I suspect this "poor bastard" was actually a CIA agent and his family knew it. The fact that Cuba reported his arrest at least means they won't just kill him, and he should be grateful for that much. If a foreign agent of an agency with a long history of trying to assassinate *our* President was caught in the U.S., do you suppose we would just give him milk and cookies and let him go?
I don't think a generation ship is entirely beyond the realms of possibility within the next 50 years.
The main problem with that kind of effort isn't the engineering, it's the motivation. Yes, it might be possible to build something like that within a century, but that would mean many trillions of $, the concerted efforts of thousands of scientists, the work of dozens of countries pumping a significant portion of their GDP into a cooperative effort, etc.
Politically, that's pretty much impossible. You're never going to get that kind of effort without some sort of direct and real threat to humanity that absolutely requires a generation ship (like an earth destroying asteroid--the kind that would smash the planet to pieces, not just rip up the biosphere). And that's unlikely (even more unlikely that we would get enough advanced notice of such a threat to pull it off anyway).
It's a nice dream, but it's still just science fiction. I personally doubt that any of us will ever live to even see man walk on another planet in our own solar system. Any hopes of crossing the almost inconceivably vast distances of interstellar space is just fantasy right now, and would probably require some pretty radical long-term technological advancements in a very distant future (assuming human technological progress continues to advance and we don't blow ourselves up in the meanwhile). Sadly, I think the era of such dreams of space has come to an end. Sputnik initiated a brief shining period when it seemed like anything was within reach, but that only lasted about 20 years before reality came crashing in and budgets got slashed.
Even accepting this, we run into the problem of how to stop once we get there. That would mean turning the ship around midway through the trip and accelerating the other way, which is going to slow that trip significantly.
Yes, a mere 28 light years away. So all we need to do is get in the fastest spacecraft we've ever built and we can be there in just about 150,000 years.
Tom Ridge was nothing but the designated fall guy at the Dept. of Homeland Security, but he managed to parlay it into a book deal and a ton of great press. Not bad for a guy who had formerly been an almost completely unknown governor of a minor state. You think anyone would have given a rat's ass about his memoirs if he had turned that job down?
If you can be a fall guy who manages to get out BEFORE the fall, there is real money and fame in it.
Advocates for public education once had to deal with basically the same arguments. And, it's certainly true that a free basic education is not a necessity in the same way that food, water, and shelter are--but very few today would dispute that it's a necessity in the sense that, without it, an individual is at a serious disadvantage in life. It's the same with the internet. Sure, you don't NEED it, but it's going to be very hard to live a normal life in an industrialized country in the future WITHOUT at least basic access to it.
Reminds me of a couple of years back when we hired a designer fresh out of art school. He had plenty of artistic and creative energy, but little to no concern with what consumers actually wanted or needed. I think he lasted about 6 months. I guess he's not compromising his vision in the unemployment line now.
As the GP pointed out, IR switchers work like crap on Time Warner cable boxes (probably other cableco boxes too). And, even if they worked flawlessly, this would only let you record one show at once. MythTV just doesn't work well for anything other than box-free analog cable. Even devices that WILL accept CableCards are a pain enough (thanks to problems with getting them set up and the SDV that a lot of HD channels use now).
Not just Time Warner--now Comcast too. If the government doesn't step in, I expect pretty much every major cableco to be owned by a major media provider by the time this is done (Disney and Sony will probably be next ones to get in the act).
Nothing ruins a passion or hobby faster than doing it as a job, unfortunately. There are exceptions to this, but the day-to-day grind really can take the fun and challenge right out of something.
With the CYA attitude of the government, they usually avoid out-and-out lying. The way they generally lie is to put in qualifiers in their statements and play with definitions (i.e. "We don't torture" can be true if you don't define waterboarding and other such practices as torture, and have some helpful Justice Dept. memos to back you up). The CIA, when asked about journalists, usually just says something vague like "Our operatives don't pose as journalists." What is needed is a much more thorough and unequivocal statement that doesn't allow as much wiggle room, i.e. "Our operatives don't pose as journalists. Nor do they pose as anyone claiming to be journalists or reporters. Nor do we hire journalists or reporters--either directly or through third parties. Nor do we encourage or condone allies to engage in any such practices."
