As a non-physicist, my understanding of the Higgs mechanism is pretty weak, but...

The way I understand it the generic idea of the Higgs mechanism isn't simply restricted to be a "mass-generating" mechanism, although the most interesting Higgs mechanism that are searched for are the ones that can suggest electro-weak symmetry breaking which gives non-zero rest masses to W and Z bosons. The reason why most folks are searching for something that can describe this is that W and Z boson have the largest masses (~85x a proton) whereas a simplistic assumption of symmetry in the electric and weak fields would imply that these particles have zero-mass.

The generic Higgs mechanims pre-supposes a field (which exists everywhere there is the effect). Simplistic assumptions of convervation properties of the field manifest themselves as certain symmetries (which imply other symmetries and can be put into a mathematical framework similar to gauge groups, but that's not too important). The question becomes since the classical equations describe a mass-like scalar term that seems to be independent of the gradients and couples to these fields, how can we put a mass-like term into a framework with all these symmetries, yet be have it be non-zero?

The basic idea is that the field must have some sort of symmetry-breaking. At some high-energy (or temperature or potential), the expected value of the mass-like term averages out to zero, but as you go towards low-energy (or temperature, or potential), the expected value becomes non-zero yielding a mass-like term. As it turns out, if the potential of the field is shaped like a W or a sombrero, it can have this property. At high potential (when you can't see the "hat" part), the expection is symmetric around zero and the field has the required symmetry. As the potential goes down (including all the way to zero), the low-energy expectation value falls away from zero (at a consistent radius away from the center because of the "hat"). This is apparently called spontaneous symmetry breaking.

Why would the field potential have this shape? Who knows? But if it does, it can simultaeously satisfy the symmetries and still have a gradient/direction independent expected value term (which would act just like a scalar constant just like mass in all the classical physics formulas).

So what everyone is calling the Higgs field (and higgs particle) are mostly a specific interaction that describes how the W and Z boson can appear to have a non-zero mass-like term with electro-weak symmetry breaking. It is my understanding that it is currently just assumed that all other stuff that has non-zero mass would be similar, but it doesn't really explain what people think of as mass per-se (which has a mysterious gravitational equivalence), it just gives a explanation for the observations that are likely consistent with mass in terms of energy of the various fields (other than gravity).

I'm not sure what to take away from that statement about "professional engineers".

It seem like you implying that since VP9 didn't want/need "the community" (of presuably unprofessional folk) in its development that somehow the current developers of VP9 don't feel that "the community" can develop an encryption schemes (being the unprofessional folk we are)?

I gather that the Cathederal mechanism of development might be deemed necessary (by google) to avoid IP contamination of VP9, but as someone that does stuff in this area (video compression and encryption) professionally, what you seem to be implying is a bit condecending to "the community" of open source developers (many of whom are professional engineers in our day-jobs)...

In fact, I might argue that encryption schemes are best done in the community (e.g., like the AES and the SHA-3 process) because an open competitive environment is the best way to assure the actual difficulty of cirvumenting the scheme is known (rather than assuming that some experts have it figured out).

http://www.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/fair-is-taking-digital-leap/Content?oid=2442281
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/06/13/hi-tech-exhibits-join-farm-animals-carnival-games-at-san-mateo-county-fair/

Among the additions this year are a 3-D printer, a Frisbee-throwing robot made by students at Aragon High School, and a "reverse-engineering" exhibit where kids can take apart VCRs and computers to see how they work. Colaluca also has organized competitions in coding and app-making, and he deputized employees of local computer companies to judge them.

Because there happens to already be a cheap way of amplifying a small sample of DNA for identification (PCR).
Most other easy to manufacture serializable microscopic substances mostly suffer from dillution/detection problems.

The technique is to use junk DNA encoded with a serial number. DNA are the is the microscopic grains and PCR is the way to quickly do the detection if a specific serial number is present (although PCR isn't yet as simple as a swab).

Presumably you could spend years doing revolutionary nobel prize winning research and replace DNA with another chemical that had an even cheaper way of detection for this niche application, but someone who worked for Applied DNA Sciences might instead think about just using DNA and an existing nobel prize winning PCR test and get something to market faster.... Just say'n... ;^)

FTFY...

Basically, Airbus's parent company (EADS) simply didn't want to invest that much of their own money on a new development and wanted to pressure the european governments into some sort of financing trick***. That didn't happen, so EADS reluctantly spent their own money on A350XWB development (and basically they have been mostly cash-flow negative since then which really puts a crimp on the value of the executive's stock options).

*** it's a bit complicated, but because of the WTO dispute with Boeing, the government can't really just give or loan the money to EADS for new development w/o triggering potentially expensive trade retaliation, but governments can loan money for something called "launch-aid" (temporary funding *after* development to finance inventory and supply chain buildup). It's always a bit suspicious when "launch-aid" loans happen before the development even starts (which seems to frequently happen with Airbus as they use the uncertaintly of location of jobs as enticements)...

So basically, they reinvented the train...

