Re: Chinese ham handedness and monopolies
Hi, >> Their entire ecconomic model, with artifically low value on their >> currency, and the disdaining of IP right of other countries, fits >> this. Well, selling products at prices below below production cost and (aggressive) disdaining of IP right of other countries has happened before. So. China is imitating the past strategies of the western countries. So what? Some disturbing thoughts remain, though. We in Germany pay high fuel taxes and are told to drive fuel-efficient and clean vehicles. OTOH, Volkswagen still produces 1980s models in China. This way, we take care that not are responsible for pollution and excessive oil consumption, but the Chinese. Hooray? - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Power and civilization
>>Unfortunately, we already have surplus crop and other produce. In order to > keep the price up, >>surplus is destroyed. > I goggled for that in the US, and it referred to this happening during the > Great Depression, when prices were so low during the deflationary era that > it wasn't worth the cost of bringing them to market. Since then, farmers > have been paid to leave land fallow. Lately, it's been much better. > Farmers are paid to plant land with the greatest risk for erosion with > grasses that are superior for soil retention. That's one reason why, on US > farms, topsoil is increasing. Yup, I checked, right. In the EU the overproduction problem had been solved by 2007. However: regardless if we destroy surplus or get paid not to produce it, it won't help feed more people. >>Monsanto has proven that genetically modified crop is dangerous. > I've seen some extraordinary sketchy studies on this, but nothing > substantial. With 95% or so of the US eating food that has been genetically > modified, then we should see the effects with real science. I've checked the > latest study of organic food vs. non-organic, and absolutely no health > benefits were found with organic foods. Yes, residue pesticides exist on That wasn't the danger I meant. >>Yes, genetic modifications have a long history. Yup, "trial & error > breeding". > Genes don't care how they are modified. Dan, you still think like a scientist. You need to think like a greedy idiot to understand what I mean. :-) In historic times, 232 different races of domestic pigs could be found in Germany. In more modern times, this was reduced to one single race (the most efficient, short-term money-wise). Nowadays, a few "old races" seem to have re-appeared. The real problem is that if you base you base your country-wide farming on a single race of crop, diseases can lead to crop failure or mass mortality. Country-wide. Diverse redundancy would have helped. The problem are not genetic modifications by themselves, but the reasons *why* and *how* it is employed. It's used to maximize short-term profits. There's a risk to it, as mentioned above. But, what the heck, if anything fucks up, the state will bails us out again. Yup, not only bankers think that way, farmers as well. > The poison you talk about is roundup. And, yes, if I drank a bottle of it, > I'd probably be sick. But, I've used it on weeds. Spray it on grass, and > the grass dies, but spray it on weeds 3 inches from grass, and the small > amount that gets on the grass doesn't hurt it. If Roundup were that bad, > wouldn't we see the effects on the laws of folks who use it, on the animal > life in the area, etc? That's what they said about DDT, too. However, I'm still suspicious. Monsanto apparently prefers buying politicians over addressing my doubts and concerns. While their product safety tests have their merits, I find them a bit...simplistic for a technology on which a complete country relies on for feeding its population. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Greens add to Greenhouse gasses
>> Of course, it would make sense to integrate water and wind plants, > probably even using the wind >>turbines to power the pumps directly. But that's a problem with politics, > not technology. > I beg to differ. The obvious problem is geography. Pump storage is highly > used in Switzerland, and they have moutainous terrain and have hydroelectric > dams which are perfect for combined generation/pump storage. But, most good > windfarm locations are offshore or on the plains (e.g. Iowa or the Panhandle > of TX) where high winds blow. The energy from a wind turbine is > porportional to the cube of the velocity of the wind. Yes, there is high Only for an ideal wind turbine. In real life, current designs have to be turned out of the wind if the wind gets strong. They actually have a rather small range of wind speeds in which they can operate; both weak and strong wind is a problem. Vertical wind turbines, like the Savonius design, are less efficient, but can cope with a wider range of wind speed (including weaker wind and turbulent wind). Advocates of vertical wind turbines often cite conspiracy theories as the reason for the limited use of these designs in large scales. > wind on ridge lines, but I've seen windmills there, and there is just one > line, not row after row. So, pump storage needs to be located in very > specific geographical locations (wherever there is a quick change in > elevation from one large area to anothermountaintops aren't good because > you can't put a big lake there), while the flat plains and the oceans, seas, > and the Great Lakes are the best place to locate wind turbines. If it were > easy, the German company that already has 10% of its nameplate capacity in > wind would be doing water storage already. Nope. In Germany, political reasons are the real reasons, not common sense. Electricity from wind turbines was highly subsidized, with the result that it became "commercially efficient" to erect wind parks at location which made absolutely no sense. After this had been found out, the subsidies have been reduced. But still you can make more money by producing electricity than by pumping water. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Clean high tech solutions
>> >How were the European Greens responsible for keeping >> Uganda poor, by >> turning them away from nuclear? >> Two ways: >> 1) They have extremely strict and unreasonable standards for >> imported food. >> For example, its virtually impossible for US food products >> to be sold there. Unreasonable standards? I do not know about Uganda, but I know other markets where such apparently overly strict standards are exist. Officially, it's claimed to prevent harm to the people by disallowing low quality imports. In reality, these standards are meant to prevent imports, simply to prevent money from leaving the country. Unless, of course, the money is used to import Ferraris or Lamborginis for the ruling class. Or weapons. The military also want their toys, and in some countries the ruler depends on the support of the military (like, North Korea). Feck. I realize that I do know too much about politics. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Greens add to Greenhouse gasses
>> So, they were fired up when the windmills were down due to low >> wind. Now, with cheap natural gas, the building of windmills has slown down >> to a virtual halt. > Well, cheap currently. It is just one carbon tax away from being > expensive. And to my mind the only question is when that tax comes, not if. Of course, certain critical businesses will be exempt from that tax. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Power and civilization
> In fact, the other major sin of the Greens (in addition to being against > nuclear power) That's their political agenda. When the CDU announced that the nuclear power plants in Germany will be shut down, the greens were not alltogether sure if they really wanted that... ;-) > is the opposition to genetically modified crops. I get > the fact that Monsanto is the poster child for evil greed, but there > really isn't any other way to feed the number of people we now have, let > alone will soon have, without those high-yield crops. Unfortunately, we already have surplus crop and other produce. In order to keep the price up, surplus is destroyed. Monsanto has proven that genetically modified crop is dangerous. Yes, genetic modifications have a long history. Yup, "trial & error breeding". My problem with Monsanto is that they not only sell the crop, but also poison which kills every living thing (except their genetically modified crop). - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Greens add to Greenhouse gasses
