I don't expect a link to a dictionary, just something to support calling a person a bigot. You did so here, and somewhere else down the thread:
You always bang on about Muslims. You really should read more unbiased news outlets, as you clearly have been corrupted by forces just as evil as the evil Muslims you think exist. See how that works? Of course not - you're a hate-filled bigot.
jareth further up the thread just went for the "you're a racist" argument.
Yeah, about 10% of his posts mention "Muslim". A fairly large percentage of them are based on the Muslim - terrorist stereotype, a fair few have references to support criticisms of Islam. Nothing beats a bit of Friday afternoon Slashdot stalking! Quite frankly, he's got every right to be highly critical of Islam, but tarring everyone with the same bush certainly isn't reasonable.
The problem I have is that people are quite happy to throw around accusations racist, *phobic, bigot as an argument against somebody's comments without ever supporting their argument, or even understanding the terms they're using. It's like a feminist calling a man a misogynist when he doesn't agree with them, or being accused of being anti-Semitic when criticising Israeli policies. More often it's just a knee-jerk reaction rather than a reasoned argument, and quite frankly the laziness of it pisses me off.
You would never say something like "Alpha C is 4.3 light years away, while the voyager spacecraft has already traveled 18.2 billion kilometers! The stars are ours, if we take the time!"
Well, to be fair you were originally complaining about the authors mixing units, and nowhere did they do so in a single sentence.
Your "metre by a yard" comparison is cute, but relying on people to know that a metre is about 3 inches more than a yard certainly is something that can lead to troubles.
i made this comment (I can't remember what it was about) in front of a group of friends in uni(engineering, management, nursing students) - some of those I knew would understand. Those that didn't, they asked, because it was obvious there was a difference, otherwise I would have said "a metre by a metre". Now they know, or at least knew for a period afterwards. As far as I'm concerned, there's no reason to be embarrassed about being ignorant of something simple. Choosing to stay ignorant is a different matter.
Right, so you chose the wrong word that had the biggest negative weight behind it.
As for Islamophobia, I doubt many people are actually frightened by Islam, more that they are disgusted by its attitudes to other religions, women, apostasy and homosexuality. So again, wrong word. Anti-Islamic would probably the best description, and many people would not feel that being described as such would be negative, for the reasons stated above. I'm wouldn't really class myself as an anti-theist - believe what ever makes you happy, but if your beliefs start impinging on the rights of people who don't toe the line, then fuck you, you deserve no respect.
So we're left with prejudice and bigotry. Prejudice may or may not apply - it was preconceived, but not necessarily without reason. As for bigotry, it is a result of somebody's prejudices which as I said may not be a valid argument for him being a bigot.
It's quite possible that Muslims were mentioned because Catholics priests (who may want to remove any mention of themselves from google) would fall under the paedophile group already mentioned.
Of course ChrisQ may be a complete Islamophobe (who shakes with fear when he sees a niqab), and loathes every Muslim, no matter how moderate, but to base that opinion on a line of text is just plain stupid. What's certain is that both yourself and myself are both being prejudiced against ChrisQ as we've been passing preconceived comments on him without knowing the actual basis of his comments.
Yes, but you can't build the wall just to survive prevailing winds, what happens if it *does* get hit by a tornado?
The problem is also that a long wall isn't like a rectangular tower - the drag coefficient will be far higher as a wall of this size can be assumed to act similarly to 2d flow (~2), compared to a tower (~1.3 -> 1.5), so loading will be much higher too. I might load up OpenFOAM to have a look.
Even if you're skimming the summary, if you see "1,000 foot" in the title, and then see the number "300" in the body text, then the immediate reaction should be "oh, they're probably using metres here". That's even if you're ignoring the fact that explicitly states the units used.
mixing them should be a capital crime.
Bollocks - I regularly mix units, because it sometimes makes a lot of sense. I've described something as a metre by a yard (it wasn't quite square). Similarly, I've described items in feet or inches in area, but thickness in millimetres (it tends to be anything less than 1/4 inch).
Before you complain that not everyone knows basic conversions (not everyone's an engineer), it helps if you do any amount of travelling, especially if you're from the US or UK. Also, this topic is physics/engineering, so it usual to see mixed units - we see them when talking about rocket payloads all the time. Similarly, would you complain about the mixing of AUs, light years, millions of km/miles in an article about astrophysics or astronomy.
