The problem is that the losses are so high that to get any practical level of power from the receiving stations you would need to transmit huge power levels. Thermodynamics and all that.
The Tesla Coil is basicly the first radio transmitter. It's a spark gap transmitter. The signal on the receiving end is strong enough to light bulbs and such. But nowhere near the levels used by a typical home today. And wiring is cheap enough now that the costs outweigh the benefits.
The idea of wireless power was an interesting one. And it is how radio works. Comparing this to modern radio may help those who don't understand yet. A modern radio receives a signal from a "station". This signal is typically in the millivolt range. The reason radios use power (batteries and such) is to power the amplifiers to make the signal strong enough to hear on a speaker. The transmitter for a commercial station typically has an output in the hundreds of watts. Yet you receive milliwatts worth of signal. Tesla coils aren't magic, they do the exact same thing.
As for the other post about blowing the generator in Colorado Springs. It is widely decided from current coil builders that what happened is that feedback made it onto the mains. This HF feedback created an arc in the generator and fried it. Modern coilers use line filters to remove these high energy spikes to prevent damage to our equipment, like computers. He did NOT send a ground pulse to the generator. Experiments with coils today show that ground propigation is pittifull at Tesla Coil frequencies. And not that great even at the resonant frequency of the Earth. And modern materials give us more powerfull coils than Tesla himself could produce.
As for generating power with the Earth magnetic field. Never heard of it. But it has possibility. Of course, do YOU want to figgure out how to build towers that reach into the Magentosphere? Me neither.;)
For those that are currious. Please check the facts. There have been numerous discussions about this stuff on the Tesla Coil mailing list. You can see archives at www.pupman.com.
Okay, but thier parents DID earn it. So why shouldn't they be allowed to dispose of it as they please? Hmmmmmm??? What makes you or anyone else a better judge of what use that all goes to. Why are you engaging in class warfare? If someone inherits something, it is THIERS. Not the government's, not society's, not yours. Why should they pay taxes on it AGAIN? The government got thier due from sales tax on the equipment, property tax on the land every year, and sales taxes on anything the farm sells. WHY SHOULD THEY GET MORE????? Just because someone got something "they didn't earn"? That's class warfare if I've ever seen it. And if you think farming isn't a "job", you've got another thing comming.
No, I'm not a farmer, nor is my family. But I do know something about it. I'm a programmer, and I have the utmost respect for farmers. They work very hard to feed me. I have spent some time on a farm, and helped out some. I know what it's like. They work harder in a day than I do all year. You may want to quit your whining.
Um, no. They don't know who the criminal is just because DNA was at the scene. It can provide a list of suspects, much like a security camera or eyewitness testimony though. Consider a hotel room that someone was murdered in. How many other people's DNA could be found? Sure, they clean the rooms, but an eyelash is more than enough to get a DNA sample. So if I stayed in that room a month ago there is a chance a good DNA sample would be there waiting for the cops. Of course, they would probably refference the hotel guest book and see that I wasn't there at that time.
I would have issue with the availablility of such a database as well. I would want it to be locked up tight. And have civilian review of access. I don't trust the government. Such a database should require a court order to access, like a wiretap, to prevent missuse.
Just a few issues with such a database. There are more and probably some better ones to consider before implimenting such a thing.
You don't need a $500 gun to protect yourself. I bought a handgun for $200 that works perfectly for this use. Just avoid the 9mm and other really popular sizes. Look into the.380ACP and.38 Special. They are available in lower cost versions that will work for you. My handgun is a Bersa Model 95. Never heard of them before. But it shoots straight, is very reliable, and easy to handle. And at $200, the price is right. I would not hesitate the recomend it to anyone. Even a small person should have no trouble with a.380ACP. Not much recoil, small size, plenty of power if you ever have to use it. Remember, every gun is only as reliable as it's owner. Clean it regularly and take care of it. Practice on a range so you know how to use it. If it ever malfunctions and you can't fix it, don't use it for protection. Use it for practice and get another one for protection. Most problems can be fixed with a gunsmith if needed.
Remember, at close range even a.22 is deadly. And most confrontations involving guns in deffence are point-blank. However, I would still recomend something a little bigger.;) Make sure to use hollow point expanding rounds. If you ever do have to use it, it will be less likely to go through your target and hit innocent bystanders.
Good message BTW. Good to see others understand the ideas here. If you want to be "ready in time of need", might I suggest a rifle as well? In a war you want some range and accuracy as well.;)
What good is a militia? At least they are fighting for thier rights. Would you rather just have to bend over and take it? Would you fight if needed?
I'll grant you, if we got rid of all the guns it would be harder for criminals to kill people. There is a catch there. *ALL* the guns. *AND* the knowledge to build them! A gun is a simple device that can be built with a little skill and the local Home Depot. I even know how to make the powder from materials they can't ban. Like chicken shit! Black Powder is all that is required and you can make it from Charcoal, shit, and sulfer. All are available in nature with a little looking.
Now, how are you planning to get rid of the guns? Hmmmmmmm????? We spend hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars per year on the War on Drugs. We have not even slowed the tide on that. You can get illegal drugs in PRISON! So how the hell do you intend to get rid of them all AND KEEP THEM OUT!?!? Propose a workable soultion that does not emulate the failed "War" on drugs. You solve this problem, and disarm the police and the government. THEN I'll consider giving up my guns. If ANYONE has them, they can be stolen or used on peacefull citizens. And until then the best deffence is a strong offence. If someone attacks me with a weapon I want to be able to fight back. Or, prefferably, scare them off so I don't have to shoot.
For hunting.. POISON???????? Do you really want to just leave them to rot now? At least hunters use the animals they kill. If they are poisoned we can't eat them now and it goes to waste. What's the point? Sure, you can limit the spread of disease and such that way. One reason we want to allow hunting is that humans have thinned the population of the natural predators and allowed the herds to grow. This is a problem for the overall health of the herds and the biosphere. We make up for it with hunting to thin out the herds. Basicly, we become the predators. We can also feed hungry people with the meat from those animals. This is a much better method than poison. Though I will suggest that the Archery hunt is a close substitute. Just not as effective.
I agree with the principles you mention. Just not the method to impliment them. The problems we have are caused by society, not our tools. Be they guns, knives, spears (no, not Brittney, though I'm not sure which is worse), etc.. Keep in mind, more people are killed each year with baseball bats than guns in this country. I read that stat someplace, it may be wrong. But the point is vaild. If you just ban guns, people will still kill each other. But they will use blunt objects, knives, bow&arrows, spears, bats, bowling balls, hammers, icepicks, etc.. You see the problem? May not be as easy to kill, but that doesn't matter. The distance is rarely a factor. Most attacks take place at point-blank range. Range where a knife would be almost as effective as a gun. Help solve the real problem rather than disarming those who only wish to protect themselves.
The way I see it, the only wasted vote is one that does not agree with your beliefs. That means that if you are voting for "the lesser of two evils", you just wasted your vote. The whole point of voting is to tell government what you want. If you vote for people you don't believe in just because the other guy is worse, you are part of the problem, not the soultion.
This will be my first second year voting, and I'm 23. Why not before? For the same reason most of my peers don't vote. Apathy. But I see that as another part of the problem. If we don't speak up, we deserve what we get. Not voting is a vote for the establishment. In thier eyes, if you can't be bothered to get off your butt and vote, you are reasonably happy with the way things are. If you want to make a statement, use the write-in spots and put your friends and family, or fictional characters, whatever. That's at least doing SOMETHING.
