Call it what you like, all I know is that my environmentalist friend is always changing his story every few years. One day he's telling me how great hydrogen fuel is, then it's ethanol, then it's electricity. I remember one time when we were in college it was methane. I keep telling him they need to decide on one thing and stick to it, but then off he goes on some new thing that's going to save the world. Tomorrow it will probably nuclear fusion, or sails on the cars, or god knows what.
I have a hard time keeping up with what's hip in the green world, but I thought electricity was the green thing that we're supposed to fuel our cars with now. Didn't hydrogen fall out of favor with the greenies a few years back?
No kidding. To even get hired at Yahoo, you have to show an amazing amount of organization, socialization, and professionalism. The article makes it sound like you can just walk through the door wearing a ratty t-shirt, tell them you are really smart and play a lot of WoW, and get hired. I don't think so.
That's how real people really act in confined quarters (especially in stressful circumstances). You're just too used to seeing people acting unrealistically in other science fiction shows to realize that.
Take Star Trek The Next Generation--where people brought their children aboard a ship that was almost destroyed every week, where crewmembers never experience PTSD/paranoia/anger/frustration (despite being almost killed on a regular basis), where everyone acts like robots, where no one ever has sex, where no one ever says "Fuck this noise, I'm quitting Starfleet and going someplace safe," where society has become a perfect communist state with no money and everyone working and risking their lives for the common good, where greed is not only not good but GONE, etc. This is a show where everyone's life is threatened every week and yet no one so much as blinks an eye afterward--much less loses the press in their lint-free uniforms.
All the Stargates before SGU were silly old-school scifi shit. You must be an old Trekkie who thinks that that unrealistic silly universe was actually remotely plausible in anything resembling the real world. Some of us happen to like our science fiction more realistic and character-oriented, thank you. The "monster/alien of the week" doesn't appeal to us. The "everything at the end of the episode is exactly the same as it was when it began" doesn't either. The old Stargates, Star Trek the Next Generation, etc.--everyone in that cast was so perfect and heroic they probably didn't even take shits. Personally I like it when a show has castmembers that at least RESEMBLE actual human beings, not heroic robots.
It would require several orders-of-magnitude more effort and resources to build giant rockets to pack humans and needed resources off to Mars than it would to manufacture a shitload of grow-lights and head underground to wait out a few decades of winter.
The problem with your argument is that it's premised on the idea that we *can* have colonies on other worlds (I presume here that you mean SELF-SUFFICIENT colonies, ones that can survive without constant resupply from earth). As I said, every other body in our solar system besides earth is a death-trap. No other body in our solar system can sustain any self-sufficient colony of any size for any length of time. The resources aren't even close. Maybe you can find some small deposits of water here and there (which would need heavy processing to even be extracted), maybe you can find some energy. But what body is going to provide everything you need to really survive long-term?
Mars? Not even close. Mars has very little atmospheric pressure, high radiation, it's cold as fuck, the soil is barren, the water is sparse. No amount of "terraforming" (if that's even possible) is going to turn that shithole into anything other than a big rusty desert.
Europa? Even if there is a water ocean there, you would have to mine very deep just to get to it. And water is pretty much ALL Titan has. And it's cold in a way that makes Mars look like a Brazilian summer. Radiation, no pressure, no soil AT ALL (not even the barren stuff), etc.
Hey buddy, the English colonists who settled the New World have every bit as much right to the language as the English who stayed behind. Just because your ancestors didn't get on the boat, don't take it out on us. Did we not give you Hollywood, Paris Hilton, and the idea of a taco WITHIN another taco? And have we gotten even one "thanks"? No.
I can't help but think that some time in the future, when we're all riding around in dune-buggies fighting over the precious gasoline, comments like this will seem truly bizarre.
NASA's "science" has always been heavily politicized. The same sort of thing went on with the Russians back during the Cold War. They even used to coordinate their launches with anniversaries of Soviet space accomplishments just to try to show up the Russkies (they even held the first space shuttle launch back just so they could have it coincide with the 20th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's first man in space flight). NASA has ALWAYS been more about politics than science. And now China are the new "bad guys."
Try looking at the comments in the "At the AV Club" section of The Onion sometime. Even though that section is supposed to be the serious part of the Onion, every single poster thinks they're trying out for the regular Onion writing staff. It's like a competition to see who can make the most ironic/detached/funny/irreverent statements in 5 seconds.