>> Wind just needs one, effective storage. The lack of it is why >> wind power cannot be counted on as part of peak demand. >> It only made sense when natural gas was expensive. >> > Here in Brazil, Wind is used as part of the electric grid (there is a > country-wide electric grid, only some parts of the Rain Forest are > outside it). It helps save "water" and not consume natural gas when > the wind blows. So, Wind is _not_ one black swam away, it can be used > complementary to other sources of energy. I remember one study where it was predicted that if (in Germany) 10% if the required electricity is produced by wind, temperatures on land will rise and drop on the sea. To me, that sounds like wind farms on land will deliver not enough energy to power the air conditions we might need. Wind farms on the water will reduce evaporation. No idea how big this impact will be, but if we begin to need desalination plants to provide water for irrigation, wind farms might again lead to less energy instead of more. Furthermore, the currently used designs require massive maintenance. Production of replacement parts is not CO2-neutral. Not by far! Yo, still somewhat better than burning coal. But still surprisingly "dirty". Water is, AFAIR, even worse. The water basins replace plants, which would otherwise convert CO2. Pumped-storage hydroelectricity are often cited as a solution to the storage problem. Apart from the problem mentioned above, they are also inefficient. While a modern pumped-storage hydropower station may yield an efficiency between 70% and 80%, energy transmission from and to the the site also takes a toll. It's estimated that today about 50% of the electrical energy is lost on it's wan from the power plant to the user. Consider that the energy might to be transmitted twice (to the pumped-storage hydropower station and back). Of course, it would make sense to integrate water and wind plants, probably even using the wind turbines to power the pumps directly. But that's a problem with politics, not technology. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Greens add to Greenhouse gasses
>> This issue is not being resolved rationally, but then very >> few people approach problems that way. > Twitter compressed solution > "Really cheap power if we bootstrap by building one power satellite > and use it for propulsion lasers to bring up parts for thousands. " > If anyone wants to know more, ask. Our political leaders don't need solutions, they need fear. Once you control voters by fear, you can do literally everything. That's toally different from us people with a scientific background, who still believe that we're constrained by physical laws. Or math. Or reason. Or logic. It works because politicians don't even get close to breaching natural laws. They are content with much, much simpler achievements. Personal wealth, power or just making certain other people feel miserable. However, Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, has studied physics. I'm wondering if she would be open to scientific solutions. Or if there political contrains which would prevent her from actually persuing solutions. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Greens add to Greenhouse gasses
> I think you are correct in that. The only thing I would add is that the > design of the Fukushima plant was very old, and that modern designs are > even safer. Um, like the german SNR-300 design? Yup, the first reactor with a core catcher! Which was, of course, dismantled. Apparently, there's only one things the "greens" fear more than an unsafe reactor - and that's a safer one. Funny quote from a politician who opposed the SNR-300: "If we had such technology, we'd have to export it, too.". That wouldn't have helped Fukushima; that was a 1960s design, while the SR-300 was a 1970s design, which was being upgraded though the 1980s. And now something completely different (warning: machine translation!): http://translate.google.de/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=de&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.planet-wissen.de%2Fnatur_technik%2Fenergie%2Ferdoel%2Finterview.jsp Yup, oil production is not as harmless as nuclear bomb tests. - Klaus -- Best regards, Klausmailto:k...@stock-consulting.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Where to now?
>> So at this point I can only conclude that the Republicans are congenital >> liars. > You are wearing selective blinders. All politicians are liars. But not all are congenital. Luckily, most voters do not care if the lies are plausible or at least delivered convincingly. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Degeneration? Re: Where to now?
Okay, back to my discussion with myself ;-) > This, of course, a tendency only. But it's sufficient and it surely > kills innovation. I wonder how much further this tendency will go. I always found it hard to swallow when SciFi authors wrote about "old degenerate races". Not only Dr. Brin; it also appeared in the Perry Rhodan pulp. I always wondered why there was no single brilliant, energetic, innovative member of this "degenerate species" who would turn the tide. Yup, that's naive. Probably read too many stories and/or watched too many movies where the hero would save the world/universe/everything, either singlehandely or with (or despite) the help of his/her idiotic sidekick. But now I wonder if we haven't already reached the goal of becoming a "degenerate race". Progress mainly happens in marketing, not in research and development. And while we have a lot of "hero material" in our population, none of them is apparently able to make a difference. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Where to now?
>>I vaguely remember that I the past it took about 50 years from an > innovation to appear until it >>became mainstream. > Huh? It took geosteering 3 years to drop the price of oil by a factor of 3. My rant about the "50 years" wasn't really meant seriously. Just the preparation to the conclusion at the end: > Or maybe it's just that someone figured out that it's easier to > develop sub-par products and sell them to people with below-average > intelligence than to develop something for an audience which knows > what it wants. > > Quite a bit different from the visions of many SciFi authors, which > envisioned that mankind would evolve towards higher intelligence. > Instead, we've an industry which makes being dumb more favourable..." Or, in other words, we don't have inspired leaders in the industry any more. A manager has to maximize profits, especially the profits which are measured in hard dollars. There are two ways to achieve this: (a) be innovative, open new markets, invent (b) cut costs Approach (a) is risky. It also requires a bit of brain. So everyone chooses the safe way, (b). This, of course, a tendency only. But it's sufficient and it surely kills innovation. I wonder how much further this tendency will go. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Where to now?
>> >> We need a black swan. >> > Maybe we already have it. The wiki model is working for editing > wikipedias (not only _the_ Wikipedia, but many other clones, parodies, > porn sites or just silly stuff), It began with IMDB and if they hadn't > been such stupid jerks IMDB would have turned itself into what > Wikipedia became. > Why can't we apply the wiki idea to _engineering_? Patents. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Where to now?
Hi,
> last big innovation, and are have Apple winning market share on style
> instead of companies providing innovation that turns the world upside down
I vaguely remember that I the past it took about 50 years from an
innovation to appear until it became mainstream.
Okay, my favourite example (again) for a counter-innovation: reading
books on the iPad. In the 1970s, I read books, real book. A lot of
them. And, especially when reading in bed, I found that were room for
improvement. First of all, the need to flip pages. It would have been
cool if books had a button "next page". Or, even better, a video
camera which tracks eye motion to flip pages automatically.
When not reading, I sometimes watched TV (when there a TV program,
back in these days TV stations were only transmitting a few hours a
day). One of my favourites was "Raumschiff Enterprise" ("Raumschiff"
being the german word for "spaceship"). Yup, that was the german title
of "Star Trek". And there they had the electronic book reader which
could flip pages automatically!
In the 1980s, computer keyboards began to sport a "next page" key
(nowadays most commonly labelled Page Down or so). In the 1990s,
portable computers began to appear. E-Books remained rare - the
technology was there for page flipping via buttons, but not the
content. The time was not yet right. Nowadays, built-in cameras
are commonplace in portable computers. There is a market for E-Books,
the content is there. And...we got the iPad, where you actually have
to flip pages the old way. Competing devices, like the Kindle, follow
suit with models with touchscreen comping up in response to the iPad.
WTF?
Simple. Star Trek ran from 1966-1970. If a new idea takes 50 years to
become commonplace, we can expect user-friendly book to appear no
earlier than 2016.
...
Or maybe it's just that someone figured out that it's easier to
develop sub-par products and sell them to people with below-average
intelligence than to develop something for an audience which knows
what it wants.
Quite a bit different from the visions of many SciFi authors, which
envisioned that mankind would evolve towards higher intelligence.
Instead, we've an industry which makes being dumb more favourable...
