Why are we not directing our massive GNP towards scientific exploration such as studying genetic therapies to cure the rift raft of ailiments that curse mankind instead of fighting petty wars against a minor enemy "aka terrorist".
I'm not sure that the resultant caliphate ruling the US would share your research priorities either...
and you like democracy because ...?
on
Good Bad Attitude
·
· Score: 1
I think it's less sixth sense and more the fact that some people just pay attention instead of shuffling around in a fog all day looking at their feet while they stroll (or follow other lemmings) right off the proverbial cliff.
and you like democracy because...? I wish/. elitists would just attempt a coup and be done with it already;)
The problem is that the world is full of machinests and sheep. Machinests want the world to conform to plans, and sheep want someone else to handle it. Between those two large groups, it is hard to get an artistic thought in edgewise.
I continue to wonder why people like you prefer democracy at all. I suspect that you really don't...
P.S. Firefox doesn't block everything, unless you want to spend eternity editing adblock filters. It's also been the #1 most crash-prone app on my system in the last year.
Mozilla *never* crashes for me, on Windows (don't know about Linux). Maybe it's just a FireFox thing? Might want to try Mozilla itself...
It did take me a while to set up my ad filters, but now the web is a dream. On the rare occasion that I see an ad, if it bothers me (which is the point, right?) I just right click it and add a new filter. I'm pretty aggressive with my wildcards, though ("*/ads/*" is fine with me).
handling malformed data is a pretty bad idea ...
on
IE Shines On Broken Code
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
... and here's why.
With correct data (in this case, HTML), there is a specified action that is "correct". In other words, a correctly marked up table will get layed out, according to the W3C rules for laying out tables. A paragraph will get formatted as a a paragraph, etc.
With malformed markup, the "correct" thing to do is indeterminate. If every browser just takes its best guess, they will all diverge, and the behavior is wildly unpredictable. Even from version to version of the same browser, the "best guess" will change.
"So? You've just described the web!" Well, exactly, but it could have been avoided. Bad markup shouldn't render. It ain't rocket science to do (or generate, though that can be a harder problem) correct markup. If you had do it to get your pages viewed, you would. Ultimately, it wouldn't cost anymore, and would actually cost less (measure twice, cut once).
Of course, what I just wrote only really applies in a heterogenous environment... which MS doesn't want... fault tolerance in your own little fiefdom can make sense.
When your opponent's campaign manager is in charge of counting the votes, just suck it up?
In the final analysis, human beings, or the hardware and software that they build, install, operate, and maintain, will count votes. These human beings will all have political opinions (at least, if they are smart enough to be doing that counting, building, etc.).
What is needed is a critical mass of human beings who will do these things honestly, even as they watch the hated opponent's totals climbing.
Obviously you work to prevent fraud, but the basic requirement is as I stated. If you are going to challenge evry election and vote, you may as well just outsource the election to the ABA.
Sorry folks, the issues in 2000 weren't technical.
To have a democracy, you need a critical mass of basically decent people. People who are prepared to lose, if need be. People who are prepared to agree to rules before the election, and stick with them, not swirl around in post-modern uncertainty.
Absent that, forget it. Why bother? If you're going to demand a perfection that is not of this world, you will never get it. And you'll obsess about the supposed illegitimacy of your opponents when they win. And you'll work yourself into a froth and decide that anything goes to oppose them.
Forget trying to "fix" elections with technology. Just reclaim decency. Stop assuming that your opponents are three-headed monsters that eat babies for breakfast. Stop accusing everybody of cheating. Just work hard and persuade lots of people to agree with you. Win by a big enough margin that none of this crap matters. And accept that it might not work, and that you might lose.
Go check the link out - it's to wired.com - they have developed a nuclear reactor that doesn't go critical when the coolant system is switched off.
Normal (in the US, that is) pressurized water reactors don't "go critical" when the coolant system is switched off either. Bad things can certainly ensue, if all other safety systems also fail, but continued self-sustaining nuclear reaction is not one of them, because neutron moderation caused by the water is a necessary component of a sustained reaction.
Just nitpicking, of course - the main point of your argument is absolutely correct.
