Re:why not construct this
on
The Space Elevator
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
I can't quite tell if you're serious with this comment... I don't think anger with the US will evaporate just because we stop trying to tell everyone what to do...
But:
Why does Bush not say that his goal for America is to construct this during this decade? (similar to JFK, etc)
Because, despite his claims that he is a"unificator" and not a "divider-upper", Bush does not appear to have any real interest in "unificating" with other countries except to further US power. I know some (US) people will undoubtedly say that this is far better than working with other countries to weaken US power, but nonetheless, I can't imagine why someone who appears to have nearly no interest in domestic issues - let alone scientific research - would make this a funding priority.
Unless someone could convince him that this could revive that whole SDI "Star Wars" thing...
And you had the *luck* to be born in circumstances (be it your country, your parents, etc) that allows you to work hard and get ahead. Some people are born into circumstances where they could work 1000 times harder than you and are still stuck picking bananas/cocoa beans/whatever everyday with no savings and no hope of getting out.
That said, I agree with one of the above posters. It's complicated and there's a mix of luck and work. Just for example, I'm really happy with my life, I've worked to get where I am, but I'm certainly willing to admit that I've been lucky, too. Lucky to have met someone that I could spend the rest of my life with in my early twenties to have support when I really needed it. Lucky that a great job became available right as I began looking for one.
That'd be San Diego, where I used to live. The problem was, when you looked at the reclamation maps to see where the waste water was coming from and where the cleaned water was going to - it was pretty clear that poor people were going to end up using rich people's (albeit clean) waste water. That just struck me as pretty screwed up.
I'd never thought about the matter until this came up for a vote, and I guess I'd always naively assumed (after growing up watching Star Trek constantly) that we already used reclaimed water, so I was surprised that people reacted so negatively to the idea of it. That said, I do think the planners could have been a bit less obvious about the class distinctions in SD.
Ah, now it comes time to paint the door. Excuse me. Paint *my* door. What the hell? There's some "anti-stick" teflon coating on my door?
It's illegal for me to remove this stuff? Isn't it mine?
You've obviously never lived in a neighborhood with a housing association.:) Then you learn that, in fact, nothing about the appearance of your house is under your control. Sort of defeats the purpose of buying property, wouldn't you think?
More relevantly, it's definitely the case that just because something is "yours" doesn't mean you can do whatever the heck you like with it. I think this sucks, too. So, I guess my bigger point is: the analogy between IP and physical objects breaks down because even with physical property, there's always plenty of laws to stop you from, oh, say, ripping out the catalytic converter of your car if you live in CA.
If only this were true! I'm a post-doc in psychology and as a grad student knew other grad students in physics and neuroscience (among others). It seemed that only the neuroscience students were optimistic about the academic job scene, basically because their field is very sexy right now and there's good funding to be had. The rest of us are just hoping tenure-tracks jobs open up in places other than Nome, AK when it's time to start applying.
I've heard of science tenure-track jobs getting 100+ applicants. If universities are having trouble finding qualified scientists, then they better start training their students better, because I don't think there's any shortage of warm bodies. Not yet, anyway.
WE (meaning the tech/IT industry and community) are the ONLY people that care about our OS being buggy.
This is simply untrue. Anybody who has ever lost a half-hour's work on a project, has had their system hosed by a virus, or worse - had porn spam sent out to their coworkers in their name, they care, believe me. The list goes on and on.
The problem is that the people I talk to don't understand that it can be different. They think it's the computer in some vague, "all computers need to be rebooted every few hours" sort of way. They don't seem to really believe me when I tell them to use a different operating system with different programs that aren't so buggy or virus prone.
I think anyone who uses a computer to do something that they either care about or are paid by someone else who cares, DO care about buggy code. They just don't know it. They think computers are just like that.
it will be illegal to ride on the road (since it is a powered vehicle)
This explains a few things about why the traffic is so slow in the UK. (I'm picturing all the cars being propelled by hamsters:) )
But, seriously, you must mean that there is something about it that makes it illegal to drive on the road despite being a powered vehicle, right? I'm curious about this, for both the US and UK, because it's not clear to me why it would be illegal. Too slow? Not a problem for urban areas. The driver is too poorly protected? Then why are motorcycles legal?
