This is a poorly researched/. story. It is, in fact, the entire country of Canada which is gaining a national fibre-optic network. information can be had here. If you read the site thouroughly, including the various white papers, you will see that the Canadian government has invested a large amount of money in the project. The aim is to create a national network by 2004. It's also a plan that Jean Chretien and Liberals are including as part of their platform in the upcoming election. Evidence can be found in what the Grits call Red Book III.
i shall answer your question: the reason the election results are not witheld until all the polls are closed is simple: in Canada the system is a first-past-the-post parliamentary one with ridings based on geographic location. as a result, election results which determine a winner are localised to the individual ridings... now, the constituents in any given riding want to know simply which candidate won in their own riding, with the party whose candidates win the most ridings, ie, seat, becoming the ruling party. SO, if i am in Halifax, Nova Scotia and the polls close at 8 or 9 PM, it is only early evening in BC. but the folks in nova scotia don't want to wait until the polls close in BC to find out the results of their own ridings.... that is why the data doesn't get witheld, so that the people in the east can find out their riding results before they go to sleep...
because there is a legitimate reason for the gag law!!! you see, in Canadian elections, when the polls close in Eastern Canada, they are still open in Western Canada. In fact, the time difference means that votes are already being counted in one part of the country before the polls even close in another part. the gag law prevents the results which are known in eastern canada from being transmitted to the west where they could possibly undermine voters' decision making process. the gag law is in effect so as not to undermine democracy!! i am a canadian geek too.... the fact that there is this web designer who thinks he's fighting for his online rights does not understand the issue here. in fact, publishing results before the polls close is not a good idea. from one geek to another dude, don't publish the results until all the polls have closed.
Actually, if you really want to know, George Orwell is a pen name. George Orwell's real name was ERIC ARTHUR BLAIR. And, while we are on the subject, Mark Twain was a pen name too. Mark Twain's real name was Samuel Clemmons (sp?).
That Al Gore NEVER SAID that he invented the Internet! I don't think that people realise the virtually non-existent line between truth and falsehood--how easy it is for the things that you hear on the evening news to be absolute bullshit, or even how often total bullshit appears on the news.
While you folks debate the merits of one wet blanket over another of the same, the world's problems continue to exist and to grow in scope.
I am going to kill myself because the world is full of lamers and there's no way to teach them otherwise, because there are systemic safeguards in place to ensure no real change can take place; well, at least in the US. In Canada, for example, the judiciary can still whip the legislative branch into submission. I would love to see the day the Supreme Court in the US ordered the US govt to do something that they would never ever consider doing ( like ending the Drug War ).
ummm you really shouldn't write to your MLA for something like this; rather, you want to be writing to your MP. MLA stands for Member of the Legislative Assembly and is the designation for those who are elected to the Provincial govt. an MP is the Member of Parliament, the elected rep at the federal level--it is at this level that the copyright board must answer to. Oh, and seeing as you are pushing for the Canadian Alliance, you must be a real retard. Stockwell Day is an anti-abortionist, right-wing, seclusionist, racist politician who likes to avoid questions and panders to the lowest common denominator, even when that is most certainly not the moral high-ground. i'd rather have another five years of liberals than the canadian alliance. c-man
If a majority of a governments citizens feel something should be illegal, or classified for a certain age group, then it will be a law.
Are you suggesting that outright, or are you going to put some qualifications on that? There is no logical reason that a govt should follow the will of the populace in all situations. Sometimes the majority of the population can be morally wrong. Also, people can be brainwashed very easily. There are many, many problems in today's democratic nations because the government panders to the voting majority and therefore takes a stance which is morally reprehensible. By morally reprehensible, I am referring to those morals which can be independently verified through logic--based upon the primary consideration of consistency, for the application of ideas. A good example of the population being brainwashed and supporting ridiculous ideas (though often used as an example where it shouldn't be, or for ad hominem attacks) is Hitler's Germany.
to the BC govt. i am in vancouver and perhaps we could even get some other/. readers here to protest this blatant act of hypocrisy. i will take the day off tomorrow. e-mail me if you are in BC and are interested in making some noise on friday, july 14.
to listen, considering the collaborative nature of Open Source software, I suggest an Open Source revolution.
