Never been too far out of the city/suburbs have you? Some rural internet users are basically forced to choose between 28.8k dial-up or satellite (assuming there's a vender to install it in the area). Satellite isn't terribly fast anyway, and it's rather expensive for what are generally poor areas.
You're right that termination sequences can arise naturally. For my own (small and unreleased) programs I generally take that risk, or scan for it first and die with an error if it occurs. Two better ways to do it would be to either specify the size of the torrent file initially as you said, or use the first bit of the alpha channel. If it's set to zero (IIRC that means >=50% transparent) then you're still in the encoded torrent section. If it's set to one then you've left it and can stop decoding.
Very true, but when dealing with different images the term "quality" becomes too subjective for a program to deal with. OTOH, the phrasing of the question makes it ambiguous whether the OP means the same original image that's been compressed at different levels (my impression), or multiple pictures of the same physical object (and lighting and all) that have been compressed at different levels (how could that happen?). Perhaps even multiple pictures of the same object compressed at the same level but keeping the one with less visible artifacts (also subjective).
There were even articles in mainstream electronics magazines on how to unscramble satellite... yet the number of people doing it remained at a tiny percentage. Yet even that small percentage made the satellite companies furious.
I'm seriously starting to wonder if that's the reason for the popularity of DRM. Apparently, cracking this system is worth $250,000, but how much was/is spent to develop and maintain it? If Dish Network stands to gain far greater profits in an increased subscriber base (beyond what could be returned from investing the money elsewhere) then maintaining this DRM makes sense. If it doesn't then it seems like the share holders should be getting upset.
File size doesn't tell you anything. If I take a picture with a bunch of noise (eg. poor lighting) in it then it will not compress as well. If I take the same picture with perfect lighting it might be higher quality but smaller file size.
That sounds like you took two different pictures and have two different files. Comparing file size obvious wouldn't work for different pictures, nor could I see why anyone would want to automatically delete one of them. But if it's the same picture, just more highly compressed, then the file size would almost certainly be greater for the less compressed image. Essentially by definition, since that's the whole point of compression.
Simplicity, although that's probably a matter of opinion. If it's a spiral then one doesn't have to define locations or anything (other than a termination sequence). OTOH, defining locations affords greater control over text placement. But I figure that for most situations it'd be easier to have a description PNG and simply add the encoded data as a border around it. Or perhaps just use the PNG alpha channel to just make the "border" transparent (either 100%, or >=50% and use the remaining 7 bits of the alpha channel to encode data).
E.g. "torrent2png --image=Description.png --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" where Description.png has the textual description along with a screenshot or logo or something (really it could be any PNG).
VS "torrent2png --crop=20,20,-20,-20 --image=Description.png --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" although figuring out the proper area to crop might be difficult.
"torrent2png --crop=text --text='Description' --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" would be easy to use, but it doesn't give the user as much control, and is likely more complex to program.
The thing about gold that's different from other goods is that its value is more or less constant over long time periods. If it wasn't intrinsically valuable (electronics, medicine, jewelry), and the supply of gold was constant then it wouldn't really ever change in buying power. The price of gold is more an indication of the value of currency. If it's high, then your currency isn't worth much. If it's low then it's the opposite. Or at least that's a simple version of it...
OTOH, goods can change a lot more in value. In a tanked economy they might be scarce so they'd have a high value. Or maybe everyone will buy up tons of them in anticipation and they'll be nearly worthless. The reason I wouldn't attempt to stock up on them is because they can be destroyed or obsoleted and lose all of their value. Not to mention that they aren't terribly portable.
So, what would I stock up on? Cheap pyrite! Because even the apocalypse can't get rid of idiots. Plus, it'd probably make fairly good slingshot ammo.
I've been using subdomain forwarding for quite a few years and it seems that extremely few websites/businesses sell e-mail addresses. This method has worked quite well at blocking spam at 100% accuracy for several years, although just about a month ago it would seem that my entire subdomain has started getting spam to random addresses. So I've had to move to whitelisting addresses rather than black listing ones that get spammed.