Fake celebrity endorsements - using Celine Dion's photo on his website after she supported "...what she believed to be a philanthropic cause..." even though she's stated that she has no involvement with him. Though in that case, I'm not sure who I should feel sorry for!
What was more interesting was reading the comments for that article. Out of the 9 comments, one commented on the Nobel Peace Prize, one commented on show business (I didn't really understand the comment). The remaining 7 were scathing about the journalism, used the standard "well what have you done" argument and questioned the journalists motives. Interestingly enough, all 7 users have only made a single comment each. Clearly that article hit a nerve.
Sounds a bit like Kent "there's no fucking carbon in it" Hovind's ethics - lie, cheat and commit fraud as long as it's for God.
For anyone who doesn't get the reference - Potholer54: "Carbon dating doesn't work -- debunked". I'd normally link to the actual time-stamp (4:51), but the video is good enough to watch on it's own. I go back to that clip whenever I need a laugh.
Having a something visible in incredibly important. I've never owned a bike, but did own a Westfield (Lotus Super7 style) kit car - it was 425kg of box metal and fiberglass. It was bright yellow, and I always drove with my headlights switched on. When you're driving something in which you'll most likely die in the event of an accident you make sure that people will see you. It wasn't massively noisy (2 twin webber carbs are noisy but behind a scoop, but it had a good exhaust silencer) compared to most kit cars, and as most people have said most of the noise is behind you.
I picked up a lot of good habits from motorcyclists when driving that car that I still use - always look over your shoulder (don't rely solely on mirrors) when changing lanes, never assume that people realise how quickly you can accelerate and never assume that people have seen you. In fact, assume nothing.
Out of interest, did you go to a CofE school or a state school, and when? I'm under the impression that my niece's school (England) has an RE class, but then they're probably a lot more careful about what they teach (rather than preach) nowadays. For her school, I can see no mention of a chaplain being on the books.
I too had a lot of RE classes where they spent more time preaching rather than teaching, though for the last few years most of us used it as a place to do our homework. In secondary school I always felt that I should kick up a fuss to allow me not to go to the [daily] religious assembly - like Jewish students - as I was (still am) an atheist. It was only years later that I realised that the only reason that I was in a private Methodist school was that the state (Republic of Ireland) provides grants to families to go to a school of their own faith - something that is granted in the constitution. So, I may have put up with the religious rubbish, but I did get an [what I feel was an] excellent education from the school.
It's not ten-year-olds that you have to worry about, it's the 40+ people (who haven't immersed themselves in the internet) who google (more likely use ask.com) for something, comes across IkeaHacks.net, sees the familiar Ikea font at the top in familiar colours and then clicks on an advert to that takes them sliderobes.com I've come across websites with a trademark in the name, and sometimes it's been easier to check the whois record to see if it's legit.
The funny thing about technology is that the "a toddler could do it" cliche no longer works - it's the complete opposite now. Companies should advertise their products as "an octogenarian could do it", but that would probably be seen as patronising.
That would work if the hacks actually linked to the Ikea furniture they used, or if the "My Mini Store" button took them to Ikea's website, rather than her affiliated Amazon store (the button is no longer working).
Unless you've visited the Ikea website recently, visiting a website that has "Ikea" on the header, with no obvious parody (like Ryanair sucks) or disclaimer (on the about page isn't obvious), and uses similar colours, then yes it *could* be confusing. And the people who are likely to be confused *may* (I'm not a psychologist) be more likely to click the "My Mini Store" button or use the adverts to try buying stuff, which as you might guess take you to Ikea's competitors.
Most fan sites put a disclaimer on their front page, or maybe even on every page so as to make it completely unambiguous. Putting it on a page that people are highly unlikely to visit comes across as being slightly dishonest.
I get pretty pissed off when I hear about company's abusing their IP rights, but as others have posted, there's a right and a wrong way of running a fan site - she's done it the wrong way. Sure they could have sent her a nice letter rather than a C&D (maybe they did, though unlikely), however think of it as a start to haggling, if you Ikea starts low, then a negotiated middle ground will be nowhere near what they want - and this appears to be what happened.
