Understanding English in principle and understanding fast-paced dialogue in English are two different things entirely. My parents understand English (though they are somewhat reluctant to speak English), but they still rely on subtitles for English-language TV-programs. Also, kids don't achieve a level of English understanding that would be sufficient to watch many popular movies until maybe their mid-to-late teens, until then reading is their only hope of understanding popular movies.
That's not to say that this is the sole contributing factor, but I would agree with the GP that it does play a part. A larger factor is probably the traditional egalitarianism of our countries with little segregation, meaning kids performing bad and kids performing well are not segregated to the same extent as many other countries and can learn from each other, though this is going away more and more at least in Sweden as society is becoming more segregated, and this also coincides with a drop in our standing in international rankings.
While I agree with your post, I think you should take another look the grandparent, it seems quite sarcastic.
We have our own ideologically blinded proponents espousing the supposed advantages of private vs public education in my country, with the difference that private schools are funded using the same means as public schools, they all get a set amount of money per student. It is now quite common to go to "free schools", these schools are allowed to profit from public funds and have both a large incentive to fudge the grades in order to make themselves look more attractive and an incentive to cut down on staff. They can get away with cutting staff because the free schools tend to attract the better students and can refuse students that require more attention, such as children with special needs. While Sweden still scores quite high on this test, we have slipped quite a bit, largely because differences between students have increased. Those doing poorly are now doing worse, stuck in schools where few of the students are doing well. This of course coincides with segregation in general being on the rise in this once-egalitarian country, but the free schools are certainly a major factor.
He's more worried about being extradited to the US, and while politicians here say that won't happen and I sort of think that would deal a PR blow both to Sweden and the US, I don't blame him for thinking so considering how much Sweden currently kowtows to every whim of the US. Obama was here only last month after what was practically fawning love-letter from our prime minister to his idol, it was branded by our foreign minister (known for acting as a spy for the US embassy during right-wing government negotiations after the 1976 elections and for his subsequent close ties to the US) as a "feel-good" meeting. This is no longer the same country where the prime minister (Olof Palme, later assassinated) once condemned the firebombings of Vietnam resulting in US withdrawal of their ambassador.
Swedish prison let most of the prisoners out for weekend
Err, no, never heard of that. A prisoner can apply for "permission" after serving something like a third of his/her time in prison, and then they can leave prison for up to three days at a time (decided by prison administration, or, as in a recently publicized case, by a central agency on appeal), but I don't think any prisoner gets permission every weekend...
If it knows your position at some point it should still be able to extrapolate your position at a later point, think accelerometer, compass, or even cameras/lasers to build a 3D model of the environment around you and compare it to the map.
Do you seriously believe there is a tangible difference between the Democrats and the Republicans in matters of any consequence? No matter which party is in power, in any country really, capitalists are the ones really in charge by simple virtue of their power to control so much of the economy and their unparalleled resources to drive legislation and influence the media which they own.
Interesting system, I assume the speaker of the house the only one who can introduce legislation? I always assumed that any parliamentary member could introduce legislation, in the Swedish parliament, there are two different ways of introducing legislation, the first being a "proposition", introduced by the government, and the second being a "motion" which can be introduced by any MP or any group of MPs.
What Americans call "corporatism", the rest of us call "capitalism". A capitalist system does not become "socialist" simply because the capitalist-controlled government makes a few concessions in terms of social welfare to avoid an all-out revolution, and a capitalist-controlled government giving profitable "contracts" to private corporations or using taxpayer money to bail out failing private corporations (i.e. enriching a few capitalists using resources collected for common use) is about as far from the definition of "socialism" as you can get.
This all stems out of confusion as to the meaning of the terms "capitalism" and "socialism" which seems quite common everywhere, but especially so in the US. "Capitalism" essentially means that means of production is in the hands of the few, the "capitalists". A hallmark of capitalism is that a minority gains more and more money from interest, rather than work. Socialism, on the other hand, means the means of production is owned by the workers themselves, whether via cooperatives, via a (truly) worker-controlled state, some other means or (more likely) from a combination of these.
