Without zooming in to the pixel level, I can sort of determine that Israel and Lebanon are the same color, I think. After zooming in I can tell they are both "resistant", simply because they are lighter than the Palestinian Authority, which is, in turn, slightly lighter than Jordan, which is big enough to tell what color it is.
I get this very same problem whenever some !@$#@! thinks it is a good idea to let me choose time zone only by clicking a map. Clicking my location will result, depending on the precise pixel, in either "Jerusalem", "Gaza", "Beirut" or "Amman".
Back in 2001, when the Palestinian only started firing rockets, these were really ridiculous. They were sometimes merely sign-posts poles with some explosives to make them fly stuffed inside, and were almost as likely to fly toward the area from which fired. These days are long gone.
Rockets today are either smuggled in through tunnels, or manufactured in shops set up for that purpose. The rockets fired at Tel Aviv (of which an older version are described here) have a range of 75 Kilometers (47 miles).
I know following a logical statement where you do not want to reach the conclusion is difficult, but do give it a try.
In this particular case, there is little correlation between which side has more casualties and which side has control over when things hit up and when they calm down.
In other words, I will accept your numbers as correct, but will ask what they are proving. Are you claiming that the barrage of rockets on Israeli cities prior to the operation's start magically evaporates once the Palestinians have more casualties?
From Hamas Charter, article 7, titled "The Universality of Hamas". It ends with the following passage:
The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him! This will not apply to the Gharqad, which is a Jewish tree (cited by Bukhari and Muslim).
That's what I just said, directing hatred at Israel serves the dictators in the middle east. But Israel is playing the part so well, it seems they are on their side.
In what way is Israel "playing the part so well"? In particular, what would you say Israel could have done differently?
The vast vast vast majority of people on both sides favor a two state solution.
I need to clear a bit of misinformation on that point.
When Israel, US leaders and most westerners hear "two states", they are assuming we are talking about "two states for two people". In other words, one Jewish state of Israel, and one Arab (or, more precisely, Muslim) state of Palestine. This, however, is not what Arab leaders mean when they say two states.
When Arab leaders say "two states", they mean one Muslim state for the Palestinians, and one non-national state where Israel was. This non-national state will then have to accept everyone who lived in Palestine for the two years prior to May 1948 plus all of their descendents (5 million people) as citizens. What this means in practice, is that when Abu Masen says "two states", he is actually referring to two Arab states.
Feel free to prove me wrong. Show me a statement by a Palestinian official where they acknowledge the right of a Jewish state called Israel to exist.
I have not seen the list of sites hacked, but I doubt a great many of them were government sites. These are, by and large, private sites who happen to belong to Israelis. In that, Anonymous are announcing that collective punishment is an acceptable form of action, as far as they are concerned.
While I can relate to the general sentiment, I do have issues with a few of the details.
They're lucky to have that option, both having the money to escape, but also the freedom to move more than 30 miles from where they're born.
By and large, the people living in those regions are among the least rich the Israeli society have. Escaping during times of war is mostly sponsored by volunteers.
Be that as it may, the Palestinian's inability to escape is offset, to some (not large) degree, by the fact that those good people are not actively targeted by the IDF. As opposed to the good people living on the east of the fence, who know that the rockets are aimed in order to kill them.
On the whole though, they can't think it's that bad living near Gaza as there's little stopping them moving north (or south).
Please tell me you are not seriously saying that your solution for someone living in Sderot and who is sick of being constantly targeted is to move.
People in Gaza don't have that choice. I have a magic western passport and GPO card, it enables me to pass through Erez into Israel more-or-less at will. People in the West Bank can move a little, and even go abroad, but people born in Gaza - on the whole - don't have the ability to leave.
And yet, they keep telling me Hamas was elected in democratic elections. This means that the majority of those very same people WANTED crazy terrorists who's proclaimed aim is to kill Jews to be their leaders. I wonder what the people casting a Hamas vote thought would happen next.
