My point being that long term considerations tend to be very very low on the agenda when considering weapons of war.
Better examples than depleted uranium (and the 'nonlethal' methods in TFA) include Agent Orange and land mines.
Both are designed for "territory denial" as the Active Denial System from TFA. Both have extremely longterm effects which are still being realised now.
The US has the unenviable distinction of being the only country to use large-scale nuclear weapons in war, and that event and it's reasons are debated and discussed to no end. I wouldn't want another weapon used that, although smaller scale, still ends up killing people decades later because they are put at an increased risk for other factors.
Are you suggesting that Japan should withdraw, the ESA stop flights and the rest of the world should leave the moon to those who first set foot upon it??
And a great topological map of New Zealand.
You can clearly see the different forces affecting the land here. The upwelling of volcanic activity in the north, and the collision of plates pushing up the Southern Alps in the south Island.
And if you look very very close in the middle of the North Island, you can see Hobbiton.
Ah, US geography. Every country in the world that isn't America is in a small contiguous region somewhere over 'there'.
Indonesia is over 7000 km away from NZ, and the discovery of the 'little humans' has nothing to do with NZ at all. The New Zealand Eagle is nowhere near the size of Gwaihir and his cohorts.
This isn't even a discovery, just a little bit of DNA analysis. Haast's eagle, better known here as the New Zealand eagle, and its existence has been known for a very long time.
The most common idea forwarded for its extinction is the fact that the original settlers of New Zealand set fire to the entire South Island of New Zealand, killing off its food sources.
as for the walking trees; you need to eat the blue mushrooms to see them.
Name one single invention that would not have been created without space exploration, and explain how it has generated or saved more money than the cost of the space exploration that led to its discovery.
GPS or Global Positioning System would definitely not have been created if not for space exploration. And the advent of having accurate positioning data available and the ability to navigate by satellite has generated huge advances in productivity.
That's just one. It's very hard to quantify advances in medicine in dollar value, but there's been a few there too. Even harder to quantify is effect upon public morale. But if you listen to older people talk about the moon landings, well, there's something worthwhile that I wouldn't mind being able to tell my grandkids about. That would be a great payoff
As for your moanings about Fox News, NBC, CBS, and ABC all lean left, to different degrees. Fox News leans right, so if you moan about Fox, you need to complain about the other news channels as well.
OK.
All the other news channels have leanings in various directions. It's extremely hard to get the real story behind many widely reported news stories. A lot of journalists are total idiots who entirely miss the entire point of most stories. A lot of editors have no idea what great news reporting is.
My point is that all these things will be very evident is Wikinews. At least until they get a large enough base to overcome these problems.
I hope that their strict adherence to "Non Point of View" holds here. Bias in media reporting is a major problem in the spread of news, and Wikipedia users will have the own type of bias (against large companies, restrictive laws).
I see this as being very useful for eyewitness accounts, and much better than Fox News, but I will hestitate to use it over traditional Newspapers. While Newspapers have gotten it (very publicly) wrong more than a few times recently, they do have departments of people fact-checking each other. If Wikinews is successful, the end result of large usage rates will result in the same thing. Until then, expect incomplete and biased newstories...
And actually claim responsibility and make amends for the vast amount of pollution that they are pumping out into the world's atmosphere?
You must be joking.
I wonder if the authors have read Kim Stanley Robinson's "Red Mars" (and Green and Blue...)
Colonisation versus Conservation is a major part of the story in the "Mars Trilogy". Basically the ecologists breakaway and combine with the geologists to try to keep Mars as pristine as possible.
I always thought this a bad plot device and resented the sympathy that Kim Stanley Robinson held for the 'Red Mars' antagonists.
Initial developments in the colonisation of Mars will be necessarily of quite small scale. Small colonies of Humans (and robotic helpers/tools) will just not have enough resources to inflict large changes upon the environment. As for the suggested despoiling of Olympus Mons by future mountaineers; WTF?
Maybe in three hundred years time we will have enough resources to begin some serious terraforming of Mars. Maybe then the setting aside of some areas will become a serious goal. Maybe then I would be in favor of reserve areas on Mars. Until then, all areas must be free game as we should use all opportunity to get established upon another planet.
I think this is a great development also.
Making sure that the vastness of space does not end up W.A.S.P. is very important.
Very little of the Earth's population is white, even fewer of any religon at all, yet nearly all astronauts have come from this group. (Tokenism notwithstanding).
The greater variety of people to enter space, the greater amount to survive any threatening situation. I say, Go India
I am so very tired of NASA. They may have accomplished some amazing feats, but they screw up so many things (sensors upside down, feet not meters, bad insulation, etc), and every time someone there miscalculates, BAM! there goes $10 billion of misappropriated taxpayer money.
I rather spend 10 billion in the space program than 120 billion in a stupid war in the Middle East.
