So they found the flask, and he had access to it, but he'd given samples from that flask to hundreds of people over the years. The FBI could not have proven anything. But when the FBI asked for a sample from the flask they suspected as the origin of the spores, but Dr Ivins gave them some other anthrax in an attempt to confuse the issue, the FBI wanted to know how it was that the sample they were given did not have the properties such as having silicon that they expected to find. So they siezed the flask, tested it, and sure enough, the contents of the flask were as they expected them to be. But that raises the question of why did Dr Ivins send them the wrong samples? Why indeed, unless he was the one who sent out the letters in the first place. Confronted with this, Dr. Ivins knew they had him, and he killed himself. He really should have just given them the samples they asked for, but he decided to get cute. This one falls under the dumbass category. As for motivation, I don't get it. He did take the trouble of half-weaponizing the spores. He made them so that they would be dispersed in air well. But if he really wanted to weaponize them, then he would have first fed his anthrax brew low levels of various antibiotics until they became resistent before making spores. The result would then be a truely weaponized and far more deadly anthrax. No doubt, Dr Ivins' primary motivation was not to kill, but to strike fear. Although he could easily have made resistent anthrax, he knew that those in the know would be more impressed by someone making easily airborne spores without getting themselves infected. This meant that whoever was sending the letters had the equivalent of an atom bomb within easy reach. It would be comparatively simple to make the anthrax resistent to all treatment, and brew up 50 pounds or so of dispersable spores to let blow over a major metropolitan area killing possibly millions. Maybe that person already had such a backpack full of death in their closet. Maybe the motivation was to feel the rush, of having such power . By sending the letters, he showed the world what he could do, and invited the full resources of the US to come and TRY to find him out. While he remained anonymous, he could feel quite clever indeed. He didn't need to actually have the backpack of death in his closet. It was enough to have the FBI looking for him and failing to find him to prove to himself that he was clever. Too bad for him that he wasn't all that clever. For one thing, having succeeded in creating such nice spores meant that whoever made the spores had a lab designed to contain them. It would take alot of money and some smarts to create such a lab. And this was Ames strain anthrax. This was no Hillbilly Joe who happened to find some anthrax on a dead cow. And the FBI knows all about serial killers who like to think they are clever. They were dealing with a technical someone with access to government anthrax who worked in real labs and knew how to deal with the anthrax. That the person didn't fully weaponize the anthrax and made no demands gave him away as a serial killer, not a terrorist. A terrorist would have made demands or just cast his bio spell on some city. And they would have fully weaponized their anthrax since it would be so easy to do so if they could already make airborne spores. Likely they would just destroy the city and then take credit since giving away a sample of their spores would give scientists a chance to find it's achilles heel in terms of treatment if it indeed had any that the terrorists hadn't thought of. Terrorists' goal being to stir up the US into inflicting collective punishment on innocent ( of terrorism at least ) individuals and nations so as to stir up more resentment of the US and thereby increase the terrorist's numbers, would want the US as pissed off as they could get it. Why pussyfoot around? It may be that would be terrorists have come into possesion of nukes or anthrax, but have chosen not to use it because it is also necc
Once upon a time there was a Big Papa Virus, a Giant Mama Virus and a Wee Little Baby Virus. The Mama Virus did resent being called 'Giant' since she had been dieting for the past year. Their Little Doggie Virus named Sputnik sat under the breakfast table as the family of viruses began to eat their bowls of amoebae, it was chewing on the bones of a creeping nematode named goldilocks that it caught trying to burglerize the Virus family when they were out walking in the woods waiting for their amoebas to cool. Then the Doggie Virus farted, and the whole Virus family got sick, puking up their breakfast.
I wonder if the RIAA is going after students because the MAC address registration thing common at universities makes them more vulnerable. People in say a large apartment block use Regular ISPs that do not require the mac address to be registered. If you have an open wireless router then any of your neighbors can use your internet connection. If you randomize your mac address then there is no way they can prove it was you and not one of your neighbors that downloaded a copyrighted file unless they actually find it on your hard drive. Just keep an old pc connected for them to find, but do your real browsing from your laptop with the rubberhose encrypted drive that you keep under your bed.
Well couldn't tufts then respond to the 'notice to preserve' by giving them a 'notice to pay for it?' Tufts didn't include this demand because it would give them the opportunity to respond earlier.
This way they must issue a notice to preserve, then recieve a notice to pay for it, take it to court, then get a notice to preserve with check attached. Then Tufts can say that it takes 6 months to implement the new logging technology etc. By now maybe a year and a half or 2 years have passed, and they possibly upgrade their network in such a way as to require the reimplementation of the logging functionality. So the RIAA gives them a notice to preserve, and they give them another notice to pay for it, but the RIAA says WHAT?? we already paid for it! Then Tufts points out that they upgraded their network and need them to pay for a new logging infrastructure. So the RIAA sends them a notice to preserve with check attached, they wait six months for the new logging infrastructure to be put into place. Then finally they get their logs.
What they see is that Joe student's computer has no illegal material on it, but that he had an open wireless router, and all his dorm mates, repeatedly warned by the Tufts IT department that the RIAA would likely catch them if they downloaded illegal material, have been using it to share and access copyrighted music and movies. They do note that Joe user's laptop is downright ancient, and has no files that have been modified in the past six months. They suspect, but can not prove that Joe has a real laptop that they've never seen with a small part of the illegal files they know were downloaded.
Joe is secure in the knowledge that by opening his wi-fi he cannot be responsible for the traffic going through it.
I somehow doubt that perchlorates are an intentional component of fertilizer. More like a contaminant.
Perchlorates such as sodium perchlorate can be made by electrolysing NaCl water. The NaCl first becomes NaOCl ( Sodium Hypoclorite aka Bleach ) then Sodium Chlorite and then Sodium Chlorate ( NaClO3 ). Sodium Chlorate is WEED KILLER. Then finally another oxygen is added to make NaClO4 ( Sodium Perchlorate ).
I doubt a bulk commoditity product like fertilizer would be made that would likely be contaminated with weed killer unless great care were taken. 'Great care' would be too expensive for something that is supposed to be cheap such as fertilizer.
