Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Tommy H. Yeargin, Jr. on March 5, 2011 at 8:15pm

Well said!

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Permalink Reply by Steve M on March 4, 2011 at 9:37pm

Perhaps the various denominations will be so busy annihilating each other they won't notice us up on the hill drinking beer and betting on the action.

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Permalink Reply by 3equ3cp1fsw0n on March 5, 2011 at 12:16am

I worry more about how the world is becoming more and more a like a giant house of cards

based on computers that can go very wrong and the speed at which they allow massive numbers

of humans to connect with each other (although I suppose the latter could be a good thing in some situations). I recently read an Article in Atlantic magazine:

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/06/the-enemy-withi...

 

about a computer worm called Conficker (this happened a couple years ago). The worm works like fireants. They get all over you but don't bite until they are amassed to avoid detection. Then one of them gives a signal and they all bite at once and it hurts like holy hell. Put that in context of a computer virus doing a similar deed but inside of one, two, or three countries' missile or nuclear computer operational programs.

Imagine that. 

I watched an interesting show on the History Channel a few weeks ago called the "Mystery of

Flight 447" and basically, the point they made at the end of the show, after going into 

the detailed timeline of recorded events leading up to the crash into the Atlantic Ocean,

is that the airline pilots may not be getting enough practical experience of being able to competently manually handle a plane in situations where the computer is malfunctioning for whatever reason as more and more computer auto-pilot systems are used in controlling and flying modern planes, leaving the pilots with less hands-on experience in performing tasks in terms of navigation and troubleshooting, etc.

 

Now I ask myself, surely the training programs take this into consideration?  Apparently, this is not a given, or they would not have talked about it at the conclusion of the show. I assume acknowledging this dilemma may help change the ways in which pilots are trained. You know how it goes, it takes a disaster or several of them, before something gets changed. Things get complex and it is difficult to foresee all the intricate combinations of variables that can intersect at a single point in time causing one cluster f*** of a chain reaction leading to disaster which seems to be the case of what happened to flight 447. The black box was never recovered but even so, they did manage to come up with a lot of data due to the satellite GPS data tracking systems. But unless the black box is recovered, I don't think anyone will ever absolutely know, what transpired to cause the deaths of 228 people that stormy night, although they did a good job of making a convincing  theoretical scenario of what most likely happened.    

 

This is a link (below) that talks a little bit about the crash but it does not go into detail like the History Channel did.

 

http://www.airsafe.com/plane-crash/air-france-flight-447-airbus-a33...

Oh yeah, and what about last year when the stock market dropped 1000 points in a matter of

hours and I don't think that was ever fully explained.

 

What is this about whole countries going bankrupt? I think it all comes down to humans maybe placing too much faith in technology (though this can be understandible).

 

Oh well, blah, blah. I get like this late at night lol. I should call myself rambling rose instead of flower lol.

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Permalink Reply by Steve M on March 5, 2011 at 7:19pm

Airbus planes are fly by wire which means that the control surfaces are not linked by hydraulic lines like older planes. Many heralded this development because it saves weight and allows for more precise control of the plane by the on board computers thus saving fuel. Problem is that it has long been established that the safest way to run any machine is to have an operator  that is watched by a computer not a computer that must be watched by humans. In the first scenario the untiring computer keeps an eye on multiple systems and alerts the operator when something is amiss allowing the operator to take corrective action. In the second and what is becoming more popular scenario. The humans sit back while the computer drives. Only humans get bored and fall asleep. Humans cannot scan all systems fast enough to take over from the computer when something is amiss.  It is not so much that the tool (technology )is bad it is that it has been applied in an incorrect fashion.

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Permalink Reply by Walter Maki on March 17, 2011 at 1:50pm

I'll bring my chair too and more beer :)

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Permalink Reply by Reggie on March 4, 2011 at 11:46pm

I don;t consider the question posed to be a legitimate concern, although I can understand the concern.  However, to play along, if we saw a "religious" war of some kind where atheists are being violently persecuted?  Here is what you do; always offer to say grace at mealtime.

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Permalink Reply by BadHandshakers on March 5, 2011 at 5:41am

I agree, even though pundits like Glenn Beck try and make it seem like it's the end of the world everyday on television and his words are amplified thousands of times through out the U.S this way, it doesn't strike me that there is an upheaval in the works concerning a holy war there, not anytime soon at least. But if those were the circumstances, I would go with your advice... or just move to Canada soon enough, maybe.

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Permalink Reply by Reggie on March 5, 2011 at 7:28pm

Canada is an option, too.  But, I figure it may just be easier to do what a good amount of people already do each Sunday; pretend to believe.  At least then I could be with my family and friends, still.

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Permalink Reply by Don on March 5, 2011 at 7:43am

The Supreme Court has made some egregious decisions in recent years (sticking W. in the White House was certainly one of them), but defending every American's right to free speech (even hateful speech), a decision which has considerable and amply justifiable precedent, is not one of them.

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Permalink Reply by Don on March 5, 2011 at 9:30am

A friend writes, "Fred Phelps is the best recruiter for atheism in the country, and I would hate to see him muzzled. He forces christians to see where the logical conclusion of their silly dogma leads. As much as they would like to disown Fred, he gets his "...authority" from the exact same scriptures so-called "moderate christians" use to discriminate against gays in all areas of society. The problem is NOT Fred Phelps, the problem is the social acceptance of belief in nonsense without evidence. Question the generic social acceptance, not the antics of one particular nutball."

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Permalink Reply by joseph boring on March 5, 2011 at 3:26pm

A tad bit severe possibily, but I would go along with about five of them having a nice stroke.

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Permalink Reply by Don on March 5, 2011 at 3:42pm

Thomas seems ripe, doesn't he?  And maybe Scalia.

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