No it's not! Seatbealts HAVE been proven to save people who USE them. Whereas missile defense has hardly been proven do to anything except gobble up money
Yes, it is. Seatbelts are a mature (and simple) technology. The missile defense is not. The post to which I was responding indicated that because a missile defense would not have prevented this attack, we shouldn't work on one. Period. To this argument, my analogy is valid.
However, you are now putting forward a different argument than that to which I was responding; of course my response does not fit exactly. Yes, missile defense technology does not function right now. Does that mean that we should not develop it? Many of the first rockets that NASA built in the space program were failures. After the first one failed, should we have given up on the attempt to put men on the moon? No, we took almost a decade, matured the technology, and succeeded in our goal. The same is possible with missile defense. Whether it is something we should do is another matter.
Yes, seatbelt use increase the likelyhood of surviving a crash, but it does not make it certain. Will a mature missile defense system protect us from every possible attack? No, but it will help reduce the threats and allow us to concentrate more on other vectors. If you wish to compare apples to apples, we are exactly back to what I stated in my first post.
Could the money be spent better? That's altogether another topic from what the original message was about. But if you want to figure out the costs, make sure you include in the benefits all the new technology that will be spun off by this research.
Although the attack was quite well organized, it probably didn't cost too much, and the shield wouldn't be useful against this kind of attacks.
I've seen this argument against the creation of a national missile defense system, and it doesn't hold water. Would you argue that, since having seatbelts in cars does not prevent everybody in a car crash from dying, we should stop putting seatbelts in cars? That's exactly the argument that's being put forward here: it doesn't make us 100% safe, so we shouldn't bother with it.
Creating a national missile defense system will not make us 100% safe from attack, but it will make certain forms of attack less likely. That would allow us to concentrate on methods of preventing attacks of other types, and being prepared to handle the aftermath of these other attacks.
Actually I DON'T support capital punishment. Do you? If you do, do you support abortion? How can anyone justify one without justifying the other?
Actually, it is quite easy and consistent to support capital punishment, but not abortion. I am firmly in support of the death penalty, and against abortion except in cases of rape, incest and the life of the mother.
The central point that makes this consistent is this simple philosophy: a person should be accountable for the results of their decisions and actions. If a person decides to go on a mass-murder spree, the well-known consequece is that society deems you too much of a danger to keep around, and you will be put to death. Does society have that right? Well, the death penalty is applied to people who apparently think that they as individuals had that right; society having that right is consistent with the criminal's world-view.
As far as abortion, there is no contraceptive method that is 100% effective other than abstinence. If a woman engages in sexual relations, then a foreseeable consequence might include pregnancy. Once a woman has made a CHOICE to engage in the risky behavior, she needs to bear the consequences of that action. (Don't get me wrong, society needs to hold the man accountable, also, even if nature doesn't.) In the cases of rape and incest, the woman did not make a free choice to engage in the activity, and so should not be bound by the consequences of it. I guess you could describe this viewpoint as pro-choice, but anti-multiple choice.
It seems to me that somebody who would support abortion on demand but be against the death penalty is essentially an anarchist: let's not hold anybody accoutable for their actions. Of course, how could they then rationally protest against the death penalty? They're then trying to hold the police, judge, jury and executioner accountable for their actions.
So all that said, how do I feel about using video facial recognition in public places to "catch criminals"? Well, have you ever been told that you look just like somebody else? Or have you caught a glance of somebody, thought they were your friend you've known since third grade, but were mistaken? Mark this: there will be a lot of innocent people hassled because they look too similar to the latest felon de jour. They will bear the consequences of actions that they had nothing to do with. It's an attempt to fix the symptoms, without treating any of the underlying causes.
Chris Beckenbach
If you're moderating this up or down because you agree or disagree with the positions stated, please review the moderation guidelines.
Another option is just to go ex-directory, which is what my phone line is. Admittedly it's in the UK and I don't know how your phone directories work, but...
I live in the US in Florida, also. State law prohibits sales solicitation calls to any phone number that is on the state's "no-call" list (costs you $10 first year, $5 each additional year) OR a phone number that is unlisted or unpublished. Unpublished numbers are not in the paper directory, but can still be found through directory assistance; unlisted numbers are not even available through directory assistance.
