Consumer digital cameras and portable camcorders were available before the takeoff/landing ban and they were used. But some of the high-sensitivity motion-capable DSLRs and EVIL cameras would be able to capture much more of the beauty of flight. It would nice to see these taken off the ban as they are mostly harmless. I've often thought of bringing a vintage wind-up (mechanical) 8mm or 16mm movie or 35mm film camera to photograph the interesting early part of a flight.

During later parts of the flight atmospheric haze makes photographs dull but I found that the camera's "infrared" RAW developing profile (fiddles with the red channel), really does cut through that haze. Some night flights (especially transatlantic great-circle routes over Greenlend) go far enough from cities and far enough north to give passengers a view of the northern lights. I've seen some airlines broadcast a view from a cockpit camera on one of the TV channels. It is a shame we're told to close our cabin windows so we end up watching some ridiculous B-movie when one of the most beautiful sights in the world is just outside

Somewhere where I saw a lot of lightning rods (possibly one of the theme parks in Florida, lightning capital of the world), I saw a dragonfly perched on the tip of every lightning rod. Now I know dragonflies like a high perch so they can see mosquitoes, but I began to wonder whether something else was going on. Were they attracted to the ions or ozone streaming from the lightning rods?

That's not pedantism, this is Slashdot! ;-) But why restrict your scale to assume we know everything about the earth and compare that to the visible universe? We don't know everything about the earth but let's assume we know all there is to know about a plank-length radius sphere (we don't but bear with me). The universe's volume/ plank volume is on the order of 3E60/(4/3*pi*(plank-length 1.6 × 10E -35)^3) =~ 5E-105. If you're talking mass, remember that we don't know all there is about a photon and its rest mass = 0. So the knowledge to ignorance ratio by mass is 2E30 / 0 = infinity. ;-)

Those whom Heaven helps we call the Sons of Heaven. Those who would by learning attain to this seek for what they cannot learn. Those who would by effort attain to this, attempt what effort can never effect. Those who aim by reasoning to reach it reason where reasoning has no place. To know to stop where they cannot arrive by means of knowledge is the highest attainment. Those who cannot do this will be destroyed on the lathe of Heaven. -- Chuang Tzu

When you have faith, true faith you see the weird man-made scaffolding of intelligent design theories as unnecessary and counterproductive. Where God seems to conflict with science some choose to believe that one is right and the other is wrong when the truth is that both are in harmony and it is our understanding of both that is flawed. Those who read only their own ephemeral rules, theories and prejudices into the bible have not accepted the spirit which is necessary to guide each of us through the poetry of God's creation whenever it seems to conflict with the logic of what we think we know.

A faithful person also knows (as any honest scientist should know), that those "gaps" where God must exist are enormous. The amount of her universe(s) we truly understand is vanishingly small, far less than 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001% of the universe is known to us. What we know is certainly smaller than ourselves, our brain, a leaf of grass, , DNA, atoms, quarks, strings and everything. While we've come to learn more about each of these things with each passing day, we should accept that a scientist 50 or 100 years from now would look at the social constructs we know as scientific beliefs as being remarkably simplistic. Even for agnostics and atheists who choose to disbelieve in a universal creator with more embedded intelligence than the 3 pounds of chemicals within their brains, the Judeo-Christian bible contains remnants of the human story which pre-dates agriculture and civilization. In this age of short attention spans we need such an anchor to counter-balance pop-cultural fads and give us a longer view of humanity.

Threaten to sue the person who posted your photo without your signing a release. Make it expensive for individuals to violate your privacy. Spread the word on Facebook and elsewhere that destroying the privacy of individuals is a potentially costly exercise. Learn from the MPAA/RIAA and other intellectual content cartels that using your image or quoting you on FB without a release is costly. I charge $100 per IP address that could potentially view my image and given that IPV4 has 4.3 billion addresses... (I can hardly wait for IPV6.)
No this is not an idle threat. Given the US's primary industry (lawsuits), its only a matter of time before you'll have to buy Facebook insurance to cover the possibility that you'll accidentally post something that could be taken as defamatory, could infringe on MPAA/RIAA rights or infringe on a person's privacy or defame their character. I suspect when the average tweet costs $40 in legal fees, Facebook will die quietly.

