Abundant, cheap entertainment and poor quality food is all that is needed to control a population. Give them that, and you can do anything to them.
Im all for the spread of technology and golbalisation (you only need to look at chinas living standards), but it seems that as we become more and more dependant on the "world" economy, the importance of policies and politics at home become less important.
I originally asked if the head poster was on crack.
I take tha back now
Are you on crack?
Im getting slightly confused.
1. The Holocaust is the name given to the jewish extermination in WW2, by definition it is a noun and cant be used an as adjective to describe the events in WW2.
2. Im not sure if your for or against Asian people from that sentance, but frankly many of my clostest friends, and yeh i live in Australia are from Korea, Japan and other asian nations. To me they are simply as human am. By which i mean they are just trying to live their lives, pay of a morgage, raise their kids like anyone else. They wouldnt appreciate what you said.
4. Just as with the japanese, people who call themselves jewish, just like the majority of people who call themselves Christian are just trying to live their lives. Religion forms only a small part of their everyday life, and... Your to far gone down the path of hate to be saved by me.
I highly doubt that the DoD is using windows on its mission critical systems (those that hold information of any value or guard a routing point). I would guess that they run their own entire system a far cry from anything avaliable to us, something home brew and totally designed from the ground up to do one job and do it well.
BEGIN Speculation The government might even have some kind of intelligent system (im not saying AI) that is able to recognise new and unfamilure traffic, and take actions accordingly to prevent anything from happening. Something at the moment consumers like us can only dream of. END Speculation
The question "What caused the depression?" is not ment to imply we have no clue as to its cause, it is simply a question which relates to the varying degrees of factors involved. For instance the Stock Market Crash, and its own causes, is known to have played a large role as well as international trade and curreny at the time.
Suffice it to say, you can "hypothesis" that a few people in the mid-twenty's were able to predict, control, deal with and would want to cause a depression as much as you want, but you have no proof.
Its hard enough today to predict a local economy let alone the world economy today. Such a feat in the late 20's would have been near on impossible. I will give you that there are certain people and organisations who weild the ability to effect global supply and demand, mainly supply such as is the case in cartels and monopolies. But in the whole scheme of things they are but small players, and as well calculated as their moves are today they are still frought with danger against the inherint impredictability of the economy. Yes im aware of the snowball effect, but you 'cannot' tell that a group of investors part of a secret organisation in the late 20's were able to predict and profit from its path.
See what you and others like yourself get wrong every single time is one simply fact. People. History is made by people. We're not in a movie. Im sure the government has things it doesnt want us to know and im sure there are shady business deals going on in every economy everywhere in the world, but this is still reality. Let me jog your memory, People are born, most are raised by loving parents, they get an education, find work and raise and love their own families. Yeh some people are pure evil, but their predisposition is to destruction themselves. The idea of a group of business people over 100 years old who have the mentality and pacience, and intelligence and lack of love to profit from and cause all the pain of the depression is the most unlikely of mixes. Surely they would also be able to predict how close it brought the world to communism. Economists and business people like to play a game of calculated risk. Im not an economist, but i can tell you right now, causing and attempting to profit from the greatest depression in human history is a risk no one would take, let alone a banker or bank.
You have no correlations, no consequence, no evidence, no proof and no clear story or sequence of events like any theory should. All you seem to do is forget the hundreds of millions even billions of people out there who all play a role in the economic system at a discernable level, as each and everyone of them makes their own consumer based choices on the success and failure of companies.
You are wrong. People are people, some are good some are bad, but we dont live in a movie, There are not people who happen to be economists, intelligent enough, both evil and patient enough to predict and profit from the great depression. And while im sure some people did profit, they most certainly did not engineer it. A good example is how People always ask why we havnt blown ourselves up yet, or why the cold war didnt destory the earth, and i just give them examples of those radar watchemen during the cold war who ignored missile warnings, they're people, none of them on either side wanted to die. Technology might be wonderous, the history of the world terrible, but behind the scenes there is always a beauitful serenity to things that is not recorded in bold, be it the love in a family or the generosity and compassion of some companies and business people.