Maybe the consumer version will be like this...

record=chromosome
song=the DNA in some specific person's chromosome
chord=mutated BRCA gene
diamond stylus=the cDNA technique to read DNA
laser pickup=some new way to read DNA

AFAIK the decision was that the "chord" is not patentable, because it's part of the naturally occurring "song".
However, since the current method to find if the "chord" is present in the "song" uses a "diamond stylus" pickup to read the "record" and is described in a patent, it might be patentable (they didn't address this in the ruling the issue of obviousness) since it uses a method to read the "song" which isn't a natural process. SCOTUS simply upheld the patent (it still can be re-examined).

The inference I made is that if someone else comes up with another way to detect the "chord" in the "song" that doesn't use a "diamond stylus" (say a "laser pickup" mechanism, or taking a picture of the groves on the record and having a computer recreate the audio), then the current patent is totally circumvented because SCOTUS says that it is not possible to patent nearly all possible uses of the "chord" (which is apparently what the patent tried to do). Unfortunately, everyone currently commonly plays "records" using a "diamond stylus" because that's the easy way to do it, so it apparently reads on their patent. However, that in itself might just make it obvious enough to invalidate their patent too, but easy and common does not necessarily make it "obvious" from a patent protection point of view (in fact some of the most valuable patents often illustrate how easy it is to do something new with an existing technique).

Also this inference I made doesn't address the issue of patentability of any specific methods to identify the "chord" in the "song" after you have read the "record" (which apparently is done with yet another common method and process which forms part of the diagnostics test that they tried to claim patent for). Maybe that part is "obvious" (in the patent sense) or easy to circumvent, but maybe not.

I don't buy that arguement. Let's say you have a phonograph (vinyl record), with a song. You could patent a phonograph player with a diamond stylus that transcribed that phonograph back to an audible sound, because that isn't only way to do it, you could also have a different instrument (say a laser-pickup), that transcribed that phonograph back to an audible sound and that would be a different invention.

However, in this case they are trying to patent using a phonograph to see if there is a specific chord on that record. Just because, everyone uses a diamond stylus to transcribe the record today, doesn't mean that that process to identify a specific chord on a record using a diamond stylus is or isn't patentable. You need to look more at the details. It may be that it doesn't pass the "obvious to someone skilled in the arts" test, but it isn't just on the face of it unpatenable or a product of nature.

FWIW, Clarence Thomas has written nearly 500 Supreme Court opinions during his tenure.
A quick glance at a few years' statistics shows that he's often in the middle of the pack when it comes to writing opinions (both majority and dissenting)...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_term_opinions_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States

In the US, alleged "perpetual-motion" machines get a special carveout. Since they want your application fee, accepting your patent application is merely a formality. However, the USPTO specifically requires a working model for machines claiming perpetual motion (and waives this requirement for all other types of patents).

The UK simply does not accept application for patents that claim processes contrary to well-established physical laws and specifically call out a "perpetual-motion" machine as an example of such a patent application that would be rejected.

I don't think anyone called 480p "hi-def" (it is technically EDTV). Also, although the Japanese had MUSE/Hi-Vision and the Europeans had HD-MAC back in the 80's, they were both mostly analog HD broadcast systems that never really had a robust consumer media component (I doubt there were more than a hand-full of MUSE encoded HD laserdiscs titles...)

The MPEG standards track (that eventually became the digital HDTV standards) was "in-the-works" in the mid 90's (not the 80's). The MPEG-2 work originally targeted SD and was rushed by Hughes (for satellite tv) and the DVD folks to completion in 1996. Nobody was delaying anything in the standardization meetings as Hughes was clamoring to have the systems layered nailed down before they launched their direct broadcast satellites and the DVD folks wanted to launch products as soon as they could. For example, all the video "scalability" cruft that nobody uses in MPEG-2 were simply a concession to a few hold-outs to get the standard approved ASAP.

There was for a short time, a "MPEG-3" standard proposed targeting for HD after the MPEG-2 work was done, but none of the proposals were significantly better than MPEG-2 coding at HD resolution, so ***rather than delay*** digital HDTV rollout to develop something better, the MPEG-3 standardization effort was simply cancelled and the first digital HD standards were MPEG-2 based (both terrestrial and satellite).

Of course, eventually, the MPEG-4-AVC (aka H.264) was eventually developed (leveraging many of the tricks used by the video conferencing standards 'churn' creating an very complicated standard) and became the current defacto standard for HDTV (except for US terrestrial broadcast which is still MPEG-2 from the 90's)...

Actually, I think this C. S. Lewis quote (I think it was from God in the Dock) was an observation concerning the tyranny of Organized Religion, not Government.
FWIW, C.S. Lewis also wrote the Chronicals of Narnia...

The full quote of the origin of your sig... It seems to have a different tone when you read the full context...

Does the buck stop at the top (the president who knew about it could have vetoed it?)

Since it appears that every member of congress and the president of the United states knew about this spying program with briefs from the intelligence agencies annual authorization and approved it, what say you about them? What makes Rep. King so special? The mere fact that he is one of the voices calling for extradition? his name? or his party affiliation?, or ...

Unless I'm mistaken, people are impeached and prosecuted for their ***crimes*** yet aren't people free to express the views that they want w/o being threatened with prosecution?

Or is this just some political rant you are going on about?