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Comment Re:Points at Lauren Weinstein (Score 1) 221

Well without the cameras what hope would be had? You shouldn't expect privacy in public. If everyone has wearable cameras the criminals and police knows they are subject to multiple witnesses. Recording needs to be done before a crime takes place so that the perps are caught in the act and can be traced. What good are aftermath videos?

Comment Instant info access won't make us smart or better (Score 1) 629

Instant access to information won't make us smart or better decision makers. We are still subject to our emotions, and our curiosities, and our desires. Also, raw knowledge is not wisdom. I am reminded of a quote from Picasso .. "Computers are useless, they can only give you answers not questions" .. So yeah if we don't correctly and deeply query our information or understand how to trust it .. the information provided will not improve our decisions.

Comment Re:Correction: (Score 1) 344

OK I understand the part about the 50K debt .. BUT .. if you are on welfare how does the debt get paid off? Why not work for $60K or whatever it is that the H1B workers are getting paid? If you don't live extravagant, you can pay off $50K in debt on $60K in about 10 years .. so why is working for that amount bad? $60K is $40K per year more than what retail workers are getting paid. I mean, if it was up to me I think people who work the cash register at McDonald's should get paid $100K, and so do retail workers at walmart. Now that's the salary they deserve .. I mean you can't argue that a walmart worker is any less of a decent human being than a STEM graduate .. BUT .. the walmart worker is forced to work for the salary that the market demand and competition has determined the value of their work to be. Should a walmart worker resent the presence of other retail workers who are causing his wage to go down?

By the way, the average H1B at Cisco and certain other silicon valley high tech companies gets about $120K (I googled H1B salaries). The wages vary wildly according to location.

I'll sidetrack here .. Should a walmart worker resent the presence of other retail workers who are causing his wage to go down? No. Because the more workers we have the lower the costs of production are and that same walmart worker knows that their salary can go further due to the fact that there are so many other retail workers.

Comment Re:And it begins (Score 1) 531

I didn't say products should be free. People will have to pay for the manufactured goods.

Think of it this way -- it's the same as working. Instead of you physically going to work and getting a paycheck. Your robot does it for you.

The economy functions fine with workers and companies right? Why wouldn't it function with robotic workers and companies?

People who make bad investment choices will be worse off than those who make wiser choices. Hopefully nobody will starve, because government will have enough tax revenue for a welfare scheme that provides the bare essentials.

Comment Re:And it begins (Score 1) 531

Simple. Nowhere.

1. People can own shares in companies that own robots. Those shares will pay dividends (or increase in value etc).

2. The government can tax the profits of the robot run factories. These profits can provide a dividend check to citizens who would hopefully invest wisely in the robot companies.

Rather than work, people's time will be spent trying to figure out which robot companies perform well. You can use a computer program to do it .. which will let you decide if you want to be a risky investor etc. If you want to design robots for extra income, you can do that too.

Comment Re:seriously? (Score 2) 133

As a WIkipedia donor .. I support this move. I got nothing against Oracle, but why would they use a database that is not the flagship database of the company? It's bound to cost more and lack features. MariaDB is owned by a foundation with goals more in line with Wikipedia.

Comment How do no-fly lists work? (Score 0) 216

The government isn't allowed to take actions against people and deny them certain freedoms if they haven't been convicted of a crime. At the very least, they should be told why they are being denied the flight.

"No person shall [...] be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; [..]"

Fifth amendment:

"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Basic grammar dictate that the exemption for wartime is only when you are holding someone .. and that too it means you don't have to convene a grand jury.

Comment Re:Cousins Not So bad Genetically. (Score 1) 296

Actually the risk of genetic problems in offspring is the same or even less than the risk of problems if a mother is over 40.

Sarah Palin's, and Rick Santorum's, youngest kids have genetic issues because of that. So if we are going to ban incest because it creates a risk of genetic problems, we need to ban older pre-menopausal women from having sex too.

My view is that we should legalize adult consensual incest, with moderate fines for getting pregnant I suppose.

Comment $2.3 for someone else's medal? (Score 1) 53

WTF.

I dont understand all the hype about Watson & Crick .. Linus Pauling or Bragg were going to get there too after they recovered from their errors (they didn't have Rosalinds photos). Furthermore, we already knew about DNA, they just figured out its structure .. which is important .. well F it I am going to say it's not THAT important compared to knowing for example .. that DNA exists, that DNA is a sequences of nucleotides etc. Who actually discovered DNA? Who actually discovered that DNA contains the genetic code? Few people know. Actually I had to wikipedia it myself, cause teachers don't tell you and books don't cover it.

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