Yeah, I tend to agree with you. Computers use 10% of electricity? I really doubt it. My home has at least two computers running at any given time, and sometimes four, and I would consider that above-average computer usage. Still, I don't know that it would take any more than 10% of our electricity. Air conditioning probably takes the majority, and then there's the water heater which is almost always running, the washer/dryer, dishwasher, pool pump, etc. I'd be skeptical of any number >5% as an average of consumer computer usage.
I'm not sure about commercial usage; I'm sure it's quite high for companies with large IT departments, but I don't even know that that could be considered any kind of majority. You've got your grocery stores, department stores, construction operations, manufacturing, etc. that use tons of electricity with relatively little computer usage. This all seems like a bunch of "OMG the internet is destroying our children" hype.
Google does offer services to large organizations whereby they can use gmail and still use their own domain. Just a few years ago, my university ditched its in-house email servers in a "partnership" with gmail, and gmail became the mail service for the entire university. They said it would save all kinds of money on maintenance, and they were probably right.
So I guess my point is, even if they have the professional-looking email, it doesn't mean they're not using gmail.;)
Probably late 19th century? I've read opinion pieces (obviously not historical fact, but interesting nonetheless) that point to the civil war as the first blatant, widespread instance of a president stepping way outside the constitution (did the constitution require states to stay in the union?).
But, even if that isn't considered abuse of presidential power, I think it would be over the course of the first half of the 20th century when we went from an isolationist, federalist, fairly libertarian state to a meddling, centralized, nanny beauracracy. FDR implemented the nanny state during the Great Depression, and his foreign policy wasn't what we would call isolationist. I'm not a history buff, so I don't know how the presidents before him would rate, but it seems to me that alot of our governmental problems can be traced back to him. But maybe that's just because he spent four terms in office...
That sounds quite useful then. I've pretty much tried to avoid shopping online at all just out of security concerns, so this could really come in handy...
Now I just have to find out if I have an account I can do that with...
Do these cards affect your credit score? I know when calculating your score they consider (a) how many new lines of credit you've opened in the last couple of years, (b) how many maxed out cards you have (or how many are over 75% or so), and (c) the average length of time you've had each of your cards. It would seem like getting a disposable card would hurt you in all three areas.
To take it further, I think the journalists simply don't know science and statistics. They know journalism, and that is it. It's like they think it's sufficient to simply copy and paste a basic x-y summary table and call it a day. Sure, maybe that's enough to make an idiot feel informed, but would it kill them to mention hypothesis tests? P-values? Statistical significance? If the statistics were relevant in any way, those numbers should be available.
The other thing that bugs the crap out of me is the fact that they only give you the mean, and if you're lucky, minimums and maximums. Seriously, give me the freaking median! I'd like to have at least some semblance of how that data is distributed. Very rarely do I find a piece of journalism--or even actual data sheets--with medians. I hate finding data on the internet or elsewhere with the minimum, mean (which, of course, they call "average"), and maximum, but no median. Useless.
Why dont you just download everything P2P to "stick it" to iTunes and the other music services?
Because I don't want to get sued.
Not that I don't agree that their business model is archaic. But it's not as much about the direct profits from music sales as it is about control. As soon as people can download whatever they like off the internet, they won't be able to tell us what to like any longer.
That is true, but I think Occam's Razor has an application here. The ordered universe is simply the most practical reason for our memories being the way they are. The multiple-universes theory, however, doesn't have the same advantage. It's alot easier for me to believe that, if I live after shooting myself in the head, the bullet simply must have deflected off my skull, or missed any critical portion of my brain, or left me a vegetable. Probability does not apply to former events. Again, if multiple universes is false, and you live through the shot to the head, the probability of your having lived is entirely irrelevant, and there is a way to trace back (given the proper knowledge) how exactly you survived.
Though I really despise the ridiculous amount of profile clutter some of the more myspace-y users have, I don't think their opening up is a bad thing at all. Yeah, I was able to connect with a few people at my school and whatnot before, but after opening up, I was able to connect with far more people. Not everybody I know goes to school, and the increased universality seems to have compelled some of my friends who do go to school who hadn't joined previously to join. And thus far, Facebook has avoided some of the biggest plagues of myspace, which are bright backgrounds, music, and blinking text.