Now, before you accuse me of muddying the water, I am not trying to disclaim your statement that most of these people are good people who really just want to live in piece. I am saying, however, that the Palestinians should be smarter regarding who they choose as their leaders. Much though I ache for the Palestinian suffering (and I do), if it's them or us, I rather it be them. If they don't like it, they should stop making it a "them or us" situation.
They keep telling us it is illegitimate for us to interfere with whoever the Palestinians choose as their leaders. I accept both the moral correctness of that statement, as well as the practical wisdom behind it. The flip side, however, is that whoever the Palestinian do choose is the one who will be representing them, for better or for worse. In the case of Hamas, it is for worse. Until they do something about it, the people, good though they are, will have to eat the stew that their crooked, crazy leadership have prepared for them.
A word of advice. This is slashdot on a subject usually causing heated discussions. Use the <sarcasm> tag or risk the consequences of people who don't stop to think.
I will give you a few simple ways to know whether your point on view on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is incorrect:
If you think you can spot a clear villain, you are wrong
If you have a simple solution, you are wrong
If you think that Israel should do (or stop doing) something and the Palestinian should do (or stop doing) something, then you are probably right, but also out of touch with what is possible to achieve
I'll illustrate with an example:
I don't know how to solve the problem in the region, but it's a problem that was deliberately created by creating the nation of Israel smack dab in the middle of everyone that hated them and everyone that they hated.
Deliberately by whom? Also, the great opposition to the Zionist movement started a (relatively) long time after Jews started immigrating to (then) Palestine.
It's past time to do something.
Right. Because, obviously, there is a solution. You can't think of one, but there must be something that can be done that is better than what is currently being done, right? I mean, none of the leaders could think of anything, and not one "expert" on the subject offers anything that has not been tried before and failed, but drinkypoo says that something can be done, so it must be true.
It's too late to turn back the clock, which is unfortunate, because not doing it in the first place would clearly have been the best solution.
Really? My mother's mother, and her brother and sisters, that left Germany between 1930 and 1936, beg to differ.
Israel's blockade of the strip is probably illegal,
International law seems to disagree with you on that point.
and the only people who can stop them won't because they have too much to gain by maintaining the status quo. Keeping that region in a condition of endless war keeps all of those people busy.
The only people I can think of who can stop this without causing even more bloodshed are Hamas leadership (proof: The west bank's leaders decided to mind their own business, and are experiencing both more freedom and more economic prosperity, despite the fact that, unlike the Gaza strip, Israel still occupies that region). While I suspect that the motives you claim for why they do that are, more or less, correct, I somehow doubt that's who you meant.
Most of these "privacy concern" articles are things that can be handled by simply going home to your wife and kids when you are supposed to. Sounds like a lot of folks with these "privacy concerns" are just trying to hide their marital affairs.
Or, the way law enforcement usually phrase this, "if you are doing nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide".
While I agree with the original commenter that this story is lame, because people see exactly what is logged, this comment is precisely why privacy matters.
Giving up privacy means pushing people toward conformity. Everyone are pressured to behave the same, because any deviation from what is normal is immediately shown to everyone. This means complete stagnation.
I have never cheated on a partner. Furthermore, I have had a partner cheat on me, and the feeling is horrid. Having said that, a society in which cheating is impossible is not one I would like to live in.
Blink and its gone, the young hotshots will inevitably become the older programmers, and a hell of a lot sooner than they think.
Not so. The burn rate for programmers is very high. Not a lot of people who programmed while young are still as motivated to do so at 45, not to say 55. Then you get unmotivated workers, which is, as you know, a real problem.
Yes, those who manage to maintain their interest are, usually, a gold mine.
Fair enough. Question though: is a comment that is utterly wrong, ignores basic technology and makes up case law to justify its selfish position contributing to a constructive discussion? Or is it just drowning out good comments?
I'll grant you that it is a common post, and such, deserving of some education. However, we've been through this for years now. When does a comment stop being a starting point for education, and start being just a troll?
This is the classic post that is technically not a troll, technically not flamebait, but is still just noise we have to filter out. As a result, I'm perfectly ok seeing it hang around at -1. If people want to respond, more power to them. But to argue that somehow, posts that are factually incorrect should be modded up is to me a sign that you don't understand what keeps online fora alive.
