So you're saying that MS has been at it that long, and they still haven't done it right? (Pending consumer response to their latest offering, of course.)
I could care less about the mouse question, but I worked for a computer distributor in the mid to late 90's, and I remember the complaints from the folks in the Mac division about Apple losing marketshare, having their heads up their asses, and generally getting their butts kicked.
I think they have things settled behind the scenes. MS pulled Apple's bacon out of the fire at a fortuitous moment over a decade ago, when Apple was struggling and MS was facing an antitrust lawsuit. I'm sure their investment didn't buy them any control, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they have influence. MS is happy to let their former rival churn out iPhones and iPods and MacBooks, as long as Apple stays out of the server room. Sure, they have a friendly little set of sparring ad campaigns, but if you look at their commercials, they aren't really poaching each other's customers. Apple: If you don't mind paying for something that works (and hopefully makes you look hip) without making you work or think. MS: We're cheaper.
1) Damn near any linux server distribution. Personally, I'd go with either Red Hat / Fedora, or some flavor of Debian.
2) Damn near any LDAP implementation for linux.
After that, just sit back, crack a beer open, and congratulate yourself for simultaneously saving some cash and slipping out of the MS licensing noose.
In other words, perhaps religiousness is causing poor societal conditions, which is what the paper concludes or perhaps it's the other way around, poor societal conditions push people towards religiousness. Perhaps it's something more complex altogether.
Exactly. Correlation != causation, and the interaction between a society and the religions its people follow is far more complex than "religion = bad".
I have no idea what your point is anymore. You've failed to make any kind of point so far.
Simply, I don't believe that religion is a net evil for society. I base this on what I have seen and experienced, which is that if I look at the religious people I know on one hand, and the non-religious on the other, I see more good done by more religious people than the other way around. Now, I know that ad-hoc personal anecdotes are not "evidence", but I'm not trying to have a formal debate to try to change your mind, just trying to explain my personal position.
Either way, the single largest donation isn't what I find compelling, since the question is how religion affects society as a whole, not just one person. I'm more curious how the average believer stacks up against the average non-believer. The Generosity Index is a better indicator of personal generosity, and shows a strong correlation between low income/rural/religious regions and greater charitable giving. Again, correlation!= causation, so obviously this hardly constitutes conclusive proof any more than Gregory Paul's study, but like his study, it provides food for thought.
It seems that we are each attached to our beliefs. Fair enough.
For what it's worth, here's a little humor for you.
As a revival meeting as hitting a fever pitch, the preacher called out to a woman in the front row "Do you want to go to Heaven?"
"Yes! Yes, I want to go to Heaven!" she replied.
"Hallelujah!" yelled the crowd.
"Do you want to go to Heaven?" the preacher called to a man in the front row.
"Yes! Yes, I want to go to Heaven!" he replied. "Hallelujah!" yelled the crowd.
"Do you want to go to Heaven?" the preacher called to another man in the front row.
"No, not really." came the unenthusiastic reply. The crowd went silent.
Dumbfounded, the preacher looks at the man. "Son, did misunderstand you? Don't you want to go to Heaven when you die?"
"Oh, sure, reverend," the man replied. "For a minute there I thought you were getting up a bunch to go now."
His conclusions were based on an examination of scatter-plots for a small set of nations with no attempt to consider alternative explanations nor to encompass the research in the larger body of sociological theory and research on the topic.
The private organizations in the US (that I am familiar with) that are doing the most to help others are generally either a) religious, or b) secular, but staffed by religious-minded folks.
Some forms of religion actually make genuine morality harder because it causes doubt as to whether you're being moral because you want to or because you'll get rewarded/punished otherwise.
Ideally, we would all be interested in doing the right thing for altruistic reasons rather than selfish reasons, but your assertion here is as applicable to conventional social constructs (courts and justice/penal system) as for religion.
One of the laws of logic is a negative: a statement CANNOT be both true and false at the same time.
Neils Bohr was credited with saying something to the effect of "The opposite of a simple truth is a simple falsehood, but the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth". I'm not trying to be pedantic, but I'm trying to illustrate that there are profound paradoxes and mysteries in life to which simple logic does not apply. That has more to do with the true reason for religion - the stuff that falls beyond our ability to rationally sift through it.
