>The poll found that 57 percent were open to >marrying someone who holds political opinions >significantly different from their own.
And given the success rate of American marriages, I sure as hell trust that 57% to know what a healthy relationship requires.
All I know is that the wishy-washy political fence sitters that say they can "understand both sides" deserve to be married to each other. And they deserve the divorce and the messed up kids that follow.
I wish some people would at least get informed and take a stand for once in their pathetic, non-confrontational lives.
That couldn't possibly have anything to do with the workforce in the U.S. doubling as women entered it since the fifties, and families with double incomes combining to buy houses now, would it?
Or possibly that other expenses have gone down so that people are more willing to spend their extra cash on their house?
Or that the country is so rich that there's an abundance of ridiculously cheap capital to finance the purchase of a house so that home ownership is at an all time high, increasing demand?
You might compare interest rates from a few decades ago (upwards of 20% during Carter admin) with those of today.
But no! High prices must be due to the few thousand jobs we've lost to India in recent years. Outsourcing will kill us all!
Personally, I have no problem with Japanese or Indians subsidizing cheap cars and computers for Americans.
The article isn't specific, but it does mention this economist isn't refuting the theory (hardly a theory, it's reality) of "Comparative Advantage."
I think what he's getting at is that with a global marketplace, changes can happen so quickly that the people hurt by them don't have time to re-train and change professions. That sounds more sensible to me, anyway. A way to help these people might be a good idea, but it's definitely no the most efficient, and society as a whole will not advance as quickly. He knows that, but is willing to sacrifice a bit of advancement for moral reasons.
This sounds good, but where exactly we draw the line between helping people individually and letting society as a whole is quite difficult. Letting individuals decide with private wage insurance is an excellent idea. Perhaps we could promote that through education.
I don't think you'll see any breakthroughs from Linux.
Why? It's based on, quite thoroughly, Unix. It has evolved to the point where any further dramatic improvements will require huge architectural changes. Anything less will be layering on top of an unsupportive base. It will always feel thrown together.
I can hear the OS X people already, but OS X, too, is thrown together. It's done extremely well, but you have different competing layers in the OS that make it much less coherent. It's Unix with a very pretty face.
I don't hold out much hope for the "next-big-thing" being on Linux. I think the next big thing will be a rethinking of fundamental design aspects of operating systems that will be completely incompatible with current systems. We should be throwing out C-based programs as much as possible for security reasons, for example. We're seeing this with the adoption of C# and Java. It needs to go further, and it will, but curiously, Linux is among the last places where this stuff is getting adopted.
This is where file storage, at least at the level where users interact with it, should be headed. I think file managers should be more like Google.
Hierarchical trees are horrible ways to manage data, especially if it's a bunch of data that can be classified multiple ways and you typically won't remember everything you save.
There's no reason why/home/user/photos/Christmas should be distinct from/home/user/Christmas/photos. I should be able to type in either path and get the same result set.
This would solve a lot of the hassle of organizing files. The only choice I'd have to make is how specific I want to get when choosing file names and directories.
Indexing of file contents is an added plus, but not even necessary for a huge gain in organization.
Excellent post, but I think you overshadow at least one complexity when you classify the disagreement as "nature vs. nurture."
I don't think most conservatives believe people aren't influenced by their environments, or that bad people are born that way. Rather, I think conservatives see adults as unlikely to change drastically. A child's personality is more maleable and responsive to changes in environment. As people age, they change.
Now, here's where your point is right on. "Bad people," in the conservative view, are unlikely to change. The 35 year old criminal with a mile long record isn't likely to have an epiphany and become a saint. It's possible, but very unlikely.
Whether this is due to his upbringing or some inate personality trait is irrelevant. You're not going to erase years of misguided behaviour overnight, in the conservative view.
You see more and more examples of this as you get older. I think this is perhaps why older people tend toward conservatism.
Finally, I think the fundamental difference in the two views lies more in whether or not you believe there is an objective good and bad. Most political arguments I've had have (d)evolved into that very basic point.
I don't think the problem in the U.S. is because of a feeling of superiority or nationalism.
If you look at the National Geographic Survey, most Americans can't even locate 10 U.S. states on a map.
Rather, our education system has been overtaken by a prgressive movement that abhors any and all rote learning. God forbid that kids have to learn where countries are, that might stifle their creativity.
I'm about to move out to California. What's it like out there? There must be warnings every three feet.
I recently installed a new drain pipe in my bathroom sink. It came with this warning label:
"This product is known by the State of California to contain materials known to cause cancer in labratory tests. Plumbers must notify the customer of this before installation."
Isn't this all going a bit far? I'm concerned that my dirty water and used toothpaste might get cancer, but let's assume a bit of common sense.
