The problem is that to be accepted in an area of science that's basically nothing more than a consequence of the maths, you have to show the maths that generate the results you expect.

I'm a mathematician. I don't claim to understand 1% of 1% of quantum mechanics at all. But it comes from a mathematical model that happens to have real-world consequences that are weird and wonderful. When we then tested for those consequences, we found out that they exist in nature. Which, to a scientist mind, kind of hints that the maths must have been at least somewhat correct (or at least on the right lines).

I have my own understanding and theories, but I would also have to state, quite clearly, that quantum physics isn't really "physics". This isn't Newton seeing an apple fall and realising there's a force at play. This is someone (probably THE most famous genius) sitting down for decades with almost unsolvable equations that make absolutely no sense until they realise that it works if you have 11 dimensions, or if space and time are two different elements of the same thing, etc. And that was back in the 1900's when quite a lot of physics and maths we enjoy now didn't even exist.

Then you go out and measure in real life and you find that, actually, it turns out that your theory fits what happens in the world, not the other way around.

As such, I don't for a second think that I can just posit a hypothesis (theory is a slightly stronger word in any science) and have any concept of if I'm talking gibberish or not. The maths of quantum mechanics is horrendous and complicated and quantum theorists spend more time in front of the blackboard than they do the LHC.

If you wish to contribute, even if you don't intend to be taken seriously, it's only proper to get yourself a decent grounding in not just "hey, there's something smaller than an electron and weird stuff starts to happen at that scale, I bet I can guess what else happens", but in WHY that's so and HOW we got to that point. And in anything quantum, that means understanding the maths behind it.

As someone with a degree in maths, I tell you now, you're going to need a decent grounding in quite a lot of basic physics and huge amounts of maths and that "real world intuition" will basically be next-to-useless until the very end. That's not to mention the level of things like calculus and linear algebra you'd need to even get close to learning how we got to all of the old "wrong" models, let alone the newer ones.

This doesn't mean that wild ideas and theories have no merit, it's just that you're theorising about something that you probably don't understand the basics of. I know I don't. And I *can* read the mathematics and, given enough time, understand it.

It just comes across to any mathematician or physicist as someone who is looking at a car for the first time and saying "You know, I bet if you made the whole thing ten times bigger, it would go even faster" or "If it goes that fast with four wheels, imagine what it'll do with 10!".

In a way it reminds me of the Moon conspiracy theorists. They can come up with a million weird and wonderful things that intuition says "must be wrong". But it turns out that a few simple tests or bits of maths show them to all be nonsense. "The shadows are wrong" - fine, go out into the street on a sunny day and try hard to replicate them. If someone can replicate something that's "wrong" in the space of ten minutes, then maybe you are reading far too much into the image, or commenting on something you just don't understand.

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

Seriously, just on that page there are some 16 equations, and that's not even a millionth of what you need to understand where those equations come from.

Honestly, I DON'T understand quantum mechanics at all. I believe it, because it's accepted as the best self-consistent theory we have that has made verifiable predictions, and I use its results every day (GPS, computer processors, etc.). But I don't understand even the bare minimum of it, past a handful of experiment names and a brief summary of what their results should mean for physics. I don't understand work that was done on it over a hundred years ago (and, hell, that predates most of graph theory, which I consider a particular fascination of mine whose first textbook only arrived in 1936 - whole areas of mathematics have sprung up and matured in that time and STILL I don't understand how people arrived at those equations for quantum theory at that time). I don't understand even the bare foundations of it.

Thus, simple statements and assertions over how I think it works? They - rightly - mean nothing at all.

And the bigger problem? Because quantum theory is a result of some very high-end mathematics, the real truth is probably MUCH, MUCH too weird for us to contemplate at the moment. Chances are, anything you can think of to add to quantum theory just won't be weird enough and will be far too "logical" and grounded in an intuition that was taught Newtonian physics from the start.

Quantum theory sprung up because we hit a mathematical dead-end on quite a simple question (relatively speaking) and it took people who believed the maths had to be right even when it looked like they were going wrong, and they bent their minds in knots trying to find ways to make the maths work in reality. In doing so, they truly thought so far out of the box that they were laughed at for decades until others could get their head around it. And then they'd invented a whole new era of science (at some point in the future, there will no doubt be a reference to "The Quantum Age" as an entire era of science).

I don't intend to say "don't have an opinion" or "pssh, without a maths degree, you're nothing". But if you wonder why you don't get taken seriously, you should just take a quick course in quantum theory, starting from what we were learning in the late 1890's / early 1900's. Otherwise you come across as, say, a shaman from the Egyptian times trying to tell a modern neurosurgeon that "you have this fabulous idea about the brain".

