I'd be willing to bet a small amount that most commercial servers in foreign countries aren't built to handle the type of traffic that, for instance, MSNBC's or Fox's servers can. Link to some more of those in Slashdot articles and keep them hammered... Eh, an idea. Perhaps a silly one.
Everything will be more interactive. The "desktop" and the Internet will be much more integrated, and everything will be built more and more on convenience and less and less on user control. People like us will hate that, even if they do make things better, because we ultimately like having control. But name a technology that has evolved to allow the people greater control, and you'll name a real innovation.
Can you imagine the computational power required for such a task? Now that's what I want on my desktop! (Where's the link to TheOnion's PlayStation 5 story when you need it?)
A funny duct tape political cartoon was printed in my local paper Friday, though I can't find it online. (Help?)
Senate Democrat Leader Tom Daschle was shown in panel one holding a roll of duct tape and asking something to the effect of, "How the hell is duct tape going to help us?"
In frame two, the Republican elephant is holding the roll of duct tape, and Daschle is excitedly mumbling something through a duct-taped mouth.
Technological improvements expand possibilities on a daily basis. It is conceivable that, with all available resources dedicated to preserving life under a prevail-or-be-annihilated scenario, a solution to the problem could be developed.
Of course, developing the solution and implementing it are two very different things... Actions speak louder than words.
"No, but you could hear it on the AM radio." -- Everclear
There are other ways to hear your news. Besides, if someone did post it to slashdot, you'd see the story's summary there, and you'd find a way to get the news... Unless, of course, the only instance of its reporting happens to get slashdotted. Oh, sweet irony that such debate over global panic is rendered pointless because their server can't handle getting the message out.
Coincidentally, your sig is a perfect example of this as well.:-) Very nice...
As for the Bush administration... They aren't the ones issuing the warning. They raise their alert status for those on the inside that are actually working to prevent bad things from happening, and the news media picks up on it and reports it, resulting in mild panic... until, of course, something happens to either cause wild panic or nothing happens to get us to back-to-normal status.
I was hoping someone would catch that. That's why I included it at the end. Very good explanation. I'd +1 you, but you've gotten a lot of that already, and I have too many comments invested in this story.
Of course, I'd also like to point on that the probabilities that I die in a plane crash or from a doomsday asteroid destroying the planet are probably roughly similar, since I fly very rarely (twice so far) and an asteroid is not likely to destroy the planet in my life time.
There is a significant difference between familial panic, which is constrained to a tiny pocket of society, than global panic, which would wreak havoc on the entire planet rather than within Dr Geoffery's inner circle.
Religious people wouldn't go insane; their insanity would simply come out to play, or wreak havoc as it were.
And I agree. If someone did discover an asteroid on a collision course with earth with enough momentum to destroy all/most life on earth, he wouldn't be able to keep quiet about it. First, his motivation would be to let everyone on the planet know so he could profit from all the news organizations wanting his mug in their publications, on their programs, etc. Second, he would hope that the government with its seemingly infinitely deep pockets (that is, it's powers to tax the living hell out of us, if it wants) would be able to figure something out.
And I would fully support the idea of sending Bruce Willis or Jeff Goldblum up to tackle the rock head-on. Hollywood represent'!
...that the Government should make readily available for anyone. It is the government's responsibility to protect us from force and fraud, and it is the government's responsibility to make its laws available to its citizens. The government can not hold us to its standards while forcing us to pay it to access those standards in writing. Okay, ignorance isn't an excuse -- I'll concede that. But discouraging knowledge encourages ignorance, placing the blame at least partially on the government. Unless the laws of the land are publicly and freely available, there is something ethically unjust about strictly enforcing every effective line of every interpretation of the law.
I have written an essay or two on the differences between equality and equity, specifically about how we have incorrectly used "equality" to mean "equity" for many, many years, and therefore people have come to advocate that we virtually become automotons when all they really want is fair treatment under the law and equal opportunities for justice.
From an article on my web site that I wrote sometime last year:
I do not believe in equality; I believe in equity. That is to say, I do not believe in reducing everyone to likeness by methods of preferentialism or favoritism. There are two primary reasons for this: (1) such treatment would violate the rules of natural law, which serve as a cornerstone of my personal philosophy of life; (2) equality would make life absolutely boring and pointless. If we could all be reduced to a single common denominator, we would no longer be human, but back to the status of primates, all thinking alike and reacting the same in every situation. The notion of equality should therefore be thrown out in favor of equity, which is the practice of fair and impartial judgement and will. Insofar as merit is not concerned, no individual shall receive any treatment different from any other.
