It's totally possible to build electric motors that use electromagnets for both the rotor and the stator... Could someone explain why permanent magnets are so much better?

People who believe in libertarianism are people who are already well off, and who think that letting capitalism run free without any regulation will somehow make the world fairer and better. The reality is that they just want to pay less taxes, because they think *they* can do without any government services. It's only slightly less stupid than people who believe in anarchy. My libertarian friends tell me how we'd be so much better protected if we all had to pay some corporation to be the police.

Let's give SecuriCorp a bunch of guns and all the power it wants. Let's pay this company to protect us, and let's let it grow as big as it can. They're so reliable, everyone buys their safety from SecuriCorp, until they've become a monopoly. Then they're all powerful, untouchable, and they can impose whatever law they want on you. They can prevent any smaller security company from ever coming into existence. Maybe the president of SecuriCorp has a taste for little girls too. He can take a few of his buddies with him into his big SUV and grab teenage girls from the street at night to gang rape them, and nobody will do anything about it.

You could of course speak with your wallet, and not pay them for safety, you smart libertarian, except then nobody's protecting you but yourself. You, of course, think you're so awesome, because you own an MP5 and a handgrenade. Too bad SecuriCorp has trained mercenaries who can make your death look like a gang-related crime. You're obviously dead because you failed to pay SecuriCorp to protect you, you unwise person.

I think that when people say "The PC is going away", they do include laptops in the definition. They honestly believe that tablets and smartphones are going to eliminate desktops and laptops... Not realizing that some of us want full-fledged keyboards to, you know, type messages longer than a few lines, do homework, write reports and other work documents, or even *gasp* programming code to run on all these devices.

I honestly think tablets are a fad, just like netbooks. Most people who use tablets would be better served by lightweight laptops, such as the MacBook Air or something along those lines... And they know it too. I mean, woah, you can watch movies on that thing, read webpages you say? You just can't tilt the screen in a convenient position without some kind of holder, using a tablet while sitting on the couch is uncomfortable, and typing on it is a pain, you need some kind of external keyboard.

Ah, yes, deemphasizes programming... Because existing CS degrees don't do enough of that already. I've done a B.Sc., a masters and am now doing a Ph.D. in CS... And the whole time, everybody's been pretending that programming is just not that important. That computer science should be something pure and somehow entirely detached from the practical realities of computing. The result? Lots of students can't code. Lots of students don't really understand how computers work, both in the concrete and in the theoretical sense.

I think if you hate coding, you should pick another field. Like it or not, unless you're doing purely theoretical CS, you're going to need to implement something on a computer at some point... And this is done with a programming language.

I think coding could be made more *fun* and less tedious, but I don't think we should try to hide it under a rug and pretend it's not there. If anything, learning to program is a great way to develop your logical/critical thinking.

Some people have a limited definition of what constitutes "science" or "progress".

At least we have the Turing Award.

I've always imagined that elementary particles must be point-like, without any actual volume. Does this study contradict that notion?

It just seems to me that it wouldn't make sense for electrons to have a volume, because that would imply some kind of structure. Nobody ever seemed to suggest that photons actually have a "shape", other than a point.

They don't use hash maps to represent objects. Both SpiderMonkey and V8 regroup objects into pseudo-classes based on the set of properties they have. The technique was actually pioneered by SELF many years ago.

V8 calls this "hidden classes": http://code.google.com/apis/v8/design.html

As for closures, they can be represented in a multitude of ways... Some more efficient than others.

Erm. I wouldn't call them "mediocre". I own a 14MP Sony digital camera, as well as a Flip Mino HD. Both do 720p video, but the video quality on the Flip Mino is much better. I seriously doubt most smartphones could even remotely compete. The thing can take pretty good video both in near darkness and in very loud environments. I've used it to take clips in nightclubs which came out quite good. I routinely use it to film my video blogs and have few complaints (although it does have some design flaws).

