"Einstein said information can't travel faster than light, and in this case, as with all fast-light experiments, no information is truly moving faster than light," says Boyd.
I hate it when headlines use the semantics of "the speed of light" to sound sensational. "The speed of light" is just used to refer to the maximum speed of information propagation because light in a vacuum travels as that speed. I can change the speed of light by wearing glasses; while experiments similar to the one in TFA are much more complex and interesting, the point is that neither one is affecting the speed of information at all.
Not even a hypothesis, actually. Valid hypotheses are falsifiable. "Nothing in nature has a true beginning and end, everything is part of a larger cycle" is not.
There is nothing magical about scientists that separates them from non-scientists. Science is a method anyone can use. Fanciful statements about the grand order of things and how natural phenomena are governed by laws inferred from common sense, however, do not science make. We should accept whatever theory is most consistent with the evidence, with a degree of reservation proportional to said theory's contradictions or shortcomings, be they internal inconsistencies or empirical evidence that it cannot explain.
Besides, if you want a common sense system to explain the universe, I recommend basing it on the Ptolemaic system--at least that one has had some pretty good mileage.
I'm not an astro-physicist and have no data to back this up.
Then why, pray tell, did you bother to enlighten us with your "theories?"
Common sense told Aristotle that objects fall because they are trying to return to a natural state of rest. Common sense and intuition are ridiculously bad tools for scientific inquiry. Esthetically-pleasing deductions with no empirical evidence are even worse.
Media is so redundant these days. I mean, why did they even make Saving Private Ryan when The Longest Day had already been filmed? Why even write Paradise Lost and Paradise Found when the Divine Comedy had already been written?
I'm not saying that Evangelion is a timeless classic, but it's no Voltron. If you get nothing more out of it than "person in a giant robot," you should probably stop watching anything more complicated than romantic comedies.
I'm totally unsympathetic to your lack of reasoning. The GP was referring to trustworthiness with respect to reporting something which could influence people to pay the reporter. Saying that everyone works for cash is a smokescreen. He never said you shouldn't trust that their anti-virus software works, which is the strawman your reply addresses. Saying that you shouldn't trust people when they are better off telling you a particular thing regardless of its truth is just good sense.
I have been told by reliable sources that the ESRB rating board in fact contains nudity, and that it can be unlocked simply by undressing the board members. I must therefore recommend that this story be rated M, and that/. prevent minors from reading it.
Intel Macs don't have a BIOS. They cannot boot an operating system targeted at an IBM PC compatible without special software. Although it would probably be more accurate simply to refer to "Windows" instead of "PCs" (as they are clearly talking about Windows), they probably want to avoid using the name of their competition.
Also, "democracy" in modern language usually refers to representative forms of government even in most political discussions. Even the Athenian democracy consisted of rule by a minority of the people. Even so, representative democracies outnumber direct democracies vastly; in fact, it's a case of many against one, just like makers of IBM compatible personal computers outnumber makers of Macintosh personal computers many against one.
I bet you're one of those people who thinks you sound smart when you insist, "America isn't a democracy! It's a representative republic!"
It's semantics. "PC" in this context means IBM PC compatible. You know, I know it, and everyone reading this knows it. Pretending to be naive about it accomplishes nothing.
There are producers, editors, recording technicians, etc.
And they get paid fuck-all, too. The marketers, the executives, and the stockholders get most of the money; that is, the people who contribute the least value get the greatest reward.
Think a little bit more, there is a real issue here, especially ethically. Copyright restricts what consenting parties do behind closed doors. Free societies should try to aviod such restrictions in all but the most extreme cases.
Nobody cares about you making copies of something you already own for personal use or private exhibition. In fact, that's probably already covered by fair use. The issue here is redistribution. I believe that copyright reform is in order, too, but don't try to cast it as a privacy issue when it isn't.
Okay, that was a bad example. But if you can pronounce a consonant and a vowel, it follows that you can pronounce the consonant followed by the vowel (as is the case for "we"). That doesn't necessarily hold for combining consonants you can independently pronounce, so Americans pronouncing "Ljuba" isn't analagous. (And no cheating and saying that "w" is really a vowel because you can make it in the slur between two vowels.)
The "w" sound is a semivowel, glide, or semiconsonant--take your pick (it's an approximant too, but not all approximants are semivowels). It is not a consonant. Furthermore, glides always form diphthongs with vowels.
The first time I was introduced to the sound I couldn't, that's correct. That's what's at issue: within their own language and without exposure to sounds outside of it, can the Japanese (or relevant native speaker) pronounce "we" (or relevant difficult sound)? Obviously, given enough practice, and without a physical impediment, anyone can make any phonetic sound, yet "The Japanese can't pronounce 'we'" still has meaning. It's just wrong in this case. The can say "wakazashi". I'm sure they can cut out the middle.
As I already said, English-speakers can and do pronounce voiceless "l"--yet most people aren't even aware that it's a sound in English! I do agree that saying that the Japanese can't pronounce "wi" is excessive, but the fact remains that it is awkward, just like it's awkward for any speaker to pronounce a sound that isn't an explicit part of their language. For example, I find it difficult to distinguish between "oo" and "ou" in Japanese, despite the fact that both of these sounds occur in English, because there is never an explicit difference between the two in English--there are no pairs of words that are distinguished solely by the difference between these two sounds.
I think the real confusion here is that in English, we think of sounds single phonemes, whereas in Japanese, they think of sounds as mora. If you ask a Japanese person what sounds are in Japanese, they won't start with, "a, b, c" or "k, s, t." They'll start with "ka, sa, ta," then work their way to "ki, shi, chi," etc.
