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A Physicist Says He Can Tornado-Proof the Midwest With 1,000-Foot Walls Screenshot-sm 501

meghan elizabeth writes: Temple physicist Rongjia Tao has a utopian proposal to build three massive, 1,000-foot-high, 165-foot-thick walls around the American Midwest, in order to keep the tornadoes out. Building three unfathomably massive anti-tornado walls would count as the infrastructure project of the decade, if not the century. It would be also be exceedingly expensive. "Building such walls is feasible," Tao says. "They are much easier than constructing a skyscraper. For example, in Philadelphia, the newly completed Comcast building has about 300-meter height. The wall with similar height as the Comcast building should be much easier to be constructed." Update: 06/28 04:14 GMT by T : Note: originally, this story said that Tao was at Drexel rather than Temple -- now corrected

Comment Only in certain regions of the US. (Score 2) 519

Why not simply let the [overused libertarian bromide]?

If not for how private schools operate, you might have a point. On the other hand, not everyone has the option of being accepted at van der Snoot Academy or affording it - which is how you see the ugly side of private schools and how they don't work.

In the South, tenure is more related to union/protectionism than to academic freedom by virtue of cultural norms.

Fixed that for you.

Comment The South would like to have a word with you... (Score 1) 519

The administrator doing that would be sued into oblivion and never work in education again

Only if they're in a sane part of the US that doesn't recognize any conflict with religion and evolution (read: not the South).

Now if you were talking about the Deep South, they'd be sued into oblivion and blackballed for not firing someone.

Comment Except that what you say isn't so. (Score 1) 519

At the time a teaching position was a super sweet patronage position that a politician awarded his friends.

If you take a look at the South and their regressive remake of education, especially North Carolina, you'll find that old system returning.

but the reasons that necessitated tenure are long gone, and all teachers are protected under the standard laws for hiring and firing, which cover us all.

...which are being eroded away by organizations like ALEC. Thankfully there are sensible states like Ohio that figured out how to get rid of these kind of groups.

They also have a strong union that will ensure protections.

I assume you're not a resident of any state in the South, inter-mountain West as well as not being a resident of Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, or Pennsylvania.

So there's no need for special laws that give teachers more advantages than everybody else at the expense of their students.

There's no need to abandon tenure when you can establish the very "van der Snoot" academy that you always wanted.

Comment They have forgotten the purpose of tenure. (Score 1) 519

It's designed to prevent about everything you see being proposed after it is removed. Hopefully this can be strung out long enough so that this ruling can die off for lack of standing.

As for the people that think it has no place below post secondary level, consider that it protects from regression in curriculum (such as known in Kansas and Tennessee) as well as indirect threats to employment (such as done with North Carolina's permatemping mandate for teachers).

Comment Banning Glass is out of pure envy. (Score 1) 376

Just because you couldn't get Glass doesn't mean nobody should be able to use it. Never mind trying to get rid of the inevitable and wide-spread use of facial recognition also being a Luddite move as well.

That aside, the unmentionable place banning Glass is like Ryanair stating that they'll charge for restroom use on their airplanes. In both cases, they're going for sensationalism.

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