I continued this up until Ubuntu released Unity as the default desktop.
I think this is the main point.
No, contrary to OP, this is not "just the usual Open Source kvetching." Successful Open Source operations listen to their users. Now it's going its own way even further with Mir.
Users were happy with Gnome (or KDE). They did not want Unity, and said so.
By now Ubuntu is too proprietary to be considered "open" anymore. It's not just a Linux distro, but rather it has become its own operating system. That is somewhat contrary to the spirit of Linux. What's next? Its own (proprietary, incompatible) versions of the command-line tools?
"And since the students were picked at random and had the tests administered after the fact, you can't argue correlation-but-not-causation."
Yes, you can. As someone else mentioned up above, there is probably a significant (large?) amount of self-selection going on here.
Do parents with lower IQs or education value a visit to a museum enough to allow their kids to go? Do poorer parents have the money to make a sack lunch, drop the kids off at school, or whatever other preparations for the visit are necessary? Etc.
I'm not saying there *IS* bias, but there is enough potential for self-selection here that we should most definitely not assume that correlation = causation in this case. We would need LOTS more information -- likely more than the experimenters have -- to come to that conclusion.
THIS much difference from ONE field trip to a museum? Why, by all that is correlated, we MUST start opening up museums like 7-11s! There should be one on every streetcorner!
I second this list. Tom's Hardware and Anandtech are probably as unbiased as you are going to find. I don't know smallnetbuilder so I won't comment on that one.
"As long as you don't keep spreading Darwinist propaganda about "130+ years of strong evidence" (which it clearly isn't) then everything sounds fair."
No, I stick by that statement unless and until proven otherwise. So far I haven't seen any real contrary evidence. Maybe one of these days I'll get around to looking at those people you mentioned but right now I am busy.
Until then, like I said: I'm not flat out saying your people are wrong. But unless and until I see their evidence, I'll stick with the evidence I know.
"I dunno. It might not be a bad idea to take legal papers drafted in purple crayon less seriously that those typed out in the proper format."
Generally speaking, I agree. But these things should be taken on a case-by-case basis. Maybe the authorities have somebody falsely locked up in solitary as "dangerous" and won't let him have sharp pencils. That doesn't mean he should not have recourse to the same legal remedies as everybody else.
"Every disclosure that he has made on this subject has inflicted serious blow-back to US foreign policy, and I don't recall him being one of the choices on 6 Nov 2012, when I had my say regarding the selection of the person that was to set American foreign policy for the next four years. "
This is a disingenuous argument if I ever saw one. These were the policies of George H.W. Bush, and they have been made even more the policies of Barack Obama. You have absolutely no evidence that Romney would have changed these policies.
I might buy this argument if you'd voted for a Libertarian candidate, but Paul was taken off the table, and though it's possible, it's not likely you voted for Johnson.
"There's a time and place for everything. Laughing with a close coworker about something you both understand is not meant seriously is a world apart from shouting it from your Facebook timeline. The former is clearly OK, but the latter is an obvious lapse of, well, judgement."
"It's great to see that you aren't dismissing Intelligent Design, and agree with all the real scientists you found out about in my original comment when they showed scientifically that Darwinism isn't supported by "strong evidence" as you repeated... even after finding out about them."
Correct. I still did not dismiss them. I clearly stated earlier that they may even be correct. I don't know that they are, but since I don't know their arguments, I don't know that they're not, either.
What about that seems unfair to you?
"Be careful not to let their fancy propaganda deceive you into thinking that Darwinism is the only way to explain their so-called "experiments." Intelligent Design is a purely scientific way of explaining all the cracks in Darwinism that their high priests never mention, like where all the information in our DNA comes from, or how the eye evolved."
Okay.
"In the same way, the Scopes monkey trial happened before all the new Intelligent Design research, so it's irrelevant to the current debate."
Well, that may be the case. I thought you were saying that the whole "Darwinist lie" started in the 70s. If you meant something else, then my argument does not apply.
