We don't *need* to "work things out." We already *have* them worked out. You burn your actinides in a breeder reactor until all that's left is negligibly dangerous. You get more power out of a given unit of fuel and you end up with far less waste. What's not to like? Oh, I forgot...the Carter Era put an end to that due to "proliferation concerns." Yeah, we can't have nasty dictators in places like Iran, North Korea, or Pakistan getting nuclear weapons... ...oh, wait...

I call bullshit. I work in the nuclear power industry. The amount of screening and safeguards in place to prevent a single contaminated Kleenex from getting offsite is beyond belief. And by "contaminated" I mean something that might have a millirem's worth of stuff on it, not something seriously crapped up like you're hinting at. To intimate that substantial hunks of contaminated metals might systematically get offsite and somehow get smelted into a consumer product is so ridiculous as to be easily dismissed. Can you cite an example of "lots of radioactive steel parts" becoming cars?

Some 7,000 of them, actually, the vast majority hardback first editions. And I'm an SF writer myself.

So I'm a little off the standard deviation.

Yes.

No one.

Again: making up bullshit.

First, your stat on "actual fraudulent voting" is bullshit. The numbers the left cites are the wrong ones. They cite the number of prosecutions or convictions. But even a tiny bit of thought will lead you to understand that if someone votes for someone else without an ID, that person will most likely never be prosecuted, because they won't be caught. Hell, the fraud might never even be detected, because that would require the real voter trying to vote and then being denied. And by then, the perpetrator is long gone. But often, people would be more likely to vote on behalf of friends or family who cannot, thereby never getting caught, thereby never being included in the stats.

Indeed, we know -- as a matter of near-certainty, based on common sense -- that whatever the number of prosecutions we've had for such fraud, the actual number of fraud cases must be much larger, because the fraud is so easy to commit without being caught. Surely you cannot believe that if we aren't checking photo IDs, that we are likely to catch someone who commits such a fraud ... ? That'd be terribly stupid.

Second, there is simply zero basis for your claim that voter ID makes voting easier for anyone, let alone "without exception." It actually makes legal voting easier for no one at all, "without exception."

Third, there is simply zero basis for the claim that it makes voting "far more difficult" for the overwhelming majority of people who "make less money working longer hours." They are notified, multiple times, months or years in advance of the change, and have ample opportunity to get the (free) ID. And even if they don't before election day, they can fill out a provisional ballot, which will be counted upon providing the proper (free) qualifications.

Even for the very few people who, with all those opportunities, cannot get a photo ID, they can still vote. And for the overwhelming people who can get the photo ID, it is a simple (and free!) process, and not "far more" difficult at all. On the contrary, they generally bend over backward to make it as easy (and free!) as possible.

Plus -- again, more lies from you -- most people who work longer hours for less pay still have a driver's license already.

You're lying again. That has never happened that I am aware of, and certainly there is no serious effort afoot. Perhaps you mean that Republicans are against special protections for unions which disallow employers from firing workers who strike? That is true, of course, but it is completely different from having the right to strike. I think every employee should have the right to strike ... and every employer should have the right to fire any employee at any time for any reason.

Actually, I take that back. Every employee and employer has that constitutional, and natural, right. It's just that the government doesn't always recognize these obvious rights that we have.

You're lying. The free market has never caused any harm or death, ever. We know this, because we know it is not even capable of doing so.

So you say he wasn't -- very clearly and obviously -- lying?

Because if he was lying, your criticism of me makes no sense. If he was not lying, then please defend his claim that asking for a voter ID is for the purpose of suppressing black votes. Or that Republicans are all white. (?) Or that Romney hid his money in the Cayman Islands (he paid taxes on that money, as federal law requires; nothing was "hidden"). He lied.

It's not enough for me to say "I disagree." That's bullshit. He is not saying, "I think the free market doesn't work, and here's why." That would be something to disagree with. He is stating, as facts, things which are false, which he either does or should know are false, as a teacher promoting these ideas in a classroom.

It's typical and sad that you criticize me for not being "sociable" for calling a lie a lie, whereas this guy gets no criticism for telling those lies.

That's sort of the point though. Most of Yahoo's properties have been stagnant for years, some even for over a decade.

I've been playing fantasy football on yahoo since 2000. The update is awful, and most of the users hate it. It's added no discernible functionality, but changed a user interface that has been in place for at least ten years. While you can deride users for being 'change resistant', the fact is a consistent, usable interface is a feature.

Lots of times power users, or IT workers don't realize just how offputting a major UI revamp can be. While we get caught up in things like, "Agile", "Features", "Web x.0" most users just want to be left alone.

Really, though, I think this whole "I'm taking my ball and going home" attitude is quite dumb. If you're willing to leave and learn a new platform in protest, why not stay and learn the new upgraded platform where your data already lives?

Users will stay with a platform they know, even if it isn't feature rich. The opportunity cost of switching to another platform is losing the time they've invested in learning the original platform. Once that cost is forced upon them, they might as well investigate other platforms, either out of spite, or simply because they've got to learn something new anyway.

If I were there, I'd have called him out as a liar and a racist, because that's what he is. It is racist to say that requiring voter ID is racist, because what you're actually saying is that black people are less capable or interested in simply following the rules to vote than white people are.

You do not actually believe that a comparison of a professor making up bullshit about Republicans being racist, and expressing purely ignorant nonsense that doesn't stand up to the slightest amount of intellectual examination, is similar to a professor promoting the free market. I sugggest you stop pretending you do.

While Pohl did frequently collaborate with C. M. Kornbluth, "The Marching Morons" is by Kornbluth alone.

Jack Vance
Fred Pohl
Iain Banks
Richard Matheson

I don't think we've seen this many giants in the field all pass away the same year before.

If no one else has mentioned it, read Pohl's story "Tunnel Under the World," which is still a great work.

Seems Napster was setting up peer to peer connections around 1998 or 1999.

I'm not sure how this invention isn't obvious after Napster.

Inevitable discovery is a defense, a way of overturning a patent. But people often overestimate what's inevitable. Many good ideas aren't discovered for generations even though all the pieces were in place.

I've got nothing against patenting good ideas, but the techniques described in the patents involved seem inevitable to me.

But then again juries don't usually include computer engineers so everything computer seems like magic to them.

So business should just be able to use someone else's research as they see fit?

Perhaps business does its own research.

There are many problems that have obvious solutions no matter who does the research. Some solutions are inevitable. They aren't supposed to be patented.

Welcome to the Business States of America.

Hardly. As far as I can tell, VirnetX is basically a combination of academics and lawyers that won against a real business like Apple.

Ever think that maybe that prosperity was a result of theft and maybe it needs to be spread around instead of kept among white people? What's the racial makeup of those "scientists and engineers" anyway? How's the diversity quotient?

Prosperity is mostly a result of applied cleverness and knowledge and not theft. Iron and carbon don't become steel without cleverness and knowledge. Niagra falls doesn't create power for factories without cleverness and knowledge. Fast computer chips don't exist without cleverness and knowledge.

We've tried spreading cleverness and knowledge through public education.

Some people just don't seem to want what the government gives away for free.