Let's look at the baseline. Anonymous cowards post at 0. Registered users at 1. Registered users with very good karma at 2.
If you look at my comments' history, you will see that they are usually either left at their baseline 2, or modded up to 5. Very few have any other score. If you go over discussions at large, you will see a very similar pattern for comments a day old or older. This means that our 7 levels mod system actually only has 5: -1, 0, 1, 2 and 5. Since 0, 1 and 2 merely mean the comment was never touched by moderation, we only use 3 of the 7. I think that is not a constructive way to use the system.
So, yes, I don't think all labels are really necessary. For example, I would ditch "underrated", one of "insightful" and "informative" (which, I think, people usually fail to distinguish between), and several others. I would also introduce "common misconception" with a default "+1" value.
To get back to your question, an irrational illogical point of view that is held by a lot of people is constructive to a discussion. Silencing it means we do not want to hear dissenting opinions, which is decidedly not what slashdot about. If someone comes, out of the blue, with an irrational rant that has nothing to do with the discussion, then, by all means, mod them off topic (and not, as some moderators placed on my previous comment, because the discussion took an organic course unrelated to the topic of the article).
If it's on topic, but makes no sense, just leave it alone. It probably only has a score of 0 anyways.
I have mod points and I would mod you down because your logic stinks rather than because I disagree, but I think it is worth commenting on
I, too, have mod points. I do not agree with the above statement. Does that mean I should mod you down? In fact, I'm discarding all of my moderation done so far just so I can point this out to you.
You do not mod someone down merely because their logic stinks. If the person was trolling, that would be something different. GP did not seem to be, however.
The idea behind mod points is not to decide who is right. The idea is to weed out those comments unhelpful to constructive discussion, and keep those that promote it.
Now, had GP been marked "+5 insightful", I might be tempted to hit that "overrated" button. At the time of this writing, however, GP is +2 with no visible moderation, which is, in fact, a little below what it deserves, considering I'm sure others feel the same way, and considering the responses were reasoned and to the point (not that I can fix it now, that I've answered you, of course).
Don't abuse the moderation system. If someone writes a comment you don't agree with, just leave it alone. Disagreeing with you is not the same as trolling.
While not an American, it seems to me that the USA is in a constant and highly emotional battle, through legislation and lobbying, not to impart religious content (which I, personally, do not find so objectionable), but to also gag all non-religious conforming (whatever that means) content, from children, adults and everyone else.
Is this a losing battle? After all, trying to fight it with reason makes no sense. The arguments against science are emotional. Are we even equipped with tools to counter these claims, being as it is we are not talking the same language?
On a somewhat related note, what would you say to the proposition that the wave we are seeing of scientific fraud in studies is related to the same basic motives, and is just as dangerous, as the religious assault?
The DNA tests are fine. The problem is that too many people watch CSI and don't know what statistics mean.
While 100% accurate, the problem is that part of these "too many people" are the police, the judges and jury.
What private company? And nobody has asserted that it matches a unique person,
Ahem ahem ahem.
I'm sorry, I was caught by a sudden cough. Do continue...
but that it's a 99.something% match. Run that through a database containing everyone on the planet, and you get a few million positive hits, all but one an error. But that's great reliability. If you run it against the top 10 suspects, then you have better than a 99% chance it's the one that you got the match on. That's enough for a conviction, in most cases.
Yes, I completely agree. Unfortunately, while you show much clue in the field of statistics, you show very little clue in the field of human behavior.
DNA is routinely used, not to narrow down the suspects pool, but in order to find the suspect to begin with. That is why DNA databases are so lucrative for law enforcement. Quite often, a finger gets pointed at someone because police already had his DNA for an unrelated reason. As I'm sure you understand, this kind of use is precisely the kind where GP's concerns are justified.
Not exactly. A cat in such a situation would of course be dead or alive, regardless of whether you observe it or not. You may not know *whether* the cat is alive or dead, but you know *that* the cat is alive or dead.