Some of us naively assume that people from the oil industry might have some reason to, oh say, make sure US energy policy continues to favor their friends in the oil industry instead of being more open to alternate sources of energy.
Even giving them the benefit of the doubt, they can't help but be biased toward the source of energy they know best. I'd rather see former researchers than former CEOs making decisions about energy. In my experience, the executive types in any company don't necessary know much about the details of the technology their company uses anyway. So, just because they run an oil company, doesn't mean they know much about oil production itself.
Same goes for this ProdiGene guy. We don't know why Bush picked him. We don't know if he's really qualified and I think it's naive to say that just because he ran a company in the field that he "knows all about agriculture". More likely he know s "all about running a agriculture busniess", which is NOT the same thing.
You bring up a good point; I think some people must think that if they eat a tomato with penguin genes (who knows?) they'll somehow absorb the genes and become more penguin-y, which is not what going to happen.
But, to answer your question... I think there are several reasonable concerns that need to be carefully addressed in any GM product:
(1) Is this product going to interact in unpredictable and possibly bad ways with natural flora/fauna? You might be able to eat a crop of GM wheat that unintentionally sterilizes non-GM wheat crops, but only the GM-wheat producing company is going to rejoice as wheat crops everywhere fail. And, there any number of chain-reaction doomsday scenarios you can think up... not that any of them are likely, but the thing is, I don't think we've spent enough time researching GM crops in general to be confident in every outcome.
One of my favourite profs was from the pharmaceutical industry (yes, yes, but he *did* leave for academia, so he can't be all bad) and he had a very insighful comment about research. Do all the phase 1/2/3 trials you want. The only way to know for certain what a drug does in a population after 50 years is to see what happens after 50 years. Of course, when you're talking about life-saving drugs, there's good reasons for not waiting through 50 years of testing before releasing it to the general public (and you get the occasional medical blunder as a result). But, I haven't heard any convincing evidence that we need to be acting quickly to bring GM foods to market.
(2) There's poison and there's poison. Maybe a company shows that its GM food looks chemically safe and the test subjects haven't died from it. Great! Chances are people will be able to eat it. But, two concerns: First, maybe there are unforseen allergic reactions by some portion of the population. The callous can say "too bad, they're defective" Fine. But second, going back to my prof again - maybe the food seems fine at first but has unforseen medical consequences over the long term.
I'm not meaning to GM-bash here. But, I think that we should be cautious about the research. There is no reason to hurry, and the results of error could be painful and tragic. I'm not saying they have to be, I'd just like the companies researching GM to demonstrate that they've learned from the mistakes of medical pioneers.
One man makes a difference only when he is joined by others doing the same. My point is that anyone who chooses banks based on their browser support is on a crusade that is not, and will not, be taken up by the wise.
I'm sorry, I still fail to see the arrogance in his question. Maybe *you* only do things because you want everyone else to behave like you, but sometimes people make choices because it's what they are comfortable with and they don't care if others do the same. I don't see this guy's question as "Geeks Unite!", I think it's an honest question. As someone has already said, maybe he just wants the convienence of not having to switch browsers. My bank doesn't support my normal browser and it drives me nuts to have to load up a program just to use their site - but, for me, I put up with it. - he doesn't want to, and that's fine. *shrug*
Just take as a for example: I don't buy things from Walmart. I don't care if *you* do, this isn't a Boycott, it's just that I don't like the idea of giving them my money, and I happen to be lucky enough to be sufficiently well off that I can afford to spend a little more elsewhere. That's it. No big crusade... I'm not asking anyone to do the same.
And I don't think this guy is, either. I really think you are reading a LOT more into this than there is.
Besides... this *is* Ask Slashdot, be thankful he's not asking what kind of tiolet paper to use.
