A lot of comments are arguing that Math makes you think in a different or better way even if you don't use it.
To accept that as a reason for teaching more math, you have to believe that other subjects of study do NOT encourage you to think in a different or better way.
I suggest that if we forced 1000 people to study math full time and 1000 other people to study whatever they want, that people who learn to think critically and make good decisions will emerge in similar numbers from both groups.
I'm largely a lurker here, but I am an ISP Systems Administrator.
The whole ISP business model is to oversubscribe. Tier 1&2 bandwidth is expensive. To make money you have to sell more than you have. When people pay residential rates and actually use what they have, you lose money on that customer. With unlimited plans you just hope that the people who aren't using it all will subsidize the ones that are......Or you impose limits.
This is the ISP business model, learn to live with it. Or start your own ISP if you honestly think you can do it better.
If you truly have literature that says the service is unlimited and they're capping you anyway, then that is poor customer service on their part and you have a right to be upset about it.
I hate to nitpick (well actually I love to nitpick), but I have a slight beef with this statement:
Did they preceed income taxes? (which didn't come into existence until how late this century?)
The first income tax in America was passed during the civil war, the supreme court then declared income taxes unconstitutional. Later on, I forget when but I think it was early 1900's, the constitution was ammended to allow income taxes.
The problem with Katz is that he cannot think cleanly and/or clearly, and he cannot write....he cannot organize either his thoughs or his writing...writing from some middle-schooler.
Well, he's certainly not as bad as a middle schooler. I don't remember anything specific about what I wrote/read in middle school, but I do remember being rather horrible; much more so than Katz.
To be perfectly honest (at the risk of being roasted) I don't think his stuff is that bad at all. In fact he's a pretty good writer. I think he makes valuable and insightful observations on the impact of technology on our culture. I believe it's true that he is prone to overestimating the impact of certain events/breakthroughs/discoveries, but I don't understand why an entire subsection of slashdot thinks he's a complete idiot.
And for those who say this is a news site, and Katz's writings aren't news: Name one major newspaper that doesn't have an editorial section. Discussing the meaning and impact of events is just as important as reporting them. And just like you can skip over the editorials to get to the comics, you don't have to read Katz.
I know I'll get slammed for this statement, but I've been thinking recently that many of those who say Katz can't write at all are simply people who don't understand what he's saying.
I liked a lot of what I read. But the assertion that raves and pop-culture have anything to do with geekdom are totally off base.
First of all, ravers are mostly acid-droppin, e-bombin, candyflippers. They have no interest in technology, only hallucinogenic drugs. The raves I was duped into attending were flooded with computer illiterate morons, and it wasn't too much fun being the only guy present who valued his higher brain functions.
Pop-culture? Come on! Every friggin MTV watchin shmuck is a conformist. If looking like a Backstreet Boy has anything to do with being a geek, you can count my sorry ass out. Pop-culture teaches people to value whatever happens to be "cool" at the moment....It is the mortal enemy of geekdom.
They reinforce every bad stereotype about geeks/hackers. Socially inept....
Geeks/Hackers generally are socially inept, except among are own kind. Basically we don't fit into normal everyday society with non-geeks very well.
...wacko conspiracy theorists...
I don't believe that the lone gunmen could be defined as "wacko", since it usually turns out that they're right.
...dangerous...
Dangerous how?
...etc.
As my World History teacher from high school explained it, you should only use etcetera when there are obvious continuations to a list that are too numerous to mention; not when you can't think of anything else to say.
I dunno.... I thought X-Files was better back in the early days. All this crazy stuff was going on with aliens, supernatural phenomenon, and genetic aberations. The government was always involved somehow, but we never new how or why. I stopped watching after they revealed the alien takeover conspiracy. After the mystery was taken away, there was no point in watching it anymore.
I did like the X-files's particular brand of humor, but the Mulder/Scully relationship never interested me.
So what I'm getting at is, if the Lone Gunmen spinoff brought back the air of mystery, I'd definately watch it.
...as an African-American it is troubling to read threats of lynching on this board...
I assume you are referring to the "I got the hammer and nails" post. Since he/she probably didn't know that you were African-American until now, it's a safe bet that has nothing to do with anything. His comments are most likely inspired by a belief that your company is either staffed by incompetent developers or is a complete fraud.
...but if that's how VA Linux Systems and Slashdot choose to handle its business competitors, so be it.
It may be true that VA Linux happens to own the network which hosts Slashdot, but I find it hard to believe that the Slashdot readers who post negative articles and comments about your company are all pawns of VA Linux under orders to spread bad press about LinuxOne. Frankly, since VA Linux actually has a product (unlike LinuxOne which appears to be distributing RedHat with a different label on the box), they probably don't even care.
That we've fucked up is not in dispute.
If by "fucked up", you mean "deliberately attempted to mislead," or "distributed someone else's product with our name on it," then you are correct.