The experiment doesn't work, so you are right. But had the experiment worked, then that claim would be incorrect. The point in time in which the universe decides whether the cat died or not is when we test it, not before. If we never test the cat, it is neither alive nor dead.
The measurement of the state to choose whether or not to kill the cat would in itself collapse the waveform.
Exactly. It is uncollapsed before the measurement.
Schroedinger developed the thought experiment to describe what he considered the absurdity of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. It's not meant to be taken as literally as it is tended to be.
But that interpretation prevailed. That is the whole point of ESR. It is not possible to extend a wavelength function, uncollapsed, to the size of a cat, but when actual atoms are involved it really is the point of testing that determines the result. The result is not there all along, just waiting to be measured.
The point of the thought experiment is that you cannot know whether the cat is alive or dead before opening the box.
No, that is not the experiment's point. That is its premise.
It's 50/50. In one interpretation of quantum mechanics that means that the cat exists in a combination of both states prior to observing it. Observing it causes one or the other of the states to prevail.
It is the only interpretation that I am aware of (though its precise phrasing varies). In fact, it is the only reason that anyone hopes qbits will work. Hence me not being confused.
Unlike what the original poster said, the cat is not already dead when you open the box. That is the whole point of the experiment. The cat is neither alive nor dead until the point in time in which you look, at which point it has already been alive/dead all along.
This principle is the one that drives the quantum computing research. The idea is that you create 512 qbits signifying a number. Since they are in their base form, they each can be either 1 or zero, which means that they are, potentially, all 2^512 possible numbers. You then pass them through a series of filters that, essentially, force them to multiply with another set of 512 qbits and form a known result. Only then do you check what each of the qbits is. You have just factored a 1024 bit integer in zero time by letting quantum mechanics test all possible combination concurrently.
This wouldn't allow you to gain a "strong" piece of information – whether the cat was alive or dead – but you might be able to detect other properties.
So, in essence, the main thing they found out is how to do more stuff with qbits without triggering a collapse of the wavelength function.
Real summary: Obscure need which is somehow quantum computing, but not in any way feline, related gets obscure advance.
Why is it equivalent of peeking without killing it ?!
The cat might already be dead when you peek. Now, apparantly you simply can peek at the cat's state.
I think you missed the whole point of the thought experiment. No, the cat is decidedly not already dead when you peeked. It is the moment of your peeking that picks a state for the cat.
Which, of course, means that the summary is meaningless. I'll go read TFA, and, more likely, then consult with a Physics Phd I know to try and make (relative) sense of this discovery.
You are NOT special and there is guaranteed someone better than you on this planet.
First, sure you are special. Everyone, best or otherwise, bring something different to anywhere they work at (unless it's a soul crushing place). Yes, there is guaranteed to be someone better than you on this planet (well, there is a 1:7,000,000,000 chance there isn't). If, however, you are one in a thousand, the company is highly unlikely to find those better people.
To summarize my comment so far: You are special, and it is possible that the company cannot get any better than you. You are still replaceable.
Yes, your replacement will not be as good as you are. They might cost more (at least when amortized over the time it takes them to complete a given task). They might not be as organized as you. They might turn out inferior solutions. At the end of the day, however, they will get the job done.
The only difference is that the men have to work harder to get their prey, while the women's prey are more than willing and eager to be "victims".
While I suspect the first part of your sentence is wrong, I know for a fact your second part, particularly the quotes, is entirely wrong. Assuming that an underage child who was seduced into having sex with an adult is not a victim merely because the child is a boy and the adult is a woman is neanderthal.
This is very similar to the perception that men are never raped. While, indeed, more rare, those rape victims now suffer, in addition to the standard problems any rape victim suffers, society's complete reluctance to even see him as a victim.
So put your fantasies aside and face reality. A 30 years old woman having "consentual" sex with a 13 years boy is no less rape than a 30 years old man having "consentual" sex with a 13 years old girl.