Not really. Work in a garage for a month, you see all kinds of weird damage come in.

And this wheel is basically a cut-open barrel. Punch it on the outside and it makes a dent on the inside. It's rolling across a rocky landscape, after being basically dropped onto the planet. It probably bumps down a lot more rocks than you realise and even more than NASA ever plan, the chances of finding a level surface to wander over that doesn't have a hidden 10cm drop onto rock for at least one of the wheels hidden behind is slim. And it weighs quite a bit. Not to mention loose things getting inside the wheels and basically being inside a small tumble-dryer.

A dent in the wheel would be the least of my worries, to be honest. And there's no way you can actually tell that the dents go from inside-out or outside-in, it's an very common optical illusion. And even if the dents go "the other way", there's no way to tell from the photos that they line up - those wheels are basically taking the shape of whatever they roll over so you might find the dent going "in" is right next to a similar bend in the metal going "out".

But never let the facts stand in the way of some mad conspiracy theory, eh?

Except the open source community doesn't take "no" for an answer, it's like calling a hermit a bad citizen simply because he wants nothing to with the rest of society. Those technologies you talk of won't work with a blob because there's no ABI and GPL hooks, so it essentially boils down to the same: nVidia doesn't do open source. They only want to offer you the blob, period. But for a lot of people in the OSS community it seems doing nothing at all is the same as being evil. Either you're with us, or you're against us.

I am, and gas costs made me decide to pay $30K for my Nissan LEAF.

I analyzed TCO (excluding maintenance costs, which are much lower for electrics, but I couldn't quantify that so I just ignored it) for about 20 different vehicles, including EVs, hybrids and pure ICE vehicles,. My model assumed that the new vehicle was going to be an additional vehicle, and that the other (gas-burning) vehicle would be available for trips beyond the range of the EV. I assumed very conservative ranges for the EVs, for example I estimated the LEAF's range at 60 miles (it's really more like 80-120, depending on conditions). Finally, I created a statistical model of my driving habits and calculated the total cost over 8 years.

The result was that the three EVs I looked at had the top three spots... they were the cheapest to drive overall, in spite of being by far the most expensive up front. Even better, thanks to tax credits the break-even point was at 2-3 years. Without the tax credits it was about 6 years. The vehicle immediately behind the EVs was the 18K Honda Insight hybrid, then a mix of other hybrids and more-efficient gas vehicles and finally a long tail of gas vehicles trailing the pack.

Of course, your driving patterns may be different, your electricity costs may be higher or gas prices lower (oh, I assumed that gas prices would continue increasing at the same rate they've increased over the last 8 years), etc., etc, etc., but I've walked several other people through applying my model to their situations and in every single case the EVs have been extremely competitive -- and usually the very cheapest.

In practice, what I've found -- for me -- is that my model was very conservative. In fact, the LEAF is even cheaper than I expected. Partly that's because I was able to get a better deal on the car than I had assumed, and partly it's because I do most of my charging at work, so my actual energy costs are dramatically lower than my model had anticipated.

Oh, and it's a very nice car, not a "tin can" that can't keep me as warm or cool as I like. It's a 3000-pound vehicle that accelerates 0-60 in 7.8 seconds, will do 90+ mph and can easily keep the cab at 60 degrees or 90 degrees or anywhere in between, regardless of outside temperature. It also has power everything, a nice stereo, GPS navigation, XM radio, bluetooth, backup camera, and computer or smartphone-based remote control... it's loaded. Of course, stomping on the gas pedal, driving 90 mph and blasting the heat (the AC doesn't use so much, plus it doesn't have to work against the heat generated by an ICE) will drop my range from 120 miles down to about 70 -- but my model only assumed a 60 mile range. It's a compact, but the alternatives I compared it against were also compacts.

EVs are very real, and very practical, today. And it's only going to get better. If Tesla can produce a $30K car with a 200-mile range, it'll be a huge hit with cost-conscious people, because that's enough range that for most people it can be a primary car -- no need for another ICE vehicle except on the rare long-distance trips, and it's cost-effective to rent for those.

When you post stuff like that, and fanboys mod it to +5, it looks really silly. The reason isn't because it is not true, but because it is not impressive. Yes, Linux has a few games for it including some older Source games. Yay. Trying to imply that because it has Steam it has games is silly. Roughly 6 of my 163 Steam games will run on Linux and most of those are the older Source engine games.

Having Steam doesn't mean you get games. It means there's a platform to sell games on that many Linux users will hate on (costs money, has DRM, no source code). The games themselves have to be ported and so far, not much of that has been going on.

