So, if VC03 actually got busted for his little project, and this thread came into evidence somehow, would it be plus to the defense because it seems to demonstrate no evil intent, or a negative because clearly there was a a lot of advice (that was ignored) not to do it.
I must give credit to VC03 for something. In the originating thread about the electronics idea, the responding members reached 100% consensus about it – BAD IDEA. I don’t think I have ever seen that before. Thank you VC03, for bringing the membership together as no one else has.
Yup, that’s exactly what tons of people, including me, would look at and think, “That’s a home-made timer/detonator and I have 8 seconds left to live, or to kill the guy and smash up the board.”
If I were a juror, and someone was told by so many people not to do something, but they went ahead and did it anyways, I wouldn’t really see that as exculpatory evidence.
He’s a fucking troll. He may be a warm wonderful huggy bear in real life, but on this board he’s a troll. No one smart enough to string three words together coherently would wonder if tinkering with one of those on an airplane would be OK.
So, basically, the argument is: People are ignorant, and don’t even try to educate them.
What do you think that the timer/detonator is going to detonate? Do timers explode by themselves, just like oxygen “explodes”? :dubious:
Wouldn’t this be much more effective: Portable wired/wireless detonator. It’s kind of scary, isn’t it?
In any case, there are two completely separate questions here:
Should someone try to take a breadboard on board a commerical airplane?
Should the thread in question have been locked?
My answers:
No. (But, only because of the ignorance and paranoia of passengers, aircraft crew, and security personnel.)
No.
And, for those who think that it’s obvious that **VCO3 ** was trolling, why did so many posters respond to his OP?
FWIW? Nothing, that’s WIW. Size isn’t the issue here, it’s the general appearance.
No, but nice strawman. It’s great to educate people about electronics and technology. But a planeful of people, many of whom will already be nervous just being there, is NOT the place to conduct such an education. And this is coming from someone heavily involved in electronics, both as an ejoyable hobby and a career.
The average person with zero background in electronics and explosives isn’t going to even bother to think about it; all they know is they see something which looks like homemade bomb circuity they’ve seen in movies and on TV. Maybe it’s a remote control to detonate an exp0lozive device in the cargo hold. They don’t know and they don’t care about possible technical details; they just know it makes them nervous.
Uh, because someone asked. Duh. I didn’t remember if the OP had included a link or not; I had a photo of one of my breadboard projects handy and I posted it. What difference does it make?
It’s a strawman because you implied that the poster you quoted suggested that ignorant people should not be educated when no such argument was advanced.
Did I say otherwise? Any reasonable person should have known that working on such a thing on a plane in the current sociopolitical climate is almost certainly going to worry some people. The answer was so glaringly obvious and it was clear no one was going to buck the trend and seriously advise the OP in the original thread to go ahead with his plan; locking it may not have been absolutely necessary, but it was perfectly sensible. It had served its purpose and gotten the OP the only answer he was going to get. There was no point to it anymore.
It’s an indication that you’re not really familiar with the OP.
So, your explanation is functionally equivalent to:
And:
Right. :dubious:
So, at least one of the moderators is a mind-reader? And, all of VCO3’s comments were blatant lies, right?
Anyway, you yourself said:
And **Sunspace **, Mangetout, and **guizot ** agreed.
What do you think poses a greater threat to airline security: A laptop computer (highly sophisticated electronics, highly programmable, with built-in wireless capability) or a breadboard?
I’m not saying that anyone should take a breadboard on a plane, but considering doing so (and addressing ways of dealing with the specific concerns that passengers and crew will have) is not moronic, nor is it automatically evidence of trolling.
No, it’s an indication I don’t really give that much of a shit.
Irrelevant. People use laptops on planes all the time; everyone knows what they are an no one is going to get freaked out by one. A breadboard, not so much.
Appearance of impropriety is the issue. Do you think I couldn’t kill someone with dental floss or a pen? Of course I could. And yet I can take those on a plane but not 4 oz of shampoo. Nobody’s arguing that VCO3 is trying to take an unsafe device on a plane. They’re arguing that it is not clever or advisable to bring something that could be misperceived as dangerous on a plane. That people took the time to respond to him with arguments against rather than immediately urging him to go ahead with his plan is, to me, a demonstration that people here often respond to even perplexingly stupid OPs from posters with a history of such in a spirit of engagement rather than ridicule.