So i wish to finish on a note, because i feel you are as angry at capitalism as you are at these intelligent-risktaking-all-knowing-predicting-econ omists who ignored communism and human suffering to profit from a seemingly unpredicatable event nearly 100 years ago.
And here it is. Capitalism sucks. Thats right it sucks. The continual battle for economic freedom each of us
Right now there are two seperate generations of cards on the market (even an emerging 3rd), some very very affordable, which can best that card, and provide (in a roundabout way) support for linux. The utility cost of waiting for intel to bring out their chip may be disproportionate to simply buying todays budget cards.
I believe the intention of this article was to introduce a new and particularly well grounded way of using said electromagnaetic induction. I dont believe the makers are stating anywhere that they have found a new way to transfer energy, they simply have made a push to have it integrated into our office lives.
I am not american. As a commerce student i'm not even going to bother to explain the theory and logic behind exactly how wrong you are, that would be to much of an insult. Simply put you are wrong. And as evidence of that you can look at the major Western OECD nations that neither have the US dollar or Euro as their currency. Lets just say the flexibility and response times of today modern cash markets simply do not push a country into depression just because its currency is not a dominant world currency.
As Good as this news in, does the slashdot community have to constantly reminded not only of the benifits of open source but more annoyingly, of every single government and private organisation which switches from Microsoft to oss?
Actually, the Large Hadron Super Collider does not have the creation of micro-singularities (aka black holes) in its objectives. Infact, some politions were concerned about this possibility, and scientists involved in the project to build the LHC did reseach into the possibility. They concluded that this accelerator does not have the power needed to collide particles at velocities needed to create small blackholes. Several orders of magnitude more power is requiredto do this.
The LHC is designed to verify many particle physics theories such as the possible existance of a Higgs Boson, or even a Meson responsible for the existance of mass, and at the greatest length, even may confirm the existance of a graviton.
Infact, even if two subatomic particles were able to be forced into a black hole, the result would be null since they would instantly decay due to hawking radiation.
Actually No, particle accelerators such as this are called cyclotrons and their ring shape is such that any particle placed within them can orbit a central point until the deisered velocity can be reached by proceeding through the same series of magnets over and over again, often close the speed of light. This is opposed to a cheaper and simpler liniar accelerator, which shoots particles down a long and stright tunnel.
This is because we already know the mass of the particles (such as molecular and atomic ions and hardrons) being used in the accelerator, and other means are used to dertermine the mass of the particles resulting from the collisions such measirng the radius of curves made in bubble-chambers close to a collison point.
This is also why it is called a Hadron Super Collider.
Shonky is an adjective used to describe how some objects are poorly designed, or more commonly, easy to break, as is the case with the ipod.
I'll take your comments on our dialect, you have provided just evidence and made a worthy argument. Although however, i believe you are mistaken in trying to overly exemplify the negative qualities of the language, esspecially in comparison to others. Surely, there are many dialects around the world, and many different people speaking them, Australias' is simply one of the them, and like any has its own features.
I would says its very must based on levels. Even in Australian society, as multicultural as it is, you'll find that there is a huge variety in the dialect. As a result of culture, background and the community you grew up in. The term 'shonky' does not have common usage as one might believe. If one really indeed must draw conclusions, the nature of our dialect, the shortening of words and commonly ill-pronouncement of words stems from the laid back nature of Australian life. But should never transpire into the working world. Just as one feels more comfortable talking freely at home, perhaps swareing as some might in other nations, Australians take pride in relaxing the language at home, but not to the extent that it should form any noticeable divergence from standard English.
You're true however about your claims of our hatered for Indian calling centres. I myself, excluding those that i miss while at work recieve 3 a day, specifically around dinner time, and often very early in the morning. But as i think most Australians would agree, its no reason to abuse them, they are simply doing their jobs. I do know a few people, and by that i mean alot, who take very offensive tones with the callers, that i cannot explain, i am sorry. An aubsive tone with anyone, doing their job, and earning a living, in the best way they know how, is something to be happy with, and if one does not like it, hang up.
