He also said he found that approach so distasteful that he only used it a few times, even though it worked.

From my point of view, porn is more honorable, and less harmful. I considered matters, and decided I didn't need to try the approach Feynman mentioned. (Forget who suggested it to him.) I could tell ahead of time that I wouldn't like the results. (A couple of times I slipped into an analogous position by accident, and it was always something that would have been better avoided.)

Please understand, I'm not saying that it is an inherently unethical or immoral approach. If used honestly, it escapes those problems. But it's still something better avoided, because of it's effects on *you*.

That was my experience too. Of course, I identified several causes that made things worse, and which were, at the time, unusual. Moving every 2-3 years while growing up didn't help at all, e.g. Funny thing, that seems to have become more common.

So quite possibly teenagers are now less socially apt than they were. I don't know. But there are many reasons why this might well be so.

That said, it's quite possible that computer games render recovery more difficult. (Recovery? But what better word is there?) This doesn't make them the proximate cause. I'd be more willing to blame parents keeping their children locked in their homes "for safety's sake". Or moving around more. Or loss of neighborhood schools. Or... Please note that each one of these "possible causative factors" has it's own separate reasons for happening. So fixing the problem isn't simple, and fixing the problem would only help the next generation, not the current one.

Did you confuse Jung and Adler? If not, authority figures don't play a major role in Jung's theories. (OTOH, the definitely do in Adler's.)

Or possibly the teacher just has a large class. I really doubt that currently a computer can really replace a teacher, but I can easily believe that they could replace a lecturer, with LOTS of improvement. Computer programs may not be as flexibly interactive as a one-on-one teacher, but they can be a lot more interactive than a lecturer can. If a teacher has to handle a class of 30, some of whom really don't want to be there, then the computer can probably teach those who *do* want to be there better than that teacher can. If the class size is 300, then I'm certain of it. But if the class size is 15 or smaller, then if the computer is better, then the teacher is probably incompetent. Today. This isn't talking about three years from now.

A flat rate package is essentially impossible. OTOH, billing by minutes connected is something that will only work in a monopoly environment. Billing by megabytes downloaded is reasonable in concept, but I have my doubts that it would be fairly implemented.

FWIW, *because* I don't trust the regulators to make things better, I'm opposed to any suggested change. It's not that I don't think that change is needed, it's that I don't trust the monopolies and their "regulators".

P.S.: This is independent of which party gets in. They *both* are savagely anti-citizen, in many different ways. And this is one of the ways in which they appear to be equally bad.

It sounds good, but the coffee grounds aren't the new part. That's a couple of years old. The new part is mixing it with cables, which is probably a bit trickier than it sounds like.

FWIW, I suspect that coffee grounds aren't a particularly good choice, outside of being cheap, and gleaning lots of PR. But when they're dry enough they aren't all that heavy. And they don't like to pack tightly, which is fairly important. But I think something sturdier would be better. Say hollow aluminum marbles. (They'd need to be sturdy enough not do dent in use, though. But coffee grounds turn into dust, which is also a bad thing.)

Still, for demonstration projects, coffee grounds is possibly the best choice. Sand is too heavy. Flour tends to pack. etc.

Perhaps I don't understand how Vector Linux works, but when the site is advertising version 7.0 for download, I end up with a strong suspicion that version 6.0 is deprecated, and that support (security fixes) will soon be ending. (This is increased by the announcement that the current verison of Vector Linux 6.0 is the final realease of the series.)

If I wanted an ultralight window manager, Debian would provide lots of options. That's not what I'm after. I'm after a maximally usable one, for a desktop system. With one screen. And no fancy graphics cards.

P.S.: I *have* considered running an old version of Debian in a virtual machine. In fact I do that kind of thing to keep old games working. But that kind of indirection isn't acceptable for major uses, even though it's the only way to keep non-supported systems relatively safe. And if that's what I wanted to do, I could run an old version of Debian.

If Vector Linux were actively supporting KDE3, then I would be extremely interested. But that's not what it sounds like is happening. Moving to a version that's being obsoleted isn't all that attractive a proposition, even if it does run the desktop I want. (I spent several years distro hopping, but it really interferes with getting much else done. Now when I switch distros, I want the new one to be one I can plan to stay with.)

Thanks. I'll give it a look.

OK. I gave it a look. All the purchase options make specific mention of KDE4, and *NO* mention of KDE3. I didn't see anything that indicated support of KDE3. So my expectation is that it will soon go away in an update, if it isn't already gone.

If you've ever called my ISP, you understand why most people will put up with very poor service rather than call and complain. One time it took me three days to get through. One time it took finding the local service center and parking in their driveway until a tech would talk to us. And it took HER over an hour to get through. (That was after 6 months of paying for DSL and getting a 20 hours/month dial-up.) Well, that was when they were rolling out DSL in the area, and I presume that things aren't quite that bad now, but as long as it's working at all, I'd rather not call and try to deal with them... but if my wife could keep her e-mail address we'd have switched to a different carrier.

I can accept that you already find KDE4 quite good. I don't. Kiosk, e.g., means nothing to me. (At one point it would have, but that isn't now.)

