There is something to what you say. However, what an experienced batter won't know is how the fielder will choose to play the ball. That means that the batter doesn't know if it will be over the fielder's head or not. Additionally, that knowledge of where the ball will land is really only true in his home park. Over the course of this past baseball season, I saw several occasions where a home team batter got an extra base because of where the ball landed that on another night a visiting team batter did not. The reason for this was that the home team batter knew that the ball hit to that spot would take a tricky bounce while the visiting team batter did not. This was compounded by the fact that the home team fielder also knew that the ball would take a tricky bounce and the visiting team fielder did not (I only noticed this particular occurrence because the announcers pointed it out, but in future games after that I noticed that the home team fielders consistently fielded balls hit to that area better than visiting team fielders).
The thing is, if a batter waits to see where the ball lands (will land) before he starts running for first base, he is unlikely to make it as far as you project from the final landing spot. Another factor is one of the rules of baseball. If a player runs straight to first base and over runs it, he is safe as long as he touched first base before a player holding the game ball touches first base. If however, a base runner rounds first base towards second base, an opposing player with the ball can tag him out.
Basically, to maximize his chances of getting on base, a batter must start running for first base as soon as the ball leaves his bat. Since at that moment he does not know where the ball will land, his optimum decision is to start running straight for first base. If while he is running, he realizes that the ball will land where he will be able to get extra bases, he can then curve out toward the optimal path for going for extra bases.
This patent should fail on two counts, not only is there prior art but this patent is obvious, not only to an expert in the field, but to a complete novice in the field.
It was a policy that allowed the side that controlled the broadcast media as a bunch of out of control nutjobs by selecting those representing the opposition for just such characteristics. Of course since the Fairness Doctrine was enforced by the government, many people thought that the nutjobs that the networks had on were actually representative of anyone who opposed the particular policy under discussion.
You are correct that China's demographic problem is a recipe for war. However, India is practically next door with a similar sized population, no particular love for China...and without either of those particular demographic problems.
The thing is that China does not have s large mass of single, young men with no jobs. They have a mass of single, middle-aged men with jobs, but no potential wives. China's demographic problem is not a surplus of young men relative to the job market, it is a shortage of young people relative to the job market and a surplus of young men relative to the number of young women.
Really? What safeguards are there against unscrupulous election workers 'losing' ballots for the guy they don't support? Or ballot box stuffing with bogus votes? Or giving a wink and a ballot to the guy who's been through 4 times already giving different names?
It is called "poll watchers". Just about anybody can be a poll watcher and make note of these things. There are provisions in place that allow poll watchers to intervene in certain circumstances when they believe that fraud is taking place.
If the machine is open & secure, you can trust that it's not going to just randomly discard votes because it doesn't like Pres. Obama's healthcare plan or can't stand John McCain's running mate.
Based on what? Your say-so, or the say-so of some other expert who has examined the code? I can trust poll watchers because there is generally one or two for each candidate in the election as well as poll watchers from other groups with an interest in an honest outcome to the election (or at least there being no fraud against their preferred candidate/proposition, with usually a representative from the opposing viewpoint as well).
Being a poll watcher require no particular expertise in order to recognize the types of shenanigans you mentioned. I am quite confident that few if any of the people who currently function as poll watchers would be competent to identify the potential for fraud involved in electronic voting.
Electronic voting where the average voter must take it on faith that the experts have ensured that no fraud is taking place is guaranteed to result in fraud (or, almost as bad, the perception of fraud).
The paper ballot system has auditing in place in a manner that allows anybody with sufficient mental capacity to vote to understand. I cannot imagine anyway that an electronic system can be set up that would allow the average citizen to monitor it for fraud.
I do not see any advantage to electronic voting over a paper ballot system. Getting the results faster doesn't accomplish anything because the winner still doesn't take office for a couple of more months anyway.
I just don't understand how "paper" is somehow better, or less error-prone when you introduce humans who have to interpret the marks made on the paper objectively, and who will no doubt try to find reasons to disqualify votes for "the other guy" while they do the recount.
Paper is not less error prone. Error is not the problem. Fraud is. Paper is less fraud prone because everybody can recognize fraud on paper ballots when they see it, not everyone can recognize fraud when they see it with electronic ballots. Worse, it is significantly easier to hide fraud with electronic ballots.
For most people, open source voting software for electronic voting is no more secure than closed source. In both cases they have to take someone else's word for it that it accurately reflects the will of the voters.
Additionally, even if the software that is used in electronic voting machines is open source, how do you know that the software installed on any voting machine is the same as the published source code?
And yet, I hear the same comments about China I heard about Japan in the 70s and early 80s: they just copy, they don't innovate, and have a mediocre directed economy. And then they ate our lunch. I expect the same to happen with China. They will eat our lunch, because we're only looking at where they are, not where they're going.
