Would you hire an architect to design a house for you without formal training?
Just to pick up on this point, I read an old book written before architecture was professionalised in the UK. It argued against professionalisation, and made many "good points". I can't remember them all, but one that stuck in my mind is that the qualities of a good architect cannot be formally tested.
Prior to professionalisation, people who were artists, perhaps sculptors, and who were also builders, could work as architects. Both the qualities of a good artist, and the qualities of a good builder, were proven by practical experience. Reading art books does not make you a good painter. Nor does looking at diagrams make you a sound builder.
One of the main complaints that the book tried to make, was that while the natural artist/builder may be excluded from practicing architecture, the good bookworm would easily 'qualify'.
So indeed we end up with only those 'architects' who are good at passing exams.
Being able to remember textbook diagrams and calculations and history essays, for exam regurgitation does not guarantee any practical understanding. Note that doctors spend a lot of time training in hospitals. But architects are trained in studio/lecture theatre conditions that bear little relation to real world practice. Still confident about that architect you want to hire?
What are you quoting from? I'm not sure I understand the koan as a "folk story", as that implies to me that it's not something real or practicable. But perhaps the quote means it's like an oral transmission, used to carry knowledge?
The koan is within ourselves, and what the Zen master does is no more than point it out for us so that we can see it more plainly than before. When the koan is brought out of the unconscious into the field of consciousness, it is said to be understood by us. -- D.T. Suzuki,
Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis
Which is how I'd sorta understood it -- something to do, an exercise.
Perhaps you can reconcile Enlightenment and Understanding based on personal realization.
Not been there. Not done that. No T-shirt. But say, boing boing, hows your interest in Zen and Buddhas formed?
That was quite an odd response to that man's comment.
Yes, it certainly was. 'Insane' even. But then you're giving me the benefit of the doubt?
Transrational as you are calling it is the part of thinking commonly referred to as "understanding".
I'm not quite sure. It is understanding, but not via thinking. Like the Zen koan defeats intellectual analysis. You can't think your way out of "show me your original face before you were born!". So there's definetly a 'trans-thinking' possible. Not just a 'better thinking'.
Memory, analysis, synthesis, understanding... can happen on lots of levels, like remembering feelings or pictures, but the original post was talking about rational analysis, which is why I tried to deal with the deficiency of what rational thinking is based on: symbols, words, concepts.
but many people start to believe in the "spirtual" side of Zen because of linguistics of the teachings and fail to see the metaphors and allegories for what they are.
Metaphors in Zen? Like what? Zen, as far as I know about it, is meant to be the most direct, most immediate, most spontaneous realisation -- "hard because it is so simple". I don't know what it's metaphors and allegories are.
My silly point was just this: rationality works by splitting the world into little chunks, and manipulating some of those chunks. If the solution to the problem happens to not be in one of those particular chunks, then you'll not find it. What you will find is a bunch of conclusions that look very reasonable based on the chunks you happen to have. Also it is very difficult to analyse complex systems of systems, consequences of consequences etc. We just don't tend to think about it. And because we see the world as Things, and think Things, subtle relashionships and consequences don't easily enter our awareness.
It's like, unless we have a name for something, we don't particularly see it. So anything we haven't 'thingified', we can't analyse. And by the time we've given it a name, it's changed, so all we're left with is the abstraction. Try making a list of all the things that define who you are. Now try to make that list 100% complete. It's a limitation of thought. And it's a problem just getting people to see beyond Either/Or terms.
Anyway, I'm suggesting. Take with pinch of salt. I'm having a strange day.
Careful fact and analysis requires that people think, and I think it's already been established that ninety-five percent of America tries to avoid thinking whenever possible.
Don't mind me, I'm just one of the 95% that doesn't think.
I sense an over reliance and confidence in Rationality in you. I'd say the Rationality is strong in you... but that doesn't have the same ring to it.
Seriously, there's a problem with 'fact and analysis'... and it's quite hard to notice it... (bear with me on this one).
There's a weakness in thinking (words, concepts, analysis etc.) which, how shall I put it, 95% of people don't realise...
Lets explore this a second. When we say 'thinking' we are talking about a mental process with symbols, concepts, or even just words. All these are 'thing' based. They are the basis of things.
Say we are thinking about a chair. When I say "look at the chair", your attention becomes focused on the 'chair'. But what are you really looking at? After all, there is really no such 'chair' in your senses. This is the Myth of the Given. For all your eyes give you are little coloured patches... (are you still with me? or have I been dismissed into fuckwit land?)... and these coloured patches are all that there "is" in an objective sence.
So while our senses just report coloured patches, the mind somehow creates 'things' in 3D space. Things like teapot, child, car, and also things like national border, race, religion, etc.
All these are things that we create in the mind and share culturally, so that when I point to a set of coloured patches in my visual field and say "chair", you examine your visual field, make the same mental construct, and agree with me.
This act of focusing on one tiny area of our sensory experience, is a 'constricting' of our experience. In order to experience, and therefore think 'chair', I have to exclude everything else. Otherwise you'd never get to 'see' the 'chair'. All you would 'see', is a sea of colour.
So what's the point? Well, we can begin to suspect that Rationality is weak at the foundations. While our senses report coloured patches, our mind focuses on some patches at the exclusion of others, and constructs a 'thing' and names it 'chair'. Note the exclusion, the cutting, the subtle ignorance required.
Now the 'chair' is real in as much as it's atoms exist, and I can pick it up and bash you over the head with it. But the 'chair' does not exist as a separate thing, even though we conceptualize it so. The illusion of separation is created by focusing on one area and ignoring all the rest.