It does not strengthen your point when you go and make a rather silly argument. The "but it has Steam!" argument that keeps getting trotted out when someone comments on Linux and gaming reminds me of Mac users back in the 90s pointing to the 10 or so old titles you could find in the store as proof that there were plenty of games on the Mac.

Linux gaming is not in a good state currently, and trying to mask that is silly.

NPR's Planet Money had a great story about it just a few months ago.

Dealers contribute a big share of state sales tax revenues — as much as 20 percent in some states — and they tend to be big local employers. That makes state and local legislators listen.

It's definitely worth listening to the story, as there's a rich and interesting history that leads to the rather broken present reality in the States.

• Short All Things Considered story | direct mp3 link
• Full Planet Money episode | direct mp3 link

The original post about the takedown request can be found at http://web.archive.org/web/20111130013603/http://code.google.com/p/moonblink/wiki/Tricorder. It says in part,

It's apparently the graphical design that's at issue, not the name. According to Wikipedia, "Gene Roddenberry's contract included a clause allowing any company able to create functioning technology to use the name". Now that GR is dead, I guess CBS believes they own swoopy curves.

Since I don't have legal weasels of my own, or the time to deal with this, that's it for Tricorder.

It's far from clear that CBS has any copyright on LCARS, it's more that any entity like CBS with enough money to throw at the legal system can get away with claiming such, and random people just have to go along with it thanks to the way our legal system works.

I swear the demonstration of Google Now voice search at Google I/O last week had Majel Barrett's voice reading back the search query.

I swear that when they demonstrated voice search with Google Now on desktops during Google I/O last week, the computer read out the resulting query in Majel Barrett's voice.

As a general rule there's two kinds of contracts, fixed bid and time&material. The former usually means a predefined scope at a fixed price, formal change orders and bug fixes are usually free within a given testing period. The other is basically "do whatever I say" and yes I will, but I don't own the specification and I'm not making any sign-offs on what I'll deliver - I just work hours for you. You get various forms of hybrids - I consider agile one of them - but that's the archetypes. I've coded off "specifications" that were a yellow post-it note, rushed it to production with hardly any testing or documentation and if it works for them it works for me. If you're overall not happy with my work stop the contract, but I charge you every hour even when I'm bug fixing my own work.

It sounds to me like you're asking for the best of both worlds, contractors that'll work regular hours during most of the project and do bug fixes for free at the end. That is going to be trouble, every time. Hell, when you say "programming project manager" I'm starting to think they're not even in full control of the code, far less the spec. Contractors tend to love repeat business, have you them coming back for more? No? Probably because they feel railroaded by the process. Do your contractors ever reject your specs? Can they reject your specs? Or are you just telling them these are the specs and I'm saying they're good enough, get to work? What about when things undoubtedly come up, is there a formal change process or you just improving or amending the spec?

Good enough to work by and good enough to sign off on are two entirely different things, try doing a proper fixed bid project and I think you'll find out.

Actually it's running three OSs at the same time.

They're just acknowledging the reality that most people do a lot more than just play games.

I have that setup.... but it's a dark arts test every time to find the right order of turning on/tuning in the devices in right order to make it actually work. Usually I have to disconnect and reconnect the cable from the PC to my surround receiver as well. I blame HDCP, clearly they have some sort of handshake issues. The TV I had before that would only work with direct source -> TV connections, going via a receiver meant no signal. Again it appears to be a HDCP handshake issue, the pass-through added just enough latency that it didn't work. Kill it with fire.

Around here I would say refrigerators for employee use and/or vending machines are more common, basic coffee is usually free though. For example there's a coffee capsule machine on my floor, but it's bring your own capsules. Every so often I bring soda, but I could also buy it on the first floor at cafeteria prices. Snacking I do too much of already, so I'd rather enjoy that at home than snacking at work. Sure I'd in some way love free soda, but I also know I'd drink much more just because I can and it's free and it's right there. Yes self control is my own task but at the same time you know it's subsidized soda, implicitly you know you're giving up a tiny bit of your paycheck for it and want your money's worth. If I ever worked a place that gave me free potato chips too, I'd probably add 20 pounds before I quit for my own good. To me, bring/buy your own refreshments makes a lot more sense than BYOD.

Sounds like you live in a big city with underground trains, yes there the power lines will be underground and fairly well protected too. More rural parts often don't have that luxury, falling trees, landslides and rock slides can take out the power cables as well. Like you I'm not very prepared but if I lived in some of the more isolated parts - which by climate are much the same - I'd definitively have a generator handy.