I believe he was speaking of people like this and discussed at much greater length here.

Ah, but they never get it, do they?

I'm not certain this hasn't already happened. Given that the vast majority of the people who practice Christianity as outlined in the Bible have virtually ceased to exist, that may well have come to pass.
Granted, I am not an expert on the work of fiction in question, so take that with a grain of salt.

I would like to note that the $75 million is their obligation for damages, not cleanup cost, which they have stated they will pay.

My college education consisted of a major in geology, double minor in physics and math. I'm not going to touch any of this guy's numbers, since I have serious reason to believe that his data is not accurate. Then again, I'm not touching any of the other numbers being released because I haven't managed to locate data that I can verify to be accurate enough to start using. One thing I can say though is that BP is only legally liable for $75 million in damages at a maximum currently. This will not change without new legislation. I'm not sure how much this will end up costing, but I'm reasonably certain it will exceed $75 million. BP is a corporation. Corporations typically tend to depend on profit, which is easier to generate if you pay only what you have to. BP may have promised to pay it all, but, like the queen's ass, this remains to be seen.

Then, by your comparison, I guess we would have to consider the grid that delivers the power to your computer to be part of your computer, and the plant which produces it, along with all of the various things which go into power production, up to and including the planet itself because we extract resources from it to do this. Perhaps it should even include the sun.

So, you are trying to tell me that with this molecule, there was no deliberate process for transforming one or more inputs into one or more results, with variable change? You obviously have no idea what a calculation actually consists of. The concept of calculation is not bound up with arithmetic. Almost counter-intuitively, it doesn't even necessarily have to mathematical.

There there, Mark Shuttleworth. You didn't have to post as AC in order to throw your temper-tantrum. We're all friends here. It's okay *soothing, cooing noises*.... You can pu

I had already tried policing them at by that point. Those who were going to do the assignment were doing it, and those who had already decided not to sat in silence giving me dirty looks. What else was I to do? The assignment was to copy definitions, and answer a few questions from a section review. In the review, the answers came from the vocabulary words and definitions they copied. I did not have a single student question all day.

Because it is the proper name of a subject/course title in this instance, and is therefore capitalized, if I recall the rules correctly. If not, then I am in error.

You are 100% correct. There was a generic vocabulary and section review today. In all of the classes, very few students participated. Even when I put forth the effort to police them, those who did not wish to do it (the majority) still did not participate.

I am currently the instructor in a high school Chemistry course (at least for the day). From my experience observing the students of today across various subjects, I can say that the fault is with both the students and their parents. Our students have no work ethic, and no desire to learn. They idolize their own ignorance. The writing I see from our high school students is worse than that mentioned in the article. Even among students who score relatively well, I get the impression that I am reading a paper written by someone without native English fluency. This is, of course, when they can be made to work on any assignment to begin with. Presently, the majority of the students I am watching as I write this have elected not to open their book and participate. Instead they have chosen to engage themselves in useless, and frankly, inane and nonsensical conversation.

Equally disturbing to me is the lack of command in spoken English. These students, with few exceptions, are native English speakers, but it would be difficult to tell this from observing them. I was raised in the same town as these students, and progressed through the same education system under most of the same teachers. The curriculum has changed in the intervening time, but not enough to account for the disparity in abilities. It is honestly as if I speak different language than these students when I speak English properly. As a matter of fact, English is an entirely differently language from what they speak, and that appalls me.

Having working experience in the public education system, I can say that our problems are arising from our youth culture. The problems with our youth culture are largely due to a lack of interest or parenting ability on the part of our parents. Our students are held to no standards at home, or at least, very low standards. They have no desire to learn, and no desire to work. I try to inspire students when I have the opportunity, but results are highly limited. It is shocking and sickening when I consider that in short order these students will be adults, with responsibility in society. The difficulty with language is a symptom of the deeper problem: our students idolize willful ignorance and have chosen to be intellectually spayed. I feel that only the sobering reality we will face when we become dependent on this generation for their participation in society will shake us from our complacency and help us to insist upon higher standards for education. This effort should be maintained not only within the education system, but at home.

Congratulations! You are today's winner for the "Who can make me feel old firs today" contest! There is no prize. However, I look at your post and everything in it made me smile. Kids today...they missed out on so many things. It makes me wonder what they'll say about the generation after them.

I'm descended from lowlanders as well. However, we're the only lowland clan, officially registered with the Lord Lyon King of Arms. This has nothing to do with the story mind you. I'm still waiting to find out the exact nature of the alleged copyright violations before I make any comments on that.

I'm reminded of a poster that I saw hanging in a fellow teacher's room. It shows young people protesting animal testing. The caption under it reads (I forget the exact number used) "That's to animal testing, they will have 28.5 more years to protest" and then gives brief commentary about how animal testing has increased the average human life span. Next to it, there is another poster showing adorable little animals and their names, along with which diseases they were cured of, which makes the statement "animal testing saves animal lives too". I've never met anyone else with pro animal testing posters before, and I really need to ask her where she got them from.

Markets do a piss poor job of that. Case in point: wire hangers. Cheap to make, cheap to buy, cheap to throw away. We don't really pay for the environmental impact of this. Enough are thrown away each year to account for enough steel to make thousands of new cars. But, hey, who cares if steel is steel and extraction is extraction? We're talking profit margins, something the market is quite adept at increasing, no matter the actual cost. We can't really afford to throw away thousands of cars the same way we do hangers, even though steel is steel and extraction is extraction. This is what I mean by price != cost.