That said, all I've generally had to black list are addresses to forums that [allegedly] got cracked, and a couple merchants that mistakenly think I'm likely to order from them again if they e-mail me three times a week. The only merchant that comes to mind that downright sold the address I gave them was AquaGlobes, though I kinda expected that given their spammy website/order process.
Oh, one warning to anyone who tries this spam prevention scheme... A lot of websites are under the impression that e-mail addresses are good identifiers. So I basically have to be very consistent in how I generate throw-away addresses since I often need to use them to log in to things. Why this practice has caught on I'll have no idea. I mean, typing a 20 character e-mail address is more difficult than a 10 character username, and people change e-mail addresses all the time.
It seems like a better method would be to just have the interpreter read the data by spiraling in from the outer edge. At some point there's a signal to stop, and the rest (e.g. middle) of the image can be whatever. So, effectively you could have an image that describes the torrent with a border around it that encodes the data. Perhaps even reduce the data density so the border more or less appears to be a solid color.
Interesting, I was assuming that it was more of the former method since I hadn't studied the latter. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as I remember it that method involves supplying only one type of fluorescently labeled nucleotide at a time during in vitro DNA replication and measuring the intensity of flashes as nucleotides are added (e.g. brighter flash means two bases were added, even brighter if it's three, etc.). Keeping track of four sensors at 200 bytes per base would imply sensors that could detect 133 levels of brightness or 8 measurements per base at 16 levels of brightness. That seems like a lot higher resolution than the example data sheets I've seen, but maybe that's what current technology can do. Still though, most bases are fairly unambiguous so the bulk of the sequence could likely be stored as results only.
The new method sounds like they're doing a microarray or something and just storing high resolution jpegs. I could see why that would require oodles of image processing power. It does seem like an odd storage format for what's essentially linear data.
I suppose my point is more that they're storing a lot of useless information. I could see storing a ton of info about a sequence back when graduate students were adding nucleotides and interpreting graphs by hand, but in this day and age you'd just redundantly sequence until you got to the desired accuracy. I couldn't imagine that it'd be cheaper to have technicians manually tweak the entire sequence.
BTW, I'm not arguing against you, more against some of the design decisions of automated sequencers. You clearly know a lot more about the subject than my undergrad degree allows me to even think about refuting.
The human genome is approximately 3.4 billion base pairs long. There are four bases, so this would correspond to 2 bits of information per base. 2 * 3,400,000,000/8/1024/1024 = 810.6 MiB of data per sequence. That doesn't seem like it'd be too difficult. With a little compression it'd fit on a CD. Now, I suppose each section is sequenced multiple times and you'd want some parity, but it still seems like something that'd easily fit on a DVD (especially if alternate sequences are all diff'd from the first). Perhaps throw in another disc for pre-computed analysis results and that ought to be it.
So, what's going on here? Are the file formats used to store this data *that* bloated? Or are they trying to include structural information beyond sequence? What am I missing that makes this an unwieldy amount of data?
(I have to laugh at how Vista is apparently 20 times more complex than the people that use it...)
My guess would be that cursing triggers a conditioned response. E.g. Pain => Profanity => Pain usually subsides => Associate profanity with pain relief. Similar to why some people think homeopathic stuff works ("hey, I took this pill and I got better" without a control group). Or perhaps the GP is right and one is conditioned to have an adrenaline spike upon swearing because you learn to swear in public before private.
I'm kinda curious as to how he got this past his IRB... I mean, it's human subject's research without informed consent and he basically makes a point of continually irritating people without significant benefit to them. That doesn't seem like something any respectable ethics committee would allow. Perhaps that's who the upset players should have complained to... That is if the researcher identified himself and his purpose to them after collecting his data.
Or they could just remind people that they aren't secret, and post a public database of everyone's name/SSN online. No legislation necessary, and businesses don't have to switch their software that (foolishly?) uses SSNs as ID numbers.
