Why do you think that would prevent them from being criticized as uncivilized after they had already lost? I'll agree that it's a silly reason, but political decisions are often based around something equally silly...

Were they criticized for it? Not that I know of. This doesn't mean it wasn't a part of the reason. (OTOH, there's no evidence that I know of that *does* indicate it was part of the reason.)

It depends on your design goals.

In Asimov's story universe, the Three Laws are so deeply embedded in robotics technology they can't be circumvented by subsequent designers -- not without throwing out all subsequent robotics technology developments and starting over again from scratch. That's one heck of a tall order. Complaining about a corner case in which the system doesn't work as you'd like after they achieved that seems like nitpicking.

We do know that *more* sophisticated robots can designed make more subtle ethical systems -- which is another sign of a robust fundamental design. The simplistic ethics is what subsequent designers get when they get "for free" when they use an off-the-shelf positronic brain to control a welding robot or bread-slicing machine.

Think of the basic positronic brain design as a design framework. One of the hallmarks of a robust framework is that easy things are easy and hard things are possible. By simply using the positronic framework the designers of the bread slicing machine don't have to figure out all the ways the machine might slice a person's fingers off. The framework takes care of that for them.

I don't think you've really grasped Apple's design sensibility. Job one for the designers is to deliver a product that consumers want but can't get anywhere else.

The "camera bulge" may be a huge blunder, or it may be just a tempest in a teapot. The real test will be the user's reactions when they hold the device in their hand, or see it in another user's hand. If the reaction is "I want it", the designers have done their job. If it's "Holy cow, look at that camera bulge," then it's a screw-up.

The thinness thing hasn't been about practicality for a long, long time; certainly not since smartphones got thinner than 12mm or so. They always been practical things the could have given us other than thinness, but what they want you to do is pick up the phone and say, "Look how thin the made this!" The marketing value of that is that it signals that you've got the latest and greatest device. There's a limit of course, and maybe we're at it now. Otherwise we'll be carrying devices in ten years that look like big razor blades.

At some point in your life you'll probably have seen so many latest and greatest things that having the latest and greatest isn't important to you any longer. That's when know you've aged out of the demographic designers care about.

You do realise that it is an all things being equal is assumed.

Yes someone with an English Lit degree from Yale that has written several FOSS apps and contributed to the Linux Kernel will win over someone from the University of Guam that with a CS degree and nothing else.
I also question the very concept that a Liberal Arts education will give you better critical thinking skills than ta CS degree from the same University.

I have two people interviewing for a programming job right out of college.
1. Has a degree in CS.
2. Has a degree in English Lit.
Hummm.......
Yea right.
Or turn it around.
You are looking for a fiction book editor.
1. Has a degree in CS.
2. Has a degree in English Lit.
Yes still works.

Not Bribes but jobs. The simple truth is that a government program like this is often driven by requirements and job creation. If you have two systems and one is going to make more jobs in the area that you happen to represent than the other a senator will support the one from his area. That is just common sense.
I do believe that the Boeing proposal had two advantages over the SpaceX and DreamChaser.
Lower risk and more political clout. Not bribes but congress people that will support it for job creation in their areas.

Are the drivers reneterent? If so you could in theory clear the data pages and restart the code instead of any type of reload.
Over all I am very excited by this news. Minix 3.0 has been very interesting but lacked apps. Being BSD compatible really helps with that issue.

Ahh the pro drug supporter.... Simple work to change the law it has happened in a few states so far. The self loathing pity and show of emotion is now even more into the range of ridiculous.

The KC-135 from the 1950s and still in service?
The F-22 is from Lockheed Martin btw not Boeing and while it did go over budget it did not under deliever as far as anyone can tell.

A lot of AM stations are automated these days also, syndicating popular national talk-radio programs. Any idea how to find out which ones aren't?

Yet you are not in jail for refusing to pay your taxes or protesting.....
So you parade you self loathing for all to see to try feel morally superior yet will not risk anything much less your physical life to stop it.
Please keep your emotional self loathing, self righteousness, and your facade of moral superiority to yourself or put yourself on the line and do something about it.

Frankly I have studied enough history that I believe that the way to security and frankly the least suffering it to fight the small war before you have no choice but to fight the big, morally clear cut war. That is my take on history.

Sorry but the "Peace" movement lost any legitimacy when they protested at the former republican vice presidents home after President Obama got elected. Their silence on the bombing of ISIL and the moving of troops to Iraq and the future bombing of Syria, the bombing of Libya, and drone strikes in Somalia just proves that they are nothing but a PR arm for the Democratic party wrapped in false morality. In fact I have seen almost no peace protests for a few years now.

"Long-time government contractor with a history of blowing budgets and under-delivering gets new"
???
Long-time government contractor with a history of delivering working system.
B-B2, E-3, KC,RC,C-135, P-8, and on and on.

The new powered landing Dragon is a "high risk" design. The Dreamchaser is also a "high risk" design plus you have all the "Shuttle was flawed" group that wants nothing to do with wings in space.
Boeing vs SpaceX? without doing all the number crunching it is hard to make an educated judgment.
As to the Politics SpaceX is in Ca, Tx, and FL. Boeing in in Ca, Tx, Fl, Washington, and Ks but the killer is that there headquarters is in... Chicago.

So delete it. The rest is just posturing even if I got the vile rappers album I would just delete it. Sure offering it for free might have been the best option but to be honest the amount of time wasted and frankly chest pounding is to the point of silliness. Probably 99.9% of Apple users will be happy with getting the free album or just not care while a tiny minority will jump up and down and pound their chest over the purity of their iTunes library. Do people show off their library to show how cool and hard core and or indie they are?
Implying that you made a choice... It is an album not a vote in an election ,a religious affiliation, or political party, it is not a big thing and if you feel that it is you need to put it in perspective.
 

I think you are entirely correct about the difficulty in predicting disruptive technologies. But there's an angle here I think you may not have considered: the possibility that just the cultural values and norms of the distant future might be so alien to us that readers wouldn't identify with future people or want to read about them and their problems.

Imagine a reader in 1940 reading a science fiction story which accurately predicted 2014. The idea that there would be women working who aren't just trolling for husbands would strike him as bizarre and not very credible. An openly transgendered character who wasn't immediately arrested or put into a mental hospital would be beyond belief.

Now send that story back another 100 years, to 1840. The idea that blacks should be treated equally and even supervise whites would be shocking. Go back to 1740. The irrelevance of the hereditary aristocracy would be difficult to accept. In 1640, the secularism of 2014 society and would be distasteful, and the relative lack of censorship would be seen as radical (Milton wouldn't publish his landmark essay Aereopagitica for another four years). Hop back to 1340. A society in which the majority of the population is not tied to the land would be viewed as chaos, positively diseased. But in seven years the BLack Death will arrive in Western Europe. Displaced serfs will wander the land, taking wage work for the first time in places where the find labor shortages. This is a shocking change that will resist all attempts at reversal.

This is all quite apart from the changes in values that have been forced upon us by scientific and technological advancement. The ethical issues discussed in a modern text on medical ethics would probably have frozen Edgar Allen Poe's blood.

I think it's just as hard to predict how the values and norms of society will change in five hundred years as it is to accurately predict future technology. My guess is that while we'd find things to admire in that future society, overall we would find it disturbing, possibly even evil according to our values. I say this not out of pessimism, but out my observation that we're historically parochial. We think implicitly like Karl Marx -- that there's a point where history comes to an end. Only we happen to think that point is *now*. Yes, we understand that our technology will change radically, but we assume our culture will not.