Heck, you could put it on TV and find out. They even have some sort of ratings system, I hear, that can tell you how many people were interested enough in your show to watch it.
My hunch is, however, that most people couldn't care less about this, which is why it hasn't been done. It certainly would be a cheap and easy show to produce.
Then again, have you ever watched someone else play a first person shooter? Two minutes of that is enough to make you vomit from dizzyness.
Here's the question that needs to be asked over and over:
"Better" in terms of what?
Most people's idea of "better" means that they'll be able to use a computer more effectively. Whether that's writing programs quickly, or that will run without hassle on a majority of currently installed desktop platforms, or just sending a message across the country.
To everyone but CS geeks, a computer is a tool to get things done. Whether the tool is the absolute best it can be is irrelevant, as long as it does the job people want it to do. If Mono allows people to get what they want to do done more efficiently, they're going to use it, and that's a good thing.
Well, from the article section about Plan B, I received the opposite impression.
Unless you're willing to consider the unstated conspiracy theory as evidence.
Be that as it may, I have a difficult time being concerned about this. So you have to get a prescription for a drug that might be harmful? This drug isn't illegal. Am I to believe that the massive inconvenience of a single doctor's visit is evidence of a campaign to undermine scientific findings by our government?
Please.
If there were no political or ethical considerations when approving drugs at the FDA, the scientists would be making the decisions, not appointees.
Slashdot Mirror
Sex.
>The poll found that 57 percent were open to >marrying someone who holds political opinions >significantly different from their own.
And given the success rate of American marriages, I sure as hell trust that 57% to know what a healthy relationship requires.
All I know is that the wishy-washy political fence sitters that say they can "understand both sides" deserve to be married to each other. And they deserve the divorce and the messed up kids that follow.
I wish some people would at least get informed and take a stand for once in their pathetic, non-confrontational lives.
That couldn't possibly have anything to do with the workforce in the U.S. doubling as women entered it since the fifties, and families with double incomes combining to buy houses now, would it?
Or possibly that other expenses have gone down so that people are more willing to spend their extra cash on their house?
Or that the country is so rich that there's an abundance of ridiculously cheap capital to finance the purchase of a house so that home ownership is at an all time high, increasing demand?
You might compare interest rates from a few decades ago (upwards of 20% during Carter admin) with those of today.
But no! High prices must be due to the few thousand jobs we've lost to India in recent years. Outsourcing will kill us all!
(1) Let Sa be the set of all possible roots of polynomial equations.
(2) From [1], we have determined that the correct roots, a1...an, exist in Sa.
(3) Let the set Sb be the set that contains only a1...an.
(4) The intersection of sets Sa and Sb will thus be the roots of the polynomial equation.
Therfore, we derive the formula:
Sa ^ Sb = roots
Personally, I have no problem with Japanese or Indians subsidizing cheap cars and computers for Americans.
The article isn't specific, but it does mention this economist isn't refuting the theory (hardly a theory, it's reality) of "Comparative Advantage."
I think what he's getting at is that with a global marketplace, changes can happen so quickly that the people hurt by them don't have time to re-train and change professions. That sounds more sensible to me, anyway. A way to help these people might be a good idea, but it's definitely no the most efficient, and society as a whole will not advance as quickly. He knows that, but is willing to sacrifice a bit of advancement for moral reasons.
This sounds good, but where exactly we draw the line between helping people individually and letting society as a whole is quite difficult. Letting individuals decide with private wage insurance is an excellent idea. Perhaps we could promote that through education.
...there's no mention of Elizabeth Shue in the article. Until we get the info hiding in her bra, this "science" is going nowhere.
Yeah!
And I'll bet if they triangulate the signal they'll find out it's probably coming from pop-star Lance Bass's own personal space station.
That freaky eccentric teen idol is only trying to spur on our scientific endeavors. He's so dreamy.
I'm color blind, and I've always heard color blindness is passed genetically and occurs in men, predominantly.
My grandfather had that problem too, so I guess my mother passed it to me.
I don't think you'll see any breakthroughs from Linux.
Why? It's based on, quite thoroughly, Unix. It has evolved to the point where any further dramatic improvements will require huge architectural changes. Anything less will be layering on top of an unsupportive base. It will always feel thrown together.
I can hear the OS X people already, but OS X, too, is thrown together. It's done extremely well, but you have different competing layers in the OS that make it much less coherent. It's Unix with a very pretty face.