Actually, come to think of it, the government isn't the only one who could do this. A cracker or disgruntled employee of a large company could effectively make this happen. I'm half surprised that it hasn't already...
The degree to which genotype determines phenotype lies in how you define phenotype. If you say phenotype is the risk of a disease, then your environment is going to play a huge role. If you say phenotype is the type and amount of protein your cells produce, then the two are practically interchangable (depending somewhat on gene regulation, but that's arguably genotype as well).
One of the more common misconceptions is that certain genes cause certain diseases. This isn't quite right. BRCA1, for example, plays a role in double stranded break repair in DNA. It's a high fidelity repair system, so it's preferable to another system your cells have that is far more error prone. The "BRCA1 mutation" generally means that one of your two copies of the BRCA1 gene is nonfunctional, or at least has reduced functionality. This means that you can't repair your DNA quite as well. That phenotype is 100%. Now, that doesn't guarantee that a woman will get breast cancer, but it does make it a bit more likely. (Cancer of any form requires several random mutations, error-prone DNA repair mechanisms can introduce these mutations over time if you're unlucky.)
The thing is, though, for BRCA1 there often isn't a point in testing. The advised treatment for women with or without the gene are pretty much the same, with the possible exception of avoiding routine x-rays if you have BRCA1, and maybe starting mammograms sooner. OTOH, BRCA1 only accounts for something like 20% of familial breast cancers. So if you have a family history of breast cancer, then you're not in the clear if you don't have the gene unless you know that your family's breast cancer is caused by BRCA1. Either way, you'd want to have mammograms earlier and such just due to the family history, so there's no real difference.
Well, while you're literally correct, IMHO you're kinda overlooking one rather large detail. Evolution takes time, quite a bit of in in fact. Think thousands of generations. Otherwise, we wouldn't have as much prevalence of traits that only make sense if modern medicine didn't exist. For an example of the difference, look at African Americans. 400 years of living in North America and there are still several issues with the slightly different environment (Vitamin D deficiency, higher cholesterol, etc.).
Besides, does it really matter if we gain new natural abilities? Disease resistance is going to be selected for either way, but AFAIK the only things "in the works" are things like having less hair, and legs more adapted to a bipedal lifestyle. OTOH, humans are a bit unique in that we can chose our path. Either a) use technology to solve problems within a few years or b) allow countless people to die over several generations until the people that suffer from the problem are weeded out. Less intelligent creatures only have option B, and it's the basis of evolution. Actually... come to think of it, that's not entirely true. Several animals (and some human cultures) practice infanticide to weed out undesirable traits.
Using flowery language for its own sake is fine, but that's poetry, not a sincere attempt at conveying meaning. Use the simplest word that accurately encapsulates your thought. That way it reaches a wider audience and frees up mental resources to focus on what you mean. Not to mention that using more complicated language usually changes the meaning of what your saying.
OTOH, if you don't want someone to understand what you mean then using complicated language is perfect. Examples include politicians and people that think using long words makes them sound smart.
Lying about your OS might not work. My university used a similar system and it definitely used OS fingerprinting techniques. I basically was dual-booting Windows and the BeOS and used Linux in a VM. In exact, one week intervals I'd be forced to log in (all outbound traffic blocked, DNS resolved everything to their internal HTTPS server, all HTTP was redirected to a captive portal page, screwing up caching of SSL certificates and DNS in the process of course). The page used the User Agent string to determine whether to show a log-in form or to merely insist you download "Cisco Clean Access". But, changing one's User Agent still didn't allow logging in, that's where the OS fingerprinting came into play.
That was the only part that used fingerprinting though. I found that I could log in from the BeOS or from Linux in a VM, so that's what I always did. Assuming the programmers behind that system are competent, I'd think they've patched that hole by now. People using Cisco Clean Access never saw that page, so I doubt they always got downloads and online games disconnected on weekly intervals. Anyway, I was using a heavily nLited and tweaked version of XP, so I knew it was secured (yes, I double checked with antivirus scans and blackhat tools every now and then), but Cisco Clean Access didn't (it apparently couldn't determine the patch status of some windows component I'd removed). I could log in with another OS and simply reboot to use Windows though. CCA was kinda a pain for normal users as well. My roommate came in with a decently updated Vista machine and basic computer usage skills (he could download and install software easily enough). I timed him, it took him six hours to clear all of CCA's requirements.
