There may be some possibility. That would, of course, have *definitely* added to the complexity and time taken to construct the rover. Which was done on the cheap, to meet a limited duration mission goal that it has vastly exceeded...without the extra complexity whose omission you find egregious.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think reciprocity is *best*...but at least it can be defended as a "rational" action. I completely agree that de-escalating a situation (e.g., responding more calmly than you perceive the other person to be acting) would be even better. But escalating the situation is absolutely not rational or reasonable.

Understandable? What's understandable is that only cretins would think that threats of violence are a reasonable response to a percieved insult. Reciprocity is reasonable--you insult me, I insult you. Escalation is not.

Indeed, the system is structured such that the deletionists are far more likely to hold sway. I think the rules would have to be set up rather differently for the inclusionists to be able to win out. A shame, really. Why wikipedia would want to shackle itself to some definition for "encyclopedia" based on what was possible with dead trees is beyond me. It's a small minded parochialism which does the project and the world a disservice.

China has built a very sophisticated and complex operation with tons of controls to "erase a service from the internet". There's nothing simple about it...I highly doubt Turkey has the ability to put in place anything like China's operation any time in the next 5 years.

The US Government is, however, wrong. (a distinction which may not change the outcome, but which is, I think, very important).

This, 100 times over. TOC should not be enforced by any criminal court in any country. Civil courts is a different matter. Breaking actual criminal laws is a different matter. Those criminal laws, however, should clearly spell out the crime and should not leave its definition up to anything a random person or company wants to throw into a TOS.

Well, maybe a little more than that... "Scary large thing! Hide! ... Hm, is this food? Scary large thing! Hide! Hm, is this food? THIS IS MY TERRITORY! Hm, is this food? I SAID THIS IS MY TERRITORY! Hm, this must be food. THIS IS oh, what a nice cloaca you have! Scary large thing! Hide!"

Thank you. i thought it was insulting to see columnists touting Twitter or Google+ as some answer/way forward for consuming information. They don't even begin to remotely serve the purpose that Google Reader did. And even if I could create a Twitter which managed to show me every article I was interested in from my current RSS collection, none of those other social sites do the tracking of what you've read, and what you haven't, so that you can make sure you don't miss things from sources you want to closely follow. How dumb to tech writers think we are that we'd see any sort of equivalence between those different platforms?

If I put a big truck on the highway and someone else comes along and opens up the doors because I didn't lock them, and everyone knows that it was, in fact, someone else who opened the doors, I would not be liable, at least not 100%. I agree that people ought to take responsibility for protecting their posessions, but I don't believe failure to secure things perfectly should lead to liability for others' damages.

Nice, someone actually analyzing facts and figures. Wait, we don't do that here! RTFM! You're only supposed to read the title of the article and then pick your side and hammer anyone on the other team! Geez, you almost lulled me to complacency there, with your looking-at-things-rationally!

Actually, I don't think it's true that the religious part of the argument doesn't come in to play. These nurses aren't making an argument from science. They're making an argument from religion, and then (after that turned out to be controversial) trying to find science to provide justification for their religious stance. So, while I do think we should discuss and clarify the science, there is no justification for the nurse's position or action.

I think it's admirable to go commenting in a second language, so kudos, don't let your detractors get your goat. :) (another fun idiom for you). And I agree with some other people, "escape goat" is one of the best mistakes I've seen, really gave me a good laugh. Not at you either, I just think it's a great phrase, and there should definitely be something which is called an escape goat. Thanks!

I mean, sure, maybe they couldn't use it as a stinger, but that doesn't mean it couldn't still be used as a weapon against US interests. If it has explosives in it, how would this stop anyone from repurposing those explosives if the missile ceased functioning as desired?