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Take off the tinfoil hat already. The files just got cooked^2 by the web server and IE popped up a save dialog anyway. The PDF files were probably all from ascii postscript and had nothing to get cooked.

P.S. why the hell doesn't <sup> work?

You're worried about this because you saw a fictional company in a fictional movie that did bad things?

You need therapy. Jesus, what is wrong with you?

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/joke may help answer that question.

It's not a tautology. It's just incredibly obvious that better-reviewed games would be downloaded more on BitTorrent.

[To be clear a tautology is something that is by definition true, like ... "if a and b are rational numbers, then ab is rational".

That's not a tautology. That's a mathematical consequence. Tautology is a repetition of meaning. "a and b are rational" has a different meaning than "ab is rational", even though one can be shown to always imply the second. Otherwise you could say that the entirety of provable mathematics is tautologous.

No. GP has it right, and you do not. Tautology is not about meaning, it is about truth. Bertrand Russell's quote from the Wiktionary entry is particularly apt, here. The proposition "if a and b are rational numbers, then ab is rational" *is* tautological, because in the deductive modality, the conclusion is always implicit in the premise; there is no way to "deduce" a new truth via the deductive modality. One can only restate a truth that was already present in the premise, and that is what makes the deductive modality tautological. Think GIGO, replacing "garbage" with "truth". So, as you implied, the entirety of provable mathematics is definitely not tautologous. There indeed exists another modality that is not tautological. The other modality is inductive logic, which *can* produce new truths, rendering it non-tautological.

If a and b are rational numbers, then is ab rational? That depends on the closure of rational numbers, which I would argue is not part of the premise at all. You are extrapolating from assumed properties of the word "rational" which are not given in the statement.

Consider this: "if a and b are imaginary numbers, then ab is imaginary". The same syntax, but not even true. What if we define "rational numbers" to be imaginary? Then the original example isn't true either.

A variation of the original example that is tautological would be "if a and b being rational numbers is sufficient for ab to be rational, and a and b are rational numbers, then ab is rational".

It's not a tautology. It's just incredibly obvious that better-reviewed games would be downloaded more on BitTorrent.

[To be clear a tautology is something that is by definition true, like ... "if a and b are rational numbers, then ab is rational".

That's not a tautology. That's a mathematical consequence. Tautology is a repetition of meaning. "a and b are rational" has a different meaning than "ab is rational", even though one can be shown to always imply the second. Otherwise you could say that the entirety of provable mathematics is tautologous.

No. GP has it right, and you do not. Tautology is not about meaning, it is about truth. Bertrand Russell's quote from the Wiktionary entry is particularly apt, here. The proposition "if a and b are rational numbers, then ab is rational" *is* tautological, because in the deductive modality, the conclusion is always implicit in the premise; there is no way to "deduce" a new truth via the deductive modality. One can only restate a truth that was already present in the premise, and that is what makes the deductive modality tautological. Think GIGO, replacing "garbage" with "truth". So, as you implied, the entirety of provable mathematics is definitely not tautologous. There indeed exists another modality that is not tautological. The other modality is inductive logic, which *can* produce new truths, rendering it non-tautological.

The hype is justified if you understand the technology, but since most customers don't then the hype from them is unjustified? Do you have any idea how that sounds?

The hype can't be justified by any means. Do you have any idea what is hype: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hype
It's pure propaganda and it doesn't have anything to do with quality or engineering.

Even non-technical people can appreciate good engineering. You don't have to know how bridges are built to appreciate that good ones don't collapse and bad ones do. If you then associate the good bridges with the companies that made them, does that mean that you only care about that company's logo?

If you have bridge company A and bridge company B who make "uncollapsible" bridges do you really care who made the bridge?
What is that with you and Apple engineers? Do you think that Apple engineers are the only good ones in the world? Do you think they are better then RIM, Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, LG, ... engineers?

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/plebeian

From what I understand paleontologists love balling each other ...

*snicker* *giggle*

It's 'bawling out' dude.

In lieu

Fuck off. Since 1547:

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/for_all_intents_and_purposes

Huh, I'd always heard it used to mean "genuine". Wiktionary does support both meanings, however a literal translation is "good faith".

