An interesting proposal. The real adventure would be getting from the southernmost tip of South America to the first bit of ice shelf. Paddlebike? Or scuba tank?
You're right, on some strong points that I can see. Trust matters, and a piece of paper can be a shortcut to trust. And, as you mention towards the end, that shortcut in itself can be dangerous.
As for certification of doctors: As I mentioned in another post, and as others have mentioned, there's a very important difference between doctors and PC Fixit Experts. Hopefully, your life isn't ever going to be in the hands of a PC Fixit Expert.
Also: The law doesn't prevent me from going to any witch-doctor I choose when I'm healthy, but if I'm in a life-threatening situation, I'm going to be sent to an emergency room in a hospital. That hospital may have the right to hire blood-letters and witch-doctors, but they're not going to, not just because the Law says so, but also because the hospital has a reputation (and insurance) to maintain.
Trouble comes two ways. One, when people take having the piece of paper as being a full substitute for trust. That's when you have people falling to crooked lawyers, auto mechanics, and yes, doctors. (Once knew someone whose dentist had put fillings in every tooth and charged her for it.)
Two, when a paper is expensive, and because of peoples' misdirected trust (as mentioned above) it becomes a burdensome barrier to entry.
Wandering off-topic for two points: Number one, my personal gruff with the McCain Campaign Finance Reform Act as written is that it does potentially restrict the time-periods in which entertainers and political pundits can speak on political issues: A potential violation of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. The number one way people get information these days is through entertainment, so if we want a generally informed society, this is bad. True campaign reform would be good. But just because you call it campaign finance reform doesn't mean it isn't aimed at continuing the protection of incumbents.
And finally, a flaimbaitish stab that I just can't resist, so I'm going to remove my +1 bonus: Which friends of which President are you talking about not getting prosecuted? Mr. McAuliffe, who made that questionable killing out of Global Crossing, perhaps?;-) In any case, for those who have lost money, it is because they made bad decisions, nothing more, nothing less. There's no good in buying high and selling low. I bought when it dipped, and my net worth is already starting to rise.
the part-time reference above kinda bothers me. would you (if you could) call a someone to do extermination if they were an accountant by day and just spayed poison on the weekends?
Of course not. But then, my roommate is getting his degree in Computer Engineering. His specialty is related to what he does to pay his bills now. But what he does to pay his bills now is not what he wants to do forever. And if his experience and an hour of his time is worth $100 to someone who was referred to him through friends or relatives, and he always does a top-notch job and guarantees his work personally, it shouldn't be a crime for him to exploit his own talents for profit. It is his right to do so.
Plus, as others have mentioned, there's a personal health/safety/real-estate-value associated with plumbing, electrical work, and poison-spraying that isn't associated with putting together a computer to browse the web and do e-mail at home.
As far as the average buyer having enough knowledge to beware: As I posted parallel to this, Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement. I'm careful to make good decisions now about certain things that I know I made bad decisions about in the past. When life or health is not a factor, you can sometimes do people a disservice by trying too hard to protect them from the consequences of their own actions.
I do a fair share of cleaning up after fly-by-night companies/consultants/johnny's-14-year-old nephew-that-really-knows-computers. It costs a lot of the local businesses serious money to replace lost data and sub-standard equipment.
So why are you complaining? The fact that you're trusted to clean up these mistakes shows that you evidently have the experience/credentials/word-of-mouth-reputation that these fly-by-nighters, consultants, and nephews lack. On your part, you'd make less money if it weren't for two things:
1) Some of your customers were at one point careless with their money.
2) You have something better to offer than their previous servicefolks. Something that allows you to charge more, and forces them to either discount or get Darwinized out of business.
And on the part of your clients, they gain the benefit of wisdom (good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from bad judgement). Plus, it is worth the money they pay you to have you around to clean up their mistakes.
1) How and at what level would it be implemented and enforced?