What does religion offer, nothing that we can't get from secular societies.
Only if you look at it from an atheistic point of view. If indeed there is a God and we are spiritual creatures, wouldn't it be important to find out more about Him (or Her)?
Even if we do consider it from an atheistic point of view, religion helps many people find peace from problems which might otherwise cause problems (anxiety -> mental/physical health issues). Studies have found that religious people tend to live longer than non-religious people.
Remember kids, before you flame someone, make sure you know how to spell, punctuate, and capitalize. Otherwise, you risk looking like an even bigger, more ignorant tool than you already are..
I'm all for questioning religion in general, but I was reacting to the parent poster's implication that the GP was either misguided or insincere with his assertion of religious guidance helping him in some way.
It's interesting that the Crusades, which were a rather unenlightened endeavor, served to relight the flame of learning in Europe, as middle eastern writings were brought to Europe, bringing with them novel ideas such as arabic numbers.
Yes, lots of evil happens in the name of religion. I still say that that is an example of people perverting something good to serve their own purposes.
If I were in Soviet Russia in the time of Stalin, I probably would have anointed him too. I'd have to imagine that there was a big quid-pro-quo there. The guy didn't give a shit about religion. He wanted the peasants to follow him through fear, God, or whatever it took. I imagine the Orthodox church there wanted to avoid having their churches taken, closed, destroyed, their followers persecuted, etc. Church leaders have to play a lot of earthly politics.
1. You think humans didn't have any form of social order before religion, as if we had no idea murder and rape were wrong before the ten commandments.
That's actually not what I meant at all. Social order and religion intertwine and affect each other. For instance, American Catholic perspective is different than French or German Catholic perspective. Even within the same religion, there are differences, many of which can be traced back to the previous social/tribal customs of those who practice it.
If you have to be told how to behave then YOU aren't really moral at all. You're just a robot following commands.
I don't think anyone is fully formed in a moral sense without society's assistance, whether that society is secular, religious, or some of both.
Religion is, more often than not [...]
Really? You did a comprehensive survey of all human actions and came to that conclusion? Or are you reiterating a speculative nugget of someone's bigoted agenda?
Lots of people use social badges as cover for their weaknesses. "I'm a (lawyer, policeman, alderman, whatever), I would never do xyz" is common. It is part of being human, not a part of religion.
We all draw our morals (those of us who have them, anyway) from different sources, including religion, philosophy, and personal experience. By our nature, and by the nature of how we see and experience things, we each have a slightly different perspective on these things. Despite the current vogue for blaming religion for many of the world's problems, the truth is that a vast amount of good takes place in the name of religion thanks to the various moral teachings among them (care for the sick and hungry, don't screw someone else's spouse, teach people not to lie, steal, and kill). The evil done in the world isn't the fault of religion itself - it is the fault of arrogant people who pervert religion to their own ends. If you really want to find evil, look to some of the more notable atheists, like Mao and Stalin.
If this guy finds that religion helps him not to do things he shouldn't, who are you to question it? Your arrogance and intolerance in dismissing and belittling value systems of others is similar to those who perpetrate the "religious" abuses you refer to.
I'd like to ask them what the hell is the difference in me stealing a CD from a music store and me "making unauthorised copies" of a friends CD?
IANAL, or more appropriately, IANAS (I Am Not A Solicitor)
When you take a CD from a store, you are taking a piece of their physical inventory. They have lost a real, tangible asset to you that they paid actual, countable money for.
When you copy a friend's CD, you are DUPLICATING a physical asset, meaning that the store has all the inventory they had paid for before you copied it. They have not experienced an actual loss. Now, there are a number of imaginative people out there who like to construe this as theft, and they have done a good job of spinning "unauthorized duplication" into "theft" in the minds of many. Of course, that bit of fiction is designed to serve the interests of the copyright owners, not serve as legal advice. Also, this artificial construct ignores the evidence that many who illegally copy music are trying it, not necessarily trying to keep it. A significant number go on to buy the music, which they might not have if they hadn't "borrowed" it.
Both give ME, the same net result, which is obtaining a product or property without paying, and therefore FOR PROFIT, yet violations of each are treated completely different.
