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User: SunTzuWarmaster

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  1. Re:Same reason we're looking for earth-like life on Why We're Looking For ET All Wrong · · Score: 1

    FYI - the Wikipedia article that you linked indicated that we have been doing so for the last decade.

  2. Onion Said it First on Why the LHC May Mean the End of Experimental Particle Physics · · Score: 1

    One year after confirming the existence of the Higgs Boson, or “God Particle,” scientists at CERN say they are struggling to find other uses for the giant particle accelerator. http://www.theonion.com/video/...

  3. Re:How much for the Diversity Initiative? on Intel Drops Support For Science Talent Search · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The above paints a (probably accurate) picture that Intel is cutting $300M in R&D and starting $300M in Diversity Initiatives. The STS highlights "Independent individual [student] research", and is (likely) funded out of the R&D budget. It seems like a pretty clear message of valuing genitalia/pigmentation above talent/competence. I disagree with this corporate value stance, but it is not my company.

    I really hate to think of the R&D scientists/engineers who will be laid off, go without equipment, or be unable to investigate new projects because the company believes that more representatives having certain genitalia or pigmentation should instead be subsidized. Doubly so for student researchers (bearing the wrong genitalia or pigmentation).

  4. Re:Hobbit on How To Die On Mars · · Score: 1

    It is every citizen's final duty to go into the tanks and become one with all the people.
      - Chairman Sheng-ji Yang, "Ethics for Tomorrow"

  5. Re:Who has the rights to the moon's resources? on Billionaire Teams Up With NASA To Mine the Moon · · Score: 1

    In other words, the law is extremely unfair and biased.

    If you believe that this law is unfair/biased in the favor of mining companies, I suggest that you start one.

    The laws are structured in the same manner as many others: if you can take it, its yours. The oil in the middle of the Pacific doesn't go to "the citizens of all involved countries [on the planet]", it goes to the first to claim it. The "gold in them hills" belongs to the first to grab it.

  6. Re:Well duh on How Blind Programmers Write Code · · Score: 1

    Of course not, some of them worked on my last codebase! *buh dun chich*

    (Sorry, couldn't resist)

  7. Re:Indicative of General Attitudes on Fewer Grants For Young Researchers Causing Brain Drain In Academia · · Score: 1

    Certainly, and that is borne out in the numbers.

    I've been having a hard time figuring out where I stand on this. The $ rate for researchers is roughly equivalent (100K average for senor scientist, 89K average for normal, www.glassdoor.com), so there is a good argument to be made for the NIH grant decision authority: "if I can pay someone with 10 extra years of experience for roughly the same money, why shouldn't I?". There is also a good argument for young scientists who claim "we have less than half the economic opportunities which were presented to the previous generation; this is unfair, and 10 years worth of scientists will be lost."

  8. Re:Indicative of General Attitudes on Fewer Grants For Young Researchers Causing Brain Drain In Academia · · Score: 4, Informative

    Parent is likely a troll, but I'm going into the numbers.

    From 1980 to 2008, the average investigator age at NIH has gone from 39 to 51. Source: http://www.plosone.org/article...

    In 1980, I had to derive the damn number (http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/1982/07/rpt2full.pdf), the median worker age is approximately ~31, while the 2013 average worker age is 42.4 (http://www.bls.gov/cps/industry_age.htm).

    The average age of workers has increased by 11 years while the average age of investigators has increased by 12 years.

    Research grants are a "winner take all" system where the total amount of research money is roughly constant (http://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/NIHfunding-fig1.png). Essentially, the older researchers are displacing the younger ones in the field through simply outcompeting for funding and working longer careers. Younger researchers, without funding, simply leave the field, as the old eat the young for breakfast.

  9. Re:Cool name, is it taken? on BlackBerry's Survival Plan: the Internet of Things · · Score: 1

    You usually don't want to be associated with the Umbrella Corporation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umbrella_Corporation).

    (\/) (,,,) (\/)

    (Why not Zoidberg?)

  10. Re:Who will get on North Korean Internet Is Down · · Score: 4, Informative

    Sorry, figure corrections (I got my info from http://www.marketwatch.com/inv..., which lists figures in yen):

    $4,799B - North Korean GDP 2014
    $7,770B - Sony Gross Sales/Revenue 2014
    $2,280B - Sony Gross Income 2014

    Sony is only really worth 1.6 North Koreas.

  11. Re:Who will get on North Korean Internet Is Down · · Score: 1

    I wouldn't say that it is "a lot smaller than a country"

    At time of writing:
    $40B - North Korean GDP 2014
    $7,770B - Sony Gross Sales/Revenue 2014
    $2,280B - Sony Gross Income 2014

    By dollars, Sony is roughly 200 times the size of North Korea.

