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Programming

Congress Mulls API For Congressional Data 121

Amerika sends in a Wired blog post on the desire in Congress to make data on lawmaking more easily available to the public. The senator who introduced the language into an omnibus appropriations bill wants feedback on the best way to make (e.g.) the Library of Congress's Thomas data more available — an API or bulk downloads, or both. Some comments on the blog posting call for an authenticated versioning system so we can know unequivocally how any particular language made its way into a bill. "Congress has apparently listened to the public's complaints about lack of convenient access to government data. The new Omnibus Appropriations Bill includes a section, introduced by Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.), that would mark the first tangible move toward making federal legislative data available to the public in bulk, so third parties can mash it up and redistribute it in innovative and accessible ways. This would include all the data currently distributed through the Library of Congress's Thomas web site — bill status and summary information, lists of sponsors, tracking timelines, voting records, etc."
Medicine

New Startup Hopes to Push Open Source Pharmaceuticals 101

waderoush writes "Nothing like the open source computing movement has ever caught fire in biology or pharmaceuticals, where intellectual property is king. But drawing inspiration from the people who make Linux software, and the social networking success of Facebook, Merck's cancer research leader has nailed down $5 million to launch a nonprofit biology platform called Sage, which aims to make it easier for researchers around the world to pool their data to make better drugs. 'We see this becoming like the Google of biological science. It will be such an informative platform, you won't be able to make decisions without it,' says Merck's Eric Schadt, a co-founder of Sage. He adds: 'We want this to be like the Internet. Nobody owns it.'"
Medicine

Why Doctors Hate Science 1064

theodp writes "A 2004 study found some 10 million women lacking a cervix were still getting Pap tests. Only problem is, a Pap test screens for cervical cancer — no cervix, no cancer. With this tale, Newsweek's Sharon Begley makes her case for comparative-effectiveness research (CER), which is receiving $1 billion under the stimulus bill for studies to determine which treatments, including drugs, are more medically sound and cost-effective than others for a given ailment. Physicians, Begley says, must stop treatments that are rooted more in local medical culture than in medical science, embrace practices that have been shown scientifically to be superior to others, and ignore critics who paint CER as government control of doctors' decision-making."

Comment Copy your reviews; then tell them to fuck off (Score 1) 675

Make copies of your reviews and other feedback. Then politely tell them you will be leaving on the date you originally notified them.

Also, you may want to make posts on Glassdoor.com, jobvent.com or other sites that allow you to anonymously provide feedback on the employee experience with specific companies.

Government

Wikileaks Publishes $1B of Public Domain Research Reports 231

laird writes "Wikileaks has released nearly a billion dollars worth of quasi-secret reports commissioned by the United States Congress. The 6,780 reports, current as of this month, comprise over 127,000 pages of material on some of the most contentious issues in the nation, from the U.S. relationship with Israel to abortion legislation. Nearly 2,300 of the reports were updated in the last 12 months, while the oldest report goes back to 1990. The release represents the total output of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) electronically available to Congressional offices. The CRS is Congress's analytical agency and has a budget in excess of $100M per year. Although all CRS reports are legally in the public domain, they are quasi-secret because the CRS, as a matter of policy, makes the reports available only to members of Congress, Congressional committees and select sister agencies such as the GAO. Members of Congress are free to selectively release CRS reports to the public but are only motivated to do so when they feel the results would assist them politically. Universally embarrassing reports are kept quiet."
Earth

Why Sustainable Power Is Unsustainable 1108

Urchin writes "Although scientists are agreed that we must cut carbon emissions from transport and electricity generation to prevent the globe's climate becoming hotter, the most advanced 'renewable' technologies are too often based upon non-renewable resources including indium and platinum — resources that could dry up in 10-15 years if they were widely used in the renewable energy market."
Power

US Becomes Top Wind Producer; Solar Next 388

SpuriousLogic sends along a SciAm piece that begins, "The United States overtook Germany as the biggest producer of wind power last year, new figures showed, and will likely take the lead in solar power this year, analysts said on Monday. Even before an expected 'Obama bounce' from a new President who has vowed to boost clean energy, US wind power capacity surged 50 percent last year to 25 gigwatts — enough to power more than five million homes."
Space

Future of Space Elevator Looks Shaky 486

lurking_giant writes "In a report on NewScientist.com, researchers working on development of a space elevator (an idea we have discussed numerous times) have determined that the concept is not stable. Coriolis force on the moving climbers would cause side loading that would make stability extremely difficult, while solar wind would cause shifting loads on the geostationary midpoint. All of this would likely make it necessary to add thrusters, which would consume fuel and negate the benefits of the concept. Alternatively, careful choreography of multiple loads might ease the instability, again with unknown but negative economic impacts."

Comment Re:Atheism vs Agnosticism vs Creationism... all wr (Score 1) 683

Our understanding has zero bearing on reality. The fact that your conscious of your existence is notable, but does not alter the fact that you exist.

The questions are then just questions about what we can and cannot know... and even then, without complete knowledge of all time and space we cannot be truly certain about anything, so we really just ask questions about what we have seen and learned, make propositions based on that learning, and make decisions based on the reliability of those decisions. In all of that, there is still reality, and as time progresses we face the reality of our decisions.

