Well, considering that Osama Bin Laden did bomb The world trade center just 8 years ago, that does make him a strong suspect. We shouldn't jump to conclusions, of course, but Bin Laden is suspect because he's tried to destroy these exact same buildings before. Not because people are 'racist'. If someone did somthing before, it is easier to believe that they will do it again.
Like they said on NPR- this is the new face of war.
It was ironic. NPR was saying that because all planes were ordered down the president might be the only one in the air. I look up in the sky and count two planes. Apparently they're letting planes finish their flights.
Pensylvania has also been hit by at least one plane too, says one station.
Take a seat on the floor young boy, and I'll explain to you about these amazing things called jokes. After you master that, we'll move onto more subtle things like wit and sarcasm. You might find those a bit more difficult.
Incidentally, the US government HAS been paranoid in the past about letting supercomputers into some nations, futile as though that may be.
But wouldn't this mean that we'd have to sell computers to China? And maybe they'd, like use these computers to guide real nuclear missles at us or somthing. Okay, I'm taking this much too seriously. Maybe we should just drop a bunch of computers with minesweeper preloaded into enemy territory and they'd immobilize the population and... hey, wait. All the computers in my office have minesweeper preloaded....
Considering that your own troops are going to be exposed to whatever emissions the weapons give off (think soliders breathing in depleted uranium dust from the gulf war) this makes good sense.
I don't know what it would take to make liberals use a little common sense. I'm still working on the *%$# conservatives.
Speaking as someone with a Scientific college education (but a tech career) there are some valid reasons for mistrusting information supposedly produced by the scientific method. Scientific studies are only as accurate as researchers are unbiased, and companies can and do manipulate this, both directly and indirectly.
For example; hybrid crops are often credited with producing huge agricultural benefits but there isn't a single scientific paper which can be used to verify this. Any gain produced through hybridization could also be gained through crossbreeding with the added value that the latter would be more genetically diverse and thus pest resistant. Yet our government devotes considerable funds to improving hybrid rather than open polinated plants.
Why? Because the hybridization process allowed seed companies to produce a product (hybrid plant) and sell it without giving farmers the two original strains necessecary to produce this product.
Some methods are more direct. Pfizer, maker of viagra, published a study on the prevalence of sexual disfunction in men and women in the Journal of American Medicine. It was published as if it were by an independant group, despite the fact that The Journal of American Medicine requires disclosure of all conflicts of interest.
As more scientific fields become applied rather than pure, more money is being devoted to PR disguised as science, medicince etc.
Misguided or not, I think you misunderstand or misrepresent the views of the average lay person.
For example, many of the people who are seriously worried about genetically engineered foods are also worried about pesticide usage.
And remember; in life, as in slashdot, just because people within a group have differing opinions dosen't make the group as a whole hypocritical.
Any robot that could intelligently answer e-mail would first be used to intelligently send spam.
Hello coolvibe. I was talking to your friend insert name here yesterday and....
Of possible revelvance- One of the determining factors of a successful commune is it's size (under 200 people). When you get over 200 people, the socializing forces that a commune relies upon to maintian itself begin to break down. Perhaps the same thing happens with corporations, except that other motivating forces take over at this point.
Okay, forget compensation for a second. The question is whether or not a person or their heirs have rights to a person's corpse and can determine what is done with it. Focus on the moral aspect of a person's body as their property, the terms of treatment and disposal they can dictate. Imagine if, after Princess Di's death someone took egg cells from her Uterus and started selling them ( or giving them away ). A similar incident actually happened in England, where people's corpses were being sold by Doctors. The point is that doctors cannot assume ownership of a person's extracted tissue. They are just it's caretakers
1. Most information on the internet has a _very_ low value to me. I'll go into a library and browse books that I would never ever pay for.
Almost all pay sites ask for more than their information is worth.
2. There is a cost to paying for information. The time it would take me to write a check and mail it increases the price in my mind. So does the worry caused by giving yet another stranger my credit card number.