Constitutionally, the Federal Government has the authority to regulate interstate commerce, and other transactions are left to state and local governments, and to individual citizens. That's the model followed in regulating most industries: Licensing of Professional Engineers is done by each state, and it just happens for convenience that all states have chosen to recognize the standards set forth by the non-governmental American Board of Engineering and Technology. Licensing of local businesses is generally done by county or city agencies.
2) What kind of regulation would you like to see, if any?
As inclined towards libertarianism as I am, I'd tend to say as little as possible. It's a 'buyer beware' world, and if someone other than me is working on my home computer, I'm going to make sure they have a good reputation, even if they are still working their way through college, as my roommate is.
Now, if the people in your community overwhelmingly want some sort of government-imposed consumer protection in this regard, that's up to you. Get your city council or county commissioners to deal with it. But I don't want it imposed on me.
3) Would you view regulation or mandatory certification as a good thing in the computer repair/installation/maintenance world?
Not if it prevents people from entering freely into business deals of their own choosing. As I mentioned above, my roommate uses his computer-building and computer-fixing skills to help pay for college, but it's not something he plans on doing for his life once he graduates. He's damned good at building and fixing computers, and he could pass any certification test you could throw at him, and there are plenty of people who would be willing to vouch for him on personal experience with his work. But would it be worth the money a government or private accrediting agency would undoubtedly charge if it's not something he plans to use for more than a few years? Not likely.
There's your problem! Your investment hasn't reached maturity yet! Kids are proven to be a net loss investment over 10- or 20-year periods. If your investment is self-sustaining in less than 25 years, you're doing good. By the time this investment reaches the 40- or 50-year mark, and you're ready to retire, it should be able to support you comfortably.;-)
Its too bad there isn't the level of unionization in the IT industry as there is in other trades and professions.
Be careful what you wish for. Not all unions are created equal. I've walked the Grocery Clerk path in high school, the Engineering School path in college, and the Stage Actor path as a hobby, and from what I've seen, profession-related organizations can fall generally into three categories.
First, there's the 'collective bargaining' unions, the Tradesters, the Food Workers, the Airline Pilots, and so on, where you join, pay some dues (which often as not end up in a politician's pocket), and theoretically get some benefit with regards to employer relations. In my state, no union can push an employer to sign a contract locking non-union employees out of work, but that varies from state to state. I've seen more harm from these unions than good: For example, United Airlines has very recently been screwed over by their Pilot's union deciding that they'd rather drive the company into bankrupcy than accept cost-cutting measures. The problem is that these groups, more often than not, work only by threatening the employer with strike-threats. They offer the employer nothing but what the employer had before the union existed: workers.
Then, there's Professional Trade Organizations. I'm thinking here of groups like IEEE. They provide nothing with regards to employer relations, but if your potential boss see's that you're in IEEE, that's a point in your book. They define profession-related standards and provide continuing education, certification, seminars, and other things that are of importance to Professional Engineers. And the types of people who join this type of professional organization are generally people who see no personal benefit to unionization.
The stage actors I know of have a very different situation. The Stage Actors' Unions are really organizations that I would consider to be 'Professional Guilds', to use a very old term. And these organizations provide services that are useful to both employers and employees. Union members are eligable for things like credit union membership and health insurance through the union, services that most people get through their employer, but since stage actors are employed seasonally, it's not so easy for them. The Guilds not only provide continuing theatrical education, but require that members must fulfill a certain requirement for taking part in it. And, yes, they require that employers meet certain contractual obligations to employ union-qualified actors, but then, the employer gets the benefit of knowing that their employees had to reach a certain level of competence just to join the union.
Re:Examine your assumptions
on
E ~ mc^2
·
· Score: 2
As you say, everything can be broken down into causes and effects, and effects themselves become causes. This does lead us into a sort of chicken-and-egg question with the universe: Was there ever a first cause which was not itself the effect of something else?
I would say, yes. How do we know? Because we are here. We exist. And for things to exist, they had to begin existing at some point.