Slashdot Mirror
Without zooming in to the pixel level, I can sort of determine that Israel and Lebanon are the same color, I think. After zooming in I can tell they are both "resistant", simply because they are lighter than the Palestinian Authority, which is, in turn, slightly lighter than Jordan, which is big enough to tell what color it is.
I get this very same problem whenever some !@$#@! thinks it is a good idea to let me choose time zone only by clicking a map. Clicking my location will result, depending on the precise pixel, in either "Jerusalem", "Gaza", "Beirut" or "Amman".
Shachar
I actually doubt they are trying.
There were plans to assassinate Saddam Hussein, which were spoiled because of a misfired missile during a training session.
Then again, those plans were based on target availability, so maybe Amadenejad would be a target. I don't know.
Shachar
Back in 2001, when the Palestinian only started firing rockets, these were really ridiculous. They were sometimes merely sign-posts poles with some explosives to make them fly stuffed inside, and were almost as likely to fly toward the area from which fired. These days are long gone.
Rockets today are either smuggled in through tunnels, or manufactured in shops set up for that purpose. The rockets fired at Tel Aviv (of which an older version are described here) have a range of 75 Kilometers (47 miles).
Shachar
Care to cite your references? Care to provide a single case in which Mossad acted against someone merely because of cyber vandalism?
And modded "insightful", too...
Shachar
I know following a logical statement where you do not want to reach the conclusion is difficult, but do give it a try.
In this particular case, there is little correlation between which side has more casualties and which side has control over when things hit up and when they calm down.
In other words, I will accept your numbers as correct, but will ask what they are proving. Are you claiming that the barrage of rockets on Israeli cities prior to the operation's start magically evaporates once the Palestinians have more casualties?
Shachar
From Hamas Charter, article 7, titled "The Universality of Hamas". It ends with the following passage:
The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him! This will not apply to the Gharqad, which is a Jewish tree (cited by Bukhari and Muslim).
All brackets in the original.
Shachar
That's what I just said, directing hatred at Israel serves the dictators in the middle east. But Israel is playing the part so well, it seems they are on their side.
In what way is Israel "playing the part so well"? In particular, what would you say Israel could have done differently?
Shachar
The vast vast vast majority of people on both sides favor a two state solution.
I need to clear a bit of misinformation on that point.
When Israel, US leaders and most westerners hear "two states", they are assuming we are talking about "two states for two people". In other words, one Jewish state of Israel, and one Arab (or, more precisely, Muslim) state of Palestine. This, however, is not what Arab leaders mean when they say two states.
When Arab leaders say "two states", they mean one Muslim state for the Palestinians, and one non-national state where Israel was. This non-national state will then have to accept everyone who lived in Palestine for the two years prior to May 1948 plus all of their descendents (5 million people) as citizens. What this means in practice, is that when Abu Masen says "two states", he is actually referring to two Arab states.
Feel free to prove me wrong. Show me a statement by a Palestinian official where they acknowledge the right of a Jewish state called Israel to exist.
Not even close.
I have not seen the list of sites hacked, but I doubt a great many of them were government sites. These are, by and large, private sites who happen to belong to Israelis. In that, Anonymous are announcing that collective punishment is an acceptable form of action, as far as they are concerned.
Ironic.
Shachar
While I can relate to the general sentiment, I do have issues with a few of the details.
They're lucky to have that option, both having the money to escape, but also the freedom to move more than 30 miles from where they're born.
By and large, the people living in those regions are among the least rich the Israeli society have. Escaping during times of war is mostly sponsored by volunteers.
Be that as it may, the Palestinian's inability to escape is offset, to some (not large) degree, by the fact that those good people are not actively targeted by the IDF. As opposed to the good people living on the east of the fence, who know that the rockets are aimed in order to kill them.
On the whole though, they can't think it's that bad living near Gaza as there's little stopping them moving north (or south).
Please tell me you are not seriously saying that your solution for someone living in Sderot and who is sick of being constantly targeted is to move.
People in Gaza don't have that choice. I have a magic western passport and GPO card, it enables me to pass through Erez into Israel more-or-less at will. People in the West Bank can move a little, and even go abroad, but people born in Gaza - on the whole - don't have the ability to leave.
