So, on a standard US keyboard, is this sign a minus or a hyphen?: -

Gonna piss off the typography police here, but...

Yes. They mean the same damned thing, and don't give me any crap about one looking a little longer than the other. A hyphen is a dash is a minus sign is any mid-height horizontal line.

Readability scores? Seriously? I will damned well use whatever character comes out when I press the key between "0" and "=" on my keyboard, and to hell with your broken automated readers that can't deal with the default character produced by 99.9% of keyboards in the English-speaking world.

They want to redefine "discipline" in order to change our culture.

That's nice, Tina, dear. You play your little make-believe games with all the other ivory-tower bleeding hearts, while the adults get real work done.

We've personally dealt with long-time academics who have no real world experience. They'll spew theoretical crap all day long, and those of us who have worked in industry see it for what it is: crap.

In CompSci, I would tend to agree with you; and the humanities do count as complete bullshit, so nothing for them to really get objectively "wrong". :)

But in Quantum Physics? In that domain, the academics overlap 100% with "industry". Sure, you could argue that virtually the entirety of the semiconductor industry depends on quantum physics, but IMO, that field evolved incrementally from the "Cat's whisker" (which may as well have worked by magic for all its users understood about it), not from any sort of first-principles breakthrough as verification of the theory.

Wow, loving all the ACs calling this obvious, who clearly didn't even make it to the abstract! "Such wave-particle duality relations (WPDRs) are often thought to be conceptually inequivalent to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, although this has been debated."

Clearly, all you armchair physicists need to set those ivory-tower morons straight!

What they have been telling me is that since Colorado legalized pot, they have seen a huge increase in people bringing pot into the state. That is the difference from a dry to wet county.

I wouldn't really call that a "difference" - The exact same thing happens in "dry" counties/town. Maybe somewhere in the deep, dark South you can find a town or two that really believe in all that "dry" bullshit, but in practice, prohibitions against alcohol work just as well as prohibitions against pot - ie, not at all.


they all agree that if you're caught with it, they can't just let you go.

I realize you said that as a paraphrased quote, not a personal stance, but... Of course they can! Did you ever get pulled over for speeding or an expired inspection, and the cop let you off with a warning?

Ironically enough, the idea of "police discretion" applies all the way up the food chain - Colorado can "get away" with its legalization precisely because the federal government has decided that, for now at least, it will turn a blind eye to marijuana use in states that legalize it.

A m00se once bit my sister... No realli!

Surely the government's wasting our tax dollars

You really didn't need the rest of those words.

It's like IT has become superficial and vacuous, and the decisions are being made by idiots who don't know which parts of technology add value to the business/support core business activities and are necessary.

Given that IT itself doesn't typically get to decide what services the company expects it to provide, I'd say you've pretty much nailed it with that quote - IT (at least the externally-visible aspects of it) has become superficial and vacuous, with the decisions made by idiots who can't tell "shiny" from "useful". You just need to clarify who makes those decisions.

Why in the hell would anybody buy a coffee maker that uses DRM to prevent using "non-genuine" coffee?

Actually, if you scan my posting history, you'll notice I have nothing particular against Obama, other than his overall impotence as a president. I like some of his policies, and dislike others.

I merely used him as a convenient example, nothing more, nothing less.

You have to understand that a particularly vocal minority, and one endemic to academia at that, believes that anyone who doesn't actively fight for Social Justice(tm) has no value to humanity, in any capacity.

For example, let's say you played a key role in discovering the structure of DNA, but then later said some things that could, if twisted juuust the right way, mean that some races potentially have attributes that others don't. You instantly become worthless, and to hell with what those stuck-up Ivory Tower fools on the Nobel committee has to say about it. If, however, you have no meaningful contributions for society beyond "first minority president", clearly the brilliant minds on the Nobel committee chose correctly in awarding you a Peace price, regardless of your stance on torture.

How are we going to pronounce this thing? "Bee-Peg" I suppose since "Bee-Pee-Gee" doesn't roll off the tongue.

Oh come on, you literalist! You should clearly pronounce it with a soft "B". ;)

Awesome, thanks... I missed that one!

Can't help but to wonder about the tax consequences of this both to Watson and all Nobel prize winners.

The US already treats prestigious awards (Nobels, Olympics, etc) as taxable income.

Watson hocking his medal doesn't change much. And depending on how much of it he actually donated, he may have no actual taxable liability as a result of the sale.

PsySSA can probably name a few for you.

Probably even a few with a bit more up-to-date methods than an Austrian pervert dead some 75 years now...