- Klaus
___
http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Obama II
> This plays into some recent conversations about "efficiency" vs "resilience." Yup. And neither "efficiency" nor "resilience" will help you in the end if you don't ponder some important questions first. Like: "do we measure altitude in feet or meters?", or "should we check if the old guidance system will work okay in the new rocket?" - Klaus >> Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2012 20:06:16 +0100 >> From: k...@stock-consulting.com >> To: brin-l@mccmedia.com >> Subject: Re: Obama II >> >> > I know as a fact that the Defense Department said they >> > would require that all programming for applications they used would have to >> > be done in Ada (I think within 5 years) because Ada was a compiler that >> > automatically eliminated bugs. >> >> AFAIK, the Ada compiler can detect many programmer mistakes at compile >> time. Of course, one might say that Ada that's mainly because Ada >> imposes so many restrictions on the programmer that the chance to make >> mistakes is greatly increased (compared to more "relaxed" languages, >> which do, for example, implicit type conversion). Ada also supports >> run-time-checks - which detects bugs when it's already too late (or >> may even cause bugs in extreme cases). >> >> Compared to other languages of the time, like Fortran, it's clearly >> superior in detecting some classes of bugs early. It also reduces the >> programmer's efficiency, resulting the number of bugs per time compare >> to more efficient languages. >> >> However, the "best bugs" are introduced during programming, but much >> earlier. Catching bugs at the earliest possible time is expensive, but >> the ROI is immense and outweighs the cost by several orders of >> magnitude. Of course, any manager who was reading this dropped out at >> the word "expensive", so defective software will remain the standard. >> >> >> Okay, the word "standard" reminds to get back on-topic. I suspect that >> the reason for the choice of Ada was that Ada was the first >> standardized HL programming language. Oh, the military loves >> standards. No further explanation necessary. >> >> Best regards, Klaus >> >> >> ___ >> http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com >> > > -- Best regards, Klausmailto:k...@stock-consulting.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Obama II
> I know as a fact that the Defense Department said they > would require that all programming for applications they used would have to > be done in Ada (I think within 5 years) because Ada was a compiler that > automatically eliminated bugs. AFAIK, the Ada compiler can detect many programmer mistakes at compile time. Of course, one might say that Ada that's mainly because Ada imposes so many restrictions on the programmer that the chance to make mistakes is greatly increased (compared to more "relaxed" languages, which do, for example, implicit type conversion). Ada also supports run-time-checks - which detects bugs when it's already too late (or may even cause bugs in extreme cases). Compared to other languages of the time, like Fortran, it's clearly superior in detecting some classes of bugs early. It also reduces the programmer's efficiency, resulting the number of bugs per time compare to more efficient languages. However, the "best bugs" are introduced during programming, but much earlier. Catching bugs at the earliest possible time is expensive, but the ROI is immense and outweighs the cost by several orders of magnitude. Of course, any manager who was reading this dropped out at the word "expensive", so defective software will remain the standard. Okay, the word "standard" reminds to get back on-topic. I suspect that the reason for the choice of Ada was that Ada was the first standardized HL programming language. Oh, the military loves standards. No further explanation necessary. Best regards, Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Employment you've been searching!
Hi, > Which they still haven't named! probably the usual money launderin. - Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Uncle Rays Dystopia
> Most of all, Mr. Bradbury knew how the future would feel: louder, > faster, stupider, meaner, increasingly inane and violent. Collective > cultural amnesia, anhedonia, isolation. The hysterical censoriousness > of political correctness. Teenagers killing one another for kicks. > Grown-ups reading comic books. A postliterate populace. "I remember > the newspapers dying like huge moths," says the fire captain in > "Fahrenheit," written in 1953. "No one wanted them back. No one > missed them." Civilization drowned out and obliterated by electronic > chatter. The book's protagonist, Guy Montag, secretly trying to > memorize the Book of Ecclesiastes on a train, finally leaps up > screaming, maddened by an incessant jingle for "Denham's Dentifrice." > A man is arrested for walking on a residential street. Everyone > locked indoors at night, immersed in the social lives of imaginary > friends and families on TV, while the government bombs someone on the > other side of the planet. Does any of this sound familiar? > http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/08/opinion/uncle-rays-dystopia.html?_r=1&src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp&pagewanted=all > http://snipurl.com/23vj8zh Unfortunately, yes. Many years ago, I still believed that science fiction was a valuable instrument for experimenting with future possibilities, in a way which makes the experiments not only accessible to scientists, but also to ordinary people like you and me. Yes, stories like "Fahrenheit 451" or "1984" were often read in school, so a lot of people should know these works. Yes, everyone detested the world which was described in these stories. And yet, nowadays very few people seem to care about the this things happening in reality. Apart from fiction, history is anonther source from which we can learn about possible mistakes in political and social development (even history, as it is taught in schools, is sometimes "adjusted" in such ways that it would be classified more as fiction than science). Does this mean that people will just not care if the next Hitler should appear? He'd just need to say "Oh, don't worry, I'm just suspending freedom and democracy in our fight against terrorism" and everybody will comfortably rest assured that everything will be fine. Oh, wait freedom and democracy have already been, erm, reduced in order to fight terrorism. Large corproations already run the executive and the judiciary in many western countries (they still do need politicians to run the legislative for them). Not totally democratic, but all in the name of the fight against terrorism. Yup, anyone remembering that the DMCA was passed as part of an "anti-terror law"? Best regards, Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Tuesday afternoon . . .
Drag out 10" and "ingress" is not a good sentence if somebody who likes to overhear conversations just happens to walk by. Thank gawd you didn't mention a rectifier. to walk by within earshot will probably be folks I know. Earshot. Luckily, you wrote "folks I know", and not "folks I knew". - Klaus ;-) ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Spray-on glass (was Re: ping)
> with a cork-screw and tugged out of the bottle. (Incidentally, is > there any reason cork is used in wine bottles other than tradition? > why not a conventional bottle-cap? Is it just wine connoisseur > stubborness, "I'd never drink wine with a bottle cap!") You're correct. While there is small selection of wine which requires a less than 100% airtight cork, most wines can simply be capped with ordinary bottle caps. While these cheap bottle caps outperform even costly corks (expect more than 0.50 EUR for a good quality cork!), they were, in the past, only found on cheap wines. So called "glass corks" are an alternative for the wine connoisseur. The manufacturer of these "glass corks" also offers "plastic corks" (identical, except made of plastic), but hasn't yet sold any of these cheaper variants. It's all just "perceived quality". Especially if you happen to know that the "glass corks" are only airtight because of a *plastic* seal. > I would think the first applications, if it is as good as they say, > are for building materials. Coating stone, brick, wood, etc. But even > for that, I would not want to be a guinea pig. What happens after > years of weathering, expansion/contraction, etc? The glass coat is said to be flexible. However, I'd be wary of anything which could emit particles. OTOH, plastic spray has been around for decades. After the solvent has evaporated, it's also chemically neutral. Yet I've still to see any "hygiene maniac" who covered everything with plastic. Best regards, Klaus ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Germany moves to ban Scientology
