They aren't stupid, they simply don't know any better. Most people barely understand the concept of things like "executable file" and "activex control" if at all. They just click away, because thats always worked for them in the past. Its not the user that is at fault for everything that happens, even they are the cause. You can't expect everybody to understand what a trojan is just because you do. Some of the malware is very clever, I recently cleaned a slew of corporate computers infected with tons of crap from some users clicking on what appeared to be legitimate security warnings from windows. These popups can easily fool most people. I took care of it by installing good antivirus and antimalware but a lot of small businesses simply have no clue. They buy a computer, it comes with norton for 60 days, they plug away and don't think twice. Two years later they are infected to all hell and have no idea why. I don't fault them, what about Dell and the likes putting trialware of CRITICAL components onto these new systems? They should have bullet proof antivirus on the system for like, as part of the purchase price. The entire PC market is messed up in that regard. In the long run, it helps sales, because people will buy new computers once their old one becomes slow and worn out, like they are tires or something.

People aren't "stupid" just because they don't have your level of computer expertise.

We are still very limited in what can be done. The amount of models on screen at any one time, the field of view, interactivity of the environment, etc. More processor speed, better GPU's and more ram will all lead to more realistic and fine grained physics, larger interactive environments, 3d displays, faster load times, you name it.

People said the same exact thing with the ps2, the pentium, all that outdated tech.

We have a long way to go yet, these primitive consoles are just the tip of the ice berg. Its not just how many "p" the resolution is. Its about the complexity that can be achieved, the depth of the experience. PC's are far better at this than the current consoles, and thats with current technology.

The next Call of Duty would REALLY be that much better if it didn't slow down with so much on screen at any one time, with fuller more interactive environments, very fast load times, hyper realistic physics, far more advanced input devices, 3d immersion, voice commands to AI squad mates, the list goes on and on.

No, Hitchcock meant that you must at all times be gratifying the user, constant thrills with no downtime in between. Just peck a button and get a treat... errr..

Causing people to work for their rewards? Nah, thats insane. Just give it to em in a constant stream, thats all the little lab rats want.

I gotta say that WoW was still fun for me when I was still getting all the flight paths. I'd swim, walk and run everywhere and it was exciting to explore a new area that was way over my head, to attempt to get a flight path that I wouldn't even use until much higher levels. I'd swim half way around a continent and see where I could get to. I don't understand why people play games if all they want to do is win constantly. Just kill things and win. Thats it. No travel, no hassles with death, no trouble whatsoever, just continuous pushing a button to get a treat. Thats why I quit WoW, once I reached the level cap, it got boring. Nothing new, just repetitive boring crap. It was fun when I was small, because I let there be a sense of danger whilst exploring. Getting to those places you'd only see on a flight path was fun, finally battling those unknown high level monsters.

Huh, yeah, top down is the king. Err, wait, aren't grey whales some of the largest nanomachines on the planet? From a single fertilized egg? Converting other creatures into itself?

Nah, must be impossible. There's no way ribosomes are nearly as complex as a transistor, or nearly as useful. Its all about chopping large hunks of matter into tiny bits.

"Real" nanotechnology is the ability to manipulate matter at that scale. How is the matter in a CPU manipulated to build the CPU? It isn't. Its chopped away from larger chunks. No matter how small it gets, this process cannot produce complex structures or machines as well as nanotechnology.

Umm, no, they wouldn't be effective. Who would you bomb, in Iraq or Afghanistan? What large largets are there? What huge armies are we trying to stop?

Nuclear weapons have no use in guerrilla warfare, not at all. They would have not been useful in vietnam for the same reasons.

The US is not a moral nation when it comes to war, we do what works for the purposes of the engagement. A destabilized but infrastructurally intact middle east is the goal, not conquering a foe. There is no enemy per se, just pissed off locals who are feebly fighting an invading force.