3. Sellers rarely provide what they promise, and there's little recourse if you get screwed. This includes computer programs. I recently bought an educational version of Macromedia Flash since I was a student and I wanted to use it for my business. The liscense included said that the product couldn't be used for commercial purposes, and if I disagreed I should return the product. I tried to return it, but the store refused to do so. I realize that the liscence is probably not enforcable, but I don't want to have to go to court to prove that. Until I can have some sort of legal assurance that I can get what I'm paying for, paying isn't worth the hassle.
4. As has been said previously- why pay when I don't have to?
5. If I'm really interested in a topic I'll buy a book. Books still provide more in-depth informaiton in a medium that does not need to 'boot up' or 'log on' or recharge. Books are readily portable. They usually have a lot more information than electronic media.
6. I'm hoping that if we don't pay all these corporate entities trying to take over the internet that they'll stick to just trying to slip their products into the middle of TV sitcoms.
A guy can dream, right?
A few things-
1st. Since some guy here accused me of being out of shape-I'm in very good shape. I weigh 135 lbs. and can benchpress 200 lbs.
second- The spike at 1 and 2 was huge, larger than the mode at 7 that my scores were centered around. I buy into the 'people being stupid and not switching from guys to girls' theory. While I don't care immensely what other people think of me ( I just wanted to meet some people to chat with, which is another feature of the site. ) I thought the trend was relevant. And, of course, I admit I was curious how I'd be rated. But I'm not on here 'complaining.' If the scores were legitamate, that's fine. I just don't think that the evidence supports that.
I'm interested whether or not girls see the same trend. Any geek chicks on here willing to suffer the flames of public whimsy for the sake of knowledge?
I think that there may be a problem with their moderation system. Most of my 'ranking' fell in a bell curve around 7. However there was an outlying spike at 1 or 2. Now this could indicate two types of rating styles, perhaps. However given the fact that the site reports back to a user what their percentile ranking is (i.e. where they stand relative to other hotornot-ers) this could be an indication that some people are trying to boost their own scores by giving other people bad ones.
Any good moderation system would need to find some way to prevent that- i.e. but ranking a group of several girls 1st second third, etc.
I realize that this would probably make the whole thing less fun, and it isn't supposed to be scientific to begin with. But if it were 'just a site about rating women' then it wouldn't belong on Slashdot, would it?
Re:Discredit a solution which goes against your be
on
Soybean Powered Harley
·
· Score: 1
The point he was trying to make is that there is no barrier preventing diesel rigs from using the stuff and they haven't yet. Vegetable oil is still more expensive than gas, even though gas is taxed far more heavily than cooking oil is.
I wonder if there's a good source of non-food grade vegetable oil that a regular citizen could get their hands on....
NPR did this story about 4 or 5 days ago. They
discussed how the idea wasn't essentially new. Rommel (the German WW2 tank commander) was short of gas in Africa and ran his tanks off cooking oil at one point.
Banning interracial breeding will _lower_ the number of possible genetic combinations, not increase it. Keep in mind that even in a family of 7, all the kids aren't identical. It's the number of genes in a population, not any sort of purity that matters.
Besides, traditional 'races' are very superficial indicators of a gene pool.
Some people are interested in subjects that 'normal' people are not interested in.
If someone showed an unusual level of interest in somthing mundane like sports they would not be teased nearly as much in junior high, because people can relate to that. Kids tease those people whom they cannot relate to.
One solution is to simply hide your interest in the subject matter. A better solution is to find people who do care and share your interest with them.
I won't make any claims to being a 'child prodigy' though I'm reasonably bright. I was teased for most of junior high until in High school I took up weight lifting, sports etc. and made acomplishments that those around me could relate to. I think the change in people's attitudes was absolutly laughable. But most importantly, the acceptance of other people for somthing that I considered marginaly significant was not nearly as rewarding as being accpeted for things I did enjoy. Literature, science etc.