Please note that I am not "agreeing" with you about Darwin. What I am saying is that since I don't know the arguments made by the people you mentioned, it would be (understatement) presumptuous of me to assume that they are prima facie incorrect. Despite many cries here on Slashdot to the contrary, that's the way science works. "I disagree" and "that violates my beliefs" are no substitutes for evidence.
"Fed up with these companies that keep trying to extort cheap overseas labor, instead of investing in their own country."
I've said it before (wait for it; it makes sense): the mistake many German people made which allowed Hitler to come to power, was to think treason meant "disloyalty to government", when what it actually means is "betraying your people or country". A government can commit treason.
If you take treason in its more reasonable and only ethical sense, i.e. to betray your people or country, then companies who push for more offshoring, or more H1B1 visas, are committing treason.
"After all, everyone knows there are only two kinds of people who love small children: female elementary school teachers and male pedophiles."
I certainly hope you were being sarcastic. Because if we wanted to take your comment literally, then all fathers would be pedophiles.
On the other hand, it has certainly seemed as though society has been willing to look askance at any male who pays any attention to children. This is a problem in our society that I noticed over 20 years ago.
Hint, folks: treating an entire gender as though they are likely perverts is far worse than discrimination in employment. In fact, I would call that a perversion in itself.
"We need to have a legal framework for EULAs that boils them down to a few simple bullet points so that ordinary people can reasonably be expected to read and understand them. Things like:"
The thing about EULAs is that companies can change them... in fact some of them want you to believe that they have the (legal) right to change them at any time, regardless of what it said when you bought said product. (IANAL but but in general: no.)
The whole concept of a EULA is to protect the company, not you. If they wanted you to be protected, they'd just sell it to you rather than "license" it.
"But it's also the kind of thing I might say as a joke to a friend afterward without attaching any real meaning to it at all."
I'd go further than "unprofessional". If you're making jokes about your hiring practices -- particularly after you just did not hire somebody -- you're setting yourself up for a lawsuit.
This topic is a good example. How do we know he was joking? Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. But somebody could claim he wasn't joking, and maybe even convince a judge or jury.
A judge like that would tempt me to draw up my own legal papers in comic sans.
Our legal system is supposed to be about the substance, not the form. If they start making a big deal about the form, you know something has gone wrong.
"You obviously have dismissed all that science without refuting any of it or even reading it (as you admit). If you had read it, you'd learn that all the "evidence" you've been told about was actually a pack of lies."
No. "Dismissing" means I had been presented with (or at least knew about) their views, and then "dismissed" them.
Repeat: I did not do that. I did not even find out about them until after I made my comment. Therefore, I could not have "dismissed" them.
"If you had read it, you'd learn that all the "evidence" you've been told about was actually a pack of lies."
No, because I have seen a lot of it with my own eyes.
"How is this different from the lies the CAGW alarmists tell?"
It is "different" because you claimed all the "lies" started in the 1970s. But I have proof that this information was in the encyclopedias in the 1960s. Therefore, the "lies" as you call them could not have "started" in the 70s, as you originally claimed.
"It's not clear that the hearing officer was ranting about a formal legal document. He called it a "letter", so it could just be some letter that the defendant was required to write without any specific formatting requirements."
More than that: the wording was that he "can't trust anyone who..." This would seem to indicate that it's a personal bias, and not some kind of technical requirement.
"You dismissed all these PROFESSIONAL scientists' science by repeating the Darwinist lie about "130+ years of very strong evidence for evolution".
You obviously don't understand how science works. Repeat: I didn't "dismiss" anybody. Your sources may have very strong evidence of their own. Great. They may even be correct. (I personally doubt it but I suppose it's possible.) BUT... the part you're not getting here is that even if they have good evidence, and even if they were correct, that doesn't change the fact that there are still 130+ years of strong evidence for the other side of the argument. There is. That's a fact.
"That's the same lie the CAGW alarmists tell! They make up absurd lies about climate scientists supposedly existing before the ice age crisis in the 1970s. If YOU want to have any credibility at all, learn some real science from the Discovery Institute and stop repeating this nonsense about Scopes if you want to have any credibility at all."
