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Comment Re:Umm... (Score 2) 590

Yeah. It happened last time Thor misplaced the hammer too.

**Thor has lost the hammer to a giant, Thrym**

"What is the way?" said Thor. "But no matter what it is, tell me of it and I shall do as thou dost say."

"Then," said laughing Loki, "I am to take you to Jötunheim as a bride for Thrym. Thou art to go in bridal dress and veil, in Freya's veil and bridal dress."

"What! I dress in woman's garb?" shouted Thor.

"Yea, Thor, and wear a veil over your head and a garland of flowers upon it."

"I--I wear a garland of flowers?"

"And rings upon thy fingers. And a bunch of housekeeper's keys in thy girdle."

"Cease thy mockery, Loki," said Thor roughly, "or I shall shake thee."

"It is no mockery. Thou wilt have to do this to win Miölnir back for the defence of Asgard. Thrym will take no other recompense than Freya. I would mock him by bringing thee to him in Freya's veil and dress. When thou art in his hall and he asks thee to join hands with him, say thou wilt not until he puts Miölnir into thy hands. Then when thy mighty hammer is in thy holding thou canst deal with him and with all in his hall. And I shall be with thee as thy bridesmaid! O sweet, sweet maiden Thor!"

"Loki," said Thor, "thou didst devise all this to mock me. I in a bridal dress! I with a bride's veil upon me! The Dwellers in Asgard will never cease to laugh at me."

"Yea," said Loki, "but there will never be laughter again in Asgard unless thou art able to bring back the hammer that thine unwatchfulness lost."

"True," said Thor unhappily, "and is this, thinkst

thou, Loki, the only way to win back Miölnir from Thrym?"

"It is the only way, O Thor," said the cunning Loki.

Loki is to blame for all this.

Security

Security At Nuclear Facilities: Danger Likely Lurks From Within 72

mdsolar (1045926) sends this excerpt from the Stanford Report: "Insider threats are the most serious challenge confronting nuclear facilities in today's world, a Stanford political scientist says. In every case of theft of nuclear materials where the circumstances of the theft are known, the perpetrators were either insiders or had help from insiders, according to Scott Sagan and his co-author, Matthew Bunn of Harvard University, in a research paper published this month by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 'Given that the other cases involve bulk material stolen covertly without anyone being aware the material was missing, there is every reason to believe that they were perpetrated by insiders as well,' they wrote. And theft is not the only danger facing facility operators; sabotage is a risk as well ... While there have been sabotage attempts in the United States and elsewhere against nuclear facilities conducted by insiders, the truth may be hard to decipher in an industry shrouded in security, [Sagan] said. The most recent known example occurred in 2012 – an apparent insider sabotage of a diesel generator at the San Onofre nuclear facility in California. Arguably the most spectacular incident happened at South Africa's Koeberg nuclear power plant (then under construction) in South Africa in 1982 when someone detonated explosives directly on a nuclear reactor."

Comment Re:Well the way things are going internationally.. (Score 1) 176

You would rather than the country you live in be on the shit list of the U.S. government as opposed to being on a list of supporters?

This argument is often raised, but Haiti and Cuba are countries that make you stop and think about it. Haiti received government support from the U.S. and it not doing well by any measure. Cuba has had an embargo with the U.S., Bay of Pigs, etc. and is doing relatively okay for it in comparison.

Now I like the U.S. and respect it for holding to its principles as a country, but there are a couple of supporting countries that have had their countries pretty well screwed over.

Comment Re:Or we could just be the first? (Score 1) 608

I've read a bit about the topic before and everything you said has already been considered; there should have been conditions favorable to life billions of years ago.

Is this really true though? A lot of what we know about Earth's formation, our moon's formation, our solar system's formation, etc. has only come to light in recent years. Earlier solar system equivalents would have faced a much higher risk of being blasted by blazars and O-type stars. This would wipe out life at any stage of development as we would know it. There are many other things like how the Earth got its water where the details of how it happened that need to be considered properly and time added for.

We could be the first. The question is still: why?

I'm postulating that the answer could be that the reason why we are the first is that all the other intelligent life that faces this problem in our neighborhood might meet humans later and not have to ask that question. Or, in other words, we may be first because we are first.

Comment Or we could just be the first? (Score 1) 608

Maybe the reason why we haven't encountered alien civilizations is simply that we are the first in our region?

If you think about it you need a second generation start like our Sun because the first lot of Stars needed to go supernova to generate the heavier elements and compact our star system into something like it is now along a nice plane with larger gas giants and a "cloud" of water bearing asteroids circling far out. The earlier second generation stars also had a problem where earlier in our galaxies history there were more pulsars and O-type stars that could have killed life by sending jets of high energy radiation our way.

Next you have to wait for the planet to form and then get water from the stabilization of larger gas planet orbits bringing in the water bearing asteroids. Then you have to wait for the planet to cool, the water to seep down and create some sort of active continents with plate techtonics. Then you have to wait for the iron to settle in with the water, first life to start producing oxygen in the atmosphere, and evolution taking its long course to make something that can make useful technologies and contemplate the universe.

Could just be that we are the first (somewhat) intelligent life around.

Comment Re:Personal Drones (Score 1) 155

Everybody having a drone is a horrible idea, kind of like giving everyone a gun is a bad idea. I expect owning a drone will be a "fundamental right" in the U.S. within 10 years.

Then you can use your guns to shoot your neighbor's drones and all will be well.

Seriously though, this seems unlikely as drones are not even remotely mentioned in the US constitution.

Comment 15 years experience only! (Score 1) 287

Reading through the comments did no one else see that in the article the company that was focused on only recruited people with 15 years industry experience?! I suppose the owner wants people to work for 15 years without pay as an intern before getting a position at his company? Looks like there are just too many people for every decent job.

Comment Re:Um... (Score 1) 80

Source? Most US courts are understaffed (even judges) and over-scheduled.

http://www.decodedc.com/home/2...

That doesn't mean they are underpayed and not soaking up all the resources. Lawyers always will want more money for the same level job. A bit cynical I know but I think a "scarcity" of lawyers is always going to be the case, because they never can actually solve anything.

Comment Re:Am I getting old? (Score 1) 90

Maybe it works for media hosting but what does it really do that a Chromecast doesn't do?

There's a market for seamless video looping that the pis are starting to fill. I use them for exhibition spaces to push videos remotely on a loop with omxplayer. Dispman_vncserver allows for remote viewing of content as well.

It's the small size that makes them attractive and I could see them being mounted to other devices than display screens as well. The new compute module and board would fit fine in home-made drones. I was thinking of trying to make a drone with a servo and 3d printer, but my 3d printer isn't up to the task unfortunately (maybe in a couple of years). You just have to use your imagination.

Comment Re:I don't think people care (Score 1) 470

When you actually have had experiences that you cannot scientifically explain you tend to realize that there is this huge domain called the Universe At Large and then there is this much smaller domain called What Mankind Currently Accepts And Understands.

I think what you are referring to has been known at least since the Egyptian times and is the result of hallucinogenic/intoxicating drugs or head knocking. Nothing wrong with having a good time, but people should at least be honest instead of saying "the god with crocodile head and lion body that only I can see told me to do X."

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