The Apple thing has gotten a lot better in recent years (as Steve Jobs looks less and less to the world like an idealistic hippie and more and more like a ruthless supervillian petting a cat). There was a time when saying anything even vaguely pro-MS or anti-Apple would get you modded to "-30 retarded" in about a millisecond.
FLOSS and Linux are still pretty bad, though. but I think even they've improved a little recently (maybe that's just my subjective experience).
Sometimes, it's true. I usually have to save up some Karma if I want to:
a) criticize Linux b) criticize certain religions c) say anything politically-incorrect (this is the BIG one) d) criticize Apple e) criticize the space program
But keep in mind that most of these things (ESPECIALLY a & b) will basically get you banned or your post completely deleted on most forums. And Slashdot does seem to be getting better. I criticized Linux just today and amazingly didn't get modded down into oblivion immediately (until moderators read this comment of course).
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to insult my Christian, black astronaut friend who likes Apple.
I'm kidding, of course. We all know there are no black astronauts.
That's where the "assembling a relatively smart/knowledgeable/literate user base" part comes in. Of course, that still won't stop you from getting modded troll for daring to criticize Linux, or implying that Apple users are a bunch of annoying hipsters with a latent homosexual attraction to Steve Jobs--but it still works pretty well.
Oh, and don't get me started on some of the registration requirements for commenting on some news sites. I swear, some of them want everything from my grandmother's street address to my the length of my dick (in centimeters). So if I want to comment, I have to call up grandma and ask for both.
People can say whatever they want, moderation points stamp out trolls and assign relative values to posts (not always the best system, but not bad), etc. Of course, for it to work, you have to assemble a pretty smart/knowledgeable/literate bunch of people (that's the real trick). And you would still have to avoid kdawson stories, of course. Not a perfect system by a longshot, but one of the best.
Most of the systems I've seen on news sites for commenting have ranged from "suck ass" to "MAJORLY suck ass." Moderators are either too tough (nothing controversial gets through) of too lenient (leading to comment threads loaded with spam). Just go look at the "Wired" story comment sections sometime. Half of them don't work at all, the other half are loaded with spam, and some of their stories don't seem to let you comment at all. And that's from a *tech* magazine.
Sure, if you can build a spacecraft that can survive the 100,000 year journey, no problem. Alternately, you could build a propulsion system that could get to at least a substantial fraction of the speed of light. Only now you also have to invent a magic construction material that will allow it to withstand the incredible force of micrometeorite collisions at that speed (think of it as constantly hitting bombs several times more powerful than any nuke, head-on).
Unless the Human Race spreads to other worlds, systems, and galaxies, we are dead as a species.
God, I am so sick of hearing that tired old cliche. Even putting aside the time scales we are talking here, there is absolutely no calamity, short of any earth-destroying asteroid (nothing even close to which has been encountered since MAYBE the strike that may have created the moon) or the sun going all Krypton on us (sure, in a few billion years) that is going to make the earth LESS survivable than any other planet or body in this solar system, and likely any other solar system for dozens of light years out (which are essentially unreachable by man).
If we had a Yucatan strike today, we would be much better off tunneling deep underground than trying to mount a ship to some Mars colony. Even a post-strike earth would still have water, supplies of oxygen, survivable atmospheric pressure, much more cosmic radiation protection, etc. compared to Mars. And it wouldn't require an extremely resource intensive journey to get underground. The earth of the only planet on which humans can survive for any length of time in a self-sufficient manner. Every other planet in the solar system is a death-trap (and there is no reason to suspect otherwise for any other solar system within reach--which currently includes no solar systems besides our own, BTW).
I've downloaded two different versions, wrestled with them for a while (first on dual-monitor support, later on sound card issues), and ultimately went back to Windows. I'm a geek, but even I'm not THAT much of a geek to stick with Linux apparently (though Ubuntu definitely was the most user-friendly Linux distro I've seen to date).
What's more, Sony users even had the option of buying a perfectly functioning online version of most games. All they had to do was buy the version marked "Xbox 360," and they would never have experienced any online outage at all. So what exactly are they complaining about?
