Misc

Comet ISON survives its explosion near the sun. After declaring ISON dead, experts are surprised. It must have been a double-layer exploding, not the comet itself.

After 47 or so years of service, suddenly a zero day exploit that is being exploited appears in Windows XP. I sure there's no coincidence with Microsoft pushing to kill this OS.

After 70+ years, flying cars are still on the drawing board. What a loss.

Home erectus skull discovered in Georgia suggests many skeletons previously thought to be different species may be one.

"The odd dimensions of the fossil prompted the team to look at normal skull variation, both in modern humans and chimps, to see how they compared. They found that while the Dmanisi skulls looked different to one another, the variations were no greater than those seen among modern people and among chimps."

Gosh, who would have ever thought to examine that?

"The scientists went on to compare the Dmanisi remains with those of supposedly different species of human ancestor that lived in Africa at the time. They concluded that the variation among them was no greater than that seen at Dmanisi. Rather than being separate species, the human ancestors found in Africa from the same period may simply be normal variants of H erectus."

This sounds like the Keystone cops portraying scientists.

""Some palaeontologists see minor differences in fossils and give them labels, and that has resulted in the family tree accumulating a lot of branches," said White. "The Dmanisi fossils give us a new yardstick, and when you apply that yardstick to the African fossils, a lot of that extra wood in the tree is dead wood. It's arm-waving.""

It's selfish self-promotion. This is another ridiculous case of assumptions promoted and accepted by scientists for personal gain.

Here's a bunch of crap about the Socratic method:
"In ancient Greece (469 - 399 BC), Socrates was widely lauded for his wisdom.

One day the great philosopher came upon an acquaintance, who ran up to him  excitedly and said,
"Socrates, do you know what I just heard about one of your students?"

"Wait a moment," Socrates replied. "Before you tell me,
I'd like you to pass a little test. It's called the Test of Three."

"Test of Three?"

"That's correct," Socrates continued. "Before you talk to me about my student let's take a moment to test what you're going to say. The first test is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man replied, "actually I just heard about it."

"All right," said Socrates. "So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second test, the test of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my student something good?"

"No, on the contrary..."

"So," Socrates continued, "you want to tell me something bad about him even  though you're not certain it's true?"

The man shrugged, a little embarrassed.

Socrates continued, "You may still pass though because there is a third test - the filter of Usefulness.
Is what you want to tell me about my student  going to be useful to me?"

"No, not really..."

"Well," concluded Socrates, "if what you want to tell me is neither true nor  good nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?"

The man was defeated and  ashamed and said no more.

This is the reason Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high  esteem."
I have a different ending...
The next day his student turned him in to the rulers who forced Socrates to eat poison and die. The problem is with the first question and its answer:

"Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man replied, "actually I just heard about it.""

Yet it could still be true, but self-indulgent Socrates never heard the claim. Bye-bye Socrates.

How government perverts out thinking from the beginning. While most cannot imagine economics without politics, we must.

How to reconfigure your router with open source software to extend connectivity. More.

New computer game lampoons others by requiring players to stand in line, inactive. That's hilarious.