Does it really matter? Half the stuff that seems to come out as tactics eventually is just plain old common sense.
Most of the militaries secrets are in intel and technology, and it doesn't seem that they've really leaked anything much there as the issuse seems to be about tactics.
Having played the game, I don't think that matters anyway as the AI usually just runs in like a headless chicken and takes a thousand bullets because it's invulnerable. There was one mission based in the Philippines that said it was based on actual events, but again I don't know what of value could really have been given away. That US special forces may have been involved in something in the Philippines once? No shit. That's groundbreaking information.
I recall when the "tactics" for the SAS raid on the Iranian embassy were eventually released and everyone made a big fuss, the tactic in question was sticking a flashlight on the gun, firing from the hip and using the centre of the torch as your aiming point whilst doing so. Hardly something top secret that no one else was ever going to think of.
As I say it's our intel, our training, our combat experience, and our technology that makes special forces what they are. That's something you either can replicate or you can't, no amount of computer games or books are going to make up for it.
Honestly, I think the punishments are more about maintaining military style discipline than because they released anything of any value yet one of the things that makes special forces special is because they recruit people smart enough to think for themselves and who don't need the baby style treatment of run of the mill grunts to ensure they do what needs to be done.
They are, but will that still hold true when Apple is eventually forced to pay all the patent royalties it owes but that it has been refusing to license?
Effectively a non-trivial amount of their profit margin over their competitors is because they're not licensing the likes of FRAND and non-FRAND patents that they're legally obligated to.
Well I did wonder, the idea of eliminating a party outright (especially when you live in what is basically a two party nation) seemingly regardless of it's policies but simply because of who they are seems awfully stupid to me.
We suffer the same problem in the UK, I call it Football Team Politics- people vote for a certain team because their family etc. have always voted for the blue team, or the red team. Not because of any particular care for the political leanings or merits of each party.
Probably because to have any kind of worthwhile size of market for an app you have to cater to the lower power processors for your apps anyway, meaning it's only the lowest common denominator processor in a line of tablets that's really ever taken any advantage of anyway.
Are there any decent number of examples of apps out there for the iPad where a more powerful processor really matters? I imagine the odd game may take advantage, but if it's just one or two then is it really a big deal to upgrade?
Numbers like this absolutely do matter outside fanboy circles. As I pointed out in another thread yesterday, Apple has lost 20% of it's share price in the 7 weeks since it hit it's all time high, shaving $130bn off the value of the company.
This figure has actually now increased to 22% including today's trading figures upping that dollar loss in value substantially more. Whether this is because of this news, or the story about them losing their Facetime patent battle I'm not sure:
There seems little doubt Apple is faltering now, as their legal strategy has largely fallen flat in all but their own backyard too. The only question is whether they can do anything with next years product releases (iPad 4 and iPhone 6), or release any new devices in new markets to reverse the current trend. If they can't do that then I'd argue they're in pretty severe trouble, the vast majority of their profits are based on their mobile offerings right now. I imagine It'll be an interesting 2013 for those watching Apple one way or another, either a tragic plummet (if iPhone/iPad sales struggle they inherently suffer a risk of iTunes store content and app purchases plummeting too) or an impressive comeback.
Either way, the tides have certainly changed against Apple this last month or two for the time being at least, despite two new major product releases.
That's funny, in our country people under the age of 16 aren't in fact classed as children, only people under 16 are. In the UK for example you can leave school, leave home, and go and join the army at 16.
Are you saying American children don't grow up as fast and are at least 2 years behind European and Asian counterparts in terms of maturity, as few people here including the people themselves would say a 16 or 17 year old is a child. You'd be hard pushed to get that definition agreed on anyone over the age of 13 in fact in the vast majority of the world.
I don't think Americans really are 2 years behind their counterparts in the rest of the world by way of maturity, I think you're simply wrong.
Oh and er, to answer your final question
"Keep your tits/dick/pussy put the fuck away. Is this really asking too much of society?"
Yes, it probably is, because you're asking society to resist against it's innate natural tendencies. That's always going to be a losing proposition and sits right up there with asking gay people not to be gay. It's dumb, you can't fight nature and win.
If it's a GP (i.e. general illness at a doctor's practice rather than a hospital, covering things like flu, asthma, STDs, whatever else) then it's more about your schedule than anything, I've never been offered any appointment that wasn't same day, though if I want them to revolve around me, then it may take about a week to get the exact time slot I want - say for example if I want the last slot of the day so I can go after work to get a prescription for something. If I was particularly ill though I've always just called up first thing in the morning (8am) and had an appointment by about 11am at the latest. Within a 5 minute drive we have 4 of these practices to choose from, the closest is about 2 minutes away, and that includes locking the front door, getting my arse in the car, and parking, and I live in rural England. If I decided I didn't like the building or the doctor there I have a free choice of going to one of the others.
If it was something the GP couldn't deal with, then I'd go to hospital and it would depend on the seriousness. If it was something life threatening they'd get me in straight away. If I'd say, hurt my leg and was in a lot of pain, they'd get me medication within a few minutes to cut the pain, then maybe 30mins for an x-ray, unless they'd had a major influx, say a coach crash or something, then again, depending on what it is or how busy it might take anywhere from 10mins to give me some crutches and some medication if it was just damage that'll sort itself out, to maybe a few hours at most to get my leg in a cast depending on how busy they are.
Perhaps the biggest disparity though is in terms of operations, old people wanting hip or eye operations to improve their ability to walk/see can take a number of months depending on how specialist the operation is in question. In the US you could presumably pay to have this done faster, but this is really where the divide in philosophy between the UK and US becomes clear. In the US you'd either be able to pay to have it done within a few days (i.e. much more quickly), or you wouldn't be able to pay to have it done at all. In the UK you wouldn't have to pay to have it done, but you would probably have to wait longer but absolutely everyone that needs it can have it done. Note also that the UK still has private healthcare services too alongside the NHS, so if you did have the money to get it done quicker you still have the option of doing so and whilst some argue that this should mean they should get some of their taxes back they paid to the NHS they generally ignore the fact that even the private doctors etc. who would perform their priority operation are sometimes using tax payer funded facilities, or are tax payer trained making their argument stupid.
It's not perfect, sometimes things go wrong and people get lost on waiting lists and so forth, but it's not as though that's a purely socialised healthcare problem. Even in private healthcare things can sometimes go wrong in that way, though the right wing press here does like to make a big deal of it when it's the NHS.
As the other guy said the tax argument is irrelevant because he was referring to the total cost - i.e. the figure he gave for the UK option includes the tax value.
