I'd like to see a citation as well, but a quick check of http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/... has deaths due to measles in 2012 in the UK, and deaths due to contact with hornets, wasps and bees in 2012 in the UK, both equalling 1. Looks like we'd have to do further research, but it seems we shouldn't outright dismiss "bees vs measles" as impossible.:)
Seriously though? Speaking as someone who was born aspie, and had a bad reaction to one of my vaccinations, and managed to catch the measles (twice), chicken pox and rubella despite being vaccinated against all three, I'm still pro-vaccination (but _not_ to the extent of thinking "anti-vaxxers" should be prosecuted, that's a stupid knee-jerk reaction).
Vaccinations work in the sense that they provide _herd_ immunity. Your own personal vaccination is _not_ guaranteed to work, and yeah, there's _also_ a small chance it's going to suck and a smaller chance it's going to really suck, but vaccination is the _community_ version of "a stitch in time saves nine". A little pain now, or a lot more later.
In Australia, at least as far I know, "punter" is slang for a customer (or likely customer) of a pub or betting place, e.g. "I watched the footy game with all the other punters", "I took a punt on the horses today". More broadly, also sometimes used as a substitute for "average joe" or "working class".
As an Aussie, I'll tell you that's bullshit. When your spooks are keeping it secret that they're doing an end-run around your Constitution by playing "let's swap" with our spooks, let alone lying under oath to your Congress about domestic surveillance programs, you bloody well do want to know what else they're up to abroad. "Trust, but verify" only works when you can actually trust them and you can actually verify them, and you can't do either. Your problem is you're too afraid to confront your government about it, and I can understand that, but that doesn't mean you get to demonise someone who has that courage.
And I'll remind you that treason is when you betray your country, not the bunch of slimy sociopaths taking turns to rule/loot it. Go ask your senator just how many of his or her Congressional colleagues actually read the full text of the Patriot Act bill before voting on it. Doesn't matter whether it was for or against, and I don't give a damn whether they had D or R after their name, just whether they actually read the thing before they voted on such an important piece of legislation. Then come back here and tell me if you really believe they're upholding their oath of office.
I love your country, but your government is all kinds of messed up.
Since you mention strategic reasons, do you think society's strategy of allowing confidentiality terms in civil suits are an overall good or harm for society as a whole, and (if it's easily explainable) why?
(I hope my wording isn't too awkward to convey what I'm trying to ask)
He was quite coldly rational about what he wanted? Really? I thought it was rather clearly established that his irrational actions contributed significantly to Germany losing in WW2.
And how does "X was insane" cultivate the field? Are you suggesting we view insanity as something desirable?
"Earth and its ecosystems – created by God's intelligent design and infinite power and sustained by His faithful providence – are robust, resilient, self-regulating, and self-correcting." -- Roy Spencer
Why do so many people fail to grok that their own religious reference frame specifically allows humanity to screw things up?
Or, you know, politicians could just admit outright that intelligence agencies spy on friend and foe alike, and that there are good reasons for it, rather than trying to pull "emperor's new clothes" and having it bite them.
You've missed the point. Pull your focus back from the NSA. Snowden isn't just whistleblowing on them, he's whistleblowing on the rot, and the rot extends to the entire Federal Government and it's fellow international governments, including mine.
I don't have a problem with intelligence agencies spying. That's what they're for. What I _do_ have a problem with is _governments_ pretending that their intelligence agencies never spy on anyone except evil villains, when that's quite frankly ludicrous.
The difference, if you think about it, is rather profound. Think about where this kind of "oh we'd never spy on our allies (except when we do)" bullshit leads - a lack of proper checks and balances, a lack of oversight in favour of rubberstamping, etc.
The hostility has nothing to do with the basic concept. I have absolutely no problem with someone believing God created the universe. The baggage that some of the proponents bring with them, however?
Hardcore Creationist: "We're sure God did it, and you'll suffer if you don't follow these rules (suffering may include us stoning you to death and you spending eternity in a lake of hellfire)."
Hardcore Simulationist: "We're sure a computer did it."
Hmm. It's not clear to me from reading the article whether he knew before downloading them that he was not authorised. That said, I will grant that as soon as he did find out, he had a problem and should have acted accordingly.
