I'll stick with privacy is a choice. But that choice requires paying attention to what one values and to not get distracted. Some would imagine that being a very private person means that they're introverted or anti-social. I don't agree with those interpretations either. The level of being focused with extended concentration that Peter Higgs must have had to do his advanced physics goes beyond anything I could ever cope with. But what a gift he gave to the world when he finally understood the Higgs boson and what it implied...that all matter gets its mass from Higgs bosons. The frosting on the cake was when the LHC experiments finally confirmed his understandings so many decades later. I'm sure that he felt vindicated, but also very afraid of the explosion of attention paid to him.

His childhood doesn't matter. Peter Higgs simply needs to be respected for the privacy choices he's made. Privacy isn't strange; it's a choice.

I've met RMS on more than one occasion to have a conversation with him at LibrePlanet meetings. My take is that he's totally committed to supporting the free software concepts pushed by the FSF. He has faults and so do I--plenty. However, I respect him for what he's done--tirelessly promoting free software. I don't like the many arrows sent his way on off-topic issues. Opinions are fine, but...please consider the positives. If we can't do that even in a minimal way, we all lose.

For an example that science discovery is not dead and isn't about to die anytime soon: just look at the history of microscopy. From elementary optics with bad chemistry on poorly-formed lenses with poor lighting to modern imagining devices that can make visible and toy with one atom at a time using time-lapse, 3-D slices along with full-color graphics. Just wait until microscopy embraces and uses the full implications of quantum mechanics. We ain't seen nothing yet! Microscopy scientists from all the science disciplines: start your engines! My prediction is that advances in just this small corner of science alone promises profound advances in all of the sciences. Personally I'm hoping for new threads of study and advancement of mathematics. (new mathematical abstractions always lead to new physical realities and vice-versa)

Use LibreOffice Calc, open a cell at the top left height: half the page tall and width: about 6 inches. Then use the drawing features of Calc and just put boxes, connectors, labels, etc. in your drawing. I usually then put written information below the drawing cell that describes special details network details, issues, and special notes about wiring. By having the entire page saved as an .ods document, you'll be able to open it easily. (I have over 150 such pages for clients in my business.)

First, use a USB external CD-RW drive. Next locate a copy of "f-secure-rescue-cd-3.11-23804.iso" and burn it using another computer to a CD-R. Finally, boot the CD-R in the CD-RW drive on the Windows computer that's infected. The disk will use a simple Linux shell and start the AV tool from F-Secure. The software will visit the home site (use an Ethernet connection) and get the virus definitions that are current and will then do a full scan of the Windows hard disk.

With the Internet locked out, the only thing left is to train employees never to introduce USB sticks into the system--at the risk of picking up a law suit or loss of employment.

Let's assume that the hospital equipment can't be patched enough or in a timely-enough manner to make it safe enough to use with the Internet. To me it's obvious: don't ever allow connections to the Internet in any way.

Science research, as funded by the U.S. Gov't agencies, is always at a disadvantage because politics works on a shorter time space--the terms of the people who get elected. Science research always has a long look forward usually much beyond the scope of even a 6-year term. It takes years for results to appear that are useful for products and procedures that pay off in better ways of living for people. The funding for the Superconducting Super Collider that got cancelled was in my opinion the perfect example of a long-term science research project (expensive YES) that would have yielded decades of good science for U.S. scientists and those from other countries. I think the cancellation of that project was a huge mistake in terms of science in the U.S. Politicians want projects finished during their term of office so they have something to point to for their reelection campaign. Science research rarely fits those kind of time lines. As I see it, the ways we fund science at the federal level are fundamentally flawed because of this lack of appreciation of how long good science research actually takes. Funding needs to be continuing and stable. We also need to study our priorities and stop focusing on just the glamorous stuff. (Unglamorous science today may develop into glamourous science tomorrow.)