I can understand that at this point they are probably just filing patents "just in case." However, taking radiographs of every air passenger is not what I would call a responsible use of ionizing radiation.
Before anyone starts quoting dose limits at me, I'm going to say right now that exposure to ionizing radiation should be kept as low as is feasible to do. This means that you _avoid_ unnecessary radiographs and similar procedures, not throw them up for every air passenger--not at the doses imparted by modern radiographs. I also can't understand how they can support such a system when some folks fly dozens of times a year or many more and will have no practical way to track the number of radiographs they've had taken so far this year etc. etc. Can you imagine a very frequent flyer being turned away from security because he'd been put through the scanner too many times this year? Of course you can't--that would never happen because nobody is keeping track.
Unless backscatter x-ray requires far, far less entrance exposure than standard radiography (which I suppose it would since it doesn't need to penetrate the body) to the point where it's into background or only somewhat above, it's very hard to not be a little worried by this. Of course, if they plan on visualizing both sides of the body at once, then naturally they will have to penetrate the body. Then you have the issues of people being told to "go through again" because of machine glitches, because someone was looking at the bag scanner instead, etc.
What really worries me is that nobody seems to even be talking about this. That either means that the doses from these radiographs really are that much lower (and I just don't know it), or that nobody is really concerned by it (which is a scary thought, meaning as it does that our "security" obsession is starting to physically do harm to people).
1) Senate proposes bill. Bill contains provisions that businesses will probably not like, but Senate feels pressure to do so from the public (?).
2) Influential conservative stirs up "public opinion" against bill's provisions.
3) Bill's provision is struck. Senate cites "will of the people" and shrugs. Senate gets to say "we tried, you didn't want it." Businesses keep astroturing. Everyone wins except the public who, as always, loses.
Just how often are the provisions of bills being discussed in Congress truly struck out because the people got wind of what was going on and spoke out--without some mouthpiece or rein-holding group to speak "for" us, or some vague poll number or other inaccurate metric telling the Congressfolks what we think, or some massive letter-writing campaign by just 2000 very angry people?
The only reason I can see someone who usually plays a lot of multiplayer games (e.g. CS or variants, FEAR Combat, etc.) wanting to be a Skirmisher is, basically, because these people are obsessed with "skill." Skill usually involves taking the most numerically powerful/useful/"best" weapon in the game and perfecting aiming with it to the point of stupidity (e.g. the AK-47 in CS or the RL in Quake). These folks, if they end up filling the Skirmisher role, will probably find the "best" Skirmisher weapon and do exactly this, then compete for who can be the first to get the killing headshot on the Elite.
What I feel that they _intend_ is for casual gamers to go into the Skirmisher role _knowing that they have basically no chance of winning against the Elite._ They'll fight and fight and, as mentioned, occasionally take down an Elite. The problem is that most casual gamers, I believe, don't play the multiplayer portions of these games (they definitely don't after the games have been around a few years and all the 1337 kiddies have twinked out their skills)--and they don't play the multiplayer much precisely because they believe they have no chance against people who play so much of these games. Rather, the casual gamer will be attracted by the single player portion and thus the level playing field offered when they have a bunch of extra health and better weapons than the Skirmishers.
I will give them that the dynamic has some merit. It will be _very_ interesting to see how it plays out. If nothing else, it's an excellent way to get out of having to push the A.I. envelope. I am highly disappointed to see that they're trying some inane matching for the non-story missions (please let me pick my own servers), and also that there may be a queue as a result of this (i.e. you're forced to wait fifteen minutes before you can play the next level because no servers are free). I'm also sad to see that the game looks like it's following the counterstrike-style "cops and terrorists" system--although they say it takes place in different dimensions or whatever, I have the feeling I'm going to see a lot of FAMAS (which is OK, I guess) and AK-47s (of which I'm completely sick and tired). That, however, is another rant entirely.
Drugs can be patented; this usually makes them expensive.
Soldiers go to war with the shoddiest equipment a billion dollars can buy.
People all over the world starve because they can't afford food, or because greedy people refuse to distribute the food because they aren't getting their cut.
There are all sorts of examples of human life costs due to price tags--that's not the argument-finishing riposte you think it is. I don't like putting a cost on human life myself, but running _that_ up the flagpole isn't the way to approach this situation, especially with the huge, glaring privacy concern with the little "oh, and a camera on every corner" tacked on to the end.