It's not a lie, it's a fact. I have proof that "the Darwinist lie", as you call it, regardless of whether it really is a lie, started well before the 1970s: my family has a set of encyclopedias from the 1960s and there is a rather large article about the Scopes trial, which is listed as happening in the 1920s.
Therefore, whether it is a lie or not, the story started well before the 1970s. Q.E.D.
"Jane, the first error is in the first paragraph... There many different models and different types of models, this claim is broad and easily falsified."
If you are rebutting only the initial abstract paragraph and don't pay any attention to what the article actually says. You have made no arguments against the scientific points made in his article. Including your quote, which has absolutely nothing to do with the actual points he made or his arguments about the science.
"Here are some links to the myths most commonly spread by..."
Great straw-man. I made no mention here of any of those people, or their claims. You can shoot them down all you like; it has absolutely no relevance to this article by this author.
"but frankly you don't pay me enough to work as your research assistant to detail the rest of the errors:... make it nigh impossible for your opponent to rebut all the errors in your statements without sounding tedious and pedantic and losing the interest of the crowd."
Really? Another straw-man, as I have done nothing of the sort. I cited one article, about one thing. These comments of yours are simply self-serving excuses for why you are not able to rebut the man's real arguments.
In summary, you did exactly what so-called "deniers" have so often been accused of doing: attacks against the sources (in this case sources that were not even mine), failure to rebut the science, and lots of hand-waving.
"So you didn't even verify the claims of these PROFESSIONAL scientists before repeating your Darwinist mantra again? You're just as dogmatic as the CAGW alarmists."
You keep missing the point. You attack me for "dismissing" these people, when I have not done so. Contrast my position with the other person who was responding to me earlier: I presented some scientific evidence of my point. He responded by attacking the people whose work I cited.
*I*, on the other hand, have attacked none of the people you mentioned. I don't even know who some of them are. That's hardly "dismissing" them, and I sure as hell did not attack them as that other person did. So why are you picking on me?
"I did. The Discovery Institute has many articles about the Darwinist fraud, if you're actually interested in science rather than dogma."
Well, if you know about the Scopes trial, then you know that the "Darwinist fraud", as you call it, started a hell of a lot earlier than the 1970s as you claimed. Note that I am not arguing about whether it is actually a fraud or not... that's a different subject and one I don't want to get into.
"You dismissed all the Intelligent Design scientists I just listed, whose science shows that evolution is NOT backed up by more than 100 years of evidence. You have to refute their science, or you are just full of hot air."
I did nothing of the sort. I discussed the science of evolution. I did not "dismiss" anybody. That is a figment of your imagination.
YOU are discussing something completely different. You are discussing what you claim to be counter-evidence (and it may be; I didn't bother to verify it). That's all well and good. But it's not the same thing.
The point is that no matter whether these people have valid science behind them, what I stated was still true: we do have 130+ years of very strong evidence for evolution.
"No, the Darwinism and CAGW frauds both started during the 1970s ice age crisis. Any "science" before then is irrelevant."
While the latter may be true, the former is demonstrably false. Look up "Scopes Trial".
"That's why it's disappointing that you dismissed Intelligent Design scientists as fringe shill sources without pointing out any flaws yourself."
Except that I DIDN'T. Your whole rant is over something I did not even do.
I did say that evolution is rather solidly backed up by more than 100 years of evidence. But that's a far cry from "dismissing" anybody. You are "putting words in my mouth" that I did not say.
And you completely missed the whole point of my original comment: that the science of evolution and the body of evidence behind it are solid and well over a century old. In comparison, the science of AGW is relatively new, and rather weak. They aren't comparable. If you conflate them, you err.
It's too bad that you wasted all this time, but that's all you did: waste your time. And mine. And that of anybody else who may have read your "argument". If indeed you were trying to argue with me, at all.
Slashdot Mirror
I continued this up until Ubuntu released Unity as the default desktop.
I think this is the main point.
No, contrary to OP, this is not "just the usual Open Source kvetching." Successful Open Source operations listen to their users. Now it's going its own way even further with Mir.
Users were happy with Gnome (or KDE). They did not want Unity, and said so.