Your point is well taken that one scientific study should not be taken to be a perfect reflection of reality.
However, I think you paint with too broad a brush to say that many scientific studies are corporately funded. I suppose it depends on your field, but I would be surprised to hear about intensive corporate funding of fields outside pharmaceuticals. My own field doesn't see a lot of corporate funding, but plenty of government funding instead. Even so, scientists may be pressured (even contractually obligated) not to publish findings that reflect poorly on a corporate product, this is different from being pressured to actually falsify data. And even if the occassional rogue scientist does this - they get discredited when people fail to replicate their work.
The upshot of all of this is - scientists don't offer their results as proof of some fact, poorly trained science reporters do. And while there are many, many blind alleys in any scientific field, this is due to the scientific process itself, not a culture of corruption as you imply.
Now, I'm young and as I said my own field doesn't generally get corporate sponsorship, so perhaps I'm still a bit of a wide-eyed idealist. *shrug*
After it bought Compaq this year, the combined company became the largest single buyer of Windows for personal computers and data-serving computers, and thus more dependent on Microsoft.
Am I the only one who thinks this is just ass-backward from the way you'd expect things to be in an open market? So, HP/Compaq becomes MS's biggest customer. Back in the olden days, it would mean that *MS* would quake in fear and bend over backwards not to piss off their biggest client, lest they lose their business. Nowadays, it appears to mean that HP/Compaq needs to be careful lest they upset their vendor.
It's ridiculous. And, frankly, it should stop. Too bad short-term shareholder value has to take precedence over long-term strategic planning (like finding a way to get out from underneath MS's thumb).
That's funny... I don't think my *husband* would approve of slaughter in the name of excellent gaming furniture.
Maybe it could be modded to double as an elegant dining table? You could send catty comments about your dinner guests to each other via the message system. Though they might get suspicious after you repeatedly drop your napkin and come up laughing.
Wait. I was under the (false?) impression that people of Islamic and Hindu faiths have been duking it out in India for the last couple thousand years - with each side waxing and waning, but always present in a non-trivial way. Now, just because it so happens that at this moment Hindu is more prevalent doesn't mean that there aren't deep cultural effects of having been under the dominant influence of Islam in the (semi)recent past.
But, maybe I've just read one too many EM Forster novels.
Other way around, I think. It sounds like if you live in BFE then for some reason they've got a PS2 for you. If you live in a major city, you're out of luck. I guess that makes sense if they underestimated just how many city dwellers want one.
I haven't gone a big quest, but I generally look out of curiousity for PS2's here in San Diego, and I've yet to find one on the shelf. I, too, refuse to go out of my way for one of these - and while the Xbox won't be on my Christmas list, I agree that they'll sell just fine as long as there is enough to go around.
It seems to me that in many ways it would be less fair, though. Maybe being salaried means different things in different companies, but it's been my experience that being salaried meant being paid the same amount no matter how many hours you worked. Now, that's a pretty fair system when the company doesn't care how much you work - only that you turn out product (of whatever kind) at a rate that they approve of.
But, it seems to me that any job where they are basically paying you to be a warm body (as opposed to paying you for finishing projects) should be an hourly job. After all, in the case of on-call time, they aren't paying you to write code, they are paying you (or should pay you) to wait around until you're needed. That seems like a classic example of the need for an hourly wage for some jobs.
Now, if there are cases where you can be salaried *and* get overtime, well, then that's a different story... I've just never seen that actually happen.
Yes, but it does happen in the sciences, after a fashion. I don't know about other big universities, but at the University of California, when you are hired (even on soft, non-university money) to do research (including grad students, assistant researchers, professors) you sign a form that states that the university is a coauthor (full author? I honestly don't remember) on any thing you patent while at the university.
So, I can publish my research all I like, but once I try to patent something and get money for it, the university gets a cut, and possibly control. (Again, I wish I could remember for certain, though in my field the odds of getting a patent on anything I come up with are very, very slim.)