Slashdot Mirror
Call it what you like, all I know is that my environmentalist friend is always changing his story every few years. One day he's telling me how great hydrogen fuel is, then it's ethanol, then it's electricity. I remember one time when we were in college it was methane. I keep telling him they need to decide on one thing and stick to it, but then off he goes on some new thing that's going to save the world. Tomorrow it will probably nuclear fusion, or sails on the cars, or god knows what.
As I said in my post, I thought electricity was the green thing that we're supposed to fuel our cars with now.
I have a hard time keeping up with what's hip in the green world, but I thought electricity was the green thing that we're supposed to fuel our cars with now. Didn't hydrogen fall out of favor with the greenies a few years back?
But according to her PR agent, she was once just like you.
No kidding. To even get hired at Yahoo, you have to show an amazing amount of organization, socialization, and professionalism. The article makes it sound like you can just walk through the door wearing a ratty t-shirt, tell them you are really smart and play a lot of WoW, and get hired. I don't think so.
Yes, climate change. Doubleplus good!
That's how real people really act in confined quarters (especially in stressful circumstances). You're just too used to seeing people acting unrealistically in other science fiction shows to realize that.
Take Star Trek The Next Generation--where people brought their children aboard a ship that was almost destroyed every week, where crewmembers never experience PTSD/paranoia/anger/frustration (despite being almost killed on a regular basis), where everyone acts like robots, where no one ever has sex, where no one ever says "Fuck this noise, I'm quitting Starfleet and going someplace safe," where society has become a perfect communist state with no money and everyone working and risking their lives for the common good, where greed is not only not good but GONE, etc. This is a show where everyone's life is threatened every week and yet no one so much as blinks an eye afterward--much less loses the press in their lint-free uniforms.
Is THAT your idea of realistic human behavior?
All the Stargates before SGU were silly old-school scifi shit. You must be an old Trekkie who thinks that that unrealistic silly universe was actually remotely plausible in anything resembling the real world. Some of us happen to like our science fiction more realistic and character-oriented, thank you. The "monster/alien of the week" doesn't appeal to us. The "everything at the end of the episode is exactly the same as it was when it began" doesn't either. The old Stargates, Star Trek the Next Generation, etc.--everyone in that cast was so perfect and heroic they probably didn't even take shits. Personally I like it when a show has castmembers that at least RESEMBLE actual human beings, not heroic robots.
It would require several orders-of-magnitude more effort and resources to build giant rockets to pack humans and needed resources off to Mars than it would to manufacture a shitload of grow-lights and head underground to wait out a few decades of winter.
The problem with your argument is that it's premised on the idea that we *can* have colonies on other worlds (I presume here that you mean SELF-SUFFICIENT colonies, ones that can survive without constant resupply from earth). As I said, every other body in our solar system besides earth is a death-trap. No other body in our solar system can sustain any self-sufficient colony of any size for any length of time. The resources aren't even close. Maybe you can find some small deposits of water here and there (which would need heavy processing to even be extracted), maybe you can find some energy. But what body is going to provide everything you need to really survive long-term?
Mars? Not even close. Mars has very little atmospheric pressure, high radiation, it's cold as fuck, the soil is barren, the water is sparse. No amount of "terraforming" (if that's even possible) is going to turn that shithole into anything other than a big rusty desert.
Europa? Even if there is a water ocean there, you would have to mine very deep just to get to it. And water is pretty much ALL Titan has. And it's cold in a way that makes Mars look like a Brazilian summer. Radiation, no pressure, no soil AT ALL (not even the barren stuff), etc.
Hey buddy, the English colonists who settled the New World have every bit as much right to the language as the English who stayed behind. Just because your ancestors didn't get on the boat, don't take it out on us. Did we not give you Hollywood, Paris Hilton, and the idea of a taco WITHIN another taco? And have we gotten even one "thanks"? No.
I can't help but think that some time in the future, when we're all riding around in dune-buggies fighting over the precious gasoline, comments like this will seem truly bizarre.
NASA's "science" has always been heavily politicized. The same sort of thing went on with the Russians back during the Cold War. They even used to coordinate their launches with anniversaries of Soviet space accomplishments just to try to show up the Russkies (they even held the first space shuttle launch back just so they could have it coincide with the 20th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's first man in space flight). NASA has ALWAYS been more about politics than science. And now China are the new "bad guys."
Try looking at the comments in the "At the AV Club" section of The Onion sometime. Even though that section is supposed to be the serious part of the Onion, every single poster thinks they're trying out for the regular Onion writing staff. It's like a competition to see who can make the most ironic/detached/funny/irreverent statements in 5 seconds.
