Customers that want to do ANYTHING with.net or java?
Business apps, emulation of any kind, that sort of thing?
And no. I don't love apple products. I recently had the toe curling misfortune of repairing a macbook pro. Thing had a very sick sounding disc mechanism in the dvd drive, and would not boot on the *supplied* OSX install DVD. My customer had to break down and hunt online for snow leopard because the default version of leopard that came on it was one subrevision newer than was on the install dvd. (The EFI loader would not permit loading the dvd.)
White plastic and a sensation of feeling posh are not justification for what apple does.
I don't want to deride Steve, (he is many orders a more effective CEO than balmer) but I personally hate the direction he has taken computing.
Apple dried up and almost died the last time he left. That is something I hope returns with this encore.
The reason I hate apple computer, is that they abuse court systems, shear their buyers, contort patent and copyright laws, and act smug and superior the whole time they do it.
Any company that makes a practice of telling the customer that they are wong (what else can you call apple's behavior concerning user demands for flash, and interpreted code execution?) While having previously decried the rest of the industry as being oppressive (1984 mac commercial, ring any bells?) And systematically attacking competitors over bullshit aesthetic patents is not only worthy of disdain and derision, but should not remain in business.
I strongly hope thar Job's resignation will mean that either these abusive practices end, and apple enters a new golden age, or that apple computer succombs to the pernicious rot going on under their polished plastic exterior.
A friend of mine recently became embroiled in a small claims suit after he go involved in a no fault, non injury accident with a cabby at a dangerous intersection on a parkway.
The suit was brought by the cabby because the accident was his second in 5 years. This is important because of the monetization the city has implemented over the cab industry, and the resulting imposed legislation. As a result of the accident the cabby was not legally eligable to work and was discharged without pay. For this reason the cabby filed small claims for lost wages against my friend.
Long story short, rediculous things like this happen frequently in NYC because the city government legally taps the till of public transit, and does so because it does not spend money efficiently. This is one of the many reasons that public transit in NYC is abysmal.
The underlying problem (poor fiscal policy, and corrupt contracts with construction unions) causes the city to seek any and all forms of extraordinary rendition of funds from the public and from its civil servants, such as registered cab companies.
This is why the mayor wants to institute a KNOWN bad solution. The problem it aims to fix is NOT dangerous traffic-- it is ALL about revinue. Installing more cameras ans watching more people means more people will get caught and will pay bigger fines.
Putting a 1/4 inch wide groove concentric to the spindle hole on the underside of a compact disc would do wonders to stabilize it for long distance flight. Ideally on the outer most periphery of the disc surface for maximum stabilization effect. (This is basically how frisbees stay oriented.)
Loading those up with pirated beatles and rolling stones titles, then launching them using a custom built robot at *IAA lawyers and corporate execs could be quite satisfactory.
Does anyone know just how fast you can spin these discs before they fly apart from centrifugal forces?
Additionally, since coopting university resources is a time honored tradition among consumate media pirates, would it be unfair to modulate a torrent seed stream over a 1MW+ femtosecond pulse laser from the physics department? I mean, they need to be able to overcome "interference" over the "transmission medium", and one of the best ways to do that is to increase the broadcast power output....
If api headers and primatives are "copyrighted", and "derivative works" are prosecuted under copyright law (how do you prove your implementation of Free() is not a derivative work of the oracle java implementation?) Then making use of the language (you DO have a valid license to read and replicate the API calls, right?) could well require draconian contract law to undertake.
What I would see come out of this is a creative commons based comminuty api set (probably based on other languages) released by the FSF, to combat the "if you want to program, pay up bitch" shitfest that would come about as big companies claim ownership of C, Java,.net, python and pals.
The sad part is I wouldn't put it past companies like Apple to say dumb things like "if you want to develop for our platforms, you have to use our languages and apis, and so also need to enter a contract to license our oh so special IP." On top of the "pay us 30% off the gross of your appstore sales" shenannigans.
If they could get away with it, I don't see why they wouldn't enforce it.
On the flipside, since linux kernel apis have already effectively been granted gratis use by Linus and the linux foundation, such moves might spell utterly desasterous for the companies that try it.
