Well, I'm a US citizen, and I agree completely with the initial poster. There is no way that we can deal with terrorism if we rely on vengeance and retaliation. No matter how many terrorist or suspected terrorists we "annihilate", there will always be more springing up.
Terrorist also have a major advantage. It's horribly easy for them to find a target, because they have no compunctions about killing the general populace.
If we are to overcome them, we must move the fight away from their arena and their rules.
OTOH, there is no way that I can look at you and be certain that I know what's in your heart, or what your relationship to God
is.
...one can observe what importance people place on different things and make a determination as to where their priorities lie. Besides, Scripture says that you will know them by their fruits.
That's true. What's in the heart does show in external symptoms ("fruit"). But it's not always absolute. That's why I said that I can't be *certain*, generally speaking. For the extreme cases, I can be pretty certain, though. Like you said, if someone claims to be Christian but their actions don't show any love for God or others, then I'm justified in treating them as unbelievers (i.e., treat them as what their actions seem to show them to be, rather than what they claim to be.)
The difficulty comes in the less-extreme cases. The initial issue was about homosexuality -- I was trying to address the question: Is it possible for someone to be violating one of God's laws, while following the vast majority of them, and still be a believer? e.g., Is it possible for someone to be a practicing homosexual and a follower of Christ?
If the person is showing many symptoms of following Christ -- loving God and others -- then I would be very uncomfortable thinking them to be unbelievers, even though there is one area where it's clear that they aren't following God's law. I think there are very few actions that can be used as a litmus test for belief. I must always look at the fruit in aggregate, and often there is no clear conclusion that I can make.
...the ability to judge
the contents of the heart would be far more useful in laying bare the hypocrite than determining the righteous.
Hmm...that would make things interesting. I can see many advantages if we were able to see each others' hearts -- but there's some dangerous drawbacks, too...
BTW, thanks. This discussion is refreshing -- wanna take it off-line? email me...
Sad, but true. Nowadays, "Christian" can mean anything from "not Muslim" to "rabid right-wing conservative" to "progressive left-wing liberal" to "follower of Christ". Often, it means more about which group one is with rather than what one really believes or how one tries to live.
But what's one to do? Lately, I've been uncomfortable with any label, because they all seem to have so much baggage.
You're right, professing something doesn't make it true. But there are some things that are easier to tell from observation. To take your example, I could easily tell whether you're a black female or white male just by looking at you. OTOH, there is no way that I can look at you and be certain that I know what's in your heart, or what your relationship to God is. That's why it's God's job, rather than mine, to judge a profession of Christianity.
I doubt very much that I will ever find a person whose actions conform completely to my understanding of what God wants. So where should I draw the line between "actual Christian" and "professing, but not actual, Christian"? AFAICS, all that I can do is note that some *actions* do not appear to be consistent with Christ's teachings (as far as I understand them at the time).
Or, to put it more succintly, "man looks at the outside appearance, but God looks at the heart."
Yeah -- sometimes I'm ashamed to call myself Christian because of the many things that have been done in that name that are anything but Christian, AFAIAC...
Hmmm, close indeed. Claims? Well, I won't argue semantics with you until I look it up myself.
"claims" or "asserts" because there is no proof proffered in the passage. Homosexuality is simply mentioned as one of the conditions that is a result of people's rejection of God, and His subsequent abandonment of them to their sin.
But what of people who are openly gay and also Christian? They clearly haven't 'rejected God'.
Hmm...Paul's argument does not say that all homosexuality comes from rejecting God. The argument simply says that homosexuality is one sin that can become prevalent in those who reject God.
Yes, there are professing Christians who are also gay. Only God is in a position to judge their position before Him. I tend to believe that God accepts people no matter what their condition -- whether homosexual, or liar, or whatever.
It's interesting to note that homosexuality is *not* included in the grand list of sins in vv. 29-31, but lying and gossip are!
Anyway, I'll look it up and draw my own conclusions.
Thanks -- I'm impressed.
<sarcasm>Most people on either side of this argument know too much about the issue to take the time to look something up. </sarcasm>
Besides, is that it? It's not terribly compelling.