Achieving the same net result does not necessarily mean that the same crime (if there is one) was committed. For example, if I killed someone, it could easily be a) murder (intent, motive), b) manslaughter (accidental, but with responsibility), or c) self-defense (unfortunate, but justifiable). Furthermore, I could argue that you didn't really get the same net result. If you stole the CD, you would possess the cover art, jewel case, and a pressed CD. If you copied the music, you might have bothered to actually burn a CD copy of it (inferior to pressed CD in lifespan, cost of media comes out of your pocket, not theirs, unless you stole that too) without taking the case and copying the art, but more likely you just downloaded the mp3 files, which although enjoyable, are measurably inferior to the store-bought product. As a matter of fact, at this point, you have come closer to a song recorded over the radio than stealing a CD from a store.
Your interpretation of "profit" is a loose one. Personal gain is not profit.
Right... so if I can survive a drop from a spaceship with it, and if I can survive falling off mountains while searching for uranium boulders, why can't I survive falling off Noveria's mountains? It's still inconsistent.
I agree with much of what you said, but not all. MOST accidents can be eliminated by good defensive driving & other skills, but some accidents are simply a bolt out of the blue. It is entirely possible that you might be one of two cars on the road, and as the other one passes you, an inner tie rod breaks, sending his car into yours, both going off the road. You might be driving down a lightly traveled road and get hit by a drunk driver at 2 in the afternoon. Or maybe he's not drunk; maybe he's the victim of a heart attack or stroke, and can't steer his car away from you. I won't excuse ignorant or stupid driving habits (mine or anyone else's), but there are driving situations beyond anyone's ability to preempt.
Slashdot Mirror
Because when a "respected" nation does something that a "non respected" nation does, then it becomes "respectable".
Or the "respected" nation becomes less respectable.
So you're saying that MS has been at it that long, and they still haven't done it right? (Pending consumer response to their latest offering, of course.)
I could care less about the mouse question, but I worked for a computer distributor in the mid to late 90's, and I remember the complaints from the folks in the Mac division about Apple losing marketshare, having their heads up their asses, and generally getting their butts kicked.
Hmmm ... they don't like 80's rock, or conservative talk radio? Tipper Gore is a bark beetle!
I think they have things settled behind the scenes. MS pulled Apple's bacon out of the fire at a fortuitous moment over a decade ago, when Apple was struggling and MS was facing an antitrust lawsuit. I'm sure their investment didn't buy them any control, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they have influence. MS is happy to let their former rival churn out iPhones and iPods and MacBooks, as long as Apple stays out of the server room. Sure, they have a friendly little set of sparring ad campaigns, but if you look at their commercials, they aren't really poaching each other's customers. Apple: If you don't mind paying for something that works (and hopefully makes you look hip) without making you work or think. MS: We're cheaper.
1) Damn near any linux server distribution. Personally, I'd go with either Red Hat / Fedora, or some flavor of Debian.
2) Damn near any LDAP implementation for linux.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_Directory_Server
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Hat_Directory_Server
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenDS
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenLDAP
After that, just sit back, crack a beer open, and congratulate yourself for simultaneously saving some cash and slipping out of the MS licensing noose.
Microsoft doesn't call their malicious software a "virus". They call it an "update", like this one.
Only if funded by a massive stimulus.
Dear God, I wish I had some mod points.
In other words, perhaps religiousness is causing poor societal conditions, which is what the paper concludes or perhaps it's the other way around, poor societal conditions push people towards religiousness. Perhaps it's something more complex altogether.
Exactly. Correlation != causation, and the interaction between a society and the religions its people follow is far more complex than "religion = bad".
I have no idea what your point is anymore. You've failed to make any kind of point so far.
Simply, I don't believe that religion is a net evil for society. I base this on what I have seen and experienced, which is that if I look at the religious people I know on one hand, and the non-religious on the other, I see more good done by more religious people than the other way around. Now, I know that ad-hoc personal anecdotes are not "evidence", but I'm not trying to have a formal debate to try to change your mind, just trying to explain my personal position.
Either way, the single largest donation isn't what I find compelling, since the question is how religion affects society as a whole, not just one person. I'm more curious how the average believer stacks up against the average non-believer. The Generosity Index is a better indicator of personal generosity, and shows a strong correlation between low income/rural/religious regions and greater charitable giving. Again, correlation!= causation, so obviously this hardly constitutes conclusive proof any more than Gregory Paul's study, but like his study, it provides food for thought.
