OK, so let me get this straight. They want to create a GIANT system with many layers of government, to take more money based on actual miles driven. But we already have that - called a gasoline tax. At least with the gas tax I have an incentive to buy a more fuel-efficient car if I must commute (I must, far too). With this I would have much less. I think this is just to avoid being the "bad guys" that raise the gas tax. I thought one of the points of the gas taxes was to encourage efficiency.

I assume (Without RFA) that this interface could be used in some way to pass simple commands. Oh, like opcodes say. Something the user could be trained to do.

If so, they why couldnt this interface be used to control a robot-arm RIGHT NOW. Or any number of other, more special purpose robotics/devices? I.e. Television, radio, tilt bed, ring nurse for drink, "Im Wet" etc. etc.

I think you are shortsighted at the possibilities here. Just having a successful interface that doesn't burn out the neurons after THREE YEARS is an amazing achievement. This is clearly an alpha-implementation. Think of the possibilities. Heck, look at what Stephen Hawking can do with one finger.

Hell yeah to everything you said. Back when "smartphones" were new, we had some crappy Samsung windows mobile phone shoved on our group. Were were to rotate it as on-call rotated. We could 'work' from it, but it was horrible, slow, tiny, and useless. We got rid of that idea and never looked back, even with the newer better phones. Why would you want to be that available?

Oh, and there IS a category of "decent" dumb phones. On VZ we have had the Env2, new LG Octane, and several others that have good screen, keyboard, good call quality and up to two week battery life. Heck you can even do real email on the Octane ... if you pay for data. (NOT).

Good SMS, a decent screen, reasonably rugged, at least 7 day standby, and good call quality. Thats ALL I need or want. I have a laptop if I need more...

I was in 11th grade. It was cold as hell in NY, it was my birthday (as is today coincidentally)... It was mid-terms week, and I was going into my "Math Course III" midterm. The kid behind me (Chris Wheeler) said "hey, did you hear the space shuttle blew up?". I thought he was kidding, until a few minutes later a few other kids came in and said the same thing. I was flattened. I remember finding it a bit hard to concentrate, but I finished my midterm, went home after school, and remember watching the replays on the tv for HOURS.. That's literally ALL that was on (we only got like 13 channels on cable then). At about 7 PM my Dad finally said "Enough. Turn it off. There's nothing else to say or that anyone can do." So we did, and I still recall almost every minute of that day as one of the most surreal birthdays I ever had. It seemed quite strange to be "celebrating" and eating cake later that evening. In my bedroom was still a poster of the space shuttle that I got when in Florida for the 2nd launch of Columbia, and I STILL have a Challenger baseball cap that I bought a few years later in FL when Challenger first flew. (Its real ratty, cause I wore it all the time as a kid before it blew up).

I too thought it was a shame how the media only focused on the school teacher dying. And also all the crude jokes that came out not even days later.

I agree completely. When walmart came to our town, pop about 20,000, it put many other retailers out of business within 5 years: Kmart, Ames (both before their parent companies dried up), two local hardware stores, a 50+ year old (good) local sporting goods store, etc. A few years later when they went "supercenter" and added the groceries it looked dismal for the local grocers too. However, interestingly, after shopping at walmart for groceries and thinking I was getting the best deal/prices, I found that not to always be true. Enough that I found that I can actually shop at Wegmans (a GREAT grocery store that I actually enjoy shopping at) and not really spend any more (with shoppers club card, free). The quality and selection at Wegmans also is infinitely better - especially meat and produce. I now shop at wallyworld as little as possible, which is still too often since there are simply no other nearby options for many goods.

Here in NY too, in fact I think we were the first state with a "bottle bill" back in the mid 80's. All the nonprofit groups in NY collect bottles and cans as a fundraiser, and people are often willing to donate a big old bag of cans more than they would shell out $10. Homeless people and others collect them willingly from anywhere. There used to be lots of trash, cans, bottles, etc on the sides of roads and in ditches. Not so much anymore, in fact after the bottle law passed there were virtually none (bottles and cans). They just added a deposit on water bottles (GOOD idea, IMHO) and I have seen most of these also disappear from roadsides and parking lots, etc.

Really, the deposit idea is a great system. Now, actually DOING something useful (like this plastic to fuel project, or a plastic to plastic, or etc) with the recycled goods is another story, but here in NY I think the majority do get recycled into a variety of things. There was in fact a show on TV about bottle plastic and all the goods that are made from it.

I wish I had mod points. You make some good points, and ones I have made myself in these sorts of philosophical arguments before. However, this is just a thought experiment. What if, when the copied brain is "lit up" it DOES have YOUR consciousness? What if you just "forked" yourself? It really IS you, but a 100% point-in-time clone... Makes for an interesting thought... You ARE you, but so is it. When you die, do YOU still die? YES, because you are the original. Perhaps, if you die as part of the copying process, you can be said to live on. But is it you?

What if you "stop" your brain, by putting it in some sort of halt state. Say, a deep coma. Then copy it. Do you "wake up" on the other side? If not, WHY NOT?

These are all interesting thought experiments. At any rate, this story ends with the usual "extraordinary new technology ready... in 5 years" as usual, so don't bet on any brain cloning in the next 50.

Except that the bacteria mentioned are genetically closely related to "known hydrocarbon degraders" and "... results suggest that the gabbroic layer hosts a microbial community that can degrade hydrocarbons and fix carbon and nitrogen." Not exactly producing hydrocarbons, more like living off them.

Although, I do wonder what "It has been hypothesized that these hydrocarbons might originate abiotically from serpentinization reactions that are occurring deep in the Earth's crust" is all about...

serpentinization: a hydration and metamorphic transformation of ultramafic rock from the Earth's mantle

Hmm... So sounds like they are saying the hydrocarbons are likely produced by some hot water/pressure/mineral interaction. That's even more interesting than the bacterial production that I've heard bounced around (and generally dismissed).

They were working on this from the start, as well as the "top hat" that will probably not be needed now. They had at least 3 different methods working in parallel. This one took this long because it was unbelievably complicated and had never been tried at anything even close to this depth. This (the actual stoppage) is an amazing success for the many 100's of skilled engineers that have been working around the clock on it for weeks. (Mostly not BP people BTW)