GRW - Slashdot User

Submission + - Why This Universe? (skeptic.com) 3

Submitted by

GRW

on Wednesday June 27, 2007 @01:11PM

GRW writes: "The current issue of Skeptic Magazine has an article by Robert Lawrence Kuhn entitled "Why This Universe: Toward a Taxonomy of Possible Explanations". Why does the universe exist? Why not nothing? Why are the physical laws and constants what they are and not something else? The author classifies the many possible scientific and non-scientific explanations for this question into four catagories: One Universe Models, Multiple Universe Models, Non-Physical Causes and Illusions."

Submission + - Teacher Convicted of Exposing Students to Popups

Submitted by

Bulldozer2003

on Wednesday February 14, 2007 @12:58AM

Bulldozer2003 writes: "A Connecticut teacher has been convicted and faces up to 40 years in prison after children in the classroom saw pornographic popups on a computer. Her defense, backed up by a computer consultant, says that malware from a hair-styling site brought up the popups. Possibly caused by the school's expired firewall/antivirus license. The prosecution argued she went to offending sites herself. From the article:
"Amero says that before her class started, a teacher allowed her to e-mail her husband. She says she used the computer and went to the bathroom, returning to find the permanent teacher gone and two students viewing a Web site on hair styles.
Amero says she chased the students away and started class. But later, she says, pornographic images started popping up on the computer screen by themselves. She says she tried to click the images off, but they kept returning, and she was under strict orders not to shut the computer off.
...
"What is extraordinary is the prosecution admitted there was no search made for spyware — an incredible blunder akin to not checking for fingerprints at a crime scene," Alex Eckelberry, president of a Florida software company, wrote recently in the local newspaper. "When a pop-up occurs on a computer, it will get shown as a visited Web site, and no 'physical click' is necessary.""

Submission + - CPCC to re-tax MP3 players

Submitted by RIAAend on Wednesday February 14, 2007 @12:35AM

RIAAend writes: After the Federal Court of Appeal struck down the levy for MP3 players, Canadian Private Copying Collective decided to lobby the government for $5 to $75 for each portable music player. When will they ever learn?

Submission + - Linux Arrives on 50,000 Brazilian Desktops

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13, 2007 @11:29PM

An anonymous reader writes: Three companies in Brazil have begun deploying tens of thousands of Linux-powered desktop PCs for the Brazilian federal government's Computers for All program. The ready-to-use PCs reportedly include the Linux XP Desktop operating system. Estimated monthly deployment reportedly is about 10,000 desktops, with 50,000 desktops already delivered. The full scope of the project was not indicated.

SCO Vs. Groklaw 477

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday February 13, 2007 @11:15PM from the timely-break dept.

Conrad Mazian points us to an article in Forbes reporting that the SCO Group is trying to subpoena Pamela Jones of Groklaw. Except they can't find her. A few days ago PJ posted a note on Groklaw saying that she is taking some time away from the blog for health reasons; she didn't mention any SCO deposition. SCO's lawyers apparently believe that "Pamela Jones" does not exist and that Groklaw is penned by a team of IBM lawyers.

Submission + - Kansas Evolution Teaching Returned

Submitted by

kwietman

on Tuesday February 13, 2007 @09:39PM

kwietman writes: "In a reversal of a 2005 policy that made Kansas the laughing stock of the nation, educational science standards have been rewritten to reflect current evolutionary theory, without language supported by proponents of intelligent design which claimed that current research challenged the scientific legitimacy of evolution. (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17132925/) The new standards, the fifth revision in eight years, are free of any references to the supposed "controversy" over natural selection, and also reverses the redefinition of science to reflect only "the search for natural explanations of what is observed in the universe." The Kansas board of education has been the butt of jokes since the earlier decision, and both educator groups and science advocates loudly decried the action as political maneuvering by creationists rather than supportable science. The decision about what to teach in classrooms still rests with the 296 local school boards, but the new standards place strong guidelines on what is expected in order to comply with mandatory state testing of students. An additional action taken by the current board removes a paragraph describing abuses of science such as Nazi experimentation and the Tuskegee syphilis study, stating that these descriptions do not reflect on the teaching of the origins of life or on the discipline of science in general."