Beginnings and endings are not all imposed by our minds. That I first breathed air at a certain point in time measurable as the equivalent of just over twenty-five orbits of the Earth about the sun is fact, not opinion. The end of the Roman Empire centuries ago was a fact, not a point of view. We can't point at the exact time and place, but we do know that there was a first culture ever to use writing, or currency, or the wheel, or even fire.
I can only rationalize one temporal view of the universe in which there is no such thing as an independent cause, and that would be an infinite loop of the universe going through the same motions of creation and destruction... which still begs the eternal question, how did that loop get there?
Your assertion is that the universe is causes 'all the way back' to infinity. I can't help but think of the old woman in the science lecture who believed that the world was flat, on the back of a tortoise. When asked what the tortoise stood on, her reply was, "You can't fool me, it's tortoises all the way down."
Pure frustration wouldn't do it. I've been frustrated to the end of my wits and back again. We've all been.
The thing is, a segment of the Arabic Muslim population in the Middle East has been indoctrinated into believing that the cause of their frustrations is not their leaders (who are more often than not monarchs, mullahs, and dictators), but Israel (a modern nation with an elected government) and the United States (which is halfway around the world, and spends more of its GNP on charity and aid than almost any other nation around). And they've been taught two other things: One, that the afterlife has no frustrations, and two, that the more 'infidels' you kill on your way to the afterlife, the nicer it is.
I know that's not an accurate representation of Islam as a whole, but I believe it is an accurate representation of that segment of the Islamic population that breeds suicide bombers and worse.
We know why they're out to kill and terrorize. They've told us, many times. They tell us every time Hamas or Islamic Jihad takes credit for another slaughtering of civilians in Israel.
Or haven't you been listening?
In this case, the root of their frustration is a condition of life imposed upon them by their own 'leaders', and those very same 'leaders' avoid ousting by turning around and telling their people that it's our fault. And you're right, it is a problem that's going to go on until that root is addressed.
So, how do you suggest 'addressing' the oppression of a people that have been taught to hate us by their oppressors?
"Whoa. Deja vu." "What?" "I saw a mispelling go by, then I saw another one, just like it." "How much like it? Was it the same mispelling?" "I dunno, might've been."
Thanks for the clarification... but now I've got this weird mental image of the doctor removing the patient's liver and sticking it in a microwave, one with the rotating plate to make sure it's 'evenly done all the way around'.
Three for the executives, with their heads in the sky, Seven for the managers, with skulls of stone, Nine for the programmers, who need to die(t), One for the Sysadmin on his dark throne.
One Ring with Root to all, one Ring to scoff them, one Ring to bring them all, and in their cubicles BOFH them.
Hear, hear. It's a story, and a good one. And I don't think everything must be "forward-thinking" to have value.
I vaguely remember a C.S. Lewis quote on the issue of whether or not to raise children on fairy tales and fiction. At the time, it was considered "forward-thinking" to raise children on reality rather than fantasy. (Still is, for some parents.)
I can't find the exact words right now, but in effect, he said that he would rather a child hearing a mysterious bump in the night think of a monster under the bed than a burglar. And yes, there are witches and monsters to frighten, but there are also heroes and knights to look up to, with timeless values such as courage and honesty.
In another much more recent bit of creative fantasy, one main character points out that humans need the little stories and lies in childhood as practice. Practice for believing in the big, important things. Things like Honor and Justice.
Slashdot Mirror
An interesting proposal. The real adventure would be getting from the southernmost tip of South America to the first bit of ice shelf. Paddlebike? Or scuba tank?
Don't give me none of this "nature theme" business
I dunno, hell frozen over might make an interesting "nature" photograph, maybe for a motivation (or de-motivation) poster....
truth is not a defense if a statement's context is deemed misleading
My strict translation of this phrase: Even if what you said was the strict, factual truth, if anyone thinks you were lying, you've broken the law.
Heaven save us from fools with lawyers.
You're right, on some strong points that I can see. Trust matters, and a piece of paper can be a shortcut to trust. And, as you mention towards the end, that shortcut in itself can be dangerous.