Personally, I'm with the other poster. I'll be voting Libertarian this year. I may not win, but that's the chance you take in a democracy/republic. From talking with other people at work and arround town, it seems to me most people lean toward the Libertarian side on many principles. Most of them don't vote as they don't see anyone to vote for. Get all those non-voters out to vote thier REAL thoughts, and you will see change. If you don't like the Libertarians, go with Green, Natural Law, Independant, hell even Communist or Nazi. Whatever, but take a STAND. sheesh.
Speak up, or be crushed. Those are your choices. What will it be? Keep in mind, if you don't speak up now, it may well be illegal to in the future. The Republicrats have allready written laws to make it illegal to TALK about making or using drugs and explosives. What's next? Think about it.
It's about $60/month. This includes the ISP service. I was on USWorst ADSL at 256k before I moved. I payed USWorst $30/mo for the DSL service and the ISP another $20/mo.
So yes, IDSL *IS* more expensive. Not by much, but it's also slower.
Here's my take:
I have two choices. IDSL at 144k or modem at 56k. If I want more bandwidth I can suck it up and pay for it or use a modem. Do I like this situation? Nope. But I don't have much choice either. I could go with normal ISDN, but USWorst charges $70/mo for the line and to get 128k I have to pay $40/mo to an ISP! I did this for a while. It works well, but is quite expensive. With IDSL I also never have to 'dial-up' again. And I can use a router to handle the traffic for my LAN. My old ISDN box is just a TA, no routing.
Remember, IDSL is basicly ISDN. ISDN costs more. It probably shouldn't, but it does. Such is life.
Oh.. and USWorst is now Qworst.. same lousy service, higher rates. Oh what a happy customer I am. ;
I have been looking into this for a while now. Here's the deal. IDSL is ISDN with a few changes to make it "always-on" and to use all the bandwidth in a single channel. Thus you get 144K rather than 128K in 2 64K channels. It has the longer range of ISDN though. This is nice for those like me who are out of range of "normal" DSL service like the stuff USWest offers. It's a pain to get installed though. I've been waiting for quite some time. Apparently there was a line issue USWest had to fix. They were supposed to be here 9/20 but no word yet one week later. This order is a coupple months old now. If you do order it, be prepared to WAIT. It will take a while.
I'm going through SpeakEasy because of the good reviews on DSLReports.com. They also offer a decent price for the service and have static IPs and a reasonable use policy. The total end cost is close to what I was paying for 256k RADSL service and the ISP charge. As I don't actually have a line yet, I can't comment on the quality.;)
And here I thought that the oldest media was going to be the first to grasp how to market to the latest one.
Proposal:
Get a group together (maybe through opencontent.org) and try to create a distribution system that we can live with but still have some way to go after copyright violators.
We need to realize that they are very concerned about theft online. Look at MP3s, whatever your stance on them you have to admit that they are stupidly easy to copy and pirate. We need to have something that will allow them to have some protection while still allowing us to use the info in a reasonable way. It will have to be some interesting technology to get them to buy off on it. It must be open source and not worry about debuggers.
The fact is, nothing can ever contain it totally. But maybe we can help develop something we can all live with. We need to get them to realize that draconian restrictions for legimate users isn't the answer either. But we should be willing to come up with a middle ground soultion too. If all we are willing to do is trupmet full openness with no protection whatsoever we will get nowhere. With paper they have some assurance that it's probably more expensive to copy than to buy it. With bits and bytes where it's a mouse click worth of effort to copy, they don't get the warm fuzzy. We need to find a way to satisfy both sides. Tricky, but I think it can be done. Any takers? If there is a discussion on this topic allready in place on the net someone post a link!
You've got them backwards. AC is a wave, there is a point where you have the ability to let go. And in some cases it will throw you away. I know this first hand, I've been hit by 15 KVAC from a neon sign transformer (building Tesla coils) I flew about 10 feet. DC, if you get across it, will contract your muscles and you will be stuck. AC is more dangerous because it carries more power. A distribution power line can blow your arm off.
Electricians use the "one hand method" to prevent creating a ground path through the heart. Intelligent ones don't touch "potentially live AC wires" at all. They use a voltmeter and make sure.
Every time we hear something about this someone or another talks about building them. Are/.'ers willing to put money on the table? How about in escrow? Anyone willing to colaborate on a project to build a handheld from the SA-1100?
I am looking for SERIOUS people here. You must be willing to dedicate a significant ammount of time toward helping the project or willing to put money on the table to see it happen. There are ways to see this done, but we would have to build a lot of them. Possibly as high as a thousand units to get the parts and such at a reasonable cost.
If you are only willing to buy one but don't want to help in the development effort, I want to hear from you too. Please email me how much you would consider paying for such a device and what specs you want it to have (RAM/Flash size, screen size/type, etc.).
If I hear from enough people to make it worth building, I'll dust off my unfinished SA design and build a prototype. The info on the unit will be published under an Open-Source compatible license and will include all design info required to build the devices.
The email address is real, all interested parties please contact me ASAP so I can get an idea of how many are really interested.
I agree. The thing is, I think we allready have a decent copy control system. And ammusingly, the content providers gave it to us! SCMS. Serial Copy Managment System. You can make copies from original media, but not from copies. IMO, this is fair. Of course, people have allready broken this system and most CD-R devices will ignore it. But something that did this would provide 'fair use' rights to consumers, and provide some copy control for content providers.
I'm surprised nobody ever mentions WebMin in these discussions. I use it on a few machines I am responsible for. I think of it like the Linux Control Panel. You can configure most services that Linux machines use, manage processes, users, groups, etc.. All via a standard web browser interface. I've put it on a few machines and trained NT admins to use it. Most of them think it's eaiser than NT. It's free for use, and IIRC presently can be considered "open source". Although the author does mention that some modules in the future may be payware. And the interface is MUCH nicer than LinuxConf, IMO.
Sure. You could probably extend battery life with a generator on the unit. But you probably can't make more power then you are drawing, so the power available is still finite even if you're walking.
Batteries aren't bad right now. I just bought a 3200 mAH 3.2V battery for my Nokia cell phone for $50 on EBay. With a power efficient CPU you could get a ton of life out of that battery. And it's Li-Ion so no memory effect, and really light. Think StrongARM here, 133 Mhz, draws 230 mW at full speed. That's a puny 73 mA. With the battery above, that's 43835.6 HOURS you could run the CPU. In sleep mode Intel says it draws ~50 uA. With a little power managment we could get a lot of life out of this. Of course, that's not very usefull, a CPU all by itself.;) But it should give you the general idea. And if you could get 12-24 hours of full-speed opperation out of the entire system you've got something very usefull. RAM and ROM don't use a lot of power, so the storage and the I/O are the things to look out for. I know the 340MB IBM Microdrive is battery friendly....
Food for thought, just drop the requirement for Win9x and you could take this idea a long ways. I don't know what Pentium CPUs are using for power of late, so if they can come close to the SA for power draw maybe it's worth it to use a standard x86 CPU...
Would you please tell me what, exactly, people are stealing by using/writing this program? Who is out something here? I'm talking about JUST the execution of the program, not the use of the resulting datastream. Why do you feel this is stealing?
They want to be able to use software playback to play a DVD movie they bought. The movie industry got thier money. And, for the record, people with a real computer can do software playback quite well, thank you.
This will not kill the format unless the movie companies get stupid and pull products to require the encryption to change, which would break all existing DVD players and royally piss off consumers. The movie industry was up in arms about VCRs. They said it would ruin thier business, people would pirate all the movies and they wouldn't make any money. They were dead wrong. The VCR has made them more money then the big screen! They are also wrong about this. People using this program lose a lot of the stuff on the disc. All the special features are now gone. Pirates don't want to do this. They want real copies. They have the money to buy mastering equipment and make real copies. THOSE are the people the movie industry should be concerned with. And I support the movie industry going after those people. But the people that wrote the CSS crack didn't hurt anyone. And it won't hurt the movie industry to have everyone know that thier DVD codes suck.