I don't know the comments I remember about Japan from the 70s and early 80s were along the lines of "They will eat our lunch, because we're only looking at where they are, not where they're going." Yet something happened along the way to Japan being the number one economy in the world. They ran up against the limits of a government managed economy.
China is certainly a country to be concerned about. However, it has several problems that are not easily dealt with. Its two main problems are demographic. Both are a result of its "one child" policy. The first is that it has an even worse aging population bulge. That bulge is 10-15 years younger than that of the U.S. and Europe, but it is much more severe. Quite simply, they do not have enough people to care for their aging population and maintain high levels of productivity. The other problem actually makes the first problem worse. In the age cadre younger than the population bubble, they do not have anywhere near enough women to go around.
You make a very good point about the futility of a war between the U.S. and China, but you might want to read a little history. WWI was pretty futile as well. If Woodrow Wilson hadn't seen it as an opportunity to expand government control over the economy (and thus kept the U.S. out of it), it would have ended up a complete draw. Yet current evidence indicates that Germany actively sought the beginning of WWI.
First, in Nazi Germany you could only make money if you were politically connected. Economic activity in Nazi Germany was highly regulated.
As for "progressive", the original Progressives from the 19th Century thought that society (including the economy) should be run "scientifically". That means that they believed in central planning. All totalitarian governments I know of are successors to the Progressive movement of the 19th century.
You never heard of Senator Jay Rockefeller, the grandson of Mr. Standard Oil Monopoly? And I guess you are somewhat correct depending on your definition of left wing. I was responding to the OP's allegation that the Right is funded by oil billionaires (referring, I believe, to the Koch brothers and their support of small government activists). In that light I was pointing out that there are many more billionaires backing greater government regulation.
In America today, the "left" is basically those who support greater government control over people's lives, while the "right" is generally those who favor letting people live their lives as they choose. The left in America today actually admits it, they call themselves "Progressives". The original Progressives were proto-fascists.
Really? George Soros, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, the Sandlers (husband and wife), John Kerry (Heinz fortune), the Kennedys, the Rockefellers. Can you make a comparable list on the other side?
No coincidence that the Religious Right in the US, who compose the vast majority of the Tea Party, are funded by oil billionaires among others.
As opposed to the entire Left in the U.S., which is funded by the billionaires who played a significant role in the housing bubble and bust (the Sandlers) combined with a currency speculator billionaire (George Soros).
Actually, the paradigm shift that will occur/is occurring because of the actual science behind this article is something I first came across in the late 80s. At a seminar for those involved in medical research (which I was in a peripheral way at the time), the main presenter proposed that medical science should view disease that resulted from bacteria and virii as failed symbiosis (which interestingly is philosophically more consistent with Judeo-Christian Creationism than the disease model it would replace). At the time, this was a new and radical idea that was viewed with significant skepticism.
The reason to follow my moral code is that if its basis is correct, there are long term negative consequences to not following it. If your moral code is correct, if I don't follow it, in 100 years it won't make any difference to me anyway (and in a couple of million years it won't make any difference to anyone)
So, basically, you practice what you consider to be moral behavior because it makes you feel good. If someone would prefer some other lifestyle, there is no particular reason why they should follow your moral code. That is if someone is not concerned about the suffering of others, there is nothing in your moral code that offers a compelling reason as to why they should care.
You can use your moral compass for other things, like figuring out that some organizations are more oppressive than others.
Why would you do that? You have yet to offer a reason why I (or anyone else) should particularly care to follow your moral code. If I live for 70 or so years and then I am no more and the Universe is going to wind down in a few million years, what does any of that matter.
I am not blaming the rise of SUVs on the car manufacturers. I am blaming the rise of SUVs on the CAFE standards. There was a market for vehicles that the auto manufacturers could not sell under the CAFE standards. People who desired/needed those vehicles looked around and found a loophole vehicle, the SUV.
Those who believe in central planning thought they could make better decisions than the market. They were wrong.
So in other words, your morals are just a means to get laid. BTW, since according to you the purpose of morals is to ensure reproduction, homosexuality is immoral by your moral code.
In that case I am going to figure you are a Wiccan, a faith that was invented in the 1950s.
The fact of the matter is that based on what you have posted on this thread there is no real basis for determining what your faith is. You said that homosexuality is not morally wrong. Lots of people with no particular faith say that. You said that Christianity is morally wrong. Many of those same people would say that. So, really there is no evidence of what faith you hold to in this thread. I can think of no faith that believing that homosexuality is not morally wrong and that Christianity is morally wrong are defining beliefs. if you hold to such a faith, it must be a very strange one.