;-) In any case, for those who have lost money, it is because they made bad decisions, nothing more, nothing less. There's no good in buying high and selling low. I bought when it dipped, and my net worth is already starting to rise.
As for certification of doctors: As I mentioned in another post, and as others have mentioned, there's a very important difference between doctors and PC Fixit Experts. Hopefully, your life isn't ever going to be in the hands of a PC Fixit Expert.
Also: The law doesn't prevent me from going to any witch-doctor I choose when I'm healthy, but if I'm in a life-threatening situation, I'm going to be sent to an emergency room in a hospital. That hospital may have the right to hire blood-letters and witch-doctors, but they're not going to, not just because the Law says so, but also because the hospital has a reputation (and insurance) to maintain.
Trouble comes two ways. One, when people take having the piece of paper as being a full substitute for trust. That's when you have people falling to crooked lawyers, auto mechanics, and yes, doctors. (Once knew someone whose dentist had put fillings in every tooth and charged her for it.)
Two, when a paper is expensive, and because of peoples' misdirected trust (as mentioned above) it becomes a burdensome barrier to entry.
Wandering off-topic for two points: Number one, my personal gruff with the McCain Campaign Finance Reform Act as written is that it does potentially restrict the time-periods in which entertainers and political pundits can speak on political issues: A potential violation of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. The number one way people get information these days is through entertainment, so if we want a generally informed society, this is bad. True campaign reform would be good. But just because you call it campaign finance reform doesn't mean it isn't aimed at continuing the protection of incumbents.
And finally, a flaimbaitish stab that I just can't resist, so I'm going to remove my +1 bonus: Which friends of which President are you talking about not getting prosecuted? Mr. McAuliffe, who made that questionable killing out of Global Crossing, perhaps?
the part-time reference above kinda bothers me. would you (if you could) call a someone to do extermination if they were an accountant by day and just spayed poison on the weekends?
Of course not. But then, my roommate is getting his degree in Computer Engineering. His specialty is related to what he does to pay his bills now. But what he does to pay his bills now is not what he wants to do forever. And if his experience and an hour of his time is worth $100 to someone who was referred to him through friends or relatives, and he always does a top-notch job and guarantees his work personally, it shouldn't be a crime for him to exploit his own talents for profit. It is his right to do so.
Plus, as others have mentioned, there's a personal health/safety/real-estate-value associated with plumbing, electrical work, and poison-spraying that isn't associated with putting together a computer to browse the web and do e-mail at home.
As far as the average buyer having enough knowledge to beware: As I posted parallel to this, Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement. I'm careful to make good decisions now about certain things that I know I made bad decisions about in the past. When life or health is not a factor, you can sometimes do people a disservice by trying too hard to protect them from the consequences of their own actions.
I do a fair share of cleaning up after fly-by-night companies/consultants/johnny's-14-year-old nephew-that-really-knows-computers. It costs a lot of the local businesses serious money to replace lost data and sub-standard equipment.
So why are you complaining? The fact that you're trusted to clean up these mistakes shows that you evidently have the experience/credentials/word-of-mouth-reputation that these fly-by-nighters, consultants, and nephews lack. On your part, you'd make less money if it weren't for two things:
1) Some of your customers were at one point careless with their money.
2) You have something better to offer than their previous servicefolks. Something that allows you to charge more, and forces them to either discount or get Darwinized out of business.
And on the part of your clients, they gain the benefit of wisdom (good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from bad judgement). Plus, it is worth the money they pay you to have you around to clean up their mistakes.
1) How and at what level would it be implemented and enforced?
Constitutionally, the Federal Government has the authority to regulate interstate commerce, and other transactions are left to state and local governments, and to individual citizens. That's the model followed in regulating most industries: Licensing of Professional Engineers is done by each state, and it just happens for convenience that all states have chosen to recognize the standards set forth by the non-governmental American Board of Engineering and Technology. Licensing of local businesses is generally done by county or city agencies.
2) What kind of regulation would you like to see, if any?