Yes, there is hydrogen and oxygen produced in electrolysis of saltwater, but some of the oxygen oxygenates the Cl to make ClOx where X = 1, 2, 3, or 4. You'll notice less than half the oxygen ( by volume ) is produced than hydrogen. The missing O2 goes to turning Cl- into ClOx-
Hmm, also, those oxygen generating candles they use to supply oxygen to the facemasks that drop down in airplanes are perchlorate. So to generate oxygen for mars space missions may be as simple as diging it out of the ground and lighting it off..
But unlike LaTeX, where the investment you make in learning the tool is a one time thing, in ten years, , will be so different that you will be basically starting from scratch.
I dunno about you, but I think that if there were no typesetting for mathematics, then mathematicians would be forced to design notation to express their concepts using just ascii characters. IMHO, this would make most mathematics much easier to read and understand. Translating this into computer code ( or typing it into a calculator ) is much easier if it is represented using the characters on your keyboard in the first place. In a hundred years, I guarantee that people will be able to decipher ascii.
According to wikipedia, worst case, 16 supertanker loads of iron costing 27 billion dollars total dumpped in low iron areas of the ocean would sequester the 3 gigatons of CO2. At that rate, to nullify human carbon emmissions by sequestering it all would mean fertilizing the ocean with enough iron to sequester 30 gigatons of CO2 per year at a cost of 270 billion dollars per year.
This would actually be quite affordable when you consider that "the annual value of the global carbon credit market is projected to exceed $1 trillion by 2012 "
Of course there is the law of unintended consequences to deal with, and also it's possible that only the first 3 gigatons of sequestration would be possible to so efficiently bring about. It might be that after fertilizing the ocean to sequester the first 3 gigatons, that the next 27 gigatons would require dumping iron where it would less efficiently sequester CO2, or perhaps not.
But be consistent! This symbol should be affixed to every nuclear waste site.
Whatever you choose for a symbol be it skull and crossed bones or whatever will attract curious people to look at what the ancients built, and 10000 years in the future, even if you post keep out, nuclear waste, poison, radioactive etc on a bunch of multilanguage rosetta stones ( which should accompany any symbol, because some current language, at least in fragments might well survive 10000 years considering the sheer number of long lived artifacts that our society produces and then burys in landfills ), there is no guarantee that anyone will be able to make sence of them 10000 years in the future.
So, likely someone 10000 years in the future will crack into a drum of radioactive waste, and die so that we might enjoy nuclear power now. How many construction workers die from hammers falling on their heads during the construction of a typical nuclear power plant ( or coal plant or wind farm )? How many people died or were injured mining the uranium fuel?
The number of casualties IN OUR TIME might be less than one per nuclear power plant, but it is surely greater than one when you consider all the nuclear power plants that would contribute waste to a dump site.
So our society considers it ok to sacrifice human life for material benefit. ( Consider how many fatal traffic accidents could be prevented if people stopped driving cars and returned to horse an buggy... Consider how many fatal kicks, and paralizing falls from up on high horses could be avoided if people just walked instead, or better yet stayed home.. )
If it is ok for some minimal number of casualties to occur in the present for our enjoyment of nuclear power, than it is surely acceptable that some minimal number of casualties occur in the future so that we can bask in the warm incandescent glow of light bulbs powered by nuclear fission.
As long as the symbol is constistent throughout the world, then in the future, likely some ONE will crack open a drum of radioactive waste and die. But then the society of 10000 years in the future will have learned that Yellow Happy Face means death, and will avoid any other sites marked with the Smile of Doom from then on.
If you mark the place with a Skull and Crossed Bones, then they will still be curious as to what the strange Skull and Crossed Bones cult was about, and they will still crack open the drum and someone will still die, but because the drum was marked with a frikken SKULL AND CROSSED BONES, the dead person's contemporaries will chuckle silently to themselves when they read about the news and say to themselves 'DUMBASS'.
We want the people of the future to curse us for leaving them with barrels of toxic crap. So by marking the site with the Yellow Smiley Face they will put the blame for the accident on us where it belongs, saying what kind of asshole civilization marks frikken radioactive waste with a Yellow Smiley Face? People 10000 years ago were such jerks!
Wear leveling is nothing new. I wish I had the link, but I read that postulating a faster thoughput than is typical today, and a moderately large flash drive, that with current wear leveling, and WORST case use, that is CONSTANTLY writing to the drive ( say if the drive were being used to store data from a security camera feed that the drive would not suffer any decrease in capacity for fifty years. With normal use, that would be hundereds of years easily.
While Usenet does have useful value, it IS full of kiddie porn.
alt.binaries.pictures.naturism.family
alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.young
alt.binaries.pictures.youth-and-beauty
alt.binaries.erotica.teen.female alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.mclt I
mean seriously, do any of these usenet categories contribute anything
of value to society???
I can see two useful functions they serve.
Illegal posts are primarily advertisements. Any criminals that attempt to get paid have posted their advertisement where law enforcement can also see it. As soon as the criminal attempts to get paid, then law enforcement will have them.
They serve as a sink for these kinds of posts, keeping these posts out of the other groups and away from the eyes of those who are not interested.
Serving as a sink is the more important function of the two. In fact this is one of the most important functions of the entire alt.* heirarchy. For instance, there will be sci.physics, frequented by physics students and even PhDs having serious discussions at one level, and then there will be alt.physics which may have some serious discussions, but is a place where Joe Stoner can post his Marijuana inspired grand green unified theory of everything without cluttering up sci.physics.
Getting rid of alt, will mean that Joe Stoner, having nowhere more appropriate to post will then post his stupid idea to sci.physics cluttering up the group.
Then the sci heirarchy will just probably just start carrying a sci.alt subheirarchy. Likely the other heirarchys will do the same. The current posters to the above newsgroups will just spam some other unfortunate non-alt ( say xyz.* ) newsgroup heirarchy which will have to provide a more appropriate xyz.alt.binaries.pictures heirarchy outside of alt.* for this stuff so as to keep it out of the other groups in that heirarchy.
That's why Aminidinadijad keeps stirring shit up. He can sell his oil a superhigh prices making a superhigh profit. Aminidinididididjad doesn't really want a war, just to keep scaring the oil market.
Remember that you don't have to stuff a bunch of information into a hostname if you just store the hostname as a key to that information in a database.