The war on terror is working because the majority of McWalmart Americans are convinced that them dirty a-rabs are just tootin' to bring their hoity toity core-anne over here and shove it down our capitalist lovin', god-fearin' country's throat.
I'm curious why folks like you even bother with democracy. Why not just stage a coup with some of your "superior" buddies, if you think that the "masses" are so ignorant and unteachable?
I love how the people who are the most loyal to "God" are also the ones who create the most pain in this world, actually their loyality has nothing to do with God and everything to do with their "religion" and let me tell you there is a major difference between being loyal to God and to a religion...
That's the passe, popular, pop culture opinion, yes. How rebellious and daring of you to restate it.
So, you think nothing should be done when we are attacked. Because of your deep faith (which comes through so clearly in your comment) and turning the other cheek, of course.
And you think that the weakest, most vulnerable humans should not be protected, apparently.
Abstinence only education has only served to increase teen pregnancy and STD infection, because they are not being made aware of any alternatives. Kids are going to have sex. If you can't accept that fact, and think you can "educate" them into not having sex, you're foolish.
A little history - sex ed in schools was first sold in the 60's, when there were teen pregnancy rates and vd rates that we would kill for now. The very things it was supposedly going to help with rose in tandem with the growth of sex ed. And it was definitely not "abstinence based" sex ed.
Only in the last few years has there been any effort to even try abstinence based sex ed. I don't agree with the president that doubling expenditures on a different style of sex ed is the solution, but it's kind of funny how you see the problem only with the new flavor of sex ed.
Kids are going to have sex. If you can't accept that fact, and think you can "educate" them into not having sex, you're foolish.
This is exactly the hoary old argument used to sell the original, non-abstinence based sex ed. Which turned out to be spectacularly wrong.
They also must not have their top people working on this - at least for the Bush campaign. I did a search for some of the words used in his responses here (like "quell"), and found that Bush himself never uses them in any of his accessable online speeches. That's not a mistake a seasoned campaign speech writer would make.
You are unaware that language used in writing differs from language used in speech?
I guess there are some children being "left behind"...;)
Touché, but I would rather the masses be somewhat informed with some non-arbitrary and non-biased (eg, if one side has 10 minutes, then so does the other side) system to control it. A pipe dream I know, but something to strive for and I believe better than nothing.
I think that the networks used to try to create an appearance of this non-arbitrary and non-biased environment (as it's old scions like Dan Rather still pretend). I'm undecided on whether this was better or worse than what we have now;)
When the constitution was framed, most news was word of mouth, candidates actually debated *each other*
True...
and there was no TV spreading any message that anyone with money wants to the vegetative masses.
If you think that the "masses" are "vegetative", it's not clear why you want democracy at all! And how can you trust the political class to regulate what the "masses" can hear? Won't they just try to manipulate for their own interests?
With out some form of regulation we would end up with the people with the deepest pockets being the people that completely control what the general population knows
This is gonna be the third time in this story that I type the words "President Forbes". Apparently, McCain-Feingold was not necessary to protect us from his riches...;)
I'm embarassed that our politicians and political organizations are so willing to follow the letter rather than the spirit of the law. And I'm sure we'll see many more laws trying to reign in abusers. And we are just as likely to see a lot of new creativity to skirt the laws that are implimented.
What's embarassing is that they need to jump through such hoops. As I pointed out in another comment, we don't have President Steve Forbes. Unless you enact very comprehensive, draconian rules, people will try to get around them.
And they should! Why should I, and others who agree with me, not be able to pool our money and buy an ad? Even if it is within 30 days of the election and says something that the political class doesn't like?
Are you saying that if bill gates wanted to spend $500,000,000.00 in advertising on google, amazon, ebay, msn, slashdot, etc., that you'd be able to match him to express _your_ opinion?
So, why didn't we have President Forbes? If money can buy an election that way, why did it not happen? Remember, he ran before McCain-Feingold.
This has entirly to do with campaign finance, and whether Internet ads are included (or excluded) from campaign finance. It has nothing to do with free speech.