As inclined towards libertarianism as I am, I'd tend to say as little as possible. It's a 'buyer beware' world, and if someone other than me is working on my home computer, I'm going to make sure they have a good reputation, even if they are still working their way through college, as my roommate is.
Now, if the people in your community overwhelmingly want some sort of government-imposed consumer protection in this regard, that's up to you. Get your city council or county commissioners to deal with it. But I don't want it imposed on me.
3) Would you view regulation or mandatory certification as a good thing in the computer repair/installation/maintenance world?
Not if it prevents people from entering freely into business deals of their own choosing. As I mentioned above, my roommate uses his computer-building and computer-fixing skills to help pay for college, but it's not something he plans on doing for his life once he graduates. He's damned good at building and fixing computers, and he could pass any certification test you could throw at him, and there are plenty of people who would be willing to vouch for him on personal experience with his work. But would it be worth the money a government or private accrediting agency would undoubtedly charge if it's not something he plans to use for more than a few years? Not likely.
for the past 10 years
;-)
There's your problem! Your investment hasn't reached maturity yet! Kids are proven to be a net loss investment over 10- or 20-year periods. If your investment is self-sustaining in less than 25 years, you're doing good. By the time this investment reaches the 40- or 50-year mark, and you're ready to retire, it should be able to support you comfortably.
Please, -please- don't turn this into a "Soviet Russia" joke....
Its too bad there isn't the level of unionization in the IT industry as there is in other trades and professions.
Be careful what you wish for. Not all unions are created equal. I've walked the Grocery Clerk path in high school, the Engineering School path in college, and the Stage Actor path as a hobby, and from what I've seen, profession-related organizations can fall generally into three categories.
First, there's the 'collective bargaining' unions, the Tradesters, the Food Workers, the Airline Pilots, and so on, where you join, pay some dues (which often as not end up in a politician's pocket), and theoretically get some benefit with regards to employer relations. In my state, no union can push an employer to sign a contract locking non-union employees out of work, but that varies from state to state. I've seen more harm from these unions than good: For example, United Airlines has very recently been screwed over by their Pilot's union deciding that they'd rather drive the company into bankrupcy than accept cost-cutting measures. The problem is that these groups, more often than not, work only by threatening the employer with strike-threats. They offer the employer nothing but what the employer had before the union existed: workers.
Then, there's Professional Trade Organizations. I'm thinking here of groups like IEEE. They provide nothing with regards to employer relations, but if your potential boss see's that you're in IEEE, that's a point in your book. They define profession-related standards and provide continuing education, certification, seminars, and other things that are of importance to Professional Engineers. And the types of people who join this type of professional organization are generally people who see no personal benefit to unionization.
The stage actors I know of have a very different situation. The Stage Actors' Unions are really organizations that I would consider to be 'Professional Guilds', to use a very old term. And these organizations provide services that are useful to both employers and employees. Union members are eligable for things like credit union membership and health insurance through the union, services that most people get through their employer, but since stage actors are employed seasonally, it's not so easy for them. The Guilds not only provide continuing theatrical education, but require that members must fulfill a certain requirement for taking part in it. And, yes, they require that employers meet certain contractual obligations to employ union-qualified actors, but then, the employer gets the benefit of knowing that their employees had to reach a certain level of competence just to join the union.
So, which union type did you have in mind?
Please no.... First a Log Blog, now a Bog Blog!
As you say, everything can be broken down into causes and effects, and effects themselves become causes. This does lead us into a sort of chicken-and-egg question with the universe: Was there ever a first cause which was not itself the effect of something else?
I would say, yes. How do we know? Because we are here. We exist. And for things to exist, they had to begin existing at some point.
Beginnings and endings are not all imposed by our minds. That I first breathed air at a certain point in time measurable as the equivalent of just over twenty-five orbits of the Earth about the sun is fact, not opinion. The end of the Roman Empire centuries ago was a fact, not a point of view. We can't point at the exact time and place, but we do know that there was a first culture ever to use writing, or currency, or the wheel, or even fire.