No one is ever happy with what they have, but all in all I think what we have in the UK is one of the better options out there. Life would be so much more stressful and so much more full of hassle if I had to dick around with medical insurance and worrying about cost if I got ill - it's annoying enough dealing with car insurance and house insurance etc. where we get ripped off every bloody year. At least with the NHS I know what I'm paying because my tax bill is fixed and know there's no insurer to fuck me over hard when I need them, or simply by upping costs every year with no excuse for it and as the GP pointed out, despite it being the easy option in this regard, it's cheaper too, and I've never felt like I've got poor service when I've used it
Their legal strategy is now beginning to fall apart and they've not innovated in over 2 years now, offering only minor updates on their products. It'll be interesting to see what happens regarding the appeals in the US Apple vs. Samsung case, because if the $1.05bn award does get undone, then that's going to tear another massive chunk off of their value.
I don't know that it is too early to say whether Apple is heading for a wall, honestly, it looks like they've already hit it. It's just a question of whether it's now continued decline, or if they can pick themselves back up with another miracle turnaround.
I suspect a lot of it will depend on next years performance, if the iPad 4 and iPhone 6 offer a dramatically new set of features and innovation, or if they produce a whole new product range on the scale of at least the iPad in terms of success then I suspect they may well be able to turn things back around, but if we see nothing more than just yet another minor iteration on a then few year old design since the last real innovation happened then I think they're going to struggle to remain such a sizeable player. The problem is they're not diversified enough for the scenario where their mobile strategy does falter as it accounts to the majority of their profits. Their Mac business is still relatively small compared to the overall PC market (though large as an individual seller) and not as profitable as their mobile business. If their mobile business starts to really struggle (The iPhone is now down to a mere 14% global marketshare from 19% at the start of the year), then all their other profit centres (digital content/apps) will struggle too. Their other markets are just too weak (Apple TV), or have been dropped (Servers).
Honestly, 2013 will be the real test for Apple's survival as a continued major player, it can go one of two ways, either a turnaround in innovation with new products or product lines that regain the momentum, or the tipping point of losing relevance if the iPhone loses the same degree of marketshare it has this year, hence bringing it down to under 10% globally and if new iPad/iPhone models continue to dissapoint the markets and the public.
Yes, I meant to say for untrusted sites. For most sites I visit I do have Javascript enabled, but if I was going somewhere untrusted then that wouldn't be the case.
I don't know why the viewpoint your put forward is so unpopular on Slashdot, I've said the same sorts of things before and been modded into oblivion for it over the years.
It's a shame because it's true. If you're sensible in what you execute and don't visit untrusted websites with the likes of Javascript turned on in a browser running as administrator, and don't open fishy e-mail attachments etc. then there's really not much that can go wrong. You're not invulnerable by any measure, but the amount of times I've seen viruses fly right by AV software like McAfee and Sophos when I was working at tech support I'm not convinced you're any worse off either. What you do gain is system stability and system performance, as AV software is a horrendous drain on resources and tends to be of horrendous quality softwarewise, something this article points out too.
Honestly, fighting AV software always took up far far more time when I worked in support than viruses and other malware did, and regularly existed on machines that had AV installed.
The problem is that still, to this day, AV vendors are pushing a rather archaic model that is largely reactive in dealing with a number of types of threat. A number of viruses over the years demonstrated how fruitless the method was when the likes of msblast.exe spread so far and wide before the AV vendors offered any kind of defence against it that the damage was already done by the time their software had any relevance to securing systems against it. The only real defence at the time was a sensible patching regime against it.
"As for Facebook and it ties with Skype, I'd be very worried about what data gets shared between the two"
It wont make any difference, MS already leaks MSN data to Facebook somehow anyway. The Skype/Faceook thing just makes it official.
I know this for a fact, as a contact whom I only have on MSN messenger, and where neither of us have used Facebook's friend finder etc. found ourselves recommended to each other on Facebook. The only place this information could have possibly come from about the link between us was MS Messenger because we live far apart, and have no IRL connection.
Last time I read about this a couple of years ago, I believe it was on the BBC, it was suggested there are at least 100 out there still - certainly enough to smuggle some to a point where they could shoot down a few 747s if they still worked which is why I'm not sure it's because of mere shortage.
I just had a quick look for the article and couldn't find it, but did stumble across this, it's interesting reading:
If that is the case then why don't we give the Syrian rebels the 1st gen versions of the stinger if it's no threat to our equipment or civilian airliners anyway? Most of the Syrian equipment is precisely the sort of older kit (Hips, Hinds) that we gave the Afghans those stingers to shoot down in the first place.
If it was purely that those 1st gen weapons are no longer any use against the west's equipment then surely there'd be no worry about handing them over as is and not worrying about this DRM shit?
No problem, as the other guy said it's refreshing to see someone admit when they're wrong, it's a rare but brilliant trait.
I wouldn't say it shuts out non-patent holders altogether - Apple could pay these fees and still probably be the most profitable smartphone supplier out there regardless even if it traded no patents into the mix. It makes it more difficult for smaller players, but if for example you want to create a smartphone and you buy Motorola's components for wireless communications then they would wave the license fee. This is to some extent what has happened in this very case - if Apple has to backpay the FRAND license fees then it wont effect every iPhone sold because some did actually use Motorola chips - it's only those that don't that are in dispute.
The idea is that in return for companies like Motorola, Samsung, Nokia etc. spending their time and money researching new mobile telecomms tech to go into the standards they get a benefit in kind in terms of being able to either charge a FRAND rate, or have people buy their components directly.
But there is a question of balance, I think 1 of 3 things needs to happen:
1) All patents should be made FRAND 2) FRAND should go putting all patent battles on a level playing field 3) All patents in the fast moving world of computing should go
Option 1 forces all patents to be licensed fairly, multi-touch can't be used as a tool to suppress competition for example. Apple has to license it's patents on rather trivial things fairly, just as Samsung et al. do their fundamental things. It's absurd to me that Apple can charge so much more to license patents for an input method like multi-touch for an order of magnitude more than Samsung has to license it's fundamental telephony patents which took far more time and money to research and develop for example.
I think option 2 is least favourable, it stops the sort of games Apple has been playing by raising the stakes to make sure Apple does come to a license agreement, but there's always the risk some nutjob will go over the brink and cause some kind of patent nuclear war by preventing even the most essential patents being licensed.
Option 3 is probably the best to encourage innovation, and best for the consumer as it forces companies to be agile and keep innovating, but it will however mean companies will no longer be able to sponge money off of standard and defacto standard ideas that are 10, 15, even 20 years old meaning profit margins will likely be lowered - again, no big deal for the consumer, but it upsets the business types, shareholders and so forth when they can only announce hundreds of millions in profits, rather than billions.