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There is something to what you say. However, what an experienced batter won't know is how the fielder will choose to play the ball. That means that the batter doesn't know if it will be over the fielder's head or not. Additionally, that knowledge of where the ball will land is really only true in his home park. Over the course of this past baseball season, I saw several occasions where a home team batter got an extra base because of where the ball landed that on another night a visiting team batter did not. The reason for this was that the home team batter knew that the ball hit to that spot would take a tricky bounce while the visiting team batter did not. This was compounded by the fact that the home team fielder also knew that the ball would take a tricky bounce and the visiting team fielder did not (I only noticed this particular occurrence because the announcers pointed it out, but in future games after that I noticed that the home team fielders consistently fielded balls hit to that area better than visiting team fielders).
The thing is, if a batter waits to see where the ball lands (will land) before he starts running for first base, he is unlikely to make it as far as you project from the final landing spot. Another factor is one of the rules of baseball. If a player runs straight to first base and over runs it, he is safe as long as he touched first base before a player holding the game ball touches first base. If however, a base runner rounds first base towards second base, an opposing player with the ball can tag him out.
Basically, to maximize his chances of getting on base, a batter must start running for first base as soon as the ball leaves his bat. Since at that moment he does not know where the ball will land, his optimum decision is to start running straight for first base. If while he is running, he realizes that the ball will land where he will be able to get extra bases, he can then curve out toward the optimal path for going for extra bases.
This patent should fail on two counts, not only is there prior art but this patent is obvious, not only to an expert in the field, but to a complete novice in the field.
It was a policy that allowed the side that controlled the broadcast media as a bunch of out of control nutjobs by selecting those representing the opposition for just such characteristics. Of course since the Fairness Doctrine was enforced by the government, many people thought that the nutjobs that the networks had on were actually representative of anyone who opposed the particular policy under discussion.
You are correct that China's demographic problem is a recipe for war. However, India is practically next door with a similar sized population, no particular love for China...and without either of those particular demographic problems.
The thing is that China does not have s large mass of single, young men with no jobs. They have a mass of single, middle-aged men with jobs, but no potential wives. China's demographic problem is not a surplus of young men relative to the job market, it is a shortage of young people relative to the job market and a surplus of young men relative to the number of young women.
Really? What safeguards are there against unscrupulous election workers 'losing' ballots for the guy they don't support? Or ballot box stuffing with bogus votes? Or giving a wink and a ballot to the guy who's been through 4 times already giving different names?
It is called "poll watchers". Just about anybody can be a poll watcher and make note of these things. There are provisions in place that allow poll watchers to intervene in certain circumstances when they believe that fraud is taking place.
If the machine is open & secure, you can trust that it's not going to just randomly discard votes because it doesn't like Pres. Obama's healthcare plan or can't stand John McCain's running mate.
Based on what? Your say-so, or the say-so of some other expert who has examined the code? I can trust poll watchers because there is generally one or two for each candidate in the election as well as poll watchers from other groups with an interest in an honest outcome to the election (or at least there being no fraud against their preferred candidate/proposition, with usually a representative from the opposing viewpoint as well).
Being a poll watcher require no particular expertise in order to recognize the types of shenanigans you mentioned. I am quite confident that few if any of the people who currently function as poll watchers would be competent to identify the potential for fraud involved in electronic voting.
Electronic voting where the average voter must take it on faith that the experts have ensured that no fraud is taking place is guaranteed to result in fraud (or, almost as bad, the perception of fraud).
The paper ballot system has auditing in place in a manner that allows anybody with sufficient mental capacity to vote to understand. I cannot imagine anyway that an electronic system can be set up that would allow the average citizen to monitor it for fraud.
I do not see any advantage to electronic voting over a paper ballot system. Getting the results faster doesn't accomplish anything because the winner still doesn't take office for a couple of more months anyway.
That would be like equating the KKK voter intimidation with Republicans.
Especially since the KKK is an organization founded byDemocrats.
I just don't understand how "paper" is somehow better, or less error-prone when you introduce humans who have to interpret the marks made on the paper objectively, and who will no doubt try to find reasons to disqualify votes for "the other guy" while they do the recount.
Paper is not less error prone. Error is not the problem. Fraud is. Paper is less fraud prone because everybody can recognize fraud on paper ballots when they see it, not everyone can recognize fraud when they see it with electronic ballots. Worse, it is significantly easier to hide fraud with electronic ballots.
For most people, open source voting software for electronic voting is no more secure than closed source. In both cases they have to take someone else's word for it that it accurately reflects the will of the voters.
Additionally, even if the software that is used in electronic voting machines is open source, how do you know that the software installed on any voting machine is the same as the published source code?
And yet, I hear the same comments about China I heard about Japan in the 70s and early 80s: they just copy, they don't innovate, and have a mediocre directed economy. And then they ate our lunch. I expect the same to happen with China. They will eat our lunch, because we're only looking at where they are, not where they're going.
