So what you are telling us is that the system is so rigged that in Oregon that it is able to suppress 40% of the population from voting for the labeling initiatives?

No. I'm saying the political system you find in the United States is designed to minimize participation by the public.

I'm curious, do you happen to know what the voter turnout was for that Oregon initiative? Let's say it was 1/2 of all registered voters. Since the election came down to a few hundred votes, that means 25% made policy for the state. This is by design. Even in blue states, universal suffrage is frowned upon.

Evolution is just a theory. I demand it be labeled on textbooks.

Um, it is labeled in textbooks. It's called the "theory of evolution".

A study once found a link between vaccines and autism. I demand that parents be informed prior to vaccinating their kids.

But a study is not a fact. If a food contains GMO product, it is an undeniable fact that the food contains GMO product. The study showing the link between autism and vaccines has been disproved, but you cannot make a food that contains GMOs not contain GMOs

Thing is, a fact taken out of context and presented to those without the basic background information is deceptive.

In that case, it is incumbent upon the person selling the product to provide that "basic background information" rather than simply hide the fact. No?

Between a bit better language design and superior support and tools, CUDA is way easier to do your work in. We've 4 labs that use CUDA in one fashion or another, none that use OpenCL. A number have tried it (also tried lines like the Cell cards that IBM sold for awhile) but settled on CUDA as being the easiest in terms of development. Open standards are nice and all but they've got shit to do and never enough time to do it, so whatever works the easiest is a win for them.

On a different side of things, I've seen less issues out of nVidia on CUDA than AMD on OpenCL for video editing. Sony Vegas supports both for accelerating video effects and encoding. When I had an AMD card, it was crashes all the time with acceleration on. Sony had to disable acceleration on a number of effects with it. I had to turn it off to have a usable setup. With nVidia, I find problems are very infrequent.

Obviously this is one one data point and I don't know the details of development. However it is one of the few examples I know of a product that supports both APIs.

The food/chemical industry? This "survey" was done by a University.

It's funny that you think that makes a difference in the US. That you are so naive as to believe there is some magical invisible wall between corporations and the "research" they fund.

I haven't been keeping close watch, but I believe that every time a GMO labeling referendum has been put on the ballot, it has failed to pass.

Because elections in the US are designed to prevent people from voting.

A majority of voters in Oregon just voted down a GMO labelling law.

Now I bet if you thought about it, you could figure out why that statement is not true.

If it can only be used to discriminate in a particularly stupid way, then perhaps it should.

You understand that consumers get to discriminate regarding the products they buy, and for whatever reason they want.

If someone doesn't care for Apple laptops, but Apple laptops are better, should they not be able to "discriminate" between Apple and non-Apple products? Since I don't like green socks, should I not be allowed to see the color of the socks I'm buying because I might "discriminate" against green socks, even though they perform exactly the same function as blue socks?

Nobody, not even the most ardent supporter of GMO foods, can claim that the GMO plants are bio-identical to the non-GMO plants, because if that was the case, how the fuck can they be covered by intellectual property laws?

And who the fuck gets to decide what information a consumer may have and what they may not? You? Monsanto?

we believe we have a chance to win and break the political party stronghold for good

That'll last all of about 5 minutes after election, should he win. Then he realizes he has to spend all but about 1/2 hour a day asking rich people for money. One of the senior members of the state legislature will sit him down and explain how everything works and the next thing you hear from Mr Fark is how climate change is a hoax, coal is the cleanest form of energy and the Second Amendment was passed down to Moses direct from God. And how human life starts at the very moment the man's sperm endows the less-important woman's egg with the glory of Jesus, so STFU, you reproductive choice cows.

This is kind of a dishonest way for the food/chemical industry to try to push an agenda. Most people don't listen to the questions they're asked. They start thinking of an answer before the question has even been completely asked. I'll be most were really answering the question, "Do you support mandatory labeling of food that's been grown using intellectual property developed by companies that are famous for creating the world's most deadly products?" And the answer to that question about labeling of GMOs is always over 90% when the public is asked.

I can understand that faced with such overwhelming public sentiment for labeling that the chemical/food industrial complex would try anything to turn things around, but this is pretty underhanded. The fact is that consumers overwhelmingly want one little bit of information, as innocuous ask the little kosher "K" commonly on food labels. A simple yes/no to the question, "Does somebody own the intellectual property on the corn in this cereal?" is apparently so dangerous that the answer must be forbidden to consumers at all costs.

It can never be "pro-science" for information to be withheld from consumers. Even if that information is inconvenient to certain powerful corporations.

Why does industrial control still use DOS? Can you even boot a modern computer into DOS or is industrial control using DOSbox?

I guess it doesn't matter. Practically every tool ever invented by man is still in use somewhere, for something.

NTSC stuff is so bad when viewed on a large TV. It is amazing how blurry things look when you flip back and forth between the HD and SD channels. That is part of what lead to the rise of big screen TVs was actually having content for them. With NTSC, a large TV just meant a big blurry image. With ATSC it can mean a nice large image.

Why shouldn't they continually improve their products? Even with NTSC sets this was done. New ones would be larger, have better focus, more clearly resolve the signal, have better phosphors, and so on. Why shouldn't this continue? They should keep trying to improve their products as technology allows.

None of that means you need to buy a new toy all the time though. You can stick with what you have until it breaks, or until the new stuff is a big enough leap that you wish to own it.

I think a lot of the whining from people comes down to simple jealousy. They'd like to own the new stuff, but cannot afford it, or do not wish to. So they try and hate on it and act like a luddite. You see it practically any time Slashdot has a story on new technology. People complain about it like it is somehow a bad thing that there might be something new.

not everyone pays for their electricity

So as long as your parents are paying for the electricity, all those bitcoins are just free money? Wow. Why isn't everybody mining bitcoins? It would end world poverty!

Most panels in higher end screens are actually real 120fps panels. However that is just used for 3D and for reduced motion blur. The only set I know that advertises support for 120fps input is Vizio. Others could do it, if they wanted to, however.

As you say, the issue with higher refresh rates isn't in the display technology.

Part of it is just getting people used to the idea I think. We've seen shitty, jerky, frame rates in moves for so long people start to associate that with being "cinematic". People need to get used to the idea that's bullshit and maybe they'll start to like it more.

Hopefully sports and such will get shot at 60fps some day and that may help.

You know, when something says that we are so close to destruction for over half a century... well you have to wonder why anyone would put any stock in it. It is a bit hard to reconcile with being on the edge of destruction, and yet everything continuing to not be destroyed.