I'm actually really glad you're right on this occasion, but when I made the post he was +4. The ugly disease of ignorant xenophobia/racism-based nationalism has become all too prominent on Slashdot recently, and sadly the sentiment sometimes gets modded up and stays modded up, which, on a site historically known for having posts modded up with at least some modicum of intelligence and a bit of insight is a sad sight to see.
I was wondering this myself, but if it is trivial then why hasn't the Taliban done it to shoot down Apaches/Chinooks in Afghanistan left right and centre?
This to me suggests it's not that trivial, as from what I've heard it's not that there aren't still a decent number of stingers in Afghanistan. I have read reports of the odd one being fired which may suggest the odd battery has been found that just about has enough charge to work perhaps but they seem to be few and far between - certainly not frequent enough that the Taliban has figured out how to power them consistently enough to be a threat.
I'd generally agree, but apparently the stingers the US handed to the Afghans haven't been a threat since they invaded because the batteries had already degraded. That suggests a shelf life of, say 20 years on the batteries at most.
If the shelf life is known like this then can't we just give them some say, 18 year old batteries, and also only give them a limited number of missiles to start with?
I agree DRM on this sort of thing is bound to end in tears, but relying on something more natural like the natural physical degradation of the batteries, and only giving them a fairly finite number of missiles anyway would surely work better? If you gave them say 20 missiles at a time monitoring their use somewhat then the threat of any dangerous number going astray would be pretty low especially coupled with the limited shelf life of old batteries.
I suspect the real problem is that the US doesn't want to do this sort of trickle effect where they control the supply and limit the effectiveness to be just effective enough to scare the shit out of Syrian airforce pilots but instead in typical US gung-ho manner they want to give a stinger and 100 missiles to every Syrian just to create a shock and awe type scenario of the entire Syrian airforce being decimated in a day or whatever.
Saudi Arabia is also too firmly pro-Western for Russia to cut that off as an oil source, and it's that the matters as a European oil/gas supplier, similarly Iraq is now a supplier again and Libya is more European friendly than ever before. If Russia is trying to reduce Middle Eastern export to Europe then it's failing. This combined with European moves towards renewables, and Europe still having good supply from places like Norway, and the UK and I don't think any Russian plan has much seriousness - the only place it has any effect is in the ex-soviet states where it can also install political puppets, like the weak willed Ukraine who rapidly let Russian elements hijack their country within only a short time of them revolting against it and of course Georgia whom they've now thoroughly bullied into submission. Western and Central Europe has a colder relationship with Russia than it has had in many decades, so I don't think a lean towards Russia is realistic. The more authoritarian Putin becomes, the worse the relationship gets too. It's support for Syria has pissed the likes of the Turks off even making them even more pro-Europe than ever also. Whatever the Russian strategy is in general with regards to the middle east it's not to make Europe swing it's way, or if it is, then it's been failing miserably ever since they went down that route. Interestingly the UK some years back actually drastically cut back it's North Sea oil/gas drilling precisely so it had it as a reserve if other supplies did go dry importing from elsewhere and draining their supplies for now instead.
For what it's worth Russia's interest in Syria is not to do with oil, but instead because Syria allows Russia a port in it's territory, meaning Syria hosts Russia's only port on the Mediterranean which is not too far from the Suez Canal which gives them easy access to the Indian Ocean and is also a major global supply route. It's that that Russia does not want to lose, because if it does it finds itself much more confined to the top of the world where things are much more cold, and much more lonely.
Oh don't even try, the type of ignorant pillock who thinks that anyone foreign is everyone foreign (i.e. Osama Bin Laden was foreign, so all foreigners are terrorists) can't be reasoned with. They're lost causes beyond help so utterly caught up in their ignorant nationalistic mindset that all hope of anything of value coming from their mouth on a topic involving somewhere outside of their home country is long lost.
Reality, that's how it works. I'm sorry you don't like that.
"What is this arbitrary "component" exclusion?"
It's not arbitrary. An aircraft radio transponder for example is in itself a complete product. Although you'd probably rarely want to you can use it in isolation of any plane so you'd pay the FRAND rates on that particular product rather than whatever plane you plug it into.
Besides, most of that tech is out of it's 20 year patent term anyway.
"Any device is going to use more than an handful of those. A percentage of the total cost is absurd."
The 2.5% rate is not per patent, it's for the full relevant portfolio of patents so said rate may well cover, say 50% of those patents, and another 2.5% to say Samsung, 40%, then say 0.5% to Nokia or whatever for the final 10%. The point being that it probably doesn't amount to much more than 5% to license for usage the entire wireless stack for a mobile phone whether wifi or gsm, 3g or lte. Most companies though mitigate the cost by cross-licensing their patents instead, so using this example, Samsung and Motorola probably just trade enough FRAND patents to not even bother charging each other. Apple's problem is that it wanted the FRAND patents free, but didn't want to give up any of it's useful patents like those related to multitouch in return. The percentage cost is irrelevant to most companies who aren't arrogant when it comes to patent negotiation.
"Nobody pays FRAND royalties like that."
Again, everyone does, and again, really, I'm sorry reality upsets you, but being upset about it doesn't change it. I'm also sorry you've clearly got no first hand experience of this topic, but ignorance of it doesn't make you right, it just makes you ignorant.
No because Boeing doesn't pay someone else to build an entire plane do they? They're build in a module manner, so that the radio equipment is a separate interchangeable component. It's this complete working component that can work in isolation to the rest of the plane that they'll pay FRAND licensing costs on.
If Apple built planes, and built an iPhone into each plane, they'd still have to pay FRAND licensing costs on the iPhone, but not on the entire plane.
GP is right, FRAND licensing costs as a percentage of device cost is normal practice.
"Sure, I do. The mist is generated by man-made equipment not a natural waterfall. Everything made by man eventually fails. And stuff that requires considerable active maintenance from humans? That'll fail even faster."
WTF? You've just reached the point now where you've stopped making any sense at all. The made made mist came along after the species had already been whiped out as a replacement for the natural mist that kept them alive before tey were whiped out. At least it's clear now why you have the view you do - you've misunderstood the whole underlying situation here.
"Human interference is just as natural as a waterfall drying up. And yes, sooner or later that waterfall would have "pinged out of existence" or some other accident come along and wipe those frogs out."
Right, but that's the same for every living species on the planet, at some point something will come along and whipe it out. But you've still failed to demonstrate how this somehow translates into the idea that it's acceptable for humans to whipe out this species, any more than it is any other, or none at all.
"You seem to indicate that it'll save a few kilograms of other organisms (those millions of organisms). That's not much gain for the effort."
