You seem to think of the Earth as a safe haven. It isn't. This gentle blue planet has tried to kill every living thing on it at least four times over the eons, maybe the next time it'll succeed.
For example, the megavolcano in Yellowstone could go medieval on us and kill everything but the cockroaches and Chuck Norris.
It's short-sighted to think "building more innovative, sustainable, protected environs right here on Earth" is any kind of plan for dealing with a hostile Universe. We need to get off this rock and emigrate to other galaxies ASAP, because who knows when the black hole at the center of this one will suck us in, or we could get slammed by a dinosaur killer, or even be consumed by an enormous mutant star goat.
Depends on how you define "long", but I agree only next two years of shuttle flights are at risk. Thanks to atmospheric drag the bag will lose about 20 miles of altitude a year, so it'll come crashing Earthwards late in 2010.
That's the problem, nobody knows where it'll finally end up, but it's likely it'll be floating within ten miles of the ISS, just waiting for the law of averages to catch up with some luckless shuttle.
No, the slight gravitational pull of the ISS may bring it back eventually, but the bag is in about the same orbit as the ISS so it'll be orbiting at about the same speed, keeping pace with the station.
I heard complaints like yours back during the Apollo program: Why spend so much money on space exploration when there's so much poverty in the US? So we stopped going to the Moon and spent all that money on social programs, which is why there are no more poor people in America.
The only problem with space exploration is that it's run by a government agency. If it was privately run, every time a shuttle lifted off, they'd have also orbited the fuel tanks rather than allow them to drop back to Earth. We'd have been able to connect them for a ready-made space station, instead of the ridiculous tinker toy ISS we've been assembling for a decade. Oh well, NASA's days are numbered, commercial space travel is almost on us, assuming short-sighted people don't kill mankind's future out of a misplaced sense of economy.
That's just great, she got sloppy and managed to lose a kit of heavy tools in an orbit that'll keep it a hazard to shuttles docking with the ISS.
As if the shuttle missions weren't dangerous enough, if they don't retrieve that kit, there's the potential of a future shuttle's pilot being (briefly) surprised as the wayward tools come crashing through the cockpit window, followed by the rush of escaping air, orifices spouting blood, and (for the grand prize) an out-of-control shuttle slamming into the ISS. Michael Bay call your office.
Correct except you've forgotten about the Corona Problem. The Sun's corona is more than a million degrees and nobody knows why yet. Probably some magnetic field effect, but if we can harness the effect and keep it going much further out from Sol, we can heat all the water you need.
It would work just like Doc Smith's Sunbeam, except you wouldn't be shooting at inertialess planets (much).
jamesh (87723), in mid psychotic break, burbled the following:
YHBT
YHL
HAND
Or: You Have Been Trolled. You Have Lost. Have A Nice Day.
What a bonehead you are, if you're going to act like an immature fool, always remember to post as an anonymous coward. You weren't trolling, you spoke your mind and the rest of us were amazed at the hollow echoes.
"If "everybody knows" such-and-such, then it ain't so, by at least ten thousand to one." Robert Heinlein.
Now, care to exercise your brain and provide a few facts, or will you continue being a conspiracy theory slacker? Does Big Oil control China and India? Do you really feel (notice I didn't write "think") that those nations would hold off deploying superior technologies if it gave them a competitive edge?
We're having a political discussion, I provide links and my post gets modded "Troll", whereas you offer hard facts like "owned by hard-core right-winger billionaires, run by hard-core right-winger CEOs and hard-core right-winger board of directors" and "politically-motivated brain-washing psychological warfare donkey-dung", so of course that rates "Interesting."
Clearly you understand your audience better than I do. But I've got better things to do than pursue this.
Many things come to mind when reading your comment:
- You didn't follow the link in my post that shows conclusively how biased the media is
- You have no proof that it is a "Karl Rove-inspired myth" or I presume you would have provided a link. Bluster doesn't win an argument, and yours is somewhat tiresome
- Have you ever looked at those boards and such you mention? What do you think it proves, that rich guys are all Republicans? Wrong!
