Echoing what others have said about the questionable use of the word "wasted", I use my commute time to listen to podcasts. The content is educational (history, news, etc.), so it's hard to consider the time 'wasted'.
I don't know what the precision is on this, but I've seen LIDAR that was used in the civil engineering arena that was precise enough to pick up skid marks on the road. Pretty cool stuff.
This is not exactly true. School teachers used to be paid by the parents and were directly answerable to them. And parents cared that their children were taught properly. Now we have neither. Lack of family structure and teacher unions that don't care about good teachers don't exactly make for good education.
Transferring education completely to the control of the government results in the education system equivalent of the U.S. Postal System.
Then you would have to close off the southwest United States. While the San Joaquin Valley has the most cases, I live in much farther south in CA and know two people who had valley fever serious enough to end up in the hospital. So it is not uncommon elsewhere in the southwest as well.
Right. That's the hard part. Most people end up doing things that contribute more to the destruction of themselves and society as a whole when given all this 'free' time and endless pursuit of pleasure. It's human nature to do so. In the end, it's hard to say there's a net gain.
Just out of curiosity, how is the soldier in the field supposed to deal with dust issues in contacts? Being a long-time wearer of contacts myself, and having experienced issues with wearing them in construction zones, I have a hard time seeing how these could be more of a liability in a combat arena.
...it's about withdrawing from an evil society so their kids can get baked in their own oven. Christian fundamentalists, right wing militia types, granola crunching hippies--these are the face of the home school movement, and it's justifiable to wonder whether it's in the kids best interest to home school the kids for political rather than educational reasons.
I'd like to see some statistical basis for this, rather than a couple of anecdotes and what the media portrays. In addition, my experience with opponents of home-schoolers is that they are more worried about people being raised with political viewpoints contrary to theirs. Their concern for the kids and a quality education is minimal. But our country thrives on the variety of political viewpoints, not a hive-mind developed by a government education system.
...typically, they're weird kids who've obviously spent too much time in a weird home environment and lack enough socialization to get along well once they're back in the public sphere. That's the danger of home schooling.
Again, this is anecdotal, and not universal. Besides, it appears that Slashdot thrives on these type of people, so shouldn't we work to create more of them? There are plenty of these types of people in the public school system as well, and there are other ways to address these types of issues.
For the record, I was not home-schooled. I spent the middle half of my elementary education in a private school, and the rest in public schools. I have many friends who home-school, so I have seen the benefits compared to the alternatives.
For those that oppose home-schooling, do they seriously think that the government does a great job of educating children? I can't believe there are so many that oppose home-schooling, yet Slashdotters in general rail on the poor quality of the American education system.
To me, home-schooling is a great alternative. Parents in general care the most about their children, not the government. Obviously there are the exception (child abusers, etc.), but that's not necessarily an argument to ban all home-schooling outright.
Seems like as long as the children can pass the standardized tests (SAT, etc.), we should support it. In fact, studies have been done that show that home-schoolers often do better than public school students. For example: http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200410250.asp
Anecdotally, my sister found that some colleges actually prefer home-schoolers for this reason.
Not true, there is plenty of disagreement. You should read a book called 'Cracks In The Crescent', about a man who was a madrassa teaching assistant and muadhin (calls Muslims to pray) for Islam until he became disillusioned with all the discrepancies and contradictions. He provides countless examples to back up his point.
One of the more humorous examples is a story where he proves to several Muslims that Islam teaches that they will all go to hell.
The thing is, that's not quite right. Flexible pavements, such as those with asphalt or bitumen-based rolling pavement, don't require any more maintenance than rigid and semi-rigid pavement roads. The only reason that may lead to premature repairs is if they suffer from draining problems or if the foundation suffers from excessive settlement, which is caused by poorly designed and/or built roads.
...or rutting/shoving due to soft pavement from 100 degree or greater temperatures, failure due to diesel spills (very likely with high truck traffic) which breaks down the asphalt, etc.
Like I said, LCCA required. Asphalt does not answer all pavement woes (neither does concrete). Your defense makes it sound like you work for the asphalt industry.
I am a licensed civil engineer, and I think your statement (and the one prior) bears qualifying.
The choice between an asphalt road and a concrete one should always be analyzed by a life-cycle cost analysis (LCCA), which takes into account the up-front cost of the road plus the maintenance costs.
In Southern California, concrete will most often come out ahead in said analysis, especially given our traffic volumes and the traffic delay costs associated with the more frequent maintenance activities required by asphalt. We have concrete pavements here that are 50+ years old.
In areas of high freeze-thaw cycles, an LCCA may produce different results. However, it should also be noted that the thump-thump of many concrete pavements today is due to a load-transfer failure between the slabs, something that in new pavements has been addressed with the inclusion of steel dowel bars between slabs.
...Nearly one in four Americans has some sort of disability, so savvy publishers who don't want to lose out on a big chunk of marketshare find it worthwhile to comply....
