The case where Schmeiser knowingly and intentionally selected for transgenic traits, pretended it was all a big coincidence, then got caught? The OSGATA case could have referenced the Schmeiser case if it actually demonstrated what they were claiming, but they could not because it does not. Again, no one got sued for cross pollination.

Very wise words.

I'd add to that: write unit tests for your code (preferably before you write the code). You'll understand how it works and where it's broken quicker and better and free up your brain cycles more for the creative design part.

You will learn and improve much more quickly with much less stress.

Back in the day (80's 8-bit micros) I started on BASIC and Z80 machine code followed by a little FORTH.

The one thing I really wish I'd known about - or understood - was what LISP really is. It was often described in the popular computing press as a language "for processing lists."

How very wrong. The reality is so much better.

I didn't seriously look at the lisp family of languages until about 6 or 7 years ago. I really wish I'd looked 25 years sooner.

I've read some of what he's written on his blog, and I am more than satisfied that he's a racist, sexist, homophobic dipshit who completely deserves all the opprobrium he receives. What's worse, he's one of those crazy religious fanatics who twists the bible into excuses to hate people, like the Westborough folks. As a human, I find him utterly contemptible.

Nevertheless, if I'd been voting on the Hugos this year, I would have judged his work on its own merit. I still find Orson Scott Card an outstanding writer, despite my (milder) contempt for the man himself. Fortunately, I have many friends who were Hugo voters this year, who are also capable of separating their opinion of the artist from their opinion of the art, and they have uniformly told me that the work didn't deserve a nomination, let alone a win. Maybe it wasn't bad enough to end up below no-award--maybe that happened because of Day's vile on-line persona--but the fact that it didn't win seems to me to be fully justified.

"Could happen"--but hasn't. That's what makes it science fiction. "Speculative science" is absolutely not a requirement of SF, and "predictions of the future" is basically what it was. It was at least as plausible a prediction as something like Heinlein's "...If This Goes On". And "fantasy elements", in a lot of people's opinions, loosely including mine, are never an element of actual science fiction.

Space exploration and research still falls basically in the domain of science these days, even though it's a lot more of an everyday activity than it once was. Once tickets to space become affordable to the average person, then maybe we can say that a movie like Gravity is no more SFnal than something like The Fast and the Furious. But until then, I think it qualifies, and a whole lot of people seem to agree with me.

Off your lawn? But you got exactly what you want! Basic is back, and it's free! Only Advanced costs money.

But it might be great for other people.

Shadowrun 5 does a very good job of taking the best parts of previous editions (mainly the smoother system from 4 and the tons of flavour from 3 and earlier).

Man, that sounds very similar to the D&D situation, actually. But Shadowrun doesn't have the crazy jumps in complexity and focus that D&D has had.

Indie games are big, and publishing something is easier than ever. However, RPGs aren't exactly a lucrative market. Most people do it for the love of the hobby, and unless your name is Monte Cook, it's not going to pay your bills.

Getting paid as a GM is an old idea, but I don't think anyone ever got it working. You'd have to be a legendary GM with everybody raving about how great you are, before you might convince anyone to pay you for playing a game with them.

Hm, I guess that is a good question.

Nope, but neither have a lot of things that present no reason to be suspicious of. Show me a long term multi-generational study on Wi-Fi exposure. You probably can't. Does that implicate Wi-Fi as potentially dangerous? Not unless I can provide a legitimate reason as to why one would be necessary, which I can't. Yeah, people go 'Ahh, no human study and they're feeding it to us!' but you know what, that's grasping for straws, implying there is a difference that requires study where none exists. Now, you provide some compelling reason as to why it is necessary to go beyond animal studies, with some biologically plausible rational, then I might be concerned. Until then I've got no problems eating them.

Totally false. Non-transgenic seed is not only readily available, in the case of Bt corn, you are required to plant a non-GE refuge area.

Right on schedule the moving goalpost away from 'genetically changing a plant is bad' to 'the way I don't like is different therefore bad'. If you note, you'll see that everything I mentioned are actually all quite different. Various types of somatic and induced mutations, selective breeding, biotech facilitate wide crossing/embryo rescue, artificial chromosome alteration...very different from genetic engineering, where a single well known gene is inserted. Why not lump genetic engineering in with everything else and select the chromosomal duplication to be the pariah? After all, that is also an entirely different thing, which I don't think is particularly meaningful, but means about as much as your argument. What I personally do is both more and less extreme than transgenics, depending on how you want to view it. The lumping of everything as 'conventional breeding' to make a dichotomy between it and genetic engineering is a very simplistic view.

Fallacy number two, the straw man. Do you really think the scientific community, which overwhelmingly supports GE crops (don't even try to deny this), does not pause to consider such things? Perhaps you could explain your long term fears in less vague terms?

Sorry, the corporate card has no bearing on scientific topics. Save it for politics.