That is to say that we should work together in an open and freely accessible way to get not only the Internet community but also the general population at large to really, and I mean really, make Politicians realise that we aren't going to take their bullshit anymore.
It is not only the loss of supposedly inalienable human rights that angers me, it is the illogicality of supporting ideas which are truly detrimental to society in general which make me feel as though each and everyone of us does not have the ability to truly be free under the current regime.
So perhaps this is better suited to its own Ask Slashdot question, but what can we do NOW that will have a real impact on getting true change to take place in our society? Do we really believe that sending some e-mails to Congress will change anything? Even if this bill doesn't go through or if it does but gets 'whacked' by the Supreme Court, how will that prevent other such bills from continually being presented to Congress? How do we EDUCATE the PEOPLE?
I am 20 years old. I am a Philosophy major and a geek in the extreme. I am also a drug user: I smoke my fair share of Cannabis. I would like to be alive during the next revolution. I would like to live to see Humanity use the greatest tool ever invented (the computer and subsequently the concept of the decentralised network) to bring Humanity together in a way that lets our own intelligence and potential reach the level that I know we can all achieve if we work together. I would like to see this done with as little bloodshed as possible-- for one should never do harm, even to one's enemies. I ask the Slashdot community:
How can we effect true, tangible change NOW? What must we do to achieve this?
We need to work together. We need to organise. Perhaps we should start at least a PGP-required mailing list to discuss some options. I implore you, at least, VOTE!.
In the upcoming election, VOTE!. Even if you don't agree with either of the two main parties, VOTE nonetheless. There is no such thing as a throw-away vote. That is a concept created to prevent people from voting for a small party that may have the potential to make a noticeable dent in the results, at least enough for the media and other politicians to take notice.
I and my inbox am waiting for ideas. I don't have all of the answers, but together perhaps we can figure out a way to improve not only our own lives, but also everyone's.
take a class in Philosophy, and you will find out that you too can believe him and be more enlightened and aware of the infinite possibilities inherent in human societal co-operation.
wow. i didnt think it was possible to twist facts the way you do so.
it is not that we can't afford it, it is that we choose to divert our monetary resources to more important things, like social programs such as our universal healthcare.
and i am not aware of the US govt ever stating that they would protect Canada any more so than they would protect any G7 country. we do not ask for their protection. the vast majority of canadians would like to see _less_ military cooperation with the US. Canada provides some of the best training terrain in the world for all manner of military applications. during WWII and WWI, canada had an incredibly strong military in relation to its total population. here's some trivia for you: at the END of the second world war, the Canadian Navy was larger than the American navy, both in the number of ships and the number of officers.
Also, i think you proved my point: canada as a peacekeeper does more than its share of the global policing responsibility, without the baggage that comes with US peacekeepers abroad--no wonder they like sending canadians to peacekeep, we don't already go in with the people we should be protecting hating us. bottom line: canada operates its military the way its PEOPLE want it to. that is because we are a democracy.
on the other hand, i would venture to say that even if the overwhelming majority of Americans were to ask their govt to cut back on military spending and put some money into social programs, Congress would have none of it.
democracy? phew, what's that? i have the corporate lobby to attend to. a two party system! wow, what a lot of choice american voters have. they can choose between corporate mouthpiece president number one or corporate mouthpiece president number two.
. I'll take having a large influence in the world, picking up some jealous enemies along the way, over being a non-player any day of the week so basically you are saying that you would exchange a peaceful existence on the planet, free from opression and violence, so that you could, as you say, be a 'player'? sounds to me like you have some self-esteem issues to resolve.
