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What Did You Change Your Mind About in 2007?
chrisd writes "The Edge 2008 question (with answers) is in. This year, the question is: 'What did you change your mind about and why?'. Answers are featured from scientists as diverse as Richard Dawkins, Simon Baron-Cohen, George Church, David Brin, J. Craig Venter and the Astronomer Royal, Lord Martin Rees, among others. Very interesting to read. For instance, Stewart Brand writes that he now realizes that 'Good old stuff sucks' and Sam Harris has decided that 'Mother Nature is Not Our Friend.' What did Slashdot readers change their minds about in 2007?"
I know everyone is complaining that oil and gas is way too expensive. They are wrong. I used to think the same way. I saw a nice chart showing gasoline prices adjusted for inflation over a period of about eighty years. You know what? It really hasn't changed that much. It was still higher in 1981 than it is now. What has changed is a decrease in our earning power.
Proof that gasoline is still too cheap: I still see tons of Hummers, Expeditions, Navigators, Armadas, Sequoias and other mondo SUVs (aka Urban Assault Vehicles) on the road.
"You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
Who said anything about bringing liberty to anyone? The only thing I heard GW talk about was exporting democracy.
I'd be much happier if the US was really in the business of exporting liberty.
you... need to go outside more.. mother nature she "loves" you, specifically she loves to attempt to kill you at every chance she gets, that's why we develop technology to enforce the restraining order against her.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
can effect any type of meaningful change.
........ on and on
.... now in my 50's I see that this just a bunch of horse-shit. I'll still vote (as I have since I turned 18) .... but to invest any time, money, or emotion in the political process ----- fuck that shit.
Healthcare reform, acting on global warming, tax reform, ending a meaningless war, supporting the middle class, fighting terrorism at its roots ( in the Madrases ) and local Muslim populations (versus invading random countries like Iraq or Iran), energy independence
Since a teenager I've been at least tuned into the issues / politics - and would get wrapped up with one candidate or another
Its not the years, its the mileage
"Mother Nature", AKA the natural laws of the universe, doesn't care about us one way or the other. Mother Nature isn't even aware we exists as Mother Nature is NOT aware of anything. Attributing awareness to 'mother nature' is irrational.
Anarchists never rule
After this sort of ego bruising they are more ready to accept modern and mature practices. Play $DEITY somewhere else, not with workers. If one has to add fear (by offshoring) over their heads to drive a point, something is terribly wrong.
You're part of what makes people hate offshoring, you use it for fear, and not productivity.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
well, not willing to, more like "forced to" accept triple the workload they used to, resulting in fatigue around which an entire industry of pharmaceuticals arose to keep them up with stims rather than labor regulations to keep offshoring down so they can live healthy lives which involve rest and the possibility of actually speaking with and raising their kids.
and of course they have to accept the erosion of their middle class status to the point they will never ever retire and can't ever afford a house.. "as the rents go up, and job opportunities go down"
yes i'm sure our descent into third world status will "only" harm the "immature"
and where do you get off declaring what is and is not mature? did it ever occur to you that you may be the one who isn't mature. Usually the ones who believe themselves far enough above others to pronounce judgment are themselves the fools.
But yeah, go ahead and support the destruction of the middle class for your twisted sense of self righteousness regarding other people's maturity.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
Yeah, cos people work best with the threat of losing their jobs hanging over them.
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If we should be in support of exporting anything (except goods MADE IN USA) it should be secularism. Liberty and democracy will follow from that.
And GP: It's kind of sad that it took a lunatic like Ron Paul to finally see something so blatantly obvious, but congratulations anyway. I sincerely hope you are not supporting him though. The guy is an anarchist, creationist, and at the very least a promoter of racists.
The Farewell Tour II
1. O.K. I believe in global warming now. I heard a lot of dissenting evidence but it appears to be tainted.
2. Video Games do affect behavior in many children. Studies and family members in the field of education with years of observational experience have made me switch my opinion. I'm still not a big fan of government intervention on the subject, though.
3. Linux is ready for the desktop thanks to the EeePC. In fact, much of open source appears to be ready to eliminate the needs or even desire for a commercial alternative. Linux, OpenOffice, Firefox. I no longer feel like I'm having to settle for second rate in order to save money. I'd actually choose them even if the alternatives were free.
4. Slashdot is moderated largely by hypocritical children who will mod up popular opinion and mod down unpopular posts regardless of accuracy. I predict the slow demise of Slashdot as the comments area, a once fertile land of discussion and intelligent observation becomes a members only arena linux/mac fanboys and video gamers who can't envision anyone else's opinion being right other than theirs. It will be a place where where speaking ill of religion, republicans or windows will be given an automatic +2 informative while speaking ill social web sites, video games, or modding practices will be an auto -2 troll.
All four are great discoveries and lifestyle changes for me.
Happy New Year.
Attributing awareness to 'mother nature' is irrational.
You must be new around here (humanity), because that's just what we do. Almost everything we do not understand is assigned an identity, a personality, and it almost always wants to hurt you (or burn you in hell forever... out of love).
In any case...
Mother Nature is NOT aware of anything
how are you so sure?
It goes from God, to Jerry, to me.
Same time the Democrats did.
Not because it applied, but because it would make you agree.
Why are they killing people? For liberty! We like liberty, so it makes it okay to kill people: it's for something we like!
You can't take the sky from me...
In early 2007 I thought I might be able to vote for Ron Paul against certain Democrats if it came down to that (unlikely).
After learning more about Dr. Paul: that he hasn't felt the need to educate himself about the scientific facts about evolution and rejects it, though wasn't willing to raise his hand during the televised debate where the candidates were asked that question; that he calls abortion "Murder"; and, most critically, that he wants to remove the ability of the federal government to intervene in violations of chuch/state separation.