You could allready get the same result by using a Windows box to decode it and re-digitizing the output. The loss of quality would be minimal on a good setup. This is nothing that was not allready available to those who want to steal. It only helps the honest users play thier DVDs.
As for paying a license fee and building a closed module. If you want to, fine. OSS people have been reverse engineering stuff for a long time now and I don't see an end in sight. Everything else they have done is still out there. They wrote a free OS and people still buy Windows! Why should an individual pay millions to get a license to DVD code? They can crack it with nothing but computer time. And they don't like closed source, that's the real point. They want to be able to help the developer fix the problems.
By your logic Linux is a work of theft. It is an OS. Windows is a commerical OS and Linux does some of the same stuff. It's stealing from MS now. Does Linus deserve to be sued? AT&T, SGI, IBM, and SCO have an even better case! Linux is a free UNIX style OS. Should they sue Linus now?
Think about it. Nobody is being harmed by this. Not even the poor poor movie industry.
Even the music industry isn't getting harmed by MP3 and piracy there is rampant. But yet CDs still sell really well. People are still buying originals. I have a ton of MP3s. But I have over 100 CDs too, and I made most of my MP3s. I can get any album I want over the net in MP3 format, yet I still buy music CDs. Interesting, isn't it? I even buy from MP3.COM. There are some great artists there.
FWIW, Greg Leyh knows what he is doing. He is a pro and isn't going to get anyone killed or blow stuff up. The demonstration with someone inside a sphere isn't as dangerous as it appears. Electricity follows the shortest path to ground. The sphere is grounded so the electricity hits it. Same things with power lines etc.. Electrum is the biggest coil I'm aware of next to the master himself, Nikola Tesla. He built a rather, uh, large facility in Colorado Springs near the turn of the century.
I build coils as well, though not nearly as well as Greg does, so I am aware of the danger and saftey issues. I'm surprised more/. members haven't heard of Tesla Coils before. There is a mailing list w/ searchable archives at www.pupman.com. There are more pics there as well. Go see one in person if you get the chance. The pictures don't do them justice.:)
Really? I think not. It's not a control issue, it's a problem in our society. We adore voilence over here in the US for some reason. Very few will admit it, but it's true anyway. There is, of course, a small percentage that does not. "All generalizations are wrong" and all that.;)
Look at our cinema, if it doesn't have a high enough body count it has about an 80% chance of being a flop at the box office. The exceptions being "feel good" movies, or really, really good acting/directing/writing. Again, this is NOT the problem, it's a symptom. Hollywood makes movies they think will draw a crowd so they can make money. It's all about business.
There are more examples, games, internet, whatever. But in the end they are all symptoms. The soultion is not controling/regulating/banning everything in existance. It is to find the root of the problem and fix it. It's like a weed in your garden, if you just hack off the top, it grows back over and over again. If you pull out the roots, you get rid of the weed for good. That is what we need to do.
As for the specific issue of guns. The 2nd Ammendment asside, there is evidence to sugest that kids who have guns thier parents give them and train them how to use are generally more responsible and well behaved then others in the same geographical area. This is not to say it's a pancea. If a parent gives their kid a gun they should take responsibility for that action and train them in saftey and the damage a gun can do. The kid should also not have direct access to it, or the ammunition. Both should be locked up, prefferably in a gun safe. At the least, in different places. This is all basic firearm saftey. The only exception I can think of would be a personal defence weapon the parent has, if they choose to have one. In that case it should be in full control of the parent at all times. Meaning, it should NEVER be left unattended. It should be carried, or locked up. PERIOD. There are plenty of quick access gun safes designed for defence situations, go buy one.
I don't have the soultion to the problem. But we will never find it if nobody looks for it. It's so easy to just blame an object, or a movie, or the internet. It takes WORK to find the REAL problem. Nobody wants to do that, so it doesn't get done. And, of course, there is the possibility that it will be discovered that something YOU like will be part of the problem.. can't have that. Much better to scapegoat the objects and things that can't defend themselves. It's so much eaiser, much less risk involved.
You know, I find it annoying that Europeans love to flame us and try to make us be like them. The fact of the matter is, we broke away because we didn't WANT to be like you. If you want to live a certain way, so be it. Please allow others the same privilage. If you don't like the US, don't come here. It's that simple. There are plenty of other places on this planet to be. I'm sorry if this seems like a flame on all of Europe. It's not intended to be. Just what I think is probably a vocal minority over there. Much like what happens here all the time.
BTW: It's the 2nd Ammendment that provides the right to bear arms.:) It doesn't effect the rest of your statement, but for everyone else's accuracy....
As for sugestions, I have a few.;)
First off, nobody can guarantee 100% saftey. Anyone who says they can is selling something. There will always be problems unless you know how to achieve utopia. As for the question you state, how much freedom am I willing to give up for saftey? None.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary saftey deserve neither liberty nor saftey." - Ben Franklin
It's often quoted, but do you really understand the point? Since nobody can provide a guarantee of saftey giving up liberty for it is stupid. It may work for a short time, but the criminals WILL find a way arround it. Then the price you paid becomes worthless. And then we go for another round where the government asks us to give up yet more freedom for saftey. Round and round we go... where does it end? For me, it ends here.
Now that I have been negative, I will offer potential soultions. I don't guarantee they will work, But you asked.;)
1) Remove the government monopoly on schooling.
In order for this to be effective you must also remove the tax burden for the people that is used to pay for it. The government schools can still exist, and they can be paid for by the people that use them just like the 'private' schools. For the needy, there are charitable organizations that can help there.
This would allow for competition in schooling. People could choose where they wanted thier kids to go to school. Kids that have special needs could go to a school that caters to those needs. "Gifted" kids can go to a school that has accelerated learning programs. etc..
2) End the failed War on Drugs.
It's a war we can't win. And we have only made the problem worse in fighting it. See the statistics for crime durring prohibition. Crime skyrockted, and fell back down after it was repealed. People also said that repaling it would mean we would have drunks running all over the place. Everyone would be wasted all the time, they said... it didn't happen. Alcoholism dropped. The Drug War is exactly the same thing as prohibition, it's just a different class of substance.
How would it help to end this for the school violence problem? In some areas there is a big problem with drug 'turf wars' and gangs. This extends into the schools at times. It also helps get the guns into the hands of children since there are so many kids with them allready. Ending the war would reduce crime across the board, and cut away the proffit from drugs. Gangs would have nothing to fight over, and most would not be able to afford the illegal guns and ammunition anymore. If you declare a war, is it any wonder there is shooting?
3) Lower the tax burden.
High taxes are a large part of the reason people have to have 2 incomes. If one parent could stay home with the children it would help restore the traditional "family unit" that everyone is so sad to see going the way of the dinosaur. The loss of family values is also blamed for the increase in school and kid violence/crime. So fix the problem. Lower taxes back to the point a single income will let people get by. They will have to decide for themselves, but I know a LOT of people that say one parrent would be home, if they could afford it. In most familys I know, the second income basicly pays the taxes. There is no excuse for this in a free nation. The colonies rebelled over far lower taxes then we now face to create this country. That should tell everyone something.
It should also be noted that school violence is dropping. I agree, one is too many. But if the trend is a decline, why mess with it? You acknowledge that nobody can guarentee saftey. We should keep a close eye one it, and make sure it stays that way. But if it's going down and government gets involved it will probably go back up. That's the track record government has throughout history.
The stuff I mentioned above would help a ton. In the mean time, we should be educating the people. Teach them to keep thier guns locked up so that kids can't steal them. Trigger/Action locks at a minimum. Get them to be parents and teach thier kids. There is no pancea, no quick fix. But maybe we can all get involved a little and make a long-term soultion to the problem. Without having to lose any freedoms either. It can be done, but are people willing to work at it? Time will tell. As you said, what price are you willing to pay? Is a little work worth it?
