Comment Re:Emacs (Score 1) 545
Real programmers use copy con filename.zip!
From Austria, the World's Smallest 3D Printer 120
fangmcgee writes "Printers which can produce three-dimensional objects have been available for years. However, at the Vienna University of Technology, a printing device has now been developed which is much smaller, lighter and cheaper than ordinary 3D-printers. With this kind of printer, everyone could produce small, tailor-made 3D-objects at home, using building plans from the internet — and this could save money for expensive custom-built spare parts."
Comment Re:Fermi's paradox. (Score 1) 380
We've only got ONE case study so far where this has occured, us. I have trouble believing these two have high probabilities.
And how many other cases have we examined in adequate detail? None.
However, I would add one more term to the Drake equation:
fe = the fraction of those who develop high technology but abuse it to bring about their own extinction.
If our case study is any indication, that final term may be quite large enough to resolve Fermi's paradox.
Collision of Two Asteroids Spotted For the First Time 31
sciencehabit writes "Astronomers report that a small asteroid located in the inner asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter took a major hit early last year. Previously rendered only in artists' conceptions, the first asteroid collision known in modern times revealed itself in a tail of debris streaming from what astronomers at first assumed was a comet. Instead of a steady stream of dust, however, they found boulders near the object with dust moving away from them."
Comment John Belushi's worst nightmare! (Score 1) 124
And it would CRUSH a telly! (Obligatory Monty Python reference)
Comment Re:Ugh (Score 1) 565
And how would you enforce this?
Possibly through a simple ratio - % of your market is in US vs. % your workforce in US.
Part of the attraction is in plenty of places there is virtually zero government (and legal) oversight. You get to do pretty much whatever you want without a lot of busybody government agents sticking their noses into your business.
Yes, you can do whatever you want - in some cases that has included murdering labor organizers and wrecking the environment. The point is, there are no "externalities". Everything has a cost, and those costs do not vanish in the absence of oversight. In the end they will all have to be paid. A market that ignores this is not sustainable.
Comment Re:Ugh (Score 1) 565
For starters, if a company lays off an American worker and replaces them with a cheaper foreign worker, why not hold them liable for FICA and unemployment taxes on that job based on the original (American) wage rate? This approach at least begins to compensate for the liability incurred by the US workforce and economy when a job is offshored, and does so with targeted taxes that do the most to protect displaced workers. It also begins to impose a real cost on "externalities", in this case the social and environmental costs of shipping product halfway around the world that could be produced locally.
Comment Re:Ugh (Score 1) 565
There are enough resources, if wisely managed, for all to live comfortably and well. That's the purpose of war - to dispose of excess production and use the resulting artificial shortages to ensure a cheap labor pool.
As to the shortage of jobs, there is more than enough work that needs doing to keep everyone busy, and more than enough wealth to pay for it . What is needed is a paradigm shift that makes the concentration of wealth economically non-viable. Keep the wealth moving, everyone wins. Concentrated wealth has produced the current economic disaster where there is so much money seeking ROI, and so little of value to invest in. Result: hundreds of trillions in fake investments (derivatives) that suck capital out of markets and destroy wealth while lining the pockets of the few who have gamed the system for their own benefit.
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What's the difference between a computer salesman and a used car salesman? A used car salesman knows when he's lying.
