Naturally, they would breed prodigiously; there would be much time, and little to do. And, with the proper breeding techniques and a ratio of say, ten females to each male, society could be rebuilt. Though since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly stimulating nature.
Apart from not mentioning beer, your argument seems compelling.
Pre-arrange such things with your family. Get a keyword between you. Or a private joke that you can deliberately ruin when you're actually in trouble. Something that others won't notice. Because the guy kidnapping your daughter might actually be that boyfriend she trusted and knows her well and that she has to phone daddy every Monday or he'll get suspicious, so he lets her but listens in. She might need that way to make herself known without anyone else noticing.
Or, more simply, never let any of your family leave the house without an armed escort. Or just never leave the house at all. (You can always order in pizza).
It would actually be interesting to know whether or not the pizza was delivered and, if so, who by.
I imagine that Pizza Hut would be reluctant to send someone into a potentially dangerous situation, so it probably wasn't delivered, but you never know.
Yes, that is clearly the most interesting thing about this story.
You're right. I only realized how good the appliances were when I house sat for a month. All she said to the salesperson was "I just want quality. I don't ever want to buy it again." Good sales staff know their products, know about return data/model and respect warranty issues.
They also know how to milk a customer with more money than sense.
A magnetron is a (type of) old fashioned vacuum tube.
Originally designed for radar back in ye olden times, then re-purposed when some guy melted a chocolate bar in his pocket by mistake and thought "hang on, that's kinda cool" (rather than the more obvious "ow my balls", which some would argue would have been a more rational response given proximity to said chocolate).
I'm sure I heard a story that it was James Lovelock (the Gaia guy), but according to Wikipedia at least it's someone called Percy Spencer. At least, he was the first to patent it.
I recently replaced my old dryer with one that shuts off when it considers the clothes dry enough.
And we all know what happens next...
"The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic, they try to pull the plug."
Anecdotelly I suspect the whole drier-obsession is largely a US thing. I own a drier, but it only gets used rarely - usually when I've run out of clean options for clothing item x and only realise at the last minute.
Electricity is expensive, and hanging clothes up really isn't all that hard.
It all depends where you live. if you're in a hot, dry climate, then I agree. Here in the UK, unless it's a clear summer's day, hanging stuff up outside just doesn't work a lot of the time.
Most of you have no clue what the FBI is really about.
I just typed a bunch of stuff that would have shocked some of
you but I thought better of posting it, because I don't need any more
visits from black Suburbans.
And how do you know they aren't recording what you type via a powerful microwave key-logger anyway?
There was a period of a month or so that I answered the phone (when caller-ID showed that it was a friend who was in on the joke) with things like "Kill the president" or "The dirty bomb is ready".;-) This was after the news about Total Information Awareness came out (really, anyone who was surprised by the Snowden leaks hadn't been paying attention for the past decade prior... it was obvious what sort of capabilities they were working toward. Heck even back in the 1990s with Carnivore the US government was already starting down this path).
So if teh evil government are recording all this, why didn't they send someone round to check up on you and/or beat a confession out of you? It's almost like they only apply it to actual malefactors.
Unless you're some sort of crusading twat trying to show that you live in a police state, or you have suffered a serious brain injury or something, then the only reason for not giving up the password to your encrypted disk is because what's on there is going to get you more than a couple of years in jail, i.e. you're a criminal.
How is turning your computer off "destruction of evidence"?
If you were looking at child porn or cracking someone's online bank account, then turning your computer off most certainly destroys the (immediate) evidence of what you were doing.
Just because something has legitimate uses doesn't mean it can't have illegitimate ones as well.
The unexpected reboot is clearly because it spotted something it shouldn't have. Can't let any photos of [elided] reach Earth. Can you imagine what would happen!?
It probably spotted a door onto the set in Area 51 where it's going round in circles.
He admitted to 7 hours and 10 minutes, and that's assuming no real waiting time, and an implausibly quick airport exit time. And omitting the time to get to his destination at the other end, although possibly his extremely wealthy consulting client has his meetings in the airport bar.
8 hours sounds about the minimum to me, and certainly not 5.
But The People as a whole gained from the improved transportation infrastructure. Not sure what gain for my tax dollars when it goes to paying someone not to work instead...
It prevents them from starting a revolution and taking your bread off you rather than starving?
How many tries did it take to get to antarctica -- which I think is a really great example. So is everest. Congrats, after many attempts, someone got there. Who's gone back to build a house? Do you want to go build one?
Good point, but certainly with antarctica if there were large quantities of (say) oil available, then you would certainly have people living there for a few months at a time on a shift basis. Although you'd have to be insane to want to live there permanently, like the Mars wannabe colonists signing up for their one way tickets.
Shouldn't the marketplace be allowed to take care of the question?
Yeah, if everything was free market, there would be no crime, children could play in bubblegum fountains in their front yards, and cats would make love to dogs.
Slashdot Mirror
There may be some leaks but hopefully the colonists can make some sort of cement out of the Martian dirt to plug them.
Lucky you covered that last point, I was getting worried your plan was insanely risky.
Hookers and blackjack.
In fact, forget the blackjack.
Naturally, they would breed prodigiously; there would be much time, and little to do. And, with the proper breeding techniques and a ratio of say, ten females to each male, society could be rebuilt. Though since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly stimulating nature.
Apart from not mentioning beer, your argument seems compelling.