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/12/07/germany.scientology.ap/index.html > > > > Germany's top security officials said Friday they consider the goals > > of the Church of Scientology to be in conflict with the principles of > > the nation's constitution and will seek to ban the organization. > > It's a small step in the right direction anyway. Let's see if they get > around to banning all the other religions later. As bureaucrats believe that Atheism is also a religion, this might result in some confusion among people who can think logcially. Luckily, this won't be an issue for politicians. Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 150 MPG from a Toyota Prius
> > I was surprised to see that it's only 67 hp... I drove my mother's > > Prius a > > while ago and it seemed zippier than that. Lots of torque, I guess. The advantage of electric motors is that the torque much less dependent on the revs/minute than with an infernal combustion engine. An eletric motor can provide full torque even when it's standing still, while an internal combustion engine will have ZERO usable torque under the same condition. That was a reason ehy it was tried to use an internal combustion engine to drive a generator which in turn powers an electrical motor to move the car. Since the internal combustion engine can be kept at the optimum rpm, such a car might provide a better mileage. The generator/motor combination could be regarded as an impedance or torque converter. Unfortunately, neither generators nor motors run at 100% efficiency, so the losses, the increased mass (and the addtional cost) apparently make this approach not very favourable. > ...and when you're accelerating hard, both the engine and the motor > are working together. Right. People buy a hybrid Lexus to brag about their "green attitude" and yet happily kick the pedal to the metal to get most of the 400+ horsepowers which both electrical and internal combustion engine together achive. They also do not count the gallons of jet fuel which are consumed when they charge their batteries during the daytime (short term electrical peak load is often provided by jet turbine generators, which are much less efficient that the normal "base load" power plants). Best rgeards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Star Trek nativity scene
> >> Some of the newer Barbies are designed to sit on a > >> horse, so they do bend adequately for that. > > Ah. At one point, I saw for sale Barbies that came with horses they > could ride. I don't know anything about collecting horses, different > brands, etc. Yes, I remember a TV ad for "Barbie horses" some years ago. I considered it ridiculous. The horses were obviously ment for eXtreme grooming _only_. The mane was so long that the horse would tread on it if it should ever get the funny idea of moving forward. But great for grooming, right, if you ever get bored of grooming Barbie herself. I think. Just some diversion from the usual "Star Trek nativity scene" topic talk, which includes DVD rentals, book critics, conspiracies... Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Star Trek nativity scene
> So, if you can get your wife interested, there you go. :) At 2 eps per > week, you can have it all watched in a little over a year. (Then Of course, there is there is the little point that your TV sets work two ways, so THEY will see what your watching. And, of course, when you watch re-runs, THEY will produce new seasons so you'll have to spend your money on new DVDs. And if you watch new episodes on TV, THEY will cancel it so you'll sink into despair and won't think about who is really ruling the world, and what one might do about it, and... ...wait, theere's someone at the door, I'll just have look what they wan _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Star Trek nativity scene
> horses...not sure what it says - that Barbie has vampy > clothes and a ridiculously over-sexed figure, but > can't open its legs... What for? Have you ever paid Ken a closer look? - klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: NASA: 'Star Wars'-Type Double Sunset Might Be Possible
"Alberto Monteiro" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Ronn! Blankenship wrote: > > This suggests the universe could be packed with planets that > > have two suns. Sunsets on some of those worlds would resemble the > > ones on Tatooine. > > > A _real double sunset_ would be a rare occasion, because even > if planets around double stars are common (something that I > read more than 30 years ago), aligning the two suns with the > horizon would be uncommon for planets with orbits in the > plane of the two suns orbits and a not-too-inclined rotation > axis. ´ Actually, the specific comparison with Tatooine raises a few more points. The sunset which was pictured in the movie owes it's appearance to the athmosphere. To form auch an athmosphere some requirements concerning the planet's climate have to be met. This is quite unlikely for planets in multi start systems. However, if someone gets the UFOs from the Roswell incidents going, one might send a team of Industrial Light & Magic to such a planet. They'll can do it. Heck, they managed to get the double sunset even on earth! Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: No accounting for taste . . .
> > STRANGE BUT TRUE: Cats Cannot Taste Sweets > > There is a reason cats prefer meaty wet food to dry > > kibble, and disdain sugar entirely. > > opened a package of apple turnovers...he immediately > > jumped up and ...licked > > the sugar off each and every one of the turnovers. > > Perhaps he could > > not read the newsletter and didn't know that he was > > supposed to eat > > the "meaty wet food" and "disdain [the] sugar > > entirely." Or perhaps > > he was following a higher law of being a cat: to do > > the opposite of what he is expected to do . . . And humans cannot digest milk products. This can, or so I'm told, easily be proven if you conduct your research in China. Perhaps they checked cats whose family trees converge towards same saber tooth tiger which didn't care about sugar, but a lot about reproducing it's genetic material. It's also proven that cats won't eat more than it would be good for them. That's why there are no fat cats. Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Kangaroos
> And remember that Brin, in His page, urged His Legions of Terror > to start wikying!!! It's a pity that there's so little information about > the Uplift Universe and His other books in the Wikipedia. Reminds me of the library which all the recaes in the Uplist universe have access to. People from earth apparently regard this source of knowledge with a certain suspicion...now we know where this suspicion comes from... - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Endless Universe Made Possible By New Model
> > Why egotistical? Science is not about uncovering mysteries and truths, > > it's about modeling observation. The Big Bang does a very good job of > > that. > > As long as the universe is 74% "mysterious" dark energy, for which there is no > direct evidence. Yup, but we've got indirect "evidence" already. As for direct evidence, we don't have any at all. Not even for gravity. All we notice is that things keep falling to the ground, and some people came up with a fishy theory about "gravity". D'oh! Yup, this model helps us to explain why things fall to the ground, but there is no way to find out the real truth. And there will never be. Meanwhile, cosmology and particle physics make darn intersting subjects to discuss! ;-) - Klaus If the universe was created by the Big Bang, was the intrenet created by the Big Flame? _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Jobs on Music and DRM
> >>> Apple will embrace this wholeheartedly." > >> > >> Good for Jobs and Apple! > > > > Like in "Embrace, extend and extinguish"? > > (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace%2C_extend%2C_and_extinguish) > > That's a Microsoft tactic, not an Apple one. Apple doesn't even own > the underlying formats like AAC or mp3 anyway. And Microsoft (or Bertelsmann) didn't own TCP/IP. They tried anyway. I just believe that Microsoft being the "bad guys" automatically makes Apple/Jobs the "good guys". They *all* want world domination, without any competition. Unfortunately (?),m Jobs shot his own leg off during hist quest for ultime world domination, leaving Gates no option to gain this goal for himself. Appararently, Yerox Parc were the only ones who didn't directly go for this ultimate goal. And they disappeared mighty fast from the scene. Howeverm without them, we'd still be stuck with mouse-less character-based displays :-) - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Jobs on Music and DRM
> Except Bertelsmann are the masterminds behind all sorts of CD > copy-protection quackery, such as the scheme that was "cracked" by marking > the outer edge of the CD with a black magic marker. I'd also bet they were > they driving force behind the Sony-BMG rootkit disaster. They also tried to "own" the internet some years ago. They failed, like Microsoft. > > Apple will embrace this wholeheartedly." > > Good for Jobs and Apple! Like in "Embrace, extend and extinguish"? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace%2C_extend%2C_and_extinguish) Jobs is of course known to have his customers suffer from his radical mood swings, so who knows what he'll be up to next ;-) Best rgeards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Digital Rights Management is evil