I don't hold out much hope for the "next-big-thing" being on Linux. I think the next big thing will be a rethinking of fundamental design aspects of operating systems that will be completely incompatible with current systems. We should be throwing out C-based programs as much as possible for security reasons, for example. We're seeing this with the adoption of C# and Java. It needs to go further, and it will, but curiously, Linux is among the last places where this stuff is getting adopted.
This is where file storage, at least at the level where users interact with it, should be headed. I think file managers should be more like Google.
/home/user/photos/Christmas should be distinct from /home/user/Christmas/photos. I should be able to type in either path and get the same result set.
Hierarchical trees are horrible ways to manage data, especially if it's a bunch of data that can be classified multiple ways and you typically won't remember everything you save.
There's no reason why
This would solve a lot of the hassle of organizing files. The only choice I'd have to make is how specific I want to get when choosing file names and directories.
Indexing of file contents is an added plus, but not even necessary for a huge gain in organization.
What did they name her?
Wait, shouldn't we be celebrating its first birthday in 2036?
Excellent post, but I think you overshadow at least one complexity when you classify the disagreement as "nature vs. nurture."
I don't think most conservatives believe people aren't influenced by their environments, or that bad people are born that way. Rather, I think conservatives see adults as unlikely to change drastically. A child's personality is more maleable and responsive to changes in environment. As people age, they change.
Now, here's where your point is right on. "Bad people," in the conservative view, are unlikely to change. The 35 year old criminal with a mile long record isn't likely to have an epiphany and become a saint. It's possible, but very unlikely.
Whether this is due to his upbringing or some inate personality trait is irrelevant. You're not going to erase years of misguided behaviour overnight, in the conservative view.
You see more and more examples of this as you get older. I think this is perhaps why older people tend toward conservatism.
Finally, I think the fundamental difference in the two views lies more in whether or not you believe there is an objective good and bad. Most political arguments I've had have (d)evolved into that very basic point.
I don't think the problem in the U.S. is because of a feeling of superiority or nationalism.
If you look at the National Geographic Survey, most Americans can't even locate 10 U.S. states on a map.
Rather, our education system has been overtaken by a prgressive movement that abhors any and all rote learning. God forbid that kids have to learn where countries are, that might stifle their creativity.
I'm about to move out to California. What's it like out there? There must be warnings every three feet.
I recently installed a new drain pipe in my bathroom sink. It came with this warning label:
"This product is known by the State of California to contain materials known to cause cancer in labratory tests. Plumbers must notify the customer of this before installation."
Isn't this all going a bit far? I'm concerned that my dirty water and used toothpaste might get cancer, but let's assume a bit of common sense.
Heck, you could put it on TV and find out. They even have some sort of ratings system, I hear, that can tell you how many people were interested enough in your show to watch it.
My hunch is, however, that most people couldn't care less about this, which is why it hasn't been done. It certainly would be a cheap and easy show to produce.
Then again, have you ever watched someone else play a first person shooter? Two minutes of that is enough to make you vomit from dizzyness.
>There is no problem with these other economic systems so long as they do not require coercion.
An example of an economic system other than capitalism that doesn't require coercion would be appropriate, I think.
>How does its content partnership with NBC News (aka MSNBC) help it sell more copies of Windows?
I have no doubt somebody could answer that, if anyone actually watched MSNBC.
Here's the question that needs to be asked over and over:
"Better" in terms of what?
Most people's idea of "better" means that they'll be able to use a computer more effectively. Whether that's writing programs quickly, or that will run without hassle on a majority of currently installed desktop platforms, or just sending a message across the country.
To everyone but CS geeks, a computer is a tool to get things done. Whether the tool is the absolute best it can be is irrelevant, as long as it does the job people want it to do. If Mono allows people to get what they want to do done more efficiently, they're going to use it, and that's a good thing.
Miguel understands this, I think.
Well, vi I'll accept. But if Blender were really similar to Emacs, you'd have to quintuple click while holding both Ctrl keys to select an object.
You know, the Japanese kids would probably love to have your hypothetical English blog quote on a T-Shirt, with few brightly colored stars on it.
I'd be surprised if it doesn't exist already.
Although it could potentially knock out some satellites, I think we should be sympathetic toward the sun as it goes through this difficult period.
Which makes it a cheap gift, too. Just put the link in the card.
I thought I'd try to be the one.
Well, from the article section about Plan B, I received the opposite impression.
Unless you're willing to consider the unstated conspiracy theory as evidence.
Be that as it may, I have a difficult time being concerned about this. So you have to get a prescription for a drug that might be harmful? This drug isn't illegal. Am I to believe that the massive inconvenience of a single doctor's visit is evidence of a campaign to undermine scientific findings by our government?
Please.
If there were no political or ethical considerations when approving drugs at the FDA, the scientists would be making the decisions, not appointees.