing...;)
Reproducing fast enough, harnessing enough energy, habitats, seasons, repelling enough predators, gathering enough food and all that without overpopulating and grazing off all food sources. The most simplistic presumptions with the most diverse, interesting and beautiful outcomes.
And even if we only manage to send a large colony of bacteria into space, hitting a yet lifeless but habitable planet, we succeeded more than any other species on the planet. Colonies on Mars and Alpha Centauri and we humans can be virtually indestructible...;)
Of course the fitness equation is fixed. Most efficient and effective use of energy. It is only a very large and complicated system with much interference in itself, but not a changing goal. The goal is "survive optimally in the current system", all that while the system itself is slowly advancing to more and more efficient and effective energy usage. Human intelligence evolved because it made tapping long lost energy resources possible, fire, coal, oil, sun power. Because it made entirely new climates habitable without the need for a different species. Because of their brain, humans can live where everything else starved. They take bacteria with them, but we surely are the species prepared best for finding energy sources beyond current solar power or conserved solar power in sugars, plants, oil and coal. As long as the "environment" is advancing, the goal is shifting with it, being more efficient and more effective than everyone else.
TV should not be government-approved. Not more than a technical check so they don't leave their assigned frequencies driving airline traffic into the ground.
I don't buy doublespeak and therefore "free" channels are something very different to me than "can be received by anyone for no cost". Although I agree on the protection of children by severely limiting "adult" content during times when children may be watching, I cannot agree on other parts of your opinion. Child protection from "adult" content is lower in rank than personal freedom, the potential for abuse would otherwise be way too great. Abuse in that case means pursuing a hidden moralist/censorship/fundamentalist agenda while officialy "protecting the children". The time "when children could be watching" can hardly be defined anyways, when satellite television reaches worldwide.
Everyone placing personal freedom lower than any other term is a threat to errrm freedom, albeit not a big one, I admit. Freedom is the highest goal in itself and everything that counts higher than freedom can and will be subverted into a measure of reducing and suppressing freedom. If you agree to live in a "partial" freedom, that's fine. You're free to agree, but I don't. Partial freedom means little more than a dog's freedom while its master is not at home. Pathetic wording, I know. But if you value childrens "unspoiled" growing up higher than freedom, you certainly need something or someONE regulating, delegating, restricting your freedom. Only a public vote could appoint that individual or agency leader. Can you vote for the FCC like you can for government officials or your local sheriff?;)
Our moral compass is lost the instant you give up your freedom for the right to tell others what to do. I'm pessimistic here, but soon afterwards we will go from restricting homosexuals from kissing in public to kissing in private to being homosexual at all. After all, the bible says it's wrong...
There was a time, when being "old-fashioned" meant keeping _freedom_ sacred. When telling others what to do and not to do was considered "commie" or "nazi". (Thank you, Godwin.) And when moral superiority was a virtue in its own and had never to be excerted upon others. "If it makes you happy, it can't be that bad" sung Sheryl Crow. I second that.
I don't care of what background the Slashdot crowd is from. It doesn't matter. If, in your "real" world, where you live, work and raise children, you are at ease with censorship, closed governmental circles restricting what is morally okay and what is not, watching over content on air, filtering out things that are "unfit" or worse, then America's values have gone lost. Raising your children is your responsibility. Protecting them from adult content is your responsibility. Guess what, preparing them for their seven year long transition from child to adult is your own, too. I want my children to be prepared for the world, not being thrown out of an ivory tower the instant they turn 16, 18, 21 or whatever that age in my legislation will be.
The categorization of "left" and "right" for political opinions is bad, BTW. It doesn't say anything. Communists are considered "left", Nazis "right", both were seriously restricting individual freedom. And a "middle" could, too. Add one dimension, "authoritarian vs. libertarian" to your compass and the thing will work again.
Porn hurts no family. Porn hurts children, adolescents and unprepared young adults. It doesn't hurt your marriage, it does not destroy lives. Unlike alcohol, BTW. Unfulfilled sexuality hurts families and lives, and your children if you allow them contact with porn first and real feeling people later, leaving them alone with their sex drive. But not much else.
