I should clarify. Yes, it costs more where the war is, but not everywhere else. Having lived in Alberta, I know how happy most people living in an oil producing region are when a war breaks out. It means larger oil revenues, more jobs, and a general economic boom. I'm talking war in Iraq, happy in Texas sort of thing. I'm not suggesting people IN the war are either happy or in a better economic situation.
My point was that world supply is tight (or at the very least controlled) and the price is driven by demand. Consumers can only affect one of those two variables, and it isn't the supply one. So, I reiterate, I pay for the "demand inflexibility" of other people.
Actually, that's absolutely wrong. The amount I pay, before taxes, to the oil companies for their fuel is directly related to the supply vs. the demand. Does it cost them any more to retrieve oil when there is a war going on? Then why does the price go up every time something flairs up in an oil producing region?
So, if an individual is unnecessarily using a lot of fuel that directly impacts how much I pay, no matter how efficient my vehicle is or how little I use it. I pay close to $80 dollars a month in gas now, and I use my car a lot less than I did 10 years ago when it cost about $60 a month. I don't use a lot of gas, but I am paying for the gas people driving older, larger cars are using.
It boils down to the following: 1) There is a limited supply of oil, period. As time goes on, that supply decreases and the value goes up until it becomes so expensive that there is no longer a market for it. 2) The more fossil fuel each person consumes, the sooner it becomes too expensive to use. 3) The more people switch to alternative fuels, the longer it will be before fossil fuels become too expensive to use. 4) Thus, each person using alternative fuels or conserving fossil fuels is subsidizing the cost of fossil fuels.
That's a completely meaningless comparison. Higher end PCs cost more $/power. I need to check my email and browse the web, should I get a $400 dollar brand X laptop or spend $1000 on something almost twice as powerful? Whether or not you think the $1000 one is a better deal doesn't really matter if they only need the $400 one. That applies to Dell laptops as much as it does to Apple.
I will recommend Dell or Apple on occasion, but that's usually to people with lots of money and little technological savvy. AKA people I don't want to support.
That said, there is a low end Apple on the market. I picked up a well equipped G4 last year for $150...
My personal approach to the problem is to stop watching TV. If they want me to watch, they can damn well promote the kinds of shows I like. Firefly would be worth a monthly $40 cable bill. Reality dating shows being delievered over something I'm paying for (and thus causing me to partially fund them) has a negative dollar value. When a month of cable seems like a great deal, I'll jump on board. Until then, I'm spending my money elsewhere.
True, but that doesn't mean you alternate between slamming on the breaks and holding the gas to the floor.
Off the start, if you floor it you generally just spin your tires
Breaking into or accelerating out of a corner often means your tires are dealing with both changing the speed and the course of the car. The friction between the tire and the road is finite and divided between those two things. You might be able to hold your speed or accelerate through a corner, but you can rarely put the pedal to the medal and start cornering at the same time
In short, you are fully accelerating or decelerating at all times, but "fully" is based on the capacity of your tires as often, or more often, than the capacity of your engine/brakes. Thus the shallow difference between not engaged and fully engaged on the dual shock is a limiting factor in some driving games.
While I adapted to the dual shock faster, I find that now I prefer the 360 controller. First off, it's more comfortable for long durations. I literally wore the skin off my fingers with the dual shock, and I've never so much as generated a callous with the new xbox controller. Second, and most importantly, the triggers on the xbox controllers are a requirement. The depth of the analog buttons on the dual shock made playing driving games almost impossible without pedals (unless your play style treats the gas/breaks as binary operations of course).
Of course, the Wii controllers are pretty cool too. Unfortunately, they aren't quite as accurate as I'd like. I expect the second generation to be significantly better...
Personally, I think all wars should be fought with suicide bombs. If it's not worth strapping a bomb to your son and sending him off to certain death, then maybe it isn't worth killing the other side over either...
