As a regular at the Moosque I'd rather be interested in the opposite device converting speech into breath.

Actually, when people say googling, they really do mean "look it up using Google."

Actually, no, they don't. They mean "look it up with whatever search engine you usually use". As in, google it with Bing".

If gun ownership were more tightly controlled, those 14000-19000 nonfatal injuries and the hundreds of fatal injuries from accidental shootings would be reduced by at least an order of magnitude - lives would be saved.

The number of firearms accidents is statistical noise. Anyone making a great hue and cry about them is clearly not actually concerned with gun accidents, but is trying to use them to veil a prohibitionist agenda.

If gun ownership were more tightly controlled, the 60,000 to 2,500,000 annual incidents of firearms self-defense (yes, huge error bars) would be reduced -- more people would be murdered, raped, and robbed from. Lives would be lost.

Also, of course, enforcing a prohibition law ipso facto means locking people in cages for acts that do not credibly threaten the rights of others. Liberty would be lost.

Here in the civilised world...murder rates and prison populations are proportionally tiny compared to the USA.

Folks in Mexico, Philippines, and Brazil might take exception to being called "uncivilized".

Yes, we have more violence than other wealthy nations. We also have more of a problem with an unaddressed legacy of slavery and segregation, ongoing racism, ongoing economic injustice, and lack of access to useful mental health care than those nations do. Those factors have far more to do with our violence problem than access to firearms does.

According to CDC's WISQARS, there are about 14,000-19,000 nonfatal injuries stemming from accidental shootings per year in the U.S.

And according to that same source, for 2012, there were 8,974,762 non-fatal accidental injuries from falls. Floors are dangerous. 2,145,927 from cutting or piercing objects, 972,923 from poisoning, 423,138 from fire, 357,629 from dog bites...

Heck, there were 58,363 from "nature/environment", which includes "exposure to adverse natural and environmental conditions (such as severe heat, severe cold, lightning, sunstroke, large storms, and natural disasters) as well as lack of food or water." Nature will hurt you with more probability than guns will.

But yours is a common mistake people make when talking about guns, because they just don't know (or care) about the actual numbers.

Pot. Kettle. Black. Numbers are meaningless without context for comparison. By any rational comparison with other things that can hurt you, firearms accidents are rare.

I had an idea that might not be so dangerous and pulled out my fone. âoeComputer,â I said, âoewhat's the best way to knock that bitch out?â
        The fone said âoeParse error, there are no female dogs on board and âknockâ(TM) is not in context. Please rephrase.â
        Who programs these God damned stupid things, anyway? Back when computers were new, science fiction movies had computers that could think. These stupid computers sure can't. God damn it, I was going to have to talk like I went to college... only I ain't went to college, damn it.

IG compliants are like cockroaches, if you see one there are probably another 100 or so waiting to be discovered. After 20 years working in the gov't most of the negative comments I see here are true. You have about 10% that are doing a great job, the next half do the bulk of the grunt work. The last 50% are made up of substandard workers. If you fired the bottom 20% on any given day the only thing you'd noticed at work would be the availability of more parking spots in the morning and possibly the productivity would go up since management could spend more time training and less time on personnel (off duty/discipline) issues.

Contracting out the work would improve it somewhat, but it would still have metric chasing issues.

Evolutionary selection pressures never stop.

It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any long-term evolutionary advantage for a species. Horseshoe crabs have been rocking along on tiny brains for about three orders of magnitude longer than Homo sapiens has been around.

When I hear from time to time those wonderful thoughtful remarks by US politicians that seem to be so upfront against "reactionary" establishment, it always reminds of a 30-year old (at least) Russian meme called "The fight of Nanay boys". Basically, those Nanay folks of Far North of Russia had had this traditional entertainment show called "The fight of Nanay boys" where an entertainer would dress his lower and upper parts of his body in clothes in such a way so when he bends forward and stands on his feet and hands it appears so as if two boys are fighting each other

Here is an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

That's what first come to mind when I here statements like the one from Mrs. Sotomayor

The whole series of his reviews of fictional books is wonderful.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

One of my favorites is Die Kultur Als Fehler, or 'Civilization as a mistake':

"...it's illegal for these ride-sharing services to charge passengers an individual fare..."

If you're charging for access to X (for any given X), you're not sharing, you're selling (or leasing). And you don't get to be exempt from consumer protection regulations just because you're doing your selling on the web.

...but some European countries (France is another one) have all these stupid little "we're special...and we don't understand the internet" rules...

Sounds like these nations understand the internet quite well. They understand that it's not magic and does not relieve companies of their responsibilities to operate in an accountable manner. "But...we do it the internet!" is not a legal escape clause, as companies like Uber are finally being taught.

I think prisons are a huge waste of time and resources so don't put words in my mouth. The problems of education, employment, and poverty are a result of state function, which is where all the demand and money for prisons comes from. Take away the "need" aka the monetary incentive, and there won't be much demand for prisons. This is why 'm a firm believer in personal responsibility. If a criminal seeks a life altering event by inflicting injury on his fellow man, you are personally responsible to deliver it. Don't disappoint! Besides the taxes you save may be your own.

1x 9mm 124 grain hollow point $.27
1x 6ft deep hole in the ground $200
vs
5 year minimum sentence in Federal prison for violent offender $150,000

If you can't see the money incentive distortion that creates in the market place then you are pretty much an idiot.

"Loeffler suggests a suite of sensors including GPS and the wristband accelerometer could be given to convicts as a requirement for their parole. Not only would this help with police response in case of recidivism"

If ex-cons are suffering from recidivism you the public are doing it wrong.

Get to the gun range and get your grouping a little tighter and for God's sakes, even though they are more expensive these days, don't be stingy with those 100% effective anti-recidivism devices (aka bullets).

or android. Or PS4. Or any other platform Microsoft doesn't want it on.

I know I might be over reacting, but is it just me or is there something wrong with a world where a company has so much money it just just nonchalantly drop $2 billion USD to get a slight competitive advantage? This isn't the first time Microsoft has done this either. This is why liberals don't like concentration of wealth and support high capital gains taxes...