That's the most direct in the NT. There are other other arguments that could be made, typically from the descriptions of marriage in places like: Matthew 19 and cognates (original pattern/intent with Adam and Eve), 1 Corinthians 7 (man/woman marriage to prevent fornication), and Ephesians 5:21-33 (rules for man/woman marriage, and parallel between human marriage and the Christ/church relationship).
And it seems to me that if being gay is the horrible atrocity that most bible-thumpers say it is, it would be spelled out a little more clearly.
Could be there's a little Pharisaism going on there...check out Matthew 23, and especially vs 23. It seems to me that the "bible-thumpers" are often missing discernment and mercy...
I keep seeing this argument that if the TPM is easily broken, then it's not effective, so the DMCA doesn't apply. I'm sorry, but as much as I would wish that to be true, it doesn't appear to be. In 1201(a)(3)(b), the DMCA clearly defines its meaning:
a technological measure "effectively controls access to a work" if the measure, in the ordinary course of its operation, requires the application of information, or a process or a treatment, with the authority of the copyright owner, to gain access to the work.
In other words, the question is not whether the TPM provides adequate protection against unauthorized access, but whether it has the effect of controlling access when it is used as intended by the copyright owner. Circumventing the TPM is not the "ordinary course of operation", so it doesn't matter how easy it is to crack the encryption.
Sorry, but this looks horribly well written. It gives the copyright owner the unquestioned right to put in place any mechanism that controls access in any way to the intellectual property, whether or not that control is granted by copyright law. That's the worst part of this law. It allows the copyright owner to extend the arenas of access control in any way they wish (region codes, forced ads, licensed hardware, etc.), and makes it a federal offense to go against the wishes of the copyright owner.
<rant>Every time I read this, it nauseates me to think that laws like this can be passed unanimously in this supposedly "free" country.</rant>
Agreed. Bad driving causes many more accidents than speeding. But since speeding is quantifiable, while bad driving is subjective, it's much easier to ticket the speeders than the bad drivers.
As long as the police have an easy and nearly incontestible method of measuring vehicle speed, then they will focus their efforts on speeding tickets rather than reckless/dangerous driving. I propose that these systems be banned, so that speeding would be less easily detected, and perhaps the police would start to spend more time ticketing the fools that are making the roads really dangerous.
<dream type="impossible">
Let's make DWD ("Driving While Distracted") as serious an offense as DUI!
Anyone running printer services over the Internet on a server is an utter moron
True, if s/Internet/web/ . But what else can Microsoft do? They're losing SMB print server share to Samba, so they've got to start using something else.
Maybe someone should start a pool on when Microsoft will be removing SMB printing capabilities from their desktop OS...
It is a complicated problem and it might even be one that cannot be solved today or even ever.
Thank you -- that's absolutely right. It's so frustrating to see most people try to oversimplify the issue and forget that we're really dealing with people. People that need to feel like they belong. People that need to feel valued by others. And this cannot be accomplished by a simply structural change.
Remove the guns -- the bullying will still be there
Abolish the games -- the agression will continue
Sanitize the movies -- they'll just find other things to do
Indoctrinate with <insert moral code here> -- they might feel a little more guilty as they do it
If we want to deal with these issues, we need to dig beyond the superficial structural factors so we can expose and fix the cultural attitudes that foster this behavior. We can only deal with these issues by changing the village attitudes.
A root of the problem is the village attitude that a person's value to me (or society) depends solely on what I (or society) can get out of them. This crops up way too often. You see it in families where the parents' affection depends on how proud their kids make them. You see it in marriages that are based mainly on how good the spouse makes me feel. You see it in cliques where popularity depends on conformity and mutual self-congratulation. You see it in bullying, because the bully can get a sense of superiority, however fleeting. Frighteningly, you can even see it in Bush's "teacher accountability" plan, where a student's value to a teacher is defined by their score on an exam.
No, I'm not saying that this is the only attitude that drives our society. However, it is far too prevalent, and especially in the United States. Somehow, it seems that the mystique of "rugged individualism" and the "self-made man" has often been defined as someone who derives all of their value from what they give to others, without having to get anything from anyone else.
The sad thing is that this attitude is so easily accepted and propagated, even in the face of the teachings most moral philosophies.