I don't know the comments I remember about Japan from the 70s and early 80s were along the lines of "They will eat our lunch, because we're only looking at where they are, not where they're going." Yet something happened along the way to Japan being the number one economy in the world. They ran up against the limits of a government managed economy.
China is certainly a country to be concerned about. However, it has several problems that are not easily dealt with. Its two main problems are demographic. Both are a result of its "one child" policy. The first is that it has an even worse aging population bulge. That bulge is 10-15 years younger than that of the U.S. and Europe, but it is much more severe. Quite simply, they do not have enough people to care for their aging population and maintain high levels of productivity. The other problem actually makes the first problem worse. In the age cadre younger than the population bubble, they do not have anywhere near enough women to go around.
You make a very good point about the futility of a war between the U.S. and China, but you might want to read a little history. WWI was pretty futile as well. If Woodrow Wilson hadn't seen it as an opportunity to expand government control over the economy (and thus kept the U.S. out of it), it would have ended up a complete draw. Yet current evidence indicates that Germany actively sought the beginning of WWI.
As opposed to the Left (Secular and Religious) which is tolerant of everyone, as long as they don't do or say anything that the Left disapproves of.
First, in Nazi Germany you could only make money if you were politically connected. Economic activity in Nazi Germany was highly regulated.
As for "progressive", the original Progressives from the 19th Century thought that society (including the economy) should be run "scientifically". That means that they believed in central planning. All totalitarian governments I know of are successors to the Progressive movement of the 19th century.
You never heard of Senator Jay Rockefeller, the grandson of Mr. Standard Oil Monopoly? And I guess you are somewhat correct depending on your definition of left wing. I was responding to the OP's allegation that the Right is funded by oil billionaires (referring, I believe, to the Koch brothers and their support of small government activists). In that light I was pointing out that there are many more billionaires backing greater government regulation.
In America today, the "left" is basically those who support greater government control over people's lives, while the "right" is generally those who favor letting people live their lives as they choose. The left in America today actually admits it, they call themselves "Progressives". The original Progressives were proto-fascists.
Really? George Soros, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, the Sandlers (husband and wife), John Kerry (Heinz fortune), the Kennedys, the Rockefellers. Can you make a comparable list on the other side?
No coincidence that the Religious Right in the US, who compose the vast majority of the Tea Party, are funded by oil billionaires among others.
As opposed to the entire Left in the U.S., which is funded by the billionaires who played a significant role in the housing bubble and bust (the Sandlers) combined with a currency speculator billionaire (George Soros).
Actually, the paradigm shift that will occur/is occurring because of the actual science behind this article is something I first came across in the late 80s. At a seminar for those involved in medical research (which I was in a peripheral way at the time), the main presenter proposed that medical science should view disease that resulted from bacteria and virii as failed symbiosis (which interestingly is philosophically more consistent with Judeo-Christian Creationism than the disease model it would replace). At the time, this was a new and radical idea that was viewed with significant skepticism.
The reason to follow my moral code is that if its basis is correct, there are long term negative consequences to not following it. If your moral code is correct, if I don't follow it, in 100 years it won't make any difference to me anyway (and in a couple of million years it won't make any difference to anyone)
So, basically, you practice what you consider to be moral behavior because it makes you feel good. If someone would prefer some other lifestyle, there is no particular reason why they should follow your moral code. That is if someone is not concerned about the suffering of others, there is nothing in your moral code that offers a compelling reason as to why they should care.
Do those Australian station wagons (from the late 70s and early 80s) also meet U.S. safety and emissions standards from that same time period?
You can use your moral compass for other things, like figuring out that some organizations are more oppressive than others.
Why would you do that? You have yet to offer a reason why I (or anyone else) should particularly care to follow your moral code. If I live for 70 or so years and then I am no more and the Universe is going to wind down in a few million years, what does any of that matter.
I am not blaming the rise of SUVs on the car manufacturers. I am blaming the rise of SUVs on the CAFE standards. There was a market for vehicles that the auto manufacturers could not sell under the CAFE standards. People who desired/needed those vehicles looked around and found a loophole vehicle, the SUV.
Those who believe in central planning thought they could make better decisions than the market. They were wrong.
So in other words, your morals are just a means to get laid. BTW, since according to you the purpose of morals is to ensure reproduction, homosexuality is immoral by your moral code.
In that case I am going to figure you are a Wiccan, a faith that was invented in the 1950s.
The fact of the matter is that based on what you have posted on this thread there is no real basis for determining what your faith is. You said that homosexuality is not morally wrong. Lots of people with no particular faith say that. You said that Christianity is morally wrong. Many of those same people would say that. So, really there is no evidence of what faith you hold to in this thread. I can think of no faith that believing that homosexuality is not morally wrong and that Christianity is morally wrong are defining beliefs. if you hold to such a faith, it must be a very strange one.