Comment "Stargazers..." (Score -1, Troll) 53
Jupiter is not a star.
Comment Re:its nothing new really. (Score 1) 823
HAHA I never thought of that, but yes I think that is somewhat funny.
And, it could tow a collection of boats if it wanted to. It's good for something like 9000lbs.
Comment Re:its nothing new really. (Score 1) 823
It's when the RPMs shoot up momentarily between shifts because the transmission, for whatever reason, is not completing the shift quickly enough. Usually it can be traced down to either a pressure problem (as in the famous defective-by-design Ford 6F35 transmission) or a computer adaptation misstep (the adaptive algorithms have learned something bad).
Comment Re:its nothing new really. (Score 1) 823
I am thankful for the tach in my Armada when I am towing my boat. A tach also gives a visual indication of slippage, flare, and other problems that are increasingly common in today's junky automatic transmissions.
Comment Climate change is real (Score 1) 667
Yes, I said it. Climate change is real. Climate is always changing. It is unavoidable, especially in a system with so many variables. There is a well-established record of climate change present in the geological record going back hundreds of millions of years.
Things we do also affect the system. There, I said it. Human activity has an effect on climate. That only makes sense. When you do stuff to a complex system, that system changes. When you alter inputs, the outputs change.
What is at issue is the magnitude of change in output from the change in input caused by human activity. Unfortunately, rather than approach this curiosity with reasoned science, it has become a political hot-button issue, which means the facts will never, EVER be found. Period. I doubt we even have the capacity to accurately model a more or less chaotic system with millions of variables.
All of that having been said, there are attitudes on both sides that are just unfathomably stupid. From the leftists who want to kill everyone but themselves and go back to living in caves, to the right-wing wackos who want to burn all the fossil fuel they can "because freedom," they are all a bunch of fucking idiots.
The rules here are pretty simple. Stop wasting shit, and stop multiplying like rabbits. The Earth has finite resources, and can therefore support only a finite amount of consumption. When we reproduce irresponsibly and consume all that we can possible consume just because we can, we're going to hit that limit a lot sooner.
I really wish the environmentalists would take a more conservationist approach rather than a purely biased political one. I am all about conservation, but I despise environmentalism, just like I despise hyper-consumptionism.
And as a disclaimer, my contributions to the conservation of world resources are: not having children, biking to work, and not having an oversized house filled with shit China told me I needed.
Comment Leftists to stamp their feet in disappointment (Score 0) 145
Leftists to stamp their feet in disappointment after the outcome of the most recent US election. News at 11.
Comment I grew up in NYC in the 1970s (Score 2) 784
I walked around NYC by myself all the goddamn time in the late 70s and early 80s. I walked from my parents' apartment at 102nd and Riverside all the way to my private school at 112th and Amsterdam every goddamn morning.
I was never kidnapped once during that time.
We need look no further than this incident to understand why we have an entire generation of completely helpless, incapable 20-something year old children.
Comment Not "offshoring" (Score 1) 484
An H1-B visa is for a foreign worker to come to the US to work, not for a company to move a job overseas.
Comment In other words... (Score 1) 129
"law enforcement agencies spent well over a year casing the site: buying drugs"
In other words, they were committing the same crimes. Oh wait, that's right, laws don't apply to our own government. They only apply to us. Silly me.
NSA Official: Supporting Backdoored Random Number Generator Was "Regrettable" 106
Trailrunner7 writes In a new article in an academic math journal, the NSA's director of research says that the agency's decision not to withdraw its support of the Dual EC_DRBG random number generator after security researchers found weaknesses in it and questioned its provenance was a "regrettable" choice. Michael Wertheimer, the director of researcher at the National Security Agency, wrote in a short piece in Notices, a publication of the American Mathematical Society, that even during the standards development process for Dual EC many years ago, members of the working group focused on the algorithm raised concerns that it could have a backdoor in it. The algorithm was developed in part by the NSA and cryptographers were suspect of it from the beginning. "With hindsight, NSA should have ceased supporting the dual EC_DRBG algorithm immediately after security researchers discovered the potential for a trapdoor. In truth, I can think of no better way to describe our failure to drop support for the Dual_EC_DRBG algorithm as anything other than regrettable," Wertheimer wrote in a piece in Notices' February issue.
Obama Planning New Rules For Oil and Gas Industry's Methane Emissions 202
mdsolar sends this quote from the NY Times:
In President Obama's latest move using executive authority to tackle climate change, administration officials will announce plans this week to impose new regulations on the oil and gas industry's emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, according to a person familiar with Mr. Obama's plans. The administration's goal is to cut methane emissions from oil and gas production by up to 45 percent by 2025 from the levels recorded in 2012.
The Environmental Protection Agency will issue the proposed regulations this summer, and final regulations by 2016, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the administration had asked the person not to speak about the plan. The White House declined to comment on the effort. Methane, which leaks from oil and gas wells, accounts for just 9 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas pollution — but it is over 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide, so even small amounts of it can have a big impact on global warming.
The Environmental Protection Agency will issue the proposed regulations this summer, and final regulations by 2016, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the administration had asked the person not to speak about the plan. The White House declined to comment on the effort. Methane, which leaks from oil and gas wells, accounts for just 9 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas pollution — but it is over 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide, so even small amounts of it can have a big impact on global warming.
Man Saves Wife's Sight By 3D Printing Her Tumor 164
An anonymous reader writes: Michael Balzer, a former software engineer and Air Force technical instructor, found himself unsatisfied with a doctor's diagnosis of a small tumor behind his wife's left eye. Balzer had recently become proficient at creating 3D models, so he asked the doctor for the raw medical imaging data and took a look himself. In addition to correcting a later misdiagnosis, Balzer 3D printed models of his wife's cranium and helped neurosurgeons plan a procedure to remove the tumor, instead of waiting to see how it developed, like previous doctors had recommended. During the procedure, surgeons found the tumor was beginning to entangle her optic nerve, and even a six-month wait would have had dire consequences for her eyesight.
Medical researchers like Dr. Michael Patton believe this sort of prototyping will become "the new normal" in a very short time. He says, "What you can now do through 3D printing is like what you're able to do in the software world: Rapid iteration, fail fast, get something to market quickly. You can print the prototypes, and then you can print out model organs on which to test the products. You can potentially obviate the need for some animal studies, and you can do this proof of concept before extensive patient trials are conducted.
Medical researchers like Dr. Michael Patton believe this sort of prototyping will become "the new normal" in a very short time. He says, "What you can now do through 3D printing is like what you're able to do in the software world: Rapid iteration, fail fast, get something to market quickly. You can print the prototypes, and then you can print out model organs on which to test the products. You can potentially obviate the need for some animal studies, and you can do this proof of concept before extensive patient trials are conducted.
Comment This is the whole problem with research (Score 1) 224
This is the entire problem with modern research. The funding model has evolved such that if a researcher wants to remain employed, he or she had better damn well come up with the desired results. Research used to be "here's some money to go find out what is going on." Today it's, "here's some money to prove my conclusion."
The confirmation bias is built into the funding model.
Comment Re:am disappoint (Score 4, Informative) 78
More speed has not been what the market has wanted in a great number of years. Lowering power consumption has taken a front seat to CPUs being faster.
That having been said, CPUs ARE getting faster, if you want to pay for it. Outside of that, a core 2 quad from SEVEN YEARS AGO is still about EIGHT TIMES AS MUCH computer power as the average Internet user needs.
Comment Re:Get your ad network shit together slashdot (Score 1) 131
Dice is desperate and will take money from anyone, including Russian hackers.