It seems that we are each attached to our beliefs. Fair enough.
For what it's worth, here's a little humor for you.
As a revival meeting as hitting a fever pitch, the preacher called out to a woman in the front row "Do you want to go to Heaven?"
"Yes! Yes, I want to go to Heaven!" she replied.
"Hallelujah!" yelled the crowd.
"Do you want to go to Heaven?" the preacher called to a man in the front row.
"Yes! Yes, I want to go to Heaven!" he replied.
"Hallelujah!" yelled the crowd.
"Do you want to go to Heaven?" the preacher called to another man in the front row.
"No, not really." came the unenthusiastic reply. The crowd went silent.
Dumbfounded, the preacher looks at the man. "Son, did misunderstand you? Don't you want to go to Heaven when you die?"
"Oh, sure, reverend," the man replied. "For a minute there I thought you were getting up a bunch to go now."
The paper that article was based on was one-sided. Criticism and a more comprehensive view can be found here.
His conclusions were based on an examination of scatter-plots for a small set of nations with no attempt to consider alternative explanations nor to encompass the research in the larger body of sociological theory and research on the topic.
Another response is here.
The private organizations in the US (that I am familiar with) that are doing the most to help others are generally either a) religious, or b) secular, but staffed by religious-minded folks.
Some forms of religion actually make genuine morality harder because it causes doubt as to whether you're being moral because you want to or because you'll get rewarded/punished otherwise.
Ideally, we would all be interested in doing the right thing for altruistic reasons rather than selfish reasons, but your assertion here is as applicable to conventional social constructs (courts and justice/penal system) as for religion.
One of the laws of logic is a negative: a statement CANNOT be both true and false at the same time.
Neils Bohr was credited with saying something to the effect of "The opposite of a simple truth is a simple falsehood, but the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth". I'm not trying to be pedantic, but I'm trying to illustrate that there are profound paradoxes and mysteries in life to which simple logic does not apply. That has more to do with the true reason for religion - the stuff that falls beyond our ability to rationally sift through it.
What does religion offer, nothing that we can't get from secular societies.
Only if you look at it from an atheistic point of view. If indeed there is a God and we are spiritual creatures, wouldn't it be important to find out more about Him (or Her)?
Even if we do consider it from an atheistic point of view, religion helps many people find peace from problems which might otherwise cause problems (anxiety -> mental/physical health issues). Studies have found that religious people tend to live longer than non-religious people.
Remember kids, before you flame someone, make sure you know how to spell, punctuate, and capitalize. Otherwise, you risk looking like an even bigger, more ignorant tool than you already are..
1. Religion isn't necessary for morality.
But that doesn't mean that religion and morality are mutually exclusive.
2. You can't prove we would be worse off without religion.
Can't prove a negative. Right. Just like you can't prove that God doesn't exist.
3. Religion causes a lot of harm.
So do automobiles. But they're still worth having.
I'm all for questioning religion in general, but I was reacting to the parent poster's implication that the GP was either misguided or insincere with his assertion of religious guidance helping him in some way.
It's interesting that the Crusades, which were a rather unenlightened endeavor, served to relight the flame of learning in Europe, as middle eastern writings were brought to Europe, bringing with them novel ideas such as arabic numbers.
FWIW, I don't find your reply trollish.
Yes, lots of evil happens in the name of religion. I still say that that is an example of people perverting something good to serve their own purposes.
If I were in Soviet Russia in the time of Stalin, I probably would have anointed him too. I'd have to imagine that there was a big quid-pro-quo there. The guy didn't give a shit about religion. He wanted the peasants to follow him through fear, God, or whatever it took. I imagine the Orthodox church there wanted to avoid having their churches taken, closed, destroyed, their followers persecuted, etc. Church leaders have to play a lot of earthly politics.
1. You think humans didn't have any form of social order before religion, as if we had no idea murder and rape were wrong before the ten commandments.
That's actually not what I meant at all. Social order and religion intertwine and affect each other. For instance, American Catholic perspective is different than French or German Catholic perspective. Even within the same religion, there are differences, many of which can be traced back to the previous social/tribal customs of those who practice it.
If you have to be told how to behave then YOU aren't really moral at all. You're just a robot following commands.