So homosexuality hurts families... Dunno what to say about that except I cringe in horror seeing you being moderated +3 insightful with a statement like that. Like I said above, first it is being against open homosexuality, th
Evolutionary algorithms work exactly that way. Outcome is undetermined, but with every iteration it gets closer to a set goal.
Come on, counter my claims if I say the purpose of our world is to evolve the most efficient _and_ effective way of using energy. All species compete for energy in some forms and their survival depends on both effectiveness (how much you can achieve) and efficiency (how few resources it takes to do that).
Otherwise our very own computerized experiments with evolutionary algorithms would be moot. But they are not...
As for my definition of slut, namely "a girl that screws everyone except you" (not you specifically, mind you), I think they must be pretty effective in passing on their genes. And for God's sake, the world needs more women that want to have orgasms and who generally have a healthy sex drive. That would rid society (and the Internet) of all porn in half a nanosecond, I swear. They don't even need to screw around, faithfulness don't hurt. But just using their God given pussies in the way it feels good would be pretty much everything I ever wanted. Yes, I am bitter.
And you Sir are one from the scary bunch of doublethinkers, who confuse a nanny state with a republic, censorship of "bad things" with freedom of speech, general authoritarism with freedom and coercion, force and a compulsory way of life with the "American Way".
People like you are responsible for ruining the values the United States of America stood and were respected for.
Freedom means being free to do whatever one wants while not hurting others. A free person can participate in the process of law making, own firearms, has inalienable rights against governmental force and sure as hell can watch anything he wants on his TV in his home.
If you're not someone from the former Soviet Union, that is...
The third comment on the last link scares my brains out. Really. How far has it come that ordinary people write lines along these into ordinary webpages about batteries'n'stuff? What is wrong with the world and its people?
Read for yourself:
1/10/2002
My father served during WW II in Burma India. As an Engineer in the Army building roads and landing strips , he told this story many times. A Jeep came in to Motor Pool where he was working that day with ignition problems and he proceeded to check the battery first . Simply hooking a tester to the battery caused an explosion.
The only thing that saved his eyes was the prescription glasses he was wearing , with fast action from some very well trained Medics his face survived too but , just because they were RIGHT THERE and knew what to do !!!
Master Sgt. . Willett M. Bruner went on to fight many battles while preparing the way for many more G.I.'s to join him and many others in securing our freedom during this war.
God rest the soul of Master Sgt. Willett M. Bruner and every other person who has made the ultimate sacrifice for our Freedom.
The Guns and Dope Party takes this even further: everybody should be a Czar of its own. And yes, they compare the current system in the US to Tsarism.
I don't know how serious their political aspirations are, but it's a good opinion anyway. Quote from their homepage:
A MAYBE MAP OF THE FUTURE Position Paper 23E
The goal of the Guns and Dope Party --
return to constitutional democracy --
will probably remain unacceptable to many in this country.
Especially in the middle of the continent,
a majority seems to prefer the tyranny of TSOG
and its associated "faith-based organizations."
Thus, Western secession must remain on our agenda,
at least as a distinct "maybe."
In Freetopia we will end all "faith-based" bans on
scientific and medical freedom, including the
verbots against orgonomic medicine, LSD, cloning, stem-cell research etc.
Every citizen will choose the type of health care he or she wants,
just as they did in the old U.S. before the Tsarist take-over.
Every scientist will research whatever she or he finds most interesting.
In short, we will become full members of the "civilized" world again,
and ostriches will have the respect they deserve.
Meanwhile, the Tsarist states will probably
sink deeper and deeper into barbarism,
becoming more and more terrified of a world
that also feels more and more terrified of them --
until like all closed systems they choke
on their own entropy [communication jams] and perish.
Maybe.
here is one I found real quick, with a price tag of 449 USD. Color laser printers are not limited to big businesses anymore, they are only double the price of a cheap b/w-laser printer. Dunno about their quality, though. But I'm sure they embed their serial numbers, too.
Of course there's no army to back this up. But if you built a base on the moon and claim anything inside plus 5 km around the perimeter your own property, it *should* be yours.
It's as simple as that: if you made new land habitable, it should be yours. Maybe I'm a little romantic here, but making some land habitable comes first, then it becomes your property, then you defend it against possible intruders.
