Not even a week ago, Microsoft doubled down on its policy that requires PCs to have TPM 2.0-compatible hardware in order to install Windows 11. But now, in an unexpected and puzzling move, the company is issuing instructions for installing Windows 11 on incompatible PCs.

You can find those official instructions on this support page. However, Microsoft begins the instructions with a direct warning:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/installing-windows-11-on-devices-that-don-t-meet-minimum-system-requirements-0b2dc4a2-5933-4ad4-9c09-ef0a331518f1. //

For anyone who updates to Windows 11 despite not meeting the requirements, Microsoft offers the opportunity to return to Windows 10. However, this is only possible for 10 days after upgrading.

The option to revert can be found in Settings under System > Recovery > Recovery options. The step-by-step process will then take you back to Windows 10. However, you should create a backup before upgrading to be on the safe side in case something goes wrong.

Have you ever wondered how the chips inside your computer work? How they process information and run programs? Are you maybe a bit let down by the low resolution of chip photographs on the web or by complex diagrams that reveal very little about how circuits work? Then you've come to the right place!

The first of our projects is aimed at the classic MOS 6502 cpu processor. ///

load some assembly language and watch the paths light up on the CPU die

Those cities at least have air service, unlike 14 U.S. airports that have lost all scheduled commercial air service since 2019. And the three largest U.S. airlines - American, Delta, and United - have exited from 74 airports since April 2020:

The built-in ringtones are located in

 /system/media/audio/ringtones

... instead of your Internal Storage. ///

Use the RootExplorer app to navigate and copy

A/I generated faces

The federal government shouldn’t be involved, directly or indirectly, in the fact-checking industry. Nor should it engage in efforts designed to limit the speech of citizens, particularly when taxpayers are the ones footing the bill.

But the cost and creation of these misinformation programs is just the tip of the iceberg. Open the Books conducted a detailed review of many of the programs, contracts and grants as part of its report, and I subsequently verified and expanded upon some of their findings.

What we found is clear evidence that the Biden-Harris White House used funds to support or develop Orwellian surveillance and propaganda strategies, create methods and tools to restrict speech online, and even to finance highly politicized reports critical of Trump.

This is the point where I usually suggest that if the above story were flipped; if the first Trump administration had spent more than a quarter billion dollars trying to restrict speech on the left and to finance highly politicized critical of, say, Kamala Harris, the histrionics on the left would have set off alarms on seismic detectors across America. //

Random US Citizen
41 minutes ago
Everything those who are no longer our countrymen do boils down to one of two things: a power grab or money laundering. Those hundreds of millions of dollars Obama gave out in green energy “loans” that were never repaid? Money that was laundered through those companies, a high percentage of which ended up back in the coffers of the DNC as corporate or personal donations. Most of the billion dollars Harris spent on “consultants” is a similar thing, and this “disinformation” spending is just another scheme to get money from the public purse into the pockets of people who really aren’t Americans in any meaningful sense.

George @BehizyTweets
·
Daniel Penny has been found NOT guilty of all charges.

Glory to God for justice
11:32 AM · Dec 9, 2024

piscorman
2 hours ago
About Social Science, my physics teacher used to say, "If they have to call it science, it isn't." The same thing applies to Social Justice.

These latest findings further support the Hubble Space Telescope's prior expansion rate measurements.

Physicists have been puzzling over conflicting observational results pertaining to the accelerating expansion rate of our Universe—a major discovery recognized by the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics. New observational data from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has confirmed that prior measurements of distances between nearby stars and galaxies made by the Hubble Space Telescope are not in error, according to a new paper published in The Astrophysical Journal. That means the discrepancy between observation and our current theoretical model of the Universe is more likely to be due to new physics.

As previously reported, the Hubble Constant is a measure of the Universe's expansion expressed in units of kilometers per second per megaparsec (Mpc). So, each second, every megaparsec of the Universe expands by a certain number of kilometers. Another way to think of this is in terms of a relatively stationary object a megaparsec away: Each second, it gets a number of kilometers more distant.