The fairness doctrine does not apply to news media which is uniformly biased to Dems/liberals. What'll happen is that the obligation to provide "balance" to political talk radio and other venues where conservatives dominate will be so onerous that it will force those shows off the air. The libs already own the news media, hence conservatives won't have a voice, so yeah, you bring back the FD and you censor conservative opinion.
Thanks for backing up your assertions with corroborating links, crashfrog. [/sarcasm]
You don't consider several different people commenting on blogs in support of Greenwald while using his IP address and many of the same mannerisms to be "damning" or even suspicious?! Not to mention all the other evidence included in the article.
I can't believe you even read the article. Or... maybe...
A not insane scientist doing research on alligators or crocs discovers that they have a congenital heart condition (hole in the heart wall I think it was) that made them so sluggish. He fixes the gene, the hole is healed, and shortly afterward the story ends with humanity living underground in fear of winged fire-breathing dragons.
"Is this just pop psychology masquerading as science?"
Yes. Otherwise they'd call it "going engineer" instead of "going postal".
Besides, wouldn't technical writers be even more qualified? They'd seem to be a match as defined by the article: "focus and attention to details, along with their perceived lack of social skills, make them ideal targets to be recruited as terrorists". Plus, they wouldn't have to understand what's going on inside the backpack, just how to work the controls. And, they suffer from the job frustration that "nobody reads the manual anyway."
Precisely,
The U.S. Constitution obeys the inverse-square law, so I'll leave it up to the math chaps to work out how much less important the 4th is than the 1st (and as for the 28th, it's so unimportant it doesn't exist!).
Slashdot Mirror
You seem to think of the Earth as a safe haven. It isn't. This gentle blue planet has tried to kill every living thing on it at least four times over the eons, maybe the next time it'll succeed.
For example, the megavolcano in Yellowstone could go medieval on us and kill everything but the cockroaches and Chuck Norris.
It's short-sighted to think "building more innovative, sustainable, protected environs right here on Earth" is any kind of plan for dealing with a hostile Universe. We need to get off this rock and emigrate to other galaxies ASAP, because who knows when the black hole at the center of this one will suck us in, or we could get slammed by a dinosaur killer, or even be consumed by an enormous mutant star goat.
Depends on how you define "long", but I agree only next two years of shuttle flights are at risk. Thanks to atmospheric drag the bag will lose about 20 miles of altitude a year, so it'll come crashing Earthwards late in 2010.
That's the problem, nobody knows where it'll finally end up, but it's likely it'll be floating within ten miles of the ISS, just waiting for the law of averages to catch up with some luckless shuttle.
No, the slight gravitational pull of the ISS may bring it back eventually, but the bag is in about the same orbit as the ISS so it'll be orbiting at about the same speed, keeping pace with the station.
That's not very likely since aliens usually probe Uranus.
I heard complaints like yours back during the Apollo program: Why spend so much money on space exploration when there's so much poverty in the US? So we stopped going to the Moon and spent all that money on social programs, which is why there are no more poor people in America.
The only problem with space exploration is that it's run by a government agency. If it was privately run, every time a shuttle lifted off, they'd have also orbited the fuel tanks rather than allow them to drop back to Earth. We'd have been able to connect them for a ready-made space station, instead of the ridiculous tinker toy ISS we've been assembling for a decade. Oh well, NASA's days are numbered, commercial space travel is almost on us, assuming short-sighted people don't kill mankind's future out of a misplaced sense of economy.
That's just great, she got sloppy and managed to lose a kit of heavy tools in an orbit that'll keep it a hazard to shuttles docking with the ISS.
As if the shuttle missions weren't dangerous enough, if they don't retrieve that kit, there's the potential of a future shuttle's pilot being (briefly) surprised as the wayward tools come crashing through the cockpit window, followed by the rush of escaping air, orifices spouting blood, and (for the grand prize) an out-of-control shuttle slamming into the ISS. Michael Bay call your office.
Correct except you've forgotten about the Corona Problem. The Sun's corona is more than a million degrees and nobody knows why yet. Probably some magnetic field effect, but if we can harness the effect and keep it going much further out from Sol, we can heat all the water you need.