And UC has no trouble getting faculty and grad students.
I don't believe that sending your children to a good (emphasis on that) daycare facility is any more of a parental copout than sending them to school. In both cases, they end up being taken care of by relative strangers who you hope will not undo your hard work as parent (regarding things like critical thinking and behavior).
I think for only children it is actually a good thing to get them used to interacting with other children at an early age. I have a sister who is 13 years younger than me, so I basically grew up as an only child. I didn't go to daycare, but my sister did. I think she has turned out to be much more comfortable in social situations than me, and while who knows what other factors might be involved, I think being around other children from an early age probably helped.
Sending your children to daycare is not giving up responsibility for them, and I think that companies are well served to make childcare available (off-site, with a high quality daycare facility that is more than a child dumping ground) at a discount for ongoing service, or at least for those emergencies when the usual arrangements fail.
One thing I really liked about the old Vaios was how thin they were. This thing looks pretty clunky, compared the old ones - do you think they've really given up on skinny Vaios, or are the pictures just an optical illusion?
And, if the Vaios are truly no longer supermodel thin, what's the point of getting one?
b) It's got a handle! You can't carry a computer like that by it's handle.
I didn't think the pictures (even the flash business) did a very good job of showing what the external surface is made of. Was it listed some place in text that I missed?
I confess, I have an iBook, and scoffed at the handle when I first got it, but now can't imagine getting another laptop without it. I spend a lot of time trundling from one part of the building to another with my iBook, and the handle is a definite plus. No dings or damage, yet, and I haven't been especially careful with it.
That said - this new Vaio is, IMO, butt-ugly. And the handle has not convinced me otherwise. Bleh.
I can't help but wonder why someone like Dick Armey would really care about whether Carnivore gets an unbiased review.
I suspect that, as usual, this has more to do with meaningless, mindless partisan politics than with actual issues.
I find it hard to believe that comparing someone (favorably or unfavorably) to any bodily oriface can be seen as a neutral statement of fact - regardless of intonation.
Referring to someone by their faith because it is the salient thing about them at that moment is NOT the same as calling someone a dickhead. I doubt most Christians are offended at being labelled "Christian" - I know some of the more fervent believers dislike the shortening of Christ in any context (Xmas, Xtian, etc), but I'm not sure they should consider it an insult any more than when someone uses other acronyms, like, say, "AFAIK".
Of course, if you really want, you can turn any word into an insult if you try hard enough.
First: Do you honestly think that previous first wives had no influence on the policies of their husbands?
I wasn't fond of Hillary's health care proposal, but I was happy to see that at last the influence of people close to people in power was now out in the open. I'd rather know what the first lady thinks than have to guess how much of the president's opinions come from. And that's to Clinton, we now we pay a little more attention to potential first ladies, which I think is a good thing. We scrutinize presidential candidates' choice of advisors, why not spouses? They're advisors, too, you know.
Second: There's lots of positions we don't get to vote for. Are you unhappy that we don't get to vote for cabinet positions? Supreme Court justices? Federal judges? Ambassadors? Lots of unelected people run lots of things in this country. If you think you are qualified to have a say in every position in the government, then more power to you. I certainly don't have the time to pay attention to every detail of our country's daily business.
In a related topic - doesn't anyone else out there have an interest in technology AND politics? I spend my fair share of time in front of a monitor, but I still gather information and try my best to vote responsibly in every election. I don't think I'd have the right to complain about the state of our government if I didn't.
I'm not sure what the goal of getting rid of the keyboard is - as others have already said, typing is faster and easier. One advantage *could* be to make the laptop smaller, but you are always constrained by screen size, anyway.
Now, if Apple wants to come out with a head-mounted display that I could plug into a Palm/Handspring-style device, *then* I'd be interested.
Slashdot Mirror
I can't quite tell if you're serious with this comment... I don't think anger with the US will evaporate just because we stop trying to tell everyone what to do...
