Rubbish. You can derive modern technology from scratch in a few hundred years: all you need is a society that can support thinkers, printing to distribute ideas, and free trade to generate the wealth to make it happen.

Anonymous coward, I'd like you to meet the United States. I'm sure you'll get on :D

Also, freedom.

You must be careful when slagging Americanisms. Many simply reflect the original usage. Plough is Old English - ploh - and 'plow' was equally common until the 18th century.

Actually, it's about ethics in games journalism.

You don't get injured by the airbag, you get injured by not wearing a seatbelt. You can crash into a brick wall head on at 100+mph with a seatbelt and airbag and walk away; with just an airbag you're toast. Mandatory seatbelts would make more of a difference than airbags have.

It's about the excess of risk. Thirty years ago or more, when all cars were equally stealable, you could charge the same theft premium for all of them because they were all equally easy to steal and there is a relatively fixed amount of theft in total. When only *one* model is easy to steal, that model *will* be stolen, and hence insuring it means a premium equal to the cost of the vehicle.

And flipping it around, if it's smarter than us and it decides it needs to destroy us, maybe it has a point.

Equally, you could take it as read that he has considered obvious things like "don't put it there". It's hardly that difficult a solution to come up with. I understand your thirst for knowledge but sometimes an answer to the question is all that's required.

Flamebait, really?

Well, not exactly. They've simply said explicitly they intend to go on investing their profits in the long term in pursuit of growth. They're free to do so and their investors are free to agree or disagree. Their competitors can do the same thing (and have access to the same sources of finance), but they simply wish to keep repaying profits to investors than invest, which is a legitimate choice.

Several reasons. Firstly, people don't simply move to the cheapest tax location, as being in America gives you access to things like...well, I don't know why people like being in America, but many of you plainly do. Secondly, because there's no real evidence that a basic income would cause people either to stop working or to choose not to work. Thirdly, characterising taxation as theft is sophistry. Clearly some uses of tax are more worthy than others; that doesn't make the principle unjust of itself. Fourthly, we already tax rich people and give it to the poor, in various forms. Fifthly, who said anything about stopping people leaving?

Yeah, they should probably consider keeping it safe, by, I don't know, building a big metal cage around it.

Simply swear allegiance to Her Majesty and I'm sure we'd welcome you back with open arms ;)

I don't know what your experience of fighting forces is, and maybe that's the experience you had if you did serve, but it certainly is not mine. The larger part of soldiering is solving problems under constraints.

Actually, modern full scale combat is going a long way towards reducing the number of people who will be killed in conflict. The point of ground warfare is to take and dominate ground and systems like this make it happen more quickly and efficiently. That's a good thing.