Concerning the court's competence, I found this part disturbing:
Incredibly, although a lower criminal court ruled that Laurelli could not be penalized for accessing data that was not secure, the DCRI decided to appeal the decision. That's after ANSES, the organization from which the documents were “stolen” in the first place, decided not to pursue any civil action. Although the court documents are not yet available, French technology news site Numerama and the French-language version of Slate both quote a baffling scene from the first appeals-court hearing in December 2013, which Mediapart (paywalled link) attended. During those opening arguments, a presiding judge appeared unable to pronounce Google (saying “gogleu” instead) and demonstrated an ignorance of how logins occur. The prosecutor did not help this perception, saying at the hearing, "half the words I heard today, I did not even understand."
The appeals court acquitted Laurelli of fraudulently accessing an information system but saw fit to convict Bluetouff of theft of documents and fraudulent retention of information. The court wrote: "It is well demonstrated that he was conscious of his irregular retention in automated data processing, accessed where he downloaded protected evidence; and that investigations have shown that these data had been downloaded before being... disseminated to others; that it is, in any event, established that Olivier Laurelli made copies of computer files inaccessible to the public for personal use without the knowledge and against the will of its owner"
1. The first court ruled the Laurelli wasn't guilty. ANSES, the source of the documents, subsequently declined to pursue any civil action. Despite this, the DCRI appealed and pursued _anyway_, yet the prosecution didn't have a proper understanding of what they were prosecuting!
2. It was actually established by ANSES that those files (however inadvertently) were _accessible_, not inaccessible, to the public, so the court has rendered judgement directly contrary to the evidence presented by the same national agency from which the data was downloaded.
It's still a public-facing website, and his entry point was public. If you build a mall, provide multiple public-facing entrances, but only put a security guard on one of those entrances, it should NOT be a crime for someone to walk into your mall via one of the other entrances.
Also, he was convicted of "theft of documents and fraudulent retention of information." Theft? Fraud? WTF? Unless there's actual evidence of criminal intent, I agree with an earlier poster, they punished him because they were embarrassed, and they're the ones who've committed theft and fraud by taking money from him.
If someone leaves their door open, you don't walk in, copy their private shit and show it to the public.
But if someone hangs "Public Entrance" over their door, then imprisons you and fines you after you show people what you saw inside, they might be the French government.
~1h57m: Presenter asks what evidence besides the literal word of the bible supports creation. After Ham's response, Nye's commentary includes that "if you find something that changes, that disagrees with the common thought, that's the greatest thing going in science, we look forward to that change". Ergo, Nye accepts the possibility of being wrong.
~2h18m: Presenter asks Ham whether, in a hypothetical scenario where evidence was found that proved his claim of a young universe was wrong, if he would still believe in God, Jesus, etc. Ham refuses to answer, claiming that such a hypothetical scenario could not occur because he claims there is no way to prove the age of the earth, despite the fact that the question was presented as a _hypothetical_ scenario (and that his response invalidates his own foundation). Ergo, Ham refuses to accept the possibility of being wrong.
I understand the problem all too well: you think it's acceptable to fight fire with fire. That if terrorists commit torture, you can too. That if they can blow up innocents, you can too. That if they can call it jihad and sacrifice, you can call it enhanced interrogation techniques and collateral damage.
Tell me, cold fjord, when the old terrorists are all finally dead, what are you going to do with all the new ones you've trained at home?
Hi Soulskill, while I don't think the beta is an eldritch abomination... I can see why some do. And I _don't_ like it either. But if the reason for the redesign is ultimately revenue? Let's eyeball that elephant. Classic slashdot serves me one or two ads in a banner at the top. But while I come to the site for the articles, I _stay_ for the comments. So almost instantly I'm scrolling down, and those ads are GONE.
(1) Keep the Classic UI. If the code is tired, rewrite what you must (unicode, wysiwyg) but keep Classic's look. Improve it without changing it. That look _works_.
(2) Add resolution-aware code, and use CSS to fix the (sigh) inevitable ads along one of the long edges of the browser's window - whatever _least_ cramps the reader's view of the comments. Allow the reader to override the edge-choice in settings.
(3) Carrot, not just stick. Or at least a choice of stick. If the site needs revenue to survive, allow individual users to turn off ads if they donate/flattr/subscribe or regularly generate comments that get insightful/informative/interesting mods.
(4) If some PHB has their knickers in a knot and is going to introduce Beta come hell or high water, then see if you can extract a compromise to retain existing Classic as an option and let the users decide. If a year onwards the majority of users are still on Classic, hopefully that PHB will have had time to disappear / exit gracefully / rewrite history that keeping Classic was their idea all along.
