Except evolution has been speeding up in the past century - significantly.
That's because travel is so much easier and there is so much more diversity everywhere.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071211-human-evolution.html

Further some scientists have argued that today evolution of the way we think is very rapid, can't find reference right now :(

100 years ago it was rather rare to see chinese men in america, or african at japan. Nevermind places like Finland where i live.
Still very little cultural mix in most Finnish cities, but in large cities there's a lot of variety. Just here in Helsinki there is A LOT of people form Africa, Turk, Philippines, China, Thailand, Vietnam, Czech Republic, Sweden, Germany, UK, Israel etc. From all everywhere in the world, especially a lot from Russia and Estonia as they are our neighbours.
I know quite a few people who's wifes/girlfriends are from outside finland.

Yes, there has been foreigners for centuries, but in modern day long distance travel is in the reach of all but the poorest!
I even know couple of people who has married with someone coming from very long away. One of my best friends married a mexican girl.

Now tell me that won't speed up things vastly! ;)
Yes it still takes generations to weed out the most desireable genes, but now more genetic variety is being introduced to the pool! :)

Oh yeah forgot to mention BMW E90 traction control system is outright dangerous in conditions where you need to avoid hitting an obstacle.
Just at the wrong time it takes away all power, so you cannot return to your line safely, results most often in a spin.

It's a heavy car so after heavy braking while avoiding something, it does still feel good, it looses just enough grip on the rear to allow you some very good response into avoiding the collision, but when you start to flick it back (ie. not to wind up into a ditch) you are essentially doing inertia drift (feint drift for some of you), the problem is to pull it off you need some significant slip on rear tires for control, problem is that the BMW system pulls of all power just at the wrong time, either causing one of two things:
  - Rear tires grip and you get a pendulum inertia drift effect, you know after a weight shift if you do weight shift at correct time you get that much stronger weight transfer, causing you to spin out of control to the opposite direction you are trying to get.
  - You cannot apply sufficient force forwards causing at least half a spin to the direction you wanted to go, 90 to 180 degrees, with insufficient steering lock there's not much that can be done. Sounds counter intuitive i know "shouldn't it just straighten out then? You did a mistake earlier!" Nope, since tires have better grip forwards applying force allows you to also push the front and by weight transfer enables more grip on rear tires.

I liked that car A LOT, but driving the stability control on at slippery conditions was outright dangerous. Taking it off tho, BMW E90 series is VERY GOOD, it surprised me A LOT how can that heavy of a car be so nimble, agile and easy to control.
I haven't taken the car to public roads, just drifted it so don't know how good it is at roads, but knowing BMW it's probably very good.
E90 is one of the very few newer cars i'd like to actually own and use as a daily driver... As long as i can figure out a way to have the stability control off at all times and still have it insured :)

First time i drived a ABS enabled car on ice+snow with friction winter tires, not studded, was the last time i will drive a car with ABS + friction winter tires, even if they are brand new like in that case. Couldn't stop at all :(
The ABS wouldn't allow me to brake efficiently, it took all braking power away, finding the maximum amount of brake without ABS kicking in was the only way to even attempt stopping and dancing at the edge, any less brake and braking distances would have been at least 10 times longer than normal.
Thing is, most systems fail to recognize that slippery conditions such as snow or ice REQUIRES certain amount of slip for maximum grip, in snow it is as high as around 20%!

The only acceptable electronic traction control system is the Skyline ATTESA, as that system provides you with just enough oversteer that you will not end up in the ditch or tree: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATTESA

Then again i'm not joe average driver, i actually know a few things about driving.

wtf? seriously?
can't be

And either could be worked around.

Online voting, for utmost security.

Each voter gets a specialized browser install based on a normal browser with few key differences:
  - Cache is flushed every 60seconds
  - Only 1 SSL key is accepted
  - Only 1 host with which communication is accepted
  - All communication over HTTPS only

Then the webservice portion, and i'm basing this how things work in Finland. Here you can authenticate with your real life details using your bank account details.
So you login via your bank, which requires 2-factor authentication (password + rotating PIN).
Add RSA dongle which is given personally to every single voter (cost 10-20€ per voter)
So you have many forms of authentication before you are able to login to make absolutely certain you are who you say you are.

