The crowd will make more serious mistakes more frequently than the criminal justice system.
And sometimes it isn't necessarily by mistake. How many times have people been targeted for mob action, not because of wrongdoing, but because of opportunity:
Tom owes me money, and doesn't look to be paying me soon.
Dick's son banged my daughter, then went and married that trollope down the hall.
Harry knows I've been siphoning cash from the coffee fund.
Of course, whoever starts this won't say the actual reason. They can just say, "Hey, look, there's [fill-in-the-blank]! Get him!"
Who would you like to train them? Kindergarten teachers?
Actually, no, I don't want kindergarten teachers training them. On the other hand, I'm not too thrilled with police being taught military responses as the default response.
You see, there is a difference between a soldier and a peace officer. A soldier does what he/she has to in order to stay alive when they know that they are going to be shot at. They are basically taught to keep their weapons loose in their holsters / ready in their hands, because they expect that they are going to be using them. A peace officer is supposed to uphold the law and protect the citizenry (even if some of them may not seem to deserve it, but that's another aspect that we needn't go into at this point).
Now, MP (Military Police) receive the additional training of police in conjunction with their military training, and those are the sort of people that I would have NO trouble with helping to train civilian police.
Once a hard-drinking fast-living example of the high life, he had an encounter with a toxic substance... straight water.
Hiding his true identity, he goes from place to place, enlisting the unwary into his army, tempting them into temperance. When he begins to take the first of twelve steps towards his target, the end is near.
When asked why he struck terror into the hearts of oenophiles, whiskey aficionados, and beer drinkers, he said:
One other thing to consider about science fiction is that someone makes a prediction, based on the known technology of the time.
In Asimov's introduction to Foundation's Edge, he pointed out that his earlier Foundation books didn't consider the ubiquity of computers for galactic astrogation. In his first books, the pilot would refer to books that contained the locations of star systems, their relative motions, and so forth. His later books had people referring to the ship's navigational computer.
Larry Niven, in an article that he wrote about black holes, pointed out how a discovery about quantum black holes rendered his short story "The Hole Man" incorrect just before it got published. He didn't immediately try to retract the story, he just went ahead and let it go to print. Was this wrong?
We need to remember that these are all (A) speculation as to what the future may be like, and (B) above all, FICTIONAL.
So, perhaps we should lighten up a little bit. (Including me, who at one point tried hard to believe that Niven's "Known Space" series was a prediction of the best possible future.)
Chief Zack Allen: Where are you going? Captain Elizabeth Lochley: To pound someone, Mr. Allen. You win. I just decided if you can't join them, beat them. -- from "Strange Relations" (season 5)
... because, as has been pointed out, the people who spammed NASA's poll were less interested in what the module got named, and more in doing the bidding of Mr. Colbert. But what the hey. Let's go ahead and name it Colbert. (I just wonder what sort of copyright issues might come up out of this - can a government entity use a copyrighted name for a publicly funded project? Hmmm...)
I have a reason for suggesting we go ahead. There is one other person whose name is guaranteed to be associated with Earth, even if we manage to blow ourselves up / pollute ourselves out / stage a mass evacuation to Mars. His name is on a plaque in the Sea of Tranquility at the Apollo 11 landing site.
The name there is Richard Milhouse Nixon.
If we want any extraterrestrials who happen along our system after we're gone, let's at least give them a choice to determine who represents humans best. Then they can pick between a crooked politician and a comedian who can get a fan base motivated to trash Internet services.
And by your "logic", the fact that the school didn't call the parents, didn't bring in the police, and didn't do any of their own due diligence is no reason for anyone to get upset.
Your "logic" suggests that (given earlier posts) the girl should've just considered this all part of the price of security, and not raised a fuss... a concept that would make her a much more compliant citizen, one who wouldn't ask such awkward questions about "rights," and whose only purpose is to follow orders as given by authority.
It is a VERY good thing that you are not responsible for public policy (which covers children AND adults.). I hope you aren't, anyway, because you scare me even more than the GP.
In his short story, "The Jigsaw Man," they talked about how using the death penalty to help restock the organ banks led to a loosening up of what constituted a capital crime... particularly as the number of repeat offenders was considerably reduced, but the number of law-abiding citizens who needed medical help rose.
The same thing is happening here, folks. First the fine is used as a deterrent, then it becomes a revenue stream, then it expands as the demand for services increases.
And it won't stop with red light cameras, either. What's going to happen when a state that funds schools via tobacco taxes sees a need to increase that tax... and people decide to quit instead?
Does anyone remember reading about the Inquisition? It was financed from the confiscated property of the accused. Thus, they had a dis-incentive to let anyone go free... and after your arms had been dislocated, you were very likely to agree that you'd committed heresy if it'd get your weight off your arms.
So, your point is well made - when a court case becomes a political power play, justice loses out.
There are even more dirty tricks than you might expect.