Alas, to conclude, one must understand, Australian language is varied as much as the land it inherits, the multiculutral society, and friendly culture it embodies. Stereotypes like the one you painted are a means of ignorance, i am sorry, for i know many a forigner who will come here, and ask us please to speak 'Australian', all the while making fun of a stereotypical American accent. Please remember sir, that during those times, i accept that within america there are differences in the way you speak, the additues of people and the words you use, just as you should remember of ours.
It's actually a common misconception amoung our population that when the people behind water saving development schemes refer to "waste water", people imagine they are talking about recycling sewerage. Of course this is not true, infact when they refer to waste water they mean in the form of "storm water".
In many cases the storm water, after similar treatment to dam water is much cleaner then dam water itself, having not been prone to turbidity and eutrophication, as well as having lower levels of dissolved solids.
However...
The recycling of waste "storm water" is only a stop gab, as all recycling eventually is. Entropy must increase, isaac asimov would say, and so the real push for the government should be to invest in desalination and more dams (the dams around sydney were built when Sydneys population was 1/5 of what it is now).
As a fellow Australian, i would just like to remind you that this is NOT a national ID or "Australia Card". Sadly, the media has drawn dotted lines between this and the history of national ID cards, the civil protest and the very very slight relation with what is currently happening with national ID in other countries.
The card that Australia is introducing is not an ID card. It is simple a card that the Medical Care system and Welfare system, Medicare and Centerlink for us Australians, have chosen as a more secure replacement for their current cards. The card is not compulsary, and will contain nothing more then your name, address and details on your medicare and centerlink account number. Just like the drivers licemce, passport, credicard, and Club membership card you currently hold in your wallet.
Please understand the issue before commenting on it.
On the issue of National ID however, im all for it. Anything that combines the uncountable number of cards one needs, into one easy to use system is more then enough reason for me. If the government was going to infringe on our civil liberties, they would pass legislation applying to everyone, if they wanted to know who we are, they would look at our drivers licence, or other numorous forms of identification. So those aguments cannot be used in this discussion. If the government wants something about a person, or wants to restrict a person, they will do it, reguardless of the notion of a national ID.
Of cause the issue of stolen identity is always a real one, but has been such with all the forms of identification that exists above today. I'll say this, it is much harder for your inexperienced ID theif to steal your identity when he does not have the same finger prints, iris and dna as you as used on national ID cards. Compared to what? The cutting out of a picture from a passport, licence, or simply using ones name to apply for bank accounts and services. I would say that i feel much safer with an all encompassing ID card, then 1000 easily stolen and illegally used cards.
So lets stop looking at the negatives, because most of the time, civil rights advocates place these negatives on unfounded beliefe, calling it founded fact, with no re-callable evidence. Sure we're all scared of a 1984 type life, if we arnt already in one now, but thats a distant and scarey dream that we cannot let stop us from making progress in this world. Anything like DRM that makes life harder, is definetly a step back, however i can only see smart cards making life easier.
Lets look at the positive.
One smart card could: Provide proof of person - bithday, residence, name, etc Car Licence Flight Licence Numorous other licences: construction, doctors, etc etc Passport Credit/Bank Card And according to The Australian Doctors Association, be used by emergancy workers to identify health issues and conditions on demand. According to Police it could indeed make their lives alot easier in catching your everday regular criminals. and many more.
So lets all get a grip on reality. National Smart ID Cards are a good thing, if done right, making our lives that little bit easier. Becase if you have nothing to hide, then yu have nothing to worry about, and if you do have something to hide, then you should turn yourself in.
I read a paper on the justification of high bandwidth systems recently. It outlined as one point, how society has always managed to fill the extra bandiwdth with data, reguardless of what that data may be, increasing the rate of dissemination of data amoung people all over the world. I can only imagine the same applies for scientists.
The article gave the example of the Large Hadron Collider (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collide r) being built by CERN, which is expected to produce data in quantities thousands of times greater then previous accelerator experiements. The need to disseminate this data to locations around the world is critical to its analysis.
Along with these are that thousands upon thousands of experiments and measurmeents being taken every moment around the globe. All this data requires storage, transmission and compution. Weather simulations, aerodynamics, radiotelescope data, biochemical simulation, the list goes on.