Kant has his "categorical imperative": treat every person as an end in themselves rather than a means to an end. Christianity says, "love your neighbor as yourself -- do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Buddhism... Hinduism... humanism... it seems like this is a very common teaching. So why isn't it followed? Why does it seem like the worst offenders come from moral philosophies that stress this more?
Sorry, ranting a bit there...lemme bring this back home. I'm starting to realize that the only way I can hope to see a difference is to work on my attitude towards others in my own village. Make sure I value others just because they are, not for what I can get from them. I can only hope that if I can do it, that others will be encouraged to do it as well.
Remember, son, when we bought you that Palm, we told you that you'd have to feed it and play with it every day. If you can't remember to take care if it nicely, we're just going to have to take it to the Palm pound, and we'll never buy you another pet again!
Yeah, and with the resources you spent on free software, you could have bought ready-to-use proprietary packages. And with the resources you spent on building your own PC you could have bought a Dell. And with the resources you spent on your significant other, you could have bought...
The odds that these identical sequences evolved in different organisms completely independently of one another are infinitesimally small. Either
they were placed there by design, or one evolved from the other.
Fascinating. That's precisely the two assertions that are being argued. Creationists claim design. Evolutionists claim ancestry and mutation.
I choose to pay insurance premiums because I don't want to have to pay for the damages if/when *I* am in an accident. The insurance company pools the premiums, and pays *me* out of the pool to cover actual damages. Claims agents are used to ensure that the payout never exceeds the actual damage.
I am forced to pay a tax on recordable media or equipment because the recording industries have convinced the legislature to pass this law to compensate them because *someone other than me* infringes their copyright. The taxes go directly to the recording industry, and are paid based on virtual (and perhaps imagined) damages, rather than claims of actual damage. No mechanism is in place to ensure any relationship whatsoever between said virtual damages and the taxes I pay.
Hmmm...maybe someone should offer "copyright infringement insurance" to this industry...;-P
The day in america that they fine me for disabling an electronic device in a car that I own, is the day that I start looking for a revolution to aid.
Seriously, that would be an absolutely attrocious (sp?) infringement on one's rights.
They already allow prosecution for disabling or working around pollution control devices on your car, or CSS in your computer. Why oh why do you think this would be any different?
Ah, electrochromic technology. That's neat stuff, especially the LBL-developed material that uses power to change the tinting, and holds its current tint when the power is removed.
You're right, it's still expensive, but the costs are coming down. We're already seeing electrochromics being used for auto-dimming rearview mirrors on everything from VWs to Buicks, and it's showing up in larger panels on show cars like the Cadillac Imaj and Mercedes Maybach. There's also a big push (and a US DOE Initiative) for developing electrochromic windows to make buildings more efficient.
Well, it's not conclusive, but the "Identifying Components" diagram on p 87 of the User Guide shows separate cables for HDD0 and HDD1. Might mean they've got separate buses...
It's a move back to pre-renaissance feudal days, but on a global scale. We can only hope that there'll be a similar cultural revolution to the
renaissance in the near future.
What scares me is that the same thing happened as recently as the late 1800s - early 1900s. Have we not learned anything from history? When I look at the corporate power during the 20s, with the monopolies, company towns, and "robber barons", I can easily envision our current corporations doing the same thing. Perhaps in a little different manner, though: the government would probably be actively involved rather than taking the hands-off attitude of the 20s.
The Great Depression was the main event that broke the feudal pattern of the era. The unchecked power of the corporations eventually resulted in a crisis that caused general harm to society. Unfortunately, unless the majority of the populace suffers as a result of the feudalism, it's rare to see the public outcry that's needed to bring about change. As long as most people are doing okay, and have opportunities for advancement, they stick with the status quo. It's only when the bottom falls out completely that there's a strong motivation for change.
I don't know what scares me more about our current situation: that we may have to face something as devastating as the Great Depression before we'll see significant structural change, or that the policies and programs that are currently in place might be just enough to stave off such devastation and preserve the feudal status quo.
The demise of the rampant scarcity economy via nuclear fusion and nanotechnology or some other technological brreakthrough would jump start
such a revolution nicely.