The point is that NASA doesn't have to spend so much money.
NASA is funded by the government. Everything they produce is therefore built to government specification. Ever hear the one about an elephant being a mouse built to government specifications?
So we get ten robots on the moon, when for the same price you could drop 1000 RC vehicles with webcams.
Please mod up parent.
Space exploration is important, and this is one the best descriptions why that I have seen.
This is the same explorative spirit that motivated some of the greatest explorers, astronomers, and scientists who have ever lived. To go and see what no other has seen before, thereby bringing such places into the human realm. One day (although i may not see it myself) Titan is going to be a very important stepping point for humanity, I hope they remember these first groundbreaking photos.
Not true.
Any regular casino visitor loses consistently. The best bets in casinos offer just less than half a chance of winning. Therefore, the majority of bets placed lose.
Nearly every gambler I have seen (in 10 years casino work) is uneducated about mathematical nature of the games, ill disciplined with their betting, keeps no records of their play. Luck and superstition play more of a part in their decision making than any logic.
I have been playing online poker for about a year. Thankfully, online players are mostly the same as the mugs walking down the strip. Most have no idea about the game and just want the titillation of a gamble. Though some can talk about pot odds, positional play etc. most really have no idea and rely far more upon luck than upon stats.
Case of beer + garden hose on the roof + a mega-sized kiddies paddling pool = Delightful afternoon.
And a good reason why the water is warm!
Re:energy independence begins at home
on
Solar Shingles
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
It wouldn't matter what it was made of, but any effort to get at some of the huge amount of energy falling upon roads around the world is a great idea.
Roading takes a huge amount of space, is only utilised a small percentage of the time and is daily bombarded with a large amount of solar energy.
If it was a cheap, clean technology, it would be far better for developing countries to use solar rather than expensive non-renewable technology.
Too right.
Cheap energy is the key!
There is a giant ball in our sky, just radiating energy towards us. Yet we still dig up fossil fuels and ignore the free energy falling upon us.
A very cheap solar panel (or maybe a paint-like substance) strong enough to use for roading & roofing would be my idea of a great prize. Efficiency wouldn't have to improve much; sheer area would generate a large current. If we could catch even a small percentage of all the sunlight falling upon the highway system, it would substantially reduce the price of electricity.
All the energy that coffee brings, combined with the lack of judgement and physical dexterity from beer.
An accident waiting to happen.
I predict this beer will be hugely popular.
Slashdot Mirror
My point being that long term considerations tend to be very very low on the agenda when considering weapons of war. Better examples than depleted uranium (and the 'nonlethal' methods in TFA) include Agent Orange and land mines. Both are designed for "territory denial" as the Active Denial System from TFA. Both have extremely longterm effects which are still being realised now.
You mean like Depleted Uranium ammunition?
more info can be found at the European Space Agency's websitet ml
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Venus_Express/index.h
and of course, at wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_Express
Are you suggesting that Japan should withdraw, the ESA stop flights and the rest of the world should leave the moon to those who first set foot upon it??
I hope not.
and I'd quite like to register Lashdot.
It sounds like a groovy site.
And a great topological map of New Zealand. You can clearly see the different forces affecting the land here. The upwelling of volcanic activity in the north, and the collision of plates pushing up the Southern Alps in the south Island. And if you look very very close in the middle of the North Island, you can see Hobbiton.
Ah, US geography. Every country in the world that isn't America is in a small contiguous region somewhere over 'there'. Indonesia is over 7000 km away from NZ, and the discovery of the 'little humans' has nothing to do with NZ at all. The New Zealand Eagle is nowhere near the size of Gwaihir and his cohorts. This isn't even a discovery, just a little bit of DNA analysis. Haast's eagle, better known here as the New Zealand eagle, and its existence has been known for a very long time. The most common idea forwarded for its extinction is the fact that the original settlers of New Zealand set fire to the entire South Island of New Zealand, killing off its food sources. as for the walking trees; you need to eat the blue mushrooms to see them.
Name one single invention that would not have been created without space exploration, and explain how it has generated or saved more money than the cost of the space exploration that led to its discovery.
GPS or Global Positioning System would definitely not have been created if not for space exploration. And the advent of having accurate positioning data available and the ability to navigate by satellite has generated huge advances in productivity.
That's just one. It's very hard to quantify advances in medicine in dollar value, but there's been a few there too. Even harder to quantify is effect upon public morale. But if you listen to older people talk about the moon landings, well, there's something worthwhile that I wouldn't mind being able to tell my grandkids about. That would be a great payoff
Space technology will repay itself in technological advance. Always has.
As for your moanings about Fox News, NBC, CBS, and ABC all lean left, to different degrees. Fox News leans right, so if you moan about Fox, you need to complain about the other news channels as well.
OK.