> > Hmmm, I wonder if the Mac's "save to pdf" option in the print options > > will allow you to get past that. :-) > > > I doubt it. Even non-DRM'd pdf's that don't "phone home" can disable > printing altogether, so I doubt they'd leave any sort of save-to-file > loophole open in their nasty DRM system. I even tried printing one of the > unprintable pdfs in a unix-based 3rd party pdf reader, and wasn't able to do > it. I have about 30 "PDFs" which suffer from "DRM" restrictions . Technically, these files are *not* PDFs. Instead, they are some proprietary, encoded format, which can only be read in the Adobe Reader. I guess there's genuine PDF behind the layer of encryption, but from a user's standpoint, it is simply a proprientary PITA. Yup, AutoIt to flip the pages and trigger some screen capture software, plus a home-brew software to re-assemble the 1600x1200 screenshots (each covering half a page) into full pages again does the job of turning it into graphics. However, even "high-end" OCR software as Abbyy FineReader sucks like hell on such screenshots. Yes, the picture is perfectly clear, the letters uniform and the resultion is more than enough...but still, about every OCR software I tried will do it's very best to misinterpret names (especially foreign ones, with accents and whatever) and either consider page numbers as "dirt" or as part of the text on the page. Yuk, and that's not counting th eUtimate Morse Code Challenge in one document! Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: The Conversion of John C Wright
"I, who did not until that moment even believe the word 'spirit' had any meaning" In fact, 'spirit' has several meanings: - breath - courage - vigor - thought - ghost - the B2 stealth bomber - an airline - the MER-A mars rover - the asteroid 37452 - an F1 racing team (from the 80s) - a music band - an album by the band "Spirit", also an album by Jewel, another one by Eluveitie - a song by Faith No More - a comic - a film - a character from G.I.Joe, another character from She-Ra, another on from Öban Star Racers - a nightclub in Dublin - a TV series - a character from the Wing Commander computer game series - a political party in Belgium - alcohol, or beverages with substantial amounts of alcohol, or an alcoholic solution of a (medical) drug - enthusiasm - intent, purpose - meaning - the fifth of the four elemnts Yup, and also 'soul'. Plus a part of the Holy Trinity. Almost forgot this one :-) Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Brin: basic is evil, why it must be eradicated
"Alberto Monteiro" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Klaus Stock suggested: > > > > OTOH, on more modern computers, one might teach the child OOA and > > OOP with some Smalltalk system. > > > From... > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smalltalk > > Because of that the meaning of Smalltalk expressions using > binary messages can be different from their "traditional" > interpretation: > > 3 + 4 * 5 > > is evaluated as "(3 + 4) * 5", producing 35. > > No, I don't think Smalltalk is a good teaching device :-P Yup, that's why I wrote that "algebra" works "object-oriented" 8as opposed to "math-oriented"). ;-) OTOH, consider the following Smalltalk code: x := 1 / 3. x := 3 * x. x inspect. Common sense tells us that the result is 0.999 - but Smalltalk insists on 1. Yes, "mathematical reality" is nowadays defined as "what the pocket calculator says". This is one more of the points where electronic assistence becomes a problem - kids don't really learn math with the assitance of computers, they are just drilled like a assembly line worker or a circus animal, just repeating the standard "number entry trick" they learned. Anyway, I meant Smalltalk not for teaching mathmetics, for for the teaching of object-oriented analysis and object-oriented programming (and, to some extent, also for OOD). Instead of drawing balls on a screen, kids could learn how to define a Ball class, how to add behavior and how to communicate with Ball instances (myball := Ball new. myball color: red. myball moveto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] myball bounce.). If someone could learn how to define reasonable and meaningful abstraction of given problems, we would have to endure a lot less of that crap which is programmed about everywhere. For example, Java, a language designed by someone who had not the slightest clue about object-orientation. Oh yes, there are things called classes and methods, but they are, in reality, mostly just modules and procedures. With the result that software development in Java takes as much time as it would in C++. Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Brin: basic is evil, why it must be eradicated
> I don't know if this has already been suggested, but I have > recently learned the programming language R, and it seems that > it's exactly what you would like to use to teach your kids > how to use a computer: > > (a) it's free and available for _all_ systems [M$, Linux, Mac] How about the good olde Apple ][, C64, or some other prehistoric computers? Wouldn't Logo be a better choice? OTOH, on more modern computers, one might teach the child OOA and OOP with some Smalltalk system. > (b) it's simple to use Logo's simple to use as well. Smalltalk even simpler, especially if it comes to debugging. > (c) it's powerful enough to treat numerical data Hm, never trated large amounts of numerical in Logo. Bit boring for children, no? Smalltalk, OTOH, can treat numerical data (even arbitrary fraction with no rounding errors, or arbitrary precision FP data), and it can do even _fully_ object-oriented! Ok, if you want complex arithmetic built-in, Python might be an option as well. > For example, if you want to show the plot of a point, > you just start R and type: > > plot(10, 10) That's overkill. For such simple tasks, I use a pencil. Don't teach your children how to perform stupifyingly simple takes with the aid of technological overkill! > and it plots a small ball at coordinates (10,10). If > you want then to add another point, just type: > > points(12, 12) For the price of a computer, I could buy a room full of balls! > and the plot will be updated, showing the two balls. > [notice that the first plot fixes the size of the graphic > window, so points will only show points inside the picture]. Yup, the balls in the room would also be visible from the outside, though the window. > Of course, rtfm and you will see that _much_ more can Balls often come without manuals, but they also can be used for a multitude of activities, including soccer, basketball, smashing of windows, attacking penguins, thwrowing at apples, whatever! Best regards, Klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Collapse Chapter 4 - Chaco Canyon
> form of public architecture. For example, there are stone markers > that mark the solstices, and little evidence of city life. It is > So, in terms of discussion questions: > > Diamond related in the Chapter on the Pitcairn Islands how trading > with friendly neighbors can sustain a civilization. Chaco Canyon > was clearly at the heart of an extensive trading network reaching to > Mexico, the Pacific, and the central Great Plains. Did Chaco > Canyon stave off collapse for so long because of its trading ties? > Or did the extensive trading increase the population pressures on > the Canyon, pushing it to unsustainable levels, and ultimately > leading to the Canyon's abandonment? Hm, wait. "Little evidence of city life" and "was clearly at the heart of an extensive trading network" appear contradictory to me. Well, at least when I consider other historical examples of how trading opportunity and/or activity lead to the appearance and/or growth of settlments and/or cities. Best regards, Klaus and/or Maru _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Jobs, not trees! (Collapse, Chapter 2)
> Think of Mesopotamia. When it was the cradle of civilization it was the > fertile > crescent. Now it is mostly desert (that is it is Iraq). How did this happen? I guess Bush has the answer to that :-) > Over time the people living in the region degraded the environment (cut down > the trees - always a bad idea). But it took quite a long time. In the Easter The people in Scotland also cut down most of the trees in order to have more room for sheep. Or so I learned. Yup, deforestation works without rats :-) - klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: 9/11 conspiracies (WAS RE: What should we believe when there is no reliable information?)
> be a conspiracy of the type alleged, thousands of
> _perfectly ordinary_ people would have to be involved.
There was an estimate that in the GDR, one out of seven persons worked for
the Stasi ("Staatssicherheit" = "state security"), in one way or the other.
Most were of course IMs ("Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter" = "inofficial
co-workers"), and quite a few did not really do what they were supposed to
do.