No you can't. If it's untrue you will arrive nowhere because you're dead.
You're absolutely wrong here. If it's untrue, there is a 0.00000001% (or however minimal we're setting it) chance that you stay alive. That is if it is untrue. If it is true, there's a 100% chance you stay alive. Either way, it is possible to arrive at the same result. There is no way to tell how you arrived at that result.
If we're setting the odds at 0% survival, there is still no proof, because even with multiple universes, there would be no way to survive then. The only way to survive in that case would be to not shoot yourself, which doesn't provide proof of multiple universes, either.
As far as "doing the entire planet," I doubt that would make much of a difference. There's no saying that anyone else will live through it; it still only guarantees that you see it, because it's possible that everybody except you dies.
See, you can't assume that fact is true and proceed to use it to prove that it is true. What I'm saying is that if it weren't true, it is still possible that you can perform these experiments and arrive at the same experimental results as if it were true. Therefore, no proof.
I still don't think that is proof of anything. Even if we did that thing that with 99.9999999999999% destroys the earth, and it doesn't get destroyed, there's no proof of parallel universes. There's still a 0.0000000000001% chance that the earth even before the experiment that the earth is not destroyed not out of any parallel universe theory but out of sheer luck.
Take the gun experiment. Suppose I don't shoot myself, but I shoot someone else in the head. If that person lives, is that proof of parallel universes? Taking it further, if I shoot 1,000,000 people in the head and one lives, is that proof of parallel universes? Someone lived. Now, if I shoot 999,999 other people and myself, and I'm the only one who lives, is that proof of parallel universes? There's exactly the same chance of that one person being me as any single other person.
Anyhow, I don't know where I'm really going with this, but a situation where the odds are firmly stacked against my continuing existence doesn't seem like any kind of proof at all.
I think there are laws out there to prevent the Opera developers from doing anything "bad", plus they have public opinion motivating them from doing anything terrible. I actually can't say I trust them any less than the folks at Mozilla. Who's to say Mozilla's not doing anything bad? Yeah, the source code is available, but who outside of their development team is familiar with it and knows how each module works? I get the whole transparency thing about open source projects, but if it gets so huge that nobody with any kind of life outside of internet browsers can monitor it, that transparency is really just an illusion (Har!). I think a closed-source project is just fine, as long as accountability is there, and Opera is small enough that public opinion can hold them accountable perfectly well.
Why would you "feel better" using an "open source" browser? Is Mozilla more deserving of our patronage simply because of that "open source" label? I think one could argue that some of Firefox's problems are because it is open-source, and some of Opera's strengths are because there is a well-managed team of paid developers working on it. I don't have any qualms whatsoever with using Opera just because it's not open-source, and I don't have any issues saying some particular piece of software is better, even if it is proprietary and closed-source.
Interestingly enough, that "leaky" business model seems to be keeping plenty of companies afloat... Thriving, even. And this thread isn't even about ad blockers, it's about the general idiotic tendency of moochers to feel they are somehow being wronged by being shown advertisements on free services. Don't want the advertisements? Don't use the free phone service. Don't use Gmail. Don't read the newspaper.
Third, copyright infringement is NOT "stealing"! Both legally and ethically, they are two very different things. Learn the difference.
I definitely agree with this, but being that IANAL, I have a difficult time explaining this to others. Care to explain this in semi-technical semi-legal terminology for those of us without law degrees? I recently heard a (horrible) lecture by an ethics professor who argued that copyright infringement is stealing, so I'm quite interested in the formal argument.
The analogy is still lacking. If you go to the box with the free newspapers and you start clipping out the ads before anyone even gets the chance to see them (or somebody else clips them out before you read it), I think there's a problem. There's a difference between ignoring the ads and blocking the ads from even displaying in the first place. I suspect there's no legal problem with adblocking, but this topic is about the morality of ad blocking.
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Yeah, I tend to agree with you. Computers use 10% of electricity? I really doubt it. My home has at least two computers running at any given time, and sometimes four, and I would consider that above-average computer usage. Still, I don't know that it would take any more than 10% of our electricity. Air conditioning probably takes the majority, and then there's the water heater which is almost always running, the washer/dryer, dishwasher, pool pump, etc. I'd be skeptical of any number >5% as an average of consumer computer usage.
