The article mentions the word 'thorium', but it doesn't specifically mention thorium or breeder reactors.

Isn't thorium reactors considered for the future? are the development issues with it so great that it has been abandoned?

Money is also artificially limited. With modern technology, it is easy for each one of us to print money. However, there is this thing called devaluation, where money loses its value if its printed without limitations.

Have you ever thought that the same might be valid for movies, songs and games? artificial scarcity is what enables their creation, keeping their value high enough to be able to spend lots of man years developing those products.

Because 'kavli' in Greek means 'cock'.

I steal your car. Now you do not have a car.

I copy your music. Now you don't have the $20 I would have paid you if I didn't steal your music.

People who are willing to pay for it, will say that. People who are not willing to pay for it, will not say that.

Isn't it extortion though to demand lower prices like that?

The probe doesn't need to land: it can carry a smaller probe, which is the one to land. The smaller probe would transmit pictures and data to the mother probe from the surface, and when the mother probe is filled up, it can return home, or closer to home. Once it gets close, it can transmit the data.

The fuel requirements are not that big. It's mostly about acceleration/deceleration. Multiple launches with fuel tanks could carry enough fuel for this probe, and then assembled in space. Once assembled, the probe's engines can be fired and the trip can begin.

Various other methods can be combined to push the probe into the appropriate direction.

Even if the probe takes 200 years to return, it will be a mjor acomplishment for the human race, and it would provide extremely important scientific data.

Now that I mention it, how come there are no plans to send probes to nearby solar systems? for example, Alpha Centauri is just 4 light years away. If we send a probe now, and the probe could get to up 10% of light speed, in 40 years it will reach that solar system and in 80 years it will be back on Earth.

NSA most probably is doing this for a long time now.

Unless they are in debt, and their credit rating depends on US credit rating companies.

The above statement covers almost all countries...

The ramifications of not signing would be extremely hard.

For example, one thing to do would be to downgrade the credit rating of said country, raising its spread and interest rate. Remember, the companies that do the rating are all US companies. Then governments would be unable to borrow money from foreign and domestic banks, leading to a catastrophic economic spiral in said countries.

This would be like a death sentence for politicians, because they will be associated with the catastrophy, and they would not be elected again.

So, the politicians are willing to sign things like ACTA, in order not to jeopardise their career.