Best regards, Klaus
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Re: An Inconvenient Truth
> Let's look at the automobiles. Big trucks, such as semi's and dump trucks, Why always automobiles? They are *not* the biggest source of air pollution (even though everybody tries to tell us so). Houses are. Funny thing about cars is also that they require catalytic converters, which generate N2O, which increases the greenhouse effect (global warming) and depletes the ozone layer. > Let's say that, tomorrow, SUVs, pick up trucks, and the like disappear and > are replaced by automobiles. That would replace a fleet with an average > mileage rating of 16.2 mpg with a fleet with a mileage rating of 22.4 mpg. While everybody wonders why the automobile industry cannot built the ececonmic cars which have been promised 20 years ago, oeverybody also wants increasingly more comfort and safety from cars. Yup, that's the price we have to pay for having a free market economy, and not living in a communist state :-). Funny things about the communist coutries (and othe rless developed countries) is that our industry finally found a place where to use their manufacturing tools. Great. While we try to save on CO2, our industry supplies the chinese with 25 year old car models. > During the interim, we should, of course, minimize their use...by switching > to nuclear power for electricity and wind power where the wind is strong > enough to make it feasible. C'mon...the Greens told us for 30 years that nuclear power is evil. Just like cars. Unfortunately, they forgot about the more evil things... - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scientists say dodos killed by natural disaster
> Scientists say dodos killed by natural disaster > > By Tim Cocks Mon Jul 3, 10:47 AM ET > > PORT LOUIS (Reuters) - Scientists who unearthed a mass dodo grave in > Mauritius say they have found evidence showing the birds were killed > by a natural disaster long before humans arrived on the Indian Ocean island. What is it what makes humans unnatural? - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Cell Phone Signal Excites Brain Near the Cell Phone
> What was that about cell-phone radiation not being able to penetrate the > skull again? Gee. Smoking is harmful, alcolhol is harmful, cell phones are harmful... ...what will come next? Something really stupid like "buring mineral oil products is harmful"? - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Elegant science (was Re: Scientific methodology)
> The "Were you there???" is a favourite creationist canard, and it > rankles me to see it espoused by people on "our side". Sure. I was also there when God pulled though the whole creation. I can confirm that everything ist true, except for the assertion about the "creation in six days". Since the solar day/nicht cycle was established only during the creation, the notion of a "day" was meaningless in the beginning. Best rgeards, klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Nutty Conspiracist [was: [L3] RE: Bird flu movie]
> > They found that a genetic mutation that gives its carriers > > protection against the HIV virus became relatively common among > > white Europeans about 700 years ago > > > So the HIV virus was designed by White People to kill Black People! > "THEY" had convinced me that it had been fnord designed by Hetero People > to kill Gay People. Time to chance Conspiracy Theories! > Don't make fun of this...I know that you are one of "them"... ...I noticed the suspicous space before the word "designed". If you know where to look... - Klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Scientific methodology
> I don't see how it works this way. Let me propose a defiantly > non-scientific method for predicting the weather 2 months in advance. It is > "ask Jimmy." Let's assume, for reasons unknown, that Jimmy has an uncanny > ability to predict the local weather two months in advance. We find that > his prediction of rainfall, snow, wind direction and speed, and temperature > range for two months in the future matches the accuracy of the Weather > Bureau's forecast for the next day. We don't know how it works, but we can > prove, through scientific methodology, that "ask Jimmy" is an accurate means > of predicting weather 2 months in advance. More obvious: the direction in which an object moves when you release it. Numerous experiments show that the object falls towards the ground. We have a rather solid statistical sampling concerning that behavior. However, no one can actuall prove that this will be true in every case. Nevertheless, we assume that there is such a "thing" as gravity, and that we explain a hell lot of stuff with this "scientifc law". - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: *-ism (was: Myers-Briggs)
> > Who discredited Marxism?
> >
> Communism :-)
>
> > It's out of favour for sure, but when was the official
> > accreditation lost?
> >
> 1989, the collapse of the Berlin Wall.
Did it discredit Marxism, or did it just discredit centrally planned
economy?
> > And are we talking Marxism here, or the more general communism?
> >
> Communism, Socialism, and other flavours.
Or is centrally planned economy just a perceivable result/sideeffect of
Marxism?
Anyway, the GDR ("East Germany") seemed to have more democracy than the
countries which the USA lead to "democracy" in the last decade or so.
- Klaus
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Re: Another blog entry of interest
> Two of the "top 7" logical fallacies. Aw. My favourite is "this saying rhymes, so it must be true." - Klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Online games
> Every Sunday Christians congregate to drink blood > in honour of their zombie master. Erm, yes, but the blood is fake - Klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Online games (was: Xbox 360)
"Nick Lidser" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> I used to be a *fanatical* StarCraft player. My brother is trying to >> get me to play DDO, since he's all the way in Utah, but otherwise I >> just don't have the time. > DDO? Dungeons and Dragons Online? Or was this a typo and you meant to say > DoD, Day of Defeat ROFL! So many TLAs to choose from... :-) - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Online games (was: Xbox 360)
> Well with the expression of interest in gaming that was put forth on the > console side of things, I figured it was just as well to see what games that > you all play online. I used to play "Counter Strike", "Day of Defeat", "Natural Selection" and "Science & Industry". All of these are first person shooters (FPS) and they are also all team-based games in which cooperation and team-play are important. In NS and S&I perhaps a bit more than in CS and DoD. One challenge in these games is to find game servers with nice, friendly, honest people with whom it's fun to play with. The team aspect often allows weaker playerrs to integrate with stronger ones. A totally different online game which I used play (and ocassionally still play) is Kingdom of Loathing (KoL). It's a FREE browser-based role playing game. Quite a bit of fun. The graphics are crappy, because they are MEANT to be crappy. KoL is sort of a parody on other role playing games. http://www.kingdomofloathing.com Some information about KoL in-game items can be found here: http://www.KoLDBase.com - a wiki set up to aid the beginner in his endevor to master the tasks which await him/her in the Kindom of Loathing. Yup, shameless plug, this. :-) Best regards, Klaus, WikiSysop of KoLDBase ;) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Frameshifting
> >To turn the question around: why not just rap the knuckles of the > >hunter/explorer kids and force them to Sit Down! Shut Up! and Pay Attention! > > Yes, why not? :P Because it's not democratic to tell a child to "pay attention". Ya know, "democracy = freedom". Which is funny, because kids aren't allowed to participate in the democratic election process. On the other hand, people who are allowed to participate in the democratic processes seem to lose some of that freedom which kids seem to have. Well, perhaps not "pay attention", but "pay taxes". Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Our goofy little dog
> A little taste of our small (but not for a Maltese) dog: > > http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2326268951915604926&q=kairo&pl=true Apparently the dog is trained to retrieve cameras. This could become profitable - klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Study: Cell-Phone Radiation Affects Brain Function & it's Cumulative
> My experience with MRIs comes mostly from having my head examined, > but I'm pretty sure that the room is a Faraday cage to contain the > substantial RF output, so it would be just about impossible to make a > cell phone work in there. You'd probably have to build a cell inside > the room (or use a simulator, as seen on "Myth Busters"). There are repeaters commercially available for use in underground parking lot, for example. It might also be possible to put one of teh antenna wires of such a repeater into the "tube" together with the person under test, so even if the mobile itself won't work there, it could be placed somewhere in the room. The antenna inside the MRI tube will provide the person under test with it's share of radiation as well. > the room (or use a simulator, as seen on "Myth Busters"). Aren't these the TV shows where they show that everything can exploade anytime? Sign. Why can't I be the host of such a show? Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Paging Alfred Hitchcock . . .