As long as there is enough land left on the moon, there will be no conflicts, if the people involved have the slightest hint of moral obligatons left. What they may or may not have anymore, considering this will be 20 years from now at a minimum.
In general, humans all alone on a vast amount of land, totally devoid of people, in a situation of need and struggle, they tend to build friendly relationships instead of murdering each other for a piece of land. Supply and demand. If there's enough resources, land in this case, left, people don't value that land high enough to commit crimes against their moral standards. Example: Australia. Even outlaws built a society, because they couldn't survive otherwise.
Sooner or later, people will fight their wars in space, of course. But not as long as there's millions of square kilometres left for anyone to take.
What kind of laptops are you used to expect? Still the old beater with a celeron 1,4GHz, 32mb shared memory and its HD filled to the brim with Windows, Office and the email folders?
Come on, wake up. We are using laptops to actually play first person shooters. Mobile Radeon, nVidia Go, whatever fits your tastes, but they are quite viable. We are used to celebrate 6 person, 3h instant after-work LANs in the local park. Man, that is relaxing, I tell you. Too bad it's winter now and we have to do that indoors...;)
Its not as fast as a price-equivalent desktop pc, but the mobility is worth a LOT. Less noise, less power consumption, sleek appearance, high availability. No more heavy lifting for the LAN, no logins from stranger's computers, no important files and data left at home, just one machine all the time. And it doesn't even clutter your desk, has no cables lying around, isn't it nice?;)
This is so utterly wrong. Here is a list of all tanks used by the Germans in the initial attacks on Poland. Please compare this with the tank specs and images here, think about it for a moment and then tell me if these vehicles could ever be stopped by soldiers on horses. I'm eager to hear your excuses then.
BTW Germany had 1 cavalry division vs. 30 on the Polish side if you believe the web. Some more facts on that. Just look at the picture of the Polish cavalry for a moment. They must've been incredibly brave and/or stupid to even think about attacking more than 1500 German tanks like that.
Even extensive searching didn't bring up a mentioning of German cavalry units and I couldn't even find anything about the one from the SS. But I'm glad to read more about German cavalry being used in WW2, but I'd like to see some links.
Nothing else, sorry. They don't get VPNs with insane key sizes and military strength cryptography over commodity hardware, they will get their own fiber lines, different equipment, different signalling, different anything. Made up to mil spec. Just like the ARPANET. But different. And expensive.
Of course this network will still be heavily encrypted, because no one knows who will be wiretapping somewhere, but different nonetheless. Did I mention expensive?;)
The *really* interesting applications of piezoelectric autotuning is under the board of skis. Put some crystals inside the ski frame, cross-wire them and they cancel out vibrations all by themselves. No kidding, it's in rather expensive equipment, but you certainly find one or two pairs with them in your local ski shop.
Guns kill people,
Software steal copyrighted works,
Hamburgers make people fat,
Crow bars break doors,
Car stereos make people deaf and last but not least
Politicians always restrict people's rights.
In short: we the people are completely unable to interfere with our environment, we are helpless to the will our things, tools and representatives.
We the people are slaves of everything. I am a slave of my computer, my gun, my wife, my politician, the underage girl and my own inabilities. I am an average person, I have the self-restraint of a rabid monkey, can follow no laws, no instructions and I have no moral obligations. God help us, if I ever get hold on a lawyer! Please, silency my voice, censor my inputs, put me on restraints and tranquilizer before I hurt myself or anyone else, break any law, destroy anyones property, violate the right of corporations to eternal profit or even - God help us - wake up from my media-induced dream.
I am helpless.
Give me a gun and I will snipe everyone in sight, yelling "Headshot!" and "Terrorists win" on every "frag".
Give me a hand driven lawnmower and I will cut short your kids. Give me a kitchen knife and I will fillet my wife.
Give me a crowbar and I will break into all houses in my street.
Give me a downloading tool and I will fill my harddrives with terabytes of underage bestiality porn.
Give me a sharpie and will crack all copy-protections.
Give me a car and I will be a rider of the Apocalypse.