All this info is available in the front of my white pages phone book; YMMV.
Now that's real smart. And I wonder where they'll get the addresses for their next round of "solicited" e-mails. Or were you planning on all of us forging our headers in our emails to them?
This article leaves open one interesting point. Say that Barrons printed an article that mentioned me in an unfavorable manner. Although I live in the US, and Dow Jones is based in the US, could I sue them under Australian defamation laws in Australian court? After all, the article can be retrieved in Australia. Heck with just that; I should file suit in every country that has an internet connection.
There definately needs to be some international agreements working out this sort of thing.
Chris Beckenbach
The above post is wholely created and housed in the United States of America (USA). By exporting the above post outside the borders of the USA the exporter agrees to indemnify and hold harmless the author from any suits arising from act of exporting or the contents of the above post, and further agrees to vigorously defend the author from and assume all liability under all suits of law that arise outside the USA from the act of exporting or the contents of the above post.
The Constitution itself promotes a strict interpretation. Congress in prohibited in Acticle I from making any ex post facto law; that is, a law that makes something illegal after the fact. Why? Simple; so that people would know the rules ahead of time, and only be punished if they break the rules that were in effect at the time that they committed a crime.
If you look at the Declaration of Independence, making past actions illegal and then punishing the colonists for them was one of the tyranies that the colonists railed against when it was done by King George. That is why they made sure to include this restriction on the laws passed by Congress.
However, if we then say that the Constitution itself is not to be interpreted strictly, but has a meaning that can change over time, then we are saying that people do not know the rules in advance; they find out that what they did was illegal when the courts "interpret" the Constitution. This smacks of the same tyranny that our founders were trying to escape.
So, if we wish to summarize, interpreting the Constitution according to its "spirit" is against the spirit of the Constitution.
Actually, the Constitutional Convention operated with the thought that any power not explicitly granted to the federal government by the Constitution would be barred to it, and the base Constitution does not give the government the power to regulate speech. Therefore, the drafters considered it safe. The state ratifying committees, however, wanted explicit protections, leading to twelve Amendments being proposed as a condition of committees' ratifications.
An additional argument can be made that the founding of the country goes back to July 4, 1776 and the Declaration of Independence. Under this argument, freedom of speech would be part of the inalienable right of liberty.
<Off Topic>Personally, I think that the state Constitution ratifying committees would have been wise to demand a stricter wording of the commerce clause, also.</Off Topic>
As to your question about the adjective "free," we in the Free Software Movement have never come across a term that has any great advantage over the term "Free Software."
I think its rude to allow for one company to exercise an attitude we find abhorrent in another. One standard, and hold them all to it.
I totally agree. Since AOL had to negotiate with and pay Compaq to get the icon for their ISP service on the desktop Compaq is shipping, MSN should have to also.
Negotiations with AOL: (Compaq): "All right, it's agreed then. You'll pay us $1 million, and we'll put an icon for your service on the desktop we ship." (AOL): "Sounds good."
Negotiations with MSN: (Compaq): "All right, it's agreed then. You'll pay us $1 million, and we'll put an icon for your service on the desktop we ship." (MSN): "Uh, no. Tell you what; you put our icon on your desktop or we won't let you have any desktops to ship."
Yes, Microsoft is once again abusing their monopolistic position.
Sure, you can legally do this, but don't expect to ever see your webcam again...
Maybe if he set up a webcam to watch the webcam watching the brick. Of course, he'd then need a webcam watching the webcam watching the webcam watching the brick...
Chris Beckenbach
Re:Make a decision, folks
on
ORBS Forks
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Censorship is either good or bad. Pick one.
Fine. Tell your church that you're going to put a copy of Hustler next to the hymn book in every pew, and if they tell you you can't you'll sue them for violating your free speech. After all, the parishoners can decide to look at them or not.
You seem to have forgotten something called property rights. The church pays for their property, they get to decide how it's used. You pay for your mailbox at the ISP, you get to decide how it's used. Spammers claim violation of free speech rights to validate their violation of property rights, ignoring the fact that nobody's preventing the spammers from getting their own property (web site) and doing whatever they want to on it. Hypocrites. Thieves. No sympathy.