Burning Crusade is a bad example of an expansion pack. You pay that monthy fee partially because you expect new content to be delivered without your having to fork over _even more_ money. The whole draw of MMOs, I always thought, was that your continuing investment paid for continuing support and improvement of the game.
Episodic gaming has been around since the Doom days. Back then, though, they called it "shareware." Of course, in those days gaming wasn't quite as "established" as it is today, which is why you got four "episodes" of Doom at once instead of paying for each one at a time.
I was really hoping that the failure of Sin would've quietly killed this change, but it'll probably blow over in a few years. If I wanted thirty-minute bites of entertainment interspersed with twelve-minute bouts of advertisement (a different but related can of worms), I'd watch television.
Cave Story is probably the only platformer I've ever played that actually had an engaging if simple story and characters that I gave a damn about. The art looks a little cutesy, but the story isn't exactly all daisies and posies. The synthetic music has a nice nostalgic quality to it without sounding dated. It's not orchestral, but it's not Nintendo, either. It is slightly on the short side--the game does, however, have multiple endings, which helps boost the replay value quite a bit. The (real) final level and boss are also quite tough, but getting a "good" ending doesn't require beating them.
I believe a Navy does a lot more than just throw shells at buildings. That aside, you'd probably have a hard time hitting an even slightly moving ship with one of these at any range, let alone finding the ship in the first place without any of your own. After all, if the ship makes a slight random adjustment to course every six minutes or so (travel time of the shell at maximum range), then they're reasonably safe--especially if we assume that each gun could only fire at the maximum noted rate of ten shots a day, which means they get a shot every few hours or they blow all their shots in a few hours. Mounting these on shorelines is a waste.
Please RTFA: even the summary states that the projectiles will reach up to 95 miles of altitude. They're not just firing the thing into the air willy-nilly--that projectile is, yes, being arced to its destination. 5-inch cannon shells must arc to reach the extent of their range, so why not these projectiles?
Since the article--or at least the summary--seems mostly concerned with safety: what safety measures do these new batteries with _double_ the energy density of standard Li-ion batteries feature? If the energy density increases, doesn't that make the batteries more dangerous to use without additional considerations to prevent damage/overcharge/whatever?
... when all the teachers get sent to jail. I like to remember it this way: the apostrophe in this case stands in for _some_ letter. Therefore, it must be the "i" in "is," since "its" has no missing letter.
It bears mentioning that potassium iodide tablets provide protection only against iodine isotopes, which I believe are far more likely to show up in a dirty bomb (one made from medical materials, especially) than in the fallout of a nuclear explosion (and I don't think that iodine would be the main concern in that fallout).
Uh, the Doomsday clock applies specifically to "doomsday" due to nuclear weapons. They are (or, at least, were at the time) a slightly more serious threat than a Star Trek movie.
...the CENTRAL intelligence agency was set up originally to unite intelligence work more or less in one place.
Yeah, that's why I included DHS in that list, because I kinda thought they were supposed to coordinate all the intelligence agencies along with whatever other crap they do.
I dunno. "A Final Unity" was an adventure game that I thought was actually not half bad.
Then again, nobody makes adventure games these days. Maybe they could take a cue from Sam and Max--if EVER a series cried out "episodic content" it's one where the original source was... episodic.
The healthcare industry does not give a shit about health...
Doctors, nurses, insurance and healthcare managers and their family AND friends also die of cancer. They therefore have an interest in a cure--I don't think anyone in today's world would have the foresight to deny themselves a cancer cure if they needed it just to keep the money flowing for other folks.
Even common, everyday stuff can have interesting properties. You can suspend liquid oxygen in a strong magnetic field, for instance, because it's a paramagnetic element. Of course, one could argue that _liquid_ oxygen isn't really an everyday material.
Slashdot Mirror
I can understand that at this point they are probably just filing patents "just in case." However, taking radiographs of every air passenger is not what I would call a responsible use of ionizing radiation.
Before anyone starts quoting dose limits at me, I'm going to say right now that exposure to ionizing radiation should be kept as low as is feasible to do. This means that you _avoid_ unnecessary radiographs and similar procedures, not throw them up for every air passenger--not at the doses imparted by modern radiographs. I also can't understand how they can support such a system when some folks fly dozens of times a year or many more and will have no practical way to track the number of radiographs they've had taken so far this year etc. etc. Can you imagine a very frequent flyer being turned away from security because he'd been put through the scanner too many times this year? Of course you can't--that would never happen because nobody is keeping track.