All the other news channels have leanings in various directions. It's extremely hard to get the real story behind many widely reported news stories. A lot of journalists are total idiots who entirely miss the entire point of most stories. A lot of editors have no idea what great news reporting is.
My point is that all these things will be very evident is Wikinews. At least until they get a large enough base to overcome these problems.
I hope that their strict adherence to "Non Point of View" holds here. Bias in media reporting is a major problem in the spread of news, and Wikipedia users will have the own type of bias (against large companies, restrictive laws).
I see this as being very useful for eyewitness accounts, and much better than Fox News, but I will hestitate to use it over traditional Newspapers. While Newspapers have gotten it (very publicly) wrong more than a few times recently, they do have departments of people fact-checking each other. If Wikinews is successful, the end result of large usage rates will result in the same thing. Until then, expect incomplete and biased newstories...
Just like Fox News.
And actually claim responsibility and make amends for the vast amount of pollution that they are pumping out into the world's atmosphere?
You must be joking.
Colonisation versus Conservation is a major part of the story in the "Mars Trilogy". Basically the ecologists breakaway and combine with the geologists to try to keep Mars as pristine as possible.
I always thought this a bad plot device and resented the sympathy that Kim Stanley Robinson held for the 'Red Mars' antagonists.
Initial developments in the colonisation of Mars will be necessarily of quite small scale. Small colonies of Humans (and robotic helpers/tools) will just not have enough resources to inflict large changes upon the environment. As for the suggested despoiling of Olympus Mons by future mountaineers; WTF?
Maybe in three hundred years time we will have enough resources to begin some serious terraforming of Mars. Maybe then the setting aside of some areas will become a serious goal. Maybe then I would be in favor of reserve areas on Mars. Until then, all areas must be free game as we should use all opportunity to get established upon another planet.
Flamebait??
Racist Mods.
I think this is a great development also.
Making sure that the vastness of space does not end up W.A.S.P. is very important.
Very little of the Earth's population is white, even fewer of any religon at all, yet nearly all astronauts have come from this group. (Tokenism notwithstanding).
The greater variety of people to enter space, the greater amount to survive any threatening situation. I say, Go India
I am so very tired of NASA. They may have accomplished some amazing feats, but they screw up so many things (sensors upside down, feet not meters, bad insulation, etc), and every time someone there miscalculates, BAM! there goes $10 billion of misappropriated taxpayer money. I rather spend 10 billion in the space program than 120 billion in a stupid war in the Middle East. The point is that NASA doesn't have to spend so much money.
NASA is funded by the government. Everything they produce is therefore built to government specification. Ever hear the one about an elephant being a mouse built to government specifications?
So we get ten robots on the moon, when for the same price you could drop 1000 RC vehicles with webcams.
Please mod up parent. Space exploration is important, and this is one the best descriptions why that I have seen.
This is the same explorative spirit that motivated some of the greatest explorers, astronomers, and scientists who have ever lived. To go and see what no other has seen before, thereby bringing such places into the human realm. One day (although i may not see it myself) Titan is going to be a very important stepping point for humanity, I hope they remember these first groundbreaking photos.
Not true.
:)
Any regular casino visitor loses consistently. The best bets in casinos offer just less than half a chance of winning. Therefore, the majority of bets placed lose.
Nearly every gambler I have seen (in 10 years casino work) is uneducated about mathematical nature of the games, ill disciplined with their betting, keeps no records of their play. Luck and superstition play more of a part in their decision making than any logic.
I have been playing online poker for about a year. Thankfully, online players are mostly the same as the mugs walking down the strip. Most have no idea about the game and just want the titillation of a gamble. Though some can talk about pot odds, positional play etc. most really have no idea and rely far more upon luck than upon stats.
Which is all good for my account status
Cheap heated swimming pool water.
Case of beer + garden hose on the roof + a mega-sized kiddies paddling pool = Delightful afternoon.
And a good reason why the water is warm!
It wouldn't matter what it was made of, but any effort to get at some of the huge amount of energy falling upon roads around the world is a great idea.
Roading takes a huge amount of space, is only utilised a small percentage of the time and is daily bombarded with a large amount of solar energy. If it was a cheap, clean technology, it would be far better for developing countries to use solar rather than expensive non-renewable technology.
Too right.
Cheap energy is the key!
There is a giant ball in our sky, just radiating energy towards us. Yet we still dig up fossil fuels and ignore the free energy falling upon us.
A very cheap solar panel (or maybe a paint-like substance) strong enough to use for roading & roofing would be my idea of a great prize. Efficiency wouldn't have to improve much; sheer area would generate a large current. If we could catch even a small percentage of all the sunlight falling upon the highway system, it would substantially reduce the price of electricity.
All the energy that coffee brings, combined with the lack of judgement and physical dexterity from beer. An accident waiting to happen. I predict this beer will be hugely popular.