How many kilometers? That's the problem here. There are basically three methods scientists use to measure the Hubble Constant: looking at nearby objects to see how fast they are moving, gravitational waves produced by colliding black holes or neutron stars, and measuring tiny deviations in the afterglow of the Big Bang known as the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). However, the various methods have come up with different values. For instance, tracking distant supernovae produced a value of 73 km/s Mpc, while measurements of the CMB using the Planck satellite produced a value of 67 km/s Mpc.

Just last year, researchers made a third independent measure of the Universe's expansion by tracking the behavior of a gravitationally lensed supernova, where the distortion in space-time caused by a massive object acts as a lens to magnify an object in the background. The best fits of those models all ended up slightly below the value of the Hubble Constant derived from the CMB, with the difference being within the statistical error. Values closer to those derived from measurements of other supernovae were a considerably worse fit for the data. The method was new, with considerable uncertainties, but it did provide an independent means of getting at the Hubble Constant.

Observations in the past several years, combined with our past knowledge, basically confirmed we live in a weird and unusual part of the universe. Some of those are supported by fairly hard numbers and others are a bit more vague. The famous Drake equation would need several more factors just to cover all relevant information to explain the lack of spacefaring civilizations.

Here are a few new-ish ones, either newly discovered, or just something we didn’t realize is highly relevant in this context.

1. The Sun is not normal. It’s a type G star, this puts it in a group of stars numbering 7.6% of the Milky way. Of those it’s in the 10% most stable type G stars stars. A stable star is probably necessary for life and the factor for a suitable star is around 0.7% at this point.

2. Plate tectonics. In relatively recent times we came to realize plate tectonics are probably important for life, recycling the crust into the mantle without wrecking havoc on the surface every few million years. Of the planets in the Solar system, only Earth has suitable plate tectonics. We don’t know how common they are in the universe, but 10% is probably generous.

3. Rocky planets are typically larger than Earth, around 1.5 times Earth mass. This is relevant, because at 125% the size of Earth you can’t make an orbital chemical rocket any more. If you want a spacefaring civilization you kind of need that, at least as a stepping stone. Let’s call this one at 10%, it shouldn’t be very far off. //

4. The Solar system itself is highly unusual and will get several points. We have large planets on the outer edges and small planets closer to the star, which is only seen in about 10% of cases. Most star systems have large planets closer to the star and smaller planets outwards.

5. Solar system part two, it is unusual for a solar system to feature both rocky planets and gas gigants. Most have one or the other type of the planet, but not both. Let’s say this is another 10%, it’s probably lower but let’s put it at 10%.

6. Solar system part three, about 85% of star systems have more than one star, 15% have one star. For type G that’s a bit higher, with 56% and we can’t explain this yet. Let’s call this one 50%.

7. Solar system part four, we’re located in an unusually calm part of the galaxy. Most places have been variously zapped with X-ray bursts, supernovae or came across various other types of other cosmic horrors that would have ended any nascent life with prejudice. Let’s put this one at 10% of the galaxy being as calm as our bit, though it could be considerably less.

If you want to count the zeroes, we’re at approximately 1 in 100 billion at this point, certainly below 1 in 10 billion. Milky way has approximately 400 billion stars. Just accounting for these factors, then adding the “chance to develop life” in and some of the other stuff present in the Drake equation, pushes the probability of advanced, spacefaring civilization forming life being present in the Milky Way, to 1 planet or less. It’s probably a lot less, we rounded plenty of those estimates upwards, because it honestly didn’t matter.

Earth is rare. We know enough to state that with some certainty. We don’t know what other solutions to the Fermi paradox are also valid, but we know enough to state Earth and Solar system being total weirdos is one of them. They might well be unique to the Milky Way and possibly even rarer than that, there’s no way to know for sure.

Everything we learn about exoplanets and solar system formation seems to point more and more toward the rarity of our planet. We circle the right sort of star in the Goldilocks part of our galaxy, which is a good galaxy for us. Our planet is in the right place and is the right size. It has this nearly impossibly large moon that helps make large tides that probably had much to do with evolutionary steps that resulted in complex animals. It also stabilized our obliquity. We have plate tectonics and a substantial magnetic field. We had an unlikely asteroid encounter 65 million years ago, exactly when mammals were ready for prime time. Exit dinosaurs stage left. Enter mammals center stage.