  12. Re:Disturbing on Colleges Face New 'Gainful Employment' Regulations For Student Loans · · Score: 1

    Florida here.

    Here is a minimal sample plan for in-state Florida college (where we didn't screw things up):
    Insurance - covered at the student health center (catastrophic covered by parent)
    Food - $100/month, rice/beans (my budget as an adult) - $1200/year
    Tuition - 39credits/year @ 212.28/cr = $8.2K/year (source: http://tuitionfees.ikm.ucf.edu...)
    Transportation - Bicycle, SERIOUSLY
    Housing - offcampus w/shuttle @ $600/month (includes utilities and roommates, "luxury living" source: http://www.livesomewhere.com/c...) - $7.2K/year
    MISC - haircuts, bike repairs, incidentals, pocket money, $100/month = $1200/year

    Cost - 17.8K/year.

    But how will someone ever pay for this?

    Part time job at campus library at lowest-salary-university-will-pay-you. 20hours/week @ $8/hour = $8K/year.

    Assuming that tuition never goes up and the student never obtains a marketable skill (dishwashing @ $10/hour, CAD drawing at $12/hour, copywriting @ $15/hour, freelance website design @ $20/hour, etc.), college costs about $10K/year, or $40K for the total package.

    Note that a "student paying their own way, working their through college on minimum wage" is actually an option. Minimum wage is nearly $8/hour. 40 hours of minimum wage is $16K/year, which is just enough to cover college when considering the Earned Income Tax Credit and Making Education Pay Tax Credit.

    Additionally note that no scholarships were to be had in the above calculations. Florida has a program called "Bright Futures" whereby a student with 1170 SAT score can get tuition 100% covered for all 4 years of college (cost reduced to $10K/year).

  13. Re:Awesome on Tesla Announces Dual Motors, 'Autopilot' For the Model S · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't understand why people want to buy things they can't afford.

    I don't think that you understand: the car goes really fast and looks really cool , and I want one.

    Note that this is different than:

    I don't understand why people do buy things they can't afford.

  14. Re:America Cannot Compete on New Global Plan Would Crack Down On Corporate Tax Avoidance · · Score: 2

    Certain country's tax codes are upending the world trade structure.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...

    The way things should work: profits made in a country are taxed in that country.
    The way things should not work: a company doing business abroad pays taxes both at home and abroad.
    The way things break: subsidiary company makes "no profit" (no tax) because it pays hefty license fees (100% net income) to my headquarters company in Ireland. Ireland does not tax licensed technology abroad. I pay effectively no taxes (and instead pay clever tax accountants, who are cheaper).

    This is an article is an attempt to remedy the situation where companies can chase low tax structure to literally any country which will offer a favorable deal. It is understood that you can't do it one at a time ("we'll just fix Ireland because they're the problem"), because there are many countries willing to offer such arrangement (Bermuda, Curacao, Panama, Iceland, etc.). This is an attempt to get to the 1st and 2nd point, while disallowing the 3rd.

  15. Re:Simple on Ask Slashdot: What Old Technology Can't You Give Up? · · Score: 2

    You owe me a keyboard. This is the funniest joke that I have seen this year.

    Last years funniest series of jokes can be found here: http://www.photoshoptroll.com/... http://www.photoshoptroll.com/...

  16. Re:TFA bad at math? on The American Workday, By Profession · · Score: 1

    Because the graph breaks it down by occupational category, rather than by population within a category.

    A friend of mine once said that it was a travesty that 25% of the vehicles on the road were SUVs. Another claimed that this was sensible, as there were four categories: cars, trucks, vans, SUVs. The second person assumed an even distribution among vehicle classes, which is obviously untrue.

    You are assuming an uniform distribution of professions where none exists; there are likely more people in "management" or "sales" (45% by 0730). This offsets the numbers significantly.

  17. Re:Classic Khan pseudoscience on It's Dumb To Tell Kids They're Smart · · Score: 1

    I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the "growth" that they are referring to is the "growth mindset":
    http://www.austinclub.cz/dorp/...
    http://www.mrscullen.com/image...
    http://scholar.google.com/scho...

    The short version of the "growth mindset" is: "the children who believe that their brain grows in response to effort/stimulus have a tendency to perform better at cognitive tasks". The alternative to a "growth mindset" is frequently self-defeatist ("I'm not smart enough to do math", "I'll never get it", "I already know all of the information I can and cannot handle anymore", etc.). The "growth mindset" is independent of any neuroscience, and doesn't pretend to be related.

    From a recent conference: "it is actually unimportant whether the brain 'grows' as it learns more or not, the children who believe that it does learn more, quicker".