I just get equally riled up when I hear "all our problems come from (worshipers of X divinity), because of their stupid devotion to their imaginary friend." As I do when I hear "those godless heathens and their satanic ways are what's dragging our god given country to its grave."
(And similar rhetoric. I do not segregate the two. I am not meaning to accuse or anything, but that's how I feel about it.)
Additionally, god's fickle nature is part of what defines it, as such no empirical test can prove effective.
Effects of segregating little timmy in a state of total quantum observation (we will assume technology that does not even exist here) will result in the same result as the control.
This is in contrast to tooth fairy who consistently leaves quarters in one condition, and not in another.
Since you are insisting on the "metaphysical" tooth fairy, my answer is:
"Not relevent"
As, like the question about the existence of god, the question of the existence of a creature who's nature defies rational boundings is axiomatically unanswerable.
What I TRIED to point out above is that unlike god "tooth fairy" has an empirical test. Put little timmy in a environment where his family and friends cannot put quarters under his bed, and low and behold, no quarters.
For this reason the explicit conflation of the two does not hold.
Yes. It is quite possible the universe does not exist.
(This is essentially what you are saying-- a fundemental axiom has no provable basis, as it is what defines the question. Without the axiom, the question is undefined, so either you accept the fundemental axioms of logic (in much the same ways you must accept thr fundamental axioms in science) or you are left with a universe that cannot be described, and may not even exist at all. Observations of the universe, lacking a framework for riggorous examination, lack context or meaning. Your argument sacrifices all sentient thought, and understanding.)
I do not hate athiests or people with faith. What I hate is intellectual dishonesty. Conflating the opinion that there are no gods as logical and factual, when the very question is axiomatically unanswerable is just as dingenuous as insisting that others believe in a specific god.
Stating an opinion, and accepting it as an opinion is radically different, and I can totally get behind you on that.:)
I do not state, either for or against, the existence of a god with any certainty.
What I state is that the question is axiomatically unanswerable, and therefor moot. The question has no meaning, because it cannot be answered. As such it is a waste of my time to attempt to answer it.
Because I know the question cannot be answered, and because I insist that people be honest about what they state as their beliefs, I insist that athiests acknowledge that the view they hold is an unprovable opinion, and not scientific fact.
Much like looking in a desert for roses is unlikely to return a positive result does not mean that roses do not exist. If you don't know enough about the roses to know that they need water, it does not seem unsensible to look for them in a place where they cannot live.
This is how the lack of evidence is not logically the evidence of absence.
You are extrapolating that god does not exist because no evidence of a physical existance can be found in the observable universe.
However, the observable universe is smaller than the whole of the universe. Due to seemingly unviolable laws of the universe, we simply cannot exhaustively search for this being, meaning we logically cannot assert odds of existence are 0. The logic just does not add up that way.
Your references for "tooth fairy" are highly localized to earth, where an omnipotent god would not.
As for the existence of the tooth fairy, there is more evidence that it exists (in some form) as more than just belief, as children really do receive quarters under their pillows. Studious examination often reveals the identity of this agent as a close relative of the child. This person does exist, and does leave quarters.
The argument you are trying to make is also a strawman, which is hardly what a stong logician would fall back to. The intent of the "tooth fairy" analogy was to imply a metaphysical entity that is known to be a mundane one as being equivalent to a metaphysical entity that is not known to be one.
A more apt comparison to your analogy with "tooth fairy" would be (tribal legend) "Orangutan". (Literally, 'old man od the woods') the mythical creature is a bit like an elf or dwarf in european culture, which is in reality a stylized conception of a real, and far more mundane creature. Other examples would be Kitsune and Tanuki in japanese folklore, being foxes and tanuki (animal) respectively.
So, once again I will assert that it is provably impossible to empirically disprove the total (universal) existence of god, given that we cannot search the whole universe, and will again assert that the asking of the question is irrelevent, since it is unlikely that god gives a toss.
By hating the ephemeral concept embodied by the beliefs of others.
You hate the concept of god, which exists.
A concept can exist without a physical or rational archetype to base it on. This is by definition what faith actually is: the firm assertion of a conceptual model without evidence.