Unless backscatter x-ray requires far, far less entrance exposure than standard radiography (which I suppose it would since it doesn't need to penetrate the body) to the point where it's into background or only somewhat above, it's very hard to not be a little worried by this. Of course, if they plan on visualizing both sides of the body at once, then naturally they will have to penetrate the body. Then you have the issues of people being told to "go through again" because of machine glitches, because someone was looking at the bag scanner instead, etc.
What really worries me is that nobody seems to even be talking about this. That either means that the doses from these radiographs really are that much lower (and I just don't know it), or that nobody is really concerned by it (which is a scary thought, meaning as it does that our "security" obsession is starting to physically do harm to people).
1) Senate proposes bill. Bill contains provisions that businesses will probably not like, but Senate feels pressure to do so from the public (?).
2) Influential conservative stirs up "public opinion" against bill's provisions.
3) Bill's provision is struck. Senate cites "will of the people" and shrugs. Senate gets to say "we tried, you didn't want it." Businesses keep astroturing. Everyone wins except the public who, as always, loses.
Just how often are the provisions of bills being discussed in Congress truly struck out because the people got wind of what was going on and spoke out--without some mouthpiece or rein-holding group to speak "for" us, or some vague poll number or other inaccurate metric telling the Congressfolks what we think, or some massive letter-writing campaign by just 2000 very angry people?
The only reason I can see someone who usually plays a lot of multiplayer games (e.g. CS or variants, FEAR Combat, etc.) wanting to be a Skirmisher is, basically, because these people are obsessed with "skill." Skill usually involves taking the most numerically powerful/useful/"best" weapon in the game and perfecting aiming with it to the point of stupidity (e.g. the AK-47 in CS or the RL in Quake). These folks, if they end up filling the Skirmisher role, will probably find the "best" Skirmisher weapon and do exactly this, then compete for who can be the first to get the killing headshot on the Elite.
What I feel that they _intend_ is for casual gamers to go into the Skirmisher role _knowing that they have basically no chance of winning against the Elite._ They'll fight and fight and, as mentioned, occasionally take down an Elite. The problem is that most casual gamers, I believe, don't play the multiplayer portions of these games (they definitely don't after the games have been around a few years and all the 1337 kiddies have twinked out their skills)--and they don't play the multiplayer much precisely because they believe they have no chance against people who play so much of these games. Rather, the casual gamer will be attracted by the single player portion and thus the level playing field offered when they have a bunch of extra health and better weapons than the Skirmishers.
I will give them that the dynamic has some merit. It will be _very_ interesting to see how it plays out. If nothing else, it's an excellent way to get out of having to push the A.I. envelope. I am highly disappointed to see that they're trying some inane matching for the non-story missions (please let me pick my own servers), and also that there may be a queue as a result of this (i.e. you're forced to wait fifteen minutes before you can play the next level because no servers are free). I'm also sad to see that the game looks like it's following the counterstrike-style "cops and terrorists" system--although they say it takes place in different dimensions or whatever, I have the feeling I'm going to see a lot of FAMAS (which is OK, I guess) and AK-47s (of which I'm completely sick and tired). That, however, is another rant entirely.
Drugs can be patented; this usually makes them expensive.
Soldiers go to war with the shoddiest equipment a billion dollars can buy.
People all over the world starve because they can't afford food, or because greedy people refuse to distribute the food because they aren't getting their cut.
There are all sorts of examples of human life costs due to price tags--that's not the argument-finishing riposte you think it is. I don't like putting a cost on human life myself, but running _that_ up the flagpole isn't the way to approach this situation, especially with the huge, glaring privacy concern with the little "oh, and a camera on every corner" tacked on to the end.
Burning Crusade is a bad example of an expansion pack. You pay that monthy fee partially because you expect new content to be delivered without your having to fork over _even more_ money. The whole draw of MMOs, I always thought, was that your continuing investment paid for continuing support and improvement of the game.
Episodic gaming has been around since the Doom days. Back then, though, they called it "shareware." Of course, in those days gaming wasn't quite as "established" as it is today, which is why you got four "episodes" of Doom at once instead of paying for each one at a time.