In learning to draw, you would be given exercises to look at the negative shapes, or maybe just the positive shapes. It's near impossible to see both at the exact same time. Even though neither the negative nor the positive shape can exist without the other. Likewise, when we think about things, we are actually performing huge acts of deliberate ignorance. In order to think about something, we have to exclude from our attention everything else. Now this is usually OK with simple things like following the rules of mathematics, or deciding what to wear. But when we talk about ecological issues (and most popular arguments against nuclear energy are about the environment), we are dealing with systems of systems of systems of systems...
Thinking is a focussing by exclusing. But to understand systems of systems etc. we need to open our minds.
Asking 'how much energy does it take to manufacture a solar panel' is questioning the start of the first level of the first system... do you see what I mean? We could also ask, what happens if every third world country gets nuclear power? That's also a first system question. How would a country that does not have access to deep mines in stable geology deal with their waste? Now we're starting to probe a little further. Notice that we have to expand our questions to begin to include more of the system. Notice that this is the opposite of 'rational analysis', where we try to cut away everything unnecessary. Here we have to take many many many points of view, just to start to get a handle on the size of the problem!
While rationality is good for relatively complex arguments that can be nailed down in twenty points or so, trying to understand ecology and society means opening to encompass vastly interconnected systems of systems of systems. And while basic rationality operates using symbols that 'chop off' everything not contained in the symbol itself, ecological problems require something better. I don't think fall-out on Scottish sheep was on the minds of the Chernobyl operators.
So while rationality has proved itself to be a hugely successful and powerful tool, we are running into evidence of it's limitation. Evidence in the form of turds (or worse) hitting swimmers in the face on a sunday outing to the beach. I'm not advocating going pre-rational (pray to your godess and chant etc.) I'm advocating trans-rational. I'm advocating not being taken in by 'rational argument' -- it is not the best we can do.
A Zen master holds up a stick before his students and says, "What is this? If you reply 'it's a stick', I'll beat you. If you reply 'it's not a stick', I'll beat you. What is it?! " A student got up, took the stick from the master, and broke it in two.
While I am not a member of Greenpeace, (I don't even like them), it does seem that there is an 'environmental crisis' ie. mass slow suicide. And Greenpeace puts out info about this. Now that doesn't mean all their info is 100% correct, but we don't just dismiss them because they're biased. I mean, if they exist to promote green ways, and attack eco-damage, and they are very focussed at doing so, then yes, they'll seem 'biased'. But that's like saying, "don't ask a linux user about linux because they're just extreemist biased weirdos".
I consider entertainment as more of a catalyst than an element in the pursuit of higher needs.
Yes, I mean, I can see that writers, artists, songwriters, etc. want to put some depth, meaning, substance to their work. A message, as well as just the pleasure of dancing around the room. And the greater the artist, the higher the message (one way of 'measuring' art).
Most of Hollywood isn't Shakespear, but even something like The Matrix contained some esoteric, philosophical questions within the action adventure. Or a personal favourite, Babylon 5 (some people will think it lame), with its endless "Who are you?" and "What do you want?". It is said that Sri Ramana Maharshi, reputedly one of the greatest spiritual teachers, gained ultimate non-dual enlightenment by asking deeply "Who am I?"
So through our art (and hence entertainment), things trickle through. And if nothing else, then what the hell, at least I'll have spent a few hours with the girlfriend/wife watching t.v. -- as you say.
BTW, as you are interested in Maslow and are open to ideas of hierarchies, have you heard of Spiral Dynamics? IANAP (I Am Not A Psychologist), but I gather it's a very useful system for understanding culture and people -- it was used to help the different factions in South Africa, who held very different values, come together to talk, and move forward.
After you've fulfilled the basics of survival and are living a relatively safe life, entertainment becomes quite valuable. It helps you forget your own shortcomings, while simultaneously providing the opportunity to learn how to overcome them. (emphasis mine)
My muscles will not get bigger by forgetting that they are 'small'. I won't increase my cardio-vascular performance by watching the game on cable. And I won't learn to make myself fitter by watching an Olympic athlete do the high jump. I mean, that's way too advanced. I need something more on my own level, like a Pillates video, that I can begin to practice with.
Yes, generally it can be inspiring to see what the body is capable of, but once inspired, I have to get out of my chair and go swimming or join the gym. And it's just soooo much easier to say, "later", and change channel.
"Entertainment" can give relief from our deficiencies, in the same way that going to sleep gives relief from the day, but I wouldn't give entertainment any more value than just a feel-good drug.
To imply that entertainment is fulfilling a higher need in Maslow's system is, IMHO, a poor reading of Maslow. I mean, I can see the 'connection' -- that starving people have no interest in cultural pursuits, and now that we're all fairly well fed, culture, and hence entertainment, is our new need.
But not all culture is entertainment. I tried reading a couple of philosophy books, and that was not a pleasant experience. I doubt that the hard discipline required for achievement in sport is considered 'fun'.
When on Star Trek they said, "We all work to better ourselves", I don't think they were referring to their pac man scores.
Self actualisation is a very hard and difficult task. Very few people are willing to do it. And even if you include "gathering information" as part of the task, most movies/games don't contain much specifically useful in that regard anyhow -- although there are exceptions, eg. "Meetings With Remarkable Men".
Yes, she attends an evening class in photography, and they have a lab of macs, and other apps like GraphicConverter (Mac only?) are very handy. And indeed, at least photophop on a mac is well proven.
It's not just great industrial design (though that is part of it) it is because a lot of that design had your friend in mind.
Yes, I think this is what mac-user-bashers are just not aware of. That's it's ok to use intuition -- that not being able to list all the 'technical' points is not a sign of being dumb. Of course those intuitions could be wrong, but so can an ill chosen set of technical comparisons.
And your list of specific points is very good (IMHO) -- it gives the intuitives something to say... put into words "what they already knew, but couldn't tell you"
Ever been job interviewed by an intuitive? They just sit there, not saying much. But they notice everything about you. Yeah, this guy is ok, but he just doesn't fit with our team mix and what we need... etc.