Sure, by itself, but we're doing this on a fairly wide scale, we whipe out say 5 species, and think, no big deal, but when that has a knock on effect on many other species taking the toll to a much higher number, because everything in nature is interlinked and species loss always has an impact on other species then it becomes a problem, and that's the key, you don't understand that you can't just whipe out a species in isolation, the world does not work like that, no ifs, no buts.
"If anthrax really was that hardy, then we'd never have gotten rid of it in the developed world."
Whilst anthrax was but one obvious example (out of millions of possible examples) of a long lived disease that can cause significant harm to returning humans and hence not exactly something worth getting into much of a debate about, I'd point out that the duration of anthrax can indeed be decades as you state, the problem is, more decades than humanity can survive. Also, we haven't gotten rid of it in the developed world, what on earth makes you think we have? Just this year the UK has had 5 cases in drug users alone. There are commonly cases of people who have dealt with for example, leather also, which is prone to transporting it. But between anthrax, other diseases, and the severe inbreeding a small population would have the point is that you can't repopulate succesfully from such a small population.
"It'd be at least several thousand people (there are a lot of nuclear subs, you know)."
Right and how do they find each other? where do they meet?
"Well, you are wrong in numerous places. So yes, I'll go with the third possible reason. Just because there is research on evolution, "the web of life" and other such subjects, doesn't mean you have a clue what you're talking about."
You're going with the 3rd reason, seriously? That the consensus of just about every professional biologist, taxonomist, and mathematician with experience in modelling living systems that is living or has lived is wrong and you're right?
No wonder with that level of arrogance you can't simply accept being wrong, you've so far passed any ability to be humble and accept that when you are out of your depth the trick is to stop digging that there's no hope for you to ever escape your pit of ignorance.
"a government who is actually seeing some modest improvements in the domestic economy even as the Eurozone drags the global economy down the tubes."
The only reason people like you think this is the biggest problem is because the Eurozone is the only part of the world economy being transparent about it's problems.
China is pretending it's growth slow down is merely a temporary blip, and not a natural saturation of it's ability to grow at the rate it was, South America is similar, and is also dealing with collapsing economies due to failed economics (e.g. Argentina) and America is simply pretending it's absurdly large debt mountain just doesn't exist, whilst the Middle East is seeing regime change left right and centre which is bound to destabilise economies- for example, the situation in Syria over the last year or two will have completely whiped it out as a player in the global economy.
The Eurozone is only one of a number of world economic problems, but yes, it's the one we hear about the most, because it's the one that's admitting it's got a problem. Like a bunch of alcoholics it's the only one that's past the denial stage.
"Frogs depending on survival by actively generated mist? Doesn't sound complex to me. They'll die out again when the mist goes away. Show the model is wrong before continuing to use up my time."
Because you've got absolutely no evidence that there was any reason the mist would magically just go away. The mist will have been generated by the features of the environment, a waterfall or whatever. What makes you think that without mans intervention and destruction of the habitat that a waterfall was going to magically ping out of existence in the near future?
"And the whole blather about "complex systems" is pure reductionism. It's a "complex system" so your argument must be right."
Or in other words, you know little about complex systems so you're going to remove all talk of them from the equation and discuss the topic at your grade school level of knowledge. Right.
"They need a host. Any atmospheric oxygen imbalance that kills off humans globally without mechanical assistance, is going to wipe out the non-human hosts."
Well that's blatantly not true - there are many species that can survive in much tougher conditions than we can, especially bacteria, again, the bacteria behind anthrax being one of the most potent examples we know of. I'm amazed you feel the need to try and reduce the discussion to such an absurd level by outright denying the existence of some pretty well documented things.
"And once humans come into contact with diseases again, they'll build up immunity again just as they did over the past few thousand years."
You still clearly show know knowledge of how disease resistance works. There is much that can kill us without the availability of modern medicine and without modern medicine to artifically protect us from these illnesses then we end up like every other creature, where the only way to build up resistance is to have a large enough population that at least one of those has the genetic variability needed to survive it so he/she can breed it into their future children. The problem is, that once again, we're not talking about a healthy enough sized gene pool. You still clearly do not get even first year degree level biology in this respect.
"You are one to talk. I tire of the ignorant lecturing me on subjects I'm familiar with."
So you're familiar with them and yet you talk utter nonsense and ignore established scientific fact on these issues? So which is it? you're not actually familiar with them but simply can't accept being wrong (even though you are) or you are familiar with them but still pretend the opposite, again, because you can't accept being wrong?
Either way it doesn't bode well for your ability to come across as an informed human being when you put ego above well established fact.
Honestly, if it's the 3rd possible reason, that I, and many decades of scientific research are wrong, then I'd love to see your published work demonstrating how you can repopulate humanity with only a tiny handful of people without worry about the long term effects and risks of inbreeding that disprove all prior research on the topic. I'd also love to see your papers disproving the existence of the web of life, that show that species always exist in isolation. I'd even love to see your paper on how large established waterfalls are known to magically vanish from existence in short order.
Oh what's that? You've done none of this? That's okay, I wont ask you to apologise, I can see you're far too proud a person to ever accept that you're in over your head on a certain topic but feel the need to pretend you know more than you do, whilst spouting grade school level simplifications that simply show that you don't in fact know what you're on about. Have fun being ignorant though, you obviously enjoy it.
So how does it go wrong so often? I'm not trying to stir shit up, but the US has an abysmal track record on civilian casualties so if the rules of engagement are followed as strictly as you suggest then I'm intrigued to know where it goes wrong, and why.
The problem is that whilst the rules of engagement are exactly what should be done, I'm not convinced they are. You only have to look at the raw original uncommented Wikileaks Apache video to see that at least Apache pilots give not the slightest shit for verifying a target as a threat before firing particularly in the case of the van that pulled up to assist the casualties. There was just no effort at all to avoid civilian casualties and every will to just shoot at anyone in the area "just in case" they were a militant who could harm the incoming US troops if they were. Under normal rules of engagement in that scenario the pilots should have held off firing until the US troops approached, the US troops should have approached carefully with the Apache pilot covering, if any sign of threat was then shown then the Apache pilots should've fired but that's the opposite of what happened. Is it that Apache pilots give less of a shit about the RoE than drone pilots making that example irrelevant in this case?
I notice you say you train, could the reality be that whilst the RoE say one thing, that in practice, it's not actually what always happens?
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Does it really matter? Half the stuff that seems to come out as tactics eventually is just plain old common sense.
Most of the militaries secrets are in intel and technology, and it doesn't seem that they've really leaked anything much there as the issuse seems to be about tactics.