Of course, if the sheer number of information producing tasks arn't enough, the definitive agument to why so much data is being generated is that with the increase of bandwidth and the power of computer, so too has the accuracy and speed of data collection increased. The micosecond is slow for todays chemical, physical and biological science.
Overall, its the number of experiments, the accuracy, resolution and speed of data generation, and the need for that data to be analysed around the globe that has created the mutual need, and provision of huge bandwidths such as those being investigated and used by I2.
For everyday folk like you and me, just go down to your accounting deparment and ask them how large their largest database is, you'll be suprised how unbelieveably data and bandwidth consuming financeal data has become since the revolution of the internet.
FYI a replacement has for alcohol has been known for a very very long time. It is called Kava.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kava. You could probly find it if you looked hard enough in your local area. It has the same effects as alcohol, without the possibility of a hangover.
It's lack of popularity however stems from The liquor companies reliance on the taste of alcohole and its addictive properties.
The increased amount of dust put into the atmosphere by smelting and fossile fuel burning apparnetly lowered the amount of sunlight reaching the earth, effectively reflecting it into space. However this was offset by the greenhouse effect.
Since the industrial revolution however, better technology has led to cleaner air, allowing more sunlight to enter the "green house"
Apparently it is a major major occurance, and was the largest scientific project next to global warming reasearch since 2000. However, very few people make the distinction between Global dimming and Warming.
In Australia, where i live, the Meterological service has noted drops of 10% in evaoration rates, caused by dimming, when they exclude drops caused by drought and day to day variations.
Slashdot Mirror
You're buying $1950 worth of DVD's a year. Try taking the kids to a themepark, going on an overseas holiday or trating the wife to a nice resuraunt.
Ill almost bet that at this rate you've exhausted any movie worth actually watching.
Bread and Circuses my good friend.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses
Abundant, cheap entertainment and poor quality food is all that is needed to control a population. Give them that, and you can do anything to them.
Im all for the spread of technology and golbalisation (you only need to look at chinas living standards), but it seems that as we become more and more dependant on the "world" economy, the importance of policies and politics at home become less important.
I wonder if this "Photon Server" can survive a slashdoting.
I originally asked if the head poster was on crack.
... Your to far gone down the path of hate to be saved by me.
I take tha back now
Are you on crack?
Im getting slightly confused.
1. The Holocaust is the name given to the jewish extermination in WW2, by definition it is a noun and cant be used an as adjective to describe the events in WW2.
2. Im not sure if your for or against Asian people from that sentance, but frankly many of my clostest friends, and yeh i live in Australia are from Korea, Japan and other asian nations. To me they are simply as human am. By which i mean they are just trying to live their lives, pay of a morgage, raise their kids like anyone else. They wouldnt appreciate what you said.
4. Just as with the japanese, people who call themselves jewish, just like the majority of people who call themselves Christian are just trying to live their lives. Religion forms only a small part of their everyday life, and
Im sorry, but after reading your first paragraph i really must ask:
Are you doing crack?
I highly doubt that the DoD is using windows on its mission critical systems (those that hold information of any value or guard a routing point). I would guess that they run their own entire system a far cry from anything avaliable to us, something home brew and totally designed from the ground up to do one job and do it well.
BEGIN Speculation
The government might even have some kind of intelligent system (im not saying AI) that is able to recognise new and unfamilure traffic, and take actions accordingly to prevent anything from happening. Something at the moment consumers like us can only dream of.
END Speculation
This is bullshit sorry.
The question "What caused the depression?" is not ment to imply we have no clue as to its cause, it is simply a question which relates to the varying degrees of factors involved. For instance the Stock Market Crash, and its own causes, is known to have played a large role as well as international trade and curreny at the time.
Suffice it to say, you can "hypothesis" that a few people in the mid-twenty's were able to predict, control, deal with and would want to cause a depression as much as you want, but you have no proof.
Its hard enough today to predict a local economy let alone the world economy today. Such a feat in the late 20's would have been near on impossible. I will give you that there are certain people and organisations who weild the ability to effect global supply and demand, mainly supply such as is the case in cartels and monopolies. But in the whole scheme of things they are but small players, and as well calculated as their moves are today they are still frought with danger against the inherint impredictability of the economy. Yes im aware of the snowball effect, but you 'cannot' tell that a group of investors part of a secret organisation in the late 20's were able to predict and profit from its path.