In your database you can add all the additional information you want. Pick someone in your company to be the hostname registrar, and all sysadmins that want to register ( eg: pinkydinkydoo.corpname.com ) are not allowed to do so until they provide the hostname registrar guy with the other information you wish to track. Then you don't have to come up with standard city codes, or building name codes etcetera. The hostnames can be easy to say over the phone and less prone to typos. Having a guy in the company who acts as the host name registrar means you can have more information than can be compressed ( until it looks like noise ) into the 20 or less characters you are willing to type as a hostname.
For the purposes of sysadmins, then the host names should be meaningful with regards to the tasks sysadmins tend to perform on the boxen. But hostnames are sometimes exposed to users etc. Since DNS allows the mapping of MORE THAN ONE NAME to an IP address, it's no trouble to use the dns 'database' to store and handle the meaningful geographic names ( eg: oh-xxx.somecorp.com. ) that sysadmins like, and also the possibly business line specific name the users like ( eg: sales.somecorp.com. ) . If a sysadmin wants to know the geographic name for a box, then the sysadmin can easily look it up. And the users can call the various boxen whatever they want too.
I love the fact that you can put http://localhost//.../filename.mp3 into anchor tags in any html page and anyone with offilesystem installed will get the file. Search engines like Google are going to index web pages hosted in the normal way that contain links such as this.
Those files will in turn link to other files on the OFFilesystem-web which will link to others layers and layers down that will contain illegal links. Google will not be able to filter the top level links out, and regular people can not be expected to click on every link of every page they link to examining every file to ensure it does not contain an illegal link to a copyrighted item somewhere buried many levels down.
Google may as well install OFFilesystem and just index everything. How is this different from the rest of the web that may contain illegal pages? If google doesn't know what the urls are, how can they be held responsible for following them to perform indexing? If someone posts some copyrighted image illegally on the regular web, then google doesn't get prosecuted for indexing their page, or for crawling that page to index it, even though the act of indexing the page ( if it is copyrighted ) may mean downloading and reading through copyrighted material in order to index it. If google doesn't know the meaning of the URIs it indexes it should be as off the hook copyright wise as those who host blocks of 'random' data but do not know the uris. It's simply not practical examine all the data the URIs refer to and still index the legitimate stuff. We don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater do we?
That's another issue - what exactly is the baby if the bathwater is copyright infringement? Sure an artist can use this to post their art if they can't afford bandwidth, but there are other ways for artists to do this that are less - um - complicated. This PROTOCOL may very well be outlawed unless it can show legitimate value that obviously exceeds the 'value' of protecting copyrightholders. (TCP/IP was not outlawed because the internet at large is obviously more valuable to society than the interests of the RIAA for instance )
An important question that will determine whether protocols like these can survive is this: What can they do legitimately that other protocols can not aside from making it easier for people to break the law? I personally suspect that some unique value will probably be found for the logic behind this, probably after the courts and congress have outlawed the fundamental logic ( such as distributed hash tables ) that this relys on.
Another important question for p2p is resource allocation. Why should I let people use my computing resources if I can just leach? You probably won't be able to prevent leaches from leaching unless you require payment for resource use.
One idea I've been mulling is digital currency ala e-cash.
What if everyone minted their own digital currency, acting as their own central bank. They would pay for resources in the currency they mint. They would give value to their currency by accepting it in return for computing resources. ( the US gives value to it's currency by accepting it as payment of taxes ) Then if someone wanted to download something from you, you would accept only your own currency as payment. Perhaps an exchange counter server would operate for a premium so they could buy your currency with theirs. You could devalue your currency as much as you wished by minting it freely when you were broke, but you would increase your currency's buying power by providing computing resources.
You might even be able to pay a service provider ( maybe someone who provides lots of computing resources such as bandwidth or data storage, or even the exchange counter, to buy some amount of your currency by paying them real money. This would have the effect of increasing your purchasing power )
Far and away the largest problem with spending more time forcing knowledge into the heads of the students who are falling behind is that the students who are falling behind don't want the knowledge. The scholastic environment where teachers struggle to force feed students enough to pass a test is not a place where those who are interested in learning can find the knowledge they would thrive on.
Instead it is a place where they must submit to having their time wasted in classes taught at the pace designed for those who don't pay attention, where they are disciplined for losing their place in the book 'the class' is taking turns reading paragraphs aloud, because they already finished that book weeks ago and were reading one they brought from home.
School is a place where history tests are filled with questions like: 'What year/dynasty/etc did X happen/get built/etc?' that can only be answered by memorizing a set of such useless trivia from a chapter in the textbook the night before the test - trivia which will certainly be forgotten the minute the test is handed in, while those tests are devoid of questions like: 'Write an essay on the prime causes of world war I'.
School is a place where students create notebooks of homework assignments they have passed in and have already been graded, that they must pass in again at the end of the term or lose a significant percentage of their grade.
School is a place where students must choose between completing 3 hours of homework that will teach them nothing because they already understand those subjects, or spending 3 hours learning something for one class where they are struggling. They usually make the grade-point-average maximizing decision to do poorly in the one class so that they can waste their time doing the homework for the other classes to at least get good grades in those classes. Homework is to help students learn material they do not know. Tests are to determine whether they have mastered the material. Homework therefore should not be graded in order to give students the flexibility to manage their study time so as to maximize LEARNING. If one can ace the tests, and write the required term papers/essays etc, it should be possible to earn an A+. As it is, you will be lucky to get a D in most 7th-12th grade classes if you ace all the tests and write excellent papers etc, but do not hand in any homework.
School is a place where all students are treated like the worst troublemakers. The only way the administration has to reduce trouble is with rules that treat the entire student body like criminals. This angers them and causes more of them to cause trouble in an endless cycle. Moreover the troublemakers tend to disrupt classes, vandalize school property, and bully the other students.
These problems are caused by one thing - trying to force students to learn who don't want to.
I am living proof that it's possible to do your level best to do well in highschool but end up with a report card full of D-E-F grades, quit highschool after the first 9'th grade report card, go directly to college at age 13, and graduate with a Bachelors in Math having earned As and Bs.
The difference? All college students want to be there. Any that don't leave. Professors don't have the time to grade homework. Because they don't have time to grade homework, they don't assign crossword puzzles to pad the grades of students who put in 'the effort' but can't pass the tests. If a student wants to pass the test, they will do the homework they need to do to understand the material enough to do well.
A college student spends 100% of their time studying those things they do not understand, and 0% of their time studying the things they already know, thus they have enough time to learn the things they do not understand.