Having played the game, I don't think that matters anyway as the AI usually just runs in like a headless chicken and takes a thousand bullets because it's invulnerable. There was one mission based in the Philippines that said it was based on actual events, but again I don't know what of value could really have been given away. That US special forces may have been involved in something in the Philippines once? No shit. That's groundbreaking information.
I recall when the "tactics" for the SAS raid on the Iranian embassy were eventually released and everyone made a big fuss, the tactic in question was sticking a flashlight on the gun, firing from the hip and using the centre of the torch as your aiming point whilst doing so. Hardly something top secret that no one else was ever going to think of.
As I say it's our intel, our training, our combat experience, and our technology that makes special forces what they are. That's something you either can replicate or you can't, no amount of computer games or books are going to make up for it.
Honestly, I think the punishments are more about maintaining military style discipline than because they released anything of any value yet one of the things that makes special forces special is because they recruit people smart enough to think for themselves and who don't need the baby style treatment of run of the mill grunts to ensure they do what needs to be done.
"I think Apple is still king on that one."
They are, but will that still hold true when Apple is eventually forced to pay all the patent royalties it owes but that it has been refusing to license?
Effectively a non-trivial amount of their profit margin over their competitors is because they're not licensing the likes of FRAND and non-FRAND patents that they're legally obligated to.
Well I did wonder, the idea of eliminating a party outright (especially when you live in what is basically a two party nation) seemingly regardless of it's policies but simply because of who they are seems awfully stupid to me.
We suffer the same problem in the UK, I call it Football Team Politics- people vote for a certain team because their family etc. have always voted for the blue team, or the red team. Not because of any particular care for the political leanings or merits of each party.
Probably because to have any kind of worthwhile size of market for an app you have to cater to the lower power processors for your apps anyway, meaning it's only the lowest common denominator processor in a line of tablets that's really ever taken any advantage of anyway.
Are there any decent number of examples of apps out there for the iPad where a more powerful processor really matters? I imagine the odd game may take advantage, but if it's just one or two then is it really a big deal to upgrade?
Numbers like this absolutely do matter outside fanboy circles. As I pointed out in another thread yesterday, Apple has lost 20% of it's share price in the 7 weeks since it hit it's all time high, shaving $130bn off the value of the company.
This figure has actually now increased to 22% including today's trading figures upping that dollar loss in value substantially more. Whether this is because of this news, or the story about them losing their Facetime patent battle I'm not sure:
http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=AAPL+Interactive#symbol=aapl;range=20120919,20121108;compare=;indicator=volume;charttype=area;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=off;source=undefined;
There seems little doubt Apple is faltering now, as their legal strategy has largely fallen flat in all but their own backyard too. The only question is whether they can do anything with next years product releases (iPad 4 and iPhone 6), or release any new devices in new markets to reverse the current trend. If they can't do that then I'd argue they're in pretty severe trouble, the vast majority of their profits are based on their mobile offerings right now. I imagine It'll be an interesting 2013 for those watching Apple one way or another, either a tragic plummet (if iPhone/iPad sales struggle they inherently suffer a risk of iTunes store content and app purchases plummeting too) or an impressive comeback.
Either way, the tides have certainly changed against Apple this last month or two for the time being at least, despite two new major product releases.
"While I wouldn't vote for a Democrat on general principle"
Out of interest (and I'm not from the US, but am simply intrigued) what principle is this?
That's funny, in our country people under the age of 16 aren't in fact classed as children, only people under 16 are. In the UK for example you can leave school, leave home, and go and join the army at 16.
Are you saying American children don't grow up as fast and are at least 2 years behind European and Asian counterparts in terms of maturity, as few people here including the people themselves would say a 16 or 17 year old is a child. You'd be hard pushed to get that definition agreed on anyone over the age of 13 in fact in the vast majority of the world.
I don't think Americans really are 2 years behind their counterparts in the rest of the world by way of maturity, I think you're simply wrong.
Oh and er, to answer your final question
"Keep your tits/dick/pussy put the fuck away. Is this really asking too much of society?"
Yes, it probably is, because you're asking society to resist against it's innate natural tendencies. That's always going to be a losing proposition and sits right up there with asking gay people not to be gay. It's dumb, you can't fight nature and win.
"And how long do you wait to see the doctor?"
If it's a GP (i.e. general illness at a doctor's practice rather than a hospital, covering things like flu, asthma, STDs, whatever else) then it's more about your schedule than anything, I've never been offered any appointment that wasn't same day, though if I want them to revolve around me, then it may take about a week to get the exact time slot I want - say for example if I want the last slot of the day so I can go after work to get a prescription for something. If I was particularly ill though I've always just called up first thing in the morning (8am) and had an appointment by about 11am at the latest. Within a 5 minute drive we have 4 of these practices to choose from, the closest is about 2 minutes away, and that includes locking the front door, getting my arse in the car, and parking, and I live in rural England. If I decided I didn't like the building or the doctor there I have a free choice of going to one of the others.
If it was something the GP couldn't deal with, then I'd go to hospital and it would depend on the seriousness. If it was something life threatening they'd get me in straight away. If I'd say, hurt my leg and was in a lot of pain, they'd get me medication within a few minutes to cut the pain, then maybe 30mins for an x-ray, unless they'd had a major influx, say a coach crash or something, then again, depending on what it is or how busy it might take anywhere from 10mins to give me some crutches and some medication if it was just damage that'll sort itself out, to maybe a few hours at most to get my leg in a cast depending on how busy they are.
Perhaps the biggest disparity though is in terms of operations, old people wanting hip or eye operations to improve their ability to walk/see can take a number of months depending on how specialist the operation is in question. In the US you could presumably pay to have this done faster, but this is really where the divide in philosophy between the UK and US becomes clear. In the US you'd either be able to pay to have it done within a few days (i.e. much more quickly), or you wouldn't be able to pay to have it done at all. In the UK you wouldn't have to pay to have it done, but you would probably have to wait longer but absolutely everyone that needs it can have it done. Note also that the UK still has private healthcare services too alongside the NHS, so if you did have the money to get it done quicker you still have the option of doing so and whilst some argue that this should mean they should get some of their taxes back they paid to the NHS they generally ignore the fact that even the private doctors etc. who would perform their priority operation are sometimes using tax payer funded facilities, or are tax payer trained making their argument stupid.
It's not perfect, sometimes things go wrong and people get lost on waiting lists and so forth, but it's not as though that's a purely socialised healthcare problem. Even in private healthcare things can sometimes go wrong in that way, though the right wing press here does like to make a big deal of it when it's the NHS.
As the other guy said the tax argument is irrelevant because he was referring to the total cost - i.e. the figure he gave for the UK option includes the tax value.