A capitalist economy can never truly become a democracy simply stemming from the discrepancy in power between the workers and the capitalists. Capitalists have so much more power than workers by simple virtue of their wealth, that even if completely free and fair elections were guaranteed, the media was in no way influenced by the interests of their owners, and corruption was unheard of (i.e. an ideal fantasy world), capitalists, by virtue of their single-handed control of the means of production can still exert undue influence over society and thus put any democracy out of action by for instance threatening to withhold production of some essential good if their interests are not satisfied.
No, even the US has a real left wing, they're just not represented by any of the two mainstream parties. They are however quite well organized, there are several very good American leftist publications ( http://jacobinmag.com/ being my favorite) and even a daily radio/TV news show that by American standards is certainly quite left-wing (and very good, http://www.democracynow.org/ )
I don't know if or when any of them were denied permission to come to the UN, but what exactly makes you think the US should have the right to deny any of them full access to the United Nations, an international organization of which their nations are members? Maybe we would be better off moving UN headquarters to Switzerland given the obvious attitudes the US has towards their "enemies" gaining equal access to it, or somewhere in no-mans land like a platform in international waters. I'm also somewhat bewildered as to your choice to include Castro with the other two, they are hardly comparable, despite what you have been told by mainstream US media where anyone who dares challenge US hegemony is painted to be disciples of the great Satan himself.
No, it's because Israel *claims* to be a first-world democracy, and as such it is held to higher standards by the world than some random tinpot dictator, unless you want to be the moral equivalent of these. In this context, it is unacceptable for a self-proclaimed civilized country to enforce what is essentially the equivalent of apartheid or worse in the Palestinian territories. It's in no way acceptable in South Africa and it's in no way acceptable in Israel or the occupied territories of Palestine, it has nothing to do with your little religion, of which I could care less (and that goes for all religions)
I think the point is that if the data-centers are on Brazilian soil, those responsible can be prosecuted for espionage, whereas if the data is stored in the US, the Brazilian government basically can't do anything, it's out of their jurisdiction.
I agree that Sweden is certainly no safe harbor in terms of data storage. In fact, we both have our own spy agency (FRA) that is legally (since 2008) allowed to tap into "international" cables (and with it, the datamine the data of most Swedes as well), and our government put in their veto against EU condemnation of NSA spying on EU governments and citizens. Despite our supposed "neutrality", our government has had a close relationship with the US for a long time, but in no time previously has the government so obviously kowtowed to US interests. Back in the day, at least the prime minister (Olof Palme) harshly criticized the actions of the US government when appropriate (e.g. the US bombings of Hanoi, resulting in the US withdrawing their ambassador). Sadly, since his assassination, the ties to the US have grown ever closer, to the degree that Obama actually came here earlier this month for what the foreign minister called a "feelgood meeting" after a love letter from our prime minister practically begged him to, this after the revelations of NSA spying...
The same can be said of self-parking cars, though, where as far as I know, the driver is still responsible. It's just another convenience. If you want to slack off and read a book while driving, sure, but IF you crash, then you're responsible for letting it happen. In the red light case, any driver should be able to detect that the car is not braking and override the autopilot. If you want to read a book then take the train/bus, at least for the foreseeable future.
I'm just saying that this is likely what will be required to begin with, until these systems have a proven track record, at which point the manufacturer could potentially license their system for completely autonomous driving, and the manufacturer at that point would have to be somehow responsible if the system causes an accident. (Which should be relatively easy to prove, any self-driving car would likely have to keep logs of their actions)
My guess is that, at least initially, a driver will be required to be in the drivers seat at all times ready to override any actions taken by the car. In that case, the driver would likely be at fault for not correcting any action taken by the car that leads to an accident, just as in some vehicles out on the roads now, a driver is responsible for making sure he/she doesn't crash into other cars even when there is a system that can detect obstacles and take action or if the car can park automatically.
Of course, if the bought all of Nokia, they'd be in the tire business, and while I guess diversifying could be a good thing, running a tire manufacturer may not be Microsoft's forte.
Actually, it's quite simple to verify that the apps are running in the background on the N9: open multiple apps with obvious visual changes (a clock for instance), swipe to the multitasking view and look at the live thumbnails of the running apps. That's not to say that an app cannot be pause when you swipe away of course, in many cases this is useful, for instance video players tend to pause when you switch to another app.