College students are adults, and so it's not suprising that they are treated as adults. But it's not their age that makes it possible to treat them like adults. It's the fact that they all want to be doing w
I just downloaded the 10.3 SuSe because I'm running a Suse 9.x that I've had for years. I didn't wait for 11.0 because I don't want a buggy system for use at work. I may get 11.x where x > 0 someday.
The only reason I'm upgrading is because I never downloaded the FULL 9.x CDs, and they seem to have shut off the Yast servers for 9.x SuSes - there are a few things that I want to install that require packages that I don't want to install myself but instead want to *have installed* by Yast.
I only downloaded a 1 CD image and have been using Yast to get packages as needed. I downloaded the 10.3 DVD though which I'll be using for 10.3
I'd be suprised if it made you install EVERYTHING in one go.
There are plans on the internet for building CO2 Lasers that can burn a hole in a piece of wood that appear to be easier to build, and with much less equipment and money than would be required for building a gun.
A CO2 laser would be easy to transport with a van, where someone could wait for their intended target to exit a building.
Since the ccds used in webcams can see infrared light, a low powered infrared laser could be used to plant a dot on the eyeballs of the target from across the street. The ccd camera mounted on the sights would see the dot, and the nefarious operator could then push a button to send a brief, much more powerful pulse from the CO2 laser to blind the target permanently. Since CO2 lasers output infrared light, the source of the attack would be invisible and silent and not give themselves away. They could wait a minute or so before leisurely driving away.
I'm suprised technology hasn't been used much before by nutjobs, criminals, and wacko groups to carry out dastardly deeds in furtherance of their evil agendas and schemes.
Webcams plus wi-fi cards = remote control robots for cheap. How come someone hasn't driven a Dalek like creation into a bank with a companion bot powered by an electric wheelchair motor carrying a large plastic tub to conduct a robbery?
Here's a possible scenario: The 'Dalek' appears cute and anime-esque to gain entrance to the bank. It's name is Kill-gore. It's followed by a dog-bot ( the one with the big plastic money tub, decorated with 'dog-fur' and likewise cutsey. It's name is Cargo.
Both Kill-gore and Cargo are equipped with web-cams and are controlled via computers connected to the operator by wireless network cards. Possibly they use a local unsecured connection enabling the operator to sit at home and control them over the internet. More likely, they are set up as a lan, with the operator in a van close by. The bots have webcams to see with, and video appears on the operator's screen.
Kill-gore can speak. Voice scrambulation is used to disguise the operator's voice and also to give Kill-gore an menacing robotic tone. It's cutesy facial expression turns evil as well. It's 'eyebrows' turn downward and it's 'eyes' glow red. A gun pops out of the top of it's head, it's voice booms: "THIS IS A ROBBERY! I AM KILL-GORE. MY COMPANION IS CARGO. NOBODY MOVE OR YOU'RE ALL GOING TO BE BLOWN TO BITS!"
Just then two of Kill-gore's panels fall to the floor exposing many pounds of dynamite ringing the bot.
"I AM ARMED AND VERY DANGEROUS ALLOW ME TO DEMONSTRATE THE CONSEQUENCES OF NONCOMPLIANCE"
An apple shoots out of the top of Kill-gore's head and the gun tracks it and shoots it. Another ring shaped panel lifts exposing a ring of gun barrels. The barrels spin menacingly. The people notice that just above the gun barrels, on the robot are stationary 'eye shaped things'. The robot can see all around it.
"IF YOU COMPLY, THEN NOBODY WILL BE HURT. YOU, TELLER, APPROACH MY COMPANION Cargo OR DIE."
The gun trained on the nervous employee, she approaches Cargo.
Kill-gore says: "Inside, you will find a collar. If you do not place it around your neck, you will die, and I will select another to wear it. Your only chance to live is to fasten the collar around your neck."
She retrieves the collar from Cargo's hold and puts it on. A timer begins to count down from twenty minutes.
"The collar is a bomb. If the robbery goes off without a hitch, then it will not explode. You are now on our side. Please ensure everything goes smoothly."
Fill Cargo with money. Do not include any dye packs or other devices in the loot. If they go off, then so do you!"
The teller is assisted to open the big safe and get all the dough. Cargo is filled to the brim.
"Cargo will now exit with the money. When it reaches it's destination, you will all be free to go. If the money fails to arrive, then you all die!"
I am all for the blind getting more consideration on the web. And though a bit nearsighted, I can see just fine. Frankly, I don't want the pictures most of the time. I'm a text guy. I even wish people would eschew mathml/latex math symbols on wikipedia and make an effort to write things in a way that is readable in ascii. I hate having to fire up a picture web browser so I can see some formula. I also hate javascript urls. WTF. Use a frikken anchor tag asshole!
Um, rather than pumping water up above the dam ( and where would you get this water if not from the river below the dam which is fed by the reservoir behind the dam itself? ) why not just shut the water flow through the turbines down, and let the river water build up naturally above the dam when there is such an overabundant supply of energy that it makes sense to store it? I mean I'd be suprised if hydroelectric plants don't already run themselves at max capacity only at peak energy use hours when there is insufficient water to run at full power output 24x7. Although likely dams are built to be run at peak 24x7 since this minimizes the size of the reservoir behind the dam and the area that must be flooded. Excess flow over and above that which is reliable 24x7 goes over the top.
They make your brain feel reward for doing monotonous things, to the point where methamphetamine users seek out monotonous activities such as looking for arrowheads in a field, or coins on a beach.
Most people would find monotonous activities, well, monotonous, and would look for a way to avoid them. Clever folks would find a creative way around performing the monotonous activity.
But under the influence of drugs like Ritalin or Methamphetamine they would likely pull an allnighter plowing through the monotony manually, but less efficiently than if they'd spent the time to find a better way.
So over the long term, the drugged out dummy will get less done than the person who's normal monotony averse brain was spurred to think of better ways to get the job done.
But the meth/ritalin addict would feel very *productive* since under the drug they were able to perform impressive amounts of monotonous work far exceeding what they would have been able to endure without the drugs. So they feel 'smarter' on the drugs, that like the Miracle Berry made a sour task taste sweet, missing the crucial fact that eating lemons is dumb, whereas finding something sweet and yummy is smart, and will get you fatter than lemons in the end. Which is the real point.
