He advances mankind more in a day than you'll accomplish in your whole useless life. What kind of arrogance leads the simple-minded to throw rocks at people actually succeeding at changing the world?

He's right that we need to get populations of humans off this rock if the species is going to survive. Mars might be a good first step, but we need to think about more distance, Mars is too close. The gamma ray burst that kills off life on earth would just as easily kill everyone on Mars. If the problem was a wandering neutron star it's going to savage everything in its path.

We need to think about sending generational ships into space. Maybe we can't do it right now, but we should be working toward that goal. Perhaps Musk is thinking that generational ships are too big of a step with current technology and that we need to get comfortable spending longer times in space before aiming higher.

I will never understand the quasi-religious fervor some people have about space.

If we, as a species, don't get off the earth, and fairly soon in terms of our evolutionary history, we're going to die. That's a fact. If it's not a gamma ray burst, a meteor or comet fragment the size of Texas, or a wandering neutron star, something is going to come along and kill everything on this planet, including us.

What I will never understand is short-sighted people who only care if the planet lasts long enough for them to get theirs and piss on future generations.

just that they never collapse further than the state that gravity can overcome the speed of light.

It sounds like a new term like "black star" rather than "black hole" might be in order. Because the stars at the center of our universe are orbiting around something really heavy that doesn't emit any visible light.

If I'm reading this right there's something really big and heavy there, we just can't see it.

I remember when the Redmond faithful used to go on about needing Windows to get "real work" done. My work must not be real because I can do it on Windows, Linux, Mac, Android and iOS. I find myself using my Android tablet more and more for work and all my social media promotions.

The operating system is becoming less relevant every day. People are choosing devices, not operating systems.

First the militarization of small town police departments, SWAT teams for serving routine warrants, rising incidents of shocking brutality and now law enforcement has devolved to the point of being little better than a band of petty thieves. This is getting pathetic and scary. Foreign countries are issuing warnings about the conduct of U.S. law enforcement personnel. Am I the only person who has a problem with that?

Sounds like someone figured out the basis for the holodeck on the Enterprise.

there are always people in third world countries who will do the same work as you for peanuts.

I remember spending hours untangling Bangalore Spaghetti Code. One application used a 2,000 character url string that passed the administrator user name and password in plain text. Cheaper does not mean better. People over there can work for peanuts because they live in cardboard ghettos. Maybe we want our people to have indoor sanitation, running water and electricity.

Maybe we should be considering trade barriers instead of feeling like we need to compete with starvation wages in every third world hell hole on the planet.

All our hopes and dreams revolving around deflecting asteroids and comets all hinge on being able to detect them far enough out to make an intercept. Makes me think we should really reconsider the priority we put on manned space missions, particularly generational missions. Otherwise we stand a good chance of getting snuffed out as a species if we hang around here long enough. Asteroids and comets are not even the most dangerous threats we face.

Attackers have used the Linux vulnerabilities on unmaintained servers to gain access, escalate privileges to allow remote control of the machine

Holy misleading headline, Batman! Any server that's not maintained is vulnerable, how is this news other than it's a Linux server botnet? OMG unpatched servers are vulnerable to hackers!

They have the vision and agility that NASA lost in the sixties.

I get smacked down here for suggesting that NASA is no longer the best agency for moving the space program forward. SpaceX soft-landed two boosters in the ocean and are ready for a land trial. They did that in their spare time. It would have taken NASA 10 years and $20 billion dollars to replicate that achievement. NASA also relies on contractors with obscene overhead rates.

SpaceX is living proof that NASA wastes billions.

When you look at the problems they have yet to solve, compared to the problems they've already solved, they don't look that menacing. To me it looks like a prototype that has been fantastically successful.

that the car wouldn't be able to spot a police officer at the side of the road frantically waving for traffic to stop

Well, can't solve that problem so lets hang up the entire concept of self-driving cars because of a handful of hypothetical obstacles. Never mind the lives and money saved, never mind the productivity salvaged by all that extra time. Can't see a cop waving so hang it up. No progress for you!

How can SpaceX come up with innovative rocket designs for a fraction of what it costs NASA? And they can produce those designs faster. SpaceX soft landed two boosters into the ocean, it would have taken NASA 10 years and $20 billion dollars to replicate that development.

I spent years in Titusville to cover the end of the shuttle program and walking away my opinion was that NASA is a flock of risk-adverse mid-managers flying in formation with a rusting theme park endless replaying clips of their glory days. There are some really good people there, some of them doing amazing things, but they're handicapped by a management structure that's too fat and doesn't have an aggressive vision for the future. NASA depends too much on contractors that can't produce anything on budget and there's no penalty for not performing. Some of that is political, not all their fault.

If we're going to explore space then we have to face the fact that it's unlikely we're going to get there with NASA as it exists today. And we have to find a way to fund that exploration so it's more insulated from politics. Otherwise we're stuck on this rock until a giant comet, asteroid or neutron star wanders by or we get fried by our own sun or a gamma ray burst.

Operating with cutting-edge technology out of a trailer in rural Illinois...

They'll more likely come to the conclusion that the universe is 16 years old and pregnant.

This means the developing thymus would not be a tissue match for the patient.

It would seem like organs grown in animals would contain animal proteins and cell receptors. I wonder how they get around that in the patient ready organs? Freaking amazing. Not quite as amazing if the recipient has to live on anti-rejection drugs the rest of their lives, but still impressive.

Researchers also need to be sure that the transplant cells do not pose a cancer risk by growing uncontrollably.

Slight problem there.