Who would care? hey, i would rather be left alone and not be attacked or feel threatened, than have to go kill a bunch of people out of fear of being killed myself. if you would rather go fight and kill people so that you can jump up and down and say 'im the king of the castle, you all have to listen to me now!' then that's what's wrong with america today. if you beleive that humans dying is worth your 'global power and prestige' then your priorities are fucked up beyond repair.
ugh, i don't know for how long i can keep this up.my fingers hurt already.:)
we have better trained soldiers able to kill better and quicker. I tell you this, I quite happily enjoy the little freedoms I have left, and I'd like to keep them, thank you very much! i would argue that the US military is at a point where it does not need to worry about trying very hard to maintain its OBVIOUS technological supremacy. and you fail to understand that the US brings upon itself this threat of attack exactly because it chooses to maintain such an advance over the other countries. look at canada. we have virtually no military, we don't go around on the world stage bullying people, and lo! could it be? we don't have many enemies, either! maybe it's because we do not prance around on the world stage, shoving our bland, cookie-cutter corporate, amoral culture on everyone. as long as America doesn't get a fucking clue, they will continue in this cycle of the military-industrial complex that will eventually lead to their own destruction.
first, this is not the realm of poly sci, it's poly phil. poly sci is something else.
now, on to your points:
the appropriateness and inappropriateness of war if you beleive that killing people can ever be 'appropriate', then you have been brainwashed. the most basic tenet of any real moral philosophy is the sanctity of human life. it makes the US look foolish on the world stage when they say to milosevic et al. "don't kill people, killing people is a bad bad thing! hell, we think it's such a bad thing, we are going to send OUR army in and kill YOUR people. basically, they are saying "we will teach you not to kill by killing."... tha's like 'fucking for virginity'... it just makes no sense.
we are the defacto policeman of the world heh, tha's a good one. so basically, the US is hypocritical once again: by this logic, you have completely destroyed the notion of the soveriegn nation-state. so when the US complains about unfair trade practices or illegal immigrants, they are coming from the standpoint of: we can go anywhere in the world and do anything to anyone we want, but if anybody tries to do that to us, well, we'll just have to kill/sanction/brainwash them.
reduce the cost of war (in terms of casulties on both our side and theirs) how is training your army to be more effective at killing going to reduce the number of casualties, you nitwit! it might reduce the financial cost of war for you, but tha's about it.
you are going to have two choices why only two? you mean only two that you can think of... there's things like diplomacy, sanctions, the UN war crimes tribunal, etc. now, i don't have a problem if some highly highly skilled commandos capture these murderers so that they can stand trial in a court of law (what a new-age thought!) but, again, fighting to end some fighting makes you look like an idiot.
But having the biggest and baddest army in the world maximizes the chance that when I go to sleep tonight, death squads won't break into my house and murder my wife as she sleeps next to me. well, this is just wrong again. it is not your army that protects you from domestic deathsquads (i didn't know that was a problem in the states, i guess i'll have to look for them next time i'm down there), it would be your local police dept, as far as i can tell. of course, if you were a little more widely read even of your own citizens' writing, you would know that many of the worst deathsquads in history were armed and trained by the US military. grab some chomsky and re-assess your ideas of the nation-state.
even though this has nothing to do with the CAVE...
personally, i advocate physical violence as a complete last resort option the thing you obviously don't understand from a philosophical/moral standpoint is that violence should not be an option, period (uh-oh, here come the flames...) this comes from the basic moral premise that one should not do harm to another person. of course, there is the infamous retort, well he did it first! but ppl fail to realise that the original premise still must hold--one should never do harm, otherwise the person who claims to hold peaceful values yet is reactionary fails to maintain their peaceful values. the addition of an unjust action to an unjust action does not result in a just action. basic addition and subtraction can tell you this. just a thought
Well then, as a stoned philosopher, i must refute your so-called evidence, therefore destroying your original premise:
A disproportionately low number PhDs and Nobel laureates use drugs.
my premise: phds and nobel laureates have reputations. they want to protect their reputations. drug use is considered a negative trait by society. therefore, they underreport their drug use in surveys, usually created by prohibitionist organisations such as NIDA, HHN (swedish group), etc.