Ignoring the issue of Singer and killing babies. The idea that because some things are deemed right and wrong is because of "God" is rediculous. Perhaps in some way depending on your religous beliefs, but what about those who don't share those beliefs?
I would submit that society dictates the sense of right and wrong. In a large part the parents of the person while a child. Although that is not always the case, some kids simply don't learn anything from thier parents despite the parents really trying to teach. You can't teach an unwilling student. Another factor is what is considered by society to be right or wrong. Throughout history this would hold more water then the "God did it" argument. Look at the conquerors. Rome is another example, as someone else allready mentioned. Even in present day, in parts of Europe sex is OK, they show stuff on broadcast TV that would probably be porn here in the US. But violence is "wrong" to them, while to those in the US sex is wrong and violence is OK. This probably has more to do with the higher violent crime statistics in the US (and the more sexually open society in Europe) then anything else.
So who's right? Depends on who you ask.;) Now, how does this prove God exists? It doesn't. Of course, it doesn't prove he doesn't exist either.
Back to the topic at hand. Freedom. As long as nobody is being harmed, people should be free to do and say as they please. If Singer want's to discuss euthanisia, fine. IDEAS are not bad. It is the implimentation of those ideas that can cause harm. Talking about being a Nazi, for example, is not hurting anyone and is not wrong or illegal. BEING a Nazi isn't even wrong or illegal (by LEGAL definition, religion is up to the reader). But if that Nazi were to start killing Jews again, well, that's wrong and illegal. Why? Because it's murder, not because he's a Nazi.
Now, why is discussing the possible results from euthanizing children with no chance at life wrong? Why should it be illegal (which is what you seem to argue for)? They are not causing any harm by talking about it, or discussing the problems and results in doing this. They aren't even advocating it at present.
People need to learn to seperate discussion and the act. We don't even know if this guy accually feels this way, has anyone asked him? Maybe he does. I don't know. The point is, teaching about an idea does not nessicarilly mean you are CONDONING the idea!
Perhaps some examples..
Christians teach about hell and sinning, at least most I'm familiar with. That does not mean they think everyone should go sin or go to hell.;)
Teachers in school teach evolution in some areas. That doesn't mean they are RIGHT, just that they are teaching students about a scientific theroy. It doesn't say that religion is wrong or God doesn't exist if you teach about evolution.
Some areas have teachers teaching sex education. That doesn't mean they are telling the students to go have sex. They are teaching them about the scientific facts of sex. Weather you agree with them teaching this or not has no bearing on the point here. To teach, is not to condone. I may not agree with something, but I could teach someone about it anyway.
And that's not even the act of doing the teaching involved. Even to support it does not harm anyone (the example of the Nazi). It is when you CAUSE HARM to someone that it becomes wrong. Why? Because as a society we have decided that is where the line is. Does it prove God exists? Not to me. If it does to you, fine, enjoy it. But don't take our freedom to discuss ideas away just because you don't agree with them. For the record, I don't believe euthanisia for damaged children is a good thing. I DO believe people should be allowed to discuss it. Freedom of speach doesn't just mean speach you like. Just like freedom of religion doesn't mean just Christian. I won't take away your right to speak out against it, if you disagree it's your right to say so. But if all they are doing is talking about it, then they are harming nobody. And I can't support banning ideas just because they are unpopular or offensive to some, even if I am part of the offended group. You mention "slipery-slope"... Giving the government the ability to be thought-police is a very slipery slope indeed. You might want to think about the consequences of THAT idea.
The problem is, there is always going to be something like this out there. Everyone is focused on the web right now. But I remember when the way you got dirty pics online was alt.binaries.pictures.erotica. This is a newsgroup. Any idiot can get pics from USENET. Now are you going to filter USENET too? Which groups? Keep in mind that isn't the only one, and sometimes people spam pics to other groups that have nothing to do with porn.
The answer isn't government. It's being responsible for yourself and your children. Sure, you can't sit there and watch them. Call arround and find an ISP that has a filtering proxy server. You can get most of it filtered out that way. There are lists online.. you just have to find them. I know there are some ISPs that will let you have an account that cannot access anything unless it's through the proxy and it filters the content. Or set one up yourself. A Linux box, Squid, and a decent list of sites to block could do this. Of course, it requires some technical know-how. That's the price you pay for doing it yourself.
Or there's always Net-Nanny, Cyberpatrol and friends. They will block most of the offensive content.
I can understand you not wanting your kids to see it. Even not wanting to see it yourself. That's your right and your choice to make. So make it, any one of the above options would solve 90% or more of the problem for you. Sure, it's not perfect, but nothing ever is. You will always have people putting up more sites, and some won't even have DNS names, just IP addresses. You can't filter it all. You can get most of it though.
Also, it may help to educate your kids about this stuff at some point. They don't grow up in a vacuum and I would think they would be better off learning it from you, the parent, then thier friends, or any of the many other places people learn about it. This is the real world, and even the kids have to live in it. If they are taught they have a much better chance of getting into adulthood unscathed. This is, of course, also your choice. Nobody should be telling you how to raise your kids. Just a thought from someone that was there not too long ago and I wish my parents would have done more teaching. IMO sheltering the kids from the real world is half the problem we have here in the US with teen pregnancy and such.
This technology has as ton of cool possible uses. The problem is, paranoid or not, I don't trust the government with it. Of course, my oppinion doesn't mean jack to them, and they are probably using it allready and just haven't told us about it. That doesn't mean I have to like it. IF they are to deploy something like this the only way I would even begin to feel good about it was if the government and law enforcement had to have a warrent to use it to look for someone. A public warrent, not those stupid sealed warrents. IMO they shouldn't even get to HAVE my pattern in there unless they would have my fingerprints allready (such as an arrest, etc). There should also be PUBLIC supervision. And I do mean public. I want EVERYONE to be able to check up on big brother.
Of course, even if it were to happen, and to quote Wayne from Wayne's World "Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt!".. It still requires a lot of trust on our part that they will have all the records regarding the use of the system available and not just cover it up. When they show me they can be responsible with the tech they have allready I'll reconsider my position. Of course, in the grand scheme of things even if the people voted it down (if they let us vote on it, and they probably wouldn't) they would just ignore us and do it anyway just like everything else. Am I being cynical, probably, but history gives me cause to be.
Oh come on. Even the so called "Wild West" wasn't so wild. It was a rare thing that someone would just shoot someone because they "looked at them funny" or some such silly excuse. Look at the history, not the movies. Most people in the west were peacefull, even those that walked arround with a gun holstered on thier sides. Sure, they had a lot of dangers to look out for. So do we in 1999. I'm not advocating everyone carry a gun. Many don't wish to, that's fine with me. But those of us who do wish to should be allowed to do so as long as we use it responsibly. And there are allready quite severe consequences for not using it responsibily.
Think about it. Men were FAMOUS CRIMINALS for killing 3 people! The "most wanted" list probably had people with 10 murders under thier belts. Today people have to kill 50-100 to get noticed, it seems. Unless they do it in a dramatic way. Which population group had more to fear from the criminal element?
As for the bill of rights, read it again. It does have wording regarding the militia. However, read more from the time and you'll find that the "militia" was every able-bodied man in America. That means I am a member of the militia, along with a large portion of the population. And it doesn't say that you have to be militia to own weapons either, it says the right to own weapons is "nessicary for" a militia.
Slashdot Mirror
It works.. sort of.
;)
The problem is that the losses are so high that to get any practical level of power from the receiving stations you would need to transmit huge power levels. Thermodynamics and all that.