If you're bright or have unusual interests, happiness comes from finding others who you can share those interests with. Not in learning to hide what you enjoy. And kids may not always take the best route to this end. The proof of whether someone is trying to dominate others through their intellegence or is simply reaching out for a kindred soul can usually be seen in how they
interact with their intellectual peers.
There are even adults who have entered their 'ivory tower' and are very content not to leave. And some adults still don't know how to relate to these people, and they still get teased. I imagine most of them are happy enough not to care.
A lot of biological systems tend to 'normalize' themselves. Inject yourself with a 1 cc of sugar water and your body will return itself to normal in less than an hour, most likely.
I'm assuming, that would make initial conditions in the physics sense a little less important, especially since biological output tends to be much more fuzzy to begin with.
Anyone want to contradict me here?
I'm not a biologist, though I ended up taking an ungodly number of life science courses in school.
They've come in quite useful on Slashdot:)
To state it in a form that may be relevant to a programming mentality; how else would you go about testing a program which was essentially self modifying?
i.e. some genes can regulate the expression of other genes.
You can figure out that some variables may affect a particular portion of the program.
Of course, just because one gene produces one protein, this dosen't mean that one protein only has one use. Just as variables can affect several parts of a program, enzymes can take part in a number of very different metabolic processes.
Didn't you see all those pictures of tobacco plants that had the gene that allowed metabolism of luciferase from fireflies? Water the plants with water containing luciferase and they glow.
Now why they couldn't also put a gene in so that you didn't have to water them with luciferase, I'll never know. I would have bought one.
Aside from what's already been mentioned, scientists have traditionally had certain 'model organisms' which are intensivly studied and then used as models for other organisms. White mice, E.coli, arabadopsis etc.
There are a disproportionate number of papers detailing the workings of E.coli.
I'm not sure how long arabadopsis has been a model plant organism- whether before the start of the human genome project or not.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, considering that Osama Bin Laden did bomb The world trade center just 8 years ago, that does make him a strong suspect. We shouldn't jump to conclusions, of course, but Bin Laden is suspect because he's tried to destroy these exact same buildings before. Not because people are 'racist'. If someone did somthing before, it is easier to believe that they will do it again.
Like they said on NPR- this is the new face of war.
It was ironic. NPR was saying that because all planes were ordered down the president might be the only one in the air. I look up in the sky and count two planes. Apparently they're letting planes finish their flights.
Pensylvania has also been hit by at least one plane too, says one station.
Take a seat on the floor young boy, and I'll explain to you about these amazing things called jokes. After you master that, we'll move onto more subtle things like wit and sarcasm. You might find those a bit more difficult.
Incidentally, the US government HAS been paranoid in the past about letting supercomputers into some nations, futile as though that may be.
But wouldn't this mean that we'd have to sell computers to China? And maybe they'd, like use these computers to guide real nuclear missles at us or somthing. Okay, I'm taking this much too seriously. Maybe we should just drop a bunch of computers with minesweeper preloaded into enemy territory and they'd immobilize the population and... hey, wait. All the computers in my office have minesweeper preloaded....
Considering that your own troops are going to be exposed to whatever emissions the weapons give off (think soliders breathing in depleted uranium dust from the gulf war) this makes good sense.
I don't know what it would take to make liberals use a little common sense. I'm still working on the *%$# conservatives.
I suppose you'd also stop crime by getting rid of the police stations?
If push came to shove, a bunch of naked unarmed people could rush another country's borders and wage war by beating each other senseless.
I am that naked, unarmed person!
Speaking as someone with a Scientific college education (but a tech career) there are some valid reasons for mistrusting information supposedly produced by the scientific method. Scientific studies are only as accurate as researchers are unbiased, and companies can and do manipulate this, both directly and indirectly.
For example; hybrid crops are often credited with producing huge agricultural benefits but there isn't a single scientific paper which can be used to verify this. Any gain produced through hybridization could also be gained through crossbreeding with the added value that the latter would be more genetically diverse and thus pest resistant. Yet our government devotes considerable funds to improving hybrid rather than open polinated plants.