As an agnostic, I have to point out the logical error of asserting that god does not exist. The only logically sound argument that does not fall victim to the fallacy is to assert ignorance of that which is provably unknowable.
The only rational answers to the "god" question are:
1) "Unknowable" 2) "not relevant"
Any other assertion, be it for or against, fails at logic.
And I agree. Most people fail to realize several important contextual clues in the biblical genesis stories.
1) genesis 1:26 implies multiple humans, simultaneously. Not just adam.
2) genesis 2:5 says specifically that god had not yet created FARMING humans. (No man to "till the earth"). Hunter gatherers could well exist, but are not mentioned, since they are not the focus of the story. This is reiterated in genesis 3:22.
I would say that the genesis story does what many ancient histories/verbal accounts/stories of myth do, which is to focus on the people that are deemed important to the story and omit any extra content. For instance, the odd lack of female characters in the geneology section, except where there are extraordinay circumstances. The omissions do not mean that males greatly outnumbered females, it means the recorders of the tradition valued males more highly, and considered the women's names superfluous. By the same vein, mentioning nomadic hunters outside "eden" would be superfluous except where they come into the narrative though interacting with a major character, such as Cain. (In the land of Nod.) Keeping the story simple is essential for these early traditions because written language has not been invented yet. (Agriculture predated written language by several thousand years. As such any such traditions or origin stories would HAVE to be oral ones. That is why there are omissions for the sake of simplicity.)
Taking such a literal approach as to imply adam was the only human at the time is absurd both from the perspective of the narrative itself and from any biological perspective as well. As such this article only should upset dyed in the wool literalists and super fundies.
This particular school was rural, and had a small student population. (My graduating class would have been 90 students)
Due to the small student body size, the school had to rely on extracurricular activites generating income for the school. As a result, the school administration came up with some 'clever' solutions to keeping dumb as rocks kids that lived and breathed football academically eligable to play.
One such clever solution was the implementation of large group projects, where grades were given to the whole group.
Think:
Science fair project. Many students are supposed to work together to create an awesome team effort project. In theory.
In reality, the cliche smart kid does all the work, makes the project, sets up and tears down the exhibit, and writes the experiment reports. The other kids assigned coast on his/her hard work, and do nothing.
To add insuult to injury, and a point which further illustrates the true intent of the practice, is the percentage of the yearly grade that such group projects add up to. (In this case, cumulatively they added up to over 70% of the grade, meaning that as long as that smart kid keeps doing all the work, the freeloaders still get passing grades, even if they bomb all their homework and tests.)
That is how failing on purpose derailed the gravy train.
In this case, the school was a big fan of "group participation" projects, designed specifically to carry dead weight.
An example:
14 students are assigned to a science fair project. Regardless of who actually does the work, the whole group gets the same grade. This leads to the situation where football boy does nothing, and gets an A, with an awesome project that he knows nothing about, and did nothing to contribute to.
Similar with some stretches for math, history class, etc.
The beef was not the group participation idea itself, the complaint was over the consistent assignment of the exact same 12 "partners" for every project, every year.
I don't know what highschool you went to, but in mine I was carrying the math and science grades of 12 (yes, I said TWELVE) other students, year round, for YEARS.
I suppose it was pure coincidence that I had straight A grades, and that they were always the same 12 students, and also were the A-team football lineup.
Pure coincidence, surely.
When I would enquire about this fact, teacher after teacher would tell me that there was nothing they could do about it, and totally circumnavigated the issue.
Strangely enough, in my junior year when I had decided that I had enough of their bullshit and chose to get straight Fs on purpose, it was less than a week before there was a parent teacher conference. (Unscheduled, mind.) The teaachers gave the whole song and dance about how I was not living up to my potential, and the whole usual shool administrator song and dance-- but refused to listen to my grievances. Something my folks both noticed.
Prior to this meeting, and as a direct result of my decision to fail spectacularly, I had managed to make pretty much the entire A-team uneligable to play, had ruined their chances for athletic scholarships, and had literally received death threats in the hall.