The Tesla Coil is basicly the first radio transmitter. It's a spark gap transmitter. The signal on the receiving end is strong enough to light bulbs and such. But nowhere near the levels used by a typical home today. And wiring is cheap enough now that the costs outweigh the benefits.
The idea of wireless power was an interesting one. And it is how radio works. Comparing this to modern radio may help those who don't understand yet. A modern radio receives a signal from a "station". This signal is typically in the millivolt range. The reason radios use power (batteries and such) is to power the amplifiers to make the signal strong enough to hear on a speaker. The transmitter for a commercial station typically has an output in the hundreds of watts. Yet you receive milliwatts worth of signal. Tesla coils aren't magic, they do the exact same thing.
As for the other post about blowing the generator in Colorado Springs. It is widely decided from current coil builders that what happened is that feedback made it onto the mains. This HF feedback created an arc in the generator and fried it. Modern coilers use line filters to remove these high energy spikes to prevent damage to our equipment, like computers. He did NOT send a ground pulse to the generator. Experiments with coils today show that ground propigation is pittifull at Tesla Coil frequencies. And not that great even at the resonant frequency of the Earth. And modern materials give us more powerfull coils than Tesla himself could produce.
As for generating power with the Earth magnetic field. Never heard of it. But it has possibility. Of course, do YOU want to figgure out how to build towers that reach into the Magentosphere? Me neither.
For those that are currious. Please check the facts. There have been numerous discussions about this stuff on the Tesla Coil mailing list. You can see archives at www.pupman.com.
Okay, but thier parents DID earn it. So why shouldn't they be allowed to dispose of it as they please? Hmmmmmm??? What makes you or anyone else a better judge of what use that all goes to. Why are you engaging in class warfare? If someone inherits something, it is THIERS. Not the government's, not society's, not yours. Why should they pay taxes on it AGAIN? The government got thier due from sales tax on the equipment, property tax on the land every year, and sales taxes on anything the farm sells. WHY SHOULD THEY GET MORE????? Just because someone got something "they didn't earn"? That's class warfare if I've ever seen it. And if you think farming isn't a "job", you've got another thing comming.
No, I'm not a farmer, nor is my family. But I do know something about it. I'm a programmer, and I have the utmost respect for farmers. They work very hard to feed me. I have spent some time on a farm, and helped out some. I know what it's like. They work harder in a day than I do all year. You may want to quit your whining.
Um, no. They don't know who the criminal is just because DNA was at the scene. It can provide a list of suspects, much like a security camera or eyewitness testimony though. Consider a hotel room that someone was murdered in. How many other people's DNA could be found? Sure, they clean the rooms, but an eyelash is more than enough to get a DNA sample. So if I stayed in that room a month ago there is a chance a good DNA sample would be there waiting for the cops. Of course, they would probably refference the hotel guest book and see that I wasn't there at that time.
I would have issue with the availablility of such a database as well. I would want it to be locked up tight. And have civilian review of access. I don't trust the government. Such a database should require a court order to access, like a wiretap, to prevent missuse.
Just a few issues with such a database. There are more and probably some better ones to consider before implimenting such a thing.
You don't need a $500 gun to protect yourself. I bought a handgun for $200 that works perfectly for this use. Just avoid the 9mm and other really popular sizes. Look into the .380ACP and .38 Special. They are available in lower cost versions that will work for you. My handgun is a Bersa Model 95. Never heard of them before. But it shoots straight, is very reliable, and easy to handle. And at $200, the price is right. I would not hesitate the recomend it to anyone. Even a small person should have no trouble with a .380ACP. Not much recoil, small size, plenty of power if you ever have to use it. Remember, every gun is only as reliable as it's owner. Clean it regularly and take care of it. Practice on a range so you know how to use it. If it ever malfunctions and you can't fix it, don't use it for protection. Use it for practice and get another one for protection. Most problems can be fixed with a gunsmith if needed.
.22 is deadly. And most confrontations involving guns in deffence are point-blank. However, I would still recomend something a little bigger. ;) Make sure to use hollow point expanding rounds. If you ever do have to use it, it will be less likely to go through your target and hit innocent bystanders.
;)
Remember, at close range even a
Good message BTW. Good to see others understand the ideas here. If you want to be "ready in time of need", might I suggest a rifle as well? In a war you want some range and accuracy as well.
What good is a militia? At least they are fighting for thier rights. Would you rather just have to bend over and take it? Would you fight if needed?
I'll grant you, if we got rid of all the guns it would be harder for criminals to kill people. There is a catch there. *ALL* the guns. *AND* the knowledge to build them! A gun is a simple device that can be built with a little skill and the local Home Depot. I even know how to make the powder from materials they can't ban. Like chicken shit! Black Powder is all that is required and you can make it from Charcoal, shit, and sulfer. All are available in nature with a little looking.
Now, how are you planning to get rid of the guns? Hmmmmmmm????? We spend hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars per year on the War on Drugs. We have not even slowed the tide on that. You can get illegal drugs in PRISON! So how the hell do you intend to get rid of them all AND KEEP THEM OUT!?!? Propose a workable soultion that does not emulate the failed "War" on drugs. You solve this problem, and disarm the police and the government. THEN I'll consider giving up my guns. If ANYONE has them, they can be stolen or used on peacefull citizens. And until then the best deffence is a strong offence. If someone attacks me with a weapon I want to be able to fight back. Or, prefferably, scare them off so I don't have to shoot.
For hunting.. POISON???????? Do you really want to just leave them to rot now? At least hunters use the animals they kill. If they are poisoned we can't eat them now and it goes to waste. What's the point? Sure, you can limit the spread of disease and such that way. One reason we want to allow hunting is that humans have thinned the population of the natural predators and allowed the herds to grow. This is a problem for the overall health of the herds and the biosphere. We make up for it with hunting to thin out the herds. Basicly, we become the predators. We can also feed hungry people with the meat from those animals. This is a much better method than poison. Though I will suggest that the Archery hunt is a close substitute. Just not as effective.
I agree with the principles you mention. Just not the method to impliment them. The problems we have are caused by society, not our tools. Be they guns, knives, spears (no, not Brittney, though I'm not sure which is worse), etc.. Keep in mind, more people are killed each year with baseball bats than guns in this country. I read that stat someplace, it may be wrong. But the point is vaild. If you just ban guns, people will still kill each other. But they will use blunt objects, knives, bow&arrows, spears, bats, bowling balls, hammers, icepicks, etc.. You see the problem? May not be as easy to kill, but that doesn't matter. The distance is rarely a factor. Most attacks take place at point-blank range. Range where a knife would be almost as effective as a gun. Help solve the real problem rather than disarming those who only wish to protect themselves.
Better than helping Bush get elected, IMO.
The way I see it, the only wasted vote is one that does not agree with your beliefs. That means that if you are voting for "the lesser of two evils", you just wasted your vote. The whole point of voting is to tell government what you want. If you vote for people you don't believe in just because the other guy is worse, you are part of the problem, not the soultion.
This will be my first second year voting, and I'm 23. Why not before? For the same reason most of my peers don't vote. Apathy. But I see that as another part of the problem. If we don't speak up, we deserve what we get. Not voting is a vote for the establishment. In thier eyes, if you can't be bothered to get off your butt and vote, you are reasonably happy with the way things are. If you want to make a statement, use the write-in spots and put your friends and family, or fictional characters, whatever. That's at least doing SOMETHING.
Personally, I'm with the other poster. I'll be voting Libertarian this year. I may not win, but that's the chance you take in a democracy/republic. From talking with other people at work and arround town, it seems to me most people lean toward the Libertarian side on many principles. Most of them don't vote as they don't see anyone to vote for. Get all those non-voters out to vote thier REAL thoughts, and you will see change. If you don't like the Libertarians, go with Green, Natural Law, Independant, hell even Communist or Nazi. Whatever, but take a STAND. sheesh.