And yet, they keep telling me Hamas was elected in democratic elections. This means that the majority of those very same people WANTED crazy terrorists who's proclaimed aim is to kill Jews to be their leaders. I wonder what the people casting a Hamas vote thought would happen next.
Now, before you accuse me of muddying the water, I am not trying to disclaim your statement that most of these people are good people who really just want to live in piece. I am saying, however, that the Palestinians should be smarter regarding who they choose as their leaders. Much though I ache for the Palestinian suffering (and I do), if it's them or us, I rather it be them. If they don't like it, they should stop making it a "them or us" situation.
They keep telling us it is illegitimate for us to interfere with whoever the Palestinians choose as their leaders. I accept both the moral correctness of that statement, as well as the practical wisdom behind it. The flip side, however, is that whoever the Palestinian do choose is the one who will be representing them, for better or for worse. In the case of Hamas, it is for worse. Until they do something about it, the people, good though they are, will have to eat the stew that their crooked, crazy leadership have prepared for them.
Shachar
A word of advice. This is slashdot on a subject usually causing heated discussions. Use the <sarcasm> tag or risk the consequences of people who don't stop to think.
Shachar
I will give you a few simple ways to know whether your point on view on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is incorrect:
I'll illustrate with an example:
I don't know how to solve the problem in the region, but it's a problem that was deliberately created by creating the nation of Israel smack dab in the middle of everyone that hated them and everyone that they hated.
Deliberately by whom? Also, the great opposition to the Zionist movement started a (relatively) long time after Jews started immigrating to (then) Palestine.
It's past time to do something.
Right. Because, obviously, there is a solution. You can't think of one, but there must be something that can be done that is better than what is currently being done, right? I mean, none of the leaders could think of anything, and not one "expert" on the subject offers anything that has not been tried before and failed, but drinkypoo says that something can be done, so it must be true.
It's too late to turn back the clock, which is unfortunate, because not doing it in the first place would clearly have been the best solution.
Really? My mother's mother, and her brother and sisters, that left Germany between 1930 and 1936, beg to differ.
Israel's blockade of the strip is probably illegal,
International law seems to disagree with you on that point.
and the only people who can stop them won't because they have too much to gain by maintaining the status quo. Keeping that region in a condition of endless war keeps all of those people busy.
The only people I can think of who can stop this without causing even more bloodshed are Hamas leadership (proof: The west bank's leaders decided to mind their own business, and are experiencing both more freedom and more economic prosperity, despite the fact that, unlike the Gaza strip, Israel still occupies that region). While I suspect that the motives you claim for why they do that are, more or less, correct, I somehow doubt that's who you meant.
Shachar
Most of these "privacy concern" articles are things that can be handled by simply going home to your wife and kids when you are supposed to. Sounds like a lot of folks with these "privacy concerns" are just trying to hide their marital affairs.
Or, the way law enforcement usually phrase this, "if you are doing nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide".
While I agree with the original commenter that this story is lame, because people see exactly what is logged, this comment is precisely why privacy matters.
Giving up privacy means pushing people toward conformity. Everyone are pressured to behave the same, because any deviation from what is normal is immediately shown to everyone. This means complete stagnation.
I have never cheated on a partner. Furthermore, I have had a partner cheat on me, and the feeling is horrid. Having said that, a society in which cheating is impossible is not one I would like to live in.
Shachar
Blink and its gone, the young hotshots will inevitably become the older programmers, and a hell of a lot sooner than they think.
Not so. The burn rate for programmers is very high. Not a lot of people who programmed while young are still as motivated to do so at 45, not to say 55. Then you get unmotivated workers, which is, as you know, a real problem.
Yes, those who manage to maintain their interest are, usually, a gold mine.
Shachar
Fair enough. Question though: is a comment that is utterly wrong, ignores basic technology and makes up case law to justify its selfish position contributing to a constructive discussion? Or is it just drowning out good comments?
I'll grant you that it is a common post, and such, deserving of some education. However, we've been through this for years now. When does a comment stop being a starting point for education, and start being just a troll?
