Photon counting for the masses

The words are only worth as much as the men who uttered them. Which, it turns out, was quite a lot.

They've inspired the world for centuries, created a goal we strive for, and produced the most prosperous, diverse, tolerant society in history.

America isn't a place, it's an idea.

-- Cheers, James Arthur

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Oh boy, the popular press version of things. Small wonder for the rest. Since when has the popular press ever gotten technology right?

Are there prison camps full of Mormons somewhere? A Mormon is likely to be the next President.

Um... there is a difference between not always obeying a Constitutional amendment, and putting people into prison camps. So in answer to your question, no, I do not know of any prison camps full of Mormons. However, since I neither said nor implied that there were any such things, that point is not relevant to what I did say - which was simply that the US has traditionally ignored its Constitution whenever it has suited it to do so.

You may recall a recent criminal case in which an alleged Mormon (the mainstream Mormon church apparently does not recognize this guy) was imprisoned for various crimes against minors, which crimes were OK in his religion. The laws under which he was convicted were ones that prohibited the free exercise of this guy's religion.

The Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) all permit slavery, polygyny, and various other practices that are not allowed in the US. US laws prohibit the free exercise of these religions.

Freedom of speech? Try going to an airport and mentioning the word, "bomb" or "terrorist." See how free you are. I don't mean you should claim to *have* a bomb or to be a terrorist; just say the words. You'll be talking to men with guns in a back room as your flight leaves without you.

In fact, someone from Iran who was wearing a tee-shirt with a Farsi message of peace was detained as a possible terrorist. Farsi is written in a script that looks very much like Arabic, and since no one knows either Farsi or Arabic, and since we know all Arabs are terrorists, this guy missed his flight as he explained to the nice men that he wasn't going to kill anyone.

You know, I can understand why they might not let me take my Boy Scout knife or my Uzi or my flamethrower onto a plane, but a word printed on a tee-shirt? That's a bit paranoid.

Peaceable assembly? Sometimes. Other times, the police just decide to knock a few heads in for whatever reason. In one town, a group of protesters were arrested for "misusing" the sidewalk - by peaceably assembling on it for the protest. And so it goes.

The problem with the Constitution is that it was devised to prevent Government from hobbling the People. This was fine when our government was new and not very powerful. Now our government wants to get around much of the Constitution, for the same reason the Constitution was created - because the Constitution interferes with the ability to stifle freedoms that make governing difficult.

Anyway, I've nattered on long enough. We have a wonderful Constitution with all kinds of bold words in it, but the minute those words inconvenience someone with money, or scare someone, we ignore them. And we've been doing it since the late 1700's - or maybe the early 1800's. I don't remember any more - it was a long time ago.

Yeah, I think my comment came across as denigrating the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Not at all my intention. It's a great document, one we would do well to follow. We're not following it very well these days.

I believe that these words are precious, but that we need to live up to them. If we don't do that, then they become hollow. We have strayed far from the original intent of these words. Saying them doesn't make them come true. We have to live them.

Yes, America is an idea(l). America the ideal seems to have been banished from her native land. I'm hoping I live to see the day when she is warmly welcomed back. I don't want her to become just a memory.

"That's the sort of blinkered, philistine, pig-ignorance I've come to expect from you non-creative garbage!"

Be reasonable. If a religion required killing all girl babies, or setting fire to police stations, we wouldn't give those activities a pass just because they are "religious."

Well, those activities are illegal for everyone.

Again, be reasonable. Some speech, like inciting violence or yelling FIRE in a theatre, are sensibly illegal.

I don't mean you should

Ooh, he missed his flight. Tragic. Scarred for life.

There will always be conflicts between the rights of people. The law is set up to mitigate these conflicts. Perhaps some religion does allow slavery, except the would-be slave has rights too. Now get real!

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I can follow it well enough to tell that it is proper and useful. I = would have to study intensively for about a week to really follow it and check the references decently. Pretty decent find.

?-)

Then why is the flap over requiring Catholic Church owned health care centers to provide "the pill", and other birth control methods? The flap happened recently, well after the passage of "Obamacare". And the recent speech by Obummer saying that he will require that.

?-)

Employers aren't public. We don't own them. And, the bishops aren't forcing anything on anyone. Unless you mean they're forcing everyone to go barefoot, by not providing shoes.

Wouldn't it be cool if they gave their employees money? That way employees could buy whatever they wanted, even if it wasn't abortion stuff, or whatever.

ap

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The Catholics have said they will not comply with Obamacare.

Walter Williams (a fairly mild-mannered hero), is saying neither should we:

It's not often such a man calls for, in essence, revolution.

-- Cheers, James Arthur

One new and impressive development on the brain to real world interface in the other direction has been the announcement by the BrainGate team yesterday that a paralysed lady now has control of an artificial limb on a direct to brain interface. The video clip is pretty amazing.

Full paper is in Nature but behind a pay wall for non-subscribers.

New Scientist had an article interviewing those Soviet strategists back in the early '90s and they were not influenced in the way this US right wing mythology expouses.

Their own military industrial complex had proposed a ballistic missle defense a couple of years before the US, so they had already made a study of the possible effectiveness and had rejected the idea. Instead they went with cost effective countermeasures like high boost launchers and decoys.

The title was "Fear and Laughter in the Kremlin".

Mark Zenier snipped-for-privacy@eskimo.com Googleproofaddress(account:mzenier provider:eskimo domain:com)

New Scientist had an article interviewing those Soviet strategists back in the early '90s and they were not influenced in the way this US right wing mythology expouses.

Their own military industrial complex had proposed a ballistic missle defense a couple of years before the US, so they had already made a study of the possible effectiveness and had rejected the idea. Instead they went with cost effective countermeasures like high boost launchers and decoys.

The title was "Fear and Laughter in the Kremlin".

Mark Zenier snipped-for-privacy@eskimo.com Googleproofaddress(account:mzenier provider:eskimo domain:com)

Old news. That was shown on the local news yesterday.