What is the advantage of this over DLNA/UPnP? I get the streaming of Netflix, etc, but why wouldn't this be possible using DLNA? Why not use standards that are already established and work on most televisions bought in the past couple of years?
That would be why the rail is usually grade separated at that speed, i.e. roads run under or over the tracks. Hell, even mainlines here in Sweden are mostly grade-separated, and where they are not there are systems in place to detect obstacles and stop the train before the train driver can physically see the obstruction. And we only have trains running 200 kph, you can be pretty sure that railways that allow trains to run at over 300 kph are entirely grade separated.
I guess it's all a matter of how much in terms of for instance working rights already exist within a nation. My concern with the EU is rather that it erodes our working rights, civil liberties and environmental regulations. For instance the Laval judgement prohibiting unions from interfering with the ongoing exploitation of EU citizens working in our country and the subsequent social dumping: in my view everyone who works in Sweden should have the same rights to a decent wage, vacation, union representation, etc, but this is not the opinion of the EU, they want to create a subclass of people who don't have the same rights as everyone else simply because they are not citizens of this country. It's the neoliberals who are in control of the EU, they have no interest in helping you maintain your workers rights.
What nation would search a diplomatic aircraft, with a friendly foreign president to boot, simply in order to grant asylum to a dissident who may or may not be on that plane, on his way to a nation where would have been granted asylum already? Seems disingenuous to say the least..
Tech workers are unionized in probably most of Europe, that doesn't mean the jobs are outsourced. Even my job is unionized, and I'm a doctoral student, employed with a decent wage (increasing with the proportion of my degree completed from the equivalent of $46000 to $55000, renegotiated by the union every year or two) and six weeks vacation (minimum by law being 5 weeks) collectively bargained for by the union for university teachers which is part of a central organization for university educated workers.
Then, by your own logic, the most notorious slave owners are capitalists, who do in fact live off the labor of the working, middle, and even the non-capitalists (i.e. those who are wealthy but not so wealthy so as to be able to live off capital returns) in the upper class.
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Understanding English in principle and understanding fast-paced dialogue in English are two different things entirely. My parents understand English (though they are somewhat reluctant to speak English), but they still rely on subtitles for English-language TV-programs. Also, kids don't achieve a level of English understanding that would be sufficient to watch many popular movies until maybe their mid-to-late teens, until then reading is their only hope of understanding popular movies.
That's not to say that this is the sole contributing factor, but I would agree with the GP that it does play a part. A larger factor is probably the traditional egalitarianism of our countries with little segregation, meaning kids performing bad and kids performing well are not segregated to the same extent as many other countries and can learn from each other, though this is going away more and more at least in Sweden as society is becoming more segregated, and this also coincides with a drop in our standing in international rankings.
While I agree with your post, I think you should take another look the grandparent, it seems quite sarcastic.
We have our own ideologically blinded proponents espousing the supposed advantages of private vs public education in my country, with the difference that private schools are funded using the same means as public schools, they all get a set amount of money per student. It is now quite common to go to "free schools", these schools are allowed to profit from public funds and have both a large incentive to fudge the grades in order to make themselves look more attractive and an incentive to cut down on staff. They can get away with cutting staff because the free schools tend to attract the better students and can refuse students that require more attention, such as children with special needs. While Sweden still scores quite high on this test, we have slipped quite a bit, largely because differences between students have increased. Those doing poorly are now doing worse, stuck in schools where few of the students are doing well. This of course coincides with segregation in general being on the rise in this once-egalitarian country, but the free schools are certainly a major factor.
He's more worried about being extradited to the US, and while politicians here say that won't happen and I sort of think that would deal a PR blow both to Sweden and the US, I don't blame him for thinking so considering how much Sweden currently kowtows to every whim of the US. Obama was here only last month after what was practically fawning love-letter from our prime minister to his idol, it was branded by our foreign minister (known for acting as a spy for the US embassy during right-wing government negotiations after the 1976 elections and for his subsequent close ties to the US) as a "feel-good" meeting. This is no longer the same country where the prime minister (Olof Palme, later assassinated) once condemned the firebombings of Vietnam resulting in US withdrawal of their ambassador.