As a result of this insanity (and the literal breakdown of my psyche from fun loving kid to cruel cynic in such a short period that had my parents frightened) I was taken out of school, obliterated the GED test, and stomped the local university entrance exam.
I loved college.
My grade was my own, and nobody elses, and I got to see first hand what happens to pampered highschool jocks when they get thrust into doing their own damn work.
I am now an engineer, working in aviation.
Don't talk to me about being a jealous nerd. Betty Big-boobs with her pompoms and Andy the dumb-as-rocks athlete that can't write his own name have nothing I want. I am interested in neither, for any reason.
And no, I never liked the "pretty girls" in science class. I found them painfully and willfully ignorant, and as such loathsome. If they and the deadweight athletes hooked up, they deserve each other.
I disagree. There are very important times where one should disobey the government. (Aka, break the law/comit a crime).
At the risk of a godwin, the nazi inquiries about jewish persons living in the neighborhood are a very strong example. (Note, that is all the further down that hole I want to go. I am NOT IMPLYING that any current government is nazi like, only that the historical existence of that government style sinks your argument. There *are* times when it is morally justified to comit crimes.)
Weather or not anonymous is pulling a godwin is not discernable at this time, but that is not relavent. Anon's motives are likely too disperate to properly describe anyway. All that matters here ia that they are doing this, and what the consequences will be.
Rather than asking why anon is doing these things, we should be asking why the government is reacting the way it is.
Slashdot Mirror
Try posting more than a few lines of text from a smartphone with staggered keys, and get back to me.
Customers that want to do ANYTHING with .net or java?
Business apps, emulation of any kind, that sort of thing?
And no. I don't love apple products. I recently had the toe curling misfortune of repairing a macbook pro. Thing had a very sick sounding disc mechanism in the dvd drive, and would not boot on the *supplied* OSX install DVD. My customer had to break down and hunt online for snow leopard because the default version of leopard that came on it was one subrevision newer than was on the install dvd. (The EFI loader would not permit loading the dvd.)
White plastic and a sensation of feeling posh are not justification for what apple does.
Cute. Post was made from an android smartphone, with stubby little chicklet buttons for keys.
Typos are unavoidable.
Do you feel better now that you called me out on an unregistered button press?
But I am actually HAPPY this has happened.
I don't want to deride Steve, (he is many orders a more effective CEO than balmer) but I personally hate the direction he has taken computing.
Apple dried up and almost died the last time he left. That is something I hope returns with this encore.
The reason I hate apple computer, is that they abuse court systems, shear their buyers, contort patent and copyright laws, and act smug and superior the whole time they do it.
Any company that makes a practice of telling the customer that they are wong (what else can you call apple's behavior concerning user demands for flash, and interpreted code execution?) While having previously decried the rest of the industry as being oppressive (1984 mac commercial, ring any bells?) And systematically attacking competitors over bullshit aesthetic patents is not only worthy of disdain and derision, but should not remain in business.
I strongly hope thar Job's resignation will mean that either these abusive practices end, and apple enters a new golden age, or that apple computer succombs to the pernicious rot going on under their polished plastic exterior.
A friend of mine recently became embroiled in a small claims suit after he go involved in a no fault, non injury accident with a cabby at a dangerous intersection on a parkway.
The suit was brought by the cabby because the accident was his second in 5 years. This is important because of the monetization the city has implemented over the cab industry, and the resulting imposed legislation. As a result of the accident the cabby was not legally eligable to work and was discharged without pay. For this reason the cabby filed small claims for lost wages against my friend.
Long story short, rediculous things like this happen frequently in NYC because the city government legally taps the till of public transit, and does so because it does not spend money efficiently. This is one of the many reasons that public transit in NYC is abysmal.
The underlying problem (poor fiscal policy, and corrupt contracts with construction unions) causes the city to seek any and all forms of extraordinary rendition of funds from the public and from its civil servants, such as registered cab companies.
This is why the mayor wants to institute a KNOWN bad solution. The problem it aims to fix is NOT dangerous traffic-- it is ALL about revinue. Installing more cameras ans watching more people means more people will get caught and will pay bigger fines.