Give me a political office and I will command an invasion on countries with petroleum reserves, alienate our allies, molest my assistants, rape them with cigars and spy on the lawful public.
I have no moral obligations, I'm the purest of evil, the hardest of the outlaws, the sickest of the sick, a satan in disguise - fear me, as I am the average consumer, converting everything into a weapon of mass destruction!
Give me ice cream and hamburgers, quick, so I'm too obese to throw the world into chaos!
Slashdot Mirror
CD-ROMs last only a fraction of the advertised time, right. But technology advances quick enough to not needing them around 30 years from now.
Your slides cannot be copied or viewed now without serious loss of quality compared to the original image. That's why the seventies look so "funny colored" when viewing images from back then. Digital images will be the same forever, can be multiplied and copied in an instant and I bet my keyboard we'll still be having jpeg-compatible viewing equipment even 20-30 years from now. There's a billion of photographs out there in that format and that will drive the industry for as long as it's necessary.
In short: your slides wear out slowly every day. My CD-ROMs wear out slowly every day.
My CD-ROMs have ECC error correction. digital 1, slides 0
My CDs can be backed up easily. digital 2, slides 0
My CDs hold 550 images in 10g acrylic plastic. digital 3, slides 0
My CDs can be transferred in a speed of 15 images per *second* onto the current up-to-date data archival medium, DVD-/+R. DVDs are supposed to outlast CDRs by orders of magnitude, because the data layer is embedded within plastic. digital 4, slides still 0
One DVD can hold 4200 of my images. That's more than a decade worth of hobbyist photography to me. Other's mileage may vary, but DVD-Rs are 50 cent a piece. digital 6, slides 0
Some keep photos on their harddiscs. I do. Linux software raid-5 secured harddrives, to be exact. Only a household fire threatens my photos now. digital 6.5, slides 0
Ten years from now there will be a digital medium, that will hold all photos my family, my friends, girlfriend(s), wife(s), employer(s) can ever produce. On one disk. At less than ten dollar apiece. Slides have no chance against that.
...and shoes, especially sneakers/running shoes and clothing. The real question, albeit flame war starting, should rather be: is this a phenomenon typical for male-dominated product categories? Computers, costly sports equipment, automobiles, bikes, electronic gadgets - male dominated consumer group I'd say.
Store clerks from these product categories tend to be overly aggressive, unfriendly, low-level, expert elitist and so on, so these could really be true gender specific marketing effects, who knows...
Damn right. Analog photography is retreating like oil paintings were a century ago. First they strive eons to get as real as possible, doing quite photorealistic paintings with great skill by hand and then, the instant a better, faster and cheaper technology is on the horizon, they switch instantly to "art". They knew they coulnd't compete with photography in terms of realism, so they added emotion and un-realism to their paintings. Their art died anyway.
Today it's pretty much similar and as soon as photographic quality became abundant (in a technical sense) they switched back some gears and declared that "emotional art". Took out the colors and shot in black and white again, washed out the sharpness, blurred the lens, jumped through hundreds of hoops and it didn't improve the art, it just added style.
It seems to me there's a regular pattern to it: if you're losing ground on one branch, if your product or profession is dying - add emotion and declare it art or lifestyle. Consumer products are marketed pretty much the same way once every other advantage is lost against the competition.
Photographers using traditional film have argued exactly the same for almost five years now and digital photography took off anyway.
Digital technology becomes cheaper every month, no matter what piece of equipment we're talking about - except digicams just before xmas of course - so at one point we might have gigapixel cameras in the consumer price range, who knows.
I must apologize for washing your detailed and insightful post away, but I think you have a narrow viewpoint from an elitist photographer's perspective. An incredibly old-school one at that, sorry to be so blunt. Analog cameras have intrinsic drawbacks that cannot be overcome and which are the reason for the digicam craze. I agree to you that digital photography is not the most efficient and not the cheapest way to do hoch resolution imaging at the moment. But Moore's Law will ensure it is in the future.
Advantages of a high-resolution digital imaging system, from an outsider's viewpoint not married to celluloid and chemicals:
- digital images can be previewed extremely fast. If a shot was wrong, retry without waste.
- digital images can be sent via networks around the globe extremely fast. Newscasts, distributed expert teams, peer review, you name it.