"Campaign finance" is a proxy for regulating speech. It's what the political class is using to stifle criticism. There are jail terms associated with broadcasting a political message that regulators do not approve of, now. The framers must be turning over in their graves.
This is the very speech that the 1st amendment was designed to protect. Not nude dancing, not obscenity, not flag burning, but political speech is what they were trying to protect. How can the 1st amendment be so expansive as to include those other things, but not the intended object of protection?
I'm a Technical Writer (well, in theory; about 60% of the time I'm a web developer) and I love OpenOffice.org.
It simply does everything that I need it to do. It does it well. Compared to Word, it has rock-solid stability (I know, some standard...). It has some very useful and obvious features built in, like direct export to PDF (and for presentations, direct export to Flash).
The compatibility issue is largely a red herring. First, a Word file is basically a memory dump of Word. It's amazing that anything can read it or convert it at all. If an organization chooses to use OpenOffice, then obviously passing files around internally presents no compatibility problem. I suspect that very few organizations really need to pass around source files to and from the outside, and those that do could keep a copy of Word on hand for just those occasions.
Having said that, reading my own text I see that I exaggerated the compatibility issue. For most documents there simply isn't one.
I'm not blind to the fact that some places have huge heaps of custom VBA code. Heck, I have some pretty fancy macros myself. But in X-thousand seat organizations, how many really use those apps? And if the number is high, wouldn't a web app make more sense? The decision is individual, but I have a feeling that it's not often made rationally.
Apparently, one or two of us were somehow so behind the times as to need to click the link... gee, I feel so "yesterday";) How could I not have heard of this wonder?
Would you care to elucidate on that and please explain how voting against the Cuban travel ban can be construed as "voting against the citizens of the 8th district" as the website claims? What, if any, is their connection with Cuba? Are they all Fidel's devil-spawn making it a top priority to keep them off the island so they can't achieve critical commie mass?
Presumably he thinks that the travel ban makes sense, and is in the interest of Americans (clearly you disagree, but so be it). Citizens of the 8th district are also Americans. I wouldn't have worded things quite that way, but I don't think it's completely illogical on the face of it.
If you're just complaining about the travel ban itself, or ascribing absurd motives to those who advocate leaving it in place, then see my remark about you disagreeing with his political positions.:)
Republican logic: A vote by Van Hollen against the Cuban travel ban is seen as a "vote against the citizens of the 8th District". Not to mention his votes against banning human cloning and claimed support for gay marriage. I think I speak for all thinking people when I say "WTF?". Are all citizens of the 8th district clone-hating, anti-gay and vehemently against anyone ever going to Cuba?
So basically, you disagree with his political positions. And imagine that all "thinking" people do the same.
Are they afraid they might succumd to the lure of Fidel unless there's a ban on travel there? "Gee, Martha, I was this close to going to Cuba today, but thanks to God and the republicans, I was turned away at the airport. Just imagine, I might have seen gay clones going on a wild rampage of the streets of Havana. The horror!"
Yes, I'm sure that's exactly the reason for a travel ban. I see now why you were reated "Insightful" for this penetrating insight.
Someone will be along soon to tell us that this is all part of a natural progression and we have nothing to worry about and to all go back to driving 5.0 SUVs as we can't hope to understand the climate and so figures are irrelevant and its not are fault etc etc etc. I wonder how many of these people STILL have their heads in the sand after this?
It just makes you feel *so* smart and superior to type that, doesn't it?
Hate to penetrate your smugness, but we still don't understand the dynamic systems of climate. And unless you were typing that on some sort of birch bark, nuclear powered computer (hey, no CO2!) you might want to tone down the superiority complex.
Do you have any ideas, other than lousy, inequitable treaties, or full-of-it smugness?
> How much more evidence do we need before >we start to do something about this problem?
What exactly do you propose to do?
>If any of the governments of the world were >thinking ahead though they would start investing >very heavily in alternative power generation >technology.
It's spelled "nuclear". You guys made it too expensive (then, disgustingly, said "look how expensive it is! We can't use this!").
>The country that owns the technology to >generate clean power will be in a very strong >position.