Oh, amusingly enough I complained about the system before it was fully implemented, asking about how they expected game consoles to log in, or how dual-boot users like myself would be affected. The IT person I talked to had no idea about dual-booters, but stated that game consoles weren't allowed on the network because they can't run an antivirus. After I pointed out that it's almost unheard of for such devices to be infected (and a few reasons why), he replied that he'd seen it happen in his personal experience, and provided a link of "such a case" (it was to a security bulletin for law enforcement saying that modded Xboxes might contain hacking tools). I kinda chuckled when I saw the system-wide e-mail a week after implementation saying that policy had been reversed, and that IT would whitelist game console MAC addresses upon request.
Methane might be a bit of an issue since it's quite a bit worse than CO2 as a greenhouse gas, but the CO2 was already sequestered by the grass the goats eat. So there's likely a net benefit. E.g. with a lawnmower you release CO2 trapped from eons ago, then let the grass decompose and release its CO2.
It seems like one could use each student as their own control. Basically see how well they performed under other teachers to gauge relative performance. One would also have to control for differences in age and such (e.g. say students got more serious their junior year of high school, and less for their senior). It'd require some fairly complex data crunching, but I don't think it's too onerous. One problem with this would be that such a system would give results like "Teacher G is 23% more effective than Teacher F", which would make everything completely objective... taking a bit of the humanism out of managing teachers. OTOH, maybe that's a good thing. I'm not sure, but I know that I've seen both scenarios happen, and wish there was a good way to identify consistently poor teachers.
I used to use Foxit, but got a little tired of its adware nature (banner ad, browser toolbar, tons of buttons that only exist to remind you what the free version doesn't have, etc.). So I switched to Sumatra (GPL and much more minimalistic than Foxit). Later, I started taking notes in class using PDF comments. I tried using Foxit again, but commenting is restricted to the Pro version. Plus it crashed every second time I tried to comment the DRM'd lecture notes (that was difficult to figure out since Foxit doesn't indicate if DRM is present). So I switched to PDF-XChange Viewer since it can handle DRM and allows comments. It's similar to Foxit in that it's adware and feature-rich, but it does it with a bit more class IMHO. E.g. there's an option to hide the "Professional" features. Plus, there's a portable version.
I'd think that drones would reduce collateral damage. Humans aren't perfect, stupid mistakes happen. Using a drone would basically remove one human from the loop (I'm assuming they aren't autonomous... given the state of AI in military type games that seems foolish). Also, a human pilot is risking his life flying in hostile territory. If he's unsure whether his target is an enemy or not then he'll likely err on the side of preserving his life. A drone operator, OTOH, would be more inclined to risk a drone being destroyed.
and holds a bulk of american debt.
we are an economic interest, so one could argue harm to us is harm to china.
Well, apparently China holds 1/16th of the national debt, which is essentially what Japan has as well, so I wouldn't call that the bulk. OTOH, if they did hold the bulk of the US debt, debt as a deterrent isn't that great an idea. Or at least it didn't end well for the Knights Templar...
My favorite idea was always to hide posts by new (or anonymous) users until a moderator OKs them. In a couple weeks and XX number of worthwhile posts later, this restriction is removed. If the account spams, it's deleted. OTOH, maybe I'm greatly underestimating the spambot to new user ratio, and this of course isn't applicable to all types of websites.
While not as old school as Lynx, I still use NetPositive from time to time (the default browser on the BeOS). Interestingly enough, a lot of webpages are considerably more pleasant to use without Javascript or CSS. Plus they load about an order of magnitude more quickly.
At my highschool, NetPositive somehow always ignored the HTTP filters, something I've always found quite odd. (My theory is that it fragments HTTP request packets in the middle of the URL.) Just for kicks, I was using it for FTP on my router a while back, and was fairly shocked to see it show me my actual root directory rather than the FTP root. Still can't figure that one out.