I was really hoping that the failure of Sin would've quietly killed this change, but it'll probably blow over in a few years. If I wanted thirty-minute bites of entertainment interspersed with twelve-minute bouts of advertisement (a different but related can of worms), I'd watch television.
Cave Story is probably the only platformer I've ever played that actually had an engaging if simple story and characters that I gave a damn about. The art looks a little cutesy, but the story isn't exactly all daisies and posies. The synthetic music has a nice nostalgic quality to it without sounding dated. It's not orchestral, but it's not Nintendo, either. It is slightly on the short side--the game does, however, have multiple endings, which helps boost the replay value quite a bit. The (real) final level and boss are also quite tough, but getting a "good" ending doesn't require beating them.
Looks like an independent version of Gloom, a Quake 2 mod (one that probably also inspired the Natural Selection mod for Half-life).
...these would almost replace Navies.
I believe a Navy does a lot more than just throw shells at buildings. That aside, you'd probably have a hard time hitting an even slightly moving ship with one of these at any range, let alone finding the ship in the first place without any of your own. After all, if the ship makes a slight random adjustment to course every six minutes or so (travel time of the shell at maximum range), then they're reasonably safe--especially if we assume that each gun could only fire at the maximum noted rate of ten shots a day, which means they get a shot every few hours or they blow all their shots in a few hours. Mounting these on shorelines is a waste.
Please RTFA: even the summary states that the projectiles will reach up to 95 miles of altitude. They're not just firing the thing into the air willy-nilly--that projectile is, yes, being arced to its destination. 5-inch cannon shells must arc to reach the extent of their range, so why not these projectiles?
Since the article--or at least the summary--seems mostly concerned with safety: what safety measures do these new batteries with _double_ the energy density of standard Li-ion batteries feature? If the energy density increases, doesn't that make the batteries more dangerous to use without additional considerations to prevent damage/overcharge/whatever?
I think this may be the only comment thread so far that has nothing to do with beer. Until now, when I just mentioned it. Oops.
... when all the teachers get sent to jail. I like to remember it this way: the apostrophe in this case stands in for _some_ letter. Therefore, it must be the "i" in "is," since "its" has no missing letter.
It bears mentioning that potassium iodide tablets provide protection only against iodine isotopes, which I believe are far more likely to show up in a dirty bomb (one made from medical materials, especially) than in the fallout of a nuclear explosion (and I don't think that iodine would be the main concern in that fallout).
Uh, the Doomsday clock applies specifically to "doomsday" due to nuclear weapons. They are (or, at least, were at the time) a slightly more serious threat than a Star Trek movie.
"When we first came out no one knew what DVR was.... So we made it hacker friendly."
Basically, they aimed it squarely at the "early adopter" segment so that they would spread the word.
...the CENTRAL intelligence agency was set up originally to unite intelligence work more or less in one place.
Yeah, that's why I included DHS in that list, because I kinda thought they were supposed to coordinate all the intelligence agencies along with whatever other crap they do.
Exactly how many intelligence agencies does the United States have?
Did Kirk also like Earl Grey Tea, hot? Darn. I don't think the joke works, then.
I dunno. "A Final Unity" was an adventure game that I thought was actually not half bad.
Then again, nobody makes adventure games these days. Maybe they could take a cue from Sam and Max--if EVER a series cried out "episodic content" it's one where the original source was... episodic.
The healthcare industry does not give a shit about health...
Doctors, nurses, insurance and healthcare managers and their family AND friends also die of cancer. They therefore have an interest in a cure--I don't think anyone in today's world would have the foresight to deny themselves a cancer cure if they needed it just to keep the money flowing for other folks.
Yeah, but liquid oxygen you can suspend with a permanent magnet from a freshman physics lab. No 16 (or whatever) Tesla field needed.
Even common, everyday stuff can have interesting properties. You can suspend liquid oxygen in a strong magnetic field, for instance, because it's a paramagnetic element. Of course, one could argue that _liquid_ oxygen isn't really an everyday material.
I'm 23 and Lady in Red was, when I was younger (say, 19), one of my favorite songs.
God, no! Disco Bandit for life. I called myself a "Senator" and gave all my pets names that started with Intern. I miss that game sometimes.