Slashdot Mirror
Why are we not directing our massive GNP towards scientific exploration such as studying genetic therapies to cure the rift raft of ailiments that curse mankind instead of fighting petty wars against a minor enemy "aka terrorist".
I'm not sure that the resultant caliphate ruling the US would share your research priorities either ...
I think it's less sixth sense and more the fact that some people just pay attention instead of shuffling around in a fog all day looking at their feet while they stroll (or follow other lemmings) right off the proverbial cliff.
and you like democracy because ...? I wish /. elitists would just attempt a coup and be done with it already ;)
The problem is that the world is full of machinests and sheep. Machinests want the world to conform to plans, and sheep want someone else to handle it. Between those two large groups, it is hard to get an artistic thought in edgewise.
I continue to wonder why people like you prefer democracy at all. I suspect that you really don't ...
P.S. Firefox doesn't block everything, unless you want to spend eternity editing adblock filters. It's also been the #1 most crash-prone app on my system in the last year.
Mozilla *never* crashes for me, on Windows (don't know about Linux). Maybe it's just a FireFox thing? Might want to try Mozilla itself ...
It did take me a while to set up my ad filters, but now the web is a dream. On the rare occasion that I see an ad, if it bothers me (which is the point, right?) I just right click it and add a new filter. I'm pretty aggressive with my wildcards, though ("*/ads/*" is fine with me).
... and here's why.
With correct data (in this case, HTML), there is a specified action that is "correct". In other words, a correctly marked up table will get layed out, according to the W3C rules for laying out tables. A paragraph will get formatted as a a paragraph, etc.
With malformed markup, the "correct" thing to do is indeterminate. If every browser just takes its best guess, they will all diverge, and the behavior is wildly unpredictable. Even from version to version of the same browser, the "best guess" will change.
"So? You've just described the web!" Well, exactly, but it could have been avoided. Bad markup shouldn't render. It ain't rocket science to do (or generate, though that can be a harder problem) correct markup. If you had do it to get your pages viewed, you would. Ultimately, it wouldn't cost anymore, and would actually cost less (measure twice, cut once).
Of course, what I just wrote only really applies in a heterogenous environment ... which MS doesn't want ... fault tolerance in your own little fiefdom can make sense.
When your opponent's campaign manager is in charge of counting the votes, just suck it up?
In the final analysis, human beings, or the hardware and software that they build, install, operate, and maintain, will count votes. These human beings will all have political opinions (at least, if they are smart enough to be doing that counting, building, etc.).
What is needed is a critical mass of human beings who will do these things honestly, even as they watch the hated opponent's totals climbing.
Obviously you work to prevent fraud, but the basic requirement is as I stated. If you are going to challenge evry election and vote, you may as well just outsource the election to the ABA.
Sorry folks, the issues in 2000 weren't technical.
To have a democracy, you need a critical mass of basically decent people. People who are prepared to lose, if need be. People who are prepared to agree to rules before the election, and stick with them, not swirl around in post-modern uncertainty.
Absent that, forget it. Why bother? If you're going to demand a perfection that is not of this world, you will never get it. And you'll obsess about the supposed illegitimacy of your opponents when they win. And you'll work yourself into a froth and decide that anything goes to oppose them.
Forget trying to "fix" elections with technology. Just reclaim decency. Stop assuming that your opponents are three-headed monsters that eat babies for breakfast. Stop accusing everybody of cheating. Just work hard and persuade lots of people to agree with you. Win by a big enough margin that none of this crap matters. And accept that it might not work, and that you might lose.
I think you meant, finally an app, period, for the blasted thing ...
Go check the link out - it's to wired.com - they have developed a nuclear reactor that doesn't go critical when the coolant system is switched off.
Normal (in the US, that is) pressurized water reactors don't "go critical" when the coolant system is switched off either. Bad things can certainly ensue, if all other safety systems also fail, but continued self-sustaining nuclear reaction is not one of them, because neutron moderation caused by the water is a necessary component of a sustained reaction.
Just nitpicking, of course - the main point of your argument is absolutely correct.
I keep "proposing" zero emmisions plants all the time, but as soon as I type the word "nuclear" around here, everyone gets all squirrly ...
