Eric Raymond's famous essays on relationships and the modern geek: http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/sextips/

I'm just amazed they found somebody willing to pay almost $5 per minute for long distance.

"So you shouldn't have to know how to solve a given problem yourself, in a vacuum, because in the "real world" we have reference books and other people to collaborate with."

This may come a surprise, but in the real world, problems are not handed down by some giant professor in the sky. Quantifying and defining the problem, taking data, developing solutions and testing, engineering the solution into something that can be manufactured, managing costs, these are all part of the process. A 45-minute test does nothing to develop these skills.

Sure, there is value in learning what others have done. The classsroom test format might encourage students to do that. But don't kid yourself into thinking that taking tests is comparable to original thought, and that somehow working alone will qualify you to find the answers to real-world questions. The days when scientists and engineers could succeed in isolation passed in the early 20th century. In this century, great scientists and engineers also have to be great leaders.

I would go even further and suggest that universities should be teaching students to solve difficult problems, that are not simple or trivially time-limited, with access to a universe of references and a team of skilled engineers. Problems that are so difficult that many will fail, and yet learn from that failure. Solving a difficult problem as a team is the only skill that matters, and the only skill that will matter. Teach students how to do *that*, and you'll be building leaders, not loners.

Sure, but that real reward is intangible to the student. It might be nice to think that students will learn "for the ultimate rewards", but the ultimate rewards are a consequence of the immediate rewards: high GPA means a shot at NSF Grant, Battelle scholarships to grad school, a great looking resume, good recommendations from professors, etc. If you don't get those, then the good opportunities don't come.

"And how much did they retain a month later, would you think, compared with those who didn't? That's the real point of getting an education, you know, not just grades." I would assert that, as long as the reward consists of grades, then the learned behavior will be "getting better grades". Teachers and professors complain about this problem all the time: students are "grade grubbing", they "fight for every point", etc, etc. But who created this form of reward? Certainly not students. If you're going to distill months of work -- and ultimately years of work -- into a single numerical measure, you can be damn sure that I'm going to seek every possible advantage to increase that number. Drugs are just one angle.

The browser on the iPhone is a revelation. It's the first small-format browser that has generated the same sense of "flow" that I get from a full-size browser. I sit down to use it after lunch then look up surprised when 40 minutes have gone by and I'm late for my next meeting.

You're right. We should feed him to the newly cloned Ibex. To address the original poster's point more clearly, I don't think anybody is doing this with the goal of repopulating the species, although they may claim it for funding purposes. They're really just trying to push the cloning envelope, and a recently-extinct goat is a perfectly good excuse to experiment.

Unfortunately KB950582 was not classified as a required security patch for Windows XP, and consequently not included for distribution in Windows Update or WSUS.

Far too few new college students (I ran a college help desk so I interviewed and hired a lot of them) understand the basic procedural operation of computer programs. The solution is to start young with simple environments (think LOGO) that limit complexity, but they are not "canned" in the sense that they walk the student through every problem.

And today, I'd say that even typing & text should not be requirements. Use graphic elements to build programs from simple blocks, laying out the high-level problem solving procedure before you teach kids how to write the blocks themselves.

I know I'm a bit late to the party here, but as the father of a disabled child who very much loves computer games, I have a lot of experience and opinion on this issue.

(1) Best computer we've found so far is the Samsung Q1 Ultra. Touchscreen, light, reasonably tough, good battery life. You can get an Otterbox external plastic shell that makes it reasonably smack-resistant.

(2) My son's favorite site is www.poissonrouge.com, which works very well with the touchscreen.

RR

Copernicus' realization that the Sun was the center of the universe was revolutionary, even if not mathematically correct by modern standards. The prevailing cosmology, which the church was more than happy to throw people in jail for questioning, was that the Earth was the center of the universe because it was created by God as the divine home for Man. The stars were not known to be like the Sun; they were believed to be lights pinned into the divine firmament.

The history of science is littered with theories that are known to be incorrect, but were more correct than their predecessors. Most of the time, the center of rotation of the solar system lies within the surface of the Sun, so the Sun can be truly said to be the center of the solar system. At the time, Copernicus would have believed that it was therefore the center of the universe.

> 1 TRILLION dollar debt

Off by an order of magnitude. That's a 1 trillion dollar deficit, a 10 trillion dollar accumulated debt.