This is the classic post that is technically not a troll, technically not flamebait, but is still just noise we have to filter out. As a result, I'm perfectly ok seeing it hang around at -1. If people want to respond, more power to them. But to argue that somehow, posts that are factually incorrect should be modded up is to me a sign that you don't understand what keeps online fora alive.
Let's look at the baseline. Anonymous cowards post at 0. Registered users at 1. Registered users with very good karma at 2.
If you look at my comments' history, you will see that they are usually either left at their baseline 2, or modded up to 5. Very few have any other score. If you go over discussions at large, you will see a very similar pattern for comments a day old or older. This means that our 7 levels mod system actually only has 5: -1, 0, 1, 2 and 5. Since 0, 1 and 2 merely mean the comment was never touched by moderation, we only use 3 of the 7. I think that is not a constructive way to use the system.
So, yes, I don't think all labels are really necessary. For example, I would ditch "underrated", one of "insightful" and "informative" (which, I think, people usually fail to distinguish between), and several others. I would also introduce "common misconception" with a default "+1" value.
To get back to your question, an irrational illogical point of view that is held by a lot of people is constructive to a discussion. Silencing it means we do not want to hear dissenting opinions, which is decidedly not what slashdot about. If someone comes, out of the blue, with an irrational rant that has nothing to do with the discussion, then, by all means, mod them off topic (and not, as some moderators placed on my previous comment, because the discussion took an organic course unrelated to the topic of the article).
If it's on topic, but makes no sense, just leave it alone. It probably only has a score of 0 anyways.
Shachar
I have mod points and I would mod you down because your logic stinks rather than because I disagree, but I think it is worth commenting on
I, too, have mod points. I do not agree with the above statement. Does that mean I should mod you down? In fact, I'm discarding all of my moderation done so far just so I can point this out to you.
You do not mod someone down merely because their logic stinks. If the person was trolling, that would be something different. GP did not seem to be, however.
The idea behind mod points is not to decide who is right. The idea is to weed out those comments unhelpful to constructive discussion, and keep those that promote it.
Now, had GP been marked "+5 insightful", I might be tempted to hit that "overrated" button. At the time of this writing, however, GP is +2 with no visible moderation, which is, in fact, a little below what it deserves, considering I'm sure others feel the same way, and considering the responses were reasoned and to the point (not that I can fix it now, that I've answered you, of course).
Don't abuse the moderation system. If someone writes a comment you don't agree with, just leave it alone. Disagreeing with you is not the same as trolling.
Shachar
While not an American, it seems to me that the USA is in a constant and highly emotional battle, through legislation and lobbying, not to impart religious content (which I, personally, do not find so objectionable), but to also gag all non-religious conforming (whatever that means) content, from children, adults and everyone else.
Is this a losing battle? After all, trying to fight it with reason makes no sense. The arguments against science are emotional. Are we even equipped with tools to counter these claims, being as it is we are not talking the same language?
On a somewhat related note, what would you say to the proposition that the wave we are seeing of scientific fraud in studies is related to the same basic motives, and is just as dangerous, as the religious assault?
Shachar
The DNA tests are fine. The problem is that too many people watch CSI and don't know what statistics mean.
While 100% accurate, the problem is that part of these "too many people" are the police, the judges and jury.
What private company? And nobody has asserted that it matches a unique person,
Ahem ahem ahem.
I'm sorry, I was caught by a sudden cough. Do continue...
but that it's a 99.something% match. Run that through a database containing everyone on the planet, and you get a few million positive hits, all but one an error. But that's great reliability. If you run it against the top 10 suspects, then you have better than a 99% chance it's the one that you got the match on. That's enough for a conviction, in most cases.
Yes, I completely agree. Unfortunately, while you show much clue in the field of statistics, you show very little clue in the field of human behavior.
DNA is routinely used, not to narrow down the suspects pool, but in order to find the suspect to begin with. That is why DNA databases are so lucrative for law enforcement. Quite often, a finger gets pointed at someone because police already had his DNA for an unrelated reason. As I'm sure you understand, this kind of use is precisely the kind where GP's concerns are justified.