That's a bit misleading... how many of those have a disability that actually matters when it comes to web disability.
I think of all the people I know (yes, it's more than 4... good for a nerd), and I can only think of a handful that might be slightly disadvantaged when using a non-standard page.
I have not used it yet (plan to download it today), but I was wondering if there is more fine-tuning of the awesome bar available than that.
For example, I can see it being useful to allow the bar to search my bookmarks, but leave out my history.
I work for a government organization, and I would have to say the biggest barrier to using many of these features is accessibility. There are huge challenges in making Web 2.0 accessible, which we are required to do.
There is definitely some complacency there as well, as well as a lack of 'customer service' attitude, but in the case of Web 2.0, why bother if it takes so much effort or is almost impossible to make it WCAG and Section 508 compliant.
Wouldn't it be easier to identify the plant you don't want removed, and the robot would just remove every other plant (whitelist instead of blacklist)?
It's a whole lot easier to place the blame on an inanimate object such as a game, or a gun, than to look for causes in human nature or societal issues that affect almost everyone.
Issues like morality, the breakdown of the family, parenting are almost taboo to talk about. People don't want to assign blame to these things because then they would have to face these same issues in their own life. In addition, these issues border on the religious for most people, and it's not in vogue to talk religion. Society wants all ills to be addressed by science and technology by banning or controlling everything with them, and not looking more to the heart of the matter.
I probably will get modded down for this, but most religion, including most of Christianity (wrongly so, I believe), believes man is inherently good and as a general rule, will pursue what is best. Science is not even willing to consider morally good/bad, for the most part. But perhaps we should consider the implications of man being inherently bad by nature. The problem is, this would be too humbling for most people to consider objectively.
Actually He spoke against the abuse and misinterpretation of the religion of the prophecies He fulfilled. It wouldn't make sense for God to send a Messiah that spoke against God himself.
That's a straw man argument. Of course there aren't examples of a war started in the name of scientific theory. There are plenty of wars started that were not related to religion though.
But your argument does nothing to prove that religion is only good for what you stated.
Slashdot Mirror
Echoing what others have said about the questionable use of the word "wasted", I use my commute time to listen to podcasts. The content is educational (history, news, etc.), so it's hard to consider the time 'wasted'.
Can this be used to block license plate readers? I can see that being a useful application for this technology.
I don't know what the precision is on this, but I've seen LIDAR that was used in the civil engineering arena that was precise enough to pick up skid marks on the road. Pretty cool stuff.
"oligarchs used to look after their people...".
This is not exactly true. School teachers used to be paid by the parents and were directly answerable to them. And parents cared that their children were taught properly. Now we have neither. Lack of family structure and teacher unions that don't care about good teachers don't exactly make for good education.
Transferring education completely to the control of the government results in the education system equivalent of the U.S. Postal System.
Then you would have to close off the southwest United States. While the San Joaquin Valley has the most cases, I live in much farther south in CA and know two people who had valley fever serious enough to end up in the hospital. So it is not uncommon elsewhere in the southwest as well.
...do things that make them fulfilled...
Right. That's the hard part. Most people end up doing things that contribute more to the destruction of themselves and society as a whole when given all this 'free' time and endless pursuit of pleasure. It's human nature to do so. In the end, it's hard to say there's a net gain.
Appropriate that this story shows right above the placement of the Richard Dawkins story.
Just out of curiosity, how is the soldier in the field supposed to deal with dust issues in contacts? Being a long-time wearer of contacts myself, and having experienced issues with wearing them in construction zones, I have a hard time seeing how these could be more of a liability in a combat arena.
Note that the 3rd edition is already out also (The Amazon link and picture is to the second edition): http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Digital-Evidence-and-Computer-Crime/Eoghan-Casey/e/9780123742681?itm=1&usri=Digital%2BEvidence%2Band%2BComputer%2BCrime
Here's a citation to help: http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/transparency-obama-denies-significantly-more-foia-requests-bush
A Google search provides other locations.
I wouldn't count on anything coming out.
...it's about withdrawing from an evil society so their kids can get baked in their own oven. Christian fundamentalists, right wing militia types, granola crunching hippies--these are the face of the home school movement, and it's justifiable to wonder whether it's in the kids best interest to home school the kids for political rather than educational reasons.
I'd like to see some statistical basis for this, rather than a couple of anecdotes and what the media portrays. In addition, my experience with opponents of home-schoolers is that they are more worried about people being raised with political viewpoints contrary to theirs. Their concern for the kids and a quality education is minimal. But our country thrives on the variety of political viewpoints, not a hive-mind developed by a government education system.
...typically, they're weird kids who've obviously spent too much time in a weird home environment and lack enough socialization to get along well once they're back in the public sphere. That's the danger of home schooling.
Again, this is anecdotal, and not universal. Besides, it appears that Slashdot thrives on these type of people, so shouldn't we work to create more of them? There are plenty of these types of people in the public school system as well, and there are other ways to address these types of issues.
