This sounds like a cost-cutting measure. Online classes are for times when the alternative is not having the class. They're "better than nothing", not "better".

If a school wanted to offer students a course in programming but didn't have anyone capable, then it might make sense to arrange for them to take an online course offered by a third party (preferably a tech school or college in the same area). It doesn't sound like this is anything close to what they're doing.

This idea has been tried several times and it always ends the same way (with fail [wikipedia.org]).

Its neighbor could conquer it if the neighbor so desired, but that's true for many small nations.
It accepted aid offered by a neighbor during a disaster (the fire), but nations do that all the time.

It defeated an armed invasion by a group of mercenaries, and it has existed in a state of self-rule since 1967 (ignoring British firearm laws).

What would you consider a "success"?

I'm not trying to be confrontational -- I'm genuinely curious. Both B.Sc. and B.A. have breadth requirements, partly to encourage inquiry outside of the student's chosen discipline. If you strip those away, you're no longer talking about a university education but a trade-school-style training.

No, trade school-style training would be learning how to perform the basic tasks expected in an industry, with little if any of the theory.

Taking a good school's CS or mathematics program, stripping out the requirements for intro-level soft-science classes, and replacing them with more relevant classes wouldn't turn it into a trade school program. It would just be a more specialized university degree.

Having these filters as an option is a good thing; that's just a tool you can use to refine a search.

Having them on by default and invisible (or obfuscated) is not. In this case, information is being hidden from searchers who may not even realize that filtering is taking place.

The TED page for the speech has a transcript for those who don't have sound, or just don't want to sit through a nine-minute video.

The more I think about it, the more likely it seems that you're right, seeing as he just wanted the illusion of fireworks and not a detailed (physics-wise) simulation. Applying an actual force and then calculating the velocity would have been a waste of time for him, so he probably just assigned a velocity at birth and (erroneously) called it a force in the article.

Upward force is applied to the object. Upward velocity is the result.

Problem?

No, that's an attempt by Brazil to pump up a national hero.

The Wright brothers didn't use a catapult in the 1903 flight, and the claim you just made would be wrong even if they had.

His reading comprehension isn't at fault here.

"That" refers to the preceding statement. The quote claims that a hypothetical outcome is a historical fact.

This is what you meant (and yes, it is most likely true).