The war on terror is working because the majority of McWalmart Americans are convinced that them dirty a-rabs are just tootin' to bring their hoity toity core-anne over here and shove it down our capitalist lovin', god-fearin' country's throat.
I'm curious why folks like you even bother with democracy. Why not just stage a coup with some of your "superior" buddies, if you think that the "masses" are so ignorant and unteachable?
I love how the people who are the most loyal to "God" are also the ones who create the most pain in this world, actually their loyality has nothing to do with God and everything to do with their "religion" and let me tell you there is a major difference between being loyal to God and to a religion...
That's the passe, popular, pop culture opinion, yes. How rebellious and daring of you to restate it.
So, you think nothing should be done when we are attacked. Because of your deep faith (which comes through so clearly in your comment) and turning the other cheek, of course.
And you think that the weakest, most vulnerable humans should not be protected, apparently.
Abstinence only education has only served to increase teen pregnancy and STD infection, because they are not being made aware of any alternatives. Kids are going to have sex. If you can't accept that fact, and think you can "educate" them into not having sex, you're foolish.
A little history - sex ed in schools was first sold in the 60's, when there were teen pregnancy rates and vd rates that we would kill for now. The very things it was supposedly going to help with rose in tandem with the growth of sex ed. And it was definitely not "abstinence based" sex ed.
Only in the last few years has there been any effort to even try abstinence based sex ed. I don't agree with the president that doubling expenditures on a different style of sex ed is the solution, but it's kind of funny how you see the problem only with the new flavor of sex ed.
Kids are going to have sex. If you can't accept that fact, and think you can "educate" them into not having sex, you're foolish.
This is exactly the hoary old argument used to sell the original, non-abstinence based sex ed. Which turned out to be spectacularly wrong.
They also must not have their top people working on this - at least for the Bush campaign. I did a search for some of the words used in his responses here (like "quell"), and found that Bush himself never uses them in any of his accessable online speeches. That's not a mistake a seasoned campaign speech writer would make.
You are unaware that language used in writing differs from language used in speech?
I guess there are some children being "left behind" ... ;)
Touché, but I would rather the masses be somewhat informed with some non-arbitrary and non-biased (eg, if one side has 10 minutes, then so does the other side) system to control it. A pipe dream I know, but something to strive for and I believe better than nothing.
I think that the networks used to try to create an appearance of this non-arbitrary and non-biased environment (as it's old scions like Dan Rather still pretend). I'm undecided on whether this was better or worse than what we have now ;)
When the constitution was framed, most news was word of mouth, candidates actually debated *each other*
True ...
and there was no TV spreading any message that anyone with money wants to the vegetative masses.
If you think that the "masses" are "vegetative", it's not clear why you want democracy at all! And how can you trust the political class to regulate what the "masses" can hear? Won't they just try to manipulate for their own interests?
With out some form of regulation we would end up with the people with the deepest pockets being the people that completely control what the general population knows
This is gonna be the third time in this story that I type the words "President Forbes". Apparently, McCain-Feingold was not necessary to protect us from his riches ... ;)
I'm embarassed that our politicians and political organizations are so willing to follow the letter rather than the spirit of the law. And I'm sure we'll see many more laws trying to reign in abusers. And we are just as likely to see a lot of new creativity to skirt the laws that are implimented.
What's embarassing is that they need to jump through such hoops. As I pointed out in another comment, we don't have President Steve Forbes. Unless you enact very comprehensive, draconian rules, people will try to get around them.
And they should! Why should I, and others who agree with me, not be able to pool our money and buy an ad? Even if it is within 30 days of the election and says something that the political class doesn't like?
Are you saying that if bill gates wanted to spend $500,000,000.00 in advertising on google, amazon, ebay, msn, slashdot, etc., that you'd be able to match him to express _your_ opinion?
So, why didn't we have President Forbes? If money can buy an election that way, why did it not happen? Remember, he ran before McCain-Feingold.
This has entirly to do with campaign finance, and whether Internet ads are included (or excluded) from campaign finance. It has nothing to do with free speech.