Speak up, or be crushed. Those are your choices. What will it be? Keep in mind, if you don't speak up now, it may well be illegal to in the future. The Republicrats have allready written laws to make it illegal to TALK about making or using drugs and explosives. What's next? Think about it.
I accept. Send me one and I will hack it.
;)
I would like a free ReplayTV anyway.
It's about $60/month. This includes the ISP service. I was on USWorst ADSL at 256k before I moved. I payed USWorst $30/mo for the DSL service and the ISP another $20/mo.
So yes, IDSL *IS* more expensive. Not by much, but it's also slower.
Here's my take:
I have two choices. IDSL at 144k or modem at 56k. If I want more bandwidth I can suck it up and pay for it or use a modem. Do I like this situation? Nope. But I don't have much choice either. I could go with normal ISDN, but USWorst charges $70/mo for the line and to get 128k I have to pay $40/mo to an ISP! I did this for a while. It works well, but is quite expensive. With IDSL I also never have to 'dial-up' again. And I can use a router to handle the traffic for my LAN. My old ISDN box is just a TA, no routing.
Remember, IDSL is basicly ISDN. ISDN costs more. It probably shouldn't, but it does. Such is life.
Oh.. and USWorst is now Qworst.. same lousy service, higher rates. Oh what a happy customer I am. ;
I have been looking into this for a while now. Here's the deal. IDSL is ISDN with a few changes to make it "always-on" and to use all the bandwidth in a single channel. Thus you get 144K rather than 128K in 2 64K channels. It has the longer range of ISDN though. This is nice for those like me who are out of range of "normal" DSL service like the stuff USWest offers. It's a pain to get installed though. I've been waiting for quite some time. Apparently there was a line issue USWest had to fix. They were supposed to be here 9/20 but no word yet one week later. This order is a coupple months old now. If you do order it, be prepared to WAIT. It will take a while.
;)
I'm going through SpeakEasy because of the good reviews on DSLReports.com. They also offer a decent price for the service and have static IPs and a reasonable use policy. The total end cost is close to what I was paying for 256k RADSL service and the ISP charge. As I don't actually have a line yet, I can't comment on the quality.
*sigh*.
And here I thought that the oldest media was going to be the first to grasp how to market to the latest one.
Proposal:
Get a group together (maybe through opencontent.org) and try to create a distribution system that we can live with but still have some way to go after copyright violators.
We need to realize that they are very concerned about theft online. Look at MP3s, whatever your stance on them you have to admit that they are stupidly easy to copy and pirate. We need to have something that will allow them to have some protection while still allowing us to use the info in a reasonable way. It will have to be some interesting technology to get them to buy off on it. It must be open source and not worry about debuggers.
The fact is, nothing can ever contain it totally. But maybe we can help develop something we can all live with. We need to get them to realize that draconian restrictions for legimate users isn't the answer either. But we should be willing to come up with a middle ground soultion too. If all we are willing to do is trupmet full openness with no protection whatsoever we will get nowhere. With paper they have some assurance that it's probably more expensive to copy than to buy it. With bits and bytes where it's a mouse click worth of effort to copy, they don't get the warm fuzzy. We need to find a way to satisfy both sides. Tricky, but I think it can be done. Any takers? If there is a discussion on this topic allready in place on the net someone post a link!
You've got them backwards. AC is a wave, there is a point where you have the ability to let go. And in some cases it will throw you away. I know this first hand, I've been hit by 15 KVAC from a neon sign transformer (building Tesla coils) I flew about 10 feet. DC, if you get across it, will contract your muscles and you will be stuck. AC is more dangerous because it carries more power. A distribution power line can blow your arm off.
Electricians use the "one hand method" to prevent creating a ground path through the heart. Intelligent ones don't touch "potentially live AC wires" at all. They use a voltmeter and make sure.
Every time we hear something about this someone or another talks about building them. Are /.'ers willing to put money on the table? How about in escrow? Anyone willing to colaborate on a project to build a handheld from the SA-1100?
I am looking for SERIOUS people here. You must be willing to dedicate a significant ammount of time toward helping the project or willing to put money on the table to see it happen. There are ways to see this done, but we would have to build a lot of them. Possibly as high as a thousand units to get the parts and such at a reasonable cost.
If you are only willing to buy one but don't want to help in the development effort, I want to hear from you too. Please email me how much you would consider paying for such a device and what specs you want it to have (RAM/Flash size, screen size/type, etc.).
If I hear from enough people to make it worth building, I'll dust off my unfinished SA design and build a prototype. The info on the unit will be published under an Open-Source compatible license and will include all design info required to build the devices.
The email address is real, all interested parties please contact me ASAP so I can get an idea of how many are really interested.
I agree. The thing is, I think we allready have a decent copy control system. And ammusingly, the content providers gave it to us! SCMS. Serial Copy Managment System. You can make copies from original media, but not from copies. IMO, this is fair. Of course, people have allready broken this system and most CD-R devices will ignore it. But something that did this would provide 'fair use' rights to consumers, and provide some copy control for content providers.
I'm surprised nobody ever mentions WebMin in these discussions. I use it on a few machines I am responsible for. I think of it like the Linux Control Panel. You can configure most services that Linux machines use, manage processes, users, groups, etc.. All via a standard web browser interface. I've put it on a few machines and trained NT admins to use it. Most of them think it's eaiser than NT. It's free for use, and IIRC presently can be considered "open source". Although the author does mention that some modules in the future may be payware. And the interface is MUCH nicer than LinuxConf, IMO.
I totally screwed that calculation up. That will teach me to speak before I'm awake. ;)
;)
It should be 43.8 Hours. I wasn't paying attention to the units.
Sure. You could probably extend battery life with a generator on the unit. But you probably can't make more power then you are drawing, so the power available is still finite even if you're walking.
;) But it should give you the general idea. And if you could get 12-24 hours of full-speed opperation out of the entire system you've got something very usefull. RAM and ROM don't use a lot of power, so the storage and the I/O are the things to look out for. I know the 340MB IBM Microdrive is battery friendly....
Batteries aren't bad right now. I just bought a 3200 mAH 3.2V battery for my Nokia cell phone for $50 on EBay. With a power efficient CPU you could get a ton of life out of that battery. And it's Li-Ion so no memory effect, and really light. Think StrongARM here, 133 Mhz, draws 230 mW at full speed. That's a puny 73 mA. With the battery above, that's 43835.6 HOURS you could run the CPU. In sleep mode Intel says it draws ~50 uA. With a little power managment we could get a lot of life out of this. Of course, that's not very usefull, a CPU all by itself.
Food for thought, just drop the requirement for Win9x and you could take this idea a long ways. I don't know what Pentium CPUs are using for power of late, so if they can come close to the SA for power draw maybe it's worth it to use a standard x86 CPU...
Would you please tell me what, exactly, people are stealing by using/writing this program? Who is out something here? I'm talking about JUST the execution of the program, not the use of the resulting datastream. Why do you feel this is stealing?
They want to be able to use software playback to play a DVD movie they bought. The movie industry got thier money. And, for the record, people with a real computer can do software playback quite well, thank you.
This will not kill the format unless the movie companies get stupid and pull products to require the encryption to change, which would break all existing DVD players and royally piss off consumers. The movie industry was up in arms about VCRs. They said it would ruin thier business, people would pirate all the movies and they wouldn't make any money. They were dead wrong. The VCR has made them more money then the big screen! They are also wrong about this. People using this program lose a lot of the stuff on the disc. All the special features are now gone. Pirates don't want to do this. They want real copies. They have the money to buy mastering equipment and make real copies. THOSE are the people the movie industry should be concerned with. And I support the movie industry going after those people. But the people that wrote the CSS crack didn't hurt anyone. And it won't hurt the movie industry to have everyone know that thier DVD codes suck.