Claiming that Fox news does so well because it is balanced is like claiming American Idol does so well because it's intellegent. It's entertainment, and there was obviously an untapped market (or room to create one) for sensational conservative news stories. If any news outlet of any sort were actually unbiased, you'd never hear of them because the general public doesn't want to have to think about the news, they want to react to it.
Personally, I think one of the big news outlets should adopt something Ze Frank said (possibly always says, only watched a couple) "Thinking, so you don't have to" or something like that...
They all read the Kuran and still strap bombs to their chest. Just looking at this situation makes it clear that the argument that "Christianity is just as violent as Islam because of the Crusades" simply doesn't hold water. It is a completely invalid comparison.
How about the argument that modern day Christians in your nation (I'm assuming you're American) shoot abortion doctors? That's about equal to suicide bombers in violence, although perhaps a little lacking in personal dedication to the cause... One could also mention the IRA as another fairly high profile example, although I'm led to believe that situation is improving.
Every movement that really believes what it is doing is right and what others are doing is wrong is going to attract crazy people that take the conviction a little too far. That's not just reserved for the religious. Heck, just take a look at extreme left wing organizations like PETA or Green Peace...
My experience with teachers is that they tend to party pretty hard. You don't know about that when you are 8, but by the time you are 12-14 you pick up on it pretty quick. Oral sex with a boyfriend is also pretty tame compared to what's happened at some of the TGIF parties they have after school:-)
As an aside, I think it's the requirement to act moral all the time that causes this behaviour. You see the same thing with police officers, lawyers, etc. People who can be themselves at work don't generally display a huge moral swing when the client leaves the building.
They banned it where I live a while ago. Even though I quit when I was 17, I still smoked occasionally at bars and at friends places who smoked. The ban helped me quit completely, and the last of my smoking friends quit this year. It also means I don't have to worry about second hand smoke when brining my daughter to a resturant or other public place. It may seem oppressive if you really love smoking while you eat, but when it's an us vs. them argument, the people doing the smart thing SHOULD win.
There's already quite a lot of children to care for who need more than egg and sperm donors to have a fair shot at a long and healthy if not materialistic life. I think anyone who chooses to increase the next generation's hopes rather than numbers deserves to feel good about it!
I wish I had mod points for that. I don't think I've ever heard it stated better. Thank you.
if we all lived like Gore, there wouldn't be enough planet for all the necessary carbon offsets.
Umm, actually, if we all lived like the average middle class American we would have run out of planet some time in the 70's (according to an article I read a few years ago in Scientific American).
I didn't run the calculations myself, and one probably needs to make assumptions that would bias it in one way or another, but I don't think the logic behind it is very far off. Given a finite area for all human activity, and an area requirement per human, one can calculate the maximum number of humans who can occupy that space. The only way to change the date is to adjust that area value from 2 square feet (or so, depending on how comfortable you are in crowds) to the x hectares they used in the article.
He is correct, in so much as you basically described software engineering.
Engineering, in my mind, is finding solutions to problems. Science, on the other hand, is more like identifying new problems.
Just because your systems are designed to solve science problems doesn't make you a scientist. That said, it's not like there isn't any cross between the disciplines. Software engineering grads probably learn about P vs. NP and CS grads recieved minimal instruction in software engineering (I say minimal since 95% of the class probably got coding jobs...) Then you land in the real world and learn what you need to know for your job. That may involve expanding on CS theory or doing cutting edge stuff using components from the established body of knowledge in new and interesting ways.
I, of course, do absolutely no CS in my job. It's all software all the time. I don't think what I do is at all uncool (and it's not even close to as cool as what you do). I get the impression that a lot of software engineers want to be called scientists, and according to my 2nd year stats teacher, that's the wrong approach. He always said "call yourself a software engineer, they get paid much better."
Anyway, I wasn't trying to say you were wrong. Just that you bit in a little hard, since your job description sounded pretty much like pure engineering.