A disproportionately high number of high school dropouts and criminals do use drugs.
my premise: these people obviously began using drugs at a very young age. currently, our society treats such people very poorly, ie, throwing them in jail, piss tests, basically treating them like human failures. it is this ostracism which causes them to become on the fring of society, aka dropouts and criminals.
Slashdot Mirror
berkeley was a dumbass.
This is a poorly researched /. story. It is, in fact, the entire country of Canada which is gaining a national fibre-optic network. information can be had here. If you read the site thouroughly, including the various white papers, you will see that the Canadian government has invested a large amount of money in the project. The aim is to create a national network by 2004. It's also a plan that Jean Chretien and Liberals are including as part of their platform in the upcoming election. Evidence can be found in what the Grits call Red Book III.
i shall answer your question: the reason the election results are not witheld until all the polls are closed is simple: in Canada the system is a first-past-the-post parliamentary one with ridings based on geographic location. as a result, election results which determine a winner are localised to the individual ridings... now, the constituents in any given riding want to know simply which candidate won in their own riding, with the party whose candidates win the most ridings, ie, seat, becoming the ruling party. SO, if i am in Halifax, Nova Scotia and the polls close at 8 or 9 PM, it is only early evening in BC. but the folks in nova scotia don't want to wait until the polls close in BC to find out the results of their own ridings.... that is why the data doesn't get witheld, so that the people in the east can find out their riding results before they go to sleep...
because there is a legitimate reason for the gag law!!! you see, in Canadian elections, when the polls close in Eastern Canada, they are still open in Western Canada. In fact, the time difference means that votes are already being counted in one part of the country before the polls even close in another part. the gag law prevents the results which are known in eastern canada from being transmitted to the west where they could possibly undermine voters' decision making process. the gag law is in effect so as not to undermine democracy!! i am a canadian geek too.... the fact that there is this web designer who thinks he's fighting for his online rights does not understand the issue here. in fact, publishing results before the polls close is not a good idea. from one geek to another dude, don't publish the results until all the polls have closed.
hear hear
That Al Gore NEVER SAID that he invented the Internet! I don't think that people realise the virtually non-existent line between truth and falsehood--how easy it is for the things that you hear on the evening news to be absolute bullshit, or even how often total bullshit appears on the news.
While you folks debate the merits of one wet blanket over another of the same, the world's problems continue to exist and to grow in scope. I am going to kill myself because the world is full of lamers and there's no way to teach them otherwise, because there are systemic safeguards in place to ensure no real change can take place; well, at least in the US. In Canada, for example, the judiciary can still whip the legislative branch into submission. I would love to see the day the Supreme Court in the US ordered the US govt to do something that they would never ever consider doing ( like ending the Drug War ).
i know canada does. Government of Canada Website
ummm you really shouldn't write to your MLA for something like this; rather, you want to be writing to your MP. MLA stands for Member of the Legislative Assembly and is the designation for those who are elected to the Provincial govt. an MP is the Member of Parliament, the elected rep at the federal level--it is at this level that the copyright board must answer to. Oh, and seeing as you are pushing for the Canadian Alliance, you must be a real retard. Stockwell Day is an anti-abortionist, right-wing, seclusionist, racist politician who likes to avoid questions and panders to the lowest common denominator, even when that is most certainly not the moral high-ground. i'd rather have another five years of liberals than the canadian alliance. c-man
Are you suggesting that outright, or are you going to put some qualifications on that? There is no logical reason that a govt should follow the will of the populace in all situations. Sometimes the majority of the population can be morally wrong. Also, people can be brainwashed very easily. There are many, many problems in today's democratic nations because the government panders to the voting majority and therefore takes a stance which is morally reprehensible. By morally reprehensible, I am referring to those morals which can be independently verified through logic--based upon the primary consideration of consistency, for the application of ideas. A good example of the population being brainwashed and supporting ridiculous ideas (though often used as an example where it shouldn't be, or for ad hominem attacks) is Hitler's Germany.
you ran for the Green party in the last election? I'm impressed. I'm interested in joining the party.
to the BC govt. i am in vancouver and perhaps we could even get some other /. readers here to protest this blatant act of hypocrisy. i will take the day off tomorrow. e-mail me if you are in BC and are interested in making some noise on friday, july 14.