See what you and others like yourself get wrong every single time is one simply fact. People. History is made by people. We're not in a movie. Im sure the government has things it doesnt want us to know and im sure there are shady business deals going on in every economy everywhere in the world, but this is still reality. Let me jog your memory, People are born, most are raised by loving parents, they get an education, find work and raise and love their own families. Yeh some people are pure evil, but their predisposition is to destruction themselves. The idea of a group of business people over 100 years old who have the mentality and pacience, and intelligence and lack of love to profit from and cause all the pain of the depression is the most unlikely of mixes. Surely they would also be able to predict how close it brought the world to communism. Economists and business people like to play a game of calculated risk. Im not an economist, but i can tell you right now, causing and attempting to profit from the greatest depression in human history is a risk no one would take, let alone a banker or bank.
You have no correlations, no consequence, no evidence, no proof and no clear story or sequence of events like any theory should. All you seem to do is forget the hundreds of millions even billions of people out there who all play a role in the economic system at a discernable level, as each and everyone of them makes their own consumer based choices on the success and failure of companies.
You are wrong. People are people, some are good some are bad, but we dont live in a movie, There are not people who happen to be economists, intelligent enough, both evil and patient enough to predict and profit from the great depression. And while im sure some people did profit, they most certainly did not engineer it. A good example is how People always ask why we havnt blown ourselves up yet, or why the cold war didnt destory the earth, and i just give them examples of those radar watchemen during the cold war who ignored missile warnings, they're people, none of them on either side wanted to die. Technology might be wonderous, the history of the world terrible, but behind the scenes there is always a beauitful serenity to things that is not recorded in bold, be it the love in a family or the generosity and compassion of some companies and business people.
So i wish to finish on a note, because i feel you are as angry at capitalism as you are at these intelligent-risktaking-all-knowing-predicting-econ omists who ignored communism and human suffering to profit from a seemingly unpredicatable event nearly 100 years ago.
And here it is. Capitalism sucks. Thats right it sucks. The continual battle for economic freedom each of us
Right now there are two seperate generations of cards on the market (even an emerging 3rd), some very very affordable, which can best that card, and provide (in a roundabout way) support for linux. The utility cost of waiting for intel to bring out their chip may be disproportionate to simply buying todays budget cards.
I believe the intention of this article was to introduce a new and particularly well grounded way of using said electromagnaetic induction. I dont believe the makers are stating anywhere that they have found a new way to transfer energy, they simply have made a push to have it integrated into our office lives.
If we let this kind of thought take hold, then the terrorists have already won.
It's Symbolic man. Try not to read into it to much.
So they can build fission bombs and bioweapons...but...can't feed their own people? What gives?
I am not american. As a commerce student i'm not even going to bother to explain the theory and logic behind exactly how wrong you are, that would be to much of an insult. Simply put you are wrong. And as evidence of that you can look at the major Western OECD nations that neither have the US dollar or Euro as their currency. Lets just say the flexibility and response times of today modern cash markets simply do not push a country into depression just because its currency is not a dominant world currency.
As Good as this news in, does the slashdot community have to constantly reminded not only of the benifits of open source but more annoyingly, of every single government and private organisation which switches from Microsoft to oss?
Your facts are inherintly flawed for one very basic reason. See Yuri Gagarin couldn't have orbited the earth because...
In Soviet Russia Earth orbits you!
Actually, the Large Hadron Super Collider does not have the creation of micro-singularities (aka black holes) in its objectives. Infact, some politions were concerned about this possibility, and scientists involved in the project to build the LHC did reseach into the possibility. They concluded that this accelerator does not have the power needed to collide particles at velocities needed to create small blackholes. Several orders of magnitude more power is requiredto do this.
The LHC is designed to verify many particle physics theories such as the possible existance of a Higgs Boson, or even a Meson responsible for the existance of mass, and at the greatest length, even may confirm the existance of a graviton.
Infact, even if two subatomic particles were able to be forced into a black hole, the result would be null since they would instantly decay due to hawking radiation.