Apple really does care about those intangibles: there's an article on ArsTechnica commenting that only Apple would bother to make QT movies continue playing while minimised in the dock and being transluscently dragged -- not that it's technically impossibe -- it just consumes engineering resources that could have been spent on something "useful" -- but apple understands these priceless little intangibles... as well as the big important ones like ColorSync and iDVD
Maybe what we are seeing (to get back to the main topic) is computer systems differentiating themselves more to cater to different cultures (needs/tasks/work methods/people)... so the visual artists use macs, the admins and hackers use linux, and the business world keeps lumbering on with win/office. Of course there will be some overlap... scientists may go for more of a mix of linux and mac etc. but generally the "one WinPC fits all" is history. And maybe MacOS X won't threaten Linux in any significant way. They'll just each build on their own strengths in different fields.
anyone who thinks that colored plastic is moving computers forward has a problem
It's about industrial design. You know, when you have three competing products, sitting there on the shelf, and as a consumer, you don't know which is technically superior (consider the average person trying to decide which washing machine to buy)... so aesthetics, company image, lifestyle etc. are maybe the only things the customer has to choose from.
Of course, true techies will not be seduced by this frivolity, but Apple is targetting home users, artists, musicians... I mean, I have a friend who wants to get a mac to manipulate her photos... and she "just prefers a mac" -- can't really tell me why.
So while the industrial design does not move the tech forward, it can get it off the shelf and into the customers' home. Just about every other product from tooth-pick containers to steam irons to VCRs to watches (especially watches and other stuff you wear) gets serious industial design.
Most people can't de-assemble their car engine. What they see is the styling, the interiors, a few specs (MPG etc.) and the image/prestige/price tag. In a way, the PC has been a 'personal' installation... but now Jobs is making it 'personal' lifestyle.
Bongo must be a club kid with a 6 centimeter wide anus if he thinks God is a "she." Either that, or he's just missed all the Biblical to references to HE and FATHER, etc.
Ok, putting aside my suspicion that I'm talking to a lower life form, I'll give you one guess as to which gender wrote all those "holy" books. But let's be brief:
religious texts were mostly written by men
equal rights for women is only a recent development
many parts of the world still don't give women the vote
saying god is a male is, how shall we say, a big insecure ego trip by the male species
there are two sexes, and women are the stronger
female bodies are built to survive, live longer, conserve resources, gather information, care for children etc.
male bodies are built to sprint and kill
human embryos start out female, and half of them are "dumbed down" to become male
WTF was all that "rib" business about anyway???
women carry and deliver children, and men have a very small part to play -- if the creative force is to be assigned a gender, it's obviously FEMALE
men need sex like all the time -- women can go without for weeks, months etc. -- so who do you think has the power??
Anyway, Anonymous Coward, may you become better informed.
this is because everytime we are unfortunate enough to have to use one of these fisher-price wannabe computers we keep hitting where the 2nd button SHOULD by all rights be, and it pisses us off when its not there
"oh yea, gonna hafta spend the next 30sec or so digging thru the menus for that command that SHOULD be right here at my fingertips, macos is sooooo much easier to use, thank god im not using a REAL OS"
Well, I'm sorry you're so upset by the lack of a god given second button. Hope you don't have a cardiac over it. Maybe it should be written into law or the constitution or something. I mean, if God had meant mice to have one button, she'd have made humans with one finger. Give us a 5 button mouse I say. :-p
In fact, the back-to-nature-and-avoid-all-technology hermit types tend to have SHORTER lifespans than city dwellers.
Well, yes. And I'm not anti-tech in general. You're right that some people are of the 'romantic' notion that "before we got civilised, we lived in harmony with nature", but there are those who argue (and I humbly agree), that primitive societies appeared 'in harmony' only because their tech was limited. You can't genocide with bows and arrows... but primitive cultures, it seems, certainly had their tyrants who would have nuked other tribes if only they had had the bomb.
But as for, "we're living longer anyway"... are we? It depends on the perspective... a pig may feel really well fed... just before the slaughter. The trouble with the greenhouse effect, GM, contaminants in the food chain etc. is that their prescence is very subtle, and they accumulate gradually...
Are we heading, with stomachs full, for a disaster?
don't deprive ourselves of useful tech, 'just in case'
it's just people looking to blame their illness on someone
Well, that's a lot of loosely strung together points. Are you a woman? No, seriously, you have to use a lot of intuition to make connections between all those points and still call it an argument.
I think it's a valuable insight that there are some people who Just Want To Blame. And these JWTBs will try to get in the way of cell phones, GM, smoking... hell, even the internet (my son shot another boy because he read it on the internet etc.)
So these JWTBs go round trying to 'protect' everyone. Because everyone is a 'victim' And as you say, we should hold ourselves as adults, and be responsable (ie. choose for ourselves).
But, in order to make that choice, we need good data. We need information. Do I start smoking for the pleasure of it, or is nicotine sufficiently addictive that I will experience more discomfort than pleasure when I want to stop? Do I use a cell phone for the convenience, or will it increase my risk of getting cancer (remembering that one in three die of cancer anyway... will a cell phone dramatically increse that risk?)
I think the argument that people are just not dying fast enough is not valid. Sorry, but your logic is silly. And I spend a lot of time being silly, so believe me, I know silly.
Just because we tolerate x thousand road deaths does not mean anything causing less than x thousand deaths is ok.
Just because light bulbs might cause harm (people falling off chairs when changing them?), and we accept light bulbs, does not mean we accept any possible hard to detect harm from everything else.
In talking statistics, we can make chances sound real small. But for the one in a million person who gets that fatal condition, it will kill them.
Also, we could be in the business of cleaning up this planet. Try hoarding all the garbage you would throw out in a year. Now multiply that by 50. And again by 500 million. It's all going somewhere.
Cell phones are just another suspect technology because we have wised up to the fact that most of our technologies involve harmful environmental side effects.