I have a young child. Not that it really matters because my opinion hasn't magically changed since becoming a parent. I personally don't think the "you don't know because you don't have kids" argument is kinda stupid, especially here, where people typically have a better than average ability to consider alternative perspectives.
That said:
a) don't let your two year old watch television. It serves no basic need aside from appealing to lazy parents as a cheap babysitting aid.
b) if you ignore point a, don't complain about what your kids see on TV. Also, see point a.
c) when your kids do watch television, make sure they understand the distinction between what happens on TV and in reality. If you don't, they'll end up believing things they see on Fox News. This will end badly.
I'm sick to death of people blaming the problems of society on the media. If you think it's so bad, cancel your cable subscription. It wouldn't take 10% of the population doing this to create a whole new market for boring television. The problem, of course, is that you consider it more important to have access to your entertainment medium of choice than to do what, at least in your opinion, is required to protect your children.
note: "you" not necessarily directed at above post
Wow, I never bothered to look that up before. The first 35 claims are all extensions of claim 1 and 2, for which I think prior art has existing since the late 70's or early 80's...
I was pretty worried about how this was going to affect the field a couple months ago. I'm feeling a little better about it now.
Just because it happens naturaly doesn't mean we aren't altering it. The ice re-formed last time. Maybe it won't this time, or it will take a lot longer. Maybe it will reform right away, and build to a much larger ice age than we otherwise would have experienced.
People in my age group (<30) tend to think the limit is fine, but the over 60 crowd (in Canada anyway) seem to think a few drinks is entirely within their rights.
My father was caught driving drunk when he was around my age (high centred in the middle of a traffic circle...) and the cop just left him there. It was a different way of thinking back then, and some of that has carried forward.
That said, IMO there should be a reaction time test. Either instead of, or as well as, a blood alchohol test. More frequent driving tests wouldn't hurt either. Given 10 shots on an empty stomach, I'm pretty sure I could drive better than quite a few of the drivers around here.
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My understanding is that most hybrids do not, in fact, plug in.
I should clarify. Yes, it costs more where the war is, but not everywhere else. Having lived in Alberta, I know how happy most people living in an oil producing region are when a war breaks out. It means larger oil revenues, more jobs, and a general economic boom. I'm talking war in Iraq, happy in Texas sort of thing. I'm not suggesting people IN the war are either happy or in a better economic situation.
My point was that world supply is tight (or at the very least controlled) and the price is driven by demand. Consumers can only affect one of those two variables, and it isn't the supply one. So, I reiterate, I pay for the "demand inflexibility" of other people.
Actually, that's absolutely wrong. The amount I pay, before taxes, to the oil companies for their fuel is directly related to the supply vs. the demand. Does it cost them any more to retrieve oil when there is a war going on? Then why does the price go up every time something flairs up in an oil producing region?
So, if an individual is unnecessarily using a lot of fuel that directly impacts how much I pay, no matter how efficient my vehicle is or how little I use it. I pay close to $80 dollars a month in gas now, and I use my car a lot less than I did 10 years ago when it cost about $60 a month. I don't use a lot of gas, but I am paying for the gas people driving older, larger cars are using.
It boils down to the following:
1) There is a limited supply of oil, period. As time goes on, that supply decreases and the value goes up until it becomes so expensive that there is no longer a market for it.
2) The more fossil fuel each person consumes, the sooner it becomes too expensive to use.
3) The more people switch to alternative fuels, the longer it will be before fossil fuels become too expensive to use.
4) Thus, each person using alternative fuels or conserving fossil fuels is subsidizing the cost of fossil fuels.
Aesthetically pleasing? Give me a break!
That's a completely meaningless comparison. Higher end PCs cost more $/power. I need to check my email and browse the web, should I get a $400 dollar brand X laptop or spend $1000 on something almost twice as powerful? Whether or not you think the $1000 one is a better deal doesn't really matter if they only need the $400 one. That applies to Dell laptops as much as it does to Apple.