  18. Re:Clearly, we need to SPEND MORE MONEY! on Professors: US "In Denial" Over Poor Maths Standards · · Score: 1

    Source:http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm

  19. Re:Clearly, we need to SPEND MORE MONEY! on Professors: US "In Denial" Over Poor Maths Standards · · Score: 2

    Perhaps that, accounting for inflation, $1 in 1962 is worth $7.77 today? This indicates that the "quadrupling of funding!" is really "slashing the inflation-adjusted budget by half". Would that be on topic, and a worthwhile point to make?

  20. I agree with the parent poster. I feel that my voice is rarely silenced due to simple unpopularity. Browsing at -1 indicates mostly that -1 posters suck. More common than this is that my posts are average (in the noise), which is probably an accurate reflection of my posting nature (small additions filling the the corners or highlighting a previous argument).

    On the moderation side, I rarely downmoderate. I downmod in one of a very few cases: poster is a jerk/troll, poster has contributed nothing, poster is provably wrong in a manner which indicates erroneous conclusions.

  21. Re:Jewelry on Japanese and Swiss Watchmakers Scoff At Smartwatches · · Score: 1

    Planet Money summed this up pretty well for me:
    Announcer: "Zoe, let's say I give you two investment vehicles. One is a piece of art, with a drawing on it. The other is a Government bond. Let's say they both will appreciate at the same rate, say, 3% above inflation. Which would you prefer to have?"
    Zoe: "Is the Government bond pretty? Does looking at it, feeling it, or smelling it give me any form of pleasure?"
    Announcer: "No, it looks, feels, and smells like a Government bond. It has a picture of an eagle on it."
    Zoe: "I'm, um, going with the art."

    This is a pretty simple example of why art underperforms typical investment vehicles. All things being equal, people prefer the art to the bond. That said, it drives demand for art up, and return for art down. While art may _hold_ its value (keep pace with inflation), it will not compare in its performance with similar investment vehicles (even if kept in pristine condition).

    More info here: http://www.npr.org/blogs/money...
    and here: http://people.stern.nyu.edu/jm...

  22. Re:Shuffles on iPad Fever Is Officially Cooling · · Score: 1

    I agree that the iPod classic is a product separate from those of other categories. Additionally, I agree with your views regarding being amazed about not having large-storage HDD-based music players. However, the following situation occurred recently to me:
      - I got a new phone (replacing the 4 year old one).
      - I uploaded all of my music on my iPod (40ish Gb) to Google Music (20,000 songs for free)
      - I cached my frequently-played favorites ("Running mix", "Workout mix", "Yard Word mix") on the HD of the phone, using about 1 Gb of space
      - I stream my music collection from Google Music
      - I also have many other capabilities, such as streaming from Pandora, downloading podcasts, using car stereo BlueTooth, etc.
      - I haven't turned on my iPod since

    I have 'unlimited' (5 Gb) bandwidth from my cell carrier when roaming, and truely 'unlimited' bandwidth from the places where I listen to the most music (gym Wifi, home Wifi, work wifi, girlfriend Wifi, etc.). In short, my phone has access to my entire music collection as part of its normal operation ($25/month, unlimited calls/data).

    I use a Moto X phone (now), from Republic Wireless, which cost $299 (https://republicwireless.com/phones/moto-x), and $25/month. It effectively replaces the functionality of my previous phone ($50/month, free phone).
    An iPod Classic (40K songs) starts at $249 (http://www.apple.com/ipodclassic/). An iPod Touch (1750-7K songs) starts at $229.

    iPods are products which will die.

    PS - Shameless plug for a company with which I am happy. You can switch to Republic Wireless using this link for the first month free: http://rwshar.es/OWQc

  23. Re:It's crap on Retired SCOTUS Justice Wants To 'Fix' the Second Amendment · · Score: 1

    Small correction: men between the ages of 17 and 45 (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/311).

  24. Re:No advocating banning guns on Retired SCOTUS Justice Wants To 'Fix' the Second Amendment · · Score: 1

    Not greatly, considering how many people are considered to be in the "unorganized militia" (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/311). Short version: all men between 18 and 45 are considered part of the unorganized militia. Also, some other people (women in the national guard, etc.).

  25. Re: DeVry on Ask Slashdot: Fastest, Cheapest Path To a Bachelor's Degree? · · Score: 1

    My alma mater averages $210/credit hour (http://tuitionfees.smca.ucf.edu/). The engineering degree, when I graduated, was 128 credit hours. This brings the cost of the degree close to $27000 ($6000/year). It appears that GP paid 50% more than traditional education (in-state tuition) for his non-traditional degree program.