- digital images can be ported to any viewing equipment, instantly. Cinema-like projection equipment, large scale video walls, large printers, details on small handouts and laptop screens
- archival without color degradation
- catalogues are generated in an instant
- easy whitebalance, even after the shooting
- automatic recording of timestamps and used equipment, shutter times etc.
Sorry for bringing up the "dinosaur"-argument, but sooner or later analog photography will die and there's nothing you can do about it. For consumer cameras, analog's nearly dead and photo studios are following now, leading digital photos slowly but steadily up the quality/picture size ladder. You are not alone, as there are many audiophile vinyl and radio tube enthusiasts out there, that simply refuse to acknowlegde digital technology and its advantages.
To mimic your "sum up":
-Large-format cameras may be easier and cheaper, but prone to human error, slower and horribly unflexible in image presentation.
-A print may be the best way to judge image quality, but in case of a 10x10m image, it can take you days if not weeks to get it on paper.
A projected or backlighted image certainly is a thousand times more enticing and "real" to the viewer's eyes. Paper images are lacking vivid colors and real appearance in my opinion and there's no studio light full-spectrum or bright enough to concinve me otherwise. A paper photograph may induce different emotions or a more distand point of view, that's why black&white imaging is so intense - but paper is no accurate representation of reality and it's going the way of portrait oil painting soon, I think. More artsy, less real. Real viewing is luminous, paper is not.
People listening to you need a reliable authentication that they are listening to the right "wwest4" in your case, not someone imposturing you.
;)
Speaking tongue-in-cheek, you better make sure everyone is listening to the correct "you" when giving out calls for revolutionary action or otherwise your followers might be guided by the wrong person and end up torching err I mean protesting at some other building or they'll be directed into an amsbush or directly into jail, without collecting $200.
Low absolute utilization, optimal relative utilization while the output is as high as possible. We'll only have problems defining "useful" output...
Because cockroaches and bacteria have a hard time colonizing new habitats. Insects are not optimal for cold habitats and totally unsuitable for freezing habitats and/or times. Bacteria may not be good in spreading into new habitats.
;)
;)
Whatever the cause is, if something larger and more complex than bacteria and insects has evolved it means invariably that these two species are not sufficiently efficient or effective in using a given energy reservoir. Or other species are able to tap into other reservoirs unreachable to these two primal species. Or they are unable to defend against larger predators - that's the ticket if you ask me. "Surviving long enough to reproduce" is not an exhaustive measure of genetic fitness, I think. Even marginally intelligent lifeforms can adapt a million times quicker to a changing environment, new habitats and different systemic requirements than any "dumb" creature could. Simplistic: if the weather changes, birds and mammals can migrate - while 95% of all cockroaches die. They survive, but while it takes them millions of years to adapt, migrating animals eat their food during the warmer season. If the weather is too cold to survive, an ice bear can literally wait 500'000 years to grow a fur warm enough, while a human develops ceremonial burial, society, religion, government, currency, metal forging, mathematics, chemistry, physics and material sciences in a little less than 20'000 years. Yielding him micro fibre materials that beat anything a polar bear could ever dream of. Until that just wait 5'000 years to develop bow and arrow and then take it from the bear, Eskimo-style until you have those micro fibre clothing...
Reproducing fast enough, harnessing enough energy, habitats, seasons, repelling enough predators, gathering enough food and all that without overpopulating and grazing off all food sources. The most simplistic presumptions with the most diverse, interesting and beautiful outcomes.
And even if we only manage to send a large colony of bacteria into space, hitting a yet lifeless but habitable planet, we succeeded more than any other species on the planet. Colonies on Mars and Alpha Centauri and we humans can be virtually indestructible...
Of course the fitness equation is fixed. Most efficient and effective use of energy. It is only a very large and complicated system with much interference in itself, but not a changing goal. The goal is "survive optimally in the current system", all that while the system itself is slowly advancing to more and more efficient and effective energy usage. Human intelligence evolved because it made tapping long lost energy resources possible, fire, coal, oil, sun power. Because it made entirely new climates habitable without the need for a different species. Because of their brain, humans can live where everything else starved. They take bacteria with them, but we surely are the species prepared best for finding energy sources beyond current solar power or conserved solar power in sugars, plants, oil and coal. As long as the "environment" is advancing, the goal is shifting with it, being more efficient and more effective than everyone else.
