Maybe they haven't been around the sort of guys who honestly believe the magical theory of business, by which businessmen make huge profits by buying expensive equipment because the "tax write-off" is greater than the value of the equipment. Coincidentally, of course, this makes it ethical for these same guys to steal/neglect/sabotage this equipment, because the boss will just make more money by paying to replace it.

If you've never actually heard these cretins who believe you must be a sucker to believe otherwise, you wouldn't believe they exist.

I was thinking the same thing. Using "miraculous" in the sense of "extremely unlikely to happen", the miracle is that this piece hit a house at all in an underpopulated region such as Siberia, not that it missed the people living in the house.

Grammatik was also pathetic.

That sounds reasonably accurate, though my impression of Australian English is that it is about half-way between British and American, splitting the difference between the two varieties (and adding a few quirks of their own).

However, the English spoken in Canada is virtually the same as that spoken in the United States - certainly the differences are no greater than those which exist regionally in the U.S. - and I've never heard a Canadian say otherwise. Perhaps your friends were trying to say that Canadian English is closer to British English than U.S. English is - which is true, but just barely.

Noting that the reality in China and India make the Kyoto Treaty pointless is not the same as blaming China and India.

The price of coal does not depend solely on its relative scarcity. It also depends on the wages of the coal miners, the costs of the equipment to mine it and move it, and so on.

I've already seen serious claims that space-based solar could provide electricity at half the cost of coal within a decade, if it was pursued. Those projections are probably optimistic - but still, there are many possibilities and several of the most interesting are almost never even mentioned.

I've heard that verse claimed as a description of a Christmas tree before, but it is also a reasonable description of the making of an idol.

How exactly does a craftsman shape a Christmas tree with a chisel?

Actually that was one of his complaints: it's almost impossible for any responsible adult to see or evaluate the tests. He had to pull strings to be allowed to take it, and he's a school board member.

I don't know whether he's right about the contents of the test, but he's absolutely correct that that degree of secrecy is not healthy - especially when students are being denied diplomas based on the test.

Yup. In practice, it doesn't matter much if you're off by a quarter inch for most construction - and guys who have been doing the work have a feel for such things that is good enough and a hell of a lot faster than crunching all the numbers. Add in the fact that after you crunch all the numbers and lay everything out perfectly, you probably won't get the saw or drill to go exactly where you marked it, and you might as well have ignored the calculating in the first place and just done it on feel.

You're right that people with degrees in Education tend to be the dumbest of the lot, as revealed by GRE scores (9 of the 10 lowest positions are for people who majored in some form of Education). Even so, after RTFA the guy actually has a point. The whole testing process is secretive, and no one is allowed to find out what questions were marked right and what questions were marked wrong. Only students are allowed to even see the test - the guy had to pull some string to be allowed to take the test. Finally, the overemphasis on testing in education is clearly a problem - and that is his real point. As he notes, if the current rules had been in place when he was in high school, he wouldn't have even graduated high school despite pretty good grades.

Relying on secretive processes to evaluate students and influence their chances in life before they even get a chance to prove themselves in practice is ... problematic. I've seen plenty of examples of people who didn't do well on tests doing just as well or better than people who did in practice.

"Absolutely not. Everyone needs to know at least this much math, even if only to be competent at handling money."

Actually, he just said that. "the maths in question is probably as advanced as they need" - and it's true for most people, as the examples - though not difficult at all - do in fact represent all the math that most people need. I take it that you did well on the math, and not so well on the verbal?

The truly sad thing is that many people do not learn this much math - but that is a problem with how it is taught, not with the standards themselves.

Yes, I did it the same way - though I then checked it with 3*40=120 + 3*7=21 to get 141.

Just remember, the sort of people who add 2+2 and get 22 are the same people who are using force to take 1/4th of your paycheck to ensure you have funds and medical care when you are retired.

Finally something factual.

There are a lot of ignorant comments in this thread. This isn't about oppressing anyone or making people poor - it's about freeing people and letting them be productive.

The fact that so many people find the idea horrifying explains quite well why the idea is necessary. The United States used to be known for innovation and industry, now it appears to be protectionist and stuck in its ways. That's not just a bad thing for the United States, it's a bad thing for humanity.

Also see the Seasteading website. http://seasteading.org/

The headline immediately brought phages to my mind, also. We do some stupid things in the USA.

I have long opposed extreme copyright terms and bad copyright law, and supported the public domain and creative commons licensing - but I have also supported paying artists for such work as they have copyrighted. I have always tried to buy a legitimate copy of music I like, where it has been available, and encouraged others to buy legitimate recordings.

But this is simply too much. If the copyright organizations are going to insist on collecting money for works they do not own nor represent, then they can go to hell. Really, this is just extortion. They deserve no more sympathy.