It's likely a case of a phrase taking on a second, similar meaning over time. "Goof faith" and "not counterfeit" are obvious intersections; it's a small hop from there to "genuine". Still, I didn't know that when I wrote it. My bad.

Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.

"Excrements" is not a word. I believe you're looking for "feces" or "excreta". Or, alternatively, "A grammar Nazi is to this community what a pile of excrement is to gold."

Wiktionary disagrees...it notes "excrements" as plural to "excrement". Also note..."excrement" can refer to any bodily waste product, so even if one considers "excrement" as a mass noun in most contexts, it still could make sense to say "excrements, like sweat, urine, or feces" (similar to fish vs. fishes as a plural).

A grammar Nazi is to this community what a pile of crap is to gold. There, I fixed it. :)

Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.

"Excrements" is not a word. I believe you're looking for "feces" or "excreta". Or, alternatively, "A grammar Nazi is to this community what a pile of excrement is to gold."

Wiktionary disagrees...it notes "excrements" as plural to "excrement". Also note..."excrement" can refer to any bodily waste product, so even if one considers "excrement" as a mass noun in most contexts, it still could make sense to say "excrements, like sweat, urine, or feces" (similar to fish vs. fishes as a plural).

Not as stupid as "shitten," yet ...

Before God, master fool, if you do not let me alone, or that you will presume to vex me any more, you shall receive from the best hand I have a mask wherewith to cover your rascally scroundrel face, you paltry shitten varlet. -- Francois Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel (translated from French)

Ted Nelson was even complaining about its overuse in the late 1960s. Seems not to have really stopped.

irregardless of any other ire given

Irregardless is not a word. You may have a point, but your use of a non-word makes me wonder.

If enough people use it and accept it as valid then it's a perfectly cromulent word, just like all the other words that weren't words 100 years ago. If you want a definition then this might assist you broadening your vocabulary (even though the entry itself state's that it isn't generally accepted as a word :)

That's because when people say "irregardless" they use it to mean the exact same thing as "regardless", but they are trying to sound intelligent by saying "irrespective". But because they are not intelligent, they just mangle the two together, and the result is the President of the USA saying things like "Edumacation" and making us all, by extension, look like a pack of fucking retards.

irregardless of any other ire given

Irregardless is not a word. You may have a point, but your use of a non-word makes me wonder.

If enough people use it and accept it as valid then it's a perfectly cromulent word, just like all the other words that weren't words 100 years ago. If you want a definition then this might assist you broadening your vocabulary (even though the entry itself state's that it isn't generally accepted as a word :)

If you're interested in the mechanics of the history of the word, "wifman" used to mean "male person", which parallels "woman" much better, but is confusing next to "wife". "Were" (as in werewolf) was also a term used for a male human.

I've quite enjoyed your measured and rational writing style throughout this thread, but found I must respond to the above misunderstanding (possibly typo?).

The word woman comes from the older wif "woman, female" + man "person", as mentioned on Merriam-Webster's page, among others. This use of wif is mirrored in the modern German word Weib , likewise meaning "woman".

FWIW, another example of the use of were to mean "male person" is wergild , and it may also be useful to note that were is essentially the same word as the Latin vir , whence we get very male modern English words like virile .

(N.B.: Will Slashdot *ever* get around to supporting Unicode? This laziness is quite appalling for a purported geek site. The i in wif above should have a macron over it, but Slashdot refuses to render these, whether inserted as text: "", or as entities: "". Commander Taco et al should frankly be embarrassed that the best they can do for user input scrubbing is simply to remove anything outside of a small superset of ASCII.)

Cheers,

I think Sony's chief failure in this whole incident is that they believe their customers like to take it in the back-door as frequently and as messily as they do.

Sony's other failure is in not making any products for cleaning up the santorum which would result from thus violating their customers. Perhaps they only want santorum lovers as customers.

livre des faces and twitteur

More like trombinoscope and piailleur.

livre des faces and twitteur

More like trombinoscope and piailleur.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/interweb

How can you object to anything that starts playing just what you need when you start to http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/spank_the_monkey

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/regular

(...)
1. With constant frequency or pattern.
2. (mostly US) Normal; ordinary
(...)

why do I, a native Spanish speaker, have to teach an english speaker, his own language?