I don't think anyone is fully formed in a moral sense without society's assistance, whether that society is secular, religious, or some of both.
Religion is, more often than not [...]
Really? You did a comprehensive survey of all human actions and came to that conclusion? Or are you reiterating a speculative nugget of someone's bigoted agenda?
Lots of people use social badges as cover for their weaknesses. "I'm a (lawyer, policeman, alderman, whatever), I would never do xyz" is common. It is part of being human, not a part of religion.
Yeah, I get that. I'm in the middle of wiping and restoring a friend's rooted PC. A nice red key marked "NUKE" would be fun.
We all draw our morals (those of us who have them, anyway) from different sources, including religion, philosophy, and personal experience. By our nature, and by the nature of how we see and experience things, we each have a slightly different perspective on these things. Despite the current vogue for blaming religion for many of the world's problems, the truth is that a vast amount of good takes place in the name of religion thanks to the various moral teachings among them (care for the sick and hungry, don't screw someone else's spouse, teach people not to lie, steal, and kill). The evil done in the world isn't the fault of religion itself - it is the fault of arrogant people who pervert religion to their own ends. If you really want to find evil, look to some of the more notable atheists, like Mao and Stalin.
If this guy finds that religion helps him not to do things he shouldn't, who are you to question it? Your arrogance and intolerance in dismissing and belittling value systems of others is similar to those who perpetrate the "religious" abuses you refer to.
I'd like to ask them what the hell is the difference in me stealing a CD from a music store and me "making unauthorised copies" of a friends CD?
IANAL, or more appropriately, IANAS (I Am Not A Solicitor)
When you take a CD from a store, you are taking a piece of their physical inventory. They have lost a real, tangible asset to you that they paid actual, countable money for.
When you copy a friend's CD, you are DUPLICATING a physical asset, meaning that the store has all the inventory they had paid for before you copied it. They have not experienced an actual loss. Now, there are a number of imaginative people out there who like to construe this as theft, and they have done a good job of spinning "unauthorized duplication" into "theft" in the minds of many. Of course, that bit of fiction is designed to serve the interests of the copyright owners, not serve as legal advice. Also, this artificial construct ignores the evidence that many who illegally copy music are trying it, not necessarily trying to keep it. A significant number go on to buy the music, which they might not have if they hadn't "borrowed" it.
Both give ME, the same net result, which is obtaining a product or property without paying, and therefore FOR PROFIT, yet violations of each are treated completely different.
Achieving the same net result does not necessarily mean that the same crime (if there is one) was committed. For example, if I killed someone, it could easily be a) murder (intent, motive), b) manslaughter (accidental, but with responsibility), or c) self-defense (unfortunate, but justifiable). Furthermore, I could argue that you didn't really get the same net result. If you stole the CD, you would possess the cover art, jewel case, and a pressed CD. If you copied the music, you might have bothered to actually burn a CD copy of it (inferior to pressed CD in lifespan, cost of media comes out of your pocket, not theirs, unless you stole that too) without taking the case and copying the art, but more likely you just downloaded the mp3 files, which although enjoyable, are measurably inferior to the store-bought product. As a matter of fact, at this point, you have come closer to a song recorded over the radio than stealing a CD from a store.
Your interpretation of "profit" is a loose one. Personal gain is not profit.
Actually, that would be incredibly helpful on occasion. Are you talking about overwriting with random bits, or just "deleting" everything?
Right ... so if I can survive a drop from a spaceship with it, and if I can survive falling off mountains while searching for uranium boulders, why can't I survive falling off Noveria's mountains? It's still inconsistent.
So, you're saying the lead content is going to be a problem?
I agree with much of what you said, but not all. MOST accidents can be eliminated by good defensive driving & other skills, but some accidents are simply a bolt out of the blue. It is entirely possible that you might be one of two cars on the road, and as the other one passes you, an inner tie rod breaks, sending his car into yours, both going off the road. You might be driving down a lightly traveled road and get hit by a drunk driver at 2 in the afternoon. Or maybe he's not drunk; maybe he's the victim of a heart attack or stroke, and can't steer his car away from you. I won't excuse ignorant or stupid driving habits (mine or anyone else's), but there are driving situations beyond anyone's ability to preempt.
If that's what he meant, he should have said so. "Most accidents" would have sufficed.