Saying "the government" this and "the government" that masks the fact that the government is made of of people who make decisions based on a number of motivating factors, not the least of which is getting reelected. So blaming "the government" is deflecting the true issue, which is that the general populace in this country have been poorly educated (maliciously or not, depending on which side of the aisle you sit on) as to the importance of funding science in a significant way and making the results openly available. Throw in a significant helping of a "shove your taxes up your a$$ and keep your hands off MY money" mentality, and funding for public research dries up. We vote for whomever says they will let us keep more of our money without regard for the long term costs of the resulting policies, which we are ill-equipped to evaluate (hence our general dependence on a political party and/or religion to tell us how to think).

Having that open research available does not, as some here seem to want to argue, stifle the fires of inovation, it provides fuel for it. Availability of more knowledge begets ever more knowledge, and there will be ways to profit from that without having to lock it all up in the safes of mega-corporations. Think about where medical science and big pharma is today without having had to previously patent genes. And is anyone seriously going to argue that big pharma will just abandon all research based on gene therapies if these patents are disallowed? Really?

I only really use algebra and maybe some trig from high school for the vast majority of what I do as a software engineer working mostly on embedded systems. Without a very strong grounding in those subjects, I wouldn't be able to do what I do.

But that doesn't mean that high school math is sufficient. Without the calculus and discrete math classes I had, I don't think I would have nearly as strong a basis in the "lower" levels of math that I need regularly, even though I remember very little calculus. And to be perfectly honest, I feel at a disadvantage at times in not having a broader knowledge of some of the higher math concepts. That would provide me with a richer tool set from which to pull solutions. But that can be said also for other fields entirely, like biology. Many of the more interesting problem solutions require interdisciplinary knowledge; think about genetic algorithms and such. I haven't the first clue about genetic algorithms so they don't exist in my toolbox, which is unfortunate.

So the question of what math is used by SW engineers on a daily basis won't necessarily get you a useful answer. As cliche as it sounds, the broader your knowledge base, the better able you will be to solve types of problems that you can't possibly anticipate while you're in school, even if you know exactly what field you want to go into. I don't regret a single second of the math classes I took; on the contrary, I wish I had taken more (especially after taking the Crypto class from Coursera).

Find a lightweight aluminum box at a craft store (try the rubber stamp aisle) that will fit the e-reader, line it with some foam from the same store for a snug but not tight fit, then put the e-reader in a ziplock bag inside the box. That should protect it from just about anything you can throw at it. Should be very inexpensive, also. If it gets broken, you've got bigger problems to worry about.

My wife has used her Kindle in the bathtub inside a ziplock bag without any complaints. A clean ziplock does not obscure the screen enough to really even notice.

I wish I had moderator points right now just for this comment. +2 hilarious.

+1 insightful for the post as a whole.

Actually, I think the possibility of discovering life on other planets is exactly what drives a disappointingly large percentage of the population to *not* care about science. Might mess with their whole world view and all that. Some of them haven't fully accepted the round-earth-orbiting-the-sun thing, life eveloving on other planets would just lead to apoplexy.

I suppose it was inevitable that someone would ask this question, although I would have thought it would be pretty worn out at this point. The phrasing of your question implies that one side has to be right and the other wrong, which is a false dichotomy. Provocative dress, either male or female, is not appropriate in many workplaces, especially professional cube-farms. The offender should be told to be more moderate. But provocative dress does not green-light ape-ish behavior, either. Discipline is appropriate in both cases. And I don't think one should have any bearing on the other, mostly in the sense that, for example, how a woman is dressed should have no bearing on how serious sexually harassing remarks from a male coworker might be taken.

Balance. I don't want to work in a toxic environment, but nor do I want to work in a completely sterile one. Over 20+ years of my career, I've never had to work in either sort of environment. I'm not aware of a single complaint in all of that time among my peers (so any complaints that may have occurred would have been between a very small group about a very specific incident, not about the general culture). At one job, we all had to attend mandatory sexual harassment training, but that was mostly in response to the lawsuit brought by the HR VP/former mistress of the CEO. I'm sure that in that time, things were said that offended some (even me), but not so much as to warrant a complaint, and certainly not endemic to the culture.

There may be a somewhat justified fear of having to live in sterile environments simply because, of the two extremes, the sterile one doesn't raise the specter of lawsuits. Society is too quick to impose zero-tolerance rules to avoid any chance of litigation (look at some of the ridiculous crap that happens in schools--suspensions for carrying Midol? Really?). That hasn't invaded any place where I've worked, but then as a rule, everyone I've worked with has been respectful in the workplace (and believe me, some of them were real jerks outside of work, definitely not the kind of people I would socialize with). Perhaps I've just been very lucky, but I hope not.

Okay, I can't disagree with this point. I really dislike PETA and the NRA because of their public extremism and tend to view the whole organization in a negative way. But I try to be careful not to extrapolate from too small a sample size. I know a member of PETA personally who does not espouse such extreme views, and since I haven't personally talked to a large percentage of members, I'm unwilling to assume they all match the profile painted mostly by the media (not blaming the media, they just tend to report the more extreme actions and beliefs of the group). On the flip side, I'm not willing to give the organization as a whole the benefit of the doubt, either.