Hmmm...that might be true, but only if the general public truly understands the change. But like you said, we're seeing true scarcity replaced by artificial scarcity. As long as those who value a scarcity-based economy are able to generate this artificial scarcity and convince the public that it's just as real as the physical scarcity, then it won't matter. An artificial scarcity that's generally accepted will work just as well as a true scarcity.
Artificial scarcity is already a reality. And there are so many ways to create it:
IP laws cause scarcity of ideas, like you've already mentioned
increasingly stringent noncompete clauses cause scarcity of employable people
gratuitous interface changes (e.g., Windows API, car diagnostic interfaces) cause scarcity of interoperable alternatives
exclusive distribution contracts (e.g., Ticketmaster, Olympics) cause scarcity of availability
...
And the scary thing is that all you have to do to create an artificial scarcity on a resources is to tie it economically, contractually or technologically to something that is already scarce. It doesn't really matter whether the existing scarcity is real or artificial, either. The tying will propagate the scarcity equally well.
Okay, call me a cynic, but I can't see this cycle of artificial scarcity being easily broken by the development of any technology, no matter how wonderful it may be.
But while I personally have nothing against seeing another unaccountable institution sacked and burned, I have to disagree with all the ill-conceived
cries to get government oversight out of this business altogether.
I'd have to agree. As much as I distrust government's motivation, I distrust corporations' motivation even more. At least some people go into government wanting to improve society. I doubt that happens very often in corporations.
No, the solution isn't less government oversight of the corporations. It's more societal oversight of government. Seems like we've got an awful lot of corporate oversight of government, and very little societal oversight. Somehow, we (citizens, geeks, whoever) have to figure out effective ways to distribute clues to our representatives. Try to get them to understand how some of these policies and decisions will truly affect society, and keep reminding them that they're our representatives rather than the corporations'.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, I'm a US citizen, and I agree completely with the initial poster. There is no way that we can deal with terrorism if we rely on vengeance and retaliation. No matter how many terrorist or suspected terrorists we "annihilate", there will always be more springing up.
Terrorist also have a major advantage. It's horribly easy for them to find a target, because they have no compunctions about killing the general populace.
If we are to overcome them, we must move the fight away from their arena and their rules.
That's true. What's in the heart does show in external symptoms ("fruit"). But it's not always absolute. That's why I said that I can't be *certain*, generally speaking. For the extreme cases, I can be pretty certain, though. Like you said, if someone claims to be Christian but their actions don't show any love for God or others, then I'm justified in treating them as unbelievers (i.e., treat them as what their actions seem to show them to be, rather than what they claim to be.)
The difficulty comes in the less-extreme cases. The initial issue was about homosexuality -- I was trying to address the question: Is it possible for someone to be violating one of God's laws, while following the vast majority of them, and still be a believer? e.g., Is it possible for someone to be a practicing homosexual and a follower of Christ?
If the person is showing many symptoms of following Christ -- loving God and others -- then I would be very uncomfortable thinking them to be unbelievers, even though there is one area where it's clear that they aren't following God's law. I think there are very few actions that can be used as a litmus test for belief. I must always look at the fruit in aggregate, and often there is no clear conclusion that I can make.
Hmm...that would make things interesting. I can see many advantages if we were able to see each others' hearts -- but there's some dangerous drawbacks, too...
BTW, thanks. This discussion is refreshing -- wanna take it off-line? email me...
Sad, but true. Nowadays, "Christian" can mean anything from "not Muslim" to "rabid right-wing conservative" to "progressive left-wing liberal" to "follower of Christ". Often, it means more about which group one is with rather than what one really believes or how one tries to live.
But what's one to do? Lately, I've been uncomfortable with any label, because they all seem to have so much baggage.
You're right, professing something doesn't make it true. But there are some things that are easier to tell from observation. To take your example, I could easily tell whether you're a black female or white male just by looking at you. OTOH, there is no way that I can look at you and be certain that I know what's in your heart, or what your relationship to God is. That's why it's God's job, rather than mine, to judge a profession of Christianity.
I doubt very much that I will ever find a person whose actions conform completely to my understanding of what God wants. So where should I draw the line between "actual Christian" and "professing, but not actual, Christian"? AFAICS, all that I can do is note that some *actions* do not appear to be consistent with Christ's teachings (as far as I understand them at the time).
