In other news... (humorous news items, etc)

[addams]

…the goats who stare at men?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GC2TzspJn5A

I thought that was one funny movie.
Because, Like skydivers wear helmets; It's true.
Somehow that makes it funny.

[jakovasaur]

Saudi woman who defied driving ban dies in car accident.

[Cathy]

But was it an accident or an "accident" ...

[SlyReaper]

More likely a proper accident because it turns out if you never let someone do any driving, or even any driving training, they're going to be pretty bad at it when they finally decide to give it a go.

[jakovasaur]

But was it an accident or an "accident" ...

I didn't consider that. I just posted it because it struck me as funny, in a cruel-cosmic-joke kind of way.

[Роберт]

Saudi woman who defied driving ban dies in car accident.

How's that funny?

Haha, guys, in Saudi Arabia, there are over 150k traffic accidents annually, causing upwards of 3000 fatalities. And now some women are contributing, even though they're not supposed to be driving at all! Hahahahaha!


Seriously, without context I have to assume what the point is of that article and you posting it, and the point seems to be "it's okay to repress women, because, man, women drivers!" Even though just one woman getting into a fatal accident says very little.

Aren't male drivers about twice as likely to get into fatal car wrecks?

Edit: ninja'd, oh well. I still don't find it funny.

[Cathy]

But was it an accident or an "accident" ...

I didn't consider that. I just posted it because it struck me as funny, in a cruel-cosmic-joke kind of way.

No, I get the cruel cosmic joke, it's just depressing.

[addams]

Saudi woman who defied driving ban dies in car accident.

How's that funny?

Haha, guys, in Saudi Arabia, there are over 150k traffic accidents annually, causing upwards of 3000 fatalities. And now some women are contributing, even though they're not supposed to be driving at all! Hahahahaha!


Seriously, without context I have to assume what the point is of that article and you posting it, and the point seems to be "it's okay to repress women, because, man, women drivers!" Even though just one woman getting into a fatal accident says very little.

Aren't male drivers about twice as likely to get into fatal car wrecks?

Edit: ninja'd, oh well. I still don't find it funny.

Yeah. Cars are big dangerous machines.
Some people take to driving like a duck to water.
Other people do not. Gender has nothing to do with it! Nothing.
I am with you. Just, being female and, just, dying in a car wreck is not enough to make it funny.
We need funny. These are very unfunny times for many of us.

[Randomizer]

the Ronpaul starts campaign to end the TSA. (His official campaign website is here)

the Ronpaul has long opposed the TSA and has campaigned for its abolishment for years. Following an episode on Monday that left his son, Sen. Rand Paul, stranded in a Nashville airport, the presidential hopeful is asking for help to finally end the TSA.

Finally! Let's shut the damn thing down once and for all! (My rant about flying in the Wil Wheaton on the TSA thread is here.)

[Nylonathatep]

http://www.thestar.com/news/article/112 ... etres-high

A Small Step for Lego man... a Giant leap for Lego-kind!


late edit: Here's a more scientificly correct article... with a VIDEO!!!

http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/01/25 ... tmosphere/

[SlyReaper]

The article says they sent a lego man into space. 24km isn't even a quarter of the way to space.

[Iulus Cofield]

You forgot to convert to lego kilometers.

[yurell]

It was nearly a thousand Lego kilometres out! Congratulations plastic person, you made it!

[Djehutynakht]

More likely a proper accident because it turns out if you never let someone do any driving, or even any driving training, they're going to be pretty bad at it when they finally decide to give it a go.

Many/most/all of the women protesting knew how to drive... I believe they had (or most had) drivers licenses issued in foreign nations (acceptable if they were a male and not banned from driving).


I'm not sure how much the head covering/would impact their driving though, or their overall public garment for that matter.

[poxic]

Or, y'know, random chance and things like that. (Of course we know that randomness and real, actual "accidents" only happen to good people. Everyone else deserves it somehow.)

[Diadem]

More likely a proper accident because it turns out if you never let someone do any driving, or even any driving training, they're going to be pretty bad at it when they finally decide to give it a go.