No one is ever happy with what they have, but all in all I think what we have in the UK is one of the better options out there. Life would be so much more stressful and so much more full of hassle if I had to dick around with medical insurance and worrying about cost if I got ill - it's annoying enough dealing with car insurance and house insurance etc. where we get ripped off every bloody year. At least with the NHS I know what I'm paying because my tax bill is fixed and know there's no insurer to fuck me over hard when I need them, or simply by upping costs every year with no excuse for it and as the GP pointed out, despite it being the easy option in this regard, it's cheaper too, and I've never felt like I've got poor service when I've used it
Apple's stock has lost 20% of it's value in the last 6 weeks alone. This is, in monetary terms, a decrease of over $130bn in value:
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=AAPL#symbol=aapl;range=20120917,20121107;compare=;indicator=volume;charttype=area;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=off;source=undefined;
Their legal strategy is now beginning to fall apart and they've not innovated in over 2 years now, offering only minor updates on their products. It'll be interesting to see what happens regarding the appeals in the US Apple vs. Samsung case, because if the $1.05bn award does get undone, then that's going to tear another massive chunk off of their value.
I don't know that it is too early to say whether Apple is heading for a wall, honestly, it looks like they've already hit it. It's just a question of whether it's now continued decline, or if they can pick themselves back up with another miracle turnaround.
I suspect a lot of it will depend on next years performance, if the iPad 4 and iPhone 6 offer a dramatically new set of features and innovation, or if they produce a whole new product range on the scale of at least the iPad in terms of success then I suspect they may well be able to turn things back around, but if we see nothing more than just yet another minor iteration on a then few year old design since the last real innovation happened then I think they're going to struggle to remain such a sizeable player. The problem is they're not diversified enough for the scenario where their mobile strategy does falter as it accounts to the majority of their profits. Their Mac business is still relatively small compared to the overall PC market (though large as an individual seller) and not as profitable as their mobile business. If their mobile business starts to really struggle (The iPhone is now down to a mere 14% global marketshare from 19% at the start of the year), then all their other profit centres (digital content/apps) will struggle too. Their other markets are just too weak (Apple TV), or have been dropped (Servers).
Honestly, 2013 will be the real test for Apple's survival as a continued major player, it can go one of two ways, either a turnaround in innovation with new products or product lines that regain the momentum, or the tipping point of losing relevance if the iPhone loses the same degree of marketshare it has this year, hence bringing it down to under 10% globally and if new iPad/iPhone models continue to dissapoint the markets and the public.
Yes, I meant to say for untrusted sites. For most sites I visit I do have Javascript enabled, but if I was going somewhere untrusted then that wouldn't be the case.
I don't know why the viewpoint your put forward is so unpopular on Slashdot, I've said the same sorts of things before and been modded into oblivion for it over the years.
It's a shame because it's true. If you're sensible in what you execute and don't visit untrusted websites with the likes of Javascript turned on in a browser running as administrator, and don't open fishy e-mail attachments etc. then there's really not much that can go wrong. You're not invulnerable by any measure, but the amount of times I've seen viruses fly right by AV software like McAfee and Sophos when I was working at tech support I'm not convinced you're any worse off either. What you do gain is system stability and system performance, as AV software is a horrendous drain on resources and tends to be of horrendous quality softwarewise, something this article points out too.
Honestly, fighting AV software always took up far far more time when I worked in support than viruses and other malware did, and regularly existed on machines that had AV installed.
The problem is that still, to this day, AV vendors are pushing a rather archaic model that is largely reactive in dealing with a number of types of threat. A number of viruses over the years demonstrated how fruitless the method was when the likes of msblast.exe spread so far and wide before the AV vendors offered any kind of defence against it that the damage was already done by the time their software had any relevance to securing systems against it. The only real defence at the time was a sensible patching regime against it.
"As for Facebook and it ties with Skype, I'd be very worried about what data gets shared between the two"
It wont make any difference, MS already leaks MSN data to Facebook somehow anyway. The Skype/Faceook thing just makes it official.
I know this for a fact, as a contact whom I only have on MSN messenger, and where neither of us have used Facebook's friend finder etc. found ourselves recommended to each other on Facebook. The only place this information could have possibly come from about the link between us was MS Messenger because we live far apart, and have no IRL connection.
Last time I read about this a couple of years ago, I believe it was on the BBC, it was suggested there are at least 100 out there still - certainly enough to smuggle some to a point where they could shoot down a few 747s if they still worked which is why I'm not sure it's because of mere shortage.
I just had a quick look for the article and couldn't find it, but did stumble across this, it's interesting reading:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/25/afghanistan-taliban-missile-strike-chinook
If that is the case then why don't we give the Syrian rebels the 1st gen versions of the stinger if it's no threat to our equipment or civilian airliners anyway? Most of the Syrian equipment is precisely the sort of older kit (Hips, Hinds) that we gave the Afghans those stingers to shoot down in the first place.
If it was purely that those 1st gen weapons are no longer any use against the west's equipment then surely there'd be no worry about handing them over as is and not worrying about this DRM shit?
No problem, as the other guy said it's refreshing to see someone admit when they're wrong, it's a rare but brilliant trait.
I wouldn't say it shuts out non-patent holders altogether - Apple could pay these fees and still probably be the most profitable smartphone supplier out there regardless even if it traded no patents into the mix. It makes it more difficult for smaller players, but if for example you want to create a smartphone and you buy Motorola's components for wireless communications then they would wave the license fee. This is to some extent what has happened in this very case - if Apple has to backpay the FRAND license fees then it wont effect every iPhone sold because some did actually use Motorola chips - it's only those that don't that are in dispute.
The idea is that in return for companies like Motorola, Samsung, Nokia etc. spending their time and money researching new mobile telecomms tech to go into the standards they get a benefit in kind in terms of being able to either charge a FRAND rate, or have people buy their components directly.
But there is a question of balance, I think 1 of 3 things needs to happen:
1) All patents should be made FRAND
2) FRAND should go putting all patent battles on a level playing field
3) All patents in the fast moving world of computing should go
Option 1 forces all patents to be licensed fairly, multi-touch can't be used as a tool to suppress competition for example. Apple has to license it's patents on rather trivial things fairly, just as Samsung et al. do their fundamental things. It's absurd to me that Apple can charge so much more to license patents for an input method like multi-touch for an order of magnitude more than Samsung has to license it's fundamental telephony patents which took far more time and money to research and develop for example.
I think option 2 is least favourable, it stops the sort of games Apple has been playing by raising the stakes to make sure Apple does come to a license agreement, but there's always the risk some nutjob will go over the brink and cause some kind of patent nuclear war by preventing even the most essential patents being licensed.