But:
Why does Bush not say that his goal for America is to construct this during this decade? (similar to JFK, etc)
Because, despite his claims that he is a"unificator" and not a "divider-upper", Bush does not appear to have any real interest in "unificating" with other countries except to further US power. I know some (US) people will undoubtedly say that this is far better than working with other countries to weaken US power, but nonetheless, I can't imagine why someone who appears to have nearly no interest in domestic issues - let alone scientific research - would make this a funding priority.
Unless someone could convince him that this could revive that whole SDI "Star Wars" thing...
And you had the *luck* to be born in circumstances (be it your country, your parents, etc) that allows you to work hard and get ahead. Some people are born into circumstances where they could work 1000 times harder than you and are still stuck picking bananas/cocoa beans/whatever everyday with no savings and no hope of getting out.
That said, I agree with one of the above posters. It's complicated and there's a mix of luck and work. Just for example, I'm really happy with my life, I've worked to get where I am, but I'm certainly willing to admit that I've been lucky, too. Lucky to have met someone that I could spend the rest of my life with in my early twenties to have support when I really needed it. Lucky that a great job became available right as I began looking for one.
That'd be San Diego, where I used to live. The problem was, when you looked at the reclamation maps to see where the waste water was coming from and where the cleaned water was going to - it was pretty clear that poor people were going to end up using rich people's (albeit clean) waste water. That just struck me as pretty screwed up.
I'd never thought about the matter until this came up for a vote, and I guess I'd always naively assumed (after growing up watching Star Trek constantly) that we already used reclaimed water, so I was surprised that people reacted so negatively to the idea of it. That said, I do think the planners could have been a bit less obvious about the class distinctions in SD.
Ah, now it comes time to paint the door. Excuse me. Paint *my* door. What the hell? There's some "anti-stick" teflon coating on my door?
:) Then you learn that, in fact, nothing about the appearance of your house is under your control. Sort of defeats the purpose of buying property, wouldn't you think?
It's illegal for me to remove this stuff? Isn't it mine?
You've obviously never lived in a neighborhood with a housing association.
More relevantly, it's definitely the case that just because something is "yours" doesn't mean you can do whatever the heck you like with it. I think this sucks, too. So, I guess my bigger point is: the analogy between IP and physical objects breaks down because even with physical property, there's always plenty of laws to stop you from, oh, say, ripping out the catalytic converter of your car if you live in CA.
If only this were true! I'm a post-doc in psychology and as a grad student knew other grad students in physics and neuroscience (among others). It seemed that only the neuroscience students were optimistic about the academic job scene, basically because their field is very sexy right now and there's good funding to be had. The rest of us are just hoping tenure-tracks jobs open up in places other than Nome, AK when it's time to start applying.
I've heard of science tenure-track jobs getting 100+ applicants. If universities are having trouble finding qualified scientists, then they better start training their students better, because I don't think there's any shortage of warm bodies. Not yet, anyway.
WE (meaning the tech/IT industry and community) are the ONLY people that care about our OS being buggy.
This is simply untrue. Anybody who has ever lost a half-hour's work on a project, has had their system hosed by a virus, or worse - had porn spam sent out to their coworkers in their name, they care, believe me. The list goes on and on.
The problem is that the people I talk to don't understand that it can be different. They think it's the computer in some vague, "all computers need to be rebooted every few hours" sort of way. They don't seem to really believe me when I tell them to use a different operating system with different programs that aren't so buggy or virus prone.
I think anyone who uses a computer to do something that they either care about or are paid by someone else who cares, DO care about buggy code. They just don't know it. They think computers are just like that.
it will be illegal to ride on the road (since it is a powered vehicle)
:) )
This explains a few things about why the traffic is so slow in the UK. (I'm picturing all the cars being propelled by hamsters
But, seriously, you must mean that there is something about it that makes it illegal to drive on the road despite being a powered vehicle, right? I'm curious about this, for both the US and UK, because it's not clear to me why it would be illegal. Too slow? Not a problem for urban areas. The driver is too poorly protected? Then why are motorcycles legal?
