The "get a job" argument is really quite annoying here. I had a job. In fact, in my area, I was one of the few that kept their jobs during the recession. My job stagnated. Moving laterally wasn't an option during this time, due to the construction bubble resulting in a glut of over qualified, underemployed workers. My field requires a masters to become licensed, and I still needed to do that. So I took a calculated risk. I knew the length of my masters and figured by the time I get out, I'll have greater skills, a better network, and both real world experience and funded research under my belt. Current estimates by those in my field show that when I graduate in 2015 (it's an annoyingly long masters), my industry will actually be severely lacking people with my skill, since so many were scared off during this time.

My point wasn't to say "oh god I'm poor." I chose this path as a calculated risk. My point was to say that the idea that everyone in the 50% is a freeloading bastard is downright wrong. I bent no rules to get the money I'm being given now, and I fully intend to use to in a way that speeds my ability to give back to the program.

Perhaps you're reading it wrong. I'm completely thankful for the assistance I've been given. I was making good money in the job I had before. However, my career had two issues - I'm an architect, a field that was decimated during the construction bubble collapse. I kept my job throughout the recession, which is more than most of my friends can say. My job, however, stagnated. Moving to another firm at this point was unlikely, due to the recession, but more importantly, to become a licensed architect, you need a professional degree (either attend a 5 year undergrad, or do the 4+2, with the 4+2 resulting in better pay). Since I had a 4 year undergrad, I chose to do grad school. It offers me many things - new connections with firms that I actually care to work for, new skills that I have had free reign and wonderful help to hone, and the ability to do funded research in an area I care about. My point was to combat the idea that anyone in the bottom 50% are entitled slackers. Living meagerly was expected, but not being able to feed or shelter yourself is hell. These programs have helped me out immensely, and I know that I'll be paying them back for a long time. This is ok. The point of these programs is to help people like me, who aside from the common misconception are the norm, to improve our lives and drive the engine that brings everyone up. No man is an island.

couple reasons - My job had stagnated during the recession. Moving to another job was unlikely during this time because my industry was decimated due to the construction bubble, but will eventually return. And finally, to become a licensed architect, it requires a masters degree. I personally find this last part ridiculous, but hey, that's the case.

As for why I quit my original job to pursue school, doing both at the same time would result in the money I paid for school being wasted, and the time I spent at work being lack luster. I am actually working during school, which perhaps i could have stated more clearly, but the amount of money it takes to go to school these days pales in comparison to the amount you could make on the side. I'm not complaining about my loans. Loans are money. Money boils down to math. Math is my friend. It's not what you make, it's what you save. The loans offer me a calculated risk to jump ahead. I could have stayed in the job that I disliked, or I could gain new connections, new skills, and an entirely new set of resume padding items to make me stand out even more from the crowd.

As part of the bottom fifty percent, I encourage you to come down and live on my level. I hold an undergraduate degree from a respected university (rated in the top 50 in the world), have worked for four years in the real world, and now am back in school to continue my education and further my degree (at another top 50 school). I'm living off of less than 20k a year. A wonderful flaw in the government loan system resulted in my summer income (a school research position) being counted one for one against the amount of loan money i could take out this year. In order to pay for tuition, I had to max out my loans, and was left with 200 dollars a month to pay for rent, food, and any school expenses. I'm now, at the advice of the school, on food stamps. Let me tell you, those food stamps - 200 bucks a month - offer me so much more than you can ever imagine. They only pay for food I cook myself. No alcohol, no toiletries, not even the 5 cent bag fee if i forget my bags. However, they allow me to feel like a human. In a few years, I'll be out of grad school, working and pumping far more money into the system than I ever took out. If we taxed the people making more than 200k 36% instead of 33%, they'd still have more than 5 times the amount of money that I live on each year. I work. I work for them. I work doing research to lower energy use, saving money, resources, and perhaps even saving the planet if you're so inclined. Your freeloaders are anything but. Many of us are busting our asses to afford a better life, and one day we will have it. The difference is, we'll damn well be happy to help those below us up. We know how it is down there.