Actually No, particle accelerators such as this are called cyclotrons and their ring shape is such that any particle placed within them can orbit a central point until the deisered velocity can be reached by proceeding through the same series of magnets over and over again, often close the speed of light. This is opposed to a cheaper and simpler liniar accelerator, which shoots particles down a long and stright tunnel.
This is because we already know the mass of the particles (such as molecular and atomic ions and hardrons) being used in the accelerator, and other means are used to dertermine the mass of the particles resulting from the collisions such measirng the radius of curves made in bubble-chambers close to a collison point.
This is also why it is called a Hadron Super Collider.
I am Australian.
Shonky is an adjective used to describe how some objects are poorly designed, or more commonly, easy to break, as is the case with the ipod.
I'll take your comments on our dialect, you have provided just evidence and made a worthy argument. Although however, i believe you are mistaken in trying to overly exemplify the negative qualities of the language, esspecially in comparison to others. Surely, there are many dialects around the world, and many different people speaking them, Australias' is simply one of the them, and like any has its own features.
I would says its very must based on levels. Even in Australian society, as multicultural as it is, you'll find that there is a huge variety in the dialect. As a result of culture, background and the community you grew up in. The term 'shonky' does not have common usage as one might believe. If one really indeed must draw conclusions, the nature of our dialect, the shortening of words and commonly ill-pronouncement of words stems from the laid back nature of Australian life. But should never transpire into the working world. Just as one feels more comfortable talking freely at home, perhaps swareing as some might in other nations, Australians take pride in relaxing the language at home, but not to the extent that it should form any noticeable divergence from standard English.
You're true however about your claims of our hatered for Indian calling centres. I myself, excluding those that i miss while at work recieve 3 a day, specifically around dinner time, and often very early in the morning. But as i think most Australians would agree, its no reason to abuse them, they are simply doing their jobs. I do know a few people, and by that i mean alot, who take very offensive tones with the callers, that i cannot explain, i am sorry. An aubsive tone with anyone, doing their job, and earning a living, in the best way they know how, is something to be happy with, and if one does not like it, hang up.
Alas, to conclude, one must understand, Australian language is varied as much as the land it inherits, the multiculutral society, and friendly culture it embodies. Stereotypes like the one you painted are a means of ignorance, i am sorry, for i know many a forigner who will come here, and ask us please to speak 'Australian', all the while making fun of a stereotypical American accent. Please remember sir, that during those times, i accept that within america there are differences in the way you speak, the additues of people and the words you use, just as you should remember of ours.
Australian here...
It's actually a common misconception amoung our population that when the people behind water saving development schemes refer to "waste water", people imagine they are talking about recycling sewerage. Of course this is not true, infact when they refer to waste water they mean in the form of "storm water".
In many cases the storm water, after similar treatment to dam water is much cleaner then dam water itself, having not been prone to turbidity and eutrophication, as well as having lower levels of dissolved solids.
However...
The recycling of waste "storm water" is only a stop gab, as all recycling eventually is. Entropy must increase, isaac asimov would say, and so the real push for the government should be to invest in desalination and more dams (the dams around sydney were built when Sydneys population was 1/5 of what it is now).
Technically, she is correct.
Wikipedia: Drake Equation
As a fellow Australian, i would just like to remind you that this is NOT a national ID or "Australia Card". Sadly, the media has drawn dotted lines between this and the history of national ID cards, the civil protest and the very very slight relation with what is currently happening with national ID in other countries.
The card that Australia is introducing is not an ID card. It is simple a card that the Medical Care system and Welfare system, Medicare and Centerlink for us Australians, have chosen as a more secure replacement for their current cards. The card is not compulsary, and will contain nothing more then your name, address and details on your medicare and centerlink account number. Just like the drivers licemce, passport, credicard, and Club membership card you currently hold in your wallet.
Please understand the issue before commenting on it.
On the issue of National ID however, im all for it. Anything that combines the uncountable number of cards one needs, into one easy to use system is more then enough reason for me. If the government was going to infringe on our civil liberties, they would pass legislation applying to everyone, if they wanted to know who we are, they would look at our drivers licence, or other numorous forms of identification. So those aguments cannot be used in this discussion. If the government wants something about a person, or wants to restrict a person, they will do it, reguardless of the notion of a national ID.