People are taught in school (at least I was) that different types of radiation have different effects, some linked to cancer. Now cell phones emit radiation, and I for one don't know what effect that type of radiation will have. I would like to know. I would like it to be studied a lot.
Now I suspect that the tobacco companies don't try to prove that nicotine is 'highly addictive'. And I suspect that scientists are a conservative bunch -- 'false' until proven 'true'. And I suspect that politicians will seek to pacify the public and protect the industries -- insert picture of politician feeding burger to daughter here. And I suspect that the environment is treated like some magical tardis where you can dump things and they will 'just dissapear'. Witness latest debate about whether it's 'safe' to eat tinned salmon.
So the JWTBs seem to target every new technology. But guess what? A lot of our technologies "don't work" -- cars turn a small mistake into a 26 car pile up, television entertains you while your mind and body rots, food packaging preserves the food a few weeks and the packet forever -- I mean, I don't want to be a bleeding heart, but we could all add to this list... is it any surprise that some people worry about mobile phone radiation?
We are just beginning to ask questions about what the real extent of pollution in the environment is. And in that light, all these 'hard to detect little risks that are a part fo life' may just all add up and wipe our 'responsable' little asses off the planet. We need more research into these things. Not just ignore it as part of 'life is risky'.
So yes, the JWTBs are a sad lot. But they are also going to be a very busy lot.
and all of those products... are available on Windows
Are you saying that because they are available on windows, the mac has no advantage in terms of apps?
Well, is this not a different argument to what the parent post made -- ie. that "if MS killed Mac Office, Apple would die"
The latter (original) argument is about whether Apple can survive without Office. But your argument is about whether Apple can survive without mac-only killer apps. These are different arguments.
I don't see how killing office for mac would kill apple. I don't think home users need office. I don't think servers need office running on them. If linux users can survive without office, then I don't see why mac users can't. If you use a machine for 3D modelling (eg. maya, form.Z), photo-artwork (eg. photoshop, graphiconverter), and web publishing (BBEdit, etc. etc.) and your secretary is doing the typing, then your work doesn't involve Office.
Alternatively, if you think computer==desktop==business, ie. the number one use for a computer is for business, then apple would have died years ago.
And anyway, let's not forget MOSX -- it isn't vapourware. Maya has been ported to it for friggen'sake. And it has iMovie. Apple is choosing it's battles very carefully.
Apple tried to do this today by comparing performance between a 733MHz Power Mac system and a 1.5GHz Pentium 4. The Mac won handily. Naturally, Apple probably chose the operations that made the Mac look best, but that still implies a G4 is comparible to a Pentium with, say, 1.5 times the MHz.
Also to note, Jobs implied that iDVD was only possible because of AltiVec. He said that usually software encoding takes 24 hours to encode a one hour MPEG2 video. Using AltiVec, they're doing it in just 2.
If this is 'true', then the usual criticism that Apple has picked a few specifically favourable benchmarks -- and hence the only thing macs are faster at is a few Photoshop filters, and encoding DVDs -- then that criticism begins to sound a bit lame.
It would be a little bit like someone sitting in a Rolls, being overtaken by a Ferrari, paw pawing the Ferrari because it's 'only good at speed'.
But let me be reminded that I know nothing about highly optimised encoding of DVD on similarly priced x86 chips... maybe they can do the same, I dunno.
Yes, before I worry about detail, I'd just like to see the whole scene composition as indended by the director. All too often I see things in films that don't make sence visually... like two actors, one standing on each side, looking at each other... but only one is visible... bah!
Scanning through Gregory Pomerantzs' paper just makes me wonder why 'we', the general computer using population, would need.NET.
It sounds to me like.NET is an MS 'replacement' of the Internet.
What I mean is that currently what we call the net is made up of many things, and MS is looking to replace them all.
Hence.NET is about languages, scripting, search engines, protocols, services, customer data, servers, clients etc. Hence.NET is really MS replacing all net related technologies with.NET versions.
So my question is, if.NET is mostly a huge technology swap (net for.NET), and only marginally a functionality provision (unless you call digital copy prevention a function 'enhancement'), why do we need it? Why would we want it? Is the net really in need of a retooling for the sake of rebranding?
Is MS so peeved that the net was built on *nix that they want to rebuild it on MS tech??
If you are designing an embedded system (TiVo, VoIP router, cell phone base station, industrial control or ispection, autonomous robot) then the power advantages of the PPC and on-chip peripheral sets offered by Motorolla make x86s not even show up on the radar.
Now that is interesting. I keep forgetting that there's more to life than the desktop. I guess I should try find out what percentage of Moto's business dollars is in the embedded world...
Indeed, even Mac 'enthusiasts' are hard pressed to find good technical reasons for buying PowerPC. Had Moto been at 900MHz by now, then, well, maybe.
But people don't necessairally start asking "What chip?". They average masses just ask "Which PC?". But they could also start asking "Which OS?" -- and this reveals one of the great potential* benefits of Linux -- that you can choose Linux first, and worry about your hardware second (as opposed to, say, the Mac, where choosing Mac OS X 'limits' you to Apple HW). And this is highly exciting for the IT industry, not to mention 'World Domination'...
For while Windows went 'everywhere' horizonatally (across all** desktops), Linux is busy going everywhere vertically (to most scales, CPUs etc.). -- So while MS has been successful keeping horizontal competition out, they are about to get vertically out-flanked.
When Linux is running on the company server, and on your PDA, the only bottleneck will be that 'troublesome' desktop running 'incompatible' Windows;-)
Note the problem won't be what chip is in your desktop. It won't be the styling of the plastics. It'll simply be a matter of installing the right OS. And most of the time, that'll be Linux.
Is there a "Fanaticism FAQ" ?
* Potential for the masses, but real and current for those who know...