You want to know why no one likes LinuxOne? Because your practices stink of Microsoft. The company that distributed a version of Intergalactic Research's Q-DOS and charged $60 for it, and then went on to rip off the Macintosh GUI and charge $180 for it. Your practices (and Microsoft's) may not be illegal, but they're pretty lame.
And, when we succed in our re-engineering and overhaul of our practices we'll expect the same level of coverage of that too.
The best software companies are the ones with products that inspire nerds to say things like, "Whoa! That's really cool!" Assuming you're not trying to pull some kind of IPO scam, and your programmers aren't 3rd string losers, and you really want to clear your name, then hack some badass code that makes us all ooh and ah.
Is it possible for any legal action to be taken against these guys? Like false advertising, or misrepresentation or something? Investigating it is great, but can't someone DO something?
You have a point. But remember that intel is stuck with an almost 20 year old instruction set because they want to maintain backwards compatability. Transmeta can make any change to their processor that they want and just write new CMS to utilize those changes. So I don't think a fuocus on x86 will hurt them too bad since they can optimize for something else later and have some new CMS to make it compatible with whatever they want.
You're right that x86 is still a relatively old and backwards instruction set, and it still sucks that Transmeta still forces you to code for it. But the difference is, they can make a switch to a new instruction set whenever they want and still support older software.....as long as no one writes any native code that isn't CMS.
There may not be any CMS that isn't x86 yet, but it's only a matter of time. We can't use x86 forever.
And plus, it's my understanding that this whole VLIW thing is in its infancy; 1st gen RISC chips weren't that great either, so I'm betting that by the time we get to 4th and 5th generation Crusoe chips, they'll be pretty hot.
I won't waste my time pointing out your many flawed arguments, since others have already done so. I just want to nitpick on one little issue: compaq didn't reverse engineer the processor in the IBM PC, it was the BIOS.
First of all, I object to internet censorship purely on the grounds that it violates the fisrt ammendment. If parents want filters on their home computers to 'protect' their kids, fine. But you can't censor material on a publicly accessed station. I believe that's unconstitutional.
However, all this crap about crazy right-wing christian extremists is a bit excessive. The bible (at least the new testament) preaches tolerance, peace, love, and lots of other happy stuff. Biggoted intolerant christians aren't christians, no matter how good they are at quoting the bible out of context. The only problem with Christians is that they get upset when they hear about dirty old men raping little boys, and they try to do things that they mistakenly believe will stop it.
Christians who actually read the bible and follow it are ususally very mellow, calm, collective, and nice people. I wish everybody could just chill out and not get so worked up about everything. Flaming rhetoric will never change people's minds, only intelligent discussion with valid arguments and supportive evidence.
P.S.: The internet is a worldwide communinty. Arguing about a political issue in one town, in one state, in the U.S.A. is probably of little interest to many readers. So lets just drop it.
Slashdot Mirror
A lot of comments are arguing that Math makes you think in a different or better way even if you don't use it.
To accept that as a reason for teaching more math, you have to believe that other subjects of study do NOT encourage you to think in a different or better way.
I suggest that if we forced 1000 people to study math full time and 1000 other people to study whatever they want, that people who learn to think critically and make good decisions will emerge in similar numbers from both groups.
I'm largely a lurker here, but I am an ISP Systems Administrator.
The whole ISP business model is to oversubscribe. Tier 1&2 bandwidth is expensive. To make money you have to sell more than you have. When people pay residential rates and actually use what they have, you lose money on that customer. With unlimited plans you just hope that the people who aren't using it all will subsidize the ones that are......Or you impose limits.
This is the ISP business model, learn to live with it. Or start your own ISP if you honestly think you can do it better.
If you truly have literature that says the service is unlimited and they're capping you anyway, then that is poor customer service on their part and you have a right to be upset about it.
Did they preceed income taxes? (which didn't come into existence until how late this century?)
The first income tax in America was passed during the civil war, the supreme court then declared income taxes unconstitutional. Later on, I forget when but I think it was early 1900's, the constitution was ammended to allow income taxes.
Do they smoke as much dope in the movie as they do in the book? =)
(****PRIOR ART****) You could use this theory to map out the net and build the first truly useful portal site.... (****PRIOR ART****)
Well, he's certainly not as bad as a middle schooler. I don't remember anything specific about what I wrote/read in middle school, but I do remember being rather horrible; much more so than Katz.
To be perfectly honest (at the risk of being roasted) I don't think his stuff is that bad at all. In fact he's a pretty good writer. I think he makes valuable and insightful observations on the impact of technology on our culture. I believe it's true that he is prone to overestimating the impact of certain events/breakthroughs/discoveries, but I don't understand why an entire subsection of slashdot thinks he's a complete idiot.
And for those who say this is a news site, and Katz's writings aren't news: Name one major newspaper that doesn't have an editorial section. Discussing the meaning and impact of events is just as important as reporting them. And just like you can skip over the editorials to get to the comics, you don't have to read Katz.