You could allready get the same result by using a Windows box to decode it and re-digitizing the output. The loss of quality would be minimal on a good setup. This is nothing that was not allready available to those who want to steal. It only helps the honest users play thier DVDs.
As for paying a license fee and building a closed module. If you want to, fine. OSS people have been reverse engineering stuff for a long time now and I don't see an end in sight. Everything else they have done is still out there. They wrote a free OS and people still buy Windows! Why should an individual pay millions to get a license to DVD code? They can crack it with nothing but computer time. And they don't like closed source, that's the real point. They want to be able to help the developer fix the problems.
By your logic Linux is a work of theft. It is an OS. Windows is a commerical OS and Linux does some of the same stuff. It's stealing from MS now. Does Linus deserve to be sued? AT&T, SGI, IBM, and SCO have an even better case! Linux is a free UNIX style OS. Should they sue Linus now?
Think about it. Nobody is being harmed by this. Not even the poor poor movie industry.
Even the music industry isn't getting harmed by MP3 and piracy there is rampant. But yet CDs still sell really well. People are still buying originals. I have a ton of MP3s. But I have over 100 CDs too, and I made most of my MP3s. I can get any album I want over the net in MP3 format, yet I still buy music CDs. Interesting, isn't it? I even buy from MP3.COM. There are some great artists there.
FWIW, Greg Leyh knows what he is doing. He is a pro and isn't going to get anyone killed or blow stuff up. The demonstration with someone inside a sphere isn't as dangerous as it appears. Electricity follows the shortest path to ground. The sphere is grounded so the electricity hits it. Same things with power lines etc.. Electrum is the biggest coil I'm aware of next to the master himself, Nikola Tesla. He built a rather, uh, large facility in Colorado Springs near the turn of the century.
/. members haven't heard of Tesla Coils before. There is a mailing list w/ searchable archives at www.pupman.com. There are more pics there as well. Go see one in person if you get the chance. The pictures don't do them justice. :)
I build coils as well, though not nearly as well as Greg does, so I am aware of the danger and saftey issues. I'm surprised more
Really? I think not. It's not a control issue, it's a problem in our society. We adore voilence over here in the US for some reason. Very few will admit it, but it's true anyway. There is, of course, a small percentage that does not. "All generalizations are wrong" and all that. ;)
Look at our cinema, if it doesn't have a high enough body count it has about an 80% chance of being a flop at the box office. The exceptions being "feel good" movies, or really, really good acting/directing/writing. Again, this is NOT the problem, it's a symptom. Hollywood makes movies they think will draw a crowd so they can make money. It's all about business.
There are more examples, games, internet, whatever. But in the end they are all symptoms. The soultion is not controling/regulating/banning everything in existance. It is to find the root of the problem and fix it. It's like a weed in your garden, if you just hack off the top, it grows back over and over again. If you pull out the roots, you get rid of the weed for good. That is what we need to do.
As for the specific issue of guns. The 2nd Ammendment asside, there is evidence to sugest that kids who have guns thier parents give them and train them how to use are generally more responsible and well behaved then others in the same geographical area. This is not to say it's a pancea. If a parent gives their kid a gun they should take responsibility for that action and train them in saftey and the damage a gun can do. The kid should also not have direct access to it, or the ammunition. Both should be locked up, prefferably in a gun safe. At the least, in different places. This is all basic firearm saftey. The only exception I can think of would be a personal defence weapon the parent has, if they choose to have one. In that case it should be in full control of the parent at all times. Meaning, it should NEVER be left unattended. It should be carried, or locked up. PERIOD. There are plenty of quick access gun safes designed for defence situations, go buy one.
I don't have the soultion to the problem. But we will never find it if nobody looks for it. It's so easy to just blame an object, or a movie, or the internet. It takes WORK to find the REAL problem. Nobody wants to do that, so it doesn't get done. And, of course, there is the possibility that it will be discovered that something YOU like will be part of the problem.. can't have that. Much better to scapegoat the objects and things that can't defend themselves. It's so much eaiser, much less risk involved.
You know, I find it annoying that Europeans love to flame us and try to make us be like them. The fact of the matter is, we broke away because we didn't WANT to be like you. If you want to live a certain way, so be it. Please allow others the same privilage. If you don't like the US, don't come here. It's that simple. There are plenty of other places on this planet to be. I'm sorry if this seems like a flame on all of Europe. It's not intended to be. Just what I think is probably a vocal minority over there. Much like what happens here all the time.
BTW: It's the 2nd Ammendment that provides the right to bear arms. :) It doesn't effect the rest of your statement, but for everyone else's accuracy....
;)
;)
As for sugestions, I have a few.
First off, nobody can guarantee 100% saftey. Anyone who says they can is selling something. There will always be problems unless you know how to achieve utopia. As for the question you state, how much freedom am I willing to give up for saftey? None.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary saftey deserve neither liberty nor saftey." - Ben Franklin
It's often quoted, but do you really understand the point? Since nobody can provide a guarantee of saftey giving up liberty for it is stupid. It may work for a short time, but the criminals WILL find a way arround it. Then the price you paid becomes worthless. And then we go for another round where the government asks us to give up yet more freedom for saftey. Round and round we go... where does it end? For me, it ends here.
Now that I have been negative, I will offer potential soultions. I don't guarantee they will work, But you asked.
1) Remove the government monopoly on schooling.
In order for this to be effective you must also remove the tax burden for the people that is used to pay for it. The government schools can still exist, and they can be paid for by the people that use them just like the 'private' schools. For the needy, there are charitable organizations that can help there.
This would allow for competition in schooling. People could choose where they wanted thier kids to go to school. Kids that have special needs could go to a school that caters to those needs. "Gifted" kids can go to a school that has accelerated learning programs. etc..
2) End the failed War on Drugs.
It's a war we can't win. And we have only made the problem worse in fighting it. See the statistics for crime durring prohibition. Crime skyrockted, and fell back down after it was repealed. People also said that repaling it would mean we would have drunks running all over the place. Everyone would be wasted all the time, they said... it didn't happen. Alcoholism dropped. The Drug War is exactly the same thing as prohibition, it's just a different class of substance.
How would it help to end this for the school violence problem? In some areas there is a big problem with drug 'turf wars' and gangs. This extends into the schools at times. It also helps get the guns into the hands of children since there are so many kids with them allready. Ending the war would reduce crime across the board, and cut away the proffit from drugs. Gangs would have nothing to fight over, and most would not be able to afford the illegal guns and ammunition anymore. If you declare a war, is it any wonder there is shooting?
3) Lower the tax burden.
High taxes are a large part of the reason people have to have 2 incomes. If one parent could stay home with the children it would help restore the traditional "family unit" that everyone is so sad to see going the way of the dinosaur. The loss of family values is also blamed for the increase in school and kid violence/crime. So fix the problem. Lower taxes back to the point a single income will let people get by. They will have to decide for themselves, but I know a LOT of people that say one parrent would be home, if they could afford it. In most familys I know, the second income basicly pays the taxes. There is no excuse for this in a free nation. The colonies rebelled over far lower taxes then we now face to create this country. That should tell everyone something.
It should also be noted that school violence is dropping. I agree, one is too many. But if the trend is a decline, why mess with it? You acknowledge that nobody can guarentee saftey. We should keep a close eye one it, and make sure it stays that way. But if it's going down and government gets involved it will probably go back up. That's the track record government has throughout history.