I will recommend Dell or Apple on occasion, but that's usually to people with lots of money and little technological savvy. AKA people I don't want to support.
That said, there is a low end Apple on the market. I picked up a well equipped G4 last year for $150...
My personal approach to the problem is to stop watching TV. If they want me to watch, they can damn well promote the kinds of shows I like. Firefly would be worth a monthly $40 cable bill. Reality dating shows being delievered over something I'm paying for (and thus causing me to partially fund them) has a negative dollar value. When a month of cable seems like a great deal, I'll jump on board. Until then, I'm spending my money elsewhere.
True, but that doesn't mean you alternate between slamming on the breaks and holding the gas to the floor.
In short, you are fully accelerating or decelerating at all times, but "fully" is based on the capacity of your tires as often, or more often, than the capacity of your engine/brakes. Thus the shallow difference between not engaged and fully engaged on the dual shock is a limiting factor in some driving games.
While I adapted to the dual shock faster, I find that now I prefer the 360 controller. First off, it's more comfortable for long durations. I literally wore the skin off my fingers with the dual shock, and I've never so much as generated a callous with the new xbox controller. Second, and most importantly, the triggers on the xbox controllers are a requirement. The depth of the analog buttons on the dual shock made playing driving games almost impossible without pedals (unless your play style treats the gas/breaks as binary operations of course).
Of course, the Wii controllers are pretty cool too. Unfortunately, they aren't quite as accurate as I'd like. I expect the second generation to be significantly better...
Personally, I think all wars should be fought with suicide bombs. If it's not worth strapping a bomb to your son and sending him off to certain death, then maybe it isn't worth killing the other side over either...
Claiming that Fox news does so well because it is balanced is like claiming American Idol does so well because it's intellegent. It's entertainment, and there was obviously an untapped market (or room to create one) for sensational conservative news stories. If any news outlet of any sort were actually unbiased, you'd never hear of them because the general public doesn't want to have to think about the news, they want to react to it.
Personally, I think one of the big news outlets should adopt something Ze Frank said (possibly always says, only watched a couple) "Thinking, so you don't have to" or something like that...
How about the argument that modern day Christians in your nation (I'm assuming you're American) shoot abortion doctors? That's about equal to suicide bombers in violence, although perhaps a little lacking in personal dedication to the cause... One could also mention the IRA as another fairly high profile example, although I'm led to believe that situation is improving.
Every movement that really believes what it is doing is right and what others are doing is wrong is going to attract crazy people that take the conviction a little too far. That's not just reserved for the religious. Heck, just take a look at extreme left wing organizations like PETA or Green Peace...
Wasn't the levy also based on the size of the media? (i.e. a 20GB player paid more than a 512MB version)
If that were the case, it probably would have made DVDs too expensive.
My experience with teachers is that they tend to party pretty hard. You don't know about that when you are 8, but by the time you are 12-14 you pick up on it pretty quick. Oral sex with a boyfriend is also pretty tame compared to what's happened at some of the TGIF parties they have after school :-)
As an aside, I think it's the requirement to act moral all the time that causes this behaviour. You see the same thing with police officers, lawyers, etc. People who can be themselves at work don't generally display a huge moral swing when the client leaves the building.
They banned it where I live a while ago. Even though I quit when I was 17, I still smoked occasionally at bars and at friends places who smoked. The ban helped me quit completely, and the last of my smoking friends quit this year. It also means I don't have to worry about second hand smoke when brining my daughter to a resturant or other public place. It may seem oppressive if you really love smoking while you eat, but when it's an us vs. them argument, the people doing the smart thing SHOULD win.
You read the article, You corrected yourself before someone else did, AND you want people to take your Karma away.
I don't think you belong here...
I wish I had mod points for that. I don't think I've ever heard it stated better. Thank you.
Umm, actually, if we all lived like the average middle class American we would have run out of planet some time in the 70's (according to an article I read a few years ago in Scientific American).