The A/C can't keep up with it - it's always 80 degrees in that room...
But if the AC can't keep up, shouldn't it be a couple hundered degrees in there by now? Maybe somebody just bent the little setting prong on the thermostat or taped an icecube to it.
'Course, we had a guy who set his 21" monitor directly beneath the thermostat in his office, then always wondered why the temperature was great when he first got in in the morning but was like an icebox by the afternoon.
If you return it with a note on it "No such resident" then the post office will start returning it for you
I tried this, but our postal carrier was too dumb to read what I had written on the envelope and would re-deliver it to me half the time. After having been in my apartment for over five years, I still get more mail addressed to previous tenants than I get addressed to me, but I just trash them now. Taking the time to write on the envelopes just isn't worth it. At least at work I have a very low incidence of junk e-mail, and have just minimal filtering of addresses I have received junk from in the past.
Sorry, the article says nothing about multiple rounds, no one can be wrong and at least one person must be right.
Yes, I know that the article says nothing about rounds. It doesn't say that there are, and it doesn't say that there aren't, just that the players must guess or pass simultaneously. It also doesn't say what happens if everybody passes. I'm not saying that my solution posted above is the one that they have, however, it does have the rate of success that they cite in the article, and also has the property that if somebody guesses wrong, everybody guesses wrong at the same time, which is also mentioned in the article. Using the information that is provided in the article, this is the best match I can come up with, although it does make a rules assumption that is not clearly set down in the article.
The US plane was in distress and landed at the nearest airfield, which was the Chinese base.
This might be factually incorrect. There have been reports from Taiwan and Hong Kong that say that the decision to land in China might not have been up to the plane's crew. The Drudge Report is reporting that the South China Morning Post is reporting the following (quoting from the Drudge Report story since it is not permenant at the above URL):
The developments came as Chinese sources gave a more detailed account of the collision than that given by Zhao Yu, the second Chinese pilot.
Zhao told state-run TV that he and Wang initially tracked the EP-3 at a distance of about 400 metres in their F-8 fighters. He said the US plane veered
abruptly, the propeller on its left wing smashing into Wang's plane and causing it to plunge into the sea.
The sources said Zhao's account was incomplete. After seeing the loss of Wang's plane, Zhao radioed ground control for permission to shoot down the US plane,
but this was refused, they said.
"The officials at ground control were cool-headed," one source said. "Zhao could have shot the plane down but that would have meant the death of 24 US airmen.
It would have been an act of war, whereas the collision was an accident."
The sources said that after the collision, the spy plane attempted to fly to the northeast, away from China. However, Zhao manoeuvred to prevent this and forced
the plane to land at Hainan's Lingshui base, where it was immediately surrounded by Chinese military.
The report from Taiwan sources indicates that warning shots were fired by Zhao to encourage the US plane to turn back to China. I strongly encourage you to take this with a grain of salt, but to keep in mind that we still might not know all that there is to know about this incident.
If you only have one opportunity to pass or choose a color, I would say that there would be a problem. However, if they keep saying, "Come on, anybody have a guess?" if everybody passes (i.e. there are rounds of passing or guessing until somebody makes a guess) then it would go something like this for a group of seven:
The first round, if anybody saw six hats of a color, they would guess the other color; otherwise, they would pass. If all the hats are the same color, you lose right here, otherwise you're going to win. If there are six hats of one color and one of the other, you win right here.
The second round, everybody knows that nobody saw six hats of a color. (Ahh... but does this count as communications? Hmmm...) So, anybody who sees five hats of a given color guesses the other color, while everybody else passes. If you have five hats of one color and two of the other, the two with the other color will guess correctly, and you win.
The third round, everybody knows that nobody saw five hats of a color. Anybody who sees four hats of a given color guesses the other color. This is guaranteed to be the last round, as the three in the minority guess their hat color correctly.
Even numbers should be fun. Having four hats, two of each color, would result in winning in the second round with everybody guessing their hat color correctly.