Absentee voting is not allowed. Only the voting right holder is allowed to vote.

Then just have a normal online poll type of solution, but with extra information, and extra steps to ensure the voter has given some thought to it.
Allow semi-anonymous commenting by different voters, ie. every voter is given a random "voter id"

In database the votes are saved by voter id.
the voter id to real life information data is only viewable for very precisely vetted small group of people, to basicly ensure every one is voting for themselves only, and everything is technically working.
Every one else will not see the actual identities, unless a voter expressly wants to reveal that (ie.in a comment has revealed his personality). A voter can be given a new pseudo-anonymous voter id at request as well.

Allow absolutely no one to log in as someone else. Databases are fully transactional only -> no modifying records directly etc. every single action against the database is logged. that way this database can be append only, and a cache database which can be at any time be rebuilt by following the log.

So this can be in extreme cases still traced to a specific voter, but i don't see why that is needed at all.

The biggest problem will be the people involved in this system, without making it technically impossible to manipulate the voting data even by administrators it will not be a sound system. Even government itself shouldn't be able to trace pseudo-anonymous voter id to voter at will and especially not in mass.

Quite simply tetris.
Teaches hand-eye coordination, planning ahead/strategy, mental 3d visualization & modeling skills. The infinite growth of difficulty will keep hooked up.

Mirrors:
Defeated with a group of very tiny droid satellites scattered for multiple angles.

Really long away: Can't really hit the enemy, and if you can see the enemy, they likely will see you too.

Lasers: As fast as light soooo -> best weapon to use if target doesn't have reflection ;) When they see it coming, they are already hit.

Getting away: Better be the fastest around, otherwise you are screwed

Getting hit: Your course will change as well, even if hit by laser, tho with laser it is very minimal amount of course change.
Shooting anything with mass or which generates surface heat: Your course will change and you need equivalent opposite force.

Mass drivers OR in other words: Rail gun is going to be super effective as there is practically zero drag except gravitational.

Targeting systems will be of utmost importance too.

Missiles, rockets, space torpedoes: Can be very fast in space, with huge acceleration BUT distances are so long that they need to be guided. Unless you are shooting a scatter of tiny rockets.

Initially as well everything will be very weak, get hit by pretty much anything and you are totally screwed, single hit will often be quite enough until we can get sufficient payloads sufficiently cheap into space to build any sort of armoring apart from reflectors.

Dark paint: I would guess visual cues are only semi important, anything in space will have infrared etc. so you might as well paint your warship bright orange, won't make much difference.

Battles are most likely to be very long and mostly quite boring tactical undertaking due to the vast distances and vast detection ranges.
Kind of playing chess in 3D, where movements are dictated by your engines and position (gravity etc.)
Decisions needs to be quite swift but not fraction of second swift usually, you are likely going to have quite a bit of time to see where it leads.
Probably also will be alot about psychology: Knowing your enemy and knowing how they will react.

Double windows, like in BMW luxury cars, 7-series has been doing a long time. Thick windows too, custom made. Not that expensive really.
That is if you must have natural light coming in still, which you obviously want.

Active noise cancellation is not that expensive anymore, i recall seeing headphones for 100€ or so with active noise cancellation!
You could hack from that set a cheap active noise cancellation system! :)
A little bit of experimenting is required with the location of the receiver microphone to get the timing right, and the distance of the reflector if reflector is required.

As for other surfaces:
Look at car acoustics, there is many types of noise insulations! Some are cheap, some a little bit less cheap. Common in everything: Comes in easy to apply format, "mattress" or "paint".
The "paint" type is usually very massive and to be applied thick, often just bitumen which is very cheap. Will not "dry" ever completely necessary. Thickest form needs to be applied with heat.
The "mattress" types are usually for specific types of noise, the bitumen type usually is best used to stop vibrations etc. in cars, and functions for all types of noise. The mattress types are usually lightweight and thus usually effective only for certain bands.
Often the mattress types also include heat shielding & insulation.
The cost per m2 ranges from couple euros to 30 euros with these, but i'm sure you can get them in big quantities far cheaper than that.
Downside is that these are only suitable for inner structures, so if you live in brick / concrete building you'd need to build separate inner walls too, thus most likely not suitable to your application.