I think the truth is that this product is not that well known, and the average Joe will be satisfied with the video quality from a digital camera. Won't want to buy a second dedicated device that's just as expensive as a whole second digital camera so they can get potentially better video quality... Especially since it's pretty hard to judge the video quality in a store, looking at the video only on the device's display. Then you have the other problem that the Flip Mino doesn't look like your "traditional" camcorder. Customers looking specifically for a camcorder might just shell more on a "reputable" $500+ camcorder-looking device from Sony, rather than something small and "toy-like" from a brand they never heard of.

>> check out Quake II with multiplayer support [youtube.com] completely done in html5 and javascript.

Completely done in html5 and javascript... Except it isn't. This won't run in a stock browser, it needs custom plugins.

I looked into programming an FPS game in a browser myself, and ran into multiple issues. For one, you can't capture the mouse. This means you can't have traditional FPS-style mouse control. The networking is also an issue. You can't just do regular TCP/IP. There's websockets, which I'm not sure if they're standardized and uniform yet, but can apparently only connect to the web server. Then there's the sound. Do you have any idea how buggy and pathetic the implementation of the audio tag is in both firefox and chrome right now? It's terrible.

I'd like for browsers to become a better gaming platform too, but right now, JavaScript and HTML5 are being standardized by people who don't really seem to truly understand (or care about) the full potential of the browser as a game platform. Hopefully they will lighten up at some point, or browser vendors will provide suitable extensions. I'm sure browser games will gain in popularity no matter what. Lots of people are already addicted to mafia wars and all those games you find on facebook. For the browser to one day replace consoles as a gaming platform though, that would take a more targeted effort by browser vendors, in my opinion.

What state? That's pretty important to what you're saying, for reasons I'll get into at the end of this post. The short version is you don't need to leave the US to be under the same standards of care that I am.

In the civilised world, that's absolutely not the reaction that I've seen. And that includes parts of the US.

Why put up the charade in the first place, if it makes you feel so uncomfortable? Just be yourself, and if people think you're too femmy, fuck 'em.

You really need to check up on some of what's come out of the US in the last little while, then... Last July, there was an edict that came out of the white house requiring that states follow the WPATH SOC. WPATH = World Professional Association for Transgender Health. While the requirements for a D/L may be different from state to state, you can get a passport that identifies you as female with a letter from your doc.

Learn French. Get a Master's degree. Or talk to the consulate about possibly applying as a refugee or discriminated class, but expect to be told no if you do that. The reason? I know for a fact that California, New York, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Minnesota, Washington State, Washington DC, Oregon, New Jersey, Michigan, and Pennsylvania all follow the WPATH standards of care with regards to issuing you ID, as do all federal government institutions, including the military. Minnesota even goes beyond the WPATH SOC: you don't need surgery to get a birth certificate that identifies you as female, you just need to go before a judge with two witnesses who say you're female, and they'll issue an order... a friend of mine did that less than a year ago. In other words, you don't need to leave the US to get treated properly.

Perhaps you're living in the wrong part of the country. Or perhaps things have changed in your area and you don't know how... a *lot* has changed in the last 10 years in how transsexuals are viewed by society at large. More and more people understand what a transsexual is, and it is becoming easier for transsexuals to be accepted pretty much everywhere in the world.

Also, you should be aware of what's come out of the White House. Last July, there was a presidential order to the passport office to start issuing passports that identify you as female with a letter from your doc, as per WPATH SOC. July was a pretty good month for LGBT rights in general, actually, with several rule changes coming out of the office of the president.

Perhaps you need to check with a lawyer on that. Human rights do still exist in the US. And perhaps you're living in the wrong part of the US.

It wouldn't even get that far if you'd look into getting ID for it, hun. Or looked at moving to a different part of the country if you're really in such a backwards part of the union.

Again, you don't need to leave the US to get proper treatment. Perhaps you just need to move to a different state. Perhaps a lot has changed since you last looked into it, and you don't have to go anywhere.