Shachar
Not exactly. A cat in such a situation would of course be dead or alive, regardless of whether you observe it or not. You may not know *whether* the cat is alive or dead, but you know *that* the cat is alive or dead.
The experiment doesn't work, so you are right. But had the experiment worked, then that claim would be incorrect. The point in time in which the universe decides whether the cat died or not is when we test it, not before. If we never test the cat, it is neither alive nor dead.
The measurement of the state to choose whether or not to kill the cat would in itself collapse the waveform.
Exactly. It is uncollapsed before the measurement.
Schroedinger developed the thought experiment to describe what he considered the absurdity of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. It's not meant to be taken as literally as it is tended to be.
But that interpretation prevailed. That is the whole point of ESR. It is not possible to extend a wavelength function, uncollapsed, to the size of a cat, but when actual atoms are involved it really is the point of testing that determines the result. The result is not there all along, just waiting to be measured.
Shachar
No. You cannot measure whether the cat is alive without causing a determination of that very question. You can measure other things, though.
I should point out that the cat analogy is not a very good one, and TFA chose it only to make the article more appealing.
Shachar
No, that is not the experiment's point. That is its premise.
It is the only interpretation that I am aware of (though its precise phrasing varies). In fact, it is the only reason that anyone hopes qbits will work. Hence me not being confused.
Unlike what the original poster said, the cat is not already dead when you open the box. That is the whole point of the experiment. The cat is neither alive nor dead until the point in time in which you look, at which point it has already been alive/dead all along.
This principle is the one that drives the quantum computing research. The idea is that you create 512 qbits signifying a number. Since they are in their base form, they each can be either 1 or zero, which means that they are, potentially, all 2^512 possible numbers. You then pass them through a series of filters that, essentially, force them to multiply with another set of 512 qbits and form a known result. Only then do you check what each of the qbits is. You have just factored a 1024 bit integer in zero time by letting quantum mechanics test all possible combination concurrently.
Shachar
So, in essence, the main thing they found out is how to do more stuff with qbits without triggering a collapse of the wavelength function.
Real summary:
Obscure need which is somehow quantum computing, but not in any way feline, related gets obscure advance.
Shachar
Why is it equivalent of peeking without killing it ?!
The cat might already be dead when you peek. Now, apparantly you simply can peek at the cat's state.
I think you missed the whole point of the thought experiment. No, the cat is decidedly not already dead when you peeked. It is the moment of your peeking that picks a state for the cat.
Which, of course, means that the summary is meaningless. I'll go read TFA, and, more likely, then consult with a Physics Phd I know to try and make (relative) sense of this discovery.
Shachar
From TFA:
First, sure you are special. Everyone, best or otherwise, bring something different to anywhere they work at (unless it's a soul crushing place). Yes, there is guaranteed to be someone better than you on this planet (well, there is a 1:7,000,000,000 chance there isn't). If, however, you are one in a thousand, the company is highly unlikely to find those better people.
To summarize my comment so far: You are special, and it is possible that the company cannot get any better than you. You are still replaceable.
Yes, your replacement will not be as good as you are. They might cost more (at least when amortized over the time it takes them to complete a given task). They might not be as organized as you. They might turn out inferior solutions. At the end of the day, however, they will get the job done.
Shachar
The only difference is that the men have to work harder to get their prey, while the women's prey are more than willing and eager to be "victims".
While I suspect the first part of your sentence is wrong, I know for a fact your second part, particularly the quotes, is entirely wrong. Assuming that an underage child who was seduced into having sex with an adult is not a victim merely because the child is a boy and the adult is a woman is neanderthal.
This is very similar to the perception that men are never raped. While, indeed, more rare, those rape victims now suffer, in addition to the standard problems any rape victim suffers, society's complete reluctance to even see him as a victim.
So put your fantasies aside and face reality. A 30 years old woman having "consentual" sex with a 13 years boy is no less rape than a 30 years old man having "consentual" sex with a 13 years old girl.
Shachar