> > >... Now, ... it seems > > > that the same pair of mockingbirds has built a nest > > > in the bush at my > > > mailbox, and in the spirit of protecting their nest, > > > one of them > > > attacks me every time I go to or near the mailbox. If they attack, they have something to protect, so I guess they have put the nest to use already. Set up a diversionary mailbox, to lure the mailman away from the present "secured" mailbox. Once the mailman is trained to the other mailbox, you can pick up your mail without being attacked by the mentioned pair of mockingbirds. Note: you might choose to provide the diversionary mailabox at a location which lacks trees and bushes. Nature might have set you up with more than one pair of birds... ;-) - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: New Levi's & Dockers may have RFID chips
> "Make no mistake," McIntyre adds. "Today's RFID inventory tags could > evolve into embedded homing beacons. Unchecked, this technology could > become a Big Brother bonanza and a civil liberties nightmare." Next thing we'll hear is that this technology help us to prevent terrorism, and everybdy will be happy to be tagged and tracked for the sake of counter-terrorism. "No, we don't live in a police-state...it's just about terrorism" - klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: FDA: Plan B would lead to 'Teen Sex Cults'
> >In the memo released by the FDA, Dr. Curtis Rosebraugh, an agency > >medical officer, wrote: "As an example, she [Woodcock] stated that we > >could not anticipate, or prevent extreme promiscuous behaviors such > >as the medication taking on an 'urban legend' status that would lead > >adolescents to form sex-based cults centered around the use of Plan B." > > The things folks will make themselves believe. You know, this is why > the First Amendment is so important. Without it, we'd have a hard > time tracking the crazy people. :) First of all, the statement seems to be based on the idea that "sex is bad". Is that really an idea which has been generally accepted? Then how comes that the U.S. americans have not died out a long time ago? I mean, unlike the Brits, they don't even have "dirty weekends". Is it perhaps a big conspiracy, and all true american have indeed died out due to the lack of reporoduction...and all "citizens" of the USA nowadays are communist immigrants? I'll need to discuss thid with JFK the next time I visit Elvis in Bielefeld. - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Optimism for the USA
> inspired later Muslim philosophers and theologians. For example, the
> Brethren of Sincerity
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brethren_of_Sincerity
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopedia_of_the_Brethren_of_Sincerity
> - full disclosure: I wrote those articles) took a position that the
> Creator was unbounded in ability and attributes, and that to even
> describe him in remotely earthly (or comprehensible for that metter)
> terms was to commit a falsity.
Heck. At least visually God resembles a human, as the Bible tell us so.
Darwinists however might conculde that this means very little, because
during the creation of the universe, apparently no complex structures
existed - so the similarities with God won't neccessarily extend past the
basic structure/interaction of elementary particles and energy.
This discussion can of course be circumvented by adopting one of the most
popular religious viewpoint ("kill all non-belivers").
- Klaus
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Re: Article: Software tracks mood swings of blogosphere
> > People blame communication issues on Mercury being retrograde. > > And they're stupid or ignorant people. FFS. > >>> > >>> I just don't get the whole astrology thing. It makes absolutely > >>> no sense when you consider the pairs of identical twins that > >>> were born within minutes of each other and then went on to have > >>> very wildly diverging lives. > >> > >> That's chaos theory. ;) > > > > Oh, I got an explanation on the twin thing just now -- in the case > > of twins, half the chart applies to one, the other half of the > > chart applies to the other. *eyeroll* > > Charts have halves? How do you know which half is which? Easy. One child is left-handed, so it belong to the left chart side. The other one is right-handed. Obvious. If both children happen to be right-handed, it because one child's natural left-handedness was supressed by the establishment. - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Article: Software tracks mood swings of blogosphere
> People blame communication issues on Mercury being retrograde. > >>>And they're stupid or ignorant people. FFS. > >> > >>I just don't get the whole astrology thing. It makes absolutely no > >>sense when you consider the pairs of identical twins that were born > >>within minutes of each other and then went on to have very wildly > >>diverging lives. Btw, did anyone notice (except me) that astrology disregards the actual constellations? Yup, the astrologocal constellations are more than a month off from the astronomical constellations nowadays. The reason is that the whole thing is about earth axis tilt (in other words, seasons), not constellations. Best regards, Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.orgg ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Hello...
> If you want to discuss the list's titular subject, then feel free, > but don't be too surprised if those of us who are guilty of the > political focus of the list become strangely quiet :-). To: "Killer Bs Discussion" Opps. Doesn't "Bush" belong to the "Killer Bs"? ;-) - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Semi-OTC Lasers
> >who had a meeting Tuesday evening and came home through some really > >nasty fog, and who really, really wishes the county had sprung for > >paint on one road in particular > > I'd be interested in the answer to that question, too, but afaik we > haven't had any thick fog like that since I got it, unless perhaps Hazers and fog machines are used to make light beams visible in professional lighting applications. In other words, if you have a PA rental service or a discotheque around, you might be able to arrange for some demonstation of their fog machines (hazers provide, as the name suggests, haze; this is sufficient to make beams visible, but does not significantly limit the visibility). You'll get a bit blinded by the reflected/diffused light from the laser youself if you stand in a thick fog. As your eyes adapt to the very bright beam nearby, and the fog limits your vision as well, you won't be able to see the beam further away. You'll need a second person who travels along the beam to observe in the fog. Note that extremely thick fog (visibility signifiacntly less that 1m/3ft) is uncommon even in professional lighting. Loss of orientation is one thing, but panic isn't very far away at this point as well. However, it might be an option for your research. Instead of "visibility range 50m", you could work at much closer ranges and scale accordingly. Best regards, Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Palladium Laptop
> Yes, Trusted Computing is used for DRM Don't despair, back doors are currentyl being considered: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4713018.stm Ross Anderson remarks: "I’m in favour of court-mandated shortcuts past rights-management systems, on competition-policy grounds. In our APIG submission I wrote ‘In cases of abuse, judges must be able to order rights-management mechanisms unlocked’. I don’t see the Vista security mechanisms as being security for me, but as security for them. It’s just not the same as the key escrow debates of the 1990s - in which I opposed key escrow on principle. The technology’s being used for different things here. If you want privacy, use PGP - or better still, some low-observable communication technology, such as throwaway prepaid mobile phones or webmail accounts Ross" (Found in the comments at http://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2006/02/13/forensics-and-terrorism/#comments) - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Semi-OTC Lasers
> label on the one I have here) that the human eye isn't very sensitive > to it. The green ones lase at 532nm, which is near the wavelength > (~550nm) where the human eye is most sensitive, so the beam from a > green laser is much more visible than that from a red laser of the > same power, making the beam from a class 1 green laser pointer > visible in a dark room or outside at night (even when there are some > lights not too far away) as it reflects off moisture and dust > particles naturally present in the air. I also forgot that a shorter wavelength means scattering at smaller particles (which a beam of longer wavelangth would "ignore"). The reason why blue light gets scattered by tobacco smoke (the causes the visible effect of the smoke appearing blue). - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Palladium Laptop
> embed DRM everywhere. IBM and Microsoft have instead stressed genuinely > useful applications, like signing programs to be certain they don’t > contain a rootkit. But at this week’s RSA show, Lenovo showed off a ROFLMAO! These "applications" are not real-world applications as we know them. Only very small programs can be made safe enough to get "enough certification" to be allowed to run in TPM. Having a tool like MS IE or MS Office inside the "trusted zone" would just mean compromize that security by opening holes to the untrusted outside. Btw, fingerprint sensors work only for maybe 95..98% of all the people. The rest has no usable fingerprints (yup, law enforcement agencies have quite a bit experience and knowledge about fingerprint identification...). Obviously, it's possible to make the sensors more tolerant, but this means less than safe. Typical fingerprint sensors can be fooled by a gummi bear (the original fingerprint which is copied to the bear may come from a water glass; these provide excellent fingerprint "master copies"). This is, of course, a good thing, because you can still access your documents after you injured your finger (provided you have a uncleaned glass with oyur fingerprints somewhere).. - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Semi-OTC Lasers