That is what NYC knows that FS doesn't.
Excellent.
Putting a 1/4 inch wide groove concentric to the spindle hole on the underside of a compact disc would do wonders to stabilize it for long distance flight. Ideally on the outer most periphery of the disc surface for maximum stabilization effect. (This is basically how frisbees stay oriented.)
Loading those up with pirated beatles and rolling stones titles, then launching them using a custom built robot at *IAA lawyers and corporate execs could be quite satisfactory.
Does anyone know just how fast you can spin these discs before they fly apart from centrifugal forces?
Additionally, since coopting university resources is a time honored tradition among consumate media pirates, would it be unfair to modulate a torrent seed stream over a 1MW+ femtosecond pulse laser from the physics department? I mean, they need to be able to overcome "interference" over the "transmission medium", and one of the best ways to do that is to increase the broadcast power output....
If api headers and primatives are "copyrighted", and "derivative works" are prosecuted under copyright law (how do you prove your implementation of Free() is not a derivative work of the oracle java implementation?) Then making use of the language (you DO have a valid license to read and replicate the API calls, right?) could well require draconian contract law to undertake.
What I would see come out of this is a creative commons based comminuty api set (probably based on other languages) released by the FSF, to combat the "if you want to program, pay up bitch" shitfest that would come about as big companies claim ownership of C, Java, .net, python and pals.
The sad part is I wouldn't put it past companies like Apple to say dumb things like "if you want to develop for our platforms, you have to use our languages and apis, and so also need to enter a contract to license our oh so special IP." On top of the "pay us 30% off the gross of your appstore sales" shenannigans.
If they could get away with it, I don't see why they wouldn't enforce it.
On the flipside, since linux kernel apis have already effectively been granted gratis use by Linus and the linux foundation, such moves might spell utterly desasterous for the companies that try it.
Then you have nothing to worry about from me. :)
I just get equally riled up when I hear "all our problems come from (worshipers of X divinity), because of their stupid devotion to their imaginary friend." As I do when I hear "those godless heathens and their satanic ways are what's dragging our god given country to its grave."
(And similar rhetoric. I do not segregate the two. I am not meaning to accuse or anything, but that's how I feel about it.)
Agreed.
Sadly, I get irritated at both when they try it. :(
Additionally, god's fickle nature is part of what defines it, as such no empirical test can prove effective.
Effects of segregating little timmy in a state of total quantum observation (we will assume technology that does not even exist here) will result in the same result as the control.
This is in contrast to tooth fairy who consistently leaves quarters in one condition, and not in another.
Since you are insisting on the "metaphysical" tooth fairy, my answer is:
"Not relevent"
As, like the question about the existence of god, the question of the existence of a creature who's nature defies rational boundings is axiomatically unanswerable.
What I TRIED to point out above is that unlike god "tooth fairy" has an empirical test. Put little timmy in a environment where his family and friends cannot put quarters under his bed, and low and behold, no quarters.
For this reason the explicit conflation of the two does not hold.
I have made similar arguments before.
What I then state is that based on available data and observations "X" would *appear* to be true/false.
Eg, based on available data, it would appear that god, if it exists, does not give a flying fuck about us.
These are opinions. Not statements of fact.
Saying that 1 + 1 = 2 is stating a fact. They are not the same thing.
Yes. It is quite possible the universe does not exist.
(This is essentially what you are saying-- a fundemental axiom has no provable basis, as it is what defines the question. Without the axiom, the question is undefined, so either you accept the fundemental axioms of logic (in much the same ways you must accept thr fundamental axioms in science) or you are left with a universe that cannot be described, and may not even exist at all. Observations of the universe, lacking a framework for riggorous examination, lack context or meaning. Your argument sacrifices all sentient thought, and understanding.)
Thank you for being honest.
I do not hate athiests or people with faith.
What I hate is intellectual dishonesty. Conflating the opinion that there are no gods as logical and factual, when the very question is axiomatically unanswerable is just as dingenuous as insisting that others believe in a specific god.
Stating an opinion, and accepting it as an opinion is radically different, and I can totally get behind you on that. :)
No.