Option 3 is probably the best to encourage innovation, and best for the consumer as it forces companies to be agile and keep innovating, but it will however mean companies will no longer be able to sponge money off of standard and defacto standard ideas that are 10, 15, even 20 years old meaning profit margins will likely be lowered - again, no big deal for the consumer, but it upsets the business types, shareholders and so forth when they can only announce hundreds of millions in profits, rather than billions.
I'm actually really glad you're right on this occasion, but when I made the post he was +4. The ugly disease of ignorant xenophobia/racism-based nationalism has become all too prominent on Slashdot recently, and sadly the sentiment sometimes gets modded up and stays modded up, which, on a site historically known for having posts modded up with at least some modicum of intelligence and a bit of insight is a sad sight to see.
I was wondering this myself, but if it is trivial then why hasn't the Taliban done it to shoot down Apaches/Chinooks in Afghanistan left right and centre?
This to me suggests it's not that trivial, as from what I've heard it's not that there aren't still a decent number of stingers in Afghanistan. I have read reports of the odd one being fired which may suggest the odd battery has been found that just about has enough charge to work perhaps but they seem to be few and far between - certainly not frequent enough that the Taliban has figured out how to power them consistently enough to be a threat.
I'd generally agree, but apparently the stingers the US handed to the Afghans haven't been a threat since they invaded because the batteries had already degraded. That suggests a shelf life of, say 20 years on the batteries at most.
If the shelf life is known like this then can't we just give them some say, 18 year old batteries, and also only give them a limited number of missiles to start with?
I agree DRM on this sort of thing is bound to end in tears, but relying on something more natural like the natural physical degradation of the batteries, and only giving them a fairly finite number of missiles anyway would surely work better? If you gave them say 20 missiles at a time monitoring their use somewhat then the threat of any dangerous number going astray would be pretty low especially coupled with the limited shelf life of old batteries.
I suspect the real problem is that the US doesn't want to do this sort of trickle effect where they control the supply and limit the effectiveness to be just effective enough to scare the shit out of Syrian airforce pilots but instead in typical US gung-ho manner they want to give a stinger and 100 missiles to every Syrian just to create a shock and awe type scenario of the entire Syrian airforce being decimated in a day or whatever.
Saudi Arabia is also too firmly pro-Western for Russia to cut that off as an oil source, and it's that the matters as a European oil/gas supplier, similarly Iraq is now a supplier again and Libya is more European friendly than ever before. If Russia is trying to reduce Middle Eastern export to Europe then it's failing. This combined with European moves towards renewables, and Europe still having good supply from places like Norway, and the UK and I don't think any Russian plan has much seriousness - the only place it has any effect is in the ex-soviet states where it can also install political puppets, like the weak willed Ukraine who rapidly let Russian elements hijack their country within only a short time of them revolting against it and of course Georgia whom they've now thoroughly bullied into submission. Western and Central Europe has a colder relationship with Russia than it has had in many decades, so I don't think a lean towards Russia is realistic. The more authoritarian Putin becomes, the worse the relationship gets too. It's support for Syria has pissed the likes of the Turks off even making them even more pro-Europe than ever also. Whatever the Russian strategy is in general with regards to the middle east it's not to make Europe swing it's way, or if it is, then it's been failing miserably ever since they went down that route. Interestingly the UK some years back actually drastically cut back it's North Sea oil/gas drilling precisely so it had it as a reserve if other supplies did go dry importing from elsewhere and draining their supplies for now instead.
For what it's worth Russia's interest in Syria is not to do with oil, but instead because Syria allows Russia a port in it's territory, meaning Syria hosts Russia's only port on the Mediterranean which is not too far from the Suez Canal which gives them easy access to the Indian Ocean and is also a major global supply route. It's that that Russia does not want to lose, because if it does it finds itself much more confined to the top of the world where things are much more cold, and much more lonely.
Oh don't even try, the type of ignorant pillock who thinks that anyone foreign is everyone foreign (i.e. Osama Bin Laden was foreign, so all foreigners are terrorists) can't be reasoned with. They're lost causes beyond help so utterly caught up in their ignorant nationalistic mindset that all hope of anything of value coming from their mouth on a topic involving somewhere outside of their home country is long lost.
"No, no, no. Where do you get this from?"
Reality, that's how it works. I'm sorry you don't like that.
"What is this arbitrary "component" exclusion?"
It's not arbitrary. An aircraft radio transponder for example is in itself a complete product. Although you'd probably rarely want to you can use it in isolation of any plane so you'd pay the FRAND rates on that particular product rather than whatever plane you plug it into.
Besides, most of that tech is out of it's 20 year patent term anyway.
"Any device is going to use more than an handful of those. A percentage of the total cost is absurd."
The 2.5% rate is not per patent, it's for the full relevant portfolio of patents so said rate may well cover, say 50% of those patents, and another 2.5% to say Samsung, 40%, then say 0.5% to Nokia or whatever for the final 10%. The point being that it probably doesn't amount to much more than 5% to license for usage the entire wireless stack for a mobile phone whether wifi or gsm, 3g or lte. Most companies though mitigate the cost by cross-licensing their patents instead, so using this example, Samsung and Motorola probably just trade enough FRAND patents to not even bother charging each other. Apple's problem is that it wanted the FRAND patents free, but didn't want to give up any of it's useful patents like those related to multitouch in return. The percentage cost is irrelevant to most companies who aren't arrogant when it comes to patent negotiation.
"Nobody pays FRAND royalties like that."
Again, everyone does, and again, really, I'm sorry reality upsets you, but being upset about it doesn't change it. I'm also sorry you've clearly got no first hand experience of this topic, but ignorance of it doesn't make you right, it just makes you ignorant.
No because Boeing doesn't pay someone else to build an entire plane do they? They're build in a module manner, so that the radio equipment is a separate interchangeable component. It's this complete working component that can work in isolation to the rest of the plane that they'll pay FRAND licensing costs on.
If Apple built planes, and built an iPhone into each plane, they'd still have to pay FRAND licensing costs on the iPhone, but not on the entire plane.
GP is right, FRAND licensing costs as a percentage of device cost is normal practice.
"Sure, I do. The mist is generated by man-made equipment not a natural waterfall. Everything made by man eventually fails. And stuff that requires considerable active maintenance from humans? That'll fail even faster."
WTF? You've just reached the point now where you've stopped making any sense at all. The made made mist came along after the species had already been whiped out as a replacement for the natural mist that kept them alive before tey were whiped out. At least it's clear now why you have the view you do - you've misunderstood the whole underlying situation here.
"Human interference is just as natural as a waterfall drying up. And yes, sooner or later that waterfall would have "pinged out of existence" or some other accident come along and wipe those frogs out."
