I also think they're underestimating cats. But If they're connecting deep learning systems to telescopes (which is not explicitly stated), when a cat is positively identified, perhaps somewhere millions of light-years away and hundreds of thousands of light-years across, I guess we'll be sorry.

sort of takes the romance out of it
more on that
alright, if you're not trolling you deserve a letter grade off that project

you're right.. I see the flaws in my proposal. thanks... esp. the part about how "Crazzy Eddies Plastic Clockwork Solar Tracker Hacked OneOffs" might not market so well, nor do such good business compared to doing it right with safety and the economics of the homeowner in mind, not the cheapest possible solution.

You don't need that kind of a motor. I was talking about clockwork tech.

true... but you're not making one. I don't get to build many bridges in a control booth, but seems like once you sorta gettit rite, when you mass produce it, that cost is spread out so much...

assuming the $100Ks per installation for trackers meant they might at least be $2K-5K per panel... I bet I could design something a lot cheaper that would work fine for 5-10 years.... out of even off the shelf stuff. I was thinking of something that worked like those plastic clock wall wart things that turn your lights on and off. At $200, does it really have to be such an accurate clock? Does it even need a powered motor? "Sun (should be) over that way... sorta... " and breaks in 4 years 2 months for $200 might whoop the pants off "Sun is exactly there to +/-0.00003% deviation" that lasts 10 years (or what have you) and is Hurricane Rated Z3.4 and 80mph winds for $2000.

hmm... sounds like there's a good reason why it might be expensive... it has an eye or something, detects where the sun is, and uses some microcomputer technology and patent encumberd logic to do things the way they do things in the 25th Century, we imagine.

But it just needs to be a clock. So I don't see why it would cost even $200 per panel to install a single axis "tracker" that is actually just a friggen clock. Seems like this space might be ripe for taking out all possible competition with one amazing "dumb" product.

I love engineers. But maybe we have too many and their bored? Maybe not enough and their bored? idk. No excuse for overengineering a problem with a really simple/cheap solution.

This is what I'm talking about. Look, resources are limited. THERE IS OTHER, REAL CRIME. Lets put resources into fighting THE WORST and most popular crimes. Lets not waste resources and time going after offenders that probably cause .01% of car accident deaths. Its just common sense: don't waste time trying to find and police things that aren't worth the effort. More people are killed by second hand smoke than a stoned driver. More people are killed by tripping and falling than intoxicated cannibis drivers. I'm not saying they're ok, I'm saying IT ISN'T WORTH THE MONEY, it will not be effective, and the courts are going to destroy these efforts. But you go ahead on your cruscade against nothing.

Entourage! Fanatics! Paparazzi! Yes, they follow the stars, but I'm not sure its necessarily "life."

Safety, of course, is obvious: accidents at high speed causes higher fatality. But the reason for the national speed limit had nothing to do with safety... it was about conserving fuel. Over 55mph, and you have diminishing fuel economy due to friction. Did we solve the energy crisis? Awesome.

Find 10. Find 100. Then I'll donate half my salary to this R&D for a pot breathalizer.

For alcohol, 2012, there's like 30,000 alcohol related auto accidents with death. That is a valid target. Cannibis? not so much. Don't waste my money on bullshit, please.

If you're going to spend money on R&D to create technology to go after these offenders, then you are incorrect. Money is money. Before a government spends it, to create a policy they want before that techology exists... idk what that is. That's throwing money in the toilet. The data exists. We have the medical records of every intoxicated driver that ever got into an accidnent. They were usually drunk. There is simply no data anywhere that would reveal that cannibis intoxicated drivers are causing any accidents. They're there, but they're not killing anyone, regardless of their law-breaking and impaired driving. We don't need to waste resources going after these offenders because resources are finite, and drunk drivers are killing people, as well as sober gun-owners being the only group that is shooting people. We need to be careful with money, and use it wisely. The worst most popular crimes should get the most attention, not the crime that isn't hurting anyone. IF they get caught and fail the sobriety test, charge them. But don't make taxpayers pay for vaporware that will never work, in order to go after a crime that has NO VICTIMS.