I don't really understand why you think women, in order to be treated equally, have to put up with sexist bullshit. You back up that supposition with the false argument that you have to put up with bullshit, so they should also. You *don't* have to put up with bullshit any more than I do. You have the same recourse they do if you feel like the environment you are in is unreasonably abusive in any way. For example, if I was in a group of all non-blacks and some or many of the members were openly racist, I would not tolerate that. In your view I should just suck it up and quit my job because I don't agree with the majority. I hope you can see how wrong that view is.

The really difficult thing in this discussion is where to draw the line between acceptable and non-acceptable behavior. There are those (like you) who would rather not have a line at all and make all behavior acceptable, which I think is a response to the belief (real or perceived) that there are those who want the line so tightly draw that almost all behavior is unacceptable. Neither is correct, there has to be a reasonable middle ground. Unfortunately, there's far too little actual reason these days, so perhaps I'm asking way too much.

That's not the world we live in. If I were interviewing a woman (or anyone, for that matter) and she asked me if the environment was sexually charged ("like a frat house"), I would politely decline to answer and immediately talk with HR after the interview. Sure, maybe she's just trying to get an idea of whether she would feel comfortable or not, or maybe she's looking for an opportunity to sue and get a small settlement. The question itself is inappropriate given the legal environment that exists right now, and no answer I could give would be the right answer.

I didn't mean to imply that I was discriminated against or harassed, only that I had the "opportunity" to get a better appreciation for what it's like to be in the minority. I never felt obviously discriminated against and was very careful not to let any paranoia (and I'm certain there was some) override documentable observations. It's hard not to feel like maybe someone from the majority might be looked upon more favorably at review time or whatnot, but that is likely as much due to internal prejudices (however slight) as reality, at least in my case.

The problem with labels like "modern feminism" is that it allows for grossly oversimplifying the discussion. All you've done here is expose your own beliefs about what women might be thinking and charicatured them in the process.

How many interviews have you been on where the interviewer explained that all your potential coworkers like to make raunchy jokes and talk about female body parts, and if you don't like that kind of environment then you should quit the interview process? I more than positively sure you've never had such an interview. So how is this hypothetical interviewee supposed to know what the environment is like when they accept a position (ignoring the fact that the company would almost surely be sued for intimidating/offending/harassing a job applicant)?

So the fact that false accusations have been made in some cases means we have to scrap the whole concept of harassment? What a stupid implication. Should all rape accusations be dismissed because some woman somewhere falsely accused someone of raping her? Obviously not. And read the OP more closely. He clearly believes that the work environment will abusive, not that some woman is going to come in and decide to retire on the settlement proceeds from a false sexual harassment claim.

Vilifying Political Correctness is used far too often, as in this case, as an excuse to be a disrespectful ass. Sure, there are lots of cases I'm sure you could dig up of PC gone amok, but this isn't one of them.

Says the guy who's obviously never been in the minority position in an uncomfortable environment.

I've always felt like I had a reasonable understanding of what it might feel like to be in such a minority position, at least in an intellectual sense, but it wasn't until I worked in a fairly large team that was >60% Indian and 20% Chinese (myself being white) that I truly understood it. So unless you've "walked a mile in her shoes", you're in no position to criticise a woman who feels uncomfortable in a group of men who act like crude sexist jerks (while claiming not to be). I'm not a big fan of zero-tolerance PC policies, but I do strongly believe in having respect for others, and if that means no sexual innuendo or whatever, I'm fine with that.

And note that in the OP's case, it may very well be that the woman that joins the group is perfectly comfortable in that environment, but that's a decision she gets to make, like it or not. Where I work now, there are women who can dish it out just as well as the guys (and seem to enjoy doing so), but we're all aware of what others are comfortable with. It's a natural part of simply being respectful.

The converse of "work" intruding on "personal time" via our gadgets is "life" intruding on "work time" via those same gadgets. How many people check their facebook accounts, read slashdot, respond to emails/IMs/texts from friends/family, etc while at work? So we might as a general rule not really be working many, if any, more hours, we're just blurring the transition between work and non-work. Whether this is welcomed as flexibility or despised for allowing employers to take advantage is really up to individual perspective.

I had a different experience. Had a blood test, 1500+ triglycerides (under 200 is "normal"). Doctor said I was in for serious trouble if I didn't fix it. Gave me a couple of options, one to take Niacin, the other to change my lifestyle from non-vegetable, meat-eating couch potato to healthy eater with lots of exercise. I took Niacin for 90 days, during which I lost 40 lbs and went from completely winded after running 100 yds to running 10ks (in addition to swimming, biking, lifting weights). Triglycerides dropped well into normal range (100), stopped taking Niacin, and have been doing well since, as long as I keep up with a reasonable diet and exercise.

Many, perhaps most, people will not do what I did. I have a *very* strong preference to avoid drugs if at all possible (I don't drink alcohol mostly for that reason), so I could motivate myself to make an extreme change in my lifestyle. You had a crappy doctor for not even discussing the alternatives, but if I were a doctor and had patient after patient saying, "exercise every day, lose 40lbs, eat vegetables with every meal, are you kidding?", I might get tired of wasting the time making the suggestion, too.

So, while your doctor may have been getting incentives to offer drugs, it's just as likely he was playing the odds that you weren't capable of doing what you did. Kudos, by the way, for not being a lazy asshole taking expensive drugs just so you could avoid changing an unhealthy lifestyle.