** In so far as 90% == 100%.
Slashdot Mirror
Would you hire an architect to design a house for you without formal training?
Just to pick up on this point, I read an old book written before architecture was professionalised in the UK. It argued against professionalisation, and made many "good points". I can't remember them all, but one that stuck in my mind is that the qualities of a good architect cannot be formally tested.
Prior to professionalisation, people who were artists, perhaps sculptors, and who were also builders, could work as architects. Both the qualities of a good artist, and the qualities of a good builder, were proven by practical experience. Reading art books does not make you a good painter. Nor does looking at diagrams make you a sound builder.
One of the main complaints that the book tried to make, was that while the natural artist/builder may be excluded from practicing architecture, the good bookworm would easily 'qualify'.
So indeed we end up with only those 'architects' who are good at passing exams.
Being able to remember textbook diagrams and calculations and history essays, for exam regurgitation does not guarantee any practical understanding. Note that doctors spend a lot of time training in hospitals. But architects are trained in studio/lecture theatre conditions that bear little relation to real world practice. Still confident about that architect you want to hire?
I once had to design a site for a gas grill company according to the owner's rather dubious tastes. It's pretty horrid
Hey, didn't your client pay you enough to type in the !DOCTYPE ??
:-p
But really, I feel sorry for you... visually it sends me screaming for cover.
What are you quoting from? I'm not sure I understand the koan as a "folk story", as that implies to me that it's not something real or practicable. But perhaps the quote means it's like an oral transmission, used to carry knowledge?
Which is how I'd sorta understood it -- something to do, an exercise.
Perhaps you can reconcile Enlightenment and Understanding based on personal realization.
Not been there. Not done that. No T-shirt. But say, boing boing, hows your interest in Zen and Buddhas formed?
That was quite an odd response to that man's comment.
Yes, it certainly was. 'Insane' even. But then you're giving me the benefit of the doubt?
Transrational as you are calling it is the part of thinking commonly referred to as "understanding".
I'm not quite sure. It is understanding, but not via thinking. Like the Zen koan defeats intellectual analysis. You can't think your way out of "show me your original face before you were born!". So there's definetly a 'trans-thinking' possible. Not just a 'better thinking'.
Memory, analysis, synthesis, understanding... can happen on lots of levels, like remembering feelings or pictures, but the original post was talking about rational analysis, which is why I tried to deal with the deficiency of what rational thinking is based on: symbols, words, concepts.
but many people start to believe in the "spirtual" side of Zen because of linguistics of the teachings and fail to see the metaphors and allegories for what they are.
Metaphors in Zen? Like what? Zen, as far as I know about it, is meant to be the most direct, most immediate, most spontaneous realisation -- "hard because it is so simple". I don't know what it's metaphors and allegories are.
My silly point was just this: rationality works by splitting the world into little chunks, and manipulating some of those chunks. If the solution to the problem happens to not be in one of those particular chunks, then you'll not find it. What you will find is a bunch of conclusions that look very reasonable based on the chunks you happen to have. Also it is very difficult to analyse complex systems of systems, consequences of consequences etc. We just don't tend to think about it. And because we see the world as Things, and think Things, subtle relashionships and consequences don't easily enter our awareness.
It's like, unless we have a name for something, we don't particularly see it. So anything we haven't 'thingified', we can't analyse. And by the time we've given it a name, it's changed, so all we're left with is the abstraction. Try making a list of all the things that define who you are. Now try to make that list 100% complete. It's a limitation of thought. And it's a problem just getting people to see beyond Either/Or terms.
Anyway, I'm suggesting. Take with pinch of salt. I'm having a strange day.
Careful fact and analysis requires that people think, and I think it's already been established that ninety-five percent of America tries to avoid thinking whenever possible.
Don't mind me, I'm just one of the 95% that doesn't think.
I sense an over reliance and confidence in Rationality in you. I'd say the Rationality is strong in you... but that doesn't have the same ring to it.
Seriously, there's a problem with 'fact and analysis'... and it's quite hard to notice it... (bear with me on this one).
There's a weakness in thinking (words, concepts, analysis etc.) which, how shall I put it, 95% of people don't realise...
Lets explore this a second. When we say 'thinking' we are talking about a mental process with symbols, concepts, or even just words. All these are 'thing' based. They are the basis of things.
Say we are thinking about a chair. When I say "look at the chair", your attention becomes focused on the 'chair'. But what are you really looking at? After all, there is really no such 'chair' in your senses. This is the Myth of the Given. For all your eyes give you are little coloured patches... (are you still with me? or have I been dismissed into fuckwit land?)... and these coloured patches are all that there "is" in an objective sence.
So while our senses just report coloured patches, the mind somehow creates 'things' in 3D space. Things like teapot, child, car, and also things like national border, race, religion, etc.
All these are things that we create in the mind and share culturally, so that when I point to a set of coloured patches in my visual field and say "chair", you examine your visual field, make the same mental construct, and agree with me.
This act of focusing on one tiny area of our sensory experience, is a 'constricting' of our experience. In order to experience, and therefore think 'chair', I have to exclude everything else. Otherwise you'd never get to 'see' the 'chair'. All you would 'see', is a sea of colour.
So what's the point? Well, we can begin to suspect that Rationality is weak at the foundations. While our senses report coloured patches, our mind focuses on some patches at the exclusion of others, and constructs a 'thing' and names it 'chair'. Note the exclusion, the cutting, the subtle ignorance required.
Now the 'chair' is real in as much as it's atoms exist, and I can pick it up and bash you over the head with it. But the 'chair' does not exist as a separate thing, even though we conceptualize it so. The illusion of separation is created by focusing on one area and ignoring all the rest.