If you've got some gaming cred, then you may have seen the short feature The Gamers from Dead Gentlemen Productions. They also did a short feature called "Campaign Ad." (You can see it here.)
They depict some of the dirty pool used in campaign ads ("Our opponent is shown in choppy black-and-white, while our candidate is depicted in saturated color!"), and was enough to make me reach for the channel changer during election seasons if I didn't need any other reasons.
Her wealth has nothing to do with whether it's a copyright infringement. It has everything to do with her being greedy and selfish and forgetting from whence she came.
And this relates to the lawsuit how?
I mean, I understand that you don't like Ms. Rowling, because you see her as a money-grubbing miser who is trying to milk as much out of her work as possible. Fine with me.
However, your arguments are starting to sound as though you wish that there were be a legal mechanism to say, "OK, you've made enough money from this, now shut up and let us have at it."
Your posts are usually cogent on other areas... actually, your posts are unusually cogent in other areas, and I admire your expertise in copyright law. Could you give this topic a rest?
I think I have to disagree with you about Timeline.
I didn't feel that he was saying that "technology is bad," I think he was saying that "technology is neither good nor bad, but greedy corporate types will find a way to make a quick buck out of it before finding out some of the hazards involved."
Mind you, that meme can get old after a while, but the biggest gripes that he seemed to have with time travel were contamination of the past by people who don't want to come back, and with the idea that people demand entertainment with their education.
I did, however, particularly like the hints of certain times and places being used as dumping grounds, like Krakatoa and Tunguska.
... one of the first full-length books I read was The Andromeda Strain.
Later, I read the condensed version of The Terminal Man, and remembered (and loved) the line where a doctor explains to a policeman that the subject had a radioactive battery, making him a possible contamination threat. The policeman's response was "Alpha or beta particle emitter?" When the doctor looks surprised, he adds, "I went to college. I can even read and write."
That was where I learned that even cops could have the geek nature.
Slashdot Mirror
I couldn't think of a good response to this. I guess I'll have to wing it.
Now, now - just a secant while I get out my cosh....
Wait until they make their first mistake and crush the first innocent person....
That will depend. If it's the Chinese government, they may well decide that an innocent person was just the sort of counter-revolutionary who would post fake information about the birthdates of the members of their Olympic women's gymnastic team...
The crowd will make more serious mistakes more frequently than the criminal justice system.
And sometimes it isn't necessarily by mistake. How many times have people been targeted for mob action, not because of wrongdoing, but because of opportunity:
Of course, whoever starts this won't say the actual reason. They can just say, "Hey, look, there's [fill-in-the-blank]! Get him!"
A snowclone is to a cliche as a (bash) function is to an alias. (I'm sorry.)
No, the snowclone is the radiator cap needed for the Volkswagen Bug engine of a cliche.... Or was that the buggy whip for the dead horse? I forget...
You must have been a graduate of the University of Coulombia!
(Re-volting, isn't it?)
Who would you like to train them? Kindergarten teachers?
Actually, no, I don't want kindergarten teachers training them. On the other hand, I'm not too thrilled with police being taught military responses as the default response.
You see, there is a difference between a soldier and a peace officer. A soldier does what he/she has to in order to stay alive when they know that they are going to be shot at. They are basically taught to keep their weapons loose in their holsters / ready in their hands, because they expect that they are going to be using them. A peace officer is supposed to uphold the law and protect the citizenry (even if some of them may not seem to deserve it, but that's another aspect that we needn't go into at this point).
Now, MP (Military Police) receive the additional training of police in conjunction with their military training, and those are the sort of people that I would have NO trouble with helping to train civilian police.
Alcoholic Anonymous
Once a hard-drinking fast-living example of the high life, he had an encounter with a toxic substance... straight water.
Hiding his true identity, he goes from place to place, enlisting the unwary into his army, tempting them into temperance. When he begins to take the first of twelve steps towards his target, the end is near.
When asked why he struck terror into the hearts of oenophiles, whiskey aficionados, and beer drinkers, he said:
"Alcohol goes against my grain."
I thought it was a reaction to the hot grits being dumped down her pants...
One other thing to consider about science fiction is that someone makes a prediction, based on the known technology of the time.
In Asimov's introduction to Foundation's Edge, he pointed out that his earlier Foundation books didn't consider the ubiquity of computers for galactic astrogation. In his first books, the pilot would refer to books that contained the locations of star systems, their relative motions, and so forth. His later books had people referring to the ship's navigational computer.
Larry Niven, in an article that he wrote about black holes, pointed out how a discovery about quantum black holes rendered his short story "The Hole Man" incorrect just before it got published. He didn't immediately try to retract the story, he just went ahead and let it go to print. Was this wrong?
We need to remember that these are all (A) speculation as to what the future may be like, and (B) above all, FICTIONAL.