Slashdot Mirror
Never been too far out of the city/suburbs have you? Some rural internet users are basically forced to choose between 28.8k dial-up or satellite (assuming there's a vender to install it in the area). Satellite isn't terribly fast anyway, and it's rather expensive for what are generally poor areas.
You're right that termination sequences can arise naturally. For my own (small and unreleased) programs I generally take that risk, or scan for it first and die with an error if it occurs. Two better ways to do it would be to either specify the size of the torrent file initially as you said, or use the first bit of the alpha channel. If it's set to zero (IIRC that means >=50% transparent) then you're still in the encoded torrent section. If it's set to one then you've left it and can stop decoding.
Very true, but when dealing with different images the term "quality" becomes too subjective for a program to deal with. OTOH, the phrasing of the question makes it ambiguous whether the OP means the same original image that's been compressed at different levels (my impression), or multiple pictures of the same physical object (and lighting and all) that have been compressed at different levels (how could that happen?). Perhaps even multiple pictures of the same object compressed at the same level but keeping the one with less visible artifacts (also subjective).
I'm seriously starting to wonder if that's the reason for the popularity of DRM. Apparently, cracking this system is worth $250,000, but how much was/is spent to develop and maintain it? If Dish Network stands to gain far greater profits in an increased subscriber base (beyond what could be returned from investing the money elsewhere) then maintaining this DRM makes sense. If it doesn't then it seems like the share holders should be getting upset.
That sounds like you took two different pictures and have two different files. Comparing file size obvious wouldn't work for different pictures, nor could I see why anyone would want to automatically delete one of them. But if it's the same picture, just more highly compressed, then the file size would almost certainly be greater for the less compressed image. Essentially by definition, since that's the whole point of compression.
Simplicity, although that's probably a matter of opinion. If it's a spiral then one doesn't have to define locations or anything (other than a termination sequence). OTOH, defining locations affords greater control over text placement. But I figure that for most situations it'd be easier to have a description PNG and simply add the encoded data as a border around it. Or perhaps just use the PNG alpha channel to just make the "border" transparent (either 100%, or >=50% and use the remaining 7 bits of the alpha channel to encode data).
E.g. "torrent2png --image=Description.png --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" where Description.png has the textual description along with a screenshot or logo or something (really it could be any PNG).
VS "torrent2png --crop=20,20,-20,-20 --image=Description.png --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" although figuring out the proper area to crop might be difficult.
"torrent2png --crop=text --text='Description' --torrent=file.torrent --output=Encoded.png" would be easy to use, but it doesn't give the user as much control, and is likely more complex to program.
The thing about gold that's different from other goods is that its value is more or less constant over long time periods. If it wasn't intrinsically valuable (electronics, medicine, jewelry), and the supply of gold was constant then it wouldn't really ever change in buying power. The price of gold is more an indication of the value of currency. If it's high, then your currency isn't worth much. If it's low then it's the opposite. Or at least that's a simple version of it...
OTOH, goods can change a lot more in value. In a tanked economy they might be scarce so they'd have a high value. Or maybe everyone will buy up tons of them in anticipation and they'll be nearly worthless. The reason I wouldn't attempt to stock up on them is because they can be destroyed or obsoleted and lose all of their value. Not to mention that they aren't terribly portable.
So, what would I stock up on? Cheap pyrite! Because even the apocalypse can't get rid of idiots. Plus, it'd probably make fairly good slingshot ammo.
I've been using subdomain forwarding for quite a few years and it seems that extremely few websites/businesses sell e-mail addresses. This method has worked quite well at blocking spam at 100% accuracy for several years, although just about a month ago it would seem that my entire subdomain has started getting spam to random addresses. So I've had to move to whitelisting addresses rather than black listing ones that get spammed.
