Why is science, space, and history so inportent?

On 2005-06-08, Scott Hedrick wrote:

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
...
Fetal Frig that is; the "Frat" is of course a combination of a frog and
a rat.

WHich doesn't stop them from having their own houses, and needing the
University police to cart them back to their dorms so they don't pass out on
the road between the bars and the university. Frat boys becoming splat boys
tends to make the alumni association cross.

I remain amazed by our transatlantic brethren, as always.

(Here, the University Police was one old chap whose job involved telling
people not to park in front of the Cathedral, most of the bars were
colocated with the dorms - in my first year I occasionally went drinking
in slippers - and people were expected to find their own way home from a
hard night's labouring at the beer-face... I don't know. And they expect
to run the world this way? It's shocking, really it is.)

--
-Andrew Gray

On Tue, 7 Jun 2005 19:46:33 -0500, Rhonda Lea Kirk wrote
(in article
):


I don't think that's what it is. I think she's a girl, and I
think she's 15, and I think she just discovered usenet.

You guys are just jaded, cynical and curmudgeonly.

Count me among the cynics, dear. Check out some of the groups she's
posting to and what kind of clueless nonsense she's saying.

http://tinyurl.com/7aey4

I think she's either a troll, a totally clueless loon, or an LEO
looking to bust geeks for inappropriate online content with a minor.

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/05/31/last_word_we_hope_on.html
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/04/28/la_times_pedophilia_.html

--
Herb Schaltegger, GPG Key ID: BBF6FC1C
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin, 1759
http://www.individual-i.com/

On 2005-06-08, Rhonda Lea Kirk wrote:
The Rocket Scientist wrote:
wrote:
I have trouble with these subjects in school, and I am
not the only one. But why do we need to know about how
to find orgens in a frog or why did america become a
free countrey? Can you help me with this question?
Your friend
K-girl15

What a lovely troll!

I don't think that's what it is. I think she's a girl, and I
think she's 15, and I think she just discovered usenet.

You guys are just jaded, cynical and curmudgeonly.

Huh. There's a thought. I was staying with an old friend of mine last
weekend, who I first encountered as a 15-year-old girl who'd recently
discovered Usenet.

I feel all old and curmudgeonly, now. (I was cynical then, though)

To the original lass: you need to find organs in a frog because frogs
are, all things considered, pretty damned simple animals. It's handy to
know what organs look like and where they are; it makes you better
prepared to understand what doctors are talking about, for one.

Unfortunately, people are a) complex and b) expensive, so you don't
really want to start cutting them open - frogs, on the other hand, are
easy to get hold of and not very difficult to find your way around, so
they're good for doing the spot-an-organ games.

(I fondly remember dissecting a rat in sixth year. Highlight of my
biology courses; same general idea)

It is useful to know why America became a free country because...

All we have of freedom, all we use or know --
This our fathers bought for us long and long ago.

Ancient Right unnoticed as the breath we draw --
Leave to live by no man's leave, underneath the Law.

Lance and torch and tumult, steel and grey-goose wing
Wrenched it, inch and ell and all, slowly from the King.

Till our fathers 'stablished, after bloody years,
How our King is one with us, first among his peers.

So they bought us freedom - not at little cost
Wherefore must we watch the King, lest our gain be lost,

And when you forget this, well, unfortunate things happen.

He shall mark our goings, question whence we came,
Set his guards about us, as in Freedom's name.
....
He shall break his judges if they cross his word;
He shall rule above the Law calling on the Lord.

He shall peep and mutter; and the night shall bring
Watchers 'neath our window, lest we mock the King --
...
Strangers of his counsel, hirelings of his pay,
These shall deal our Justice: sell - deny - delay.

[Written in 1899, if you're wondering...]

Of course, this is all academic; the rights won by the colonists in the
1780s are so well-established that you would never need to worry about
guards being posted around you in the name of Freedom.

(Um. I'll get back to you on that one.)

It's useful to remember how you got this way, really. If nothing else,
it lets you know how to retrace your steps.

--
-Andrew Gray

On 2005-06-08, Herb Schaltegger
wrote:

[The things I will do when unable to sleep...]