Then you might want to use a pastel background of one color with pastel text of another color designed to be of identical total brightness. This would appear to colorblind over the shoulder onlookers as a blank screen. You can send emails that way too to be a real d*ck. The best thing to do is have a pastel background with black text, but add an important paragraph at the bottom of the message that would be invisible to the colorblind. Fscking evil.
Slashdot Mirror
So they found the flask, and he had access to it, but he'd given samples from that flask to hundreds of people over the years. The FBI could not have proven anything.
But when the FBI asked for a sample from the flask they suspected as the origin of the spores, but Dr Ivins gave them some other anthrax in an attempt to confuse the issue, the FBI wanted to know how it was that the sample they were given did not have the properties such as having silicon that they expected to find. So they siezed the flask, tested it, and sure enough, the contents of the flask were as they expected them to be.
But that raises the question of why did Dr Ivins send them the wrong samples? Why indeed, unless he was the one who sent out the letters in the first place. Confronted with this, Dr. Ivins knew they had him, and he killed himself.
He really should have just given them the samples they asked for, but he decided to get cute. This one falls under the dumbass category.
As for motivation, I don't get it. He did take the trouble of half-weaponizing the spores. He made them so that they would be dispersed in air well. But if he really wanted to weaponize them, then he would have first fed his anthrax brew low levels of various antibiotics until they became resistent before making spores. The result would then be a truely weaponized and far more deadly anthrax.
No doubt, Dr Ivins' primary motivation was not to kill, but to strike fear. Although he could easily have made resistent anthrax, he knew that those in the know would be more impressed by someone making easily airborne spores without getting themselves infected. This meant that whoever was sending the letters had the equivalent of an atom bomb within easy reach.
It would be comparatively simple to make the anthrax resistent to all treatment, and brew up 50 pounds or so of dispersable spores to let blow over a major metropolitan area killing possibly millions.
Maybe that person already had such a backpack full of death in their closet.
Maybe the motivation was to feel the rush, of having such power . By sending the letters, he showed the world what he could do, and invited the full resources of the US to come and TRY to find him out. While he remained anonymous, he could feel quite clever indeed. He didn't need to actually have the backpack of death in his closet. It was enough to have the FBI looking for him and failing to find him to prove to himself that he was clever.
Too bad for him that he wasn't all that clever. For one thing, having succeeded in creating such nice spores meant that whoever made the spores had a lab designed to contain them. It would take alot of money and some smarts to create such a lab. And this was Ames strain anthrax. This was no Hillbilly Joe who happened to find some anthrax on a dead cow.
And the FBI knows all about serial killers who like to think they are clever. They were dealing with a technical someone with access to government anthrax who worked in real labs and knew how to deal with the anthrax. That the person didn't fully weaponize the anthrax and made no demands gave him away as a serial killer, not a terrorist. A terrorist would have made demands or just cast his bio spell on some city. And they would have fully weaponized their anthrax since it would be so easy to do so if they could already make airborne spores. Likely they would just destroy the city and then take credit since giving away a sample of their spores would give scientists a chance to find it's achilles heel in terms of treatment if it indeed had any that the terrorists hadn't thought of.
Terrorists' goal being to stir up the US into inflicting collective punishment on innocent ( of terrorism at least ) individuals and nations so as to stir up more resentment of the US and thereby increase the terrorist's numbers, would want the US as pissed off as they could get it. Why pussyfoot around?
It may be that would be terrorists have come into possesion of nukes or anthrax, but have chosen not to use it because it is also necc
Once upon a time there was a Big Papa Virus, a Giant Mama Virus and a Wee Little Baby Virus. The Mama Virus did resent being called 'Giant' since she had been dieting for the past year.
Their Little Doggie Virus named Sputnik sat under the breakfast table as the family of viruses began to eat their bowls of amoebae, it was chewing on the bones of a creeping nematode named goldilocks that it caught trying to burglerize the Virus family when they were out walking in the woods waiting for their amoebas to cool. Then the Doggie Virus farted, and the whole Virus family got sick, puking up their breakfast.
I wonder if the RIAA is going after students because the MAC address registration thing common at universities makes them more vulnerable. People in say a large apartment block use Regular ISPs that do not require the mac address to be registered. If you have an open wireless router then any of your neighbors can use your internet connection. If you randomize your mac address then there is no way they can prove it was you and not one of your neighbors that downloaded a copyrighted file unless they actually find it on your hard drive. Just keep an old pc connected for them to find, but do your real browsing from your laptop with the rubberhose encrypted drive that you keep under your bed.
Well couldn't tufts then respond to the 'notice to preserve' by giving them a 'notice to pay for it?' Tufts didn't include this demand because it would give them the opportunity to respond earlier. This way they must issue a notice to preserve, then recieve a notice to pay for it, take it to court, then get a notice to preserve with check attached. Then Tufts can say that it takes 6 months to implement the new logging technology etc. By now maybe a year and a half or 2 years have passed, and they possibly upgrade their network in such a way as to require the reimplementation of the logging functionality. So the RIAA gives them a notice to preserve, and they give them another notice to pay for it, but the RIAA says WHAT?? we already paid for it! Then Tufts points out that they upgraded their network and need them to pay for a new logging infrastructure. So the RIAA sends them a notice to preserve with check attached, they wait six months for the new logging infrastructure to be put into place. Then finally they get their logs. What they see is that Joe student's computer has no illegal material on it, but that he had an open wireless router, and all his dorm mates, repeatedly warned by the Tufts IT department that the RIAA would likely catch them if they downloaded illegal material, have been using it to share and access copyrighted music and movies. They do note that Joe user's laptop is downright ancient, and has no files that have been modified in the past six months. They suspect, but can not prove that Joe has a real laptop that they've never seen with a small part of the illegal files they know were downloaded. Joe is secure in the knowledge that by opening his wi-fi he cannot be responsible for the traffic going through it.
Perchlorates such as sodium perchlorate can be made by electrolysing NaCl water. The NaCl first becomes NaOCl ( Sodium Hypoclorite aka Bleach ) then Sodium Chlorite and then Sodium Chlorate ( NaClO3 ). Sodium Chlorate is WEED KILLER. Then finally another oxygen is added to make NaClO4 ( Sodium Perchlorate ).
I doubt a bulk commoditity product like fertilizer would be made that would likely be contaminated with weed killer unless great care were taken. 'Great care' would be too expensive for something that is supposed to be cheap such as fertilizer.