We cannot assign exact probabilities to all of the steps, but we can see how unusual and rare our planet really is. There are not trillions of copies in this universe.

Vox, who has been reporting some evaluation of cow "emissions," and doing a little panic-mongering into the bargain. The problem? They predictably get almost everything wrong. [On the "Climate Realism" website, the Arthur B. Robinson Center on Climate and Environmental Policy's Linnea Lueken has the receipts]<https://climaterealism.com/2024/12/no-vox-measuring-burps-and-farts-will-not-save-the-planet/).

A recent article at Vox, titled “Scientists are measuring burps and farts. It could help save the planet,” claims that methane produced by farm animals is causing dangerous global warming, and thus that reducing agriculture-related methane is critical to limiting warming to the 1.5°C target established for political ends in the 2015 Paris climate agreement. This is false. Animal related methane is not a threat to the environment, contributing little if anything to global warming.

Part of what Vox doesn't understand (and that's a lengthy list) involves the nature of methane and its half-life in the atmosphere - which, one would think, would be something that should be added to the evaluation.

Although methane is, as Vox says, a “powerful” greenhouse gas with much more warming potential per molecule than carbon dioxide, it has a short atmospheric life as so plays a relatively minor role in the atmosphere when it comes to long-term warming. NASA, one source for Vox’s story admits as much. What Vox and NASA neglect to mention, however, is that methane’s absorption bands occur at wavelengths that the most powerful and abundant greenhouse gas, water vapor, making up as much of 97 percent of the greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere, already covers. Methane, a small trace gas, is a very minor player despite alarmism surrounding it. //

But beef production only represents 2 percent of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, and is beaten out in emissions by crop agriculture, which contributes 10.2 percent of U.S. emissions. These numbers are likely similar in most western countries. Climate Realism has covered these facts multiple times before, here, here, and here, for example. The facts haven’t changed, yet climate alarmists arguments are never revised or improved.

Unsurprisingly, Welker frames her response with a lie: "The 14th Amendment, though, says that, quote, "All persons born in the United States are citizens."

The actual quote is:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

While there has been widespread acquiescence to an interpretation that says a child born to an illegal is a citizen, there is nothing in our law that says that and a great deal that says just the opposite. Read this excellent essay on why birthright citizenship is not a constitutional right.

I don't know if executive action will be sufficient to change our direction because it will be open to reversal by any future president. I think the clearest course of action would be a legal case that results in "y'all can do that if you want to, but there is no constitutional reason to support birthright citizenship.". https://www.heritage.org/immigration/commentary/birthright-citizenship-fundamental-misunderstanding-the-14th-amendment. //

Trump may find that the same obstacle that prevented a solution for Dreamers early in his first term remains. The Democrats don't care about solving the Dreamer issue. But they care very much about keeping it alive so they can demagogue it to fight immigration reform and raise cash from their donor base; see The Democrats Don't Want a DACA Deal, They Want a DACA Issue. Trump has a lot more bargaining potential with this issue than with birthright citizenship. DACA has been ruled illegal by a federal judge. That has stopped any processing of the 80,000+ applications now in the pipeline. The decision has been appealed and will be heard by the Fifth Circuit. //

However, if the Democrats refuse to cooperate, Trump will face an uphill battle in crafting a successor to DACA that can pass the House only on GOP votes. Then he will be confronted with a choice of ignoring the law, like Obama and Biden, or deporting tens of thousands of people to countries where they are foreigners. I can even see the Democrats opting to force this choice. //

The border wall and tougher policing are just one part of the equation. For any kind of long-term border security, we must ensure that cretins like Joe Biden have their ability to make up policy on the fly limited. We must act to withdraw the incentives that attract millions of people to the US. One of those incentives is the knowledge that by having a kid on American soil, the parents can probably avoid deportation. And we must also act with mercy toward those, like the Dreamers, who were left stateless by the actions of their parents. At the same time, we need to make sure that any program to accommodate DACA registrants has a final date attached, and it doesn't become just another way of beating the system. //

NightTwister
an hour ago
While I've stated before that I think Dreamers may need a different solution, they must be the last ones dealt with, and even then, any that have shown a hatred of their new country must be excluded. If they hate it here, they can leave.

