In the case of Therac25, the bugs were triggered by a sequence of keystrokes that the UI programmer did not expect. The deaths were the result of a cascade of errors. The programmer was incompetent, and never should have been writing critical code. After the fatalities, the code was reviewed by experts, and they were horrified that such a mangled mess of spaghetti was controlling a lethal machine. The code was never reviewed by anyone, and there was no testing by anyone trained on QA, and no third party testing at all. Most importantly, the radiation shield and trigger were under full software control, with no mechanical interlocks. Even after the first reported deaths, they continued to insist that the software could not possibly be at fault, when an experienced engineer would consider a software bug to be the mostly likely explanation.

The Soviet Union allowed many of its citizens to own guns. There were restrictions on handguns, and private guns were banned in some urban areas. But most people could legally own a rifle or shotgun, and many people did. The same is true in Russia today. Gun ownership is common.

The homicide rate in Russia is far higher than America, but Russia does not report gun homicides separately, so a direct comparison is difficult.

In addition to being chemically inert, a good liquid coolant should have other properties:

1. Electrically insulating (duh).
2. Low viscosity, so it flows easily.
3. High thermal conductivity.
4. High thermal expansion, to increase natural convection.
5. Low vapor pressure.
6. Non-flammable.
7. Non-toxic.
8. Cheap.
Liquid fluorocarbons have often been used. But the fluid in this case is not a fluorocarbon. It is specially blended white mineral oil.

This is why it is important to keep low-tech, inexpensively operated planes like the A-10 around. They've been so frequently used that the wings all wore out and they put new ones on. You still want to have a credible air force to protect the aircraft carriers and interests in Asia. Stealth is important to keep adversaries on their toes if they think they have air defenses squared away. Maybe the F-35 is the wrong plane, but you won't get to that decision by looking at how much was already spent - just what it will cost going forward.

The Soviet Union. Gun ownership was common there, and is common in Russia today.

This is not a manned mission, and not even the nuttiest nutter thinks that man is going to Pluto. You are trolling the wrong article.

I'm pretty sure that "fault" has a specific meaning in NASA parlance. There was obviously a software bug, but it probably didn't "fault".

Marksmanship is an area where women tend to do well. They have a lower center of gravity, less fast-twitch muscle, and a weaker systolic heartbeat. For the opposite reasons, black men tend to be the worst marksmen. In general, if you are good at sports that require sprinting, fast reactions, and upper body strength, you will be bad at shooting.

You would need to run and manage a botnet of thousands of computers to generate as many hashes as a single ASIC. It just isn't worth it. Nearly all new bitcoins are mined on ASICs.

They don't use hydropower because it is "environmental". They use it because it is cheap.

No it isn't. Areas with plentiful hydropower have electricity prices much lower than coal.

Yes. That is about twice the price of wholesale hydropower.

There are a few small miners outside these areas, but the big ASIC miners are located in areas where cheap hydropower is available.

Very close to zero. Bitcoins are mined where power is cheapest, which means where there is plenty of hydropower, like in Iceland and the US Pacific Northwest. It is not cost effective to mine bitcoins using electricity from FFs.

The supercharged version was actually more fuel efficient, but it raised the cost of the vehicle. They could not compete with the Chrysler minivan using such an expensive engine and had to introduce the Sienna, which had a normally aspirated engine (and 20 or so more horses).

The Previa couldn't get out of its own way. That's why the had to make the Sienna. Maybe you could get a more powerful electric engine in the same space, though. But it's a pipe dream for now - they can barely make affordable batteries for tiny economy cars... a minivan is out of the question.

I found $159 with no money down, but it's only for 7500 miles. If you only drive 7500 miles, you use far less than 250 gallons per year in gas in a Golf. Maybe less than 200 if you are on the highway. Even in a state with $3 gas, you are talking about $750 per year in fuel costs. Not worth it.

The comparable gasoline lease gives you 10,000 miles, so you are also getting less miles in the lease. I don't know what beelsebob's terms are, but it is very rare that a lease would be a better deal than a purchase.