The explanation will be AGW and CO2 until something more profitable comes along...

Fascinating video on the sunspot factor. Makes the best sense I've seen yet.

...it says that sometimes they found the new equaled or surpassed the old.

That's far from being "can't distinguish".

It's been done for decades.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Lazy was probably not the best word. But people do generally avoid needless work, and when that was something you formerly had to do to survive, it can be perceived as 'lazy'. If the deaf person can now hear and has no pressing need for ASL, why go to all the extra work of learning or maintaining your ASL?

I've heard basically the same about 'dwarf culture' -- that when surgical techniques for increasing leg length became a realistic treatment, there was a huge backlash against it, as if being able to be 'fixed' invalidated all the existing dwarfs.

And don't think it doesn't exist among the blind, too. A friend who is partially sighted has been on both sides of the fence, and while immersed in it, railed against the same crap in the blind community.

When I was a kid I lived next door to the deaf-and-blind school. Every kid in the neighborhood played on the grounds. We never saw the blind kids, but when we'd see the deaf kids out on the grounds, we'd try to include them in our games. But they would not play with the rest of us.

Some of whom practiced slaving and genocide, too. Roundly denied by the idyllicists.

Some people fail basic math... Frex, this handy story problem:

new truck: $500/mo. payment, $200/mo. insurance, $500/yr lic.
old truck: $700 in repairs on average every 3 years, which is $20/month, permanent lic. $270 one-time cost, ins. $10/mo.
Both get about the same gas mileage.
Which one is more expensive to own??

There was a story here a while back about where someone had pulled together stats, total number of computers vs how many were infected (I don't remember precisely how they collected the data, but I vaguely recall it was from a search engine's logs). We were all astounded to read that the infection rate was only 0.4% of all internet-connected computers.

Same here. I'd have to replace the whole machine to 'upgrade' the OS, and there's nothing Win7/8 can do for me and my current needs that XP can't. Firewall and router, don't click on or run random shit, and don't let email run scripts... I have clients with setups 15+ years old, infection-free, who do no more than that for security.

Someone pointed out that these 0day exploits aren't quite... that most derive from reverse-engineering the patch, then seeking unpatched machines. No patches, no cues where to look.

Someone here turned me on to this motherboard:

http://www.ibase-i.com.tw/mb80...

I got one purely for the ISA slots. It's very stable and well-mannered, tho it does need an update to handle larger HDs. (I don't really care since anymore I either run HDs as externals or off a SATA adapter card.) Company responds to support queries with a Real Human.

I have a stash of P2 and P3 motherboards/CPUs for the same reason... ISA slots, and fast enough for the purpose.

That's another good point, and I've known people who did not distinguish. One function of skimming is to find out if it's worth your while to read carefully... read everything carefully and you waste a lot of time and effort.

I max out at about 800wpm with full comprehension, but can skim much faster -- a skill learned in high school history class, where the trick was to pick out the highlights from the wall of uninspired text. Conversely, I may read a book with a leisurely pace at a similarly relaxed speed. And yeah, I've found that people who read slowly do not grok that some people can process print that fast.

Indeed -- I took this to be the same skill as the primitive who glances at a vast prairie, immediately gets all the information he needs from it (not enough game to be worth the trouble to hunt, too big to search for scarce water) and moves along to something else.

And how much of a problem are these accidents as a percentage of the whole? I'd guess it's some miniscule fraction of a percent, relatively safe compared to, say, medicine or automobiles or bathtubs. But like a plane crash (also a rare risk) it's spectacular compared to everyday risks.

Also, let's not forget that a great many of today's housing developments grew up AFTER the pipeline or refinery or whatever nasty-NIMBY. Who is really liable when you move in next door to a known potential risk?