One good step towards making imprisonment and mistreatment of journalists a big international no-no would be for all the major countries to openly ban their intelligence agencies (the CIA, MI6, etc.) from using operatives posing as journalists, or hiring journalists for intelligence gathering purposes. One of the arguments a lot of these oppressive governments use when they imprison journalists is that these journalists are actually spies. And in at least some cases, they probably actually ARE spies (particularly with freelancers and bloggers with no connection to reputable news organizations).
It would be nice if we could at least have the CIA come out openly and bluntly and say to the world community "We don't do this, under any circumstances" the next time some petty tyrant claims that the journalists he's caught are working for the CIA. As it is, anyone wandering into a foreign country and asking questions, journalist or not, is going to be wearing a big target on their chest that says "Possible intelligence operative." The tyrant wouldn't care if we denied it, but it would do a lot to encourage the world community to go to bat for more journalists if they had some sort of assurance that the sanctions they were imposing were on behalf of actual legitimate journalists, not James Bond wannabes with fake press credentials.
Slashdot Mirror
I suspect this "poor bastard" was actually a CIA agent and his family knew it. The fact that Cuba reported his arrest at least means they won't just kill him, and he should be grateful for that much. If a foreign agent of an agency with a long history of trying to assassinate *our* President was caught in the U.S., do you suppose we would just give him milk and cookies and let him go?
Ha, obviously you have no idea of the might of the aliens and their many advancements in anal probe technology!
Do we even have the math to do a close pass-by of something that far away? It's tricky enough just to get a probe down on Mars with any accuracy.
10,000 times the energy output of the sun is "doable"?!?!? Not in this millennium, I'm afraid.
The main problem with that kind of effort isn't the engineering, it's the motivation. Yes, it might be possible to build something like that within a century, but that would mean many trillions of $, the concerted efforts of thousands of scientists, the work of dozens of countries pumping a significant portion of their GDP into a cooperative effort, etc.
Politically, that's pretty much impossible. You're never going to get that kind of effort without some sort of direct and real threat to humanity that absolutely requires a generation ship (like an earth destroying asteroid--the kind that would smash the planet to pieces, not just rip up the biosphere). And that's unlikely (even more unlikely that we would get enough advanced notice of such a threat to pull it off anyway).
It's a nice dream, but it's still just science fiction. I personally doubt that any of us will ever live to even see man walk on another planet in our own solar system. Any hopes of crossing the almost inconceivably vast distances of interstellar space is just fantasy right now, and would probably require some pretty radical long-term technological advancements in a very distant future (assuming human technological progress continues to advance and we don't blow ourselves up in the meanwhile). Sadly, I think the era of such dreams of space has come to an end. Sputnik initiated a brief shining period when it seemed like anything was within reach, but that only lasted about 20 years before reality came crashing in and budgets got slashed.
Even accepting this, we run into the problem of how to stop once we get there. That would mean turning the ship around midway through the trip and accelerating the other way, which is going to slow that trip significantly.
Yes, a mere 28 light years away. So all we need to do is get in the fastest spacecraft we've ever built and we can be there in just about 150,000 years.
Who's coming with me?!?!?
Tom Ridge was nothing but the designated fall guy at the Dept. of Homeland Security, but he managed to parlay it into a book deal and a ton of great press. Not bad for a guy who had formerly been an almost completely unknown governor of a minor state. You think anyone would have given a rat's ass about his memoirs if he had turned that job down?
If you can be a fall guy who manages to get out BEFORE the fall, there is real money and fame in it.