And in response to your other post, I know many women who are articulate and intelligent. Perhaps you're working in the wrong field. Admittedly I'm working in a very technical field right now, which is dominated by males, but most of the women that I work with have degrees in computer science or related fields. Even at University, however, I took Philosophy/Linguistics, with a minor in Japanese language.... Linguistics is a field that's dominated by females these days, and the overwhelming majority of them are very intelligent and articulate people. I took electives in subjects ranging from astronomy to maths (I was the only arts major in 3rd year honours calculus) to english lit and film studies, and in all of those fields, I met some very intelligent women (there is a reason what should have been a 4-year degree took 6 years). Since graduation, most of my academic work has been in psychology and cognitive science... psych is another field that's dominated by females, and again, is chock full of extremely intelligent and articulate people.

So perhaps you're living in the wrong state *and* working in the wrong field? Or perhaps you do work with some very intelligent and articulate females, but are focusing on the bad? I know I used to focus on what disgusted me about males, and I developped a real hatred of the male of the species that didn't start to go away until about 6 months after I was full time... now I have several male friends, something that I never would have imagined possible. And here's the kicker: some of those male friends are people that I knew from before. Being out to them isn't an option, and they're still very supportive and good friends. People have changed in the last several years.

I logged into an account I promised myself I would never use again, just to avoid undoing mod points to reply to this. I was sorely tempted to simply moderate you down, but I think that somebody needs to point out a few home truths to you instead.

And lord have mercy on any transsexual that gets clocked in one of those places. Females are far more sexist and closed-minded than any male I know.

Let me share my experience with both genders when caught as the other gender in a place I shouldn't be as that gender.

My experience has been the exact opposite of what you profess. Perhaps it's because I don't think of a place like the ladies' room as a "place I shouldn't be". I have as much right to be there as any other woman. And I have *never* been "caught" as you describe. Despite being 6' tall, and having been a former rugby player, and 250lbs of muscle when I began my transition, I have never once been confronted or challenged in the womens' bathroom, and it's been well over a year since the last time I set foot in the mens' room. The mens' room is the threatening (and dangerous) environment for me, not the ladies'.

I've been full time for over a year, and while the tits help, they're really not that important for your ability to pass: people look at your body language. They look at your dress. If you open your mouth, they listen to your voice. I transitionned on the job and still work for the same company I did before I went full time, and there are people I work with who have absolutely no idea that I'm anything other than a cisgendered female. People don't tend to consider your size or your build unless you give them a reason to, which brings me to my next point:

There's a reason I use the men's bathroom at bars, even if I'm passing. It's just not worth the drama to use the bathroom of the gender I'm presenting as.

If you're constantly worried about being "clocked", as you put it, then people are going to pick up on that. You may be unintentionally sending off signals which make things more difficult for you than it needs to be. If you are thinking about yourself in those terms, then that's all you'll ever be. You will never be the woman that you seem to want to be, because you are afraid to go into the correct bathroom with the confidence and conviction that it's where you're supposed to be.

A guy who sees someone apparently female in the men's room is sometimes surprised or shocked. Sometimes the man will become angry, especially if he's older. But yet, at the end of the day, I have not had a single serious problem with being apparently female, even fixing my hair or something, in the men's room. No police, not a ton of drama.

Now, I don't know myself what it's like to be a guy caught in the women's room, but from what I understand, it involves the police, drama, screaming, more drama, and signs that get posted at clubs saying that "crossdressers" must use the men's room. Then you have to show your papers and make sure you always have that letter from the psychologist that says you may use the women's room. Even though that really carries no legal weight and you're still getting your ass escorted out of the bar anyway.

