Series (?) of scifi stories about an alien race going through iterations of evolution and near extinction
Looking for book: contact with aliens, five different races, mismatched claws, biological imperative to breed
Make it cost more to downvote without comment; make it hurt to leave a crap comment Possible Duplicate:    In the spirit of &quot;encouraging&quot; people to leave comments on downvoting, I would propose that if someone downvotes without a comment, I propose a heavy point tax, say 3x the current point cost for a downvote. If he or she downvotes and leaves a comment, then it costs the current amount. If someone leaves a crap comment (to avoid the &quot;charge&quot;) they get a painful spank (100 points gone or whatever the community decides) if and only if:  The comment is flagged Three (five? whatever) moderators agree it is crap  Common complaints Or, why my proposal is different.  &quot;  a &quot;   No it isn't. I specifically address the issue of leaving garbage comments to avoid the downvote tax, unlike the other proposals.   &quot;Some people want to leave anonymous (down)votes.&quot;  I understand that some might be fearful of retaliation. Is retaliation a real problem or a &quot;what if&quot; conjecture? (Where's the data?) What if we try it for 3-6 months and then circle back to see how well it works?  If a user starts retaliating against another user, they will be dealt with as are all other problem users. Nothing else is anonymous - asking questions, answering questions, editing questions, leaving comments, etc. and there is a clear benefit. What is the benefit to the community for having anonymous voting? I would argue &quot;none.&quot; Even though some people might want to leave anonymous questions, answer anonymously or anonymously edit a question, it is not allowed, because it is not good for the community.   &quot;But this will discourage downvoting&quot;  I agree, and I think that's a good thing, which goes to the philosophy of the site: promote good questions and answers. If a question or answer is poor, few will up-vote it. If is is really poor, it will get flagged and . If someone really wants to downvote, no one is stopping him or her. Just as we want quality questions and answers, we need quality voting.   It will require too much work to implement  Maybe. Let's ask if it is worth the effort. What benefit does anonymous, no-comment downvoting add to the site? It certainly doesn't allow the author to improve. What benefit would owned, commented downvoting add? It would hopefully allow authors to improve and discourage drive-by downvoting. Would me (or someone else) submitting a patch alleviate this complaint?   Jeff (or Joel) thinks this is a stupid feature, and you're stupid for suggesting it.  &quot;&quot; Is this a true statement?    Thanks for reading. I cannot update my Kali Linux, when trying to execute apt-get update I get this error message:  # apt-get update  Get:1 http://kali.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/kali kali-rolling InRelease [30.5 kB] Err:1 http://kali.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/kali kali-rolling InRelease   The following signatures were invalid: EXPKEYSIG ED444FF07D8D0BF6 Kali Linux Repository &lt;devel@kali.org&gt; Reading package lists... Done W: GPG error: http://kali.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/kali kali-rolling InRelease: The following signatures were invalid: EXPKEYSIG ED444FF07D8D0BF6 Kali Linux Repository &lt;devel@kali.org&gt; E: The repository 'http://kali.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/kali kali-rolling InRelease' is not signed. N: Updating from such a repository can't be done securely, and is therefore disabled by default. N: See apt-secure(8) manpage for repository creation and user configuration details.   If you need my kernel version:  # uname -a 4.13.0-kali1-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.13.10-1kali2 (2017-11-08) x86_64 GNU/Linux   How can I fix this? Should you use a plural verb if you refer to a fraction?     Nine tenths of the pillar have rotted away.   I think has should be used here, but I'm not sure. Declaring variables inside or outside of a loop Is there a word or phrase to define several words linked by hyphens, such as in "a sit-back-and-wait-for-it attitude" some more examples:   "And she gave me that aren't-I-just-gorgeous smile." "The I-did-it-my-way approach." "A from-this-day-forward-I-have-no-son scene." Can someone use DC generator along with electric motor to make electricity along with mechanical energy? I know this might sound stupid and maybe stupid totally, but I need some clarification....  I came through electric motor principle.  and then I came across the following link on DC generators    Now my question is, can't we combine them both to provide DC current with little DC used in motor side? By "combine," I mean using a DC generator coil only at the other side of the coil of the motor in the motor itself. The condition is that the 2 coils are connected via some apparatus that causes the 2nd coil to move along with the 1st coil.   In this way we can use both the mechanical energy produced by the 1st coil and the electrical energy produced by the 2nd coil, right?   This is a great concept if it works, right? Please throw some light on this. Ok, so I'm such a newbie to Ubuntu and I bought a Windows 8 pre-installed laptop last month.  I updated to Windows 8.1 and then I thought about installing Ubuntu as a dual boot so I could mess around and learn more about it.   So I followed a Youtube tutorial (  ) and I got my stuff working fine.   The first few times I booted I got the GRUB menu instead of my default HP Boot OS Manager, and I was able to select my OS.   So I went to sleep and the next day I turned on my computer and the GRUB menu did not show up. I tried several times and it didn't automatically show up.  In order for me to see the GRUB menu I had to turn on my PC and on start had to press ESC to pause startup and press F9 to get boot options. Then from there I had to pick from OS Boot, Ubuntu, Ubuntu (Yes there were two Ubuntus available) and a default EFI file thingy.   