Those who have committed crimes here are gone first. Then those who committed crimes in their home country. Change laws and practices to force self-deportation. Then find and deport the remainder. THEN we can worry about the Dreamers. Under no circumstances can they be first.

According to the DOJ, Gonzalez helped smuggle “dozens of migrants” from South America to the United States illegally so he could profit from their labor. He faces a maximum of 120 years in prison and will be sentenced March 18. //

Once in Philadelphia, Gonzalez and his co-conspirators picked them up at the airport, and took them to a residence in Chester used to house aliens.

Gonzalez told the five they owed him “substantial debts for his assistance” and that they should remain in one of the homes he owned and work at jobs he arranged to pay off the debts. The debt was much more than the cost of transporting and housing them, although the indictment did not say how much he demanded. //

Most illegal immigrants do not understand they are getting involved in a trafficking scheme, Arthur said. //

President-elect Donald Trump has nominated his former Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Tom Homan, to lead border enforcement. Arthur says detaining people who have entered the U.S. illegally until it is determined if they should be allowed into the country would be a “gut punch” to trafficking. And although he has not heard Trump or Homan speak to this yet, Arthur recommends ending the CHNV program due to its exploitation by traffickers.

“This is new age slavery; 159 years after the 14th Amendment, we are still faced with this scourge. And unfortunately, the immigration policies of the current administration facilitate trafficking,” Arthur said.

One doctor has murdered more than 430 patients — not counting unborn babies. She is still practicing this twisted ‘medicine.’

‘[I]f they have specialties that we can use, especially if we want to maintain an all-volunteer force, we want to bring that talent into our services.’. //

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, previously endorsed allowing trans-identifying individuals to serve in the U.S. military, a position military specialists and reports have warned hampers the force’s overall readiness.

In Afghanistan, tribalism is at a virtually unparalleled level. Westerners have no idea how deeply disturbing that tribalism can be. //

The following is an excerpt from If It Takes a Thousand Years: From Al-Qaeda to Hamas, How the Jihadists Think & How to Defeat Them. //

When analyzing our Islamic extremist enemies, it is important for the American people to understand the tribal mindset that so many of our enemies come from. Islam developed from tribal cultures, and many tribal cultures over the past 1,400 years developed under Islam. The Islamic world itself is divided into what I would describe as tribes; you have the Sunni tribe, the Shia tribe, and within that are thousands of other tribes, one of the most recent being the “Palestinian” tribe which has become somewhat of a self-appointed identity by various lost members of other tribes. But in Afghanistan, tribalism is at a level that is virtually unparalleled in the world. //

Most people there got it. But back in Washington, and among so many in the higher ranks in the military trying to please those in Washington, there was a complete disconnect from the reality on the ground, and a complete misunderstanding of just who our enemy is, how they think, and how ferociously determined they are.

Based on AlmaLinux, the operating system — which is the successor to Oreon Lime — has been designed with simplicity and familiarity in mind, bridging the gap between the ease of use people expect from Windows and the power and flexibility of Linux.

The brand new operating system sports an intuitive interface that will be instantly recognizable to Windows users, and it offers seamless compatibility with popular applications, and solid performance. Oreon 10 promises to make transitioning to a Linux environment not only approachable but (whisper it!) enjoyable.
https://oreonproject.org/download/

The vulnerability, which affects Linux kernel versions 5.14 through 6.6, resides in the NF_tables, a kernel component enabling the Netfilter, which in turn facilitates a variety of network operations, including packet filtering, network address [and port] translation (NA[P]T), packet logging, userspace packet queueing, and other packet mangling. It was patched in January, but as the CISA advisory indicates, some production systems have yet to install it. At the time this Ars post went live, there were no known details about the active exploitation.