But this is what I mean about choice being good. I'd *prefer* to choose KDE3. Maybe I eventually will have that option. In the meantime there are usable options...but those usable options don't include Gnome3 or Unity, and KDE4 is inferior (in my use case) to other existing choices. That these other choices are, themselves, inferior to Gnome2 and KDE3 doesn't matter, as those choices are no longer viable. (Unless Pearson finally gets Trinity into Debian.)

N.B.: If I had access to plenty of spare systems to test on, and plenty of bandwidth to download on, Trinity might already be usable. But installing it on my current system would require removing things that might break things horribly. So I've been avoiding that, just as I avoid upgrading Vala for the same reason.

I thought so too...until they started pushing Unity. OTOH, Gnome3 isn't that much better.

There wasn't anything major wrong with Gnome2 or KDE3. Gnome3 and KDE4 are (still?) far inferior. So much so that when neither Gnome2 nor KDE3 are available (and supported) anywhere, I expect to switch to LXDE or some such. I've experimented with them already, and they may not be as good as Gnome2 or KDE3, they are, for my purposes, far superior to any of Gnome3, KDE4, or Unity. If I used a tablet my opinions might be different, but I don't expect that to happen, as for my use case a tablet if far inferior to a desktop, or even a laptop.

As a result, I'm quite happy that there are lots of options. I currently have my wife on Ubuntu stable, but when Unity if forced on us, it's going to be over to Debian, and possibly one of the less publicized window managers. She's quite sensitive to visual elegance, so it's likely to not be the same one that I would prefer. But it's quite *unlikely* to be Gnome3 or Unity. KDE4 has some potential, though, even though it isn't as good as KDE3 was. (Good means "easy to use and get things done in". I'll agree that it's prettier, but for me that doesn't cut much ice. And my wife wants something that will run the electric-sheep screen-saver, something that's for me a minor consideration.)

So options are good. My wife wouldn't like to make the choice, but she delegates that to me. I just need to choose something that she likes.

Well, we have cables strong enough to build elevators on the Moon and on Mars. And on neither place is there a problem will people living underneath the fall path. The electrical charge problems don't exist on the Moon. (Not sure about Mars.)

But the stable ecosystem problem means that we can't support people out there yet, even so. That's the real major problem. Submarines aren't a good example, as even at the extreme they come up for air every month or so, and they've got plentiful access to water, so if worst came to worst they could electrolyze it for Oxygen. (Don't know if they do, but they *could*.)

A stable habitat implies, among other things, that it can supply it's own food, air, and water from locally available resources at a rate sufficient to keep it stable. So far we can't do that unless air and water are readilly available externalities. (Given ammonia, Carbon Dioxide, Methane, and water as available externalities (comets, Jovian orbit asteroids, etc.), we need LOTS!! of energy to convert them into food, air, and water. And that's if we move out to where those resources are available. Closer in asteroids are dry, because the volatiles have evaporated. So the ecosystem needs to be really TIGHT. Transporting the stuff up form Earth is not only expensive, it is a vital dependency that makes planning to live there unreasonably dangerous. Politics that you have nothing to do with can kill you without warning, and even by accident.

No, it won't look much like what we're building now, and the reason is that rotating habitat. That will be large compared with most of the rest of the ship, unless you are planning to use ion engines to take off from a planet with moderate g-forces.

What we are currently building is largely conditioned by air resistance. That won't have any effect on something that MUST stay out of atmospheres. So while inertial mass needs to be balanced, symmetry isn't needed. Neither is smoothness.

Sorry, but there *could* be star ships with just an ion drive. It wouldn't be fast, but it could be done.

The only thing it, you need the thing to support a large enough population to maintain a stable gene-pool, and you need the place to be comfortable enough that people are willing to live in it. (Fancy computer games help here a lot. So would various forms of virtual reality.) And maintaining civilization during the "voyage" becomes very important. (You lose it and everybody dies.) It becomes even more important that your leaders not be psychopaths. (We haven't solved that one locally, but perhaps a designed society could. Perhaps.) Etc.

Basically, the people aren't explorers or passengers, they are citizens. Every one of them needs to be a part of the crew, but there also need to be multiple thousands of them. (Not sure what the minimum number for a stable civilization is.) And you can expect that when they reach the next system they won't want to debark and live on a planet. Particularly on one that will need A LOT of terraforming, and still wouldn't be really suitable. When it gets to the goal system, it will probably do some research while building an industrial complex, build two new copies, and head off in at least two new directions. If communications are kept up, then they'll probably report back on what they found, if not, not.

But nothing here says you can't have a starship with an ion drive. Just that it won't be much like Star Trek.

P.S.: What you can't do it without is some efficient source of energy. Matter annihilation for preference, but fusion would probably be good enough. I'm not sure fission would cut the mustard.

Macs are generally very nice machines. It's only the EULAs they stick on their software that drove me away from them. And Linux installs quite easily. (Or at least it did the last time I tried. They may be nice, but not enough to cause me to pay the extra price. So instead I buy from ZAReason or Penguin Computing.)