Dear Lover of 1984-Style Government (aka, a liberal):

I'm always amazed how distorted the political name-calling has gotten. White means black and black means white. From http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/liberal:

liberal
Etymology
From Old French liberal < Latin liberalis ("befitting a freeman") < liber ("free").

1. (now rare except in phrases) Pertaining to those arts and sciences whose study was considered "worthy of a free man" (as opposed to servile, mechanical); worthy, befitting a gentleman.

2. Generous, bountiful.

3. Generous in quantity, abundant.

4. (obsolete) Unrestrained, licentious.

5. Free from prejudice or narrow-mindedness; open-minded, open to new ideas, willing to depart from established opinions, conventions etc.; permissive.

6. (politics) Open to political or social changes and reforms in favour of increased freedom or democracy.

Like newcastlejon said, his Scottish Gaelic spelling was flawless. I always hate it when Google doesn't recognize my wasps.

Or he's blind and using TTS, you (possibly) insensitive clods!. Not you drb226, that was very amusing.

Could Google Speech google a googol of speach?

Scottish Gaelic. Noun speach f (genitive speacha, plural speachan)
1. wasp

Like newcastlejon said, his Scottish Gaelic spelling was flawless. I always hate it when Google doesn't recognize my wasps.

Good to see I've drawn out a know-nothing deletionist, but I repeat myself.

Oh, and before the obligatory [Citation Needed]:
http://www.snopes.com/language/notthink/deserts.asp
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/just_deserts
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/just-deserts.html

heh. "OPFER" in German means "victim". (Yes, I switched one letter.)

to be fair, linux isnt sold to soccer moms in mass

To be fair, I don't know of any OS that is being sold during Catholic religious services.

Oh! Did you mean "en masse"?

Then why is doxtar doing so well? And seksi?
I think this a classic case of Ted Haggard being completely heterosexual.

Then why is doxtar doing so well? And seksi?
I think this a classic case of Ted Haggard being completely heterosexual.

"Sample says it isn't stealth creationism - he says the intelligent agency might just as well be aliens."

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/disingenuous

That's not what's meant by 'falsify' in this context. See definition 3.

Thanks for the tip!

He meant head on a pike

How exactly is this related to Hitler? (and by the way it's spelled Führer)

Let me see if I can follow your Palin-like chain of reasoning:

Big content lobbies for the right to restrict net access (rather than adapt to the market) and politicians don't like that their dirty little secrets are now openly discussed.

Let me point you in a direction that will allow you to complete the thought process. Now, how exactly is this related to Palin? (and by the way, she doesn't appear to be as smart as you think she is)

...all the games they can't afford or don't want to pay for...

The thing is, there is no harm in that. Not to anyone. Pirating something that you would under no circumstance pay for is a Pareto improvement, as it leaves someone better off, and most importantly nobody worse off than if infringement had not happened.

It is good that USA citizens are starting to realize that the USA is no more the "dream" country where /everyone/ can make their dreams come true. That was the case maybe 10 or 20 years ago, but nowadays it is just a country with the same kind of problems as other countries. And thus, it is feasible for their citizens to compare their quality of life (noting of course that QOL is more than "cash in hand"), and why not, look for places where they feel better.

I do firmly believe that world travel is important for perspective. Exposure to other countries and cultures provides some understanding of the world that shows up in our news (I'll resist the temptation to make a comment on the quality of said news). In this regard, the US is at a disadvantage due to geography and scale. It's a big country separated by big oceans. And that tends to create an insular atmosphere. The world is far away and we have so much going on in our own (huge) back-yard. It takes effort to break out of that; I dare say more effort than our European counter-parts.

None the less, US citizens should make the effort to see the world outside our borders. I have many fond memories and good stories from the times I traveled. I found places I'd like to live, enjoyed living, and would loathe to stay in any long term (despite being offered considerable income to do so). I got to experience things in a way that one just can't get from any form of media. And in the end, I returned to the US quite happy to do so. I wonder when we see people talk about emigrating from the US in disgust if it isn't a "grass is greener" mentality at work. But I also think that it is up to the individual to discover that on their own.

