AkThhhpppt

This is the power of dialogue. You talk, you talk, you keep talking. You deal with the less extreme popular factions (analogy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SDLP), but the key word in that sentence is popular: an agreement with an organization with no backing in the community is an agreement with no-one. You do NOT commit to something and then completely disregard it, because then your word becomes worthless, and no-one believes anything you say ever again.

I do not know the solution. No-one does. But attempting to push the Palestinians into the sea is not it.

Comment · 14 years ago

Well, history says different, and how things actually happened tends to have more weight than theoretical speculation about a perfect employment market.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day

Comment · 14 years ago

Ballistics is occasionally interestingly counterintuitive, but perhaps that was overkill.

Bully for you. But it's the idea of prioritizing what is essentially a technician's job (yes, we call ourselves engineers; in reality, most of us are craftsmen) over knowing how the world works, and having some of the mental tools to figure stuff out that's confusing me.

Also, physics really rubbed in abstraction as a concept: "here's the atom, it's a black box, but externally scientists at this point in history could tell this about it. Then this discovery was made. Here's the nucleus, it's a black box, but externally scientists at this point in history could tell this about it..."

Comment · 14 years ago

Point of information: the world population is currently predicted to peak at 11 billion, due to the rest of the world going through demographic transition. So not ever-growing - though 11 billion is definitely enough to cause problems...

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overpopulation#Projections_of_...)

Comment · 14 years ago

So you think schools should teach programming over fundamental science? As a very learned person said, "[physics] runs the shit that runs the shit that runs the shit that runs your shit!"

If you don't know physics, you don't know why there are fundamental limits to Moore's Law that we are rapidly approaching, for an example.

Comment · 14 years ago

When a terrorist hate group is the elected government of the Palestinian Authority, we expect you to deal with them as the elected government. Not to like it, but to do it. Martin McGuinness, former member of the IRA army council, is Deputy Minister of Northern Ireland - a country he ran bombing campaigns to destroy (I'm not exaggerating: the explicit aim of the 30-year PIRA campaign was a reunited Ireland). Nelson Mandela is a convicted terrorist. We expect so much from you, yes. No-one expects this much from people they hate.

That tar-brush you're waving around is very, very wide.

Comment · 14 years ago

What about biological production of plastics?

Or bioinfomatics or computational biology, where they're understanding current biology, not engineering new stuff?

You've discarded all of fundamental science, in favour of teaching your kids programming. Programming's important, but a physics degree _definitely_ teaches programming along with _how the universe works_. And stats. Lots and lots of stats. ",)

I'm just saying; you come across as a little short sighted, here.

Comment · 14 years ago

It's a Red Queen Race: everyone's running as fast as they can to stay in the same place - and burning cash by the ton to do so. Red Queen races tend to be good for advancing the state of the art, but they're wasteful. And if you're trying to do something other than advance the state of the art, they're a trap.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Queen%27s_Hypothesis