I'm not sure about commercial usage; I'm sure it's quite high for companies with large IT departments, but I don't even know that that could be considered any kind of majority. You've got your grocery stores, department stores, construction operations, manufacturing, etc. that use tons of electricity with relatively little computer usage. This all seems like a bunch of "OMG the internet is destroying our children" hype.
Google does offer services to large organizations whereby they can use gmail and still use their own domain. Just a few years ago, my university ditched its in-house email servers in a "partnership" with gmail, and gmail became the mail service for the entire university. They said it would save all kinds of money on maintenance, and they were probably right.
;)
So I guess my point is, even if they have the professional-looking email, it doesn't mean they're not using gmail.
Probably late 19th century? I've read opinion pieces (obviously not historical fact, but interesting nonetheless) that point to the civil war as the first blatant, widespread instance of a president stepping way outside the constitution (did the constitution require states to stay in the union?).
But, even if that isn't considered abuse of presidential power, I think it would be over the course of the first half of the 20th century when we went from an isolationist, federalist, fairly libertarian state to a meddling, centralized, nanny beauracracy. FDR implemented the nanny state during the Great Depression, and his foreign policy wasn't what we would call isolationist. I'm not a history buff, so I don't know how the presidents before him would rate, but it seems to me that alot of our governmental problems can be traced back to him. But maybe that's just because he spent four terms in office...
I think you're wrong. Clearly he does support his position by proclaiming that his opponents are ignorant.
Now whether it is a valid argument is an entirely different story...
That sounds quite useful then. I've pretty much tried to avoid shopping online at all just out of security concerns, so this could really come in handy...
Now I just have to find out if I have an account I can do that with...
They might be valid, but what it looks to me like they're saying is "they didn't come from eBay."
Do these cards affect your credit score? I know when calculating your score they consider (a) how many new lines of credit you've opened in the last couple of years, (b) how many maxed out cards you have (or how many are over 75% or so), and (c) the average length of time you've had each of your cards. It would seem like getting a disposable card would hurt you in all three areas.
To take it further, I think the journalists simply don't know science and statistics. They know journalism, and that is it. It's like they think it's sufficient to simply copy and paste a basic x-y summary table and call it a day. Sure, maybe that's enough to make an idiot feel informed, but would it kill them to mention hypothesis tests? P-values? Statistical significance? If the statistics were relevant in any way, those numbers should be available.
The other thing that bugs the crap out of me is the fact that they only give you the mean, and if you're lucky, minimums and maximums. Seriously, give me the freaking median! I'd like to have at least some semblance of how that data is distributed. Very rarely do I find a piece of journalism--or even actual data sheets--with medians. I hate finding data on the internet or elsewhere with the minimum, mean (which, of course, they call "average"), and maximum, but no median. Useless.
Because I don't want to get sued.
Not that I don't agree that their business model is archaic. But it's not as much about the direct profits from music sales as it is about control. As soon as people can download whatever they like off the internet, they won't be able to tell us what to like any longer.
That is true, but I think Occam's Razor has an application here. The ordered universe is simply the most practical reason for our memories being the way they are. The multiple-universes theory, however, doesn't have the same advantage. It's alot easier for me to believe that, if I live after shooting myself in the head, the bullet simply must have deflected off my skull, or missed any critical portion of my brain, or left me a vegetable. Probability does not apply to former events. Again, if multiple universes is false, and you live through the shot to the head, the probability of your having lived is entirely irrelevant, and there is a way to trace back (given the proper knowledge) how exactly you survived.
Though I really despise the ridiculous amount of profile clutter some of the more myspace-y users have, I don't think their opening up is a bad thing at all. Yeah, I was able to connect with a few people at my school and whatnot before, but after opening up, I was able to connect with far more people. Not everybody I know goes to school, and the increased universality seems to have compelled some of my friends who do go to school who hadn't joined previously to join. And thus far, Facebook has avoided some of the biggest plagues of myspace, which are bright backgrounds, music, and blinking text.
Yeah, my newspaper that charges something like $15/month and displays all their content online for free is making a killing off of subscription fees.