I know I'll get slammed for this statement, but I've been thinking recently that many of those who say Katz can't write at all are simply people who don't understand what he's saying.
Doesn't AOL have a toll free number for people out in the styx?
First of all, ravers are mostly acid-droppin, e-bombin, candyflippers. They have no interest in technology, only hallucinogenic drugs. The raves I was duped into attending were flooded with computer illiterate morons, and it wasn't too much fun being the only guy present who valued his higher brain functions.
Pop-culture? Come on! Every friggin MTV watchin shmuck is a conformist. If looking like a Backstreet Boy has anything to do with being a geek, you can count my sorry ass out. Pop-culture teaches people to value whatever happens to be "cool" at the moment....It is the mortal enemy of geekdom.
Geeks/Hackers generally are socially inept, except among are own kind. Basically we don't fit into normal everyday society with non-geeks very well.
I don't believe that the lone gunmen could be defined as "wacko", since it usually turns out that they're right.
Dangerous how?
As my World History teacher from high school explained it, you should only use etcetera when there are obvious continuations to a list that are too numerous to mention; not when you can't think of anything else to say.
I did like the X-files's particular brand of humor, but the Mulder/Scully relationship never interested me.
So what I'm getting at is, if the Lone Gunmen spinoff brought back the air of mystery, I'd definately watch it.
Touche.
I assume you are referring to the "I got the hammer and nails" post. Since he/she probably didn't know that you were African-American until now, it's a safe bet that has nothing to do with anything. His comments are most likely inspired by a belief that your company is either staffed by incompetent developers or is a complete fraud.
It may be true that VA Linux happens to own the network which hosts Slashdot, but I find it hard to believe that the Slashdot readers who post negative articles and comments about your company are all pawns of VA Linux under orders to spread bad press about LinuxOne. Frankly, since VA Linux actually has a product (unlike LinuxOne which appears to be distributing RedHat with a different label on the box), they probably don't even care.
That we've fucked up is not in dispute.
If by "fucked up", you mean "deliberately attempted to mislead," or "distributed someone else's product with our name on it," then you are correct.
You want to know why no one likes LinuxOne? Because your practices stink of Microsoft. The company that distributed a version of Intergalactic Research's Q-DOS and charged $60 for it, and then went on to rip off the Macintosh GUI and charge $180 for it. Your practices (and Microsoft's) may not be illegal, but they're pretty lame.
And, when we succed in our re-engineering and overhaul of our practices we'll expect the same level of coverage of that too.
The best software companies are the ones with products that inspire nerds to say things like, "Whoa! That's really cool!" Assuming you're not trying to pull some kind of IPO scam, and your programmers aren't 3rd string losers, and you really want to clear your name, then hack some badass code that makes us all ooh and ah.
Is it possible for any legal action to be taken against these guys? Like false advertising, or misrepresentation or something? Investigating it is great, but can't someone DO something?
You have a point. But remember that intel is stuck with an almost 20 year old instruction set because they want to maintain backwards compatability. Transmeta can make any change to their processor that they want and just write new CMS to utilize those changes. So I don't think a fuocus on x86 will hurt them too bad since they can optimize for something else later and have some new CMS to make it compatible with whatever they want.
You're right that x86 is still a relatively old and backwards instruction set, and it still sucks that Transmeta still forces you to code for it. But the difference is, they can make a switch to a new instruction set whenever they want and still support older software.....as long as no one writes any native code that isn't CMS.
There may not be any CMS that isn't x86 yet, but it's only a matter of time. We can't use x86 forever.
And plus, it's my understanding that this whole VLIW thing is in its infancy; 1st gen RISC chips weren't that great either, so I'm betting that by the time we get to 4th and 5th generation Crusoe chips, they'll be pretty hot.
No kidding. After all this suspense, I was hoping for something more along the lines of a Warp Drive or something.
I won't waste my time pointing out your many flawed arguments, since others have already done so. I just want to nitpick on one little issue: compaq didn't reverse engineer the processor in the IBM PC, it was the BIOS.
First of all, I object to internet censorship purely on the grounds that it violates the fisrt ammendment. If parents want filters on their home computers to 'protect' their kids, fine. But you can't censor material on a publicly accessed station. I believe that's unconstitutional.
However, all this crap about crazy right-wing christian extremists is a bit excessive. The bible (at least the new testament) preaches tolerance, peace, love, and lots of other happy stuff. Biggoted intolerant christians aren't christians, no matter how good they are at quoting the bible out of context. The only problem with Christians is that they get upset when they hear about dirty old men raping little boys, and they try to do things that they mistakenly believe will stop it.
Christians who actually read the bible and follow it are ususally very mellow, calm, collective, and nice people. I wish everybody could just chill out and not get so worked up about everything. Flaming rhetoric will never change people's minds, only intelligent discussion with valid arguments and supportive evidence.
P.S.: The internet is a worldwide communinty. Arguing about a political issue in one town, in one state, in the U.S.A. is probably of little interest to many readers. So lets just drop it.