Just curious.
Some of us naively assume that people from the oil industry might have some reason to, oh say, make sure US energy policy continues to favor their friends in the oil industry instead of being more open to alternate sources of energy.
Even giving them the benefit of the doubt, they can't help but be biased toward the source of energy they know best. I'd rather see former researchers than former CEOs making decisions about energy. In my experience, the executive types in any company don't necessary know much about the details of the technology their company uses anyway. So, just because they run an oil company, doesn't mean they know much about oil production itself.
Same goes for this ProdiGene guy. We don't know why Bush picked him. We don't know if he's really qualified and I think it's naive to say that just because he ran a company in the field that he "knows all about agriculture". More likely he know s "all about running a agriculture busniess", which is NOT the same thing.
You bring up a good point; I think some people must think that if they eat a tomato with penguin genes (who knows?) they'll somehow absorb the genes and become more penguin-y, which is not what going to happen.
But, to answer your question... I think there are several reasonable concerns that need to be carefully addressed in any GM product:
(1) Is this product going to interact in unpredictable and possibly bad ways with natural flora/fauna? You might be able to eat a crop of GM wheat that unintentionally sterilizes non-GM wheat crops, but only the GM-wheat producing company is going to rejoice as wheat crops everywhere fail. And, there any number of chain-reaction doomsday scenarios you can think up... not that any of them are likely, but the thing is, I don't think we've spent enough time researching GM crops in general to be confident in every outcome.
One of my favourite profs was from the pharmaceutical industry (yes, yes, but he *did* leave for academia, so he can't be all bad) and he had a very insighful comment about research. Do all the phase 1/2/3 trials you want. The only way to know for certain what a drug does in a population after 50 years is to see what happens after 50 years. Of course, when you're talking about life-saving drugs, there's good reasons for not waiting through 50 years of testing before releasing it to the general public (and you get the occasional medical blunder as a result). But, I haven't heard any convincing evidence that we need to be acting quickly to bring GM foods to market.
(2) There's poison and there's poison. Maybe a company shows that its GM food looks chemically safe and the test subjects haven't died from it. Great! Chances are people will be able to eat it. But, two concerns: First, maybe there are unforseen allergic reactions by some portion of the population. The callous can say "too bad, they're defective" Fine. But second, going back to my prof again - maybe the food seems fine at first but has unforseen medical consequences over the long term.
I'm not meaning to GM-bash here. But, I think that we should be cautious about the research. There is no reason to hurry, and the results of error could be painful and tragic. I'm not saying they have to be, I'd just like the companies researching GM to demonstrate that they've learned from the mistakes of medical pioneers.
One man makes a difference only when he is joined by others doing the same. My point is that anyone who chooses banks based on their browser support is on a crusade that is not, and will not, be taken up by the wise.
I'm sorry, I still fail to see the arrogance in his question. Maybe *you* only do things because you want everyone else to behave like you, but sometimes people make choices because it's what they are comfortable with and they don't care if others do the same. I don't see this guy's question as "Geeks Unite!", I think it's an honest question. As someone has already said, maybe he just wants the convienence of not having to switch browsers. My bank doesn't support my normal browser and it drives me nuts to have to load up a program just to use their site - but, for me, I put up with it. - he doesn't want to, and that's fine. *shrug*
Just take as a for example: I don't buy things from Walmart. I don't care if *you* do, this isn't a Boycott, it's just that I don't like the idea of giving them my money, and I happen to be lucky enough to be sufficiently well off that I can afford to spend a little more elsewhere. That's it. No big crusade... I'm not asking anyone to do the same.
And I don't think this guy is, either. I really think you are reading a LOT more into this than there is.
Besides... this *is* Ask Slashdot, be thankful he's not asking what kind of tiolet paper to use.
Your point is well taken that one scientific study should not be taken to be a perfect reflection of reality.