It would work just like Doc Smith's Sunbeam, except you wouldn't be shooting at inertialess planets (much).
Fill it up with distilled water--it's an excellent insulator.
The Napoleon scale rates aircraft/spacecraft on the likelihood that they would have enabled him to win the Battle of Waterloo.
B-52: 0
B-2: +6.3
U.S.S. Enterprise (NCC-1701): +3,000,000.5
Death Star (Mk II): +4,000,000
Or: You Have Been Trolled. You Have Lost. Have A Nice Day.
What a bonehead you are, if you're going to act like an immature fool, always remember to post as an anonymous coward. You weren't trolling, you spoke your mind and the rest of us were amazed at the hollow echoes.
No, Who's on, first base. And if you're asking what's the name of the guy who killed the electric car, What is on second.
"If "everybody knows" such-and-such, then it ain't so, by at least ten thousand to one."
Robert Heinlein.
Now, care to exercise your brain and provide a few facts, or will you continue being a conspiracy theory slacker? Does Big Oil control China and India? Do you really feel (notice I didn't write "think") that those nations would hold off deploying superior technologies if it gave them a competitive edge?
We're having a political discussion, I provide links and my post gets modded "Troll", whereas you offer hard facts like "owned by hard-core right-winger billionaires, run by hard-core right-winger CEOs and hard-core right-winger board of directors" and "politically-motivated brain-washing psychological warfare donkey-dung", so of course that rates "Interesting."
Clearly you understand your audience better than I do. But I've got better things to do than pursue this.
Many things come to mind when reading your comment:
- You didn't follow the link in my post that shows conclusively how biased the media is
- You have no proof that it is a "Karl Rove-inspired myth" or I presume you would have provided a link. Bluster doesn't win an argument, and yours is somewhat tiresome
- Have you ever looked at those boards and such you mention? What do you think it proves, that rich guys are all Republicans? Wrong!
The fairness doctrine does not apply to news media which is uniformly biased to Dems/liberals. What'll happen is that the obligation to provide "balance" to political talk radio and other venues where conservatives dominate will be so onerous that it will force those shows off the air. The libs already own the news media, hence conservatives won't have a voice, so yeah, you bring back the FD and you censor conservative opinion.
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury:
The one who smelt it, dealt it!
A pedant, eh? Too bad for you.
Thanks for backing up your assertions with corroborating links, crashfrog. [/sarcasm]
You don't consider several different people commenting on blogs in support of Greenwald while using his IP address and many of the same mannerisms to be "damning" or even suspicious?! Not to mention all the other evidence included in the article.
I can't believe you even read the article. Or... maybe...
Glenn, is that you?
Greenwald's got a rep for turgid prose and multiple personalities.
Well if Glenn Greenwald said it, I agree with him. Glenn is always right and he's very smart and has LOADS of integrity. Yay Glenn!
Signed
Not a sock-puppet.
From Alfred Hitchcock's Book of Monster (IIRC)
A not insane scientist doing research on alligators or crocs discovers that they have a congenital heart condition (hole in the heart wall I think it was) that made them so sluggish. He fixes the gene, the hole is healed, and shortly afterward the story ends with humanity living underground in fear of winged fire-breathing dragons.
"Is this just pop psychology masquerading as science?"
Yes. Otherwise they'd call it "going engineer" instead of "going postal".
Besides, wouldn't technical writers be even more qualified? They'd seem to be a match as defined by the article: "focus and attention to details, along with their perceived lack of social skills, make them ideal targets to be recruited as terrorists". Plus, they wouldn't have to understand what's going on inside the backpack, just how to work the controls. And, they suffer from the job frustration that "nobody reads the manual anyway."
QED
Precisely, The U.S. Constitution obeys the inverse-square law, so I'll leave it up to the math chaps to work out how much less important the 4th is than the 1st (and as for the 28th, it's so unimportant it doesn't exist!).
I'll bet they wonder "Hey, where's my flying car?!"