So, perhaps we should lighten up a little bit. (Including me, who at one point tried hard to believe that Niven's "Known Space" series was a prediction of the best possible future.)
I was going to write something longer elsewhere, but this seems to sum up what I was going to say.
It's just a story, written for entertainment. No need to read serious predictions of the future into it.
I wasn't expecting anyone to ask that question... but I figure somebody else will deal with it.
Ah! My mistake, then. In that case, let's name it Colbert.
Chief Zack Allen: Where are you going?
Captain Elizabeth Lochley: To pound someone, Mr. Allen. You win. I just decided if you can't join them, beat them.
-- from "Strange Relations" (season 5)
... because, as has been pointed out, the people who spammed NASA's poll were less interested in what the module got named, and more in doing the bidding of Mr. Colbert. But what the hey. Let's go ahead and name it Colbert. (I just wonder what sort of copyright issues might come up out of this - can a government entity use a copyrighted name for a publicly funded project? Hmmm...)
I have a reason for suggesting we go ahead. There is one other person whose name is guaranteed to be associated with Earth, even if we manage to blow ourselves up / pollute ourselves out / stage a mass evacuation to Mars. His name is on a plaque in the Sea of Tranquility at the Apollo 11 landing site.
The name there is Richard Milhouse Nixon.
If we want any extraterrestrials who happen along our system after we're gone, let's at least give them a choice to determine who represents humans best. Then they can pick between a crooked politician and a comedian who can get a fan base motivated to trash Internet services.
Makes you proud to be human, don't it?
And by your "logic", the fact that the school didn't call the parents, didn't bring in the police, and didn't do any of their own due diligence is no reason for anyone to get upset.
Your "logic" suggests that (given earlier posts) the girl should've just considered this all part of the price of security, and not raised a fuss... a concept that would make her a much more compliant citizen, one who wouldn't ask such awkward questions about "rights," and whose only purpose is to follow orders as given by authority.
It is a VERY good thing that you are not responsible for public policy (which covers children AND adults.). I hope you aren't, anyway, because you scare me even more than the GP.
In his short story, "The Jigsaw Man," they talked about how using the death penalty to help restock the organ banks led to a loosening up of what constituted a capital crime... particularly as the number of repeat offenders was considerably reduced, but the number of law-abiding citizens who needed medical help rose.
The same thing is happening here, folks. First the fine is used as a deterrent, then it becomes a revenue stream, then it expands as the demand for services increases.
And it won't stop with red light cameras, either. What's going to happen when a state that funds schools via tobacco taxes sees a need to increase that tax... and people decide to quit instead?
Does anyone remember reading about the Inquisition? It was financed from the confiscated property of the accused. Thus, they had a dis-incentive to let anyone go free... and after your arms had been dislocated, you were very likely to agree that you'd committed heresy if it'd get your weight off your arms.
So, your point is well made - when a court case becomes a political power play, justice loses out.
There are even more dirty tricks than you might expect.
If you've got some gaming cred, then you may have seen the short feature The Gamers from Dead Gentlemen Productions. They also did a short feature called "Campaign Ad." (You can see it here.)
They depict some of the dirty pool used in campaign ads ("Our opponent is shown in choppy black-and-white, while our candidate is depicted in saturated color!"), and was enough to make me reach for the channel changer during election seasons if I didn't need any other reasons.
... A solution that I don't see legislation helping.
This is probably the most cogent explanation of the problem.
You're a purist, you don't like your issues blended. :)
Or my whiskeys! :)
Fair enough. Sorry if I goofed on the context.
And this relates to the lawsuit how?
I mean, I understand that you don't like Ms. Rowling, because you see her as a money-grubbing miser who is trying to milk as much out of her work as possible. Fine with me.
However, your arguments are starting to sound as though you wish that there were be a legal mechanism to say, "OK, you've made enough money from this, now shut up and let us have at it."
Your posts are usually cogent on other areas... actually, your posts are unusually cogent in other areas, and I admire your expertise in copyright law. Could you give this topic a rest?
I think I have to disagree with you about Timeline.
I didn't feel that he was saying that "technology is bad," I think he was saying that "technology is neither good nor bad, but greedy corporate types will find a way to make a quick buck out of it before finding out some of the hazards involved."
Mind you, that meme can get old after a while, but the biggest gripes that he seemed to have with time travel were contamination of the past by people who don't want to come back, and with the idea that people demand entertainment with their education.
I did, however, particularly like the hints of certain times and places being used as dumping grounds, like Krakatoa and Tunguska.
... one of the first full-length books I read was The Andromeda Strain.
Later, I read the condensed version of The Terminal Man, and remembered (and loved) the line where a doctor explains to a policeman that the subject had a radioactive battery, making him a possible contamination threat. The policeman's response was "Alpha or beta particle emitter?" When the doctor looks surprised, he adds, "I went to college. I can even read and write."
That was where I learned that even cops could have the geek nature.