On Tue, 7 Jun 2005 19:46:33 -0500, Rhonda Lea Kirk wrote
(in article
):

I don't think that's what it is. I think she's a girl, and I
think she's 15, and I think she just discovered usenet.

You guys are just jaded, cynical and curmudgeonly.

Count me among the cynics, dear. Check out some of the groups she's
posting to and what kind of clueless nonsense she's saying.

http://tinyurl.com/7aey4

I think she's either a troll, a totally clueless loon, or an LEO
looking to bust geeks for inappropriate online content with a minor.

Google shows up a 15yo lass by the same name posting to a webforum three
years ago; on the other hand, the name is a fairly plausible one to be
repeated so I wouldn't place any value on that. [1]

I don't know enough teenage American girls (thank God!) to comment on
the plausibility of the *content* of the postings, but the pattern is
consistentish for someone just discovering Usenet. (More specifically,
just discovering Google Groups; ssh is the only one there which is in
the Real World). Throw in a lot of keywords to a search, start posting
enthusiastically. [This does pose the question of how ssh got there, but
strange and baroque are the Ways of Google]

I can quite easily see why a troll would post to a sci. group as a
rather enthusiastic teenage girl, and the intended response to it is
predictable; it's just that it's not consistent with that to post to the
other groups. I mean, look at them. 17, 9, 5, 3 & 2 members, all of them
pretty much dead.

Ignoring the demographic issues (trolling ssh is likely to require a
different approach and aim from trolling a group on, uh, whatever the
hell some of these are about), these just aren't places you'd troll. No
chance for a bite. So why post there 'in character' if your aim is
simply to troll?

I think you may have cyniced too quickly, today. Rhonda's theory looks
consistent from where I'm sitting. Given no-one's paid me to do this
research, all usual disclaimers apply. g

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/05/31/last_word_we_hope_on.html
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/04/28/la_times_pedophilia_.html

Ah, yeah. Those stories. Not cheering reading. I still have a pile of
notes about normalisation of deviance in subcultures and
internet-mediated socialisation kicking around. Must polish off my
bull****ting abilities and finish writing it, if I can avoid the
temptation to name case studies from the net.

[1] There's something interesting yet to be written about the popularity
of numeral forms in usernames. Ah, in that Copious Free Time of mine...

--
-Andrew Gray

"Andrew Gray" wrote in message
. ..
I remain amazed by our transatlantic brethren, as always.

Andrew, Old Chap, why, alcohol is forbidden on campus, because it would
offend some alumni (except, of course, when those same alumni are attending
some function on campus).

At the University of Florida, cars *must* stop for pedestrians, even when
not at a crosswalk. Unfortunately, the road between the university and the
nearest bars is not part of the university, and the plebes- I mean,
freshmen, tend to forget this *before* the drinks, and the upperclassfolks
tend to forget it after.

Every year tends to alternate between a biker getting killed just
off-campus, and a drunk falling out of an upper-story window during a frat
party. It's Darwin's way of making room for a more qualified applicant

"Rhonda Lea Kirk" wrote in message
...
You guys are just jaded, cynical and curmudgeonly.

I do not smell like OM!

"Andrew Gray" wrote in message
. ..
It's useful to remember how you got this way, really. If nothing else,
it lets you know how to retrace your steps.

I was astounded at recent statements made by high school students that
suggested the government should have to approve news stories.

There's little point in trying to explain Watergate to them.

On 8 Jun 2005 01:22:13 GMT, Andrew Gray
wrote:

To the original lass: you need to find organs in a frog because frogs
are, all things considered, pretty damned simple animals.

....Especially when they explode.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

On Wed, 08 Jun 2005 00:46:33 GMT, "Rhonda Lea Kirk"
wrote:

You guys are just jaded, cynical and curmudgeonly.

....You're just ****ed because we're picking on your little sister,
Rhon. But you're right - we should be picking on *you*, because you
should have trained her better before letting her loose on usenet
unchapperoned.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr

On Tue, 07 Jun 2005 16:25:03 -0500, Damon Hill
wrote:

Blows raspberry at OM; winks at Pat.

....I'd watch this guy, Pat. Or, at least, don't bend over to pick up
the soap when he's nearby.

OM

--

"No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m
his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms
poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society

- General George S. Patton, Jr