It's not about giving any group power. It's about improving free trade. Before the euro, dozens of European states were required to exchange goods in various currencies at risk of one currency rising in relative value to another. Constant fluctuations in currency value put an unfair risk on everyone involved. A steady, accepted currency would prevent everyone from having these problems, and it would also single out where the true problems in the global economy lay. As with anything in economics, this can only be theory until (dis)proven.
Evidence favors many things that may or many not be. Proof favors only reality. This story, based in theory, is only fun to think about and discuss (which is why it's here, I suppose). It's purpose, aside from creating that fun, is supposedly to lead to the eventual proof of one thing or another... like where everything came from or where it's going. Who knows? Not me. Not you.
Evidence can be used to support anything. To prove it, though, is another thing entirely.
The current conception of money as an asset will not disappear in our lifetimes. It is presumably an intermediate step between barter and the next best thing. The limitations of the barter system were obvious: you had to find somebody who not only had what you wanted but also wanted what you had in order to make a trade. The idea of money was a result of that. People needed a standard for trade, and marked coins (at first) and paper (later) are it.
Where will the idea go from here? Well, we have to ask ourselves what the problem with the money system is for that. We have gotten off of the gold standard (or other standards, for other currencies), so there is nothing but consumer confidence holding up any currency's value now. The only steps to be taken from here are to further consolidate world currencies into a single, accepted currency.
But will it be the dollar or the euro, and will wars be fought over it? I have a feeling that many stubborn states with long-established monetary systems will never be friendly to the idea of a universal monetary unit, especially one that emphasizes the weakness of their economy.
Gah... I could ramble on and on. I'll stop here though.:-)
In what may serve as a cautionary tale for people who use computers in public areas...
Given the headline associated with the story and this line, I couldn't tell whether sympathies lay with the ordinary Joes and Janes who may suffer the adverse effects of partial "identity theft", or with the hackers whose abilities are likely to be legislated against.
My opinion: in a "free" country, if the United States is actually supposed to be free, then we should be "free" to install spyware anytime we would like on our own computers (i.e., school administrators and internet cafe owners should be allowed to install keystroke monitoring software on their own systems) as long as they do not use the information maliciously. On the other hand, there are ethical issues when there is no warning of installation of said software. And, again, when data gathered by such measures are used for purposes other than network security -- such as to violate the security of an individual without warrant for any reason -- foul play is afoot and repercussions should be harsh.
Like I said... Utilizing the electoral system in place for dozens of elections, the American people elected George W. Bush president in 2000.
A democracy may or may not be governed by popular majority rule. A republic is not governed by a simple popular majority. The entire purpose of representation of the various territorial units -- which vary in size, population, and geographical location (duh) -- is to assert the will of the states along with the will of the people. (This is why the 17th Amendment is bad. Before it was passed, state legislatures elected US Senators. The Senate was intended to be the federal legislative representative body of the states, while the House was intended to be the federal legislative reprensative body of the people. The direct election of Senators has completely removed the states' from having their say.)
But anyway, 29 states chose Bush and 21 states chose Gore. But 48.3% chose Gore and 48.1% chose Bush. *gasp* Would you look at that? It appears that no majority chose any president in 2000!
Note 1: no candidate who has ever won a majority of the popular vote has ever not been elected to the presidency.
Note 2: the Electoral College elects the president based on the popular vote; the people do not directly elect the president.
That isn't necessarily the case. Set up message rules so the TO line of messages coming to your inbox *must* contain your email address (or one of the email addresses coming to that inbox). Any that don't are considered "junk" and sent to the trash. Check the trash before deleting it permanently, and once in a blue moon some non-SPAM might be found. Add a message rule that specifies that messages from the sender of that message should be kept in the inbox in the future. The occasional lost email is a tolerable price to pay. (Of course, nothing in my trash gets deleted permanently until I do it manually, so I have the option of skimming through it, which I do every few days.)
When other filters fail, set up your own rules to overrule them.
That is to say, it takes the democracy right out of it.
"Democracy" means "government by the people". When the people's voice is simply thrown out because its volume is too much, that is ignoring the will of the people. When focusing instead on those special interests that have worked hard to earn a special status of favor with politicians, that is a form of aristocracy. (Okay, so it isn't necessarily government by the "rich" in terms of money, but those lobbyists are certainly rich in politician-attention-grabbing resources that the average American is forced to live without.)