Point for point:
;)
TV should not be government-approved. Not more than a technical check so they don't leave their assigned frequencies driving airline traffic into the ground.
I don't buy doublespeak and therefore "free" channels are something very different to me than "can be received by anyone for no cost". Although I agree on the protection of children by severely limiting "adult" content during times when children may be watching, I cannot agree on other parts of your opinion. Child protection from "adult" content is lower in rank than personal freedom, the potential for abuse would otherwise be way too great. Abuse in that case means pursuing a hidden moralist/censorship/fundamentalist agenda while officialy "protecting the children". The time "when children could be watching" can hardly be defined anyways, when satellite television reaches worldwide.
Everyone placing personal freedom lower than any other term is a threat to errrm freedom, albeit not a big one, I admit. Freedom is the highest goal in itself and everything that counts higher than freedom can and will be subverted into a measure of reducing and suppressing freedom. If you agree to live in a "partial" freedom, that's fine. You're free to agree, but I don't. Partial freedom means little more than a dog's freedom while its master is not at home. Pathetic wording, I know. But if you value childrens "unspoiled" growing up higher than freedom, you certainly need something or someONE regulating, delegating, restricting your freedom. Only a public vote could appoint that individual or agency leader. Can you vote for the FCC like you can for government officials or your local sheriff?
Our moral compass is lost the instant you give up your freedom for the right to tell others what to do. I'm pessimistic here, but soon afterwards we will go from restricting homosexuals from kissing in public to kissing in private to being homosexual at all. After all, the bible says it's wrong...
There was a time, when being "old-fashioned" meant keeping _freedom_ sacred. When telling others what to do and not to do was considered "commie" or "nazi". (Thank you, Godwin.) And when moral superiority was a virtue in its own and had never to be excerted upon others. "If it makes you happy, it can't be that bad" sung Sheryl Crow. I second that.
I don't care of what background the Slashdot crowd is from. It doesn't matter. If, in your "real" world, where you live, work and raise children, you are at ease with censorship, closed governmental circles restricting what is morally okay and what is not, watching over content on air, filtering out things that are "unfit" or worse, then America's values have gone lost. Raising your children is your responsibility. Protecting them from adult content is your responsibility. Guess what, preparing them for their seven year long transition from child to adult is your own, too. I want my children to be prepared for the world, not being thrown out of an ivory tower the instant they turn 16, 18, 21 or whatever that age in my legislation will be.
The categorization of "left" and "right" for political opinions is bad, BTW. It doesn't say anything. Communists are considered "left", Nazis "right", both were seriously restricting individual freedom. And a "middle" could, too. Add one dimension, "authoritarian vs. libertarian" to your compass and the thing will work again.
Porn hurts no family. Porn hurts children, adolescents and unprepared young adults. It doesn't hurt your marriage, it does not destroy lives. Unlike alcohol, BTW. Unfulfilled sexuality hurts families and lives, and your children if you allow them contact with porn first and real feeling people later, leaving them alone with their sex drive. But not much else.
So homosexuality hurts families... Dunno what to say about that except I cringe in horror seeing you being moderated +3 insightful with a statement like that. Like I said above, first it is being against open homosexuality, th
Evolutionary algorithms work exactly that way. Outcome is undetermined, but with every iteration it gets closer to a set goal.
Come on, counter my claims if I say the purpose of our world is to evolve the most efficient _and_ effective way of using energy. All species compete for energy in some forms and their survival depends on both effectiveness (how much you can achieve) and efficiency (how few resources it takes to do that).
Otherwise our very own computerized experiments with evolutionary algorithms would be moot. But they are not...
As for my definition of slut, namely "a girl that screws everyone except you" (not you specifically, mind you), I think they must be pretty effective in passing on their genes. And for God's sake, the world needs more women that want to have orgasms and who generally have a healthy sex drive. That would rid society (and the Internet) of all porn in half a nanosecond, I swear. They don't even need to screw around, faithfulness don't hurt. But just using their God given pussies in the way it feels good would be pretty much everything I ever wanted. Yes, I am bitter.