Slashdot Mirror
Encryption may not be a must for most people, but keeping the government out of one's private business is a must for all people, everywhere.
You are factually incorrect. Fortunately, that is just your opinion :)
I'm not worried. I have a rock that keeps cancer away.
The point isn't just to steal an election; the point is to steal it and to be able to deny that it was stolen at all.
I hate it when headlines use the semantics of "the speed of light" to sound sensational. "The speed of light" is just used to refer to the maximum speed of information propagation because light in a vacuum travels as that speed. I can change the speed of light by wearing glasses; while experiments similar to the one in TFA are much more complex and interesting, the point is that neither one is affecting the speed of information at all.
Apple is going to sue now that /. has a link to a page containing a link to the picture!
I don't know what nitpicking sounds like, but I imagine it isn't very loud, whereas your post sounded like a "whoosh" at 100 decibels.
There is nothing magical about scientists that separates them from non-scientists. Science is a method anyone can use. Fanciful statements about the grand order of things and how natural phenomena are governed by laws inferred from common sense, however, do not science make. We should accept whatever theory is most consistent with the evidence, with a degree of reservation proportional to said theory's contradictions or shortcomings, be they internal inconsistencies or empirical evidence that it cannot explain.
Besides, if you want a common sense system to explain the universe, I recommend basing it on the Ptolemaic system--at least that one has had some pretty good mileage.
Then why, pray tell, did you bother to enlighten us with your "theories?"
Common sense told Aristotle that objects fall because they are trying to return to a natural state of rest. Common sense and intuition are ridiculously bad tools for scientific inquiry. Esthetically-pleasing deductions with no empirical evidence are even worse.
I'm not saying that Evangelion is a timeless classic, but it's no Voltron. If you get nothing more out of it than "person in a giant robot," you should probably stop watching anything more complicated than romantic comedies.
I'm totally unsympathetic to your lack of reasoning. The GP was referring to trustworthiness with respect to reporting something which could influence people to pay the reporter. Saying that everyone works for cash is a smokescreen. He never said you shouldn't trust that their anti-virus software works, which is the strawman your reply addresses. Saying that you shouldn't trust people when they are better off telling you a particular thing regardless of its truth is just good sense.
I have been told by reliable sources that the ESRB rating board in fact contains nudity, and that it can be unlocked simply by undressing the board members. I must therefore recommend that this story be rated M, and that /. prevent minors from reading it.
England isn't a country, but it's arguably a nation. The Anglo-Saxons are of a different nationality than the Welsh or the Scots.
Sure, anything you can hear, you can copy, but if you want to copy it, it's probably easier just to download it off a P2P network anyway.
That's okay, but the RIAA demands that you wait at least 70 years for free music.
Also, "democracy" in modern language usually refers to representative forms of government even in most political discussions. Even the Athenian democracy consisted of rule by a minority of the people. Even so, representative democracies outnumber direct democracies vastly; in fact, it's a case of many against one, just like makers of IBM compatible personal computers outnumber makers of Macintosh personal computers many against one.
I'm going to go out on a limb here, and make a wild guess that Linux users aren't the target audience of this marketing campaign.
It's semantics. "PC" in this context means IBM PC compatible. You know, I know it, and everyone reading this knows it. Pretending to be naive about it accomplishes nothing.
And they get paid fuck-all, too. The marketers, the executives, and the stockholders get most of the money; that is, the people who contribute the least value get the greatest reward.
Thank, you sir! I'm glad someone finally has the courage to stand up to mainstream pedestrian trash like Shakespeare and Beethoven.
I believe it was Arthur C. Clarke who said, "Any sufficiently advanced trolling is indistinguishable from stupidity."
Nobody cares about you making copies of something you already own for personal use or private exhibition. In fact, that's probably already covered by fair use. The issue here is redistribution. I believe that copyright reform is in order, too, but don't try to cast it as a privacy issue when it isn't.
There are archaic kana for "wi" and "we."
Actually, they use "u" to do this already for foreign words.
The "w" sound is a semivowel, glide, or semiconsonant--take your pick (it's an approximant too, but not all approximants are semivowels). It is not a consonant. Furthermore, glides always form diphthongs with vowels.
The first time I was introduced to the sound I couldn't, that's correct. That's what's at issue: within their own language and without exposure to sounds outside of it, can the Japanese (or relevant native speaker) pronounce "we" (or relevant difficult sound)? Obviously, given enough practice, and without a physical impediment, anyone can make any phonetic sound, yet "The Japanese can't pronounce 'we'" still has meaning. It's just wrong in this case. The can say "wakazashi". I'm sure they can cut out the middle.
As I already said, English-speakers can and do pronounce voiceless "l"--yet most people aren't even aware that it's a sound in English! I do agree that saying that the Japanese can't pronounce "wi" is excessive, but the fact remains that it is awkward, just like it's awkward for any speaker to pronounce a sound that isn't an explicit part of their language. For example, I find it difficult to distinguish between "oo" and "ou" in Japanese, despite the fact that both of these sounds occur in English, because there is never an explicit difference between the two in English--there are no pairs of words that are distinguished solely by the difference between these two sounds.
I think the real confusion here is that in English, we think of sounds single phonemes, whereas in Japanese, they think of sounds as mora. If you ask a Japanese person what sounds are in Japanese, they won't start with, "a, b, c" or "k, s, t." They'll start with "ka, sa, ta," then work their way to "ki, shi, chi," etc.