I can only rationalize one temporal view of the universe in which there is no such thing as an independent cause, and that would be an infinite loop of the universe going through the same motions of creation and destruction... which still begs the eternal question, how did that loop get there?
Your assertion is that the universe is causes 'all the way back' to infinity. I can't help but think of the old woman in the science lecture who believed that the world was flat, on the back of a tortoise. When asked what the tortoise stood on, her reply was, "You can't fool me, it's tortoises all the way down."
Down to what?
I'm guessing they rushed to make the presses in Kabul (where it is, according to my world-clock, 12:43am).
Pure frustration wouldn't do it. I've been frustrated to the end of my wits and back again. We've all been.
The thing is, a segment of the Arabic Muslim population in the Middle East has been indoctrinated into believing that the cause of their frustrations is not their leaders (who are more often than not monarchs, mullahs, and dictators), but Israel (a modern nation with an elected government) and the United States (which is halfway around the world, and spends more of its GNP on charity and aid than almost any other nation around). And they've been taught two other things: One, that the afterlife has no frustrations, and two, that the more 'infidels' you kill on your way to the afterlife, the nicer it is.
I know that's not an accurate representation of Islam as a whole, but I believe it is an accurate representation of that segment of the Islamic population that breeds suicide bombers and worse.
We know why they're out to kill and terrorize. They've told us, many times. They tell us every time Hamas or Islamic Jihad takes credit for another slaughtering of civilians in Israel.
Or haven't you been listening?
In this case, the root of their frustration is a condition of life imposed upon them by their own 'leaders', and those very same 'leaders' avoid ousting by turning around and telling their people that it's our fault. And you're right, it is a problem that's going to go on until that root is addressed.
So, how do you suggest 'addressing' the oppression of a people that have been taught to hate us by their oppressors?
"Whoa. Deja vu."
"What?"
"I saw a mispelling go by, then I saw another one, just like it."
"How much like it? Was it the same mispelling?"
"I dunno, might've been."
Thanks for the clarification... but now I've got this weird mental image of the doctor removing the patient's liver and sticking it in a microwave, one with the rotating plate to make sure it's 'evenly done all the way around'.
Minutes later: Ding!
And they shall be allocated thus:
Three for the executives, with their heads in the sky,
Seven for the managers, with skulls of stone,
Nine for the programmers, who need to die(t),
One for the Sysadmin on his dark throne.
One Ring with Root to all, one Ring to scoff them, one Ring to bring them all, and in their cubicles BOFH them.
Ah, thanks, now I remember. I think I was just reading a lot of old sci-fi short stories by the Greats around that time....
Hear, hear. It's a story, and a good one. And I don't think everything must be "forward-thinking" to have value.
I vaguely remember a C.S. Lewis quote on the issue of whether or not to raise children on fairy tales and fiction. At the time, it was considered "forward-thinking" to raise children on reality rather than fantasy. (Still is, for some parents.)
I can't find the exact words right now, but in effect, he said that he would rather a child hearing a mysterious bump in the night think of a monster under the bed than a burglar. And yes, there are witches and monsters to frighten, but there are also heroes and knights to look up to, with timeless values such as courage and honesty.
In another much more recent bit of creative fantasy, one main character points out that humans need the little stories and lies in childhood as practice. Practice for believing in the big, important things. Things like Honor and Justice.
Just ask Snake Plissken.
A sign of that horrid song-stuck-in-the-head phenomenon.
I looked at the story above, and suddenly a tune popped into my head. Y'all are going to kill my karma for this....
Remember that Hanson song that was all over the radio some years ago. Only, not as 'Mmmm-Bop'. I'm hearing 'Hale-Bopp'.
I remember this one. If I recall correctly, it was one of Asimov's Azazel short stories.
Already been done:
Meow meow meow meow, Meow meow meow meow....
This is decent timing for the Daredevil movie, isn't it? Could actually have a 'man with no fear'....