Active noise cancellation might be the best bet here.

this is nothing new, wikipedia is a collection of rumours accepted as fact by the majority, not actual facts based on science and credible sources.
I've seen some outrageous claims, such as tweeter speakers being capable only to produce upto 20kHz, not even a picture of a *TWO* retail tweeters (tweeter + retail packaging with specs) promising 30kHz made them change their mind back then.
I stopped trying to fix all the errors in the english wikipedia ages ago because "the elite of editors" seemingly knows better than anyone.

Must be of lesser quality metal then ...
I got bolts which are meant to be reusable for "as many times as they are undamaged to the naked eye". They are very expensive very high tensile strength bolts, studs and nuts meant to hold very high forces in some cases extreme temperature changes, potentially from ~-40C going to +100C in few short minutes while other metals around them are at unevent temperature and different material, therefore different thermal expansion. Any sane person will allow some warming period before actually putting their strength to the test when peak temperatures can become as high as 1200-1300C.

What are they, you ask?
High performance engine fasteners, for example:
  - Flywheel which is connected directly to crankshaft... If it comes loose, somebody is likely to die
  - Cylinder heads. Imagine the pressure when you have 10:1 or higher static compression ratio and you are pushing more than 3 bars of boost pressure, in a gasoline engine or a diesel engine pushing 7-8bars of boost pressure .... That's some wicked pressure and heat peaks!
  - Connecting rods and crankshafts ... Experiencing some extreme revolutions (you know, 4stroke engine doing 18k RPM as per ignition, is doing hell of a lot more at crankshaft and connecting rods ...)

They are always fastened to very precise, and usually very high torque, preferrably using molybdene based lubricant, but even higher torque if using somekind of assembly oil (traditionally some 30W mineral oil...). If try torque rating is 90nM (quite usual), then molybdene torque rating is around 105nM and with oil can be 120-130nM and that's not even a particularly special case, using JUST 8-10mm diameter studs.
I got some studs which costed 18€ each at wholesale prices, and these are mass produced afterall, available to anyone, made from high strength steel and not some unobtainium.
10 of those TINY studs + bolts + washers might be holding down the force generated by a 1liter turbocharged engine revving to 10k RPM and upwards, while producing more than 600hp at the wheels... dyno failed at that point, not enough grip, and that was at quite mild boost because there was not enough cold air to be used for cooling the engine... This particular engine was ran at the salt flats on even higher boost ratio.
or a 13k RPM screamer 1.6liter naturally aspirated engine with EVEN HIGHER peak pressures, charged engines have actually lower peak pressures than naturally aspirated engines. and yes both of the engines is still roughly at the reach of anyone motivated sufficiently and meant for a car. First one had actually displacement reduced significantly.

Do you really think NASA is not using bolts, nuts and studs of AT LEAST this kind of quality?

That being said, they probably should use studs in exterior fastening, exactly because of the reasons mentioned in TFA.

Those rockets you mention are not meant to operate in 0G vacuum under huge temperature swings without convection to aid ...

Likely WD-40 turns to gaseous form in vacuum, would be my guess. But who knows.

Bolts and nuts are relatively cheap, easy to manufacture and very reliable usually.
Given the temperature swings, 0G etc. it doesn't leave much room for other kind of joints. Maybe stainless zip ties could work to some degree.

working on old cars almost daily this is somewhat common.

without any lubricants or excessive force, the trick is usually to remove the object being attached, then try to get the bolt to screw in fully, failing that, using something to try and clean the thread and just trying again several times.
Usually it's just some kind of dirt OR the object being attached not perfectly aligned or slightly wrong dimensions.

Once i tried to get a bolt to screw in for weeks, despite everything seemingly aligning perfectly (VW Golf MK2 gearbox) it simply wouldn't bolt in, removing the gearbox and then screwing in the bolt no problems, but as soon as i put the gearbox in place on a gearbox jack, despite all the other bolts going in like supposed to, the last one kept on giving grief until one day it just went in like it's supposed to.

Point is, it's no rocket science (pun intended) and usually it's going to be either of the two (dirty or misalignment)

and unfortunately every bit of regulation, laws etc. are designed with the worst of the idiots in mind.

yea but we could decrease the complexity of the habitat to a great degree probably, with few nicely chosen microbes, and maybe eventually plants.