In learning to draw, you would be given exercises to look at the negative shapes, or maybe just the positive shapes. It's near impossible to see both at the exact same time. Even though neither the negative nor the positive shape can exist without the other. Likewise, when we think about things, we are actually performing huge acts of deliberate ignorance. In order to think about something, we have to exclude from our attention everything else. Now this is usually OK with simple things like following the rules of mathematics, or deciding what to wear. But when we talk about ecological issues (and most popular arguments against nuclear energy are about the environment), we are dealing with systems of systems of systems of systems...
Thinking is a focussing by exclusing. But to understand systems of systems etc. we need to open our minds.
Asking 'how much energy does it take to manufacture a solar panel' is questioning the start of the first level of the first system... do you see what I mean? We could also ask, what happens if every third world country gets nuclear power? That's also a first system question. How would a country that does not have access to deep mines in stable geology deal with their waste? Now we're starting to probe a little further. Notice that we have to expand our questions to begin to include more of the system. Notice that this is the opposite of 'rational analysis', where we try to cut away everything unnecessary. Here we have to take many many many points of view, just to start to get a handle on the size of the problem!
While rationality is good for relatively complex arguments that can be nailed down in twenty points or so, trying to understand ecology and society means opening to encompass vastly interconnected systems of systems of systems. And while basic rationality operates using symbols that 'chop off' everything not contained in the symbol itself, ecological problems require something better. I don't think fall-out on Scottish sheep was on the minds of the Chernobyl operators.
So while rationality has proved itself to be a hugely successful and powerful tool, we are running into evidence of it's limitation. Evidence in the form of turds (or worse) hitting swimmers in the face on a sunday outing to the beach. I'm not advocating going pre-rational (pray to your godess and chant etc.) I'm advocating trans-rational. I'm advocating not being taken in by 'rational argument' -- it is not the best we can do.
A Zen master holds up a stick before his students and says, "What is this? If you reply 'it's a stick', I'll beat you. If you reply 'it's not a stick', I'll beat you. What is it?! " A student got up, took the stick from the master, and broke it in two.
extreamly biased extreamist organizations
While I am not a member of Greenpeace, (I don't even like them), it does seem that there is an 'environmental crisis' ie. mass slow suicide. And Greenpeace puts out info about this. Now that doesn't mean all their info is 100% correct, but we don't just dismiss them because they're biased. I mean, if they exist to promote green ways, and attack eco-damage, and they are very focussed at doing so, then yes, they'll seem 'biased'. But that's like saying, "don't ask a linux user about linux because they're just extreemist biased weirdos".
I consider entertainment as more of a catalyst than an element in the pursuit of higher needs.
Yes, I mean, I can see that writers, artists, songwriters, etc. want to put some depth, meaning, substance to their work. A message, as well as just the pleasure of dancing around the room. And the greater the artist, the higher the message (one way of 'measuring' art).
Most of Hollywood isn't Shakespear, but even something like The Matrix contained some esoteric, philosophical questions within the action adventure. Or a personal favourite, Babylon 5 (some people will think it lame), with its endless "Who are you?" and "What do you want?". It is said that Sri Ramana Maharshi, reputedly one of the greatest spiritual teachers, gained ultimate non-dual enlightenment by asking deeply "Who am I?"
So through our art (and hence entertainment), things trickle through. And if nothing else, then what the hell, at least I'll have spent a few hours with the girlfriend/wife watching t.v. -- as you say.
BTW, as you are interested in Maslow and are open to ideas of hierarchies, have you heard of Spiral Dynamics? IANAP (I Am Not A Psychologist), but I gather it's a very useful system for understanding culture and people -- it was used to help the different factions in South Africa, who held very different values, come together to talk, and move forward.
After you've fulfilled the basics of survival and are living a relatively safe life, entertainment becomes quite valuable. It helps you forget your own shortcomings, while simultaneously providing the opportunity to learn how to overcome them. (emphasis mine)
My muscles will not get bigger by forgetting that they are 'small'. I won't increase my cardio-vascular performance by watching the game on cable. And I won't learn to make myself fitter by watching an Olympic athlete do the high jump. I mean, that's way too advanced. I need something more on my own level, like a Pillates video, that I can begin to practice with.
Yes, generally it can be inspiring to see what the body is capable of, but once inspired, I have to get out of my chair and go swimming or join the gym. And it's just soooo much easier to say, "later", and change channel.
"Entertainment" can give relief from our deficiencies, in the same way that going to sleep gives relief from the day, but I wouldn't give entertainment any more value than just a feel-good drug.
To imply that entertainment is fulfilling a higher need in Maslow's system is, IMHO, a poor reading of Maslow. I mean, I can see the 'connection' -- that starving people have no interest in cultural pursuits, and now that we're all fairly well fed, culture, and hence entertainment, is our new need.
But not all culture is entertainment. I tried reading a couple of philosophy books, and that was not a pleasant experience. I doubt that the hard discipline required for achievement in sport is considered 'fun'.
When on Star Trek they said, "We all work to better ourselves", I don't think they were referring to their pac man scores.
Self actualisation is a very hard and difficult task. Very few people are willing to do it. And even if you include "gathering information" as part of the task, most movies/games don't contain much specifically useful in that regard anyhow -- although there are exceptions, eg. "Meetings With Remarkable Men".
Yes, she attends an evening class in photography, and they have a lab of macs, and other apps like GraphicConverter (Mac only?) are very handy. And indeed, at least photophop on a mac is well proven.
It's not just great industrial design (though that is part of it) it is because a lot of that design had your friend in mind.
Yes, I think this is what mac-user-bashers are just not aware of. That's it's ok to use intuition -- that not being able to list all the 'technical' points is not a sign of being dumb. Of course those intuitions could be wrong, but so can an ill chosen set of technical comparisons.
And your list of specific points is very good (IMHO) -- it gives the intuitives something to say... put into words "what they already knew, but couldn't tell you"
Ever been job interviewed by an intuitive? They just sit there, not saying much. But they notice everything about you. Yeah, this guy is ok, but he just doesn't fit with our team mix and what we need... etc.