That said, all I've generally had to black list are addresses to forums that [allegedly] got cracked, and a couple merchants that mistakenly think I'm likely to order from them again if they e-mail me three times a week. The only merchant that comes to mind that downright sold the address I gave them was AquaGlobes, though I kinda expected that given their spammy website/order process.
Oh, one warning to anyone who tries this spam prevention scheme... A lot of websites are under the impression that e-mail addresses are good identifiers. So I basically have to be very consistent in how I generate throw-away addresses since I often need to use them to log in to things. Why this practice has caught on I'll have no idea. I mean, typing a 20 character e-mail address is more difficult than a 10 character username, and people change e-mail addresses all the time.
It seems like a better method would be to just have the interpreter read the data by spiraling in from the outer edge. At some point there's a signal to stop, and the rest (e.g. middle) of the image can be whatever. So, effectively you could have an image that describes the torrent with a border around it that encodes the data. Perhaps even reduce the data density so the border more or less appears to be a solid color.
Interesting, I was assuming that it was more of the former method since I hadn't studied the latter. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as I remember it that method involves supplying only one type of fluorescently labeled nucleotide at a time during in vitro DNA replication and measuring the intensity of flashes as nucleotides are added (e.g. brighter flash means two bases were added, even brighter if it's three, etc.). Keeping track of four sensors at 200 bytes per base would imply sensors that could detect 133 levels of brightness or 8 measurements per base at 16 levels of brightness. That seems like a lot higher resolution than the example data sheets I've seen, but maybe that's what current technology can do. Still though, most bases are fairly unambiguous so the bulk of the sequence could likely be stored as results only.
The new method sounds like they're doing a microarray or something and just storing high resolution jpegs. I could see why that would require oodles of image processing power. It does seem like an odd storage format for what's essentially linear data.
I suppose my point is more that they're storing a lot of useless information. I could see storing a ton of info about a sequence back when graduate students were adding nucleotides and interpreting graphs by hand, but in this day and age you'd just redundantly sequence until you got to the desired accuracy. I couldn't imagine that it'd be cheaper to have technicians manually tweak the entire sequence.
BTW, I'm not arguing against you, more against some of the design decisions of automated sequencers. You clearly know a lot more about the subject than my undergrad degree allows me to even think about refuting.
The human genome is approximately 3.4 billion base pairs long. There are four bases, so this would correspond to 2 bits of information per base. 2 * 3,400,000,000 /8 /1024 /1024 = 810.6 MiB of data per sequence. That doesn't seem like it'd be too difficult. With a little compression it'd fit on a CD. Now, I suppose each section is sequenced multiple times and you'd want some parity, but it still seems like something that'd easily fit on a DVD (especially if alternate sequences are all diff'd from the first). Perhaps throw in another disc for pre-computed analysis results and that ought to be it.
So, what's going on here? Are the file formats used to store this data *that* bloated? Or are they trying to include structural information beyond sequence? What am I missing that makes this an unwieldy amount of data?
(I have to laugh at how Vista is apparently 20 times more complex than the people that use it...)
My guess would be that cursing triggers a conditioned response. E.g. Pain => Profanity => Pain usually subsides => Associate profanity with pain relief. Similar to why some people think homeopathic stuff works ("hey, I took this pill and I got better" without a control group). Or perhaps the GP is right and one is conditioned to have an adrenaline spike upon swearing because you learn to swear in public before private.
I'm kinda curious as to how he got this past his IRB... I mean, it's human subject's research without informed consent and he basically makes a point of continually irritating people without significant benefit to them. That doesn't seem like something any respectable ethics committee would allow. Perhaps that's who the upset players should have complained to... That is if the researcher identified himself and his purpose to them after collecting his data.
Or they could just remind people that they aren't secret, and post a public database of everyone's name/SSN online. No legislation necessary, and businesses don't have to switch their software that (foolishly?) uses SSNs as ID numbers.
Actually, come to think of it, the government isn't the only one who could do this. A cracker or disgruntled employee of a large company could effectively make this happen. I'm half surprised that it hasn't already...