For the record, I was not home-schooled. I spent the middle half of my elementary education in a private school, and the rest in public schools. I have many friends who home-school, so I have seen the benefits compared to the alternatives.
For those that oppose home-schooling, do they seriously think that the government does a great job of educating children? I can't believe there are so many that oppose home-schooling, yet Slashdotters in general rail on the poor quality of the American education system.
To me, home-schooling is a great alternative. Parents in general care the most about their children, not the government. Obviously there are the exception (child abusers, etc.), but that's not necessarily an argument to ban all home-schooling outright.
Seems like as long as the children can pass the standardized tests (SAT, etc.), we should support it. In fact, studies have been done that show that home-schoolers often do better than public school students. For example:
http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000010/200410250.asp
Anecdotally, my sister found that some colleges actually prefer home-schoolers for this reason.
Not true, there is plenty of disagreement. You should read a book called 'Cracks In The Crescent', about a man who was a madrassa teaching assistant and muadhin (calls Muslims to pray) for Islam until he became disillusioned with all the discrepancies and contradictions. He provides countless examples to back up his point.
One of the more humorous examples is a story where he proves to several Muslims that Islam teaches that they will all go to hell.
The thing is, that's not quite right. Flexible pavements, such as those with asphalt or bitumen-based rolling pavement, don't require any more maintenance than rigid and semi-rigid pavement roads. The only reason that may lead to premature repairs is if they suffer from draining problems or if the foundation suffers from excessive settlement, which is caused by poorly designed and/or built roads.
Like I said, LCCA required. Asphalt does not answer all pavement woes (neither does concrete). Your defense makes it sound like you work for the asphalt industry.
I am a licensed civil engineer, and I think your statement (and the one prior) bears qualifying. The choice between an asphalt road and a concrete one should always be analyzed by a life-cycle cost analysis (LCCA), which takes into account the up-front cost of the road plus the maintenance costs. In Southern California, concrete will most often come out ahead in said analysis, especially given our traffic volumes and the traffic delay costs associated with the more frequent maintenance activities required by asphalt. We have concrete pavements here that are 50+ years old. In areas of high freeze-thaw cycles, an LCCA may produce different results. However, it should also be noted that the thump-thump of many concrete pavements today is due to a load-transfer failure between the slabs, something that in new pavements has been addressed with the inclusion of steel dowel bars between slabs.
...Nearly one in four Americans has some sort of disability, so savvy publishers who don't want to lose out on a big chunk of marketshare find it worthwhile to comply. ...
That's a bit misleading... how many of those have a disability that actually matters when it comes to web disability.
I think of all the people I know (yes, it's more than 4... good for a nerd), and I can only think of a handful that might be slightly disadvantaged when using a non-standard page.
I have not used it yet (plan to download it today), but I was wondering if there is more fine-tuning of the awesome bar available than that. For example, I can see it being useful to allow the bar to search my bookmarks, but leave out my history.
I work for a government organization, and I would have to say the biggest barrier to using many of these features is accessibility. There are huge challenges in making Web 2.0 accessible, which we are required to do.
There is definitely some complacency there as well, as well as a lack of 'customer service' attitude, but in the case of Web 2.0, why bother if it takes so much effort or is almost impossible to make it WCAG and Section 508 compliant.
Wouldn't it be easier to identify the plant you don't want removed, and the robot would just remove every other plant (whitelist instead of blacklist)?
It's a whole lot easier to place the blame on an inanimate object such as a game, or a gun, than to look for causes in human nature or societal issues that affect almost everyone.
Issues like morality, the breakdown of the family, parenting are almost taboo to talk about. People don't want to assign blame to these things because then they would have to face these same issues in their own life. In addition, these issues border on the religious for most people, and it's not in vogue to talk religion. Society wants all ills to be addressed by science and technology by banning or controlling everything with them, and not looking more to the heart of the matter.
I probably will get modded down for this, but most religion, including most of Christianity (wrongly so, I believe), believes man is inherently good and as a general rule, will pursue what is best. Science is not even willing to consider morally good/bad, for the most part. But perhaps we should consider the implications of man being inherently bad by nature. The problem is, this would be too humbling for most people to consider objectively.
CNET had a story about some of the worst politicians' web sites. Further demonstrates how many politicians are behind in technology.
Actually He spoke against the abuse and misinterpretation of the religion of the prophecies He fulfilled. It wouldn't make sense for God to send a Messiah that spoke against God himself.
Hmmm... I don't remember Hitler using religion... or Stalin... or Castro... Seems that your argument is 100% flawed.
If coke bottle glasses are no longer needed, will geeks still exist?!!
That's a straw man argument. Of course there aren't examples of a war started in the name of scientific theory. There are plenty of wars started that were not related to religion though.
But your argument does nothing to prove that religion is only good for what you stated.