However, I think you paint with too broad a brush to say that many scientific studies are corporately funded. I suppose it depends on your field, but I would be surprised to hear about intensive corporate funding of fields outside pharmaceuticals. My own field doesn't see a lot of corporate funding, but plenty of government funding instead. Even so, scientists may be pressured (even contractually obligated) not to publish findings that reflect poorly on a corporate product, this is different from being pressured to actually falsify data. And even if the occassional rogue scientist does this - they get discredited when people fail to replicate their work.
The upshot of all of this is - scientists don't offer their results as proof of some fact, poorly trained science reporters do. And while there are many, many blind alleys in any scientific field, this is due to the scientific process itself, not a culture of corruption as you imply.
Now, I'm young and as I said my own field doesn't generally get corporate sponsorship, so perhaps I'm still a bit of a wide-eyed idealist. *shrug*
"Does this mean McDonald's will start selling Space Burgers?"
That would require McDonald's to put something healthy in their burgers... I don't think they'll go for that.
When we can start growing random cow/kangaroo/moose parts in space, then we should give 'em a call
Mmmmm... moose burgers...
After it bought Compaq this year, the combined company became the largest single buyer of Windows for personal computers and data-serving computers, and thus more dependent on Microsoft.
Am I the only one who thinks this is just ass-backward from the way you'd expect things to be in an open market? So, HP/Compaq becomes MS's biggest customer. Back in the olden days, it would mean that *MS* would quake in fear and bend over backwards not to piss off their biggest client, lest they lose their business. Nowadays, it appears to mean that HP/Compaq needs to be careful lest they upset their vendor.
It's ridiculous. And, frankly, it should stop. Too bad short-term shareholder value has to take precedence over long-term strategic planning (like finding a way to get out from underneath MS's thumb).
That's funny... I don't think my *husband* would approve of slaughter in the name of excellent gaming furniture.
Maybe it could be modded to double as an elegant dining table? You could send catty comments about your dinner guests to each other via the message system. Though they might get suspicious after you repeatedly drop your napkin and come up laughing.
Wait. I was under the (false?) impression that people of Islamic and Hindu faiths have been duking it out in India for the last couple thousand years - with each side waxing and waning, but always present in a non-trivial way. Now, just because it so happens that at this moment Hindu is more prevalent doesn't mean that there aren't deep cultural effects of having been under the dominant influence of Islam in the (semi)recent past.
But, maybe I've just read one too many EM Forster novels.
Wind
umm... and where do you live? Antarctica?
Other way around, I think. It sounds like if you live in BFE then for some reason they've got a PS2 for you. If you live in a major city, you're out of luck. I guess that makes sense if they underestimated just how many city dwellers want one.
I haven't gone a big quest, but I generally look out of curiousity for PS2's here in San Diego, and I've yet to find one on the shelf. I, too, refuse to go out of my way for one of these - and while the Xbox won't be on my Christmas list, I agree that they'll sell just fine as long as there is enough to go around.
Wind
It seems to me that in many ways it would be less fair, though. Maybe being salaried means different things in different companies, but it's been my experience that being salaried meant being paid the same amount no matter how many hours you worked. Now, that's a pretty fair system when the company doesn't care how much you work - only that you turn out product (of whatever kind) at a rate that they approve of.
But, it seems to me that any job where they are basically paying you to be a warm body (as opposed to paying you for finishing projects) should be an hourly job. After all, in the case of on-call time, they aren't paying you to write code, they are paying you (or should pay you) to wait around until you're needed. That seems like a classic example of the need for an hourly wage for some jobs.
Now, if there are cases where you can be salaried *and* get overtime, well, then that's a different story... I've just never seen that actually happen.
Wind
Yes, but it does happen in the sciences, after a fashion. I don't know about other big universities, but at the University of California, when you are hired (even on soft, non-university money) to do research (including grad students, assistant researchers, professors) you sign a form that states that the university is a coauthor (full author? I honestly don't remember) on any thing you patent while at the university.