Here is how my world looks, to remove any doubt:
I do not state, either for or against, the existence of a god with any certainty.
What I state is that the question is axiomatically unanswerable, and therefor moot. The question has no meaning, because it cannot be answered. As such it is a waste of my time to attempt to answer it.
Because I know the question cannot be answered, and because I insist that people be honest about what they state as their beliefs, I insist that athiests acknowledge that the view they hold is an unprovable opinion, and not scientific fact.
That is all.
That they choose to hold such a belief is of no concern to me.
That they often conflate that belief as fact is.
Yes, quite correct.
Much like looking in a desert for roses is unlikely to return a positive result does not mean that roses do not exist. If you don't know enough about the roses to know that they need water, it does not seem unsensible to look for them in a place where they cannot live.
This is how the lack of evidence is not logically the evidence of absence.
You are extrapolating that god does not exist because no evidence of a physical existance can be found in the observable universe.
However, the observable universe is smaller than the whole of the universe. Due to seemingly unviolable laws of the universe, we simply cannot exhaustively search for this being, meaning we logically cannot assert odds of existence are 0. The logic just does not add up that way.
Your references for "tooth fairy" are highly localized to earth, where an omnipotent god would not.
As for the existence of the tooth fairy, there is more evidence that it exists (in some form) as more than just belief, as children really do receive quarters under their pillows. Studious examination often reveals the identity of this agent as a close relative of the child. This person does exist, and does leave quarters.
The argument you are trying to make is also a strawman, which is hardly what a stong logician would fall back to. The intent of the "tooth fairy" analogy was to imply a metaphysical entity that is known to be a mundane one as being equivalent to a metaphysical entity that is not known to be one.
A more apt comparison to your analogy with "tooth fairy" would be (tribal legend) "Orangutan". (Literally, 'old man od the woods') the mythical creature is a bit like an elf or dwarf in european culture, which is in reality a stylized conception of a real, and far more mundane creature. Other examples would be Kitsune and Tanuki in japanese folklore, being foxes and tanuki (animal) respectively.
So, once again I will assert that it is provably impossible to empirically disprove the total (universal) existence of god, given that we cannot search the whole universe, and will again assert that the asking of the question is irrelevent, since it is unlikely that god gives a toss.
By hating the ephemeral concept embodied by the beliefs of others.
You hate the concept of god, which exists.
A concept can exist without a physical or rational archetype to base it on. This is by definition what faith actually is: the firm assertion of a conceptual model without evidence.
As an agnostic, I have to point out the logical error of asserting that god does not exist. The only logically sound argument that does not fall victim to the fallacy is to assert ignorance of that which is provably unknowable.
The only rational answers to the "god" question are:
1) "Unknowable"
2) "not relevant"
Any other assertion, be it for or against, fails at logic.
"The land of Nod." (Genesis 4:16)
And I agree. Most people fail to realize several important contextual clues in the biblical genesis stories.
1) genesis 1:26 implies multiple humans, simultaneously. Not just adam.
2) genesis 2:5 says specifically that god had not yet created FARMING humans. (No man to "till the earth"). Hunter gatherers could well exist, but are not mentioned, since they are not the focus of the story. This is reiterated in genesis 3:22.
I would say that the genesis story does what many ancient histories/verbal accounts/stories of myth do, which is to focus on the people that are deemed important to the story and omit any extra content. For instance, the odd lack of female characters in the geneology section, except where there are extraordinay circumstances. The omissions do not mean that males greatly outnumbered females, it means the recorders of the tradition valued males more highly, and considered the women's names superfluous. By the same vein, mentioning nomadic hunters outside "eden" would be superfluous except where they come into the narrative though interacting with a major character, such as Cain. (In the land of Nod.) Keeping the story simple is essential for these early traditions because written language has not been invented yet. (Agriculture predated written language by several thousand years. As such any such traditions or origin stories would HAVE to be oral ones. That is why there are omissions for the sake of simplicity.)
Taking such a literal approach as to imply adam was the only human at the time is absurd both from the perspective of the narrative itself and from any biological perspective as well. As such this article only should upset dyed in the wool literalists and super fundies.