Yes, there is hydrogen and oxygen produced in electrolysis of saltwater, but some of the oxygen oxygenates the Cl to make ClOx where X = 1, 2, 3, or 4. You'll notice less than half the oxygen ( by volume ) is produced than hydrogen. The missing O2 goes to turning Cl- into ClOx-
Hmm, also, those oxygen generating candles they use to supply oxygen to the facemasks that drop down in airplanes are perchlorate. So to generate oxygen for mars space missions may be as simple as diging it out of the ground and lighting it off..
But unlike LaTeX, where the investment you make in learning the tool is a one time thing, in ten years, , will be so different that you will be basically starting from scratch.
I dunno about you, but I think that if there were no typesetting for mathematics, then mathematicians would be forced to design notation to express their concepts using just ascii characters.
IMHO, this would make most mathematics much easier to read and understand.
Translating this into computer code ( or typing it into a calculator ) is much easier if it is represented using the characters on your keyboard in the first place.
In a hundred years, I guarantee that people will be able to decipher ascii.
Iron Fertilization is a far more effective way to sequester carbon.
According to wikipedia, worst case, 16 supertanker loads of iron costing 27 billion dollars total dumpped in low iron areas of the ocean would sequester the 3 gigatons of CO2. At that rate, to nullify human carbon emmissions by sequestering it all would mean fertilizing the ocean with enough iron to sequester 30 gigatons of CO2 per year at a cost of 270 billion dollars per year.
This would actually be quite affordable when you consider that "the annual value of the global carbon credit market is projected to exceed $1 trillion by 2012 "
Of course there is the law of unintended consequences to deal with, and also it's possible that only the first 3 gigatons of sequestration would be possible to so efficiently bring about. It might be that after fertilizing the ocean to sequester the first 3 gigatons, that the next 27 gigatons would require dumping iron where it would less efficiently sequester CO2, or perhaps not.
But be consistent! This symbol should be affixed to every nuclear waste site.
Whatever you choose for a symbol be it skull and crossed bones or whatever will attract curious people to look at what the ancients built, and 10000 years in the future, even if you post keep out, nuclear waste, poison, radioactive etc on a bunch of multilanguage rosetta stones ( which should accompany any symbol, because some current language, at least in fragments might well survive 10000 years considering the sheer number of long lived artifacts that our society produces and then burys in landfills ), there is no guarantee that anyone will be able to make sence of them 10000 years in the future.
So, likely someone 10000 years in the future will crack into a drum of radioactive waste, and die so that we might enjoy nuclear power now. How many construction workers die from hammers falling on their heads during the construction of a typical nuclear power plant ( or coal plant or wind farm )? How many people died or were injured mining the uranium fuel?
The number of casualties IN OUR TIME might be less than one per nuclear power plant, but it is surely greater than one when you consider all the nuclear power plants that would contribute waste to a dump site.
So our society considers it ok to sacrifice human life for material benefit. ( Consider how many fatal traffic accidents could be prevented if people stopped driving cars and returned to horse an buggy... Consider how many fatal kicks, and paralizing falls from up on high horses could be avoided if people just walked instead, or better yet stayed home.. )
If it is ok for some minimal number of casualties to occur in the present for our enjoyment of nuclear power, than it is surely acceptable that some minimal number of casualties occur in the future so that we can bask in the warm incandescent glow of light bulbs powered by nuclear fission.
As long as the symbol is constistent throughout the world, then in the future, likely some ONE will crack open a drum of radioactive waste and die. But then the society of 10000 years in the future will have learned that Yellow Happy Face means death, and will avoid any other sites marked with the Smile of Doom from then on.
If you mark the place with a Skull and Crossed Bones, then they will still be curious as to what the strange Skull and Crossed Bones cult was about, and they will still crack open the drum and someone will still die, but because the drum was marked with a frikken SKULL AND CROSSED BONES, the dead person's contemporaries will chuckle silently to themselves when they read about the news and say to themselves 'DUMBASS'.
We want the people of the future to curse us for leaving them with barrels of toxic crap. So by marking the site with the Yellow Smiley Face they will put the blame for the accident on us where it belongs, saying what kind of asshole civilization marks frikken radioactive waste with a Yellow Smiley Face? People 10000 years ago were such jerks!
Wear leveling is nothing new. I wish I had the link, but I read that postulating a faster thoughput than is typical today, and a moderately large flash drive, that with current wear leveling, and WORST case use, that is CONSTANTLY writing to the drive ( say if the drive were being used to store data from a security camera feed that the drive would not suffer any decrease in capacity for fifty years. With normal use, that would be hundereds of years easily.
I can see two useful functions they serve.
Serving as a sink is the more important function of the two. In fact this is one of the most important functions of the entire alt.* heirarchy. For instance, there will be sci.physics, frequented by physics students and even PhDs having serious discussions at one level, and then there will be alt.physics which may have some serious discussions, but is a place where Joe Stoner can post his Marijuana inspired grand green unified theory of everything without cluttering up sci.physics.
Getting rid of alt, will mean that Joe Stoner, having nowhere more appropriate to post will then post his stupid idea to sci.physics cluttering up the group.
Then the sci heirarchy will just probably just start carrying a sci.alt subheirarchy. Likely the other heirarchys will do the same. The current posters to the above newsgroups will just spam some other unfortunate non-alt ( say xyz.* ) newsgroup heirarchy which will have to provide a more appropriate xyz.alt.binaries.pictures heirarchy outside of alt.* for this stuff so as to keep it out of the other groups in that heirarchy.
That's why Aminidinadijad keeps stirring shit up. He can sell his oil a superhigh prices making a superhigh profit. Aminidinididididjad doesn't really want a war, just to keep scaring the oil market.
Remember that you don't have to stuff a bunch of information into a hostname if you just store the hostname as a key to that information in a database. In your database you can add all the additional information you want. Pick someone in your company to be the hostname registrar, and all sysadmins that want to register ( eg: pinkydinkydoo.corpname.com ) are not allowed to do so until they provide the hostname registrar guy with the other information you wish to track. Then you don't have to come up with standard city codes, or building name codes etcetera. The hostnames can be easy to say over the phone and less prone to typos. Having a guy in the company who acts as the host name registrar means you can have more information than can be compressed ( until it looks like noise ) into the 20 or less characters you are willing to type as a hostname.