Many/most/all of the women protesting knew how to drive... I believe they had (or most had) drivers licenses issued in foreign nations (acceptable if they were a male and not banned from driving).

Even then. You don't really know how to drive until you've driven for several tens of thousands of kilometers. Having a foreign driver's license is one thing, but if you haven't been able to practice for 10 years, and have never driven in Saudi Arabia, so you have 0 experience with local traffic, that's not going to be the safest trip ever.

So I would still expect these women to be in accidents at an above average rate.

Other factors that might increase the risk, is that these women are going to be preoccupied with watching for police cars, and that the traffic around them might react in unexpected ways to seeing women drive.

Plus, yeah, accidents happen.

[broken_escalator]

Nasa releases HD version of the classical earth picture, blue marble. It looks pretty cool, but I think they need to add a polaroid effect and some burn.

[phlip]

Wow, not only have they majorly increased the resolution compared to the original, they've also rotated it to be centred on America! That makes it double better!

[KnightExemplar]

For those who are lazy, here's the full resolution (8000 x 8000) picture:

http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/6184 ... h_full.jpg

[Djehutynakht]

For those who are lazy, here's the full resolution (8000 x 8000) picture:

http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/6184 ... h_full.jpg

It's nice. Bit iffy on the angle though.

[Randomizer]

I forget, is NASA stuff public domain? Are there any restrictions on what someone can do with their space pictures? I might have use for the big ball of blue. :p

[Steax]

Wow, not only have they majorly increased the resolution compared to the original, they've also rotated it to be centred on America! That makes it double better!

It actually looks like they're somehow making North America extremely large there. I'm toying with Google Earth and I can't find a perspective that matches the new "photo".

Spoiler:

Unless, which is probably the case, they're just using a wider-angle lens and taking it from a lower altitude. But this is a pretty bad misrepresentation.

[Angua]

Wow, not only have they majorly increased the resolution compared to the original, they've also rotated it to be centred on America! That makes it double better!

It actually looks like they're somehow making North America extremely large there. I'm toying with Google Earth and I can't find a perspective that matches the new "photo".

It's not even a pretty part of North America. You could have thought that they'd give us some nice green areas instead of a giant patch of brown.

[Steax]

Definitely needs more Fotoshop.

... In all seriousness, I'm calling a lot of editing on that. Also pretty sure the atmospheric halo wouldn't be that large/clear.

[Zamfir]

Spoiler:

Nasa has released an update of the picture

Bugfixes:
- Removed weird artifacts around the edges of earth

Todo:
- Mexico

[CorruptUser]

Clearly Mexico is the most important place on Earth.

[bentheimmigrant]

Wow, not only have they majorly increased the resolution compared to the original, they've also rotated it to be centred on America! That makes it double better!

Obviously.

[Iulus Cofield]

It's comforting to see that an accurate projection of landmasses is impossible, even in real life.

[Zamfir]

It's comforting to see that an accurate projection of landmasses is impossible, even in real life.

A photo is still a 2-d projection of a 3-d globe.

[Ghostbear]

A photo is still a 2-d projection of a 3-d globe.

Until Hollywood gets its wish and everything is displayed in 3d. Even ebooks!

Though I'm not actually sure any of the current methods of 3d displays handle depth in the proper manner to solve that problem. It'd have to be a brand new technology. Of course, that would bring the question up of how you would take a 3d photograph.

[Zamfir]

Images on your retina are 2-d projections of a 3d world.

[Ghostbear]

That's true, and maybe it's just me being overtired, but how does that relate to our ability to properly display 3d objects?

I feel like I'm stupidly missing something obvious.

[Zamfir]

It means that 3-d technology (like a globe) still does not show us undistorted images of the earth's landmasses. We humans are physically incapable of seeing (or really understanding) an undistorted image of a large part of the surface of a globe, all when we can do is to see (nearly) undistorted patches of the globe in a temporal series.

Imagine that we would have 10 eyes on long flexible stalks, plus the mental machinery to build a single coherent 3d image from those eyes. Then we could look at a globe from many sides and have a nearly undistorted view.