By now Ubuntu is too proprietary to be considered "open" anymore. It's not just a Linux distro, but rather it has become its own operating system. That is somewhat contrary to the spirit of Linux. What's next? Its own (proprietary, incompatible) versions of the command-line tools?
"And since the students were picked at random and had the tests administered after the fact, you can't argue correlation-but-not-causation."
Yes, you can. As someone else mentioned up above, there is probably a significant (large?) amount of self-selection going on here.
Do parents with lower IQs or education value a visit to a museum enough to allow their kids to go? Do poorer parents have the money to make a sack lunch, drop the kids off at school, or whatever other preparations for the visit are necessary? Etc.
I'm not saying there *IS* bias, but there is enough potential for self-selection here that we should most definitely not assume that correlation = causation in this case. We would need LOTS more information -- likely more than the experimenters have -- to come to that conclusion.
Good to know.
I should add, all sarcasm aside: I really do love museums and I really do think they're valuable and educational.
But these claimed results are a little hard to swallow.
THIS much difference from ONE field trip to a museum? Why, by all that is correlated, we MUST start opening up museums like 7-11s! There should be one on every streetcorner!
I second this list. Tom's Hardware and Anandtech are probably as unbiased as you are going to find. I don't know smallnetbuilder so I won't comment on that one.
"As long as you don't keep spreading Darwinist propaganda about "130+ years of strong evidence" (which it clearly isn't) then everything sounds fair."
No, I stick by that statement unless and until proven otherwise. So far I haven't seen any real contrary evidence. Maybe one of these days I'll get around to looking at those people you mentioned but right now I am busy.
Until then, like I said: I'm not flat out saying your people are wrong. But unless and until I see their evidence, I'll stick with the evidence I know.
"So really you want H-1B folks to end up like the Jews under Hitler, is that what you are saying?"
Um... NO. That is very definitely not what I was saying.
"I dunno. It might not be a bad idea to take legal papers drafted in purple crayon less seriously that those typed out in the proper format."
Generally speaking, I agree. But these things should be taken on a case-by-case basis. Maybe the authorities have somebody falsely locked up in solitary as "dangerous" and won't let him have sharp pencils. That doesn't mean he should not have recourse to the same legal remedies as everybody else.
Not a likely scenario, I admit. But possible.
"Every disclosure that he has made on this subject has inflicted serious blow-back to US foreign policy, and I don't recall him being one of the choices on 6 Nov 2012, when I had my say regarding the selection of the person that was to set American foreign policy for the next four years. "
This is a disingenuous argument if I ever saw one. These were the policies of George H.W. Bush, and they have been made even more the policies of Barack Obama. You have absolutely no evidence that Romney would have changed these policies.
I might buy this argument if you'd voted for a Libertarian candidate, but Paul was taken off the table, and though it's possible, it's not likely you voted for Johnson.
"There's a time and place for everything. Laughing with a close coworker about something you both understand is not meant seriously is a world apart from shouting it from your Facebook timeline. The former is clearly OK, but the latter is an obvious lapse of, well, judgement."
Haha. Clearly.
"It's great to see that you aren't dismissing Intelligent Design, and agree with all the real scientists you found out about in my original comment when they showed scientifically that Darwinism isn't supported by "strong evidence" as you repeated... even after finding out about them."
Correct. I still did not dismiss them. I clearly stated earlier that they may even be correct. I don't know that they are, but since I don't know their arguments, I don't know that they're not, either.
What about that seems unfair to you?
"Be careful not to let their fancy propaganda deceive you into thinking that Darwinism is the only way to explain their so-called "experiments." Intelligent Design is a purely scientific way of explaining all the cracks in Darwinism that their high priests never mention, like where all the information in our DNA comes from, or how the eye evolved."
Okay.
"In the same way, the Scopes monkey trial happened before all the new Intelligent Design research, so it's irrelevant to the current debate."
Well, that may be the case. I thought you were saying that the whole "Darwinist lie" started in the 70s. If you meant something else, then my argument does not apply.