Again, if you're a transsexual, you're not a crossdresser. Don't think about yourself in those terms, because if you do, you'll never be anything more than a guy in a dress. People will pick up on that self doubt, and they'll look a little deeper. And if you can get that paperwork from your psychologist that says you can use the womens' room, then you can quite easily get a driver's licence that identifies you as female. I didn't even need a letter from my psychologist for it, I simply went to the ministry of transport with a letter from my OB/GYN, who happens to be administering the hormones... that same letter was also good enough to get a passport that identifies me as female. That's in the WPATH standards of care, which is implemented across most of the US, and *is* implemented everywhere else in the English-speaking world (outside of parts of Africa), as well as all of the EU, most of South America, and most of southeast Asia. Behaviour like *you* describe would be seriously illegal in this part of the world, as it would be a violation of my human rights (and was recently read into the constitution as such, yay Canada!). Even in the US, the human rights tribunals have pretty much unanimously agreed that a transsexual has the right to use the bathroom of their preferred gender, as long as they're presenting as such, regardless of what their documentation says.

Look into the drama surrounding a transsexual in an abusive relationship who tries to get into a battered women's shelter, and the truth shall set ye free.

They can't legally turn you away. Know your rights. You didn't choose this life, but if you don't fight for it, then you're going to get trampled by people who are either ignorant of you, or actively belligerent.

A woman just has to sit back and let her body just do its animal functions, because there will always be a man to rush in and save her whether personally or by proxy of government assistance. There will always be someone to feel sorry for her. A woman has no need for something like wikipedia. Wikipedia has man-knowledge, things that men write down so the next generation can build upon it. Woman-knowledge, on the other hand, is always about transient, animal things, like their period or their pregnancy, things they feel in the moment. Woman-knowledge is always renewed, but yet stagnant. Woman-knowledge is not knowledge for building and improving, like man-knowledge is.

I find this statement incredibly offensive. This is anti-feminism at its worst, and coming from somebody who claims to be of the demographic you claim, I am at a complete loss as to how you could be so ignorant of the point of it all. Men and women *are* wired differently, yes, but you clearly don't understand why they're different, or how.... if you want to go back to the animal brain, *way* back when, the breeding strategy was for the male to club the female over the head and essentially rape her. More recently, in hunter-gatherer societies, the majority of the calorie intake was from gatherered food, not hunted food. Humans never evolved to eat meat every day, and that's a major source of the health problems in the western world. And who do you suppose most of the gatherers were? Women. When we moved from gathering to cultivation? Again, mostly it was women (though it was more balanced, usually the women tended the crops and the men tended the livestock). Women were the ones learning about reading the seasons, and using things like the stars to figure out how close the next season was, which was incredibly important to figure out when to plant. *that* type of knowledge is definitely *NOT* transient in nature. Couple it with herbalism and knowledge of ancient medicines, and you have a basis for ancient "witchcraft" and shamanism, most of the practitioners of which (at least in Europe) were female. "female" knowledge most emphatically *is* about building and improving society.

I think you need to go back to the drawing board and figure out what it actually means to be female, and what the actual differences are between the male brain and the female brain. Yeah, there are differences, and yeah, females do tend to be more social animals, but it isn't for the reasons that you seem to think: Historically, females aren't as expendible as males, and most of the differences between female wiring and male wiring comes from the fact that people are safer in social groups; by contrast, male individualism probably comes from a drive to spread out and increase genetic diversity by joining other groups, though short of sending an anthropologist back in time to watch, we'll never really know for sure.. And I think you need to do it before you do something drastic and irreversible to yourself.

At this year's CASCON, I spoke to Murray Campbell from IBM. He's one of the lead people who work on this project and who also worked on Deep Blue. I discussed this with him. My girlfriend had told me that she also had no difficulty beating the online demo. He answered that the online demo is only a part of the system, and that their full system routinely beats top Jeopardy players. They're going to showcase their system on TV because they truly believe it has a chance at winning.

Unrelated to this, I also learned that Deep Blue had custom processors engineered and fabricated (VLSI) just to be chess accelerators. Prior to this, I always thought the machine was a relatively powerful supercomputer (with general purpose hardware) running their custom chess software. It turns out that it had many blades of processors dedicated to searching positions really fast, which each even contained libraries of chess opening moves engraved in ROM.

>> Observing real-world behavior will teach you alot more about human nature...

You have me confused with my younger sister, LUH 3417.