That would seem pretty unlikely to anyone that thinks about it since I have taken a pretty consistent stand against Russian aggression and Soviet Communism.

And that's another talking point Putin would probably want discredited. So it's perfectly consistent with you being on Kremlin's payroll.

In case you aren't, I suggest you take a long hard look at what kind of service you're actually doing to your country.

Ah yes, the infamous "authoritarianism" of limited government.

Limited government? As far as I can tell, your ideal is the exact opposite: a government not bound by any rules, laws or ethics whatsoever, trusted with limitless power over its own citizens and everyone else, wielded with no oversight or regard for consequences.

Or are you confusing the ability of a free people to defend themselves with authoritarianism?

No, I simply don't think that people who are being spied on by their government are free. And frankly, I don't think Americans control the American Government anymore. I don't think anyone does. The whole thing acts too much like an animal reacting to its instincts, with no rational will at charge. That's what happens when you let an organization escape human control, and why non-democracies typically require a single strong leader who can force at least some of his will on them. Democracies make do with the voters giving feedback, but that fails if the organization gains power over them, for example with a total, paranoid surveillance system.

But where else could you find cleverly insightful "tastes like chicken" jokes about dinosaurs?

Other things too, from thinking about modern birds: can we assume that theropods had a syrinx rather than a larynx? Then they would be able to have very tonally-complex sounds, including vocalizing multiple different frequencies at the same time.

I assume they had a similar lung layout? Birds have a really brilliant respiratory system. The lungs are rigid and more like tubes for the passage of air rather than storing it. On inhalation, half the air goes directly into one air sac and the other straight through the lung into a different air sac; then on exhalation the sacs reverse so that the "used" air goes straight out and the "unused" air goes through the lung on the way out. So they get fresh air moving through their lungs both on inhalation and exhalation, and they never mix fresh air with used air. This means that the oxygen content of air in their lungs is much higher, which means that the oxygen levels in their blood can be much higher. It helps sustain them during high metabolic activity such as flight; I'm sure their giant predatory ancestors made good use of that oxygen as well.

I wonder if their ancestors had a similar sort of relatively inefficient fast-through digestive system, or whether that's an adaptation their descendents have made for flight? It's known for a fact at the very least that some dinosaurs consumed rocks to aid in digestion (gizzard stones) in the same way birds consume grit. Hmm, so theropods would likely have some sort of a crop then? I mean, there is evidence that at least some theropods cared for their young. Picture a bunch of baby velociraptors reaching their heads into a parent's jaw to get a meal!

It takes no imagination to picture correspondence between the legs / feet, bird legs and feet already look positively dinosaurian.

Even the evidence of fossilized prints of rough scaly skin from some tyrranosaurids (in addition to evidence of feathers, and some completely feathered) shouldn't be a real shock because we see that in modern bird species. For example, look at the head of a bald ibis or turkey vulture.

The more I read, the more it looks like it should be possible to "backport" birds to a surprising degree even without any unobtanium "dinosaur DNA". Even without studying what specific genes do, we can already start by comparing different lineages to see what genetic shifts in birds occurred between their theropod ancestors and modern descendents (for example, if most other groups of animals, including alligators, have a certain gene but birds don't, then that change occurred at some point on the bird side of the branching point between birds and alligators). Looking at modern descendents won't give us an exact picture of their common ancestors, but it'll certainly let us role back a lot of the changes. Combining that with reasoning out and experimenting with what morphological changes in birds that differ from dinosaurs are the result of what genes... we should be able to come up with something rather close to their ancestors at different stages.

It's amazing how much detail they're starting to be able to determine about ancient species - even to the point of being able to determine the number of wing quill feathers in velociraptors. We're certainly constraining the reversal problem more and more.

Oh god, I just had a terrifying thought... A T-Rex with the threat gestures of an Amazon. For those who don't own Amazon parrots, when they get overexcited or aggressive, they not only do this fantail display, but they have this creepy thing that they do with their eyes where they make their pupils expand and contract. Picture this, but with the pupil repeatedly changing in size 3x while it stares at you. It basically means "This is my Crazy Time. Go on, try coming close to me, see what happens!" They really lose their mind during it - for example, they may go into Crazy Mode because you gave them some treat that got them overexcited, but because they can't think straight, they're prone to drop and lose whatever it was that you gave them.

But yeah... crazy T-rex flaring whatever feathers it has and giving you an unflinching death stare with giant pulsating yellow eyes.

My parrot can take the backs off my earrings and take my earrings out without eating the backs or damaging my ears. He can open clasps on my clothes. No question that their beaks are dexterous.

However, I think the author was actually referring more to "adaptable". Bird beaks come in all sorts of shapes, apparently achieved by relatively simple genetic tweaks that allows them to adapt quickly (in evolutionary terms) to changing food sources.

Watch out, everybody! There's a new Windows virus going about. See here for more information http://:

Yeah, and I changed my sig in case other people are too lazy to look up where to do said reporting.

So give the laundry bot thermal vision. It will be better at detecting your pets than you are: it will be able to see them under your laundry.

If you expect it to play well with AD, prepare to be disappointed. Otherwise, I don't see the problem.

People only get satisfaction out of working for other people because they have been raised with a slave mentality and they forgot how to be themselves. They were bred to be cogs in the machine, bricks in the wall, and most people participate faithfully.

Let people be people.

We need better birth control :p

That's OK, they will have mouse-hunting robots soon enough. An R/C car is much faster than any mouse, I'm surprised it's not been done already in a warehouse context where there's appropriate terrain. Keep your cat out of the warehouse just like one is meant to keep their children out of the street (so tired of slow children at play signs, keep those little fuckers out of the road and we don't need another ugly sign cluttering up our world) and there won't be a problem.

Oh no, very much no. It dropped to another new low in the latest recession. A whole lot of horses went to the knackers in that one. Local trailer store on the 101 put up a sign FREE HORSE WITH TRAILER.

So instead of robbery we have theft and rape, not to mention gross inefficiency? That doesn't seem like a good deal.

We're talking about two people in line talking to one another, not a conversation with the security screener. Unless he did complain to the screener, and then someone behind him chimed in, his text wasn't clear. But why would you open your mouth to complain if you're just going to shut it when the opportunity for bravery comes along? Just shut the fuck up in the first place and get on the plane like a good little obedient slave.