Swedish prison let most of the prisoners out for weekend
Err, no, never heard of that. A prisoner can apply for "permission" after serving something like a third of his/her time in prison, and then they can leave prison for up to three days at a time (decided by prison administration, or, as in a recently publicized case, by a central agency on appeal), but I don't think any prisoner gets permission every weekend...
If it knows your position at some point it should still be able to extrapolate your position at a later point, think accelerometer, compass, or even cameras/lasers to build a 3D model of the environment around you and compare it to the map.
Do you seriously believe there is a tangible difference between the Democrats and the Republicans in matters of any consequence? No matter which party is in power, in any country really, capitalists are the ones really in charge by simple virtue of their power to control so much of the economy and their unparalleled resources to drive legislation and influence the media which they own.
Interesting system, I assume the speaker of the house the only one who can introduce legislation? I always assumed that any parliamentary member could introduce legislation, in the Swedish parliament, there are two different ways of introducing legislation, the first being a "proposition", introduced by the government, and the second being a "motion" which can be introduced by any MP or any group of MPs.
What Americans call "corporatism", the rest of us call "capitalism". A capitalist system does not become "socialist" simply because the capitalist-controlled government makes a few concessions in terms of social welfare to avoid an all-out revolution, and a capitalist-controlled government giving profitable "contracts" to private corporations or using taxpayer money to bail out failing private corporations (i.e. enriching a few capitalists using resources collected for common use) is about as far from the definition of "socialism" as you can get.
This all stems out of confusion as to the meaning of the terms "capitalism" and "socialism" which seems quite common everywhere, but especially so in the US. "Capitalism" essentially means that means of production is in the hands of the few, the "capitalists". A hallmark of capitalism is that a minority gains more and more money from interest, rather than work. Socialism, on the other hand, means the means of production is owned by the workers themselves, whether via cooperatives, via a (truly) worker-controlled state, some other means or (more likely) from a combination of these.
A capitalist economy can never truly become a democracy simply stemming from the discrepancy in power between the workers and the capitalists. Capitalists have so much more power than workers by simple virtue of their wealth, that even if completely free and fair elections were guaranteed, the media was in no way influenced by the interests of their owners, and corruption was unheard of (i.e. an ideal fantasy world), capitalists, by virtue of their single-handed control of the means of production can still exert undue influence over society and thus put any democracy out of action by for instance threatening to withhold production of some essential good if their interests are not satisfied.
No, even the US has a real left wing, they're just not represented by any of the two mainstream parties. They are however quite well organized, there are several very good American leftist publications ( http://jacobinmag.com/ being my favorite) and even a daily radio/TV news show that by American standards is certainly quite left-wing (and very good, http://www.democracynow.org/ )
I don't know if or when any of them were denied permission to come to the UN, but what exactly makes you think the US should have the right to deny any of them full access to the United Nations, an international organization of which their nations are members? Maybe we would be better off moving UN headquarters to Switzerland given the obvious attitudes the US has towards their "enemies" gaining equal access to it, or somewhere in no-mans land like a platform in international waters. I'm also somewhat bewildered as to your choice to include Castro with the other two, they are hardly comparable, despite what you have been told by mainstream US media where anyone who dares challenge US hegemony is painted to be disciples of the great Satan himself.
A Swedish company already did this, they call it "myFC" and it's powered by a "puck" of hydrogen. Wether it's useful, I have no idea.
http://www.kth.se/en/forskning/pa-djupet/ladda-mobilen-med-vatten-1.381551
http://powertrekk.com/
No, it's because Israel *claims* to be a first-world democracy, and as such it is held to higher standards by the world than some random tinpot dictator, unless you want to be the moral equivalent of these. In this context, it is unacceptable for a self-proclaimed civilized country to enforce what is essentially the equivalent of apartheid or worse in the Palestinian territories. It's in no way acceptable in South Africa and it's in no way acceptable in Israel or the occupied territories of Palestine, it has nothing to do with your little religion, of which I could care less (and that goes for all religions)
I think the point is that if the data-centers are on Brazilian soil, those responsible can be prosecuted for espionage, whereas if the data is stored in the US, the Brazilian government basically can't do anything, it's out of their jurisdiction.