Why? Because the hybridization process allowed seed companies to produce a product (hybrid plant) and sell it without giving farmers the two original strains necessecary to produce this product.
Some methods are more direct. Pfizer, maker of viagra, published a study on the prevalence of sexual disfunction in men and women in the Journal of American Medicine. It was published as if it were by an independant group, despite the fact that The Journal of American Medicine requires disclosure of all conflicts of interest.
As more scientific fields become applied rather than pure, more money is being devoted to PR disguised as science, medicince etc.
Misguided or not, I think you misunderstand or misrepresent the views of the average lay person.
For example, many of the people who are seriously worried about genetically engineered foods are also worried about pesticide usage.
And remember; in life, as in slashdot, just because people within a group have differing opinions dosen't make the group as a whole hypocritical.
Any robot that could intelligently answer e-mail would first be used to intelligently send spam. Hello coolvibe. I was talking to your friend insert name here yesterday and....
Of possible revelvance- One of the determining factors of a successful commune is it's size (under 200 people). When you get over 200 people, the socializing forces that a commune relies upon to maintian itself begin to break down. Perhaps the same thing happens with corporations, except that other motivating forces take over at this point.
Okay, forget compensation for a second. The question is whether or not a person or their heirs have rights to a person's corpse and can determine what is done with it. Focus on the moral aspect of a person's body as their property, the terms of treatment and disposal they can dictate. Imagine if, after Princess Di's death someone took egg cells from her Uterus and started selling them ( or giving them away ). A similar incident actually happened in England, where people's corpses were being sold by Doctors. The point is that doctors cannot assume ownership of a person's extracted tissue. They are just it's caretakers
1. Most information on the internet has a _very_ low value to me. I'll go into a library and browse books that I would never ever pay for. Almost all pay sites ask for more than their information is worth. 2. There is a cost to paying for information. The time it would take me to write a check and mail it increases the price in my mind. So does the worry caused by giving yet another stranger my credit card number. 3. Sellers rarely provide what they promise, and there's little recourse if you get screwed. This includes computer programs. I recently bought an educational version of Macromedia Flash since I was a student and I wanted to use it for my business. The liscense included said that the product couldn't be used for commercial purposes, and if I disagreed I should return the product. I tried to return it, but the store refused to do so. I realize that the liscence is probably not enforcable, but I don't want to have to go to court to prove that. Until I can have some sort of legal assurance that I can get what I'm paying for, paying isn't worth the hassle. 4. As has been said previously- why pay when I don't have to? 5. If I'm really interested in a topic I'll buy a book. Books still provide more in-depth informaiton in a medium that does not need to 'boot up' or 'log on' or recharge. Books are readily portable. They usually have a lot more information than electronic media. 6. I'm hoping that if we don't pay all these corporate entities trying to take over the internet that they'll stick to just trying to slip their products into the middle of TV sitcoms. A guy can dream, right?
A few things- 1st. Since some guy here accused me of being out of shape-I'm in very good shape. I weigh 135 lbs. and can benchpress 200 lbs. second- The spike at 1 and 2 was huge, larger than the mode at 7 that my scores were centered around. I buy into the 'people being stupid and not switching from guys to girls' theory. While I don't care immensely what other people think of me ( I just wanted to meet some people to chat with, which is another feature of the site. ) I thought the trend was relevant. And, of course, I admit I was curious how I'd be rated. But I'm not on here 'complaining.' If the scores were legitamate, that's fine. I just don't think that the evidence supports that. I'm interested whether or not girls see the same trend. Any geek chicks on here willing to suffer the flames of public whimsy for the sake of knowledge?
I posted my picture on amihotornot.com
I think that there may be a problem with their moderation system. Most of my 'ranking' fell in a bell curve around 7. However there was an outlying spike at 1 or 2. Now this could indicate two types of rating styles, perhaps. However given the fact that the site reports back to a user what their percentile ranking is (i.e. where they stand relative to other hotornot-ers) this could be an indication that some people are trying to boost their own scores by giving other people bad ones.
