You're not making any sense. The 'they' you are complaining about being paid are the employees, the suppliers, the landlord, the utility company, etc. 'They' are not taking any risk at all, nor should they be expected to.

However, SOMEONE is paying out all that money. THEY are the ones taking a risk. If they never succeed they don't get paid, they are out their entire investment. However, if they DO eventually succeed, then it is perfectly reasonable to use the profits from that success to cover the costs of past and future failures. The reason they can have those profits is that they don't have to compete on price with all the people who just sit on their asses doing nothing until someone else comes along and invents something that works, and thus have NONE of the expenses associated with development, including the cost of failure.

You are entirely wrong about there being no risk - there is huge risk. However, your 'no patent protection' idea means that there is ONLY risk, and no possible reward. That is not exactly how to 'advance the sciences and useful arts'.

I see, thanks.

Here is my question about the 'cry wolf' thing. In the story, the moral was not that people started ignoring the kid, it is that they ignored him even when there was a real threat. So why doesn't that happen here? Doesn't the cry wolf effect make the predators of the aphids that much more effective? Or is the problem that the predators are also a problem for the crops?

Yes, it is well known that businesses (like farming) use the highest cost option when there are cheaper alternatives available. That is why the farms switched to GMO even though cheaper (or free) seeds are available - because it drives their cost UP. Not too smart, are you?

In other words, preventing someone from making a profit is more important than having a cheap and plentiful food supply.

You fail to understand that free speech is not some grand more-important-than-everything-else freedom. Your right to free speech is no more important, morally or otherwise, than my right to not be associated with your speech.

If we are to really take you at your word, that free speech must be supported by everyone, then you would have no problem with me writing some hateful thing on your car, right?

Well OK, if your definition of 'good enough' is that the engine runs. If your definition includes using fuel effieciently and polluting the least amount possible, an improperly tuned carburetor is nowhere near 'good enough'. If you want a quick demo of that, take a walk on a suburban street some Saturday morning and enjoy the fresh aroma of all those poorly tuned lawnmowers.

You're assuming the response is fixed. Whoops.

A properly tuned carburetor may do a good enough job. Of course, properly tuned means it is adjusted for the current air temp, engine temp, altitude, etc. That may happen at a race track, it doesn't happen anywhere else. Do you think the manufacturers all switched to computer controlled fuel injection just to mess with you?

Please explain how you determine what the next output of a 40-bit PRNG will be by capturing a sample or two. You haven't 'synced' anything, and you have no ability to do what the real fob can do. The most you can do is stop the real fob from working. Big deal.

I have no idea what 'city bumpers' are, but the luggage net is something added by the dealer, not the factory. Same with things like floor mats. Most other things, however, are added (or not) when the car is manufactured. So there are basically two possibilities: make a mix of options that you think cover most of your market, or custom-build cars.

Making a mix of options means you have to guess at what people will buy. Guess wrong, and you have a shortage of some combinations and a glut of unsold cars with a different combination. Not good. The more combinations you have, the more likely it is you have the wrong mix. So, the manufacturers choose a few trim levels, and that is the choice you get.

Custom building has its own set of problems, and is very expensive.

OBD is required by law, so nobody is going to offer the option of not having it.

You DO, of course, have the option of refusing something you don't want - don't buy the vehicle. Nobody is required to produce what you want.

Their objections never once mention privacy or anything like that. Their objections are solely based on the 'proven health problems' caused by smart meters.

You are certainly right about that. I recently witnessed such as exchange.

Person 1: Smart-meters/Wifi, etc cause cancer! The proof is that the Soviets microwaved the US Embassy in Moscow for decades and some people got cancer.
Person 2: A very large study examined that case, and found no negative health affects from it
1: The US government manipulated the data! You can't trust them. And besides, the GAO issued a report that the FCC should lower exposure limits but the FCC won't do it because the head of the FCC was in the industry
2: The GAO report actually states that there are no known problems with the levels of EMF from cell phones, etc, and asks the FCC to RAISE the limits
1: The GAO is corrupt and you can't trust them! The MILITARY knows the truth because they did some experiments (links to some FOIA document)
2: That only says that if you hit someone with microwave-oven levels of microwaves for several minutes you can give them fever-like symptoms, wifi and smart meters have energy levels millions of times lower
1: You can't trust the military, they lied about the Gulf of Tonkin. And besides, power levels don't matter
2: Power levels DO matter, you can't effect change without an input of energy
1: There is NO SCIENCE proving that. And besides, these things use SWITCHING POWER SUPPLIES, and there was a cancer cluster in a high school where switching power supplies were found.
2: Okayyyyy...

http://www.dailyfreeman.com/op...

That is not 'hearing' EM, that is just hearing vibrating components.

Bullshit. Woodstock, NY, about as liberal place as you will find in the US, has so many of these loonies that the town board is trying to ban smart meters.