In practice, we just don't have the eyes or brains for 3d vision. More a kind of 2.5-D vision, mostly flat images with some depth cues attached. In particular, our the mental machinery is not skilled at seeing objects from multiple sides, and understand that as one image.

Take some small object and hold it very close to your eyes, so each eye sees a different side. Usually, your brain and eyes just stops their effort to merge the two images to signel picture. You become aware of the raw data dump of two different images, the way you normally are not. If you try harder, you can sort of vaguely force the image into one coherent picture, and then your 3-d sense will be somewhat wrong. The object "feels" as if it tapers wider.

[Ghostbear]

Ah, right. Wouldn't that all just point to a flaw in our ability to make sense of a 3d image though, and not the difficulty of creating it? I suppose I was being more silly than anything in my initial post (3d ebooks, heh), but if we go with something like the typical science fiction holographic display- like holochess from Star Wars or the TVs from The Jetsons- you would have something able to properly display a globe. The issue would just be that our vision system would have trouble properly interpreting and processing the globe. That trouble should be the same it would encounter with an actual, real sphere however.

[Zamfir]

We already have the technology to make 3-d globes...

Spoiler:

That's not just a joke. It also shows that we don't make world maps because of our inability to do it in 3-d. It's mostly because a world map is better than a globe at showing the world to human beings.

The main advantage of a globe is that it contains all parts of the globe in undistorted form, at the same time. We humans are not capable of fully accessing that advantage. We still have to look at different parts of a globe in succession and when we look at one part, most of the globe is either invisible or highly distorted near the edges. That's in practice similar to paging through an atlas that shows parts of the globe, also in fairly undistorted shape.

A 2-d world map allows us binocular creatures to see the surface of the entire world, with the distortions carefully balanced and mostly moved to parts of the world we aren't very interested in. That's an improvement on a 3-d globe, not a compromise caused by our lack of cheap 3-d technology. In the same way that a map is usually superior to a satellite photo.

The main case where globes becomes useful is when we want to look to part of the world under a specific angle that is not found in an atlas, often something to do with the poles or shortest air routes. It would be even better to have tool that draws a balanced 2-d world map on command, with the least-distorted area in the part you're interested in.

[Arrian]

I forget, is NASA stuff public domain? Are there any restrictions on what someone can do with their space pictures? I might have use for the big ball of blue. :p

Images created by the US Government are not covered by copyright, so have at it. (Several things, like agency logos, are covered by trademark, though.)

A United States government work is prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties.

It is not subject to copyright in the United States and there are no copyright restrictions on reproduction, derivative works, distribution, performance, or display of the work. Anyone may, without restriction under U.S. copyright laws:

- reproduce the work in print or digital form;
- create derivative works;
- perform the work publicly;
- display the work;
- distribute copies or digitally transfer the work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending.

[Jessica]

regarding

Saudi woman who defied driving ban dies in car accident.

It is in fact completely wrong. The woman who died in that accident wasn't the woman who is protesting it. Someone randomly attributed her name to the unnamed woman. Yay for shitty reporting, and horrible stereotypes.

Link

[Chen]

regarding

Saudi woman who defied driving ban dies in car accident.

It is in fact completely wrong. The woman who died in that accident wasn't the woman who is protesting it. Someone randomly attributed her name to the unnamed woman. Yay for shitty reporting, and horrible stereotypes.

Link

The title is hilariously wrong.

The article reads:

[Title]Saudi female driver who defied ban in fatal accident

A Saudi woman who defied a driving ban in the kingdom was injured and her companion killed...

One thing that caught my eye in the article was the following though:

"In November 2010, a Saudi who defied the driving ban was killed along with three of her 10 female passengers when her car overturned in a crash."

What the hell kind of car holds 11 people in any reasonable manner? I mean I suppose she could have been driving a limousine but that's the only thing I can think of that would be big enough.

[Iulus Cofield]

There are passenger vans that can hold that many people.

[philsov]

Well, that's what she gets for sharing the same name as a protesting woman.

Women.