That is to say that we should work together in an open and freely accessible way to get not only the Internet community but also the general population at large to really, and I mean really, make Politicians realise that we aren't going to take their bullshit anymore.
It is not only the loss of supposedly inalienable human rights that angers me, it is the illogicality of supporting ideas which are truly detrimental to society in general which make me feel as though each and everyone of us does not have the ability to truly be free under the current regime.
So perhaps this is better suited to its own Ask Slashdot question, but what can we do NOW that will have a real impact on getting true change to take place in our society? Do we really believe that sending some e-mails to Congress will change anything? Even if this bill doesn't go through or if it does but gets 'whacked' by the Supreme Court, how will that prevent other such bills from continually being presented to Congress? How do we EDUCATE the PEOPLE?
I am 20 years old. I am a Philosophy major and a geek in the extreme. I am also a drug user: I smoke my fair share of Cannabis. I would like to be alive during the next revolution. I would like to live to see Humanity use the greatest tool ever invented (the computer and subsequently the concept of the decentralised network) to bring Humanity together in a way that lets our own intelligence and potential reach the level that I know we can all achieve if we work together. I would like to see this done with as little bloodshed as possible-- for one should never do harm, even to one's enemies. I ask the Slashdot community:
How can we effect true, tangible change NOW? What must we do to achieve this?
We need to work together. We need to organise. Perhaps we should start at least a PGP-required mailing list to discuss some options. I implore you, at least, VOTE! .
In the upcoming election, VOTE!. Even if you don't agree with either of the two main parties, VOTE nonetheless. There is no such thing as a throw-away vote. That is a concept created to prevent people from voting for a small party that may have the potential to make a noticeable dent in the results, at least enough for the media and other politicians to take notice.
I and my inbox am waiting for ideas. I don't have all of the answers, but together perhaps we can figure out a way to improve not only our own lives, but also everyone's.
take a class in Philosophy, and you will find out that you too can believe him and be more enlightened and aware of the infinite possibilities inherent in human societal co-operation.
no one from Quebec was arrested in this case
hey buddy, Montreal, the place in where mafiaboy was arrested, is in Quebec!
Ya, it's tasty as all hell.
<homer>MMMMM..... nutella</homer>
It's been available in Canada for years, don't know about anywhere else tho. There's probably a jar at your local supermarket... damn, it's good.
it is not that we can't afford it, it is that we choose to divert our monetary resources to more important things, like social programs such as our universal healthcare.
and i am not aware of the US govt ever stating that they would protect Canada any more so than they would protect any G7 country. we do not ask for their protection. the vast majority of canadians would like to see _less_ military cooperation with the US. Canada provides some of the best training terrain in the world for all manner of military applications. during WWII and WWI, canada had an incredibly strong military in relation to its total population. here's some trivia for you: at the END of the second world war, the Canadian Navy was larger than the American navy, both in the number of ships and the number of officers.
Also, i think you proved my point: canada as a peacekeeper does more than its share of the global policing responsibility, without the baggage that comes with US peacekeepers abroad--no wonder they like sending canadians to peacekeep, we don't already go in with the people we should be protecting hating us. bottom line: canada operates its military the way its PEOPLE want it to. that is because we are a democracy.
on the other hand, i would venture to say that even if the overwhelming majority of Americans were to ask their govt to cut back on military spending and put some money into social programs, Congress would have none of it.
democracy? phew, what's that? i have the corporate lobby to attend to. a two party system! wow, what a lot of choice american voters have. they can choose between corporate mouthpiece president number one or corporate mouthpiece president number two.