Or, to put it more succintly, "man looks at the outside appearance, but God looks at the heart."
Yeah -- sometimes I'm ashamed to call myself Christian because of the many things that have been done in that name that are anything but Christian, AFAIAC...
[de-ACing]
Hmmm, close indeed. Claims? Well, I won't argue semantics with you until I look it up myself.
"claims" or "asserts" because there is no proof proffered in the passage. Homosexuality is simply mentioned as one of the conditions that is a result of people's rejection of God, and His subsequent abandonment of them to their sin.
But what of people who are openly gay and also Christian? They clearly haven't 'rejected God'.
Hmm...Paul's argument does not say that all homosexuality comes from rejecting God. The argument simply says that homosexuality is one sin that can become prevalent in those who reject God.
Yes, there are professing Christians who are also gay. Only God is in a position to judge their position before Him. I tend to believe that God accepts people no matter what their condition -- whether homosexual, or liar, or whatever.
It's interesting to note that homosexuality is *not* included in the grand list of sins in vv. 29-31, but lying and gossip are!
Anyway, I'll look it up and draw my own conclusions.
Thanks -- I'm impressed.
<sarcasm>Most people on either side of this argument know too much about the issue to take the time to look something up. </sarcasm>
Besides, is that it? It's not terribly compelling.
That's the most direct in the NT. There are other other arguments that could be made, typically from the descriptions of marriage in places like: Matthew 19 and cognates (original pattern/intent with Adam and Eve), 1 Corinthians 7 (man/woman marriage to prevent fornication), and Ephesians 5:21-33 (rules for man/woman marriage, and parallel between human marriage and the Christ/church relationship).
And it seems to me that if being gay is the horrible atrocity that most bible-thumpers say it is, it would be spelled out a little more clearly.
Could be there's a little Pharisaism going on there...check out Matthew 23, and especially vs 23. It seems to me that the "bible-thumpers" are often missing discernment and mercy...
[IANAL]
I keep seeing this argument that if the TPM is easily broken, then it's not effective, so the DMCA doesn't apply. I'm sorry, but as much as I would wish that to be true, it doesn't appear to be. In 1201(a)(3)(b), the DMCA clearly defines its meaning:
In other words, the question is not whether the TPM provides adequate protection against unauthorized access, but whether it has the effect of controlling access when it is used as intended by the copyright owner. Circumventing the TPM is not the "ordinary course of operation", so it doesn't matter how easy it is to crack the encryption.
Sorry, but this looks horribly well written. It gives the copyright owner the unquestioned right to put in place any mechanism that controls access in any way to the intellectual property, whether or not that control is granted by copyright law. That's the worst part of this law. It allows the copyright owner to extend the arenas of access control in any way they wish (region codes, forced ads, licensed hardware, etc.), and makes it a federal offense to go against the wishes of the copyright owner.
<rant>Every time I read this, it nauseates me to think that laws like this can be passed unanimously in this supposedly "free" country.</rant>
Agreed. Bad driving causes many more accidents than speeding. But since speeding is quantifiable, while bad driving is subjective, it's much easier to ticket the speeders than the bad drivers.
As long as the police have an easy and nearly incontestible method of measuring vehicle speed, then they will focus their efforts on speeding tickets rather than reckless/dangerous driving. I propose that these systems be banned, so that speeding would be less easily detected, and perhaps the police would start to spend more time ticketing the fools that are making the roads really dangerous.
<dream type="impossible">Let's make DWD ("Driving While Distracted") as serious an offense as DUI!
</dream>And once the smoke has escaped, it becomes a
DED (Dark Emitting Diode)
Anyone running printer services over the Internet on a server is an utter moron
True, if s/Internet/web/ . But what else can Microsoft do? They're losing SMB print server share to Samba, so they've got to start using something else.
Maybe someone should start a pool on when Microsoft will be removing SMB printing capabilities from their desktop OS...
If someone steals my DVDs it would be nice if I could just write them back to new DVD disks from my backup storage.
