Wouldn't a tidally locked planet with an atmosphere have fierce winds at the transition zone due to convection currents between the hot side and cold side? Air get heated by sun, rises, spreads to dark side, cools, falls, blows at a thousand miles per hour to the day side, repeat?

Yes, we've all heard the quote but it doesn't really apply here. The guy is saying it's not just possible, it's almost certain. And yes, technically you could say 'well he's really saying it's impossible there isn't life there' but that's just being a pedant. Yes, he could be wrong but it's clearly hyperbole. When a scientist says that something is impossible he's rarely being hyperbolic. The meaning and spirit of Clarke's quote is clearly that 'far more things are possible than people/scientists think'.

So the blackmailer accidentally exposes the blackmail, and Sky is upset not because they've been working with a blackmailer but because the blackmail got out early. Classy.

Right, but you can also buy foreign currency for basically the same effect. Still not a great argument for buying gold.

Are you being obtuse on purpose? The price of gold has gone up largely *because* Beck and friends have been pimping it. The people who listen to his rants without knowing that he's getting paid by Goldline are getting scammed. Textbook conflict of interest.

It's inefficient compared to e.g. a heat pump, which instead of turning electricity into heat uses electricity (turned into kinetic energy) to move heat energy around. The coefficient of performance of a heat pump can easily be several times unity, making it much more efficient than electric radiant heat.*

*Heat pumps get less efficient as the temperature difference between the room and the cold reservoir grows, so heat pumps tend to be supplemented by electric heaters or other furnaces for these situations.

Have you not read the Old Testament? Canaan? Jericho? They were at least as warlike as any other culture at the time, probably moreso.

Fantastically well-said. Thanks. They're going at this all backward, trying to build emotion from logic instead of logic from emotion.

"I was not aware the right to life was an inherent right, if the government was not here to grant it to you, anyone can come along and stab you all they want."

See what I did there?

Oil is a fungible commodity. The gas stations could all be McDonalds-branded and it wouldn't make any difference.

Union Carbide didn't have a world-class PR and astroturfing department.

I would say, to be a bit more realistic, that no matter how much we discover and can explain of the universe, no matter how many other worlds and civilizations we discover. There will always be people who can't be arsed to try to understand, and instead take the simple microwave meal version of the universe. That and the indoctrination of children is a powerful and evil force.

The AMD thing should attract geeks because hey, all you need is a pencil to upgrade! No, this is different. You have to imagine all the bullshit Intel will have to shovel to make sure no one jailbreaks their chip. You might wind up seeing the BSA, the DMCA, and god know what else involved. No one wants that, lease of all geeks.

We use salesforce all day long and yet none of us at work use "chatter". It's almost as if it's a clunky, superfluous facebook-alike shoehorned into what's otherwise a good CRM system.

Does anyone here on /. actually use chatter?