Right, but that's the same for every living species on the planet, at some point something will come along and whipe it out. But you've still failed to demonstrate how this somehow translates into the idea that it's acceptable for humans to whipe out this species, any more than it is any other, or none at all.
"You seem to indicate that it'll save a few kilograms of other organisms (those millions of organisms). That's not much gain for the effort."
Sure, by itself, but we're doing this on a fairly wide scale, we whipe out say 5 species, and think, no big deal, but when that has a knock on effect on many other species taking the toll to a much higher number, because everything in nature is interlinked and species loss always has an impact on other species then it becomes a problem, and that's the key, you don't understand that you can't just whipe out a species in isolation, the world does not work like that, no ifs, no buts.
"If anthrax really was that hardy, then we'd never have gotten rid of it in the developed world."
Whilst anthrax was but one obvious example (out of millions of possible examples) of a long lived disease that can cause significant harm to returning humans and hence not exactly something worth getting into much of a debate about, I'd point out that the duration of anthrax can indeed be decades as you state, the problem is, more decades than humanity can survive. Also, we haven't gotten rid of it in the developed world, what on earth makes you think we have? Just this year the UK has had 5 cases in drug users alone. There are commonly cases of people who have dealt with for example, leather also, which is prone to transporting it. But between anthrax, other diseases, and the severe inbreeding a small population would have the point is that you can't repopulate succesfully from such a small population.
"It'd be at least several thousand people (there are a lot of nuclear subs, you know)."
Right and how do they find each other? where do they meet?
"Well, you are wrong in numerous places. So yes, I'll go with the third possible reason. Just because there is research on evolution, "the web of life" and other such subjects, doesn't mean you have a clue what you're talking about."
You're going with the 3rd reason, seriously? That the consensus of just about every professional biologist, taxonomist, and mathematician with experience in modelling living systems that is living or has lived is wrong and you're right?
No wonder with that level of arrogance you can't simply accept being wrong, you've so far passed any ability to be humble and accept that when you are out of your depth the trick is to stop digging that there's no hope for you to ever escape your pit of ignorance.
"a government who is actually seeing some modest improvements in the domestic economy even as the Eurozone drags the global economy down the tubes."
The only reason people like you think this is the biggest problem is because the Eurozone is the only part of the world economy being transparent about it's problems.
China is pretending it's growth slow down is merely a temporary blip, and not a natural saturation of it's ability to grow at the rate it was, South America is similar, and is also dealing with collapsing economies due to failed economics (e.g. Argentina) and America is simply pretending it's absurdly large debt mountain just doesn't exist, whilst the Middle East is seeing regime change left right and centre which is bound to destabilise economies- for example, the situation in Syria over the last year or two will have completely whiped it out as a player in the global economy.
The Eurozone is only one of a number of world economic problems, but yes, it's the one we hear about the most, because it's the one that's admitting it's got a problem. Like a bunch of alcoholics it's the only one that's past the denial stage.
"Frogs depending on survival by actively generated mist? Doesn't sound complex to me. They'll die out again when the mist goes away. Show the model is wrong before continuing to use up my time."
Because you've got absolutely no evidence that there was any reason the mist would magically just go away. The mist will have been generated by the features of the environment, a waterfall or whatever. What makes you think that without mans intervention and destruction of the habitat that a waterfall was going to magically ping out of existence in the near future?
"And the whole blather about "complex systems" is pure reductionism. It's a "complex system" so your argument must be right."
Or in other words, you know little about complex systems so you're going to remove all talk of them from the equation and discuss the topic at your grade school level of knowledge. Right.
"They need a host. Any atmospheric oxygen imbalance that kills off humans globally without mechanical assistance, is going to wipe out the non-human hosts."
Well that's blatantly not true - there are many species that can survive in much tougher conditions than we can, especially bacteria, again, the bacteria behind anthrax being one of the most potent examples we know of. I'm amazed you feel the need to try and reduce the discussion to such an absurd level by outright denying the existence of some pretty well documented things.
"And once humans come into contact with diseases again, they'll build up immunity again just as they did over the past few thousand years."
You still clearly show know knowledge of how disease resistance works. There is much that can kill us without the availability of modern medicine and without modern medicine to artifically protect us from these illnesses then we end up like every other creature, where the only way to build up resistance is to have a large enough population that at least one of those has the genetic variability needed to survive it so he/she can breed it into their future children. The problem is, that once again, we're not talking about a healthy enough sized gene pool. You still clearly do not get even first year degree level biology in this respect.
"You are one to talk. I tire of the ignorant lecturing me on subjects I'm familiar with."
So you're familiar with them and yet you talk utter nonsense and ignore established scientific fact on these issues? So which is it? you're not actually familiar with them but simply can't accept being wrong (even though you are) or you are familiar with them but still pretend the opposite, again, because you can't accept being wrong?
Either way it doesn't bode well for your ability to come across as an informed human being when you put ego above well established fact.
Honestly, if it's the 3rd possible reason, that I, and many decades of scientific research are wrong, then I'd love to see your published work demonstrating how you can repopulate humanity with only a tiny handful of people without worry about the long term effects and risks of inbreeding that disprove all prior research on the topic. I'd also love to see your papers disproving the existence of the web of life, that show that species always exist in isolation. I'd even love to see your paper on how large established waterfalls are known to magically vanish from existence in short order.
Oh what's that? You've done none of this? That's okay, I wont ask you to apologise, I can see you're far too proud a person to ever accept that you're in over your head on a certain topic but feel the need to pretend you know more than you do, whilst spouting grade school level simplifications that simply show that you don't in fact know what you're on about. Have fun being ignorant though, you obviously enjoy it.
So how does it go wrong so often? I'm not trying to stir shit up, but the US has an abysmal track record on civilian casualties so if the rules of engagement are followed as strictly as you suggest then I'm intrigued to know where it goes wrong, and why.
The problem is that whilst the rules of engagement are exactly what should be done, I'm not convinced they are. You only have to look at the raw original uncommented Wikileaks Apache video to see that at least Apache pilots give not the slightest shit for verifying a target as a threat before firing particularly in the case of the van that pulled up to assist the casualties. There was just no effort at all to avoid civilian casualties and every will to just shoot at anyone in the area "just in case" they were a militant who could harm the incoming US troops if they were. Under normal rules of engagement in that scenario the pilots should have held off firing until the US troops approached, the US troops should have approached carefully with the Apache pilot covering, if any sign of threat was then shown then the Apache pilots should've fired but that's the opposite of what happened. Is it that Apache pilots give less of a shit about the RoE than drone pilots making that example irrelevant in this case?
I notice you say you train, could the reality be that whilst the RoE say one thing, that in practice, it's not actually what always happens?