Begin with passive infrared (PIR) sensors and when they is triggered, enable your narrowly-focused pulsed-infrared laser illumination system so your cameras can get a high res look at what triggered the PIR. Your image recognizer will then compare with previous captures to determine whether the movement was caused by a squirrel, blowing leaves, or a band of Ninjas. If it is Ninjas, turn on the tri-color visible laser illumination system. Use an intensity capable of seeing or burning through the black Ninja clothing so that a good color photograph can be captured and sent to your local rent-a-cop or SWAT team. Optional spectrometer will log the absorption lines of the vaporized Ninja clothing to see if they show any traces of drugs or explosives. Your visible-light lasers will be polarized and pulsed in a pseudo-random NRZ pattern so that the synchronized Kerr cells in your own bedroom window can keep out the glare while allowing you to enjoy the beauty of a starry night sky. The visible laser wavelengths will be selected so that a multi-layer interference filter can be installed on each of your neighbor's windows in order to block the light.

Mod parent up. We now have flexibility far beyond our 19th century lighting (lighting==security && more == better) mindset. Ask yourself:

• Why do you need a light? Is it intended to scare people away? In most cases it doesn't and some studies have found that it can attract certain kinds of crime.
• If it is intended to reveal an intruder, who is watching? Wouldn't motion-triggered lights make their movements more obvious?
• Is it necessary to have these lights on 24/7 (as the morons in my country do) or just during darkness? Or just when you're walking from your car to your house?
• Is full spectrum necessary? If it's merely to provide lights for cameras, infrared is far more effective, watch the intruder stumble in the dark!
• If it's aesthetic lighting, are you simply pimping your house or is it subtle and artistic?
• Is it illuminating something that needs to be illuminated or is it deepening shadows adding glare and reducing visibility?
• Is crime inversely proportional to wattage/candlepower? If not, what is the optimal lighting level for your needs?

I don't know what your definition of pollution is, but excess outdoor lighting is ugly, it's unwanted, it can cause adverse change (everything from sleepness nights to wildlife deaths to increased levels of vandalism and other crime. And it has detrimental effects on health including a carcinogenic effect. I call it pollution, you call it light trespass or whatever you like but I suspect there is a level of excess light that you would call pollution. Can your neighbor shine floodlights into your window? How about stroboscopic flashing lights tuned to disorient and possibly trigger seizures? How about lasers? I'm not joking, given the fact that running a laser advertisement is now practically free, expect to see the night sky filled with McDonalds ads and other annoyances. If we continue to treat light pollution as a non-issue, our beautiful night sky will be replaced with pop-up ads.

I agree with you here. This is a very good start. Ask yourself, "Is the light necessary? Is it necessary to run continuously? Would I like it if all of my neighbors had the same light? What if millions of people did exactly what you are doing, would the environmental impact be worth it? Does it provide even and useful illumination of an important area or does it provide glare and deepen shadows?"

If you do need lights, LED lights provide many advantages over older outdoor lighting technology. They are smaller than discharge tubes so can be focused better. They can be placed where you need them and they consume far less power than incandescent lights. They can be PWM dimmed, they can be cycled instantaneously (opposed to the 10-20 minute warm-up of sodium/mercury discharge lights) without significant reduction in life. Rural areas could turn off streetlights unless they detect someone (a car or a mobile phone) in the area.

No. But by using a word that is a mirror image of the acceptable newspeak, I'm drawing attention to the use of language to reframe thinking (brainwash?) about abortion. It looks like it worked.

It's also interesting that my use of this term has caused so many to jump to irrational conclusions about where I fall on the spectrum of beliefs about this issue.

Exactly. The US is cleansing itself and future generations of people who suffer DS at the same time that services and support for these people to live productive and happy lives are better than they've ever been.

Eugenics (\yü-je-niks\) is the bio-social movement which advocates practices to improve the genetic composition of a population, usually a human population.
Eugenics needn't be about the NBA or eye color. Down syndrome tests and abortions have cleansed future generations of a particular kind of people. People who are typically gentle, loving and incapable of lying.

The happiest days of your life. Surely you don't believe you have the only valid kind of happiness?

What about the 1 chance in 80 of giving birth to a child with autistic spectrum disorder or 1 chance in 25 of giving birth to a child with bipolar disorder? Both of these conditions can be a more severe disability than DS But as there is no accurate per-natal test for these, wouldn't sterilization be the sensible thing be to do... for everyone?