Nukes have no place in situations like these, because they are ineffective at achieving the goal. Nukes are a terror weapon, and a strategic weapon against large infrastructure. The terror aspect wouldn't work because the targets are too large, and there is no leadership or army to defeat by scaring the shit out of the population. Strategically it makes no sense because we are occupying these countries, and want/need their infrastructure.

Huh? I live in a coastal california beach town, a popular tourist destination, and can see a couple dozen oil platforms from the beach 2 blocks from my house.

You mean monopoly money?

Huh... http://www.max-planck-innovation.de/share/newsletter/Newsletter_01_2005_en.pdf

Anyway, don't know how accurate the quote is, but that is the first link to pop up.

Thats the biggest issue with high ram systems, is disk IO, in hpc thats always the biggest issue to face. We spend lots of effort on that, huge multi channel disk arrays striped raid0, trying to get all that data into ram for processing. Fast disk io is the magic art behind heavy high ram hpc.

Umm, the word simply means "improving human genetic qualities."

This isn't even that, it is not selective breeding, in a sense, it is simply choosing to bring to term babies of certain genetic qualities.

Now, it is most definitely part of a process, that could be defined as eugenics. Seeing as if we start to eliminate bearing children with certain genetic defects, eventually those defects will be less prevalent and therefore we are "improving human genetic qualities."

I guess the question is "what are genetic defects?" Diseases, flipper babies, etc. However it is not exactly selective breeding as the parents have already mated. Down the road though, as these children breed, it IS selective breeding.

Is it wrong? I don't think so. Can it be construed as eugenics? Of course it can. What does favoring blue eyes have to do with Hitler? Because he favored blue eyes? And blond hair? So do a lot of men. And women. So what.

Just because an idea was taken to some bizarre extreme, doesn't make mechanisms which allow finer control of who parents choose to bear to term evil. No matter what word you use to describe it.

Nobody is engineering these embryos. They are fertilized eggs that are then screen for traits, and only the ones wanted are implanted.

There are no mucking with genes being done. Its a passive process. Make X many embryos, and scan them for various traits. Pick the ones you want. Simple, and non threatening to the species.

Humans are not evolving anymore anyway, so what does it matter? We do not exist in a world of natural selection pressures.
 

Of course it does, there is ample gravity for an atmosphere. The magnetic field isn't really the issue for an atmosphere, its the shielding from solar radiation that the magnetic field helps with. Without one, life will have a hard time taking hold, and living on the surface will be problematic.

Jesus. You just don't get it. TPB does NOT HOST ANY CONTENT. At all! It simply provides a place for a torrent file to be hosted. The torrent file is NOT infringing content.

They simply set up a torrent tracker. For whatever purposes anybody wants to use it for. Interestingly, many of the large file sets out there are infringing content, and torrents happen to be a good way of distributing that data. However, ALL content is hosted on USERS hard drives, not a drip on TPB. Not ever. All of the content is shared between users, they simply have a mechanism to find each other via the torrent protocol, of which a tracker is a crucial part.

It doesn't really matter that most of the content is infringing. It only matters if TPB causes that infringement. If they are culpable, then so is google. Its as simple as that. You need to understand what bittorrent IS. It is peer-to-peer file sharing. The PEERS are infringing. TPB just chose a really bad name for their tracker site.

Of course, because scribblings on tombs don't tell us the entire history of said civilization, then there cannot possibly be any events which aren't in full evidence.

Whatever, its all a big conspiracy and religious wackos are just trying to fool you. Its not like tobacco and coca were actually found on mummies or anything. Oh wait, they were.

We don't even have any idea exactly how the pyramids were built, or if they were built by slaves, or any number of things we do not know about their civilization from scratches on walls and dirt and graves. Just conjecture and supposition, with a great many competing hypothesis.

Does it even matter? Its interesting data, doesn't require an inquisition to proves its meaning. There are a great many things we will never, ever know about ancient egypt. Which is actually almost EVERYTHING about them. Deal with it.