"your very own kitchen smelter is terrifying"

I must admit, I've used my oven more for preheating cast iron for welding and low temp curing of refractory than I've done for baking lately. But smelting in it is a bit much even for a lunatic like me.

Is this due to unfamiliarity with Centigrade?

All the food baking I've done is well below 260C (500F).

800C (1472F) is cherry red can melt a lot of metals.

It's in the range you would use a muffle furnace or kiln to get.

If we get rid of all the farmers, not only will we have unity of ideas, but everyone will starve so we've solved anthropogenic global warming.

Of course, even at this point it may well take a long time for the existing effects to reverse, but we can rest easy in our graves. ;)

(Extreme tongue in cheek warning for the humorless bastards on both sides of this flamepit topic who'd take anything seriously no master how ridiculous.)

Now my insurance company will want access to that data to verify that I'm not loaning my car to anyone.

After anchoring its right to the South China Sea with islands constructed from Chinese materials, China has begun investigating the use of other purely Chinese items in the rest of the world.

As such, China is announcing an air defense identification zone surrounding all zoos containing giant pandas. In particular, all aircraft entering or departing the airspace in the 5 miles surrounding the Smithsonian National Zoological Park in Washington D.C. will now have to file a flight plan with China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration, and maintain regular two way radio contact. In case of aircraft not following these guidelines, China reserves the right to take Emergency Defensive Measures.

You mean god is a pimply faced slashdotter playing Spore in his mother's basement?

This came out of a row in Britain over an investigation into schools in Birmingham. Unlike the US situation, what brought this about was a charge that Muslims were trying to take over schools in Birmingham and alter the lessons to support Islamic Ideals. The term you can search on to find this is Trojan Horse Investigation, along with Birmingham.

For example: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-eng...

For a more sensationalist view, we have the Daily Fail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

One of (many) things charged was teaching creationism. Others were teaching in sex ed that wives weren't allowed to "say no" and must submit to their husbands.

How much of this is true depends on who you ask and, no surprise, it's quite a controversy.

But, to put it in context, this came up in response to charges of Islamic influence. Apparently any Christian state funded schools teaching creationism didn't raise this level of concern.

Gee. I'm a slashdotter too, and I must not have gotten the memo on that. Maybe it ended up in my spam trap.

It's so hard to keep up with what I'm supposed to be thinking since I'm on Slashdot.

"And we'll block any web site that says there is!"

Wasn't he the gunner in Catch 22?

Imagine what this will do to sales of Doritos from the vending machines at the FBI.

Does Linden Lab know about this?

Only if I can have that screechy augmented voice saying "Exterminate!"

My bad. Left out "up to" between "now" and "67".

I put it down to early onset Alzheimer's.

I'd bet it's in one or more of his books (None of which, I must confess, I've read.). Probably something more nuanced than those two options only.

It's a good question, though. In some ways we're already confronting a similar situation. People are living a lot longer after retirement than was originally planned. Full benefit retirement age for social security used to be 65 across the board, but is now 67 for those born after 1937. It's a very touchy political issue, so nothing more has been done in that direction. Yet.