Pre-arrange such things with your family. Get a keyword between you. Or a private joke that you can deliberately ruin when you're actually in trouble. Something that others won't notice. Because the guy kidnapping your daughter might actually be that boyfriend she trusted and knows her well and that she has to phone daddy every Monday or he'll get suspicious, so he lets her but listens in. She might need that way to make herself known without anyone else noticing.
Or, more simply, never let any of your family leave the house without an armed escort. Or just never leave the house at all. (You can always order in pizza).
It would actually be interesting to know whether or not the pizza was delivered and, if so, who by. I imagine that Pizza Hut would be reluctant to send someone into a potentially dangerous situation, so it probably wasn't delivered, but you never know.
Yes, that is clearly the most interesting thing about this story.
You're right. I only realized how good the appliances were when I house sat for a month. All she said to the salesperson was "I just want quality. I don't ever want to buy it again." Good sales staff know their products, know about return data/model and respect warranty issues.
They also know how to milk a customer with more money than sense.
A magnetron is a (type of) old fashioned vacuum tube.
Originally designed for radar back in ye olden times, then re-purposed when some guy melted a chocolate bar in his pocket by mistake and thought "hang on, that's kinda cool" (rather than the more obvious "ow my balls", which some would argue would have been a more rational response given proximity to said chocolate).
I'm sure I heard a story that it was James Lovelock (the Gaia guy), but according to Wikipedia at least it's someone called Percy Spencer. At least, he was the first to patent it.
I recently replaced my old dryer with one that shuts off when it considers the clothes dry enough.
And we all know what happens next... "The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic, they try to pull the plug."
Anecdotelly I suspect the whole drier-obsession is largely a US thing. I own a drier, but it only gets used rarely - usually when I've run out of clean options for clothing item x and only realise at the last minute.
Electricity is expensive, and hanging clothes up really isn't all that hard.
It all depends where you live. if you're in a hot, dry climate, then I agree. Here in the UK, unless it's a clear summer's day, hanging stuff up outside just doesn't work a lot of the time.
Most of you have no clue what the FBI is really about.
I just typed a bunch of stuff that would have shocked some of you but I thought better of posting it, because I don't need any more visits from black Suburbans.
And how do you know they aren't recording what you type via a powerful microwave key-logger anyway?
There was a period of a month or so that I answered the phone (when caller-ID showed that it was a friend who was in on the joke) with things like "Kill the president" or "The dirty bomb is ready". ;-) This was after the news about Total Information Awareness came out (really, anyone who was surprised by the Snowden leaks hadn't been paying attention for the past decade prior... it was obvious what sort of capabilities they were working toward. Heck even back in the 1990s with Carnivore the US government was already starting down this path).
So if teh evil government are recording all this, why didn't they send someone round to check up on you and/or beat a confession out of you? It's almost like they only apply it to actual malefactors.
Turing was not breaking codes and reading messages of British citizens !
How can you possibly know that?
I imagine that if the Military found an encrypted message from a possible spy they wouldn't have said "we can't touch this, he's a British citizen".
A criminal using a computer is a criminal.
How is turning your computer off "destruction of evidence"?
If you were looking at child porn or cracking someone's online bank account, then turning your computer off most certainly destroys the (immediate) evidence of what you were doing.
Just because something has legitimate uses doesn't mean it can't have illegitimate ones as well.
Water on Mars would make it more habitable than California.
Sure, once they get the atmosphere pumps working Total Recall style.
The unexpected reboot is clearly because it spotted something it shouldn't have. Can't let any photos of [elided] reach Earth. Can you imagine what would happen!?
It probably spotted a door onto the set in Area 51 where it's going round in circles.
There's nothing wrong with failing, that's part of life.
Speak for yourself: the only thing I fail at is failing, where I fail spectacularly to fail.
Or something.
If you designed something to last for 90 days and it lasts for 4000 you've over-engineered the solution.
When your workshop is 140 million miles away, that's probably a good idea.
The only reason why Humans have not been on Mars is that we can't find a really good reason to do it.
Well yes, that is kind of the issue.
People generally mumble something about mining He3 at this point.
8 hours sounds about the minimum to me, and certainly not 5.
Sorry if you've never had money or have been in a position with money to pay for that
Thanks for slipping in the essential information that you're rich, it makes all the difference when talking about flight times.
Twat.
But The People as a whole gained from the improved transportation infrastructure. Not sure what gain for my tax dollars when it goes to paying someone not to work instead...
It prevents them from starting a revolution and taking your bread off you rather than starving?
How many tries did it take to get to antarctica -- which I think is a really great example. So is everest. Congrats, after many attempts, someone got there. Who's gone back to build a house? Do you want to go build one?
Good point, but certainly with antarctica if there were large quantities of (say) oil available, then you would certainly have people living there for a few months at a time on a shift basis. Although you'd have to be insane to want to live there permanently, like the Mars wannabe colonists signing up for their one way tickets.
What were you thinking, putting an autoplaying video on the front page????
(Sorry for going offtopic) Strange that video's never autoplay on my computer. Maybe you should install adblock+, ghostery, muter, ... or something.
Yes, because everyone reads slashdot on their infinitely customisable home computer, and not at work.
Shouldn't the marketplace be allowed to take care of the question?
Yeah, if everything was free market, there would be no crime, children could play in bubblegum fountains in their front yards, and cats would make love to dogs.