When I click the first Ubuntu I get the GRUB Menu (I was too scared to try the second in case I screwed my laptop up) and I can safely load Ubuntu from there and use it (although I do have to increase my brightness every time I load Ubuntu because it somehow reduces my brightness to complete darkness on boot)  So my problem here is why isn't my GRUB showing on boot, after it worked on the first day?   My laptop is a HP TouchSmart j-078CA.  EDIT 1: FYI I just switched to Ubuntu LiveCD to check my Installation and found out that one of my partition is flagged as msftres. Here is a screenshot of my GParted on a LiveCD: How to cite a source that has vanished due to link rot? My colleague is writing a manuscript about a subject that is rarely reported in the mainstream literature (predation events). A few years ago on a fishing forum she found a photograph that demonstrated this phenomenon pretty well and saved it to her computer, but unfortunately between then and now the original source has vanished: Google Reverse Image Search can't locate it, the website is no longer running and is also unavailable in the Internet Archive. The original URL to the photo was also not retained.  What's the proper way to cite this source? It's not critical to include but it would definitely improve the final manuscript. Quantum entanglement faster than speed of light? recently i was watching a  on quantum computing where the narrators describes that quantum entanglement information travels faster than light!  Is it really possible for anything to move faster than light? Or are the narrators just wrong?  Regards, Error : Warning: strpos() [function.strpos]: Offset not contained in string - can not find solution How to download an MP3 track from a YouTube video I'm using Lubuntu for a while now, but found a couple of details that I wanted to view with Unity (that's another story).  Ok, the thing is: I've tried on a VM with Lubuntu to install Unity (sudo apt-get install unity) When the installation is over. I selected in the Lubuntu login Unity/Unity2D but did not work.  Right now I'm installing ubuntu-desktop, I am presuming that will work, but also it will change my login for example.  Is there a way to do a "clean" installation of Unity but not make major changes on my Lubuntu?  I would prefer Gnome-Shell instead of Unity. g++ undefined reference to typeinfo Is there difference in force when the height increases? Interaction with the site on the app should count towards Enthusiast/Fanatic If I do any of the below, which would normally constitute "activity" on any Stack Exchange site (including mobile):   View my profile Vote on any question or comment Visit one or more questions   ...then Stack Exchange considers me to have "visited" the site.  If I do any of the below on the mobile app:   Vote on any question or comment Visit one or more questions   ...then Stack Exchange does not consider me to have visited the site.  If one wants the app to have feature parity with the mobile site, then shouldn't my participation within the app also count towards the Enthusiast/Fanatic badge? In a simple battery + resistor circuit, what form of energy is lost from the electrons upon exiting the resistor? I will give this question a little context. Firstly, as I understand it, as soon as I "close the switch" on a circuit, electric current pretty quickly establishes a steady state where, at any given cross section along a wire, the average kinetic energy of that slice is both constant and equal anywhere along the wire. (Please correct me if I am misunderstanding).   If the average kinetic energy is constant anywhere throughout the wire in the circuit (which confuses me, as I would think that the electrons should all accelerate after exiting the resistor since they are no longer being impeded as much), that means that the average velocity is constant. So, in the example of a simple circuit with a battery of v Volts and a resistor of o Ohms, my question is the following:  Because a 'voltage drop' is known to occur across the resistor, what type energy is being "traded" to generate the heat that radiates from the resistor? I would think that the reflexive answer is "electrical energy"...hence the VOLTAGE drop (the sacrificed energy is clearly not kinetic, as the velocity is constant everywhere). However, I find this confusing. Does this mean that if I had a positive test charge, it would be easier for me to bring it to the beginning of the resistor as compared to bringing it to the end of the resister?     Further, if the correct answer IS "electrical energy", why exactly DOES electrical energy get "dissipated" as the electrons pass through the resistor? I always here the comment Oh! It's because all the electrons are running into densely packed crap which impedes their flow but that to me sounds like a reason for their KINETIC energy to be reduced. However, clearly that's not the case. So, ultimately, I guess the real question is:  **What goes on in the resistor that is literally removing electrical energy **. I am sure that this is a quantum mechanics question, but my quantum mechanics knowledge is not terribly strong. If I could get an answer that is devoid of crazy wave function equations, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks! How do I root my Android device? Given $\int_0^{\infty}e^{-x^2}dx = \frac{\sqrt{\pi}}{2}$, evaluate $\int_0^{\infty}e^{-a^2x^2-\frac{b^2}{x^2}}dx $ Given $$\int_0^{\infty}e^{-x^2}dx = \frac{\sqrt{\pi}}{2}$$ evaluate:   $$\int_0^{\infty}e^{-a^2x^2-\frac{b^2}{x^2}}dx. $$   I can find that  $$\left(ax+\frac{b}{x}\right)^2 = a^2x^2+2ab+\frac{b^2}{x^2}$$  therefore: $$\int_0^{\infty}e^{-a^2x^2-\frac{b^2}{x^2}}dx = e^{2ab}\int_0^{\infty}e^{-\left(ax+\frac{b}{x}\right)^2}dx$$  but I can't find any clue then. What does "all the more" mean and how is it used? Here is a sample context:     As you might expect, the framework also provides some convenience   classes to make the task of writing custom validators all the more agreeable.   (Emphasis added.) Let $I = \langle 2\rangle$. Prove $I[x]$ is not a maximal ideal of $\mathbb Z[x]$ even though $I$ is a maximal ideal of $\mathbb Z$.   My professor mentioned that I should try adding something to it to prove that $I[x]$ is not the maximal ideal. I want to assume he meant to add $ \langle 2 \rangle$ to $I[x]$?