However, I personally have yet to see a solid explanation to the problem of how the 'ingredients' of the Big Bang. Space is expanding, and is expanding from a central point. I can roll with this, but the only examples of those things that I've seen have been things like balloons, where the balloon can expand because it is pushing the air on the outside out of the way. [if there's no air on the outside, the balloon expands even faster] Is there something outside the universe that is being pushed out of the way (what is it?) [we're still figuring that out - there are some interesting 'marks' on the universe that may (or not) be evidence of a collision] or not (so then, space is continuing to get 'created'?). [more that space is continuing to get 'stretched' - if it helps, imagine 'space' as the surface of the balloon, not the air inside] From where did all the original energy come from? [possibly a self-reinforcing fluctuation, literally a spontaneous order arising out of chaos, though an omnipotent being could make it happen too] I've heard of the oscillating universe theory, in which case the heat death of the universe will cause the universe to once again contract into a singularity, but to me that sounds like "turtles all the way down". [currently looks like there's not enough gravity for a big crunch, but there's other maybes starting around 10^10^56 years from now] The 'spontaneous' transition from energy to matter-and-energy - what was its cause? [temperature is inversely proportional to volume, so as the universe expanded, the former dropped sufficiently for energy to form stable states - this happened more than once]Were there Newtonian/Einsteinian/Quantum physical laws that caused it? [yes] Was there 'time' when that happened? [yes] These are just a handful of questions that I've yet to find solid answers for in a model of the universe that precludes a Creator, some of which start to stretch the definition of being scientific themselves because they, by definition, are very difficult to observe, measure, or repeat.
Part of the problem is that... hmm... well, it's that we're just barely smart enough to sometimes realise just how stupid we are. So we devote our incredibly tiny lifespans to building on the work of those who came before, figuring out (maybe) how this universe of ours began and formed - and then somebody else comes along and complains when an elderly scientist can't explain, let alone "prove", their life's work in the time it takes to leisurely consume a cup of coffee and a doughnut.
Want to know something? It's incredibly frustrating for the scientist too.
But if the scientist doesn't live long enough to condense the work, some other scientist does, so that others can further the work, and then that gets condensed, and eventually some artist can grasp enough to make a story out of it, one that we can read over that beverage and pastry, and give us merer mortals a glimpse.
I rather like this one, notwithstanding the fictional liberties and an ignorant comment afterward.
I suppose one of my problems with many Creationists isn't the idea of God as an omnipotent being, it's that their idea of God isn't omnipotent enough. They want God to fit in a box, and their blueprints don't include nearly enough infinities.
I have a similar problem, but I'd wait for a local version that doesn't artificially "require" a third party to datamine it "for" us.
Some favours come with too high a price.
P.S. For whatever it's worth, I find focusing on intermediary associations sometimes helps - e.g. instead of the direct approach of "that face is Tom", which tends to 404, I try to remember things like "that face threw up at cafe" and then I work on remembering who threw up at the cafe... "aha, Tom!" Of course this takes longer, but at least that means I can sometimes say, "Nice meeting you again Tom" at the end of a sufficiently long conversation with the familiar stranger.:)
Slashdot Mirror
I'd like to see a citation as well, but a quick check of http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/... has deaths due to measles in 2012 in the UK, and deaths due to contact with hornets, wasps and bees in 2012 in the UK, both equalling 1. Looks like we'd have to do further research, but it seems we shouldn't outright dismiss "bees vs measles" as impossible. :)
Seriously though? Speaking as someone who was born aspie, and had a bad reaction to one of my vaccinations, and managed to catch the measles (twice), chicken pox and rubella despite being vaccinated against all three, I'm still pro-vaccination (but _not_ to the extent of thinking "anti-vaxxers" should be prosecuted, that's a stupid knee-jerk reaction).
Vaccinations work in the sense that they provide _herd_ immunity. Your own personal vaccination is _not_ guaranteed to work, and yeah, there's _also_ a small chance it's going to suck and a smaller chance it's going to really suck, but vaccination is the _community_ version of "a stitch in time saves nine". A little pain now, or a lot more later.
Why should I trust polling figures produced by an organisation that is owned and run by the same government that is suppressing opposition media?
In Australia, at least as far I know, "punter" is slang for a customer (or likely customer) of a pub or betting place, e.g. "I watched the footy game with all the other punters", "I took a punt on the horses today". More broadly, also sometimes used as a substitute for "average joe" or "working class".