Who would care? hey, i would rather be left alone and not be attacked or feel threatened, than have to go kill a bunch of people out of fear of being killed myself. if you would rather go fight and kill people so that you can jump up and down and say 'im the king of the castle, you all have to listen to me now!' then that's what's wrong with america today. if you beleive that humans dying is worth your 'global power and prestige' then your priorities are fucked up beyond repair.
canadaman
we have better trained soldiers able to kill better and quicker. I tell you this, I quite happily enjoy the little freedoms I have left, and I'd like to keep them, thank you very much! i would argue that the US military is at a point where it does not need to worry about trying very hard to maintain its OBVIOUS technological supremacy. and you fail to understand that the US brings upon itself this threat of attack exactly because it chooses to maintain such an advance over the other countries. look at canada. we have virtually no military, we don't go around on the world stage bullying people, and lo! could it be? we don't have many enemies, either! maybe it's because we do not prance around on the world stage, shoving our bland, cookie-cutter corporate, amoral culture on everyone. as long as America doesn't get a fucking clue, they will continue in this cycle of the military-industrial complex that will eventually lead to their own destruction.
canadaman
now, on to your points:
the appropriateness and inappropriateness of war if you beleive that killing people can ever be 'appropriate', then you have been brainwashed. the most basic tenet of any real moral philosophy is the sanctity of human life. it makes the US look foolish on the world stage when they say to milosevic et al. "don't kill people, killing people is a bad bad thing! hell, we think it's such a bad thing, we are going to send OUR army in and kill YOUR people. basically, they are saying "we will teach you not to kill by killing."... tha's like 'fucking for virginity'... it just makes no sense.
we are the defacto policeman of the world heh, tha's a good one. so basically, the US is hypocritical once again: by this logic, you have completely destroyed the notion of the soveriegn nation-state. so when the US complains about unfair trade practices or illegal immigrants, they are coming from the standpoint of: we can go anywhere in the world and do anything to anyone we want, but if anybody tries to do that to us, well, we'll just have to kill/sanction/brainwash them.
reduce the cost of war (in terms of casulties on both our side and theirs) how is training your army to be more effective at killing going to reduce the number of casualties, you nitwit! it might reduce the financial cost of war for you, but tha's about it.
you are going to have two choices why only two? you mean only two that you can think of... there's things like diplomacy, sanctions, the UN war crimes tribunal, etc. now, i don't have a problem if some highly highly skilled commandos capture these murderers so that they can stand trial in a court of law (what a new-age thought!) but, again, fighting to end some fighting makes you look like an idiot.
But having the biggest and baddest army in the world maximizes the chance that when I go to sleep tonight, death squads won't break into my house and murder my wife as she sleeps next to me. well, this is just wrong again. it is not your army that protects you from domestic deathsquads (i didn't know that was a problem in the states, i guess i'll have to look for them next time i'm down there), it would be your local police dept, as far as i can tell. of course, if you were a little more widely read even of your own citizens' writing, you would know that many of the worst deathsquads in history were armed and trained by the US military. grab some chomsky and re-assess your ideas of the nation-state.
canadaman
personally, i advocate physical violence as a complete last resort option the thing you obviously don't understand from a philosophical/moral standpoint is that violence should not be an option, period (uh-oh, here come the flames...) this comes from the basic moral premise that one should not do harm to another person. of course, there is the infamous retort, well he did it first! but ppl fail to realise that the original premise still must hold--one should never do harm, otherwise the person who claims to hold peaceful values yet is reactionary fails to maintain their peaceful values. the addition of an unjust action to an unjust action does not result in a just action. basic addition and subtraction can tell you this. just a thought
canadaman
heh, exactly.
A disproportionately low number PhDs and Nobel laureates use drugs.
my premise: phds and nobel laureates have reputations. they want to protect their reputations. drug use is considered a negative trait by society. therefore, they underreport their drug use in surveys, usually created by prohibitionist organisations such as NIDA, HHN (swedish group), etc.
A disproportionately high number of high school dropouts and criminals do use drugs.
my premise: these people obviously began using drugs at a very young age. currently, our society treats such people very poorly, ie, throwing them in jail, piss tests, basically treating them like human failures. it is this ostracism which causes them to become on the fring of society, aka dropouts and criminals.
Q.E.D
canadaman
heh, when i smoke a fat spliff, my q3 skills increase several-fold. :P