Please note that I am not "agreeing" with you about Darwin. What I am saying is that since I don't know the arguments made by the people you mentioned, it would be (understatement) presumptuous of me to assume that they are prima facie incorrect. Despite many cries here on Slashdot to the contrary, that's the way science works. "I disagree" and "that violates my beliefs" are no substitutes for evidence.
"Fed up with these companies that keep trying to extort cheap overseas labor, instead of investing in their own country."
I've said it before (wait for it; it makes sense): the mistake many German people made which allowed Hitler to come to power, was to think treason meant "disloyalty to government", when what it actually means is "betraying your people or country". A government can commit treason.
If you take treason in its more reasonable and only ethical sense, i.e. to betray your people or country, then companies who push for more offshoring, or more H1B1 visas, are committing treason.
"After all, everyone knows there are only two kinds of people who love small children: female elementary school teachers and male pedophiles."
I certainly hope you were being sarcastic. Because if we wanted to take your comment literally, then all fathers would be pedophiles.
On the other hand, it has certainly seemed as though society has been willing to look askance at any male who pays any attention to children. This is a problem in our society that I noticed over 20 years ago.
Hint, folks: treating an entire gender as though they are likely perverts is far worse than discrimination in employment. In fact, I would call that a perversion in itself.
"We need to have a legal framework for EULAs that boils them down to a few simple bullet points so that ordinary people can reasonably be expected to read and understand them. Things like:"
The thing about EULAs is that companies can change them... in fact some of them want you to believe that they have the (legal) right to change them at any time, regardless of what it said when you bought said product. (IANAL but but in general: no.)
The whole concept of a EULA is to protect the company, not you. If they wanted you to be protected, they'd just sell it to you rather than "license" it.
"But it's also the kind of thing I might say as a joke to a friend afterward without attaching any real meaning to it at all."
I'd go further than "unprofessional". If you're making jokes about your hiring practices -- particularly after you just did not hire somebody -- you're setting yourself up for a lawsuit.
This topic is a good example. How do we know he was joking? Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. But somebody could claim he wasn't joking, and maybe even convince a judge or jury.
A judge like that would tempt me to draw up my own legal papers in comic sans.
Our legal system is supposed to be about the substance, not the form. If they start making a big deal about the form, you know something has gone wrong.
"You obviously have dismissed all that science without refuting any of it or even reading it (as you admit). If you had read it, you'd learn that all the "evidence" you've been told about was actually a pack of lies."
No. "Dismissing" means I had been presented with (or at least knew about) their views, and then "dismissed" them.
Repeat: I did not do that. I did not even find out about them until after I made my comment. Therefore, I could not have "dismissed" them.
"If you had read it, you'd learn that all the "evidence" you've been told about was actually a pack of lies."
No, because I have seen a lot of it with my own eyes.
"How is this different from the lies the CAGW alarmists tell?"
It is "different" because you claimed all the "lies" started in the 1970s. But I have proof that this information was in the encyclopedias in the 1960s. Therefore, the "lies" as you call them could not have "started" in the 70s, as you originally claimed.
"It's not clear that the hearing officer was ranting about a formal legal document. He called it a "letter", so it could just be some letter that the defendant was required to write without any specific formatting requirements."
More than that: the wording was that he "can't trust anyone who..." This would seem to indicate that it's a personal bias, and not some kind of technical requirement.
"You dismissed all these PROFESSIONAL scientists' science by repeating the Darwinist lie about "130+ years of very strong evidence for evolution".
You obviously don't understand how science works. Repeat: I didn't "dismiss" anybody. Your sources may have very strong evidence of their own. Great. They may even be correct. (I personally doubt it but I suppose it's possible.) BUT... the part you're not getting here is that even if they have good evidence, and even if they were correct, that doesn't change the fact that there are still 130+ years of strong evidence for the other side of the argument. There is. That's a fact.
"That's the same lie the CAGW alarmists tell! They make up absurd lies about climate scientists supposedly existing before the ice age crisis in the 1970s. If YOU want to have any credibility at all, learn some real science from the Discovery Institute and stop repeating this nonsense about Scopes if you want to have any credibility at all."