No you can't. If it's untrue you will arrive nowhere because you're dead.
You're absolutely wrong here. If it's untrue, there is a 0.00000001% (or however minimal we're setting it) chance that you stay alive. That is if it is untrue. If it is true, there's a 100% chance you stay alive. Either way, it is possible to arrive at the same result. There is no way to tell how you arrived at that result.
If we're setting the odds at 0% survival, there is still no proof, because even with multiple universes, there would be no way to survive then. The only way to survive in that case would be to not shoot yourself, which doesn't provide proof of multiple universes, either.
As far as "doing the entire planet," I doubt that would make much of a difference. There's no saying that anyone else will live through it; it still only guarantees that you see it, because it's possible that everybody except you dies.
See, you can't assume that fact is true and proceed to use it to prove that it is true. What I'm saying is that if it weren't true, it is still possible that you can perform these experiments and arrive at the same experimental results as if it were true. Therefore, no proof.
I still don't think that is proof of anything. Even if we did that thing that with 99.9999999999999% destroys the earth, and it doesn't get destroyed, there's no proof of parallel universes. There's still a 0.0000000000001% chance that the earth even before the experiment that the earth is not destroyed not out of any parallel universe theory but out of sheer luck.
Take the gun experiment. Suppose I don't shoot myself, but I shoot someone else in the head. If that person lives, is that proof of parallel universes? Taking it further, if I shoot 1,000,000 people in the head and one lives, is that proof of parallel universes? Someone lived. Now, if I shoot 999,999 other people and myself, and I'm the only one who lives, is that proof of parallel universes? There's exactly the same chance of that one person being me as any single other person.
Anyhow, I don't know where I'm really going with this, but a situation where the odds are firmly stacked against my continuing existence doesn't seem like any kind of proof at all.
Doesn't this mean that all of us are immortal, then?
I think there are laws out there to prevent the Opera developers from doing anything "bad", plus they have public opinion motivating them from doing anything terrible. I actually can't say I trust them any less than the folks at Mozilla. Who's to say Mozilla's not doing anything bad? Yeah, the source code is available, but who outside of their development team is familiar with it and knows how each module works? I get the whole transparency thing about open source projects, but if it gets so huge that nobody with any kind of life outside of internet browsers can monitor it, that transparency is really just an illusion (Har!). I think a closed-source project is just fine, as long as accountability is there, and Opera is small enough that public opinion can hold them accountable perfectly well.
Yeah, the article seemed to be a little lacking in the "mathematical proof" area.
Why would you "feel better" using an "open source" browser? Is Mozilla more deserving of our patronage simply because of that "open source" label? I think one could argue that some of Firefox's problems are because it is open-source, and some of Opera's strengths are because there is a well-managed team of paid developers working on it. I don't have any qualms whatsoever with using Opera just because it's not open-source, and I don't have any issues saying some particular piece of software is better, even if it is proprietary and closed-source.
Interestingly enough, that "leaky" business model seems to be keeping plenty of companies afloat... Thriving, even. And this thread isn't even about ad blockers, it's about the general idiotic tendency of moochers to feel they are somehow being wronged by being shown advertisements on free services. Don't want the advertisements? Don't use the free phone service. Don't use Gmail. Don't read the newspaper.
Don't you know that we're entitled to everything we want the way we want it for absolutely no charge at all?
I think auf Deutsch it would be, "I see nussing, I hear nussing!"
Thanks. I would agree with all of that.
Third, copyright infringement is NOT "stealing"! Both legally and ethically, they are two very different things. Learn the difference.
I definitely agree with this, but being that IANAL, I have a difficult time explaining this to others. Care to explain this in semi-technical semi-legal terminology for those of us without law degrees? I recently heard a (horrible) lecture by an ethics professor who argued that copyright infringement is stealing, so I'm quite interested in the formal argument.
The analogy is still lacking. If you go to the box with the free newspapers and you start clipping out the ads before anyone even gets the chance to see them (or somebody else clips them out before you read it), I think there's a problem. There's a difference between ignoring the ads and blocking the ads from even displaying in the first place. I suspect there's no legal problem with adblocking, but this topic is about the morality of ad blocking.