Not trying to be an ass here, but Eric Spiegel's self-agrandizing "columns" have been discussed on Slashdot before. Based on his past writings, he seems to think it's ok to treat people like cattle. (Give the cows a salt lick, they'll feel better. Give the developers their carbonated sugar water, they'll feel better.) He also doesn't miss an opportunity to point out how smart he thinks his decisions are, and his writings have an "I told you so" undertone. I can't help but get the feeling that he writes to help convince himself that he was right, if not others. If he were my boss, I'd transfer or quit, and if I couldn't transfer or quit, I'd lie down on his desk and slit my wrists.

Did you reply to the wrong comment?

Yes. Anybody with a cheap Harbor Freight welder and Chinese 7" mini lathe can produce a gun. Total cost of the tools is about 1/2 that of the Lulz 3D printer, and you'd be able to make actual guns, not these fragile plastic toys that everybody is losing their shit over.

Nope. Nothing will change as a result of these poor quality, single shot, plastic 3D printed guns. Not in Africa, not nowhere.

Before piling onto the 3D printed gun hype bandwagon, think about the practical aspects of deplying these toy guns for any purpose, besides messing around in your basement with your 3D printer and CAD software.

It may be a fun proof of concept, but about the only things it is good for are generating political hype and drawing attention to the inventors.

People fail to realize that it's much easier and cheaper to make a home made gun using existing tools and materials. Just because someone now made a [not very good] one using a 3D printer, everybody seems to be freaking out.

Further well-grounded and thoughtful discussion on the matter can be found here:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/10/oh_no_its_the_plastic_3d_gun/

You might think that comment was "skeptical" or that it demonstrates your "critical thinking" but really, it was just plain ignorant. Based on this comment, one might reasonably assume you fall in with the kind of douchetards that yell out "42! Haha!" every time a mathematical discussion takes place.

To answer your question, you might start by reading the article. It talks about isotopes and geochemistry.

Then you could do some reading at the library to find out more about isotopes and geochemistry, and why these things are interesting and important. If you want to go further, you could take an undergraduate degree in geology, where you will learn all kinds of strange and wonderful things about the Earth, and how we can know about things that occurred billions of years ago.

Exactly this.

Also, I was not in the mood to handle these parrotsheep who bleat out, "42! Get it?? Haha!" on cue, any time there is any remotely math-related discussion taking place.

Also, I see what you did there at the end, but I will not gratify it with a response.

...so this is a pretty big deal."

As if it would NOT be a big deal for anybody else?

Agreed, that's the dumbest motto I've ever seen, from a weapons company. They must think people are idiots if they think anybody will buy that bleeding heart line of bullshit.

Ok ok, guys, message received

Maybe I've been spending too much time on Facebook, getting sick while new parents gush about their kids.

Your genderless, generic 15-year-old piece of human offspring?

Seriously, what the fuck is it with people who refer to their kids as "my 15-year-old" or "my 2-year-old", etc.? In my mind, that reduces a person to nothing more than their age, as if that were the only important characteristic. Why can't people say, "my 15-year-old daughter" or "my 2-year-old son" instead?

Everytime someone says in conversation, "Oh hahahaha you wouldn't BELIEVE what our 2-year-old did the other day!" I cringe a thousand times on the inside. Maybe it's just me.

Here on business.

Some web sites work reasonably fast, some terribly slowly, others not at all. In particular, local city newspaper web sites appear to be blocked by the Great Firewall, while national news sites appear to work.

Ok, so Stewart Lee is a very rage filled man who sincerely hates Jeremy Clarkson. His comedy routine is quite angry and vitriolic actually. He basically repeats the same joke again and again and again for 14 minutes, in varying degrees of hate and rage.

Please help me out, what was I supposed to appreciate?! Did I miss it because I don't have a spine??