Apple really does care about those intangibles: there's an article on ArsTechnica commenting that only Apple would bother to make QT movies continue playing while minimised in the dock and being transluscently dragged -- not that it's technically impossibe -- it just consumes engineering resources that could have been spent on something "useful" -- but apple understands these priceless little intangibles ... as well as the big important ones like ColorSync and iDVD
Maybe what we are seeing (to get back to the main topic) is computer systems differentiating themselves more to cater to different cultures (needs/tasks/work methods/people)... so the visual artists use macs, the admins and hackers use linux, and the business world keeps lumbering on with win/office. Of course there will be some overlap... scientists may go for more of a mix of linux and mac etc. but generally the "one WinPC fits all" is history. And maybe MacOS X won't threaten Linux in any significant way. They'll just each build on their own strengths in different fields.
anyone who thinks that colored plastic is moving computers forward has a problem
It's about industrial design. You know, when you have three competing products, sitting there on the shelf, and as a consumer, you don't know which is technically superior (consider the average person trying to decide which washing machine to buy)... so aesthetics, company image, lifestyle etc. are maybe the only things the customer has to choose from.
Of course, true techies will not be seduced by this frivolity, but Apple is targetting home users, artists, musicians... I mean, I have a friend who wants to get a mac to manipulate her photos... and she "just prefers a mac" -- can't really tell me why.
So while the industrial design does not move the tech forward, it can get it off the shelf and into the customers' home. Just about every other product from tooth-pick containers to steam irons to VCRs to watches (especially watches and other stuff you wear) gets serious industial design.
Most people can't de-assemble their car engine. What they see is the styling, the interiors, a few specs (MPG etc.) and the image/prestige/price tag. In a way, the PC has been a 'personal' installation... but now Jobs is making it 'personal' lifestyle.
Well, you would resort to spamming? Many people would kill you for that.
Bongo must be a club kid with a 6 centimeter wide anus if he thinks God is a "she." Either that, or he's just missed all the Biblical to references to HE and FATHER, etc.
Ok, putting aside my suspicion that I'm talking to a lower life form, I'll give you one guess as to which gender wrote all those "holy" books. But let's be brief:
Anyway, Anonymous Coward, may you become better informed.
this is because everytime we are unfortunate enough to have to use one of these fisher-price wannabe computers we keep hitting where the 2nd button SHOULD by all rights be, and it pisses us off when its not there "oh yea, gonna hafta spend the next 30sec or so digging thru the menus for that command that SHOULD be right here at my fingertips, macos is sooooo much easier to use, thank god im not using a REAL OS"
Well, I'm sorry you're so upset by the lack of a god given second button. Hope you don't have a cardiac over it. Maybe it should be written into law or the constitution or something. I mean, if God had meant mice to have one button, she'd have made humans with one finger. Give us a 5 button mouse I say.
:-p
In fact, the back-to-nature-and-avoid-all-technology hermit types tend to have SHORTER lifespans than city dwellers.
Well, yes. And I'm not anti-tech in general. You're right that some people are of the 'romantic' notion that "before we got civilised, we lived in harmony with nature", but there are those who argue (and I humbly agree), that primitive societies appeared 'in harmony' only because their tech was limited. You can't genocide with bows and arrows... but primitive cultures, it seems, certainly had their tyrants who would have nuked other tribes if only they had had the bomb.
But as for, "we're living longer anyway"... are we? It depends on the perspective... a pig may feel really well fed... just before the slaughter. The trouble with the greenhouse effect, GM, contaminants in the food chain etc. is that their prescence is very subtle, and they accumulate gradually...
Are we heading, with stomachs full, for a disaster?
So your main points are...
Well, that's a lot of loosely strung together points. Are you a woman? No, seriously, you have to use a lot of intuition to make connections between all those points and still call it an argument.
I think it's a valuable insight that there are some people who Just Want To Blame. And these JWTBs will try to get in the way of cell phones, GM, smoking... hell, even the internet (my son shot another boy because he read it on the internet etc.)
So these JWTBs go round trying to 'protect' everyone. Because everyone is a 'victim' And as you say, we should hold ourselves as adults, and be responsable (ie. choose for ourselves).
But, in order to make that choice, we need good data. We need information. Do I start smoking for the pleasure of it, or is nicotine sufficiently addictive that I will experience more discomfort than pleasure when I want to stop? Do I use a cell phone for the convenience, or will it increase my risk of getting cancer (remembering that one in three die of cancer anyway... will a cell phone dramatically increse that risk?)
I think the argument that people are just not dying fast enough is not valid. Sorry, but your logic is silly. And I spend a lot of time being silly, so believe me, I know silly.
Just because we tolerate x thousand road deaths does not mean anything causing less than x thousand deaths is ok.
Just because light bulbs might cause harm (people falling off chairs when changing them?), and we accept light bulbs, does not mean we accept any possible hard to detect harm from everything else.
In talking statistics, we can make chances sound real small. But for the one in a million person who gets that fatal condition, it will kill them.
Also, we could be in the business of cleaning up this planet. Try hoarding all the garbage you would throw out in a year. Now multiply that by 50. And again by 500 million. It's all going somewhere.
Cell phones are just another suspect technology because we have wised up to the fact that most of our technologies involve harmful environmental side effects.
People are taught in school (at least I was) that different types of radiation have different effects, some linked to cancer. Now cell phones emit radiation, and I for one don't know what effect that type of radiation will have. I would like to know. I would like it to be studied a lot.
Now I suspect that the tobacco companies don't try to prove that nicotine is 'highly addictive'. And I suspect that scientists are a conservative bunch -- 'false' until proven 'true'. And I suspect that politicians will seek to pacify the public and protect the industries -- insert picture of politician feeding burger to daughter here. And I suspect that the environment is treated like some magical tardis where you can dump things and they will 'just dissapear'. Witness latest debate about whether it's 'safe' to eat tinned salmon.