And you Sir are one from the scary bunch of doublethinkers, who confuse a nanny state with a republic, censorship of "bad things" with freedom of speech, general authoritarism with freedom and coercion, force and a compulsory way of life with the "American Way".
People like you are responsible for ruining the values the United States of America stood and were respected for.
Freedom means being free to do whatever one wants while not hurting others. A free person can participate in the process of law making, own firearms, has inalienable rights against governmental force and sure as hell can watch anything he wants on his TV in his home.
If you're not someone from the former Soviet Union, that is...
The third comment on the last link scares my brains out. Really. How far has it come that ordinary people write lines along these into ordinary webpages about batteries'n'stuff? What is wrong with the world and its people?
.
Read for yourself:
1/10/2002
My father served during WW II in Burma India. As an Engineer in the Army building roads and landing strips , he told this story many times. A Jeep came in to Motor Pool where he was working that day with ignition problems and he proceeded to check the battery first . Simply hooking a tester to the battery caused an explosion.
The only thing that saved his eyes was the prescription glasses he was wearing , with fast action from some very well trained Medics his face survived too but , just because they were RIGHT THERE and knew what to do !!!
Master Sgt. . Willett M. Bruner went on to fight many battles while preparing the way for many more G.I.'s to join him and many others in securing our freedom during this war.
God rest the soul of Master Sgt. Willett M. Bruner and every other person who has made the ultimate sacrifice for our Freedom
Col. James L. Bruner
Emphasis mine. This is fascism. Today.
The Guns and Dope Party takes this even further: everybody should be a Czar of its own. And yes, they compare the current system in the US to Tsarism.
I don't know how serious their political aspirations are, but it's a good opinion anyway. Quote from their homepage:
A MAYBE MAP OF THE FUTURE Position Paper 23E
The goal of the Guns and Dope Party --
return to constitutional democracy --
will probably remain unacceptable to many in this country.
Especially in the middle of the continent,
a majority seems to prefer the tyranny of TSOG
and its associated "faith-based organizations."
Thus, Western secession must remain on our agenda,
at least as a distinct "maybe."
In Freetopia we will end all "faith-based" bans on
scientific and medical freedom, including the
verbots against orgonomic medicine, LSD, cloning, stem-cell research etc.
Every citizen will choose the type of health care he or she wants,
just as they did in the old U.S. before the Tsarist take-over.
Every scientist will research whatever she or he finds most interesting.
In short, we will become full members of the "civilized" world again,
and ostriches will have the respect they deserve.
Meanwhile, the Tsarist states will probably
sink deeper and deeper into barbarism,
becoming more and more terrified of a world
that also feels more and more terrified of them --
until like all closed systems they choke
on their own entropy [communication jams] and perish.
Maybe.
Emphasis mine.
here is one I found real quick, with a price tag of 449 USD. Color laser printers are not limited to big businesses anymore, they are only double the price of a cheap b/w-laser printer. Dunno about their quality, though. But I'm sure they embed their serial numbers, too.
Of course there's no army to back this up. But if you built a base on the moon and claim anything inside plus 5 km around the perimeter your own property, it *should* be yours.
It's as simple as that: if you made new land habitable, it should be yours. Maybe I'm a little romantic here, but making some land habitable comes first, then it becomes your property, then you defend it against possible intruders.
As long as there is enough land left on the moon, there will be no conflicts, if the people involved have the slightest hint of moral obligatons left. What they may or may not have anymore, considering this will be 20 years from now at a minimum.
In general, humans all alone on a vast amount of land, totally devoid of people, in a situation of need and struggle, they tend to build friendly relationships instead of murdering each other for a piece of land. Supply and demand. If there's enough resources, land in this case, left, people don't value that land high enough to commit crimes against their moral standards. Example: Australia. Even outlaws built a society, because they couldn't survive otherwise.
Sooner or later, people will fight their wars in space, of course. But not as long as there's millions of square kilometres left for anyone to take.