> >And more easily blind people than the class 1 lasers. > > > >Want to kill someone? Wait till he drives past on th efreeway, point the > >laser at his eyes and there he goes. The perfect crime, killing people with > >an intuitive "point and click" interface. > > > I have a class 1 green laser rated at 4.99mW that I use for a star > pointer which would likely be sufficient for that purpose. (Drives > the cat crazy, too.) The downside of doing what you describe at > night is that the beam of even a class 1 green laser is visible at > night (the very reason it is useful for pointing out objects in the > sky), so any witnesses would be able to describe where the beam came > from. The laser Rob described is actually bright enough that the I was temporarily blinded by a red laser while traveling in a train (some years ago). I suppose one these normal laser pointers. The air was clear and I could not make out where the beam came from. I ssume that the beam was turned on before it hit me, that it took the operator a few seconds to "home in". If I had noticed the beam (or the spot) before, I would have taken appropiate measures (having worked around industrial lasers of the cuts-though-concrete-walls variety, I am trained to extreme reactions at the sight of a laser beam getting close...). I didn't immediately realize what happened when the beam hit my left eye - it was the first time that I looked into a laser beam. Since then, I have a few black spots flyling before my left eye (such laser damage was described to me as being like "flies flying in front of your eye", and now I can confirm that). A normal retinography shows nothings, but I can see it, close to the center of my field of view. Took me more than a year to get used to it. However, even temporary blinding will be a problem when, for example, entering a curve. Traffic in the opposite direction is very close, and during the curve entrace, it is not sufficient just to keep the steering wheel in position. Yup, there are people who enjoy throwing rocks from freeway bridges. People aleady got killed by that. Green lasers might be the new "geek way" to have such "fun"... - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Semi-OTC Lasers
> For the last few months you have been able to buy lasers that could > pop balloons, melt trash bags, cut electrical tape, and melt through > plastic. And more easily blind people than the class 1 lasers. Want to kill someone? Wait till he drives past on th efreeway, point the laser at his eyes and there he goes. The perfect crime, killing people with an intuitive "point and click" interface. - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Stop AOL from ruining email
> I've been on AOl since 1990, and my email address (my last name > @aol.com) is something that I enjoy because I never, ever have to > repeat it for anybody. So many people have stupid email addresses > like [EMAIL PROTECTED] or some such nonsense. Mine is 12 > characters, made up of two parts that anybody who knows me and has a > computer can remember. And it tells everybody "Warning. AOL dummy ahead." :-) Ah, well, where have to good times gone when people has e-mail-adresses like [EMAIL PROTECTED] No need to repeat it either, since you had to write it up anyway :-) - KLaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: unbelievable
> "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created Yup. However, some people cannot tell a man from a bird - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Brin: California Recertifies Hackable Diebold Voting Machines
Dave Land <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > PS: This is one reason that Peggy and I are registered for > permanent absentee voter status. Well...perhaps you'll vote in 2006 for a change. Although you might not be aware of your "vote" =:-O - Klaus ;-) _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.org ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: THE STEEP PRICE OF DEFEATING TERROR
> > President Bush has asked Congress for $72.4 billion > to fund > > the "Global War on Terror" through fiscal year 2006. > About > > $65 billion will go toward the wars in Iraq and > Afghanistan, > I'm curious about the rationale for hiring a company > based in/owned by the UAE (two of the 911 hijackers > were from there, IIRC) to be responsible for security > in several American ports -- IIRC New York and New > Orleans among them. Is it the Republican stance that > that company is much cheaper and at least as safe as > an American firm? Chertoff certainly seemed confidant > yesterday that there was no security risk in turning > over our ports to foreign control. If you have a look at the numbers (65/72.4), it's obvious that about 90% of the terrorism is confined to Iraq and Afghanistan. The remaining 10% are insignificant. Yup, first the USA funded the terroism in Afghanistan, now they want to kill it off. I guess there must be the Illuminati behind this. - Klaus _ This mail sent using V-webmail - http://www.v-webmail.org ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Iran to hang teenage girl who fought back against rapists
> Religious fanaticism is a poison. Well, I consider *every* kinf od fanaticism a poison. It means absense of reason, which is one thing which justifies the word "sapiens" after the word "homo". > > find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming > > feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology. Millions > > of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of > > Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned. What > > has > > been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and > > the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the > > earth." > > --Thomas Jefferson Letter to William Short > > I rather doubt that that the Iranians in question are Christian. IMHO, a lot of Chritians have learnt from the past mistakes of Christianity. Other religions refuse to learn from the kmistakes of others and prefer to do the mistakes again themselves. However, this is perfectly human behavior. We see it in politics and on the job every single day. Still, that's not an excuse. - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Fight the Future: Houston Police wanna put Cameras in Your Home
> Cameras are getting cheap enough to use everywhere. Just ask our friends > in the UK. But it's important that we keep the government honest - that's > how we ward off the big brother syndrome. Funny thing is that goverments are strongly opposed to observation of politicans, both during their work hours and their private lives. Why, if they don't ever do anything wrong? Btw, some guy in Germany got busted because he installed a webcam in his window. Everyone with a web browser could therefore observe the public road. His neighbours sued and won. I guess there si a differnce between being in a crowded place and knowing it, or being "alone", with the suspicion that some unseen people are watching your every move. It seems nowadays that "freedom" is best implemented by "constant supervision". :-( - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Use of cameras
> > > It could provide incentive for people to buy safer and smaller cars. No. Not really. Heavier cars are safer in crashes, because they can simply push aside smaller opponents, while losing only little speed. The negative accleration is what kills you in a car crash. Heavier car = less negative accleration = less injury. I guess that's also the reason why seat belt are less common in busses than in cars. - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Irrregulars Questions on Macs
> WindowsT comes with solitaire. Do Macs come with solitaire or any other card games? Nope, I guess. Ya know: "Linux is for networking, Mac is for working, Windows is for Solitaire" (originator of this unknown to me) - Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Picking apart the Matrix - no spoilers
> I mean, Morpheus may not have been perfect, but I find Laurence > Fishburne to be very easy on the eyes. And I'm not complaining about > Keanu Reeves, either. Yes, all we talk about is _eyes_. Not ears. My ears were definitely NOT entertained by the dialogues (and monologues). Best regards, Klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Picking apart the Matrix - no spoilers
> Using humans or any other animal as an energy source is of course foolish since the energy needed to create a human is far greater than the energy that the human can generate. You could run machines on plants thus converting sunlight into complex carbohydrates that can be used as fuel. But why bother with this - just use mechanical devices to collect solar energy. Uh, I guess the human are farmed for other kind of energy than the one which we know. As one can see, the energy which is farmed in the movie "The Matrix" forms very interesting spark forms, which do not relate to any form of energy we know so far. What "The Matrix" really extracts from the people is money. As you may have noticed when visting the cinema. And also, when you noticed that you'll have to watch ANOTHER film, because the current one is unfinished. Best regards, KLaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
Re: Picking apart the Matrix - no spoilers
> >For example, in the Matrix universe, what functional reason would the > >machines have for plugging humans into a simulation (besides the obvious > >of being a plot device)? > > Maybe the machines, who presumably were once "enslaved" by humanity, are now > obsessed with enslaving humanity in return. I thought the argument was thatz the humans "work better" wehen stimulated by the simulation. "Better working" humans will produce more energy for the machines. - klaus ___ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