For the purposes of sysadmins, then the host names should be meaningful with regards to the tasks sysadmins tend to perform on the boxen. But hostnames are sometimes exposed to users etc. Since DNS allows the mapping of MORE THAN ONE NAME to an IP address, it's no trouble to use the dns 'database' to store and handle the meaningful geographic names ( eg: oh-xxx.somecorp.com. ) that sysadmins like, and also the possibly business line specific name the users like ( eg: sales.somecorp.com. ) .
If a sysadmin wants to know the geographic name for a box, then the sysadmin can easily look it up. And the users can call the various boxen whatever they want too.
I love the fact that you can put http://localhost//.../filename.mp3 into anchor tags in any html page and anyone with offilesystem installed will get the file. Search engines like Google are going to index web pages hosted in the normal way that contain links such as this.
Those files will in turn link to other files on the OFFilesystem-web which will link to others layers and layers down that will contain illegal links. Google will not be able to filter the top level links out, and regular people can not be expected to click on every link of every page they link to examining every file to ensure it does not contain an illegal link to a copyrighted item somewhere buried many levels down.
Google may as well install OFFilesystem and just index everything. How is this different from the rest of the web that may contain illegal pages? If google doesn't know what the urls are, how can they be held responsible for following them to perform indexing? If someone posts some copyrighted image illegally on the regular web, then google doesn't get prosecuted for indexing their page, or for crawling that page to index it, even though the act of indexing the page ( if it is copyrighted ) may mean downloading and reading through copyrighted material in order to index it. If google doesn't know the meaning of the URIs it indexes it should be as off the hook copyright wise as those who host blocks of 'random' data but do not know the uris. It's simply not practical examine all the data the URIs refer to and still index the legitimate stuff. We don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater do we?
That's another issue - what exactly is the baby if the bathwater is copyright infringement? Sure an artist can use this to post their art if they can't afford bandwidth, but there are other ways for artists to do this that are less - um - complicated. This PROTOCOL may very well be outlawed unless it can show legitimate value that obviously exceeds the 'value' of protecting copyrightholders. (TCP/IP was not outlawed because the internet at large is obviously more valuable to society than the interests of the RIAA for instance )
An important question that will determine whether protocols like these can survive is this: What can they do legitimately that other protocols can not aside from making it easier for people to break the law? I personally suspect that some unique value will probably be found for the logic behind this, probably after the courts and congress have outlawed the fundamental logic ( such as distributed hash tables ) that this relys on.
Another important question for p2p is resource allocation. Why should I let people use my computing resources if I can just leach? You probably won't be able to prevent leaches from leaching unless you require payment for resource use.
One idea I've been mulling is digital currency ala e-cash.
What if everyone minted their own digital currency, acting as their own central bank. They would pay for resources in the currency they mint. They would give value to their currency by accepting it in return for computing resources. ( the US gives value to it's currency by accepting it as payment of taxes ) Then if someone wanted to download something from you, you would accept only your own currency as payment. Perhaps an exchange counter server would operate for a premium so they could buy your currency with theirs. You could devalue your currency as much as you wished by minting it freely when you were broke, but you would increase your currency's buying power by providing computing resources.
You might even be able to pay a service provider ( maybe someone who provides lots of computing resources such as bandwidth or data storage, or even the exchange counter, to buy some amount of your currency by paying them real money. This would have the effect of increasing your purchasing power )
Of course the tax implications are dizzying...
Far and away the largest problem with spending more time forcing knowledge into the heads of the students who are falling behind is that the students who are falling behind don't want the knowledge. The scholastic environment where teachers struggle to force feed students enough to pass a test is not a place where those who are interested in learning can find the knowledge they would thrive on.
Instead it is a place where they must submit to having their time wasted in classes taught at the pace designed for those who don't pay attention, where they are disciplined for losing their place in the book 'the class' is taking turns reading paragraphs aloud, because they already finished that book weeks ago and were reading one they brought from home.
School is a place where history tests are filled with questions like: 'What year/dynasty/etc did X happen/get built/etc?' that can only be answered by memorizing a set of such useless trivia from a chapter in the textbook the night before the test - trivia which will certainly be forgotten the minute the test is handed in, while those tests are devoid of questions like: 'Write an essay on the prime causes of world war I'.
School is a place where students create notebooks of homework assignments they have passed in and have already been graded, that they must pass in again at the end of the term or lose a significant percentage of their grade.
School is a place where students must choose between completing 3 hours of homework that will teach them nothing because they already understand those subjects, or spending 3 hours learning something for one class where they are struggling. They usually make the grade-point-average maximizing decision to do poorly in the one class so that they can waste their time doing the homework for the other classes to at least get good grades in those classes. Homework is to help students learn material they do not know. Tests are to determine whether they have mastered the material. Homework therefore should not be graded in order to give students the flexibility to manage their study time so as to maximize LEARNING. If one can ace the tests, and write the required term papers/essays etc, it should be possible to earn an A+. As it is, you will be lucky to get a D in most 7th-12th grade classes if you ace all the tests and write excellent papers etc, but do not hand in any homework.
School is a place where all students are treated like the worst troublemakers. The only way the administration has to reduce trouble is with rules that treat the entire student body like criminals. This angers them and causes more of them to cause trouble in an endless cycle. Moreover the troublemakers tend to disrupt classes, vandalize school property, and bully the other students.
These problems are caused by one thing - trying to force students to learn who don't want to.
I am living proof that it's possible to do your level best to do well in highschool but end up with a report card full of D-E-F grades, quit highschool after the first 9'th grade report card, go directly to college at age 13, and graduate with a Bachelors in Math having earned As and Bs.
The difference? All college students want to be there. Any that don't leave. Professors don't have the time to grade homework. Because they don't have time to grade homework, they don't assign crossword puzzles to pad the grades of students who put in 'the effort' but can't pass the tests. If a student wants to pass the test, they will do the homework they need to do to understand the material enough to do well.
A college student spends 100% of their time studying those things they do not understand, and 0% of their time studying the things they already know, thus they have enough time to learn the things they do not understand.