I would recommend that the UK continue on its current course. A better plan might to be to hire several politically qualified persons to act as email secretaries -- save the controversial, coherent, and funny letters and essentially keep the officials' inboxes down to manageable levels. (I'd imagine that something like this is already in place anyway.)
If you really want to send an email to ME that you want me to actually READ, put my address on the TO line. None of that BCC or undisclosed recipients stuff. Those are the most commonly filtered out, I would think. Also, don't mention "mortgage", "casino", or "sluts" in the subject line, because to this day I have received no emails with any of those words in the subject line that wasn't trying to sell me something.
I apologize for people who might actually want to talk to me about mortgages, casinos, or sluts. But I figure it's okay because I'm not interested in those things.
No matter how good a movie might be, if the critics mostly agree that a movie is bad, then people are less likely to see it. There are some "pop" movies that obviously violate this theory, but that's explained simply because they're targeted at pop culture. I wouldn't place too much emphasis on this theory, but I know that I have skipped several movies based on prejudices generated by a review, or a friend's opinion, etc... If someone has a reason to believe that it isn't worth their time/money, they'll pass.
Right. But everything seemed to go dead at once, or so that's what I've understood to this point. Of course, at 12,000 MPH, it wouldn't take more than a twitch to destroy everything, and probably pretty quick. After all the speculation is over, I wonder if they're just going to conclude that after 22 years, the wear and tear just got to the machine and it couldn't handle re-entry...
Slashdot Mirror
I'd be willing to bet a small amount that most commercial servers in foreign countries aren't built to handle the type of traffic that, for instance, MSNBC's or Fox's servers can. Link to some more of those in Slashdot articles and keep them hammered... Eh, an idea. Perhaps a silly one.
Everything will be more interactive. The "desktop" and the Internet will be much more integrated, and everything will be built more and more on convenience and less and less on user control. People like us will hate that, even if they do make things better, because we ultimately like having control. But name a technology that has evolved to allow the people greater control, and you'll name a real innovation.
Can you imagine the computational power required for such a task? Now that's what I want on my desktop! (Where's the link to TheOnion's PlayStation 5 story when you need it?)
I fail to see why one movie trailer, this one, is worth slashdotting when hundreds upon hundreds of others haven't been. I guess I'm not cultured.
Senate Democrat Leader Tom Daschle was shown in panel one holding a roll of duct tape and asking something to the effect of, "How the hell is duct tape going to help us?"
In frame two, the Republican elephant is holding the roll of duct tape, and Daschle is excitedly mumbling something through a duct-taped mouth.
I laughed. I laughed hard.
Of course, developing the solution and implementing it are two very different things... Actions speak louder than words.
There are other ways to hear your news. Besides, if someone did post it to slashdot, you'd see the story's summary there, and you'd find a way to get the news... Unless, of course, the only instance of its reporting happens to get slashdotted. Oh, sweet irony that such debate over global panic is rendered pointless because their server can't handle getting the message out.
As for the Bush administration... They aren't the ones issuing the warning. They raise their alert status for those on the inside that are actually working to prevent bad things from happening, and the news media picks up on it and reports it, resulting in mild panic ... until, of course, something happens to either cause wild panic or nothing happens to get us to back-to-normal status.
Of course, I'd also like to point on that the probabilities that I die in a plane crash or from a doomsday asteroid destroying the planet are probably roughly similar, since I fly very rarely (twice so far) and an asteroid is not likely to destroy the planet in my life time.
There is a significant difference between familial panic, which is constrained to a tiny pocket of society, than global panic, which would wreak havoc on the entire planet rather than within Dr Geoffery's inner circle.
And I agree. If someone did discover an asteroid on a collision course with earth with enough momentum to destroy all/most life on earth, he wouldn't be able to keep quiet about it. First, his motivation would be to let everyone on the planet know so he could profit from all the news organizations wanting his mug in their publications, on their programs, etc. Second, he would hope that the government with its seemingly infinitely deep pockets (that is, it's powers to tax the living hell out of us, if it wants) would be able to figure something out.
And I would fully support the idea of sending Bruce Willis or Jeff Goldblum up to tackle the rock head-on. Hollywood represent'!
...that the Government should make readily available for anyone. It is the government's responsibility to protect us from force and fraud, and it is the government's responsibility to make its laws available to its citizens. The government can not hold us to its standards while forcing us to pay it to access those standards in writing. Okay, ignorance isn't an excuse -- I'll concede that. But discouraging knowledge encourages ignorance, placing the blame at least partially on the government. Unless the laws of the land are publicly and freely available, there is something ethically unjust about strictly enforcing every effective line of every interpretation of the law.