Well played, good sir

Bee's die after stinging, which means that you're losing twenty hives of bees for only $350. That sounds like a huge loss to any bee keeper. That also seems like a hell of a lose of bees that are already suffering from sudden colony collapse... Am I wrong here?

I can't be the only one who thought that "Biophilia" is something you get when you don't use a trojan...

No small task on a planet that has 38% our gravity, an inhospitable atmosphere, and no large scale mining, manufacturing, or fabrication plant. It would take many years and many missions to make the colonies self sustaining. Currently, our closest attempt at living in a closed ecosystem (biosphere-2) resulted in 2 years, with O2 dropping and CO2 rising heavily towards the end of the experiment. Worse yet, the experiment spawned a movie staring Pauly Shore. It's not that I don't believe that we will have the technology eventually, but I can't help but feel that anyone who thinks that we can colonize Mars the way we colonized other continents has no understanding of the issues.

Really? This is based of anecdotal evidence. This statement means nothing. I can think of many ways that the government has regulated things that haven't caused death, but that's as good as saying that they haven't. Here's a more pressing question - at what point should a government step in to regulate something to prevent death. if it prevents the death of 10 people? 100 people? 1000 people? Is there greater benefit in not regulating as the number of people who are killed pales in comparison to the trouble that regulation would cause? Accidents will happen, people will die. Not everything is done without reason. A lot of it is playing the odds, and sometimes, people lose.

This is assuming that a house's wall is a singular item, which is a silly thing to think. Walls contain space for insulation, space for water to drain, wiring, plumbing and HVAC space. Yes, we could build a shelter with this machine, but 3d printing a house would be like 3d printing a maker bot. It may look similar, but until you have the insides built, it won't function. There's also a big issue with reinforcing the concrete. The walls will be primarily in compression which is fine, but if you tried to create multiple levels, the floors in tension would quickly crack under their own weight.

I'm not saying that we'll never 3d print a house, but their proposal shows a lack of understanding of the basic premise.

I often wonder if the real reason they don't post these documents is that they are simply not interesting. Lulzsec and Anonymous are both quick to say that they've hacked into servers, and as they've shown, they've been very good at exploiting holes. However, they seem to be finding holes into low level information, and the "scandal" they find is generally nothing more than mundane information. Do you recall Chinga La Migra? They released tons of personal emails against the Arizona police department, and the only thing that these emails showed is that they were a pretty normal operation, including the fact that this department, too, hires idiots who like to send chain mail through email. So in the end, they found a few gigs of unprotected email, bragged about it, and never bothered to realize that this wonderful treasure trove of information was essentially trash. At best, they created harassment for the officers who, as far as the documents show, weren't involved in anything illegal. The most damaging release of information so far has been usernames and passwords of a porn site, which only exposed the dangers of having the same log in and password information for multiple sites.

To be fair, NPR did post the breakdown of this cost and explanation in the article, near the top. It's also a quote from Steven Anderson, who is "a retired brigadier general who served as Gen. David Patreaus' chief logistician in Iraq." I would argue that man knows what he's talking about, and more importantly, it's his words, not NPR's.

That's one purpose of a window. Thanks to modern building techniques, we have the option to create much larger openings in the facade, and thus you get your typical glass and steel skyscraper. Ever notice that they all have a reflective, metallic tint to them? This is to keep much of the light out, because in a large office building, your interior temperature suffers heavily from the amount of light let in. You also have an issue with glare, which tinting can help with as well. If your solar system reduces the amount of solar gain and the amount of light into the building while still allowing some light/vision/heat in, you can forgo the window tinting, and make the windows even more useful.

Surface area. Most (if not all) homes lack the sq.ft. of glazing required to make a transparent PV array viable.