It's not a lie, it's a fact. I have proof that "the Darwinist lie", as you call it, regardless of whether it really is a lie, started well before the 1970s: my family has a set of encyclopedias from the 1960s and there is a rather large article about the Scopes trial, which is listed as happening in the 1920s.
Therefore, whether it is a lie or not, the story started well before the 1970s. Q.E.D.
"Jane, the first error is in the first paragraph... There many different models and different types of models, this claim is broad and easily falsified."
If you are rebutting only the initial abstract paragraph and don't pay any attention to what the article actually says. You have made no arguments against the scientific points made in his article. Including your quote, which has absolutely nothing to do with the actual points he made or his arguments about the science.
"Here are some links to the myths most commonly spread by..."
Great straw-man. I made no mention here of any of those people, or their claims. You can shoot them down all you like; it has absolutely no relevance to this article by this author.
"but frankly you don't pay me enough to work as your research assistant to detail the rest of the errors: ... make it nigh impossible for your opponent to rebut all the errors in your statements without sounding tedious and pedantic and losing the interest of the crowd."
Really? Another straw-man, as I have done nothing of the sort. I cited one article, about one thing. These comments of yours are simply self-serving excuses for why you are not able to rebut the man's real arguments.
In summary, you did exactly what so-called "deniers" have so often been accused of doing: attacks against the sources (in this case sources that were not even mine), failure to rebut the science, and lots of hand-waving.
"So you didn't even verify the claims of these PROFESSIONAL scientists before repeating your Darwinist mantra again? You're just as dogmatic as the CAGW alarmists."
You keep missing the point. You attack me for "dismissing" these people, when I have not done so. Contrast my position with the other person who was responding to me earlier: I presented some scientific evidence of my point. He responded by attacking the people whose work I cited.
*I*, on the other hand, have attacked none of the people you mentioned. I don't even know who some of them are. That's hardly "dismissing" them, and I sure as hell did not attack them as that other person did. So why are you picking on me?
"I did. The Discovery Institute has many articles about the Darwinist fraud, if you're actually interested in science rather than dogma."
Well, if you know about the Scopes trial, then you know that the "Darwinist fraud", as you call it, started a hell of a lot earlier than the 1970s as you claimed. Note that I am not arguing about whether it is actually a fraud or not... that's a different subject and one I don't want to get into.
"You dismissed all the Intelligent Design scientists I just listed, whose science shows that evolution is NOT backed up by more than 100 years of evidence. You have to refute their science, or you are just full of hot air."
I did nothing of the sort. I discussed the science of evolution. I did not "dismiss" anybody. That is a figment of your imagination.
YOU are discussing something completely different. You are discussing what you claim to be counter-evidence (and it may be; I didn't bother to verify it). That's all well and good. But it's not the same thing.
The point is that no matter whether these people have valid science behind them, what I stated was still true: we do have 130+ years of very strong evidence for evolution.
"No, the Darwinism and CAGW frauds both started during the 1970s ice age crisis. Any "science" before then is irrelevant."
While the latter may be true, the former is demonstrably false. Look up "Scopes Trial".
"That's why it's disappointing that you dismissed Intelligent Design scientists as fringe shill sources without pointing out any flaws yourself."
Except that I DIDN'T. Your whole rant is over something I did not even do.
I did say that evolution is rather solidly backed up by more than 100 years of evidence. But that's a far cry from "dismissing" anybody. You are "putting words in my mouth" that I did not say.
And you completely missed the whole point of my original comment: that the science of evolution and the body of evidence behind it are solid and well over a century old. In comparison, the science of AGW is relatively new, and rather weak. They aren't comparable. If you conflate them, you err.
It's too bad that you wasted all this time, but that's all you did: waste your time. And mine. And that of anybody else who may have read your "argument". If indeed you were trying to argue with me, at all.
"If you can't spot at least half a dozen sophomoric flaws in the article you posted yourself, then you're beyond hope for rational discourse."
If YOU want to have any credibility at all, point them out yourself. That's what you're supposed to do in science.