Maybe it's because of an extra battery in the drive bay? ;)
What kind of laptops are you used to expect? Still the old beater with a celeron 1,4GHz, 32mb shared memory and its HD filled to the brim with Windows, Office and the email folders?
;)
;)
Come on, wake up. We are using laptops to actually play first person shooters. Mobile Radeon, nVidia Go, whatever fits your tastes, but they are quite viable. We are used to celebrate 6 person, 3h instant after-work LANs in the local park. Man, that is relaxing, I tell you. Too bad it's winter now and we have to do that indoors...
Its not as fast as a price-equivalent desktop pc, but the mobility is worth a LOT. Less noise, less power consumption, sleek appearance, high availability. No more heavy lifting for the LAN, no logins from stranger's computers, no important files and data left at home, just one machine all the time. And it doesn't even clutter your desk, has no cables lying around, isn't it nice?
Check those URLs! Sorry forgot that one:
Facts on German vs. Polish cavalry.
This is so utterly wrong. Here is a list of all tanks used by the Germans in the initial attacks on Poland. Please compare this with the tank specs and images here, think about it for a moment and then tell me if these vehicles could ever be stopped by soldiers on horses. I'm eager to hear your excuses then.
BTW Germany had 1 cavalry division vs. 30 on the Polish side if you believe the web. Some more facts on that. Just look at the picture of the Polish cavalry for a moment. They must've been incredibly brave and/or stupid to even think about attacking more than 1500 German tanks like that.
Even extensive searching didn't bring up a mentioning of German cavalry units and I couldn't even find anything about the one from the SS. But I'm glad to read more about German cavalry being used in WW2, but I'd like to see some links.
There was another term that instantly sprung into my mind:
;)
pork barrel
Nothing else, sorry. They don't get VPNs with insane key sizes and military strength cryptography over commodity hardware, they will get their own fiber lines, different equipment, different signalling, different anything. Made up to mil spec. Just like the ARPANET. But different. And expensive.
Of course this network will still be heavily encrypted, because no one knows who will be wiretapping somewhere, but different nonetheless. Did I mention expensive?
The *really* interesting applications of piezoelectric autotuning is under the board of skis. Put some crystals inside the ski frame, cross-wire them and they cancel out vibrations all by themselves. No kidding, it's in rather expensive equipment, but you certainly find one or two pairs with them in your local ski shop.
"If God wanted humans to fly, he'd given them wings." and no amount of research, money and stubbornness on our part will change that, right? ;)
Guns kill people,
Software steal copyrighted works,
Hamburgers make people fat,
Crow bars break doors,
Car stereos make people deaf and last but not least
Politicians always restrict people's rights.
In short: we the people are completely unable to interfere with our environment, we are helpless to the will our things, tools and representatives.
We the people are slaves of everything. I am a slave of my computer, my gun, my wife, my politician, the underage girl and my own inabilities. I am an average person, I have the self-restraint of a rabid monkey, can follow no laws, no instructions and I have no moral obligations. God help us, if I ever get hold on a lawyer! Please, silency my voice, censor my inputs, put me on restraints and tranquilizer before I hurt myself or anyone else, break any law, destroy anyones property, violate the right of corporations to eternal profit or even - God help us - wake up from my media-induced dream.
I am helpless.
Give me a gun and I will snipe everyone in sight, yelling "Headshot!" and "Terrorists win" on every "frag".
Give me a hand driven lawnmower and I will cut short your kids.
Give me a kitchen knife and I will fillet my wife.
Give me a crowbar and I will break into all houses in my street.
Give me a downloading tool and I will fill my harddrives with terabytes of underage bestiality porn.
Give me a sharpie and will crack all copy-protections.
Give me a car and I will be a rider of the Apocalypse.
Give me a political office and I will command an invasion on countries with petroleum reserves, alienate our allies, molest my assistants, rape them with cigars and spy on the lawful public.
I have no moral obligations, I'm the purest of evil, the hardest of the outlaws, the sickest of the sick, a satan in disguise - fear me, as I am the average consumer, converting everything into a weapon of mass destruction!
Give me ice cream and hamburgers, quick, so I'm too obese to throw the world into chaos!
Do you think he would be more polite and calm if he included the middle eastern point of view?