Advocates for public education once had to deal with basically the same arguments. And, it's certainly true that a free basic education is not a necessity in the same way that food, water, and shelter are--but very few today would dispute that it's a necessity in the sense that, without it, an individual is at a serious disadvantage in life. It's the same with the internet. Sure, you don't NEED it, but it's going to be very hard to live a normal life in an industrialized country in the future WITHOUT at least basic access to it.
With the AT&T network, "under-served areas of the US" includes pretty much the entire country, including isolated rural towns like San Francisco.
Nonsense! Who DIDN'T love Gil Gerard in spandex?
And Kiff, issue a flashing light thingie!
Uhh...a red alert, sir?
No time for details man, just do it!
Don't worry, AT&T's network coverage sucks so bad that no one will ever be ABLE to get close to the limit.
Reminds me of a couple of years back when we hired a designer fresh out of art school. He had plenty of artistic and creative energy, but little to no concern with what consumers actually wanted or needed. I think he lasted about 6 months. I guess he's not compromising his vision in the unemployment line now.
As the GP pointed out, IR switchers work like crap on Time Warner cable boxes (probably other cableco boxes too). And, even if they worked flawlessly, this would only let you record one show at once. MythTV just doesn't work well for anything other than box-free analog cable. Even devices that WILL accept CableCards are a pain enough (thanks to problems with getting them set up and the SDV that a lot of HD channels use now).
Not just Time Warner--now Comcast too. If the government doesn't step in, I expect pretty much every major cableco to be owned by a major media provider by the time this is done (Disney and Sony will probably be next ones to get in the act).
Sure beats the hell out of those damn annoying cards that just play music.
Nothing ruins a passion or hobby faster than doing it as a job, unfortunately. There are exceptions to this, but the day-to-day grind really can take the fun and challenge right out of something.
"Dead Space 2011"--to be followed by "Dead Space 2012," "Dead Space 2013," and "Dead Space 2014."
With the CYA attitude of the government, they usually avoid out-and-out lying. The way they generally lie is to put in qualifiers in their statements and play with definitions (i.e. "We don't torture" can be true if you don't define waterboarding and other such practices as torture, and have some helpful Justice Dept. memos to back you up). The CIA, when asked about journalists, usually just says something vague like "Our operatives don't pose as journalists." What is needed is a much more thorough and unequivocal statement that doesn't allow as much wiggle room, i.e. "Our operatives don't pose as journalists. Nor do they pose as anyone claiming to be journalists or reporters. Nor do we hire journalists or reporters--either directly or through third parties. Nor do we encourage or condone allies to engage in any such practices."
One good step towards making imprisonment and mistreatment of journalists a big international no-no would be for all the major countries to openly ban their intelligence agencies (the CIA, MI6, etc.) from using operatives posing as journalists, or hiring journalists for intelligence gathering purposes. One of the arguments a lot of these oppressive governments use when they imprison journalists is that these journalists are actually spies. And in at least some cases, they probably actually ARE spies (particularly with freelancers and bloggers with no connection to reputable news organizations). It would be nice if we could at least have the CIA come out openly and bluntly and say to the world community "We don't do this, under any circumstances" the next time some petty tyrant claims that the journalists he's caught are working for the CIA. As it is, anyone wandering into a foreign country and asking questions, journalist or not, is going to be wearing a big target on their chest that says "Possible intelligence operative." The tyrant wouldn't care if we denied it, but it would do a lot to encourage the world community to go to bat for more journalists if they had some sort of assurance that the sanctions they were imposing were on behalf of actual legitimate journalists, not James Bond wannabes with fake press credentials.
Uh...just don't...uh...keep unconsciously...uh...saying...uh...annoying words...uh....throughout...uh...your...uh...speech.
And we'll spend years wondering why they don't just maroon said sociopathic doctor on the next planet they come to.
Why are you as government?
Because that let's us rob *everyone*.
Oh man, you will smoke a turd in the deepest sewer of hell for insulting Leo Laporte. Even Jesus looks up to that guy.