I agree that Sweden is certainly no safe harbor in terms of data storage. In fact, we both have our own spy agency (FRA) that is legally (since 2008) allowed to tap into "international" cables (and with it, the datamine the data of most Swedes as well), and our government put in their veto against EU condemnation of NSA spying on EU governments and citizens. Despite our supposed "neutrality", our government has had a close relationship with the US for a long time, but in no time previously has the government so obviously kowtowed to US interests. Back in the day, at least the prime minister (Olof Palme) harshly criticized the actions of the US government when appropriate (e.g. the US bombings of Hanoi, resulting in the US withdrawing their ambassador). Sadly, since his assassination, the ties to the US have grown ever closer, to the degree that Obama actually came here earlier this month for what the foreign minister called a "feelgood meeting" after a love letter from our prime minister practically begged him to, this after the revelations of NSA spying...
That may be *technically* true, but in general opinion, computers are held to a much higher standard than human beings.
The same can be said of self-parking cars, though, where as far as I know, the driver is still responsible. It's just another convenience. If you want to slack off and read a book while driving, sure, but IF you crash, then you're responsible for letting it happen. In the red light case, any driver should be able to detect that the car is not braking and override the autopilot. If you want to read a book then take the train/bus, at least for the foreseeable future.
I'm just saying that this is likely what will be required to begin with, until these systems have a proven track record, at which point the manufacturer could potentially license their system for completely autonomous driving, and the manufacturer at that point would have to be somehow responsible if the system causes an accident. (Which should be relatively easy to prove, any self-driving car would likely have to keep logs of their actions)
My guess is that, at least initially, a driver will be required to be in the drivers seat at all times ready to override any actions taken by the car. In that case, the driver would likely be at fault for not correcting any action taken by the car that leads to an accident, just as in some vehicles out on the roads now, a driver is responsible for making sure he/she doesn't crash into other cars even when there is a system that can detect obstacles and take action or if the car can park automatically.
Of course, if the bought all of Nokia, they'd be in the tire business, and while I guess diversifying could be a good thing, running a tire manufacturer may not be Microsoft's forte.
Actually, it's quite simple to verify that the apps are running in the background on the N9: open multiple apps with obvious visual changes (a clock for instance), swipe to the multitasking view and look at the live thumbnails of the running apps. That's not to say that an app cannot be pause when you swipe away of course, in many cases this is useful, for instance video players tend to pause when you switch to another app.
What is the advantage of this over DLNA/UPnP? I get the streaming of Netflix, etc, but why wouldn't this be possible using DLNA? Why not use standards that are already established and work on most televisions bought in the past couple of years?
That would be why the rail is usually grade separated at that speed, i.e. roads run under or over the tracks. Hell, even mainlines here in Sweden are mostly grade-separated, and where they are not there are systems in place to detect obstacles and stop the train before the train driver can physically see the obstruction. And we only have trains running 200 kph, you can be pretty sure that railways that allow trains to run at over 300 kph are entirely grade separated.
I guess it's all a matter of how much in terms of for instance working rights already exist within a nation. My concern with the EU is rather that it erodes our working rights, civil liberties and environmental regulations. For instance the Laval judgement prohibiting unions from interfering with the ongoing exploitation of EU citizens working in our country and the subsequent social dumping: in my view everyone who works in Sweden should have the same rights to a decent wage, vacation, union representation, etc, but this is not the opinion of the EU, they want to create a subclass of people who don't have the same rights as everyone else simply because they are not citizens of this country. It's the neoliberals who are in control of the EU, they have no interest in helping you maintain your workers rights.
What nation would search a diplomatic aircraft, with a friendly foreign president to boot, simply in order to grant asylum to a dissident who may or may not be on that plane, on his way to a nation where would have been granted asylum already? Seems disingenuous to say the least..
Tech workers are unionized in probably most of Europe, that doesn't mean the jobs are outsourced. Even my job is unionized, and I'm a doctoral student, employed with a decent wage (increasing with the proportion of my degree completed from the equivalent of $46000 to $55000, renegotiated by the union every year or two) and six weeks vacation (minimum by law being 5 weeks) collectively bargained for by the union for university teachers which is part of a central organization for university educated workers.
Then, by your own logic, the most notorious slave owners are capitalists, who do in fact live off the labor of the working, middle, and even the non-capitalists (i.e. those who are wealthy but not so wealthy so as to be able to live off capital returns) in the upper class.