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Comment Dihydrogen Monoxide. (Score 1, Offtopic) 377

because hybrid seeds are bred for intensive agriculture, they typically need chemicals to thrive

...unlike natural, free-range grains that are invulnerable to pests and thrive under the gentle light of the waxing crescent moon. Sorry, but you lost me at "chemicals". Yes. They're matter-based lifeforms, and need a whole slew of chemicals to exist.

Comment Re:Ok, they got ONE right... (Score 1) 257

roll back IRS harassment powers

If they were smart they would increase IRS funding since it results in something like a 10:1 return rate. You know where the extra money would come from? Tax cheats! People who don't pay their taxes aren't your heros, they are your parasites. While I'm being wistful about things that will never happen, increased funding might even give us more streamlined processes and overcome the turbotax lobby...which for years has been lobbying against simpler taxes that you can do yourself on the IRS website, reducing errors and thus the likelihood the IRS would want to talk to you.

No. The extra money would come from harassing politically "undesirable" non-profits out of existence.

How is LESS complication going to COST MORE? By your standards, someone putting more money into developing a better snow blower would end up with a shovel. Your ideas of how the world works are ass backwards.

Comment Re:I do this with water temp. (Score 1) 136

I always thought this was the pipe, the faucet head and aerator and sink changing temp. Not the water itself.

You can hear the difference between a mug of hot water and a mug of cold water if you tap the outside of the mug with a spoon as well. That doesn't have any turbulent flow to it...

Comment Re:Is it cheating? In CS classes, yes it is (Score 1) 320

The problem isn't necessarily that code was copied directly from the Internet

It might be as simple as that. If the syllabus said "do your own work" and they didn't, then it's cheating. If your calc teacher says "I expect you to do the arithmetic by hand" and you use a calculator, then you're cheating. A classroom is a tiny little environment with its own rules, and violating those rules (even if they seem silly or outdated by those who don't understand them) isn't generally tolerated well.

Comment Re:The Internet Is The Way We All Do It. (Score 1) 320

In a way, using the internet to get the answer is the way it works in IT these days.

Speak for yourself. I don't copy stuff off the Internet because I'm making new things and don't have anyone to copy from. I'd change careers tomorrow if I had a job where copy-and-pasting was the order of the day.

That's assuming you weren't talking about downloading modules to do routine stuff. Sure, I'll use someone else's HTTP request library instead of rolling my own.

Comment Re:type of assignment (Score 2) 320

I've told this story before, but... why not. I used to do my homework with my buddy. We would not copy each other's stuff, but we'd bounce ideas around: "hmm, this problem sort of looks like this thing", and "I'm trying to decide between these two data structures". That kind of stuff. You know, actually learning by thinking things through out loud and considering alternatives.

We had one class with an archetypically CompSci homework assignment, like "simulate a telephone switchboard with M operators, N callers, and X extensions". We each started off with boilerplate like "int operators, callers, extensions", etc., and went from there. When we were finished, we had written the exact same program. I mean, same variables, same functions, same indentation, everything. Probably not surprising given that we'd been doing this for a couple of years by that point, but still.

Fortunately, we had an awesome professor who knew both of us well. He called us each in separately (without saying why) to ask us how our program worked, why we'd made the design choices, and so on - basically interrogating us to see whether we'd actually done the work ourselves. Then he brought us in together, showed us each other's assignments, and watched us stammer in confused terror before he broke down laughing.

That could have gone very, very badly. We didn't cheat in any sense of the word, but it definitely would have looked like it to anyone else.

Comment Re:Benefits, but still misses the point... (Score 1) 698

The front office at Newtowne elementary school did have a pistol in their desk, but they were gunned down before they had a chance to use it. And when you allow staff to have guns, now you have a problem of securing the guns so kids don't break in and take them. Just the kind of stunt that would give the "bad boys" some stature within his crowd.

You know your assertion would carry more weight if you could spell the place right.

Also, citation needed. That little tidbit would have been used by the anti-gunners and the pro-gunners alike. So, nobody is going to believe you without some reputable sources to link to.

Comment Re:Wonderful idea. (Score 1) 698

A subsonic round indicates the velocity of the projectile. This will pick up the sound of the propelant escaping the gun's muzzel and possibly measure differences in pressure of the atmosphere (which would likely only be effective in buildings). As long as there is a shot sound, it should pick it up.

A silencer could possibly escape detection and none firearm type weapons too. For instance a modified potato cannon that shoots .17 cal projectiles may have a completely different sound profile.

Comment Re:In other words. (Score 1, Informative) 127

First, the FCC is not under the executive branch. It was set up and remains separate. Second, i challenge you to show where the law allows the FCC to change its mind and all the sudden start regulating something more strictly than it previously has. The constitution has no provisions for congress to ingore its responsibility to create law and pass that to regulatory agencies to dictate defacto law outside the constitutional process.

Finally, i do not really care if congress is disfunctional or not. That is only a small problem to fix compared to extra constitutional dictatorships. If congress wants internet to be included under a different regulatory scheme, they need to act.

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