As others have mentioned, the "My Mini Store" button take you (it's now not working) to an Amazon affiliate store, so everything pointed to the owner making money from Ikea's trademark.
As a disclaimer, I used to buy quite a lot from Ikea, but I've stopped - the quality has really gone downhill, and rather than increase prices a little, they elected to drop the quality. They've obviously done the maths and worked out it's more profitable, but it's still annoying to find that simple wooden shelves now have ugly grey plastic bit visible on them.
I'm not convinced Serbians would blow even more money on firearms - they don't have to, they've a massive surplus of weapons left over after an incredibly bloody civil war - there's a firearm for every 2nd man, woman and child.
Look at it another way, large ownership of weapons are a result of wars in the country 1 - USA - In the constitution as a result of the war of independence 2 - Serbia - A succession of wars following the breakup of Yugoslavia 3 - Yemem - Take your pick - there are 4 since 1994 4 - Switzerland - No civil war since 1840s, but instead had been surrounded by countries at war for the following 105 years, while attempting to stay neutral 5 - Cyprus - A country which has been a host to sectarian violence between Greeks and Turks since the Ottoman Empire
Similarly, for the UK, Northern Ireland has over 3 times the number of firearms than the rest of the UK, again a history of bloody sectarian violence. I'm not saying that I'm right, just that it the history of the country should be considered when looking at the reason for firearm ownership rates.
[After trying to find out where it is, it said it wouldn't be more specific because I hadn't told it where I was] Me: I live in [REDACTED], do you know where that is. Bot: No! Where? M: I've told you where I live, so now it's your turn. B: I live in a land of beautiful dreams and hopes. M: Ah, so you're not in the physical realm. B:...
No I didn't mean to, for that reason I did state "solely" - normally I reread my posts to remove any ambiguity, but I think I was concentrating on the numbers part of my post. I certainly didn't mean to imply that gun ownership isn't part of the culture of violence.
...and I am confident for Sweden at least the number is higher than the US.
So you arbitrarily multiply double the number of firearms, because of a feeling - basically saying that 30% of Swedes are lying about possessing unregistered firearms. Then you add the number of government firearms (920,000* + 32,652**) which adds an extra 10 firearms per 100 people, but keep in mind that only a small percentage of these may be in possession of a civil militia, however, and this is a big one - a Swedish colleague of mine said that they don't have government issued rifles in almost every house, like they do in Switzerland. Certainly I can find no mention of one online, so please link to some sources.
He did however say that he's heard of stories of weapons caches, but mainly among Hells Angels type groups who stole them during national service - but again I can find no solid evidence of that. Plus, it doesn't fit in with the idea of repelling an Eastern foe, more like a gang wanting a stash of weapons for turf wars, crime, etc. Moose hunting is a big thing, but do you really think that 30% of the population have an illegally owner firearm for something as public as hunting?
Even with your plucked out of the air numbers you haven't even reached gun ownership levels in the USA. And surely, if you feel it's ok to arbitrarily inflate gun possession level in one country, you should inflate it for the USA too, but you haven't.
* 920,000 in the defence forces ** 32,652 in law enforcement Source: Guns in Sweden
While I completely agree with you on the violence being cultural rather than due solely to firearm ownership rates, I do have to disagree with you about Scandinavia having higher ownership rates. According to this the US (89/100 people) has 53% more firearms per person than Serbian (58/100 people) who is second in the list. Sweden and Norway are ranked 10th and 11th respectively with almost 32/100 people.
This is a list of privately owned firearms, not possession, so state owned firearms (like in Switzerland) are not included. However to bring the possession rate of Sweden up to the ownership rate in the US, the government would have to give a firearm to every 2nd person.
Not necessarily - they could just go straight over (or under) the North Pole, It may not be the shortest route (I haven't checked distances), but it's certainly the path of least resistance, unless of course Canada has armed their polar bears and mooseseses
Slashdot Mirror
I don't expect a link to a dictionary, just something to support calling a person a bigot. You did so here, and somewhere else down the thread:
You always bang on about Muslims. You really should read more unbiased news outlets, as you clearly have been corrupted by forces just as evil as the evil Muslims you think exist. See how that works? Of course not - you're a hate-filled bigot.
jareth further up the thread just went for the "you're a racist" argument.