From your vote in the Presidential election last year, you and I seem diametrically opposed politically. That said, I agree 100% with what you have posted above. (Well, okay, maybe not the assholes part; not that you said they are, just that they might be.) Well put, and Bravo!
It does not surprise me that they have ignored freedom of speech like this, and started to clamp down on those who think differently.
I am afraid that you are very mistaken on what "free speech" actually means. It does not mean without monetary cost, but unfettered. Agree with their viewpoints or not, you cannot dispute the fact that Free Republic has taken no action to prevent Aldridge from starting his own site and presenting his own views there. The only two things that Free Republic is asking for in this case is that (a) Aldridge stop posting his views at their expense and (b) Aldridge stop trying to prevent them from presenting their views at their own expense.
If Aldridge can start his own competing web site--which he can--and if he can put on it his views--which he can--then his freedom of speech has not been infringed. Free Republic set up their own web site, and tried to post their own views. Aldridge made every effort he could to stop them. Thus, Free Republic's free speech rights were violated by Aldridge.
Maybe he's talking about this story, Euro Fighting for Survival. According to the article, last night (22 March 2001) the Euro closed at 1.127 Euros per USD (88.7 cents), which is the weakest since mid-December. I will admit that this story is published by a UK paper, and that there is currently a debate in the UK about joining in on the Euro, so this whole article might just be FUD thrown in to advance a particular point of view on that debate.
Slashdot Mirror
Chris Beckenbach
However, you are now putting forward a different argument than that to which I was responding; of course my response does not fit exactly. Yes, missile defense technology does not function right now. Does that mean that we should not develop it? Many of the first rockets that NASA built in the space program were failures. After the first one failed, should we have given up on the attempt to put men on the moon? No, we took almost a decade, matured the technology, and succeeded in our goal. The same is possible with missile defense. Whether it is something we should do is another matter.
Yes, seatbelt use increase the likelyhood of surviving a crash, but it does not make it certain. Will a mature missile defense system protect us from every possible attack? No, but it will help reduce the threats and allow us to concentrate more on other vectors. If you wish to compare apples to apples, we are exactly back to what I stated in my first post.
Could the money be spent better? That's altogether another topic from what the original message was about. But if you want to figure out the costs, make sure you include in the benefits all the new technology that will be spun off by this research.
Chris Beckenbach
Creating a national missile defense system will not make us 100% safe from attack, but it will make certain forms of attack less likely. That would allow us to concentrate on methods of preventing attacks of other types, and being prepared to handle the aftermath of these other attacks.
Chris Beckenbach
The central point that makes this consistent is this simple philosophy: a person should be accountable for the results of their decisions and actions. If a person decides to go on a mass-murder spree, the well-known consequece is that society deems you too much of a danger to keep around, and you will be put to death. Does society have that right? Well, the death penalty is applied to people who apparently think that they as individuals had that right; society having that right is consistent with the criminal's world-view.
As far as abortion, there is no contraceptive method that is 100% effective other than abstinence. If a woman engages in sexual relations, then a foreseeable consequence might include pregnancy. Once a woman has made a CHOICE to engage in the risky behavior, she needs to bear the consequences of that action. (Don't get me wrong, society needs to hold the man accountable, also, even if nature doesn't.) In the cases of rape and incest, the woman did not make a free choice to engage in the activity, and so should not be bound by the consequences of it. I guess you could describe this viewpoint as pro-choice, but anti-multiple choice.
It seems to me that somebody who would support abortion on demand but be against the death penalty is essentially an anarchist: let's not hold anybody accoutable for their actions. Of course, how could they then rationally protest against the death penalty? They're then trying to hold the police, judge, jury and executioner accountable for their actions.
So all that said, how do I feel about using video facial recognition in public places to "catch criminals"? Well, have you ever been told that you look just like somebody else? Or have you caught a glance of somebody, thought they were your friend you've known since third grade, but were mistaken? Mark this: there will be a lot of innocent people hassled because they look too similar to the latest felon de jour. They will bear the consequences of actions that they had nothing to do with. It's an attempt to fix the symptoms, without treating any of the underlying causes.
Chris Beckenbach
If you're moderating this up or down because you agree or disagree with the positions stated, please review the moderation guidelines.