The degree to which genotype determines phenotype lies in how you define phenotype. If you say phenotype is the risk of a disease, then your environment is going to play a huge role. If you say phenotype is the type and amount of protein your cells produce, then the two are practically interchangable (depending somewhat on gene regulation, but that's arguably genotype as well).
One of the more common misconceptions is that certain genes cause certain diseases. This isn't quite right. BRCA1, for example, plays a role in double stranded break repair in DNA. It's a high fidelity repair system, so it's preferable to another system your cells have that is far more error prone. The "BRCA1 mutation" generally means that one of your two copies of the BRCA1 gene is nonfunctional, or at least has reduced functionality. This means that you can't repair your DNA quite as well. That phenotype is 100%. Now, that doesn't guarantee that a woman will get breast cancer, but it does make it a bit more likely. (Cancer of any form requires several random mutations, error-prone DNA repair mechanisms can introduce these mutations over time if you're unlucky.)
The thing is, though, for BRCA1 there often isn't a point in testing. The advised treatment for women with or without the gene are pretty much the same, with the possible exception of avoiding routine x-rays if you have BRCA1, and maybe starting mammograms sooner. OTOH, BRCA1 only accounts for something like 20% of familial breast cancers. So if you have a family history of breast cancer, then you're not in the clear if you don't have the gene unless you know that your family's breast cancer is caused by BRCA1. Either way, you'd want to have mammograms earlier and such just due to the family history, so there's no real difference.
Well, while you're literally correct, IMHO you're kinda overlooking one rather large detail. Evolution takes time, quite a bit of in in fact. Think thousands of generations. Otherwise, we wouldn't have as much prevalence of traits that only make sense if modern medicine didn't exist. For an example of the difference, look at African Americans. 400 years of living in North America and there are still several issues with the slightly different environment (Vitamin D deficiency, higher cholesterol, etc.).
Besides, does it really matter if we gain new natural abilities? Disease resistance is going to be selected for either way, but AFAIK the only things "in the works" are things like having less hair, and legs more adapted to a bipedal lifestyle. OTOH, humans are a bit unique in that we can chose our path. Either a) use technology to solve problems within a few years or b) allow countless people to die over several generations until the people that suffer from the problem are weeded out. Less intelligent creatures only have option B, and it's the basis of evolution. Actually... come to think of it, that's not entirely true. Several animals (and some human cultures) practice infanticide to weed out undesirable traits.
Using flowery language for its own sake is fine, but that's poetry, not a sincere attempt at conveying meaning. Use the simplest word that accurately encapsulates your thought. That way it reaches a wider audience and frees up mental resources to focus on what you mean. Not to mention that using more complicated language usually changes the meaning of what your saying.
OTOH, if you don't want someone to understand what you mean then using complicated language is perfect. Examples include politicians and people that think using long words makes them sound smart.
Lying about your OS might not work. My university used a similar system and it definitely used OS fingerprinting techniques. I basically was dual-booting Windows and the BeOS and used Linux in a VM. In exact, one week intervals I'd be forced to log in (all outbound traffic blocked, DNS resolved everything to their internal HTTPS server, all HTTP was redirected to a captive portal page, screwing up caching of SSL certificates and DNS in the process of course). The page used the User Agent string to determine whether to show a log-in form or to merely insist you download "Cisco Clean Access". But, changing one's User Agent still didn't allow logging in, that's where the OS fingerprinting came into play.
That was the only part that used fingerprinting though. I found that I could log in from the BeOS or from Linux in a VM, so that's what I always did. Assuming the programmers behind that system are competent, I'd think they've patched that hole by now. People using Cisco Clean Access never saw that page, so I doubt they always got downloads and online games disconnected on weekly intervals. Anyway, I was using a heavily nLited and tweaked version of XP, so I knew it was secured (yes, I double checked with antivirus scans and blackhat tools every now and then), but Cisco Clean Access didn't (it apparently couldn't determine the patch status of some windows component I'd removed). I could log in with another OS and simply reboot to use Windows though. CCA was kinda a pain for normal users as well. My roommate came in with a decently updated Vista machine and basic computer usage skills (he could download and install software easily enough). I timed him, it took him six hours to clear all of CCA's requirements.