Of cause the issue of stolen identity is always a real one, but has been such with all the forms of identification that exists above today. I'll say this, it is much harder for your inexperienced ID theif to steal your identity when he does not have the same finger prints, iris and dna as you as used on national ID cards. Compared to what? The cutting out of a picture from a passport, licence, or simply using ones name to apply for bank accounts and services. I would say that i feel much safer with an all encompassing ID card, then 1000 easily stolen and illegally used cards.
So lets stop looking at the negatives, because most of the time, civil rights advocates place these negatives on unfounded beliefe, calling it founded fact, with no re-callable evidence. Sure we're all scared of a 1984 type life, if we arnt already in one now, but thats a distant and scarey dream that we cannot let stop us from making progress in this world. Anything like DRM that makes life harder, is definetly a step back, however i can only see smart cards making life easier.
Lets look at the positive.
One smart card could:
Provide proof of person - bithday, residence, name, etc
Car Licence
Flight Licence
Numorous other licences: construction, doctors, etc etc
Passport
Credit/Bank Card
And according to The Australian Doctors Association, be used by emergancy workers to identify health issues and conditions on demand.
According to Police it could indeed make their lives alot easier in catching your everday regular criminals.
and many more.
So lets all get a grip on reality. National Smart ID Cards are a good thing, if done right, making our lives that little bit easier. Becase if you have nothing to hide, then yu have nothing to worry about, and if you do have something to hide, then you should turn yourself in.
I read a paper on the justification of high bandwidth systems recently. It outlined as one point, how society has always managed to fill the extra bandiwdth with data, reguardless of what that data may be, increasing the rate of dissemination of data amoung people all over the world. I can only imagine the same applies for scientists.
e r) being built by CERN, which is expected to produce data in quantities thousands of times greater then previous accelerator experiements. The need to disseminate this data to locations around the world is critical to its analysis.
0 /MRO_data.jpg
The article gave the example of the Large Hadron Collider (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collid
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is expected to produce fairly large quantities of data also.
Along with these are that thousands upon thousands of experiments and measurmeents being taken every moment around the globe. All this data requires storage, transmission and compution. Weather simulations, aerodynamics, radiotelescope data, biochemical simulation, the list goes on.
Of course, if the sheer number of information producing tasks arn't enough, the definitive agument to why so much data is being generated is that with the increase of bandwidth and the power of computer, so too has the accuracy and speed of data collection increased. The micosecond is slow for todays chemical, physical and biological science.
Overall, its the number of experiments, the accuracy, resolution and speed of data generation, and the need for that data to be analysed around the globe that has created the mutual need, and provision of huge bandwidths such as those being investigated and used by I2.
For everyday folk like you and me, just go down to your accounting deparment and ask them how large their largest database is, you'll be suprised how unbelieveably data and bandwidth consuming financeal data has become since the revolution of the internet.
FYI a replacement has for alcohol has been known for a very very long time. It is called Kava.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kava. You could probly find it if you looked hard enough in your local area. It has the same effects as alcohol, without the possibility of a hangover.
It's lack of popularity however stems from The liquor companies reliance on the taste of alcohole and its addictive properties.
It's called Global Dimming.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming
The increased amount of dust put into the atmosphere by smelting and fossile fuel burning apparnetly lowered the amount of sunlight reaching the earth, effectively reflecting it into space. However this was offset by the greenhouse effect.
Since the industrial revolution however, better technology has led to cleaner air, allowing more sunlight to enter the "green house"
Apparently it is a major major occurance, and was the largest scientific project next to global warming reasearch since 2000. However, very few people make the distinction between Global dimming and Warming.
In Australia, where i live, the Meterological service has noted drops of 10% in evaoration rates, caused by dimming, when they exclude drops caused by drought and day to day variations.
Could a child who has had his iPod locked simply restore it using the ipod updater software, erasing the code?
I feel painfully sorry for a child whos parents go to such protective lengths, and as such totally agree with the above post.