Yeah, about 10% of his posts mention "Muslim". A fairly large percentage of them are based on the Muslim - terrorist stereotype, a fair few have references to support criticisms of Islam. Nothing beats a bit of Friday afternoon Slashdot stalking! Quite frankly, he's got every right to be highly critical of Islam, but tarring everyone with the same bush certainly isn't reasonable.
The problem I have is that people are quite happy to throw around accusations racist, *phobic, bigot as an argument against somebody's comments without ever supporting their argument, or even understanding the terms they're using. It's like a feminist calling a man a misogynist when he doesn't agree with them, or being accused of being anti-Semitic when criticising Israeli policies. More often it's just a knee-jerk reaction rather than a reasoned argument, and quite frankly the laziness of it pisses me off.
You would never say something like "Alpha C is 4.3 light years away, while the voyager spacecraft has already traveled 18.2 billion kilometers! The stars are ours, if we take the time!"
Well, to be fair you were originally complaining about the authors mixing units, and nowhere did they do so in a single sentence.
Your "metre by a yard" comparison is cute, but relying on people to know that a metre is about 3 inches more than a yard certainly is something that can lead to troubles.
i made this comment (I can't remember what it was about) in front of a group of friends in uni(engineering, management, nursing students) - some of those I knew would understand. Those that didn't, they asked, because it was obvious there was a difference, otherwise I would have said "a metre by a metre". Now they know, or at least knew for a period afterwards. As far as I'm concerned, there's no reason to be embarrassed about being ignorant of something simple. Choosing to stay ignorant is a different matter.
Right, so you chose the wrong word that had the biggest negative weight behind it.
As for Islamophobia, I doubt many people are actually frightened by Islam, more that they are disgusted by its attitudes to other religions, women, apostasy and homosexuality. So again, wrong word. Anti-Islamic would probably the best description, and many people would not feel that being described as such would be negative, for the reasons stated above. I'm wouldn't really class myself as an anti-theist - believe what ever makes you happy, but if your beliefs start impinging on the rights of people who don't toe the line, then fuck you, you deserve no respect.
So we're left with prejudice and bigotry. Prejudice may or may not apply - it was preconceived, but not necessarily without reason. As for bigotry, it is a result of somebody's prejudices which as I said may not be a valid argument for him being a bigot.
It's quite possible that Muslims were mentioned because Catholics priests (who may want to remove any mention of themselves from google) would fall under the paedophile group already mentioned.
Of course ChrisQ may be a complete Islamophobe (who shakes with fear when he sees a niqab), and loathes every Muslim, no matter how moderate, but to base that opinion on a line of text is just plain stupid. What's certain is that both yourself and myself are both being prejudiced against ChrisQ as we've been passing preconceived comments on him without knowing the actual basis of his comments.
But, but but, they were communist sympathisers - that should have been reason enough.
Yes, but you can't build the wall just to survive prevailing winds, what happens if it *does* get hit by a tornado?
The problem is also that a long wall isn't like a rectangular tower - the drag coefficient will be far higher as a wall of this size can be assumed to act similarly to 2d flow (~2), compared to a tower (~1.3 -> 1.5), so loading will be much higher too. I might load up OpenFOAM to have a look.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_coefficient
Even if you're skimming the summary, if you see "1,000 foot" in the title, and then see the number "300" in the body text, then the immediate reaction should be "oh, they're probably using metres here". That's even if you're ignoring the fact that explicitly states the units used.
mixing them should be a capital crime.
Bollocks - I regularly mix units, because it sometimes makes a lot of sense. I've described something as a metre by a yard (it wasn't quite square). Similarly, I've described items in feet or inches in area, but thickness in millimetres (it tends to be anything less than 1/4 inch).
Before you complain that not everyone knows basic conversions (not everyone's an engineer), it helps if you do any amount of travelling, especially if you're from the US or UK. Also, this topic is physics/engineering, so it usual to see mixed units - we see them when talking about rocket payloads all the time. Similarly, would you complain about the mixing of AUs, light years, millions of km/miles in an article about astrophysics or astronomy.
Fake celebrity endorsements - using Celine Dion's photo on his website after she supported "...what she believed to be a philanthropic cause..." even though she's stated that she has no involvement with him. Though in that case, I'm not sure who I should feel sorry for!