Oh, amusingly enough I complained about the system before it was fully implemented, asking about how they expected game consoles to log in, or how dual-boot users like myself would be affected. The IT person I talked to had no idea about dual-booters, but stated that game consoles weren't allowed on the network because they can't run an antivirus. After I pointed out that it's almost unheard of for such devices to be infected (and a few reasons why), he replied that he'd seen it happen in his personal experience, and provided a link of "such a case" (it was to a security bulletin for law enforcement saying that modded Xboxes might contain hacking tools). I kinda chuckled when I saw the system-wide e-mail a week after implementation saying that policy had been reversed, and that IT would whitelist game console MAC addresses upon request.
Methane might be a bit of an issue since it's quite a bit worse than CO2 as a greenhouse gas, but the CO2 was already sequestered by the grass the goats eat. So there's likely a net benefit. E.g. with a lawnmower you release CO2 trapped from eons ago, then let the grass decompose and release its CO2.
It seems like one could use each student as their own control. Basically see how well they performed under other teachers to gauge relative performance. One would also have to control for differences in age and such (e.g. say students got more serious their junior year of high school, and less for their senior). It'd require some fairly complex data crunching, but I don't think it's too onerous. One problem with this would be that such a system would give results like "Teacher G is 23% more effective than Teacher F", which would make everything completely objective... taking a bit of the humanism out of managing teachers. OTOH, maybe that's a good thing. I'm not sure, but I know that I've seen both scenarios happen, and wish there was a good way to identify consistently poor teachers.
I used to use Foxit, but got a little tired of its adware nature (banner ad, browser toolbar, tons of buttons that only exist to remind you what the free version doesn't have, etc.). So I switched to Sumatra (GPL and much more minimalistic than Foxit). Later, I started taking notes in class using PDF comments. I tried using Foxit again, but commenting is restricted to the Pro version. Plus it crashed every second time I tried to comment the DRM'd lecture notes (that was difficult to figure out since Foxit doesn't indicate if DRM is present). So I switched to PDF-XChange Viewer since it can handle DRM and allows comments. It's similar to Foxit in that it's adware and feature-rich, but it does it with a bit more class IMHO. E.g. there's an option to hide the "Professional" features. Plus, there's a portable version.
I'd think that drones would reduce collateral damage. Humans aren't perfect, stupid mistakes happen. Using a drone would basically remove one human from the loop (I'm assuming they aren't autonomous... given the state of AI in military type games that seems foolish). Also, a human pilot is risking his life flying in hostile territory. If he's unsure whether his target is an enemy or not then he'll likely err on the side of preserving his life. A drone operator, OTOH, would be more inclined to risk a drone being destroyed.
and holds a bulk of american debt. we are an economic interest, so one could argue harm to us is harm to china.
Well, apparently China holds 1/16th of the national debt, which is essentially what Japan has as well, so I wouldn't call that the bulk. OTOH, if they did hold the bulk of the US debt, debt as a deterrent isn't that great an idea. Or at least it didn't end well for the Knights Templar...
My favorite idea was always to hide posts by new (or anonymous) users until a moderator OKs them. In a couple weeks and XX number of worthwhile posts later, this restriction is removed. If the account spams, it's deleted. OTOH, maybe I'm greatly underestimating the spambot to new user ratio, and this of course isn't applicable to all types of websites.
While not as old school as Lynx, I still use NetPositive from time to time (the default browser on the BeOS). Interestingly enough, a lot of webpages are considerably more pleasant to use without Javascript or CSS. Plus they load about an order of magnitude more quickly.
At my highschool, NetPositive somehow always ignored the HTTP filters, something I've always found quite odd. (My theory is that it fragments HTTP request packets in the middle of the URL.) Just for kicks, I was using it for FTP on my router a while back, and was fairly shocked to see it show me my actual root directory rather than the FTP root. Still can't figure that one out.