So the JWTBs seem to target every new technology. But guess what? A lot of our technologies "don't work" -- cars turn a small mistake into a 26 car pile up, television entertains you while your mind and body rots, food packaging preserves the food a few weeks and the packet forever -- I mean, I don't want to be a bleeding heart, but we could all add to this list... is it any surprise that some people worry about mobile phone radiation?
We are just beginning to ask questions about what the real extent of pollution in the environment is. And in that light, all these 'hard to detect little risks that are a part fo life' may just all add up and wipe our 'responsable' little asses off the planet. We need more research into these things. Not just ignore it as part of 'life is risky'.
So yes, the JWTBs are a sad lot. But they are also going to be a very busy lot.
and all of those products ... are available on Windows
Are you saying that because they are available on windows, the mac has no advantage in terms of apps?
Well, is this not a different argument to what the parent post made -- ie. that "if MS killed Mac Office, Apple would die"
The latter (original) argument is about whether Apple can survive without Office. But your argument is about whether Apple can survive without mac-only killer apps. These are different arguments.
I don't see how killing office for mac would kill apple. I don't think home users need office. I don't think servers need office running on them. If linux users can survive without office, then I don't see why mac users can't. If you use a machine for 3D modelling (eg. maya, form.Z), photo-artwork (eg. photoshop, graphiconverter), and web publishing (BBEdit, etc. etc.) and your secretary is doing the typing, then your work doesn't involve Office.
Alternatively, if you think computer==desktop==business, ie. the number one use for a computer is for business, then apple would have died years ago.
And anyway, let's not forget MOSX -- it isn't vapourware. Maya has been ported to it for friggen'sake. And it has iMovie. Apple is choosing it's battles very carefully.
24 hours to encode 1 hour of DVD is utterly ridiculous.
How long does it take then?
Apple tried to do this today by comparing performance between a 733MHz Power Mac system and a 1.5GHz Pentium 4. The Mac won handily. Naturally, Apple probably chose the operations that made the Mac look best, but that still implies a G4 is comparible to a Pentium with, say, 1.5 times the MHz.
Also to note, Jobs implied that iDVD was only possible because of AltiVec. He said that usually software encoding takes 24 hours to encode a one hour MPEG2 video. Using AltiVec, they're doing it in just 2.
If this is 'true', then the usual criticism that Apple has picked a few specifically favourable benchmarks -- and hence the only thing macs are faster at is a few Photoshop filters, and encoding DVDs -- then that criticism begins to sound a bit lame.
It would be a little bit like someone sitting in a Rolls, being overtaken by a Ferrari, paw pawing the Ferrari because it's 'only good at speed'.
But let me be reminded that I know nothing about highly optimised encoding of DVD on similarly priced x86 chips... maybe they can do the same, I dunno.
I don't want HDTV, I do want a 16:9 screen.
Yes, before I worry about detail, I'd just like to see the whole scene composition as indended by the director. All too often I see things in films that don't make sence visually... like two actors, one standing on each side, looking at each other... but only one is visible... bah!
we're not all poncy art students, just like linux users aren't all socially maladjusted virgins.
Feel very very sorry for those who dual boot... them poncy socially malajusted virgin art students !!!
Scanning through Gregory Pomerantzs' paper just makes me wonder why 'we', the general computer using population, would need .NET.
It sounds to me like .NET is an MS 'replacement' of the Internet.
What I mean is that currently what we call the net is made up of many things, and MS is looking to replace them all.
Hence .NET is about languages, scripting, search engines, protocols, services, customer data, servers, clients etc. Hence .NET is really MS replacing all net related technologies with .NET versions.
So my question is, if .NET is mostly a huge technology swap (net for .NET), and only marginally a functionality provision (unless you call digital copy prevention a function 'enhancement'), why do we need it? Why would we want it? Is the net really in need of a retooling for the sake of rebranding?
Is MS so peeved that the net was built on *nix that they want to rebuild it on MS tech??
Just to get back at Jobs for killing the clones.
V..e..r..y....i..n..t..e..r..e..s..t..i..n..g.. .... but is it true?
If you are designing an embedded system (TiVo, VoIP router, cell phone base station, industrial control or ispection, autonomous robot) then the power advantages of the PPC and on-chip peripheral sets offered by Motorolla make x86s not even show up on the radar.
Now that is interesting. I keep forgetting that there's more to life than the desktop. I guess I should try find out what percentage of Moto's business dollars is in the embedded world...
Parent post by me. Somehow /. marked it AC. Timeout??
Indeed, even Mac 'enthusiasts' are hard pressed to find good technical reasons for buying PowerPC. Had Moto been at 900MHz by now, then, well, maybe.
But people don't necessairally start asking "What chip?". They average masses just ask "Which PC?". But they could also start asking "Which OS?" -- and this reveals one of the great potential* benefits of Linux -- that you can choose Linux first, and worry about your hardware second (as opposed to, say, the Mac, where choosing Mac OS X 'limits' you to Apple HW). And this is highly exciting for the IT industry, not to mention 'World Domination'...
For while Windows went 'everywhere' horizonatally (across all** desktops), Linux is busy going everywhere vertically (to most scales, CPUs etc.). -- So while MS has been successful keeping horizontal competition out, they are about to get vertically out-flanked.
When Linux is running on the company server, and on your PDA, the only bottleneck will be that 'troublesome' desktop running 'incompatible' Windows ;-)
Note the problem won't be what chip is in your desktop. It won't be the styling of the plastics. It'll simply be a matter of installing the right OS. And most of the time, that'll be Linux.
Is there a "Fanaticism FAQ" ?
* Potential for the masses, but real and current for those who know...
** In so far as 90% == 100%.