Not about the retun of internet services, but about the entire affair of their dictator and the uprising against him.
Up until now our reports are essentially the press releases of the rebel faction and quadaffi's, respectively.
Unrestricted internet access would grant a wealth of on the street reports on civilian sentiment about these events.
I'm sorry I wasn't more descriptive.
This particular school was rural, and had a small student population. (My graduating class would have been 90 students)
Due to the small student body size, the school had to rely on extracurricular activites generating income for the school.
As a result, the school administration came up with some 'clever' solutions to keeping dumb as rocks kids that lived and breathed football academically eligable to play.
One such clever solution was the implementation of large group projects, where grades were given to the whole group.
Think:
Science fair project. Many students are supposed to work together to create an awesome team effort project. In theory.
In reality, the cliche smart kid does all the work, makes the project, sets up and tears down the exhibit, and writes the experiment reports. The other kids assigned coast on his/her hard work, and do nothing.
To add insuult to injury, and a point which further illustrates the true intent of the practice, is the percentage of the yearly grade that such group projects add up to. (In this case, cumulatively they added up to over 70% of the grade, meaning that as long as that smart kid keeps doing all the work, the freeloaders still get passing grades, even if they bomb all their homework and tests.)
That is how failing on purpose derailed the gravy train.
In this case, the school was a big fan of "group participation" projects, designed specifically to carry dead weight.
An example:
14 students are assigned to a science fair project. Regardless of who actually does the work, the whole group gets the same grade. This leads to the situation where football boy does nothing, and gets an A, with an awesome project that he knows nothing about, and did nothing to contribute to.
Similar with some stretches for math, history class, etc.
The beef was not the group participation idea itself, the complaint was over the consistent assignment of the exact same 12 "partners" for every project, every year.
I don't know what highschool you went to, but in mine I was carrying the math and science grades of 12 (yes, I said TWELVE) other students, year round, for YEARS.
I suppose it was pure coincidence that I had straight A grades, and that they were always the same 12 students, and also were the A-team football lineup.
Pure coincidence, surely.
When I would enquire about this fact, teacher after teacher would tell me that there was nothing they could do about it, and totally circumnavigated the issue.
Strangely enough, in my junior year when I had decided that I had enough of their bullshit and chose to get straight Fs on purpose, it was less than a week before there was a parent teacher conference. (Unscheduled, mind.) The teaachers gave the whole song and dance about how I was not living up to my potential, and the whole usual shool administrator song and dance-- but refused to listen to my grievances. Something my folks both noticed.
Prior to this meeting, and as a direct result of my decision to fail spectacularly, I had managed to make pretty much the entire A-team uneligable to play, had ruined their chances for athletic scholarships, and had literally received death threats in the hall.
As a result of this insanity (and the literal breakdown of my psyche from fun loving kid to cruel cynic in such a short period that had my parents frightened) I was taken out of school, obliterated the GED test, and stomped the local university entrance exam.
I loved college.
My grade was my own, and nobody elses, and I got to see first hand what happens to pampered highschool jocks when they get thrust into doing their own damn work.
I am now an engineer, working in aviation.
Don't talk to me about being a jealous nerd. Betty Big-boobs with her pompoms and Andy the dumb-as-rocks athlete that can't write his own name have nothing I want. I am interested in neither, for any reason.
And no, I never liked the "pretty girls" in science class. I found them painfully and willfully ignorant, and as such loathsome. If they and the deadweight athletes hooked up, they deserve each other.
I disagree. There are very important times where one should disobey the government. (Aka, break the law/comit a crime).
At the risk of a godwin, the nazi inquiries about jewish persons living in the neighborhood are a very strong example. (Note, that is all the further down that hole I want to go. I am NOT IMPLYING that any current government is nazi like, only that the historical existence of that government style sinks your argument. There *are* times when it is morally justified to comit crimes.)
Weather or not anonymous is pulling a godwin is not discernable at this time, but that is not relavent. Anon's motives are likely too disperate to properly describe anyway. All that matters here ia that they are doing this, and what the consequences will be.
Rather than asking why anon is doing these things, we should be asking why the government is reacting the way it is.