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/... lists some additional meanings. Seems to be of UK origin.
As an Aussie, I'll tell you that's bullshit. When your spooks are keeping it secret that they're doing an end-run around your Constitution by playing "let's swap" with our spooks, let alone lying under oath to your Congress about domestic surveillance programs, you bloody well do want to know what else they're up to abroad. "Trust, but verify" only works when you can actually trust them and you can actually verify them, and you can't do either. Your problem is you're too afraid to confront your government about it, and I can understand that, but that doesn't mean you get to demonise someone who has that courage.
And I'll remind you that treason is when you betray your country, not the bunch of slimy sociopaths taking turns to rule/loot it. Go ask your senator just how many of his or her Congressional colleagues actually read the full text of the Patriot Act bill before voting on it. Doesn't matter whether it was for or against, and I don't give a damn whether they had D or R after their name, just whether they actually read the thing before they voted on such an important piece of legislation. Then come back here and tell me if you really believe they're upholding their oath of office.
I love your country, but your government is all kinds of messed up.
Since you mention strategic reasons, do you think society's strategy of allowing confidentiality terms in civil suits are an overall good or harm for society as a whole, and (if it's easily explainable) why?
(I hope my wording isn't too awkward to convey what I'm trying to ask)
He was quite coldly rational about what he wanted? Really? I thought it was rather clearly established that his irrational actions contributed significantly to Germany losing in WW2.
And how does "X was insane" cultivate the field? Are you suggesting we view insanity as something desirable?
Why do so many people fail to grok that their own religious reference frame specifically allows humanity to screw things up?
Um, just curious: if you don't believe, why are you self-censoring?
... wow. Really makes me think of Grey's Law: "any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice". Which state?
Just noticed someone else post that for misdemeanours they still discretion, but does that depend on jurisdiction?
Hmm. Please clarify: do they still have that right when the matter has reached a court and a judge has issued a warrant for the person to be arrested?
Or, you know, politicians could just admit outright that intelligence agencies spy on friend and foe alike, and that there are good reasons for it, rather than trying to pull "emperor's new clothes" and having it bite them.
You've missed the point. Pull your focus back from the NSA. Snowden isn't just whistleblowing on them, he's whistleblowing on the rot, and the rot extends to the entire Federal Government and it's fellow international governments, including mine.
I don't have a problem with intelligence agencies spying. That's what they're for. What I _do_ have a problem with is _governments_ pretending that their intelligence agencies never spy on anyone except evil villains, when that's quite frankly ludicrous.
The difference, if you think about it, is rather profound. Think about where this kind of "oh we'd never spy on our allies (except when we do)" bullshit leads - a lack of proper checks and balances, a lack of oversight in favour of rubberstamping, etc.
Yeah, but when was the last time a bunch of string physicists burnt someone at the stake or stoned them to death?
The hostility has nothing to do with the basic concept. I have absolutely no problem with someone believing God created the universe. The baggage that some of the proponents bring with them, however?
Hardcore Creationist: "We're sure God did it, and you'll suffer if you don't follow these rules (suffering may include us stoning you to death and you spending eternity in a lake of hellfire)."
Hardcore Simulationist: "We're sure a computer did it."
Can you spot the difference?
True, but they do still have an ethical responsibility to pay a reasonable sum to the society that cradles them.
Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society. -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
So when I see someone, of ample ability to pay tax, indulge in contortions to remit a pittance? I see a leech upon society.
That said, I live in a country where the tax man does not bear down too onerously and our grievances are generally heard. Your mileage may vary.
Hmm. It's not clear to me from reading the article whether he knew before downloading them that he was not authorised. That said, I will grant that as soon as he did find out, he had a problem and should have acted accordingly.
Concerning the court's competence, I found this part disturbing:
1. The first court ruled the Laurelli wasn't guilty. ANSES, the source of the documents, subsequently declined to pursue any civil action. Despite this, the DCRI appealed and pursued _anyway_, yet the prosecution didn't have a proper understanding of what they were prosecuting!
2. It was actually established by ANSES that those files (however inadvertently) were _accessible_, not inaccessible, to the public, so the court has rendered judgement directly contrary to the evidence presented by the same national agency from which the data was downloaded.
It's still a public-facing website, and his entry point was public. If you build a mall, provide multiple public-facing entrances, but only put a security guard on one of those entrances, it should NOT be a crime for someone to walk into your mall via one of the other entrances.