As for US prosperity - The American Dream has been idolized and criticized for decades on end. Even 10 or 20 years ago, there were critics claiming the dream was dead. And that criticism and debate stretches back over 80 years ago with numerous examples in the 1920s and even some from the 1800s. To claim that the Dream is now dead ignores a long standing history of similar claims.

Part of the issue is that The American Dream is an ideal. It is a mistake to consider any ideal a guarantee. Likewise, it doesn't mean that the ideal doesn't hold true for some while it isn't realized by others. The fact is that while there are aspects in US history that offer opportunity, it doesn't mean that there are not barriers and problems that may cause some to fall short. It really depends on individual experience, history, and expectations. I think I have realized the Dream in my life. I know many others who likely would claim the same. But I do have family who may think otherwise.

It would be silly to claim knowledge whether any given stranger reading a /. post would be happy one place or another. And so again - I say go and find out for yourself. My only caution is to be as flexible as you can while doing so.

Fun, useless fact of the day:
There's an old English unit called the Pottle that is two quarts. :-)
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pottle

Some communities are able to get over signing copyright assignation forms, although it definitely creates some friction. Even the FSF has problems getting copyright assignation for GNU Emacs on occasion, and you have to be pretty paranoid if you are worried about the FSF misusing Emacs source code.

Copyright assignation might involve more than mere friction - actually, the mind boggles at the mechanisms which might be involved. Copyright assignment , on the other hand, is a fairly routine legal procedure.

Some communities are able to get over signing copyright assignation forms, although it definitely creates some friction. Even the FSF has problems getting copyright assignation for GNU Emacs on occasion, and you have to be pretty paranoid if you are worried about the FSF misusing Emacs source code.

Copyright assignation might involve more than mere friction - actually, the mind boggles at the mechanisms which might be involved. Copyright assignment , on the other hand, is a fairly routine legal procedure.

Ethe or ethea, apparently.

A right is not a natural thing. It is something granted by a society or it's representative in the form of a government. Constitutional democracies/republics/other may codify these rights in written documents in the form of laws, but really the rights are defined by the behaviour of the society/government, not the laws. The term "inalienable" (as in the American bill of rights) is often misconstrued. Is does not mean "cannot be taken away", it means "cannot be given away".

By the parent's logic, you have the right to steal, murder or act otherwise as you want, because you could do this without intervention. I don't think murder is a right...

In this sense, web access is becoming a right in some developed countries because those countries already provide the right to conduct business, the right to participate in government, and a bunch other relevant rights which are increasingly becoming dependent internet access in practical terms. Web access is not yet an explicit right (except in finland), but I fell that eventually it should become an explicit and inalienable right, at the point where it is actually totally impractical to conduct business and exercise your other democratic rights without internet access.

Yet again, I think Berners-Lee is not being silly, he's prescient.

Here's an interesting fact for you: factoid does not mean what you think it does. Though I realize that asking /. editors to pick up on something like that is a pipe dream.

What you're describing is a "plurality."

Majority: More than half (50%) of some group

Plurality: A number of votes for a single candidate or position which is greater than the number of votes gained by any other single candidate or position voted for, but which is less than a majority of valid votes cast.

What you're describing is a "plurality."

Majority: More than half (50%) of some group

Plurality: A number of votes for a single candidate or position which is greater than the number of votes gained by any other single candidate or position voted for, but which is less than a majority of valid votes cast.

virii

viruses

This comment has too few characters per line (currently 3.0).

You see, we have a lot of folks who want to wax phiosophical about why software should be free [...]

Let me remind everybody that what most of those folks mean with "free" has nothing to do with what you seem to think they mean.

You see, we have a lot of folks who want to wax phiosophical about why software should be free [...]

Let me remind everybody that what most of those folks mean with "free" has nothing to do with what you seem to think they mean.

harbinger.

RMS is seen as crying wolf, but many of his weirdest predictions have come true.

Viz. The Right to Read

And we're already there with Amazon's action's regarding remote Kindle book manipulation.

Cell phones? Remember the article on government snooping while the phone's turned off? The fact that cell phones can and do track you is blindingly true, but for some reason, people don't even want to hear it.

Yup, it isn't just government agencies. It could be douchey co-workers as well.

Do you assholes hear me? I'm NOT bringing the potato salad to the pot luck on Thursday!!