I didn't run the calculations myself, and one probably needs to make assumptions that would bias it in one way or another, but I don't think the logic behind it is very far off. Given a finite area for all human activity, and an area requirement per human, one can calculate the maximum number of humans who can occupy that space. The only way to change the date is to adjust that area value from 2 square feet (or so, depending on how comfortable you are in crowds) to the x hectares they used in the article.
In the real movie they flew into the trench instead of over it. No way to hit the exhaust port from the angle they show here.
He is correct, in so much as you basically described software engineering.
Engineering, in my mind, is finding solutions to problems. Science, on the other hand, is more like identifying new problems.
Just because your systems are designed to solve science problems doesn't make you a scientist. That said, it's not like there isn't any cross between the disciplines. Software engineering grads probably learn about P vs. NP and CS grads recieved minimal instruction in software engineering (I say minimal since 95% of the class probably got coding jobs...) Then you land in the real world and learn what you need to know for your job. That may involve expanding on CS theory or doing cutting edge stuff using components from the established body of knowledge in new and interesting ways.
I, of course, do absolutely no CS in my job. It's all software all the time. I don't think what I do is at all uncool (and it's not even close to as cool as what you do). I get the impression that a lot of software engineers want to be called scientists, and according to my 2nd year stats teacher, that's the wrong approach. He always said "call yourself a software engineer, they get paid much better."
Anyway, I wasn't trying to say you were wrong. Just that you bit in a little hard, since your job description sounded pretty much like pure engineering.
I have a young child. Not that it really matters because my opinion hasn't magically changed since becoming a parent. I personally don't think the "you don't know because you don't have kids" argument is kinda stupid, especially here, where people typically have a better than average ability to consider alternative perspectives.
That said:
a) don't let your two year old watch television. It serves no basic need aside from appealing to lazy parents as a cheap babysitting aid.
b) if you ignore point a, don't complain about what your kids see on TV. Also, see point a.
c) when your kids do watch television, make sure they understand the distinction between what happens on TV and in reality. If you don't, they'll end up believing things they see on Fox News. This will end badly.
I'm sick to death of people blaming the problems of society on the media. If you think it's so bad, cancel your cable subscription. It wouldn't take 10% of the population doing this to create a whole new market for boring television. The problem, of course, is that you consider it more important to have access to your entertainment medium of choice than to do what, at least in your opinion, is required to protect your children.
note: "you" not necessarily directed at above post
Wow, I never bothered to look that up before. The first 35 claims are all extensions of claim 1 and 2, for which I think prior art has existing since the late 70's or early 80's...
I was pretty worried about how this was going to affect the field a couple months ago. I'm feeling a little better about it now.
But if you push the natural cycle out of whack...
Just because it happens naturaly doesn't mean we aren't altering it. The ice re-formed last time. Maybe it won't this time, or it will take a lot longer. Maybe it will reform right away, and build to a much larger ice age than we otherwise would have experienced.
Purely random? Name one. As far as I can tell (and I'm not a randomologist), nothing is random.
People in my age group (<30) tend to think the limit is fine, but the over 60 crowd (in Canada anyway) seem to think a few drinks is entirely within their rights.
My father was caught driving drunk when he was around my age (high centred in the middle of a traffic circle...) and the cop just left him there. It was a different way of thinking back then, and some of that has carried forward.
That said, IMO there should be a reaction time test. Either instead of, or as well as, a blood alchohol test. More frequent driving tests wouldn't hurt either. Given 10 shots on an empty stomach, I'm pretty sure I could drive better than quite a few of the drivers around here.
Good call. Sometimes that name just pops into my head in the middle of the day, and it always makes me smile :-)
Before I posted, I took into consideration the fact that someone like you would point that out for me. I concede, yes it was possible.
Bandwidth was the real issue back then, but people got around that problem by using an extremely efficient lossy format called "ASCII"...