What was more interesting was reading the comments for that article. Out of the 9 comments, one commented on the Nobel Peace Prize, one commented on show business (I didn't really understand the comment). The remaining 7 were scathing about the journalism, used the standard "well what have you done" argument and questioned the journalists motives. Interestingly enough, all 7 users have only made a single comment each. Clearly that article hit a nerve.
Sounds a bit like Kent "there's no fucking carbon in it" Hovind's ethics - lie, cheat and commit fraud as long as it's for God.
For anyone who doesn't get the reference - Potholer54: "Carbon dating doesn't work -- debunked". I'd normally link to the actual time-stamp (4:51), but the video is good enough to watch on it's own. I go back to that clip whenever I need a laugh.
Yeah, I suppose they should have just gone ahead with the launch. There was probably only a small chance of doing this or this.
Having a something visible in incredibly important. I've never owned a bike, but did own a Westfield (Lotus Super7 style) kit car - it was 425kg of box metal and fiberglass. It was bright yellow, and I always drove with my headlights switched on. When you're driving something in which you'll most likely die in the event of an accident you make sure that people will see you. It wasn't massively noisy (2 twin webber carbs are noisy but behind a scoop, but it had a good exhaust silencer) compared to most kit cars, and as most people have said most of the noise is behind you.
I picked up a lot of good habits from motorcyclists when driving that car that I still use - always look over your shoulder (don't rely solely on mirrors) when changing lanes, never assume that people realise how quickly you can accelerate and never assume that people have seen you. In fact, assume nothing.
Is this what we've come to? "It's not a law", so fuck common sense?
Out of interest, did you go to a CofE school or a state school, and when? I'm under the impression that my niece's school (England) has an RE class, but then they're probably a lot more careful about what they teach (rather than preach) nowadays. For her school, I can see no mention of a chaplain being on the books.
I too had a lot of RE classes where they spent more time preaching rather than teaching, though for the last few years most of us used it as a place to do our homework. In secondary school I always felt that I should kick up a fuss to allow me not to go to the [daily] religious assembly - like Jewish students - as I was (still am) an atheist. It was only years later that I realised that the only reason that I was in a private Methodist school was that the state (Republic of Ireland) provides grants to families to go to a school of their own faith - something that is granted in the constitution. So, I may have put up with the religious rubbish, but I did get an [what I feel was an] excellent education from the school.
More like they didn't want to be seen practicing Thierry Henry's "technique".
It's not ten-year-olds that you have to worry about, it's the 40+ people (who haven't immersed themselves in the internet) who google (more likely use ask.com) for something, comes across IkeaHacks.net, sees the familiar Ikea font at the top in familiar colours and then clicks on an advert to that takes them sliderobes.com
I've come across websites with a trademark in the name, and sometimes it's been easier to check the whois record to see if it's legit.
The funny thing about technology is that the "a toddler could do it" cliche no longer works - it's the complete opposite now. Companies should advertise their products as "an octogenarian could do it", but that would probably be seen as patronising.
That would work if the hacks actually linked to the Ikea furniture they used, or if the "My Mini Store" button took them to Ikea's website, rather than her affiliated Amazon store (the button is no longer working).
Unless you've visited the Ikea website recently, visiting a website that has "Ikea" on the header, with no obvious parody (like Ryanair sucks) or disclaimer (on the about page isn't obvious), and uses similar colours, then yes it *could* be confusing. And the people who are likely to be confused *may* (I'm not a psychologist) be more likely to click the "My Mini Store" button or use the adverts to try buying stuff, which as you might guess take you to Ikea's competitors.
Most fan sites put a disclaimer on their front page, or maybe even on every page so as to make it completely unambiguous. Putting it on a page that people are highly unlikely to visit comes across as being slightly dishonest.
I get pretty pissed off when I hear about company's abusing their IP rights, but as others have posted, there's a right and a wrong way of running a fan site - she's done it the wrong way. Sure they could have sent her a nice letter rather than a C&D (maybe they did, though unlikely), however think of it as a start to haggling, if you Ikea starts low, then a negotiated middle ground will be nowhere near what they want - and this appears to be what happened.