Have you ever met anyone with Down Syndrome or Mosaic Down Syndrome? Are you really saying that allowing them to live is comparable to experimenting on Jews in concentration camps? This is the sad thing about the fact that Americans have virtually cleansed future generations of a kind of person who someone decided is undesirable. Too few of these people and their loved ones are here to correct your generation's terribly negative assumptions about the value of their human lives. Yes, Down syndrome is a burden but any parent who isn't prepared to care for a child for at least 1/3rd of their lives should not have children of any sort. There are a number of disorders which are much more of a burden. In my neighborhood there are several people with Down syndrome, two of my friends were born blind as were other, another was born with MD and countless other friends have a disposition to bipolar disorders. These good people are able to think, create, love and enjoy their lives which in many cases are more independent and just as as the lives of others.

A virus-delivered multicell cure for single-gene disorders is a real possiblity given experiments with colorblindness. We should celebrate this, but I shudder to think of a world where a 1 chance in 40 of a disorder causes us to ignore the humanity of the person with the disorder.

I'm glad I used the political wordplay "newspeak" mirror image of anti-choice because it obviously made you think.

Would 100% certainty that an unborn child would have Down Syndrome be enough to justify an abortion? That is a decision I'm thankful I haven't had to make. My answer is no and while I respect another's ability to make this decision, you won't stop me from trying to make it an informed decision.

Yes I deliberately used a term that was just as charged as the common "anti-choice" term that you've heard so much on news media and in pop political-culture, you're immune to the fact that it's an equally charged term.

The phrase "Pro Choice" is not descriptive. (Pro choice about what? iPod vs Android, Republican vs Democrat?, Beans vs Carrots?) Nor does the phrase "Pro Choice" accurately describe the plight of women in places where abortion is not only permissible, it is mandatory. It also ignores the fact that there are pro-abortion individuals (abusive boyfriends/husbands/parents) who are decidedly against giving a woman the choice to let her unborn child live.

See my OP. No the neuchal ultrasound evaluation is not particularly reliable. Combined with a maternal blood test it becomes somewhat more reliable but anyone who would use either of these to justify life/death decisions is an idiot, whatever their eugenic good intentions are. Even if these tests were 100% accurate, we have the problem of medical incompetence. A nurse read our son's neuchal/blood test results of 1/40 (2.5%) chance of Down Syndrome and presented it as a 40% chance. This nurse previously worked in well respected Boston hospital and heaven knows how many aborted babies were the result of her mathematical illiteracy. Thankfully the country where she now works (Ireland) doesn't allow abortion for eugenics as the US does.

Since we're talking statistics, amniocentesis, the invasive test for Down Syndrome, has a 0.75% chance of ending the pregnancy so we opted for a lower risk combination of an ultrasound scan and blood test. The results (along with our age and other factors) gave a 1 in 40 (2.5%) chance of a baby with Down Syndrome. But the nurse who read the results to us didn't say once chance in 40 and she didn't say 2.5% chance. She said 40% chance! (Is mathematic literacy a medical training requirement.) Fortunately we did the tests merely to inform ourselves of what special preparation we might need to make. Abortion for eugenic purposes is not legal here in Ireland as it is in the US. Unfortunately this same nurse trained in Boston. Heaven only knows how many pregnancies were ended based on this. We're thankful for a healthy little boy who doesn't have Down Syndrome but we may all owe a debt of gratitude to people with Down Syndrome. Studying the characteristics of this syndrome may help us understand Alzheimers and studying the fact that cancer is much rarer in people Down Syndrome may help us understand and cure this terrible disease.

The take no prisoners battle between the anti-life and anti-choice people have left us in a state of anti-science, anti-compassion and anti-love.

Yes, and IBM and Apple and Google... US tax, SEC and patent law as well as Fed/Obama helicopter drops assures that Goliath companies grow by absorbing smaller companies, not by innovation. And the overhead of a Goliath company assures that anything that doesn't add half a billion or more to the balance sheet will be killed. The good news is that this leaves huge holes in the market which can be filled by smaller companies. Sun Ray has been around for more than a decade and if you've seen it in action, you might wonder whether like so many other computer technologies, it was ahead of its time. For a decade it has been ready to save millions of dollars in energy and IT support costs and it would be a perfect fit healthcare, education, government and many corporate uses. Lets hope that bad corporate decisions and bad government policy are not enough to bury a good idea forever.