I live in the US in Florida, also. State law prohibits sales solicitation calls to any phone number that is on the state's "no-call" list (costs you $10 first year, $5 each additional year) OR a phone number that is unlisted or unpublished. Unpublished numbers are not in the paper directory, but can still be found through directory assistance; unlisted numbers are not even available through directory assistance.
All this info is available in the front of my white pages phone book; YMMV.
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
There definately needs to be some international agreements working out this sort of thing.
Chris Beckenbach
The above post is wholely created and housed in the United States of America (USA). By exporting the above post outside the borders of the USA the exporter agrees to indemnify and hold harmless the author from any suits arising from act of exporting or the contents of the above post, and further agrees to vigorously defend the author from and assume all liability under all suits of law that arise outside the USA from the act of exporting or the contents of the above post.
If you look at the Declaration of Independence, making past actions illegal and then punishing the colonists for them was one of the tyranies that the colonists railed against when it was done by King George. That is why they made sure to include this restriction on the laws passed by Congress.
However, if we then say that the Constitution itself is not to be interpreted strictly, but has a meaning that can change over time, then we are saying that people do not know the rules in advance; they find out that what they did was illegal when the courts "interpret" the Constitution. This smacks of the same tyranny that our founders were trying to escape.
So, if we wish to summarize, interpreting the Constitution according to its "spirit" is against the spirit of the Constitution.
Chris Beckenbach
An additional argument can be made that the founding of the country goes back to July 4, 1776 and the Declaration of Independence. Under this argument, freedom of speech would be part of the inalienable right of liberty.
<Off Topic>Personally, I think that the state Constitution ratifying committees would have been wise to demand a stricter wording of the commerce clause, also.</Off Topic>
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
You seem to have forgotten something called property rights. The church pays for their property, they get to decide how it's used. You pay for your mailbox at the ISP, you get to decide how it's used. Spammers claim violation of free speech rights to validate their violation of property rights, ignoring the fact that nobody's preventing the spammers from getting their own property (web site) and doing whatever they want to on it. Hypocrites. Thieves. No sympathy.
Chris Beckenbach
'Course, we had a guy who set his 21" monitor directly beneath the thermostat in his office, then always wondered why the temperature was great when he first got in in the morning but was like an icebox by the afternoon.
Chris Beckenbach
Chris Beckenbach
The first round, if anybody saw six hats of a color, they would guess the other color; otherwise, they would pass. If all the hats are the same color, you lose right here, otherwise you're going to win. If there are six hats of one color and one of the other, you win right here.
The second round, everybody knows that nobody saw six hats of a color. (Ahh... but does this count as communications? Hmmm...) So, anybody who sees five hats of a given color guesses the other color, while everybody else passes. If you have five hats of one color and two of the other, the two with the other color will guess correctly, and you win.
The third round, everybody knows that nobody saw five hats of a color. Anybody who sees four hats of a given color guesses the other color. This is guaranteed to be the last round, as the three in the minority guess their hat color correctly.
Even numbers should be fun. Having four hats, two of each color, would result in winning in the second round with everybody guessing their hat color correctly.
From your vote in the Presidential election last year, you and I seem diametrically opposed politically. That said, I agree 100% with what you have posted above. (Well, okay, maybe not the assholes part; not that you said they are, just that they might be.) Well put, and Bravo!
If Aldridge can start his own competing web site--which he can--and if he can put on it his views--which he can--then his freedom of speech has not been infringed. Free Republic set up their own web site, and tried to post their own views. Aldridge made every effort he could to stop them. Thus, Free Republic's free speech rights were violated by Aldridge.
Chris Beckenbach
Great. Now all we need is somebody who can explain the explanation. ;-)
Maybe he's talking about this story, Euro Fighting for Survival. According to the article, last night (22 March 2001) the Euro closed at 1.127 Euros per USD (88.7 cents), which is the weakest since mid-December. I will admit that this story is published by a UK paper, and that there is currently a debate in the UK about joining in on the Euro, so this whole article might just be FUD thrown in to advance a particular point of view on that debate.
(Sorry, just something I had to say...)