College students are adults, and so it's not suprising that they are treated as adults. But it's not their age that makes it possible to treat them like adults. It's the fact that they all want to be doing w
I just downloaded the 10.3 SuSe because I'm running a Suse 9.x that I've had for years. I didn't wait for 11.0 because I don't want a buggy system for use at work. I may get 11.x where x > 0 someday. The only reason I'm upgrading is because I never downloaded the FULL 9.x CDs, and they seem to have shut off the Yast servers for 9.x SuSes - there are a few things that I want to install that require packages that I don't want to install myself but instead want to *have installed* by Yast. I only downloaded a 1 CD image and have been using Yast to get packages as needed. I downloaded the 10.3 DVD though which I'll be using for 10.3 I'd be suprised if it made you install EVERYTHING in one go.
There are plans on the internet for building CO2 Lasers that can burn a hole in a piece of wood that appear to be easier to build, and with much less equipment and money than would be required for building a gun.
A CO2 laser would be easy to transport with a van, where someone could wait for their intended target to exit a building.
Since the ccds used in webcams can see infrared light, a low powered infrared laser could be used to plant a dot on the eyeballs of the target from across the street. The ccd camera mounted on the sights would see the dot, and the nefarious operator could then push a button to send a brief, much more powerful pulse from the CO2 laser to blind the target permanently. Since CO2 lasers output infrared light, the source of the attack would be invisible and silent and not give themselves away. They could wait a minute or so before leisurely driving away.
I'm suprised technology hasn't been used much before by nutjobs, criminals, and wacko groups to carry out dastardly deeds in furtherance of their evil agendas and schemes.
Webcams plus wi-fi cards = remote control robots for cheap. How come someone hasn't driven a Dalek like creation into a bank with a companion bot powered by an electric wheelchair motor carrying a large plastic tub to conduct a robbery?
Here's a possible scenario: The 'Dalek' appears cute and anime-esque to gain entrance to the bank. It's name is Kill-gore. It's followed by a dog-bot ( the one with the big plastic money tub, decorated with 'dog-fur' and likewise cutsey. It's name is Cargo.
Both Kill-gore and Cargo are equipped with web-cams and are controlled via computers connected to the operator by wireless network cards. Possibly they use a local unsecured connection enabling the operator to sit at home and control them over the internet. More likely, they are set up as a lan, with the operator in a van close by. The bots have webcams to see with, and video appears on the operator's screen.
Kill-gore can speak. Voice scrambulation is used to disguise the operator's voice and also to give Kill-gore an menacing robotic tone. It's cutesy facial expression turns evil as well. It's 'eyebrows' turn downward and it's 'eyes' glow red. A gun pops out of the top of it's head, it's voice booms: "THIS IS A ROBBERY! I AM KILL-GORE. MY COMPANION IS CARGO. NOBODY MOVE OR YOU'RE ALL GOING TO BE BLOWN TO BITS!"
Just then two of Kill-gore's panels fall to the floor exposing many pounds of dynamite ringing the bot.
"I AM ARMED AND VERY DANGEROUS ALLOW ME TO DEMONSTRATE THE CONSEQUENCES OF NONCOMPLIANCE"
An apple shoots out of the top of Kill-gore's head and the gun tracks it and shoots it. Another ring shaped panel lifts exposing a ring of gun barrels. The barrels spin menacingly. The people notice that just above the gun barrels, on the robot are stationary 'eye shaped things'. The robot can see all around it.
"IF YOU COMPLY, THEN NOBODY WILL BE HURT. YOU, TELLER, APPROACH MY COMPANION Cargo OR DIE."
The gun trained on the nervous employee, she approaches Cargo.
Kill-gore says: "Inside, you will find a collar. If you do not place it around your neck, you will die, and I will select another to wear it. Your only chance to live is to fasten the collar around your neck."
She retrieves the collar from Cargo's hold and puts it on. A timer begins to count down from twenty minutes.
"The collar is a bomb. If the robbery goes off without a hitch, then it will not explode. You are now on our side. Please ensure everything goes smoothly."
Fill Cargo with money. Do not include any dye packs or other devices in the loot. If they go off, then so do you!"
The teller is assisted to open the big safe and get all the dough. Cargo is filled to the brim.
"Cargo will now exit with the money. When it reaches it's destination, you will all be free to go. If the money fails to arrive, then you all die!"
I am all for the blind getting more consideration on the web. And though a bit nearsighted, I can see just fine.
Frankly, I don't want the pictures most of the time. I'm a text guy. I even wish people would eschew mathml/latex math symbols on wikipedia and make an effort to write things in a way that is readable in ascii. I hate having to fire up a picture web browser so I can see some formula.
I also hate javascript urls. WTF. Use a frikken anchor tag asshole!
Um, rather than pumping water up above the dam ( and where would you get this water if not from the river below the dam which is fed by the reservoir behind the dam itself? ) why not just shut the water flow through the turbines down, and let the river water build up naturally above the dam when there is such an overabundant supply of energy that it makes sense to store it? I mean I'd be suprised if hydroelectric plants don't already run themselves at max capacity only at peak energy use hours when there is insufficient water to run at full power output 24x7. Although likely dams are built to be run at peak 24x7 since this minimizes the size of the reservoir behind the dam and the area that must be flooded. Excess flow over and above that which is reliable 24x7 goes over the top.
Here is the correct link to miracle berry entry on wikipedia
Most people would find monotonous activities, well, monotonous, and would look for a way to avoid them. Clever folks would find a creative way around performing the monotonous activity.
But under the influence of drugs like Ritalin or Methamphetamine they would likely pull an allnighter plowing through the monotony manually, but less efficiently than if they'd spent the time to find a better way.
So over the long term, the drugged out dummy will get less done than the person who's normal monotony averse brain was spurred to think of better ways to get the job done.
But the meth/ritalin addict would feel very *productive* since under the drug they were able to perform impressive amounts of monotonous work far exceeding what they would have been able to endure without the drugs. So they feel 'smarter' on the drugs, that like the Miracle Berry made a sour task taste sweet, missing the crucial fact that eating lemons is dumb, whereas finding something sweet and yummy is smart, and will get you fatter than lemons in the end. Which is the real point.
Then you might want to use a pastel background of one color with pastel text of another color designed to be of identical total brightness. This would appear to colorblind over the shoulder onlookers as a blank screen. You can send emails that way too to be a real d*ck. The best thing to do is have a pastel background with black text, but add an important paragraph at the bottom of the message that would be invisible to the colorblind. Fscking evil.
Those damn antibiotics