The Apple thing has gotten a lot better in recent years (as Steve Jobs looks less and less to the world like an idealistic hippie and more and more like a ruthless supervillian petting a cat). There was a time when saying anything even vaguely pro-MS or anti-Apple would get you modded to "-30 retarded" in about a millisecond.
FLOSS and Linux are still pretty bad, though. but I think even they've improved a little recently (maybe that's just my subjective experience).
what goes after the kilometer?
A Tesla Roadster's battery?
Yeah, I meant b & c. Though a comes close on /.
Sometimes, it's true. I usually have to save up some Karma if I want to:
a) criticize Linux
b) criticize certain religions
c) say anything politically-incorrect (this is the BIG one)
d) criticize Apple
e) criticize the space program
But keep in mind that most of these things (ESPECIALLY a & b) will basically get you banned or your post completely deleted on most forums. And Slashdot does seem to be getting better. I criticized Linux just today and amazingly didn't get modded down into oblivion immediately (until moderators read this comment of course).
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to insult my Christian, black astronaut friend who likes Apple.
I'm kidding, of course. We all know there are no black astronauts.
That's where the "assembling a relatively smart/knowledgeable/literate user base" part comes in. Of course, that still won't stop you from getting modded troll for daring to criticize Linux, or implying that Apple users are a bunch of annoying hipsters with a latent homosexual attraction to Steve Jobs--but it still works pretty well.
Oh, and don't get me started on some of the registration requirements for commenting on some news sites. I swear, some of them want everything from my grandmother's street address to my the length of my dick (in centimeters). So if I want to comment, I have to call up grandma and ask for both.
People can say whatever they want, moderation points stamp out trolls and assign relative values to posts (not always the best system, but not bad), etc. Of course, for it to work, you have to assemble a pretty smart/knowledgeable/literate bunch of people (that's the real trick). And you would still have to avoid kdawson stories, of course. Not a perfect system by a longshot, but one of the best.
Most of the systems I've seen on news sites for commenting have ranged from "suck ass" to "MAJORLY suck ass." Moderators are either too tough (nothing controversial gets through) of too lenient (leading to comment threads loaded with spam). Just go look at the "Wired" story comment sections sometime. Half of them don't work at all, the other half are loaded with spam, and some of their stories don't seem to let you comment at all. And that's from a *tech* magazine.
Sure, if you can build a spacecraft that can survive the 100,000 year journey, no problem. Alternately, you could build a propulsion system that could get to at least a substantial fraction of the speed of light. Only now you also have to invent a magic construction material that will allow it to withstand the incredible force of micrometeorite collisions at that speed (think of it as constantly hitting bombs several times more powerful than any nuke, head-on).
Unless the Human Race spreads to other worlds, systems, and galaxies, we are dead as a species.
God, I am so sick of hearing that tired old cliche. Even putting aside the time scales we are talking here, there is absolutely no calamity, short of any earth-destroying asteroid (nothing even close to which has been encountered since MAYBE the strike that may have created the moon) or the sun going all Krypton on us (sure, in a few billion years) that is going to make the earth LESS survivable than any other planet or body in this solar system, and likely any other solar system for dozens of light years out (which are essentially unreachable by man).
If we had a Yucatan strike today, we would be much better off tunneling deep underground than trying to mount a ship to some Mars colony. Even a post-strike earth would still have water, supplies of oxygen, survivable atmospheric pressure, much more cosmic radiation protection, etc. compared to Mars. And it wouldn't require an extremely resource intensive journey to get underground. The earth of the only planet on which humans can survive for any length of time in a self-sufficient manner. Every other planet in the solar system is a death-trap (and there is no reason to suspect otherwise for any other solar system within reach--which currently includes no solar systems besides our own, BTW).
I've downloaded two different versions, wrestled with them for a while (first on dual-monitor support, later on sound card issues), and ultimately went back to Windows. I'm a geek, but even I'm not THAT much of a geek to stick with Linux apparently (though Ubuntu definitely was the most user-friendly Linux distro I've seen to date).
What's more, Sony users even had the option of buying a perfectly functioning online version of most games. All they had to do was buy the version marked "Xbox 360," and they would never have experienced any online outage at all. So what exactly are they complaining about?