If the founding fathers got nothing else right with our country, they got the separation of church and state right. Integrating religion and state power is a sure path to tyranny.
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I apologize if this comes across as a troll, but WTF do any of those things have to do with Ron Paul?
Libertarians have been tossing those ideas around forever. Ron Paul brings absolutely nothing new to the table, apart from a dose of religious insanity, and a rather hypocritical view on states' rights (a Ron Paul administration would almost certainly result in vastly larger and more powerful state governments)
Although I agree that the US Federal government needs to be cut back, we can't do so by outsourcing governmental functions to private corporations, or allocating powers previously held by the fed to the individual states. Likewise, there are a few limits to how far the cuts need to be made -- healthcare and education in the US are a joke, and there is absolutely no evidence that the private sector is willing to fill that void.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
It happened so that 2007 was a year in which many things went wrong, and I was really upset with my [lack of] performance. However, on December the 31st I concluded that everything can also be interpreted as good news, because after analyzing the failed projects, I noticed that the bottleneck was in me, and not in my colleagues, friends, or the environment.
:-) 2008 will tell.
In other words, things are [relatively] simple now, because I only have to focus on myself (there is no need to "change other people" or "alter my environment", etc). Of course, this may also be nothing but lying to myself and trying to excuse the poor results of 2007
The saddest poem
This will probably be out of place here amongst the /. crowd. But I met the absolutely most beautiful woman on the planet, inside much more so than outside this year. And the whole experience changed me and my mind on the value of emotion in general. I am still dealing with the fallout from realizing I have been an emotional equivalent to a black hole up until now.
:)
It used to be hard to say stuff like that, even to myself. But not any more, personal growth is always a good thing to achieve. And no she wasn't a girlfriend or anything like that either before anyone asks.
Oh and tv. It is now almost entirely out of my life, to be replaced by real life things like skydiving and adrenaline rushes.
Second point: Ron Paul being a creationist is completely irrelevant to his ability to be a good president. Religious views have no bearing on one's ability to run the country.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
No, you have the right idea, but you missed it by a bit. Religious views still have no bearing on one's ability to run the country. What you're talking about is someone letting their religious views dictate how they run the country, which is a very bad quality, but is separate from their religious views.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
// MD_Update(&m,buf,j);
The Neo-cons have a rather odd view of the world and of the nature of power. They are the political equivalents of the economists of the 1920s; both essentially asserting that the old rules don't apply. In the 1920s everyone assumed that the Capitalist boom-bust cycle was over for good, that it was going to party days forever. The Neo-cons felt the same way about American power after the fall of the USSR, that the US was a hyperpower that could have nearly unlimited global influence. Iraq has demonstrated that the US is no different than Rome was in its day, a mighty military power, but not so mighty that it can't get overextended or get itself into military fiascos that have very direct political consequences.
The US now faces a 21st century with a rising China (something that clever folks have in fact been predicting for a couple of centuries) and Russia recovering from its wounds and taking back its position as a pre-eminent Old World power. Europe, despite a lot of roadbumps, is making a growing, vibrant political union, and I suspect in the long term it will become a Neo-Rome, controlling the Mediterranean.
The Neo-cons have weakened the United States at the very moment when it should have been mustering its resources to prepare for the new order. They thought they can short-circuit the historical trends, and by flying the American flag on distant lands and bringing democracy that they would retain uncontested pre-eminence. They seriously misread the reconstruction of Japan and thought that it could be a roadmap for the Middle East, to safeguard oil supplies and put in friendly powers.
It's time for Americans to start reading their history, to start understanding that the United States is not some blessed land, but is an empire like any, and that it is just as vulnerable as any in history.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Which part is removed from reality? His talking about free markets? Minimal government? Austrian economics??? He has written a dozen books, many about foreign policy and economic history, and he was good friends with Milton Friedman, so I don't understand how you can call him a historical ignoramus.
Your brain is not a computer.
So if they spend less on socialized healthcare than we do, yet they're doing better, then obviously the amount we're spending is not the problem, and perhaps if we spent less and changed some things at the same time, maybe our situation would get better.
The United States of America: We do what we must because we can.
Really? To me it says something very relevant about his ability to reason from facts.
Religious views have no bearing on one's ability to run the country.
But creationism isn't just a religious belief, it's also a (fallacious) scientific position. How can a president deal rationally with issues such as biotechnology or global warming when he can't bring himself to accept evolution? It's like hiring an accountant who doesn't believe in negative numbers, and expecting him to do your taxes correctly. Not going to happen.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
I'm still confused as to why him being a Muslim would be such a bad thing if it were true?...
I realized that a large group of people like getting up on Sunday mornings to sing songs and look at each other's fancy clothes. I realized that religion is more of a social thing then a belief.
I realized that people fear things like the earth being round, or the earth orbiting the sun, or evolution, because they're afraid that such knowledge will destroy their ability to get up on Sunday mornings and sing songs.
I realized that far too many people let emotion get in the way of logic.
No, I will not work for your startup
Funny... I imagine that's what your cells are telling each other about you right now.
(Of course, cell language is pretty limited - that's probably the only words they know.)
Thats what I imagine what Mother Nature is saying about us.
"THAT'S what you consider as an example of intelligence?!?!?"
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
"I realized that far too many people let emotion get in the way of logic."
Your emotional urge to follow logic no matter where it goes is something you should examine more closely.
-- A fellow atheist.
Um - no he's not. But even if he was - so what?
I love Dawkins' point about the difference in how we view politicians vs scientists who change their minds. I never did understand why some people criticize politicians for changing direction- that should be a virtue.