Also, he was convicted of "theft of documents and fraudulent retention of information." Theft? Fraud? WTF? Unless there's actual evidence of criminal intent, I agree with an earlier poster, they punished him because they were embarrassed, and they're the ones who've committed theft and fraud by taking money from him.
But if someone hangs "Public Entrance" over their door, then imprisons you and fines you after you show people what you saw inside, they might be the French government.
Looks like the GP is paraphrasing, but has captured the essence. I've just skimmed the debate at https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
The Q&A sessions begins at ~1h50m.
~1h57m: Presenter asks what evidence besides the literal word of the bible supports creation. After Ham's response, Nye's commentary includes that "if you find something that changes, that disagrees with the common thought, that's the greatest thing going in science, we look forward to that change". Ergo, Nye accepts the possibility of being wrong.
~2h18m: Presenter asks Ham whether, in a hypothetical scenario where evidence was found that proved his claim of a young universe was wrong, if he would still believe in God, Jesus, etc. Ham refuses to answer, claiming that such a hypothetical scenario could not occur because he claims there is no way to prove the age of the earth, despite the fact that the question was presented as a _hypothetical_ scenario (and that his response invalidates his own foundation). Ergo, Ham refuses to accept the possibility of being wrong.
I understand the problem all too well: you think it's acceptable to fight fire with fire. That if terrorists commit torture, you can too. That if they can blow up innocents, you can too. That if they can call it jihad and sacrifice, you can call it enhanced interrogation techniques and collateral damage.
Tell me, cold fjord, when the old terrorists are all finally dead, what are you going to do with all the new ones you've trained at home?
Hi Soulskill, while I don't think the beta is an eldritch abomination... I can see why some do. And I _don't_ like it either. But if the reason for the redesign is ultimately revenue? Let's eyeball that elephant. Classic slashdot serves me one or two ads in a banner at the top. But while I come to the site for the articles, I _stay_ for the comments. So almost instantly I'm scrolling down, and those ads are GONE.
(1) Keep the Classic UI. If the code is tired, rewrite what you must (unicode, wysiwyg) but keep Classic's look. Improve it without changing it. That look _works_.
(2) Add resolution-aware code, and use CSS to fix the (sigh) inevitable ads along one of the long edges of the browser's window - whatever _least_ cramps the reader's view of the comments. Allow the reader to override the edge-choice in settings.
(3) Carrot, not just stick. Or at least a choice of stick. If the site needs revenue to survive, allow individual users to turn off ads if they donate/flattr/subscribe or regularly generate comments that get insightful/informative/interesting mods.
(4) If some PHB has their knickers in a knot and is going to introduce Beta come hell or high water, then see if you can extract a compromise to retain existing Classic as an option and let the users decide. If a year onwards the majority of users are still on Classic, hopefully that PHB will have had time to disappear / exit gracefully / rewrite history that keeping Classic was their idea all along.
Part of the problem is that... hmm... well, it's that we're just barely smart enough to sometimes realise just how stupid we are. So we devote our incredibly tiny lifespans to building on the work of those who came before, figuring out (maybe) how this universe of ours began and formed - and then somebody else comes along and complains when an elderly scientist can't explain, let alone "prove", their life's work in the time it takes to leisurely consume a cup of coffee and a doughnut.
Want to know something? It's incredibly frustrating for the scientist too.
But if the scientist doesn't live long enough to condense the work, some other scientist does, so that others can further the work, and then that gets condensed, and eventually some artist can grasp enough to make a story out of it, one that we can read over that beverage and pastry, and give us merer mortals a glimpse.
I rather like this one, notwithstanding the fictional liberties and an ignorant comment afterward.
I suppose one of my problems with many Creationists isn't the idea of God as an omnipotent being, it's that their idea of God isn't omnipotent enough . They want God to fit in a box, and their blueprints don't include nearly enough infinities.
I have a similar problem, but I'd wait for a local version that doesn't artificially "require" a third party to datamine it "for" us.
Some favours come with too high a price.
P.S. For whatever it's worth, I find focusing on intermediary associations sometimes helps - e.g. instead of the direct approach of "that face is Tom", which tends to 404, I try to remember things like "that face threw up at cafe" and then I work on remembering who threw up at the cafe... "aha, Tom!" Of course this takes longer, but at least that means I can sometimes say, "Nice meeting you again Tom" at the end of a sufficiently long conversation with the familiar stranger. :)