"Campaign finance" is a proxy for regulating speech. It's what the political class is using to stifle criticism. There are jail terms associated with broadcasting a political message that regulators do not approve of, now. The framers must be turning over in their graves.
This is the very speech that the 1st amendment was designed to protect. Not nude dancing, not obscenity, not flag burning, but political speech is what they were trying to protect. How can the 1st amendment be so expansive as to include those other things, but not the intended object of protection?
I'm a Technical Writer (well, in theory; about 60% of the time I'm a web developer) and I love OpenOffice.org.
It simply does everything that I need it to do. It does it well. Compared to Word, it has rock-solid stability (I know, some standard ...). It has some very useful and obvious features built in, like direct export to PDF (and for presentations, direct export to Flash).
The compatibility issue is largely a red herring. First, a Word file is basically a memory dump of Word. It's amazing that anything can read it or convert it at all. If an organization chooses to use OpenOffice, then obviously passing files around internally presents no compatibility problem. I suspect that very few organizations really need to pass around source files to and from the outside, and those that do could keep a copy of Word on hand for just those occasions.
Having said that, reading my own text I see that I exaggerated the compatibility issue. For most documents there simply isn't one.
I'm not blind to the fact that some places have huge heaps of custom VBA code. Heck, I have some pretty fancy macros myself. But in X-thousand seat organizations, how many really use those apps? And if the number is high, wouldn't a web app make more sense? The decision is individual, but I have a feeling that it's not often made rationally.
Check this link if you're still not sure what the OQO is."
Apparently, one or two of us were somehow so behind the times as to need to click the link ... gee, I feel so "yesterday" ;) How could I not have heard of this wonder?
Would you care to elucidate on that and please explain how voting against the Cuban travel ban can be construed as "voting against the citizens of the 8th district" as the website claims? What, if any, is their connection with Cuba? Are they all Fidel's devil-spawn making it a top priority to keep them off the island so they can't achieve critical commie mass?
Presumably he thinks that the travel ban makes sense, and is in the interest of Americans (clearly you disagree, but so be it). Citizens of the 8th district are also Americans. I wouldn't have worded things quite that way, but I don't think it's completely illogical on the face of it.
If you're just complaining about the travel ban itself, or ascribing absurd motives to those who advocate leaving it in place, then see my remark about you disagreeing with his political positions. :)
Republican logic: A vote by Van Hollen against the Cuban travel ban is seen as a "vote against the citizens of the 8th District". Not to mention his votes against banning human cloning and claimed support for gay marriage. I think I speak for all thinking people when I say "WTF?". Are all citizens of the 8th district clone-hating, anti-gay and vehemently against anyone ever going to Cuba?
So basically, you disagree with his political positions. And imagine that all "thinking" people do the same.
Are they afraid they might succumd to the lure of Fidel unless there's a ban on travel there? "Gee, Martha, I was this close to going to Cuba today, but thanks to God and the republicans, I was turned away at the airport. Just imagine, I might have seen gay clones going on a wild rampage of the streets of Havana. The horror!"
Yes, I'm sure that's exactly the reason for a travel ban. I see now why you were reated "Insightful" for this penetrating insight.
Someone will be along soon to tell us that this is all part of a natural progression and we have nothing to worry about and to all go back to driving 5.0 SUVs as we can't hope to understand the climate and so figures are irrelevant and its not are fault etc etc etc. I wonder how many of these people STILL have their heads in the sand after this?
It just makes you feel *so* smart and superior to type that, doesn't it?
Hate to penetrate your smugness, but we still don't understand the dynamic systems of climate. And unless you were typing that on some sort of birch bark, nuclear powered computer (hey, no CO2!) you might want to tone down the superiority complex.
Do you have any ideas, other than lousy, inequitable treaties, or full-of-it smugness?
> How much more evidence do we need before
;)
>we start to do something about this problem?
What exactly do you propose to do?
>If any of the governments of the world were
>thinking ahead though they would start investing
>very heavily in alternative power generation
>technology.
It's spelled "nuclear". You guys made it too
expensive (then, disgustingly, said "look how
expensive it is! We can't use this!").
>The country that owns the technology to
>generate clean power will be in a very strong
>position.
Ironically, this could France