The stuff I mentioned above would help a ton. In the mean time, we should be educating the people. Teach them to keep thier guns locked up so that kids can't steal them. Trigger/Action locks at a minimum. Get them to be parents and teach thier kids. There is no pancea, no quick fix. But maybe we can all get involved a little and make a long-term soultion to the problem. Without having to lose any freedoms either. It can be done, but are people willing to work at it? Time will tell. As you said, what price are you willing to pay? Is a little work worth it?
Travis
Ignoring the issue of Singer and killing babies. The idea that because some things are deemed right and wrong is because of "God" is rediculous. Perhaps in some way depending on your religous beliefs, but what about those who don't share those beliefs?
;) Now, how does this prove God exists? It doesn't. Of course, it doesn't prove he doesn't exist either.
;)
I would submit that society dictates the sense of right and wrong. In a large part the parents of the person while a child. Although that is not always the case, some kids simply don't learn anything from thier parents despite the parents really trying to teach. You can't teach an unwilling student. Another factor is what is considered by society to be right or wrong. Throughout history this would hold more water then the "God did it" argument. Look at the conquerors. Rome is another example, as someone else allready mentioned. Even in present day, in parts of Europe sex is OK, they show stuff on broadcast TV that would probably be porn here in the US. But violence is "wrong" to them, while to those in the US sex is wrong and violence is OK. This probably has more to do with the higher violent crime statistics in the US (and the more sexually open society in Europe) then anything else.
So who's right? Depends on who you ask.
Back to the topic at hand. Freedom. As long as nobody is being harmed, people should be free to do and say as they please. If Singer want's to discuss euthanisia, fine. IDEAS are not bad. It is the implimentation of those ideas that can cause harm. Talking about being a Nazi, for example, is not hurting anyone and is not wrong or illegal. BEING a Nazi isn't even wrong or illegal (by LEGAL definition, religion is up to the reader). But if that Nazi were to start killing Jews again, well, that's wrong and illegal. Why? Because it's murder, not because he's a Nazi.
Now, why is discussing the possible results from euthanizing children with no chance at life wrong? Why should it be illegal (which is what you seem to argue for)? They are not causing any harm by talking about it, or discussing the problems and results in doing this. They aren't even advocating it at present.
People need to learn to seperate discussion and the act. We don't even know if this guy accually feels this way, has anyone asked him? Maybe he does. I don't know. The point is, teaching about an idea does not nessicarilly mean you are CONDONING the idea!
Perhaps some examples..
Christians teach about hell and sinning, at least most I'm familiar with. That does not mean they think everyone should go sin or go to hell.
Teachers in school teach evolution in some areas. That doesn't mean they are RIGHT, just that they are teaching students about a scientific theroy. It doesn't say that religion is wrong or God doesn't exist if you teach about evolution.
Some areas have teachers teaching sex education. That doesn't mean they are telling the students to go have sex. They are teaching them about the scientific facts of sex. Weather you agree with them teaching this or not has no bearing on the point here. To teach, is not to condone. I may not agree with something, but I could teach someone about it anyway.
And that's not even the act of doing the teaching involved. Even to support it does not harm anyone (the example of the Nazi). It is when you CAUSE HARM to someone that it becomes wrong. Why? Because as a society we have decided that is where the line is. Does it prove God exists? Not to me. If it does to you, fine, enjoy it. But don't take our freedom to discuss ideas away just because you don't agree with them. For the record, I don't believe euthanisia for damaged children is a good thing. I DO believe people should be allowed to discuss it. Freedom of speach doesn't just mean speach you like. Just like freedom of religion doesn't mean just Christian. I won't take away your right to speak out against it, if you disagree it's your right to say so. But if all they are doing is talking about it, then they are harming nobody. And I can't support banning ideas just because they are unpopular or offensive to some, even if I am part of the offended group. You mention "slipery-slope"... Giving the government the ability to be thought-police is a very slipery slope indeed. You might want to think about the consequences of THAT idea.
The problem is, there is always going to be something like this out there. Everyone is focused on the web right now. But I remember when the way you got dirty pics online was alt.binaries.pictures.erotica. This is a newsgroup. Any idiot can get pics from USENET. Now are you going to filter USENET too? Which groups? Keep in mind that isn't the only one, and sometimes people spam pics to other groups that have nothing to do with porn.
The answer isn't government. It's being responsible for yourself and your children. Sure, you can't sit there and watch them. Call arround and find an ISP that has a filtering proxy server. You can get most of it filtered out that way. There are lists online.. you just have to find them. I know there are some ISPs that will let you have an account that cannot access anything unless it's through the proxy and it filters the content. Or set one up yourself. A Linux box, Squid, and a decent list of sites to block could do this. Of course, it requires some technical know-how. That's the price you pay for doing it yourself.
Or there's always Net-Nanny, Cyberpatrol and friends. They will block most of the offensive content.
I can understand you not wanting your kids to see it. Even not wanting to see it yourself. That's your right and your choice to make. So make it, any one of the above options would solve 90% or more of the problem for you. Sure, it's not perfect, but nothing ever is. You will always have people putting up more sites, and some won't even have DNS names, just IP addresses. You can't filter it all. You can get most of it though.
Also, it may help to educate your kids about this stuff at some point. They don't grow up in a vacuum and I would think they would be better off learning it from you, the parent, then thier friends, or any of the many other places people learn about it. This is the real world, and even the kids have to live in it. If they are taught they have a much better chance of getting into adulthood unscathed. This is, of course, also your choice. Nobody should be telling you how to raise your kids. Just a thought from someone that was there not too long ago and I wish my parents would have done more teaching. IMO sheltering the kids from the real world is half the problem we have here in the US with teen pregnancy and such.
My new sig...
We are Borg, resistance is futile....
This technology has as ton of cool possible uses. The problem is, paranoid or not, I don't trust the government with it. Of course, my oppinion doesn't mean jack to them, and they are probably using it allready and just haven't told us about it. That doesn't mean I have to like it. IF they are to deploy something like this the only way I would even begin to feel good about it was if the government and law enforcement had to have a warrent to use it to look for someone. A public warrent, not those stupid sealed warrents. IMO they shouldn't even get to HAVE my pattern in there unless they would have my fingerprints allready (such as an arrest, etc). There should also be PUBLIC supervision. And I do mean public. I want EVERYONE to be able to check up on big brother.
Of course, even if it were to happen, and to quote Wayne from Wayne's World "Yeah, and monkeys might fly out of my butt!".. It still requires a lot of trust on our part that they will have all the records regarding the use of the system available and not just cover it up. When they show me they can be responsible with the tech they have allready I'll reconsider my position. Of course, in the grand scheme of things even if the people voted it down (if they let us vote on it, and they probably wouldn't) they would just ignore us and do it anyway just like everything else. Am I being cynical, probably, but history gives me cause to be.
Oh come on. Even the so called "Wild West" wasn't so wild. It was a rare thing that someone would just shoot someone because they "looked at them funny" or some such silly excuse. Look at the history, not the movies. Most people in the west were peacefull, even those that walked arround with a gun holstered on thier sides. Sure, they had a lot of dangers to look out for. So do we in 1999. I'm not advocating everyone carry a gun. Many don't wish to, that's fine with me. But those of us who do wish to should be allowed to do so as long as we use it responsibly. And there are allready quite severe consequences for not using it responsibily.
Think about it. Men were FAMOUS CRIMINALS for killing 3 people! The "most wanted" list probably had people with 10 murders under thier belts. Today people have to kill 50-100 to get noticed, it seems. Unless they do it in a dramatic way. Which population group had more to fear from the criminal element?
As for the bill of rights, read it again. It does have wording regarding the militia. However, read more from the time and you'll find that the "militia" was every able-bodied man in America. That means I am a member of the militia, along with a large portion of the population. And it doesn't say that you have to be militia to own weapons either, it says the right to own weapons is "nessicary for" a militia.