1. The Political Ideal: Equality vs. Inequality, which advocates celebration of inequality (diversity)
2. Conflicts of Interests, which contrasts individualism and collectivism
From an article on my web site that I wrote sometime last year:
It's not about giving any group power. It's about improving free trade. Before the euro, dozens of European states were required to exchange goods in various currencies at risk of one currency rising in relative value to another. Constant fluctuations in currency value put an unfair risk on everyone involved. A steady, accepted currency would prevent everyone from having these problems, and it would also single out where the true problems in the global economy lay. As with anything in economics, this can only be theory until (dis)proven.
Evidence can be used to support anything. To prove it, though, is another thing entirely.
I know what you mean. You'd think that this piece were copied from something Glenn Reynolds wrote or something.
Where will the idea go from here? Well, we have to ask ourselves what the problem with the money system is for that. We have gotten off of the gold standard (or other standards, for other currencies), so there is nothing but consumer confidence holding up any currency's value now. The only steps to be taken from here are to further consolidate world currencies into a single, accepted currency.
But will it be the dollar or the euro, and will wars be fought over it? I have a feeling that many stubborn states with long-established monetary systems will never be friendly to the idea of a universal monetary unit, especially one that emphasizes the weakness of their economy.
Gah... I could ramble on and on. I'll stop here though. :-)
Confidential to Sun developers: You must not use our software!
Paint me confused.
My opinion: in a "free" country, if the United States is actually supposed to be free, then we should be "free" to install spyware anytime we would like on our own computers (i.e., school administrators and internet cafe owners should be allowed to install keystroke monitoring software on their own systems) as long as they do not use the information maliciously. On the other hand, there are ethical issues when there is no warning of installation of said software. And, again, when data gathered by such measures are used for purposes other than network security -- such as to violate the security of an individual without warrant for any reason -- foul play is afoot and repercussions should be harsh.
A democracy may or may not be governed by popular majority rule. A republic is not governed by a simple popular majority. The entire purpose of representation of the various territorial units -- which vary in size, population, and geographical location (duh) -- is to assert the will of the states along with the will of the people. (This is why the 17th Amendment is bad. Before it was passed, state legislatures elected US Senators. The Senate was intended to be the federal legislative representative body of the states, while the House was intended to be the federal legislative reprensative body of the people. The direct election of Senators has completely removed the states' from having their say.)
But anyway, 29 states chose Bush and 21 states chose Gore. But 48.3% chose Gore and 48.1% chose Bush. *gasp* Would you look at that? It appears that no majority chose any president in 2000!
Note 1: no candidate who has ever won a majority of the popular vote has ever not been elected to the presidency.
Note 2: the Electoral College elects the president based on the popular vote; the people do not directly elect the president.
When other filters fail, set up your own rules to overrule them.
"Democracy" means "government by the people". When the people's voice is simply thrown out because its volume is too much, that is ignoring the will of the people. When focusing instead on those special interests that have worked hard to earn a special status of favor with politicians, that is a form of aristocracy. (Okay, so it isn't necessarily government by the "rich" in terms of money, but those lobbyists are certainly rich in politician-attention-grabbing resources that the average American is forced to live without.)
I would recommend that the UK continue on its current course. A better plan might to be to hire several politically qualified persons to act as email secretaries -- save the controversial, coherent, and funny letters and essentially keep the officials' inboxes down to manageable levels. (I'd imagine that something like this is already in place anyway.)
I apologize for people who might actually want to talk to me about mortgages, casinos, or sluts. But I figure it's okay because I'm not interested in those things.
No matter how good a movie might be, if the critics mostly agree that a movie is bad, then people are less likely to see it. There are some "pop" movies that obviously violate this theory, but that's explained simply because they're targeted at pop culture. I wouldn't place too much emphasis on this theory, but I know that I have skipped several movies based on prejudices generated by a review, or a friend's opinion, etc... If someone has a reason to believe that it isn't worth their time/money, they'll pass.
Right. But everything seemed to go dead at once, or so that's what I've understood to this point. Of course, at 12,000 MPH, it wouldn't take more than a twitch to destroy everything, and probably pretty quick. After all the speculation is over, I wonder if they're just going to conclude that after 22 years, the wear and tear just got to the machine and it couldn't handle re-entry...