Plato's Cave illustrates our predicament... we watch the wall from our viewpoint and believe what we see and understand is real. We construct language and thought patterns based on what we see and how we understand it, and yet there may (and in the case of Plato's cave there is) be a greater reality beyond what we see.

Subjecting reality to the logical and linguistic constructs we've deduced from experiencing reality is useful, but not definitive.

We then fall back on having to use what we have learned to determine how the universe is... no answer is provable... we simply make the best decisions we can based on the information we have. Some may believe that a man born 2000 years ago is the Son of God, is God, and has told us about what will was and what will come... others might believe we're in a karmic force and that good and evil struggle for control of existence... others may believe the whole conversation is pointless and refuse to even think about it or discuss it. Either way... as time progresses the truth or folly of their choices will be proven out (although it's certainly possible that no one will know or care).

I think agnosticism is a comfortable and perhaps even logical philosophical position to accept in that it requires no faith, just existence. The hope for an agnostic is that their choices are not in conflict with reality.

Comment Re:Atheism vs Agnosticism vs Creationism... all wr (Score 1) 683

Your argument against creationism based on the idea that you can't have something from nothing fails under your logic for agnosticism. One could be agnostic as to the origins of god/God/gods/force/universe (I'll call this thing God... it depends on your religious/philosophical views what terms and understanding are applied) and use the same basic argumentation you used for the universes existence.

A Christian creationist might argue that God existed, that his being defined the concept of existance and that out of that existence something else was created and that thing was our universe... our little closed box of existence. I think we'd agree that if you existed in a closed system you cannot know anything about anything outside of that system (even whether there is or is not anything) without information from outside of your system being made available to you. This is the typical religious argument... that God has made Himself (or whatever) known in some way. The test of course is how reliable are the claims, are the based in knowable reality, are they somewhat testable, are the claims consistent, etc...

The key point in all of this discussion is that our inability to know has no bearing on the actual truth of the matter.

Censorship

Senate Votes To Empower Parents As Censors 418

unlametheweak recommends an Ars Technica report that the US Senate has unanimously passed a bill requiring the FCC to explore what "advanced blocking technologies" are available to parents to help filter out "indecent or objectionable programming." "...the law does focus on empowering parents to take control of new media technologies to deal with undesired content, rather than handing the job over to the government. It asks the FCC to focus the inquiry on blocking systems for a 'wide variety of distribution platforms,' including wireless and Internet, and an array of devices, including DVD players, set top boxes, and wireless applications."
Microsoft

Microsoft Uses "I'm a PC" Character In New Ads 837

arcticstoat writes to tell us that in the wake of their largely unsuccessful Jerry Seinfeld ad campaign Microsoft is setting their sights directly on recent Apple ads by featuring the "I'm a PC" character in their new advertising campaign. "He then follows this with another phrase, such as 'and I've been made into a stereotype' before the advert shifts to a range of people performing a diverse assortment of jobs, all of which also say they're a PC. Among those featured are astronaut Bernard Harris, as well as religious author Deepak Chopra and 'Desperate Housewives' actress Eva Longoria. The ad also features a wide range of anonymous people, including a shark diver, a teacher and a guy with a beard."
GNU is Not Unix

Richard Stallman Proclaims Don't Follow Linus Torvalds 965

StonyandCher writes "Here is an interview with Richard Stallman about a range of free software topics including GPLv3 and comment on the Microsoft patent issue. Stallman has a go at Linus Torvalds even suggesting that if people want to keep their freedom they better not follow Torvalds. From the interview 'Stallman: The fact that Torvalds says "open source" instead of "free software" shows where he is coming from. I wrote the GNU GPL to defend freedom for all users of all versions of a program. I developed version 3 to do that job better and protect against new threats. Torvalds says he rejects this goal; that's probably why he doesn't appreciate GPL version 3. I respect his right to express his views, even though I think they are foolish. However, if you don't want to lose your freedom, you had better not follow him.'"

Is KDE 4.0 the Holy Grail of Desktops? 511

An anonymous reader writes "With KDE 4.0 being expected some time this year, expectation runs high in the linux/unix users camp and the media read a lot between the lines of what the KDE developers say and do. In some ways KDE will provide a standard as to how a desktop should look and behave. This interesting article wonders whether KDE 4.0 will become the complete desktop which will meet the needs of a wide cross section of computer users. One of the common complaints that some Linux users have over KDE is that it is too cluttered. And by addressing this need without putting off the power users, the KDE developers could make it an all in one Desktop. Keep in mind that KDE 4.0 is based on Qt 4.0 and so can be easily ported to Windows and other OSes too which makes this thought doubly relevant."
Software

Open Source Network Management Beats IBM and HP 100

mjhuot writes "Last week SearchNetworking.com announced their Product Leadership Awards for 2007. It was a pleasant surprise to see an open source project, OpenNMS, win the Gold in their Network and IT Management Platforms category. OpenNMS beat out the established players of Hewlett-Packard's OpenView and IBM's Tivoli. This was based on a user survey of all IT solutions, not just open source; it demonstrates that open source software is indeed making inroads into the enterprise."

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