So, I can publish my research all I like, but once I try to patent something and get money for it, the university gets a cut, and possibly control. (Again, I wish I could remember for certain, though in my field the odds of getting a patent on anything I come up with are very, very slim.)
And UC has no trouble getting faculty and grad students.
I don't believe that sending your children to a good (emphasis on that) daycare facility is any more of a parental copout than sending them to school. In both cases, they end up being taken care of by relative strangers who you hope will not undo your hard work as parent (regarding things like critical thinking and behavior).
I think for only children it is actually a good thing to get them used to interacting with other children at an early age. I have a sister who is 13 years younger than me, so I basically grew up as an only child. I didn't go to daycare, but my sister did. I think she has turned out to be much more comfortable in social situations than me, and while who knows what other factors might be involved, I think being around other children from an early age probably helped.
Sending your children to daycare is not giving up responsibility for them, and I think that companies are well served to make childcare available (off-site, with a high quality daycare facility that is more than a child dumping ground) at a discount for ongoing service, or at least for those emergencies when the usual arrangements fail.
Wind
One thing I really liked about the old Vaios was how thin they were. This thing looks pretty clunky, compared the old ones - do you think they've really given up on skinny Vaios, or are the pictures just an optical illusion?
And, if the Vaios are truly no longer supermodel thin, what's the point of getting one?
Wind
b) It's got a handle! You can't carry a computer like that by it's handle.
I didn't think the pictures (even the flash business) did a very good job of showing what the external surface is made of. Was it listed some place in text that I missed?
I confess, I have an iBook, and scoffed at the handle when I first got it, but now can't imagine getting another laptop without it. I spend a lot of time trundling from one part of the building to another with my iBook, and the handle is a definite plus. No dings or damage, yet, and I haven't been especially careful with it.
That said - this new Vaio is, IMO, butt-ugly. And the handle has not convinced me otherwise. Bleh.
Wind
I can't help but wonder why someone like Dick Armey would really care about whether Carnivore gets an unbiased review.
I suspect that, as usual, this has more to do with meaningless, mindless partisan politics than with actual issues.
Wind
I find it hard to believe that comparing someone (favorably or unfavorably) to any bodily oriface can be seen as a neutral statement of fact - regardless of intonation.
Referring to someone by their faith because it is the salient thing about them at that moment is NOT the same as calling someone a dickhead. I doubt most Christians are offended at being labelled "Christian" - I know some of the more fervent believers dislike the shortening of Christ in any context (Xmas, Xtian, etc), but I'm not sure they should consider it an insult any more than when someone uses other acronyms, like, say, "AFAIK".
Of course, if you really want, you can turn any word into an insult if you try hard enough.
Wind
First: Do you honestly think that previous first wives had no influence on the policies of their husbands?
I wasn't fond of Hillary's health care proposal, but I was happy to see that at last the influence of people close to people in power was now out in the open. I'd rather know what the first lady thinks than have to guess how much of the president's opinions come from. And that's to Clinton, we now we pay a little more attention to potential first ladies, which I think is a good thing. We scrutinize presidential candidates' choice of advisors, why not spouses? They're advisors, too, you know.
Second: There's lots of positions we don't get to vote for. Are you unhappy that we don't get to vote for cabinet positions? Supreme Court justices? Federal judges? Ambassadors? Lots of unelected people run lots of things in this country. If you think you are qualified to have a say in every position in the government, then more power to you. I certainly don't have the time to pay attention to every detail of our country's daily business.
In a related topic - doesn't anyone else out there have an interest in technology AND politics? I spend my fair share of time in front of a monitor, but I still gather information and try my best to vote responsibly in every election. I don't think I'd have the right to complain about the state of our government if I didn't.
W
I'm not sure what the goal of getting rid of the keyboard is - as others have already said, typing is faster and easier. One advantage *could* be to make the laptop smaller, but you are always constrained by screen size, anyway.
Now, if Apple wants to come out with a head-mounted display that I could plug into a Palm/Handspring-style device, *then* I'd be interested.
Wind