Any good moderation system would need to find some way to prevent that- i.e. but ranking a group of several girls 1st second third, etc.
I realize that this would probably make the whole thing less fun, and it isn't supposed to be scientific to begin with. But if it were 'just a site about rating women' then it wouldn't belong on Slashdot, would it?
The point he was trying to make is that there is no barrier preventing diesel rigs from using the stuff and they haven't yet. Vegetable oil is still more expensive than gas, even though gas is taxed far more heavily than cooking oil is.
I wonder if there's a good source of non-food grade vegetable oil that a regular citizen could get their hands on....
NPR did this story about 4 or 5 days ago. They
discussed how the idea wasn't essentially new. Rommel (the German WW2 tank commander) was short of gas in Africa and ran his tanks off cooking oil at one point.
... maybe he's just frustrated that he can't get bombed on a saturday night.
When I die, I'd like my organs to go to Hawaii. I think they deserve it.
All this garbage with films being the launching bases for toys and happy meals that you see?
Lucas invented this capitalist blitzkreig with the first Star Wars. All the people who've done it today are taking plays from Lucas's playbook.
Banning interracial breeding will _lower_ the number of possible genetic combinations, not increase it. Keep in mind that even in a family of 7, all the kids aren't identical. It's the number of genes in a population, not any sort of purity that matters.
Besides, traditional 'races' are very superficial indicators of a gene pool.
Look at it this way;
Some people are interested in subjects that 'normal' people are not interested in.
If someone showed an unusual level of interest in somthing mundane like sports they would not be teased nearly as much in junior high, because people can relate to that. Kids tease those people whom they cannot relate to.
One solution is to simply hide your interest in the subject matter. A better solution is to find people who do care and share your interest with them.
I won't make any claims to being a 'child prodigy' though I'm reasonably bright. I was teased for most of junior high until in High school I took up weight lifting, sports etc. and made acomplishments that those around me could relate to. I think the change in people's attitudes was absolutly laughable. But most importantly, the acceptance of other people for somthing that I considered marginaly significant was not nearly as rewarding as being accpeted for things I did enjoy. Literature, science etc.
If you're bright or have unusual interests, happiness comes from finding others who you can share those interests with. Not in learning to hide what you enjoy. And kids may not always take the best route to this end. The proof of whether someone is trying to dominate others through their intellegence or is simply reaching out for a kindred soul can usually be seen in how they
interact with their intellectual peers.
There are even adults who have entered their 'ivory tower' and are very content not to leave. And some adults still don't know how to relate to these people, and they still get teased. I imagine most of them are happy enough not to care.
A lot of biological systems tend to 'normalize' themselves. Inject yourself with a 1 cc of sugar water and your body will return itself to normal in less than an hour, most likely. I'm assuming, that would make initial conditions in the physics sense a little less important, especially since biological output tends to be much more fuzzy to begin with. Anyone want to contradict me here? I'm not a biologist, though I ended up taking an ungodly number of life science courses in school. They've come in quite useful on Slashdot :)
To state it in a form that may be relevant to a programming mentality; how else would you go about testing a program which was essentially self modifying?
i.e. some genes can regulate the expression of other genes.
You can figure out that some variables may affect a particular portion of the program.
Of course, just because one gene produces one protein, this dosen't mean that one protein only has one use. Just as variables can affect several parts of a program, enzymes can take part in a number of very different metabolic processes.
Didn't you see all those pictures of tobacco plants that had the gene that allowed metabolism of luciferase from fireflies? Water the plants with water containing luciferase and they glow. Now why they couldn't also put a gene in so that you didn't have to water them with luciferase, I'll never know. I would have bought one.
Aside from what's already been mentioned, scientists have traditionally had certain 'model organisms' which are intensivly studied and then used as models for other organisms. White mice, E.coli, arabadopsis etc.
There are a disproportionate number of papers detailing the workings of E.coli.
I'm not sure how long arabadopsis has been a model plant organism- whether before the start of the human genome project or not.