Seriously, you want intoxicated pot drivers charged before the violent criminally offending assholes?

The responsibilty lies squarely with whatever coward racist came up with the idea: "cannibis causes car accidents and kills people" --- fucking prove that!! IS IT A PROBLEM? IS THIS REAL? If so, move forward. If not, go to hell, you fucking racist!

Respect appreciated! However, you absolutely do because you're simply wrong, and the data PROOVES that. Sleepy drivers, old drivers, and new drivers will cause more accidents than your average cannibis user. Driving with a gun in the car is a potential for danger, but there's no way you could outlaw guns in cars unless there was data to show that potential is reality.

I agree we should not keep giving chances to drunk drivers. How many drunk drivers killed someone after getting a DUI, and getting back on the road? MANY. You get caught drunk driving a vehicle in Germany, you'll never legally drive again. That's how it should be because ALCOHOL KILLS PEOPLE.

Cannibis, by all the data in the US of all car accidents, does not, and its a big issue to medical cannibis patients because of how the drug lingers, beyond its psychoactive effects. A breathalizer cannot tell you if someone is stoned, only if they have pot on their breath.

The reason it is ludicrous, and anathema, is that we have a rather large population that is prescribed drugs like Xanax (which is a good drug for those that need it, I'm just using it as an example). You think Xanax isn't abused, Xanax intoxication doesn't cause accidents? Xanax has been legal a long time... where the fuck are the Xanax breathalizers??

This singling out of cannibis by these police is rooted in racism. Really. Learn history, and you will find that your very own negative opinions have thier roots in racism. If you can live with that, ok. I cannot.

Reiterating: intoxicated driving is bad. No, we don't need to single out cannibis users with technology and spend any resources going after these offenders that cause no harm... I'm not saying they're good, I'm saying it is a tremendously poor distribution of resources to go after the least offenders the hardest.

Have data that cannabis intoxication causes accidents before you make laws attempting to prevent these accidents. Don't assume. The facts are in stark opposition to the actions of these authorities. For every 10K alcohol related accidents, you may see one cannabis related accident. Seriously, its not even on par with texting, but likely on par with crashing because someone had their high beams in your face. Don't be afraid of the unknown, and don't make up things that make you afraid and pretend they are real. The scourge of cannabis induced car accidents is fiction. That being said, intoxicated driving is intoxicated driving, should still be illegal. But to spend God-knows-what on some technology for law enforcement to use when it certainly is not clear its necessary is really stupid. They're not going to prevent a single accident (because stoned drivers so so so rarely get into accidents), and they will have blown a bunch of money for nothing. What happened to hold your head back and touch your nose... walk a straight line? If you beat the sobriety test, you beat it! If that's not good enough, then wtf was it doing there to begin with? Police don't need a breathalizer to do their job... they just need to stfu and do their damn job: stop crime! Stop making up bullshit and costing taxpayers for no reason.

See the fallacy being presented! They are putting the cart before the horse. Before a government implements policy to go after stone drivers to prevent accidental death, it needs to be shown that stoners cause accidents! You can't just assume that. There is tons of data for alcohol related accidents. But there is hardly any for cannabis induced accidents... because there are so few, if any, documented cases of a person who is intoxicated ONLY with pot causing an accident. This is fear-mongering, pure and simple, and they're using their fear-mongering to set up controls that are inappropriate. You don't have to be afraid of the unknown... just admit to yourself that you don't know, and suspend judgement until you do.

That's the wrong question. The question needs to be "where are all these car accidents caused by stoners?" The nanny-staters are INVENTING this problem without data (because there is none... pot doesn't cause car accidents like alcohol will... and if it did, there'd be bodies everywhere), because crime solving and the prevention of violence is too difficult. But them stoners are easy pickings! SO lets inflate the non-problem to blind everyone from the fact that police are ineffective at stopping crime, so are instead driving their own economy by milling stoners into criminals. "No, you didn't do anything wrong... but you might!" wtf.

God, what a world it might be if the police got their damn priorities straight! (Its not the officers, its their racist, fear-filled bosses).