As others have mentioned, the "My Mini Store" button take you (it's now not working) to an Amazon affiliate store, so everything pointed to the owner making money from Ikea's trademark.
As a disclaimer, I used to buy quite a lot from Ikea, but I've stopped - the quality has really gone downhill, and rather than increase prices a little, they elected to drop the quality. They've obviously done the maths and worked out it's more profitable, but it's still annoying to find that simple wooden shelves now have ugly grey plastic bit visible on them.
Denis Leary - Coffee flavoured coffee.
I'm not convinced Serbians would blow even more money on firearms - they don't have to, they've a massive surplus of weapons left over after an incredibly bloody civil war - there's a firearm for every 2nd man, woman and child.
Look at it another way, large ownership of weapons are a result of wars in the country
1 - USA - In the constitution as a result of the war of independence
2 - Serbia - A succession of wars following the breakup of Yugoslavia
3 - Yemem - Take your pick - there are 4 since 1994
4 - Switzerland - No civil war since 1840s, but instead had been surrounded by countries at war for the following 105 years, while attempting to stay neutral
5 - Cyprus - A country which has been a host to sectarian violence between Greeks and Turks since the Ottoman Empire
Similarly, for the UK, Northern Ireland has over 3 times the number of firearms than the rest of the UK, again a history of bloody sectarian violence. I'm not saying that I'm right, just that it the history of the country should be considered when looking at the reason for firearm ownership rates.
Interesting, but I think I broke it's brain
[After trying to find out where it is, it said it wouldn't be more specific because I hadn't told it where I was] ...
Me: I live in [REDACTED], do you know where that is.
Bot: No! Where?
M: I've told you where I live, so now it's your turn.
B: I live in a land of beautiful dreams and hopes.
M: Ah, so you're not in the physical realm.
B:
No I didn't mean to, for that reason I did state "solely" - normally I reread my posts to remove any ambiguity, but I think I was concentrating on the numbers part of my post. I certainly didn't mean to imply that gun ownership isn't part of the culture of violence.
...and I am confident for Sweden at least the number is higher than the US.
So you arbitrarily multiply double the number of firearms, because of a feeling - basically saying that 30% of Swedes are lying about possessing unregistered firearms. Then you add the number of government firearms (920,000* + 32,652**) which adds an extra 10 firearms per 100 people, but keep in mind that only a small percentage of these may be in possession of a civil militia, however, and this is a big one - a Swedish colleague of mine said that they don't have government issued rifles in almost every house, like they do in Switzerland. Certainly I can find no mention of one online, so please link to some sources.
He did however say that he's heard of stories of weapons caches, but mainly among Hells Angels type groups who stole them during national service - but again I can find no solid evidence of that. Plus, it doesn't fit in with the idea of repelling an Eastern foe, more like a gang wanting a stash of weapons for turf wars, crime, etc. Moose hunting is a big thing, but do you really think that 30% of the population have an illegally owner firearm for something as public as hunting?
Even with your plucked out of the air numbers you haven't even reached gun ownership levels in the USA. And surely, if you feel it's ok to arbitrarily inflate gun possession level in one country, you should inflate it for the USA too, but you haven't.
* 920,000 in the defence forces
** 32,652 in law enforcement
Source: Guns in Sweden
While I completely agree with you on the violence being cultural rather than due solely to firearm ownership rates, I do have to disagree with you about Scandinavia having higher ownership rates. According to this the US (89/100 people) has 53% more firearms per person than Serbian (58/100 people) who is second in the list. Sweden and Norway are ranked 10th and 11th respectively with almost 32/100 people.
This is a list of privately owned firearms, not possession, so state owned firearms (like in Switzerland) are not included. However to bring the possession rate of Sweden up to the ownership rate in the US, the government would have to give a firearm to every 2nd person.
One of the reasons why gun control works isn't because it stops sociopaths doing crazy things, it works because it's a lot harder to damage with a knife than a TEC-9 in one hand and a shotgun in the other. I was appalled when I came across this page detailing US school shootings while looking up the numbers.
Not necessarily - they could just go straight over (or under) the North Pole, It may not be the shortest route (I haven't checked distances), but it's certainly the path of least resistance, unless of course Canada has armed their polar bears and mooseseses