The news report, contrary to the summary, states that part one terminal - not the whole airport - was shut down and that for only 40 minutes. The costs would be borne by the airline in terms of possible employee and fuel overtime since some planes must have been delayed.

No. Board passes all checks and later fails. Imagine a weak solder joint for instance.

I don't think that this is the kind of soldering job that an enthusiast could do, unless you happen to be up for reflow soldering.

I haven't ever replaced a socketed CPU, but I have added one. My work machine only had a single 4-core CPU, but had an empty socket, so now I'm running dual CPU! Its a nice way to future-proof a computer, especially since the second CPU might be purchased at a lower price or as budget allows. (Yes, I do use all 8 cores.)

You're assuming fixed demand for leather products and meat, independent of price. If there is additional supply leather from bio-reactor production, the price of leather is likely to decline until it reaches a point where all leather produced is purchased. Econ 101. You may indeed end up paying more for meat because some people buy bio-engineered leather rather than the traditional variety. This price increase is likely to decrease meat consumption, so the beef industry will kill fewer cows.

Creation of new nerve cells (neurons) in the adult human brain has only been only confirmed in a couple areas. (Granule cells of the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus, an area involved in forming new memories and cells which migrate to the olfactory bulb.) Much searching in other places including studies looking at uptake of radioactive particles from atmospheric nuclear bomb testing has shown that if new neurons are created in other areas, the rate must be extremely low. The plasticity of the adult nervous system comes from forming new connections between neurons, pruning existing connections, changing the strength of those connections and changing the sensitivity of a neuron to inputs. This forming of new connections and changing of connection strengths between neurons is lifelong and robust and is key to adult learning. Research that showed "critical periods" for certain kinds of brain development, such as binocular vision, led some to assume that this meant that new learning was more limited than it is and this idea sometimes got mixed in with the rarity of new neuron growth as a limit to plasticity. All that said, early intervention can be hugely helpful as the young brain is much more plastic than the adult brain.

The treatment regimen for the mice was to stop suppressing the gene that they had attached a chemically activated genetic switch to, so this particular treatment would not be applicable to humans who haven't been genetically engineered from birth to have this switch in the first place. If it were possible to insert a copy of this gene into humans with the proper regulation that might be a route for treatment, but the regulation bit is critical and difficult and I believe beyond what we can do with current technology. Perhaps someone who actually knows genetics might be able to comment on this question better than I.

They do suggest that there could be treatments for this genetic defect. They mention that drugs that block the (metabotropic) glutamate receptor "might hold promise for designing treatment strategies for non-syndromic autism," since the gene in question regulates this glutamate receptor.

The cool thing about the paper is that is showed that they could "rescue" the mice by turning on the gene switch and they were able to see that the mice recovered typical function at a cellular level and at a behavioral level, suggesting that if it were possible to re-enable this gene in humans that you might see some similar effects.

PS If you want to read the original paper, post here and I'll send you the pdf.

I'm not sure I'd want to give all robots rights ... until they earn them!

First, this is not an OnStar rental service. This is RelayRides adding a feature, allowing people with OnStar equipped vehicles to easily participate in their service without having to have the special module from RelayRides installed. The module provides the GPS, network connection and locking/unlocking capability which is all stuff that the OnStar system is capable of. RelayRides restricts its service to renters with at least two years of driving experience and a clean driving record. I don't know what they consider clean and I don't think this is configurable. You also have the option of being able to look at a renter's history and feedback on the site before choosing whether to rent to them.

Yes and the offender is charged for the damage. Also, in business you gotta take the good with the bad. You usually get good renters, and sometimes get bad renters, but you always get paid. Hopefully you're satisfied with your returns on your investment.

From the RelayRides Terms for Renters. (Answers this question and some related ones.)

"12. Fees. You are responsible for paying all fees when they come due in connection with your use of the service. You give permission to RelayRides to charge your credit card for all amounts due including but not limited to usage fees, fines/penalties, deductibles and damages. You will be responsible for payment of usage fees from the start of your rental period until the time you return the car. You will be responsible for all of the costs relating to any citations and fines (e.g. tolls, parking tickets, towing fines) incurred during the rental period (and after if the car has not been parked in an authorized and legal parking space). You are also responsible for any insurance deductibles that are related to damage or liability incurred during the rental period. "

From the RelayRides web site: "If you return the car more than 30 minutes after the scheduled return time then you will be charged $25 for every 1/2 hour past the expected return time." Since you're required to return the car to its home or within 1/4 mile (400 meters) of its home if the car doesn't have a dedicated spot, I'm guessing that leaving the car across town will incur fines, half of which go to the owner.

If you get a car that isn't what you expected, you can leave a bad review. Also, you can decide not to rent that car again. Owners have a strong incentive to take care of their vehicles to get new renters and to keep old renters coming back.

Insurance is covered by RelayRides and usually explicitly not covered by owners policies when renting out a car.

For non-obvious damage your choice on whether to rent your car depends on your appetite for risk. Compensation for that risk part of what you're getting from your rental fee. This might not be enough for you, especially if you have an expensive car or an emotional attachment to your vehicle.

Yeah, but at work you don't know who the scoundrel is. With RelayRides, there is accountability for obvious abuse, since owners can leave reviews of renters. Owners can simply refuse to rent to bad renters. Renters driving records are also checked, prior to being accepted.

RelayRides does offer manual transmission cars, too. They're not too common, but clearly indicated.

Right where the GPS says he left it. Yep, RelayRides rentals are GPS equipped. This way renters and owners can find the car easily. I used it recently when my car was in the shop. Relay Rides gave me a link to the GPS coodinates of the car. Click to Google Maps and there's the car. I returned close to its home and I was all done.

Great point about my proposal being a weak form of digital currency.

I believe there is still an important role for paper money and that its security can be improved. The advantage of the system I proposed is that it maintains the ease of use of the current paper system, while adding optional validation. The nice bit is that not everyone has to validate to make successfully distributing counterfeit bills substantially more difficult.

The question that interests me the most is whether counterfeiters could effectively overcome the problem of distributing counterfeit bills without revealing their source in a world with occasional validation.