Good for you...BAD for the studios. That's BILLIONS OF DOLLARS of lost profits for them. :-P
YM "comrade". HTH
It is a complicated problem and it might even be one that cannot be solved today or even ever.
Thank you -- that's absolutely right. It's so frustrating to see most people try to oversimplify the issue and forget that we're really dealing with people. People that need to feel like they belong. People that need to feel valued by others. And this cannot be accomplished by a simply structural change.
Remove the guns -- the bullying will still be there
Abolish the games -- the agression will continue
Sanitize the movies -- they'll just find other things to do
Indoctrinate with <insert moral code here> -- they might feel a little more guilty as they do it
If we want to deal with these issues, we need to dig beyond the superficial structural factors so we can expose and fix the cultural attitudes that foster this behavior. We can only deal with these issues by changing the village attitudes.
A root of the problem is the village attitude that a person's value to me (or society) depends solely on what I (or society) can get out of them. This crops up way too often. You see it in families where the parents' affection depends on how proud their kids make them. You see it in marriages that are based mainly on how good the spouse makes me feel. You see it in cliques where popularity depends on conformity and mutual self-congratulation. You see it in bullying, because the bully can get a sense of superiority, however fleeting. Frighteningly, you can even see it in Bush's "teacher accountability" plan, where a student's value to a teacher is defined by their score on an exam.No, I'm not saying that this is the only attitude that drives our society. However, it is far too prevalent, and especially in the United States. Somehow, it seems that the mystique of "rugged individualism" and the "self-made man" has often been defined as someone who derives all of their value from what they give to others, without having to get anything from anyone else.
The sad thing is that this attitude is so easily accepted and propagated, even in the face of the teachings most moral philosophies.
Kant has his "categorical imperative": treat every person as an end in themselves rather than a means to an end. Christianity says, "love your neighbor as yourself -- do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Buddhism... Hinduism... humanism... it seems like this is a very common teaching. So why isn't it followed? Why does it seem like the worst offenders come from moral philosophies that stress this more?
Sorry, ranting a bit there...lemme bring this back home. I'm starting to realize that the only way I can hope to see a difference is to work on my attitude towards others in my own village. Make sure I value others just because they are, not for what I can get from them. I can only hope that if I can do it, that others will be encouraged to do it as well.
Remember, son, when we bought you that Palm, we told you that you'd have to feed it and play with it every day. If you can't remember to take care if it nicely, we're just going to have to take it to the Palm pound, and we'll never buy you another pet again!
Yeah, and with the resources you spent on free software, you could have bought ready-to-use proprietary packages. And with the resources you spent on building your own PC you could have bought a Dell. And with the resources you spent on your significant other, you could have bought...
Nah -- fingers, feet, head => 13. Try it sometime!
when you multiply six by nine?
The odds that these identical sequences evolved in different organisms completely independently of one another are infinitesimally small. Either they were placed there by design, or one evolved from the other.
Fascinating. That's precisely the two assertions that are being argued. Creationists claim design. Evolutionists claim ancestry and mutation.
Not quite accurate.
I choose to pay insurance premiums because I don't want to have to pay for the damages if/when *I* am in an accident. The insurance company pools the premiums, and pays *me* out of the pool to cover actual damages. Claims agents are used to ensure that the payout never exceeds the actual damage.
I am forced to pay a tax on recordable media or equipment because the recording industries have convinced the legislature to pass this law to compensate them because *someone other than me* infringes their copyright. The taxes go directly to the recording industry, and are paid based on virtual (and perhaps imagined) damages, rather than claims of actual damage. No mechanism is in place to ensure any relationship whatsoever between said virtual damages and the taxes I pay.
Hmmm...maybe someone should offer "copyright infringement insurance" to this industry... ;-P
The day in america that they fine me for disabling an electronic device in a car that I own, is the day that I start looking for a revolution to aid. Seriously, that would be an absolutely attrocious (sp?) infringement on one's rights.
They already allow prosecution for disabling or working around pollution control devices on your car, or CSS in your computer. Why oh why do you think this would be any different?
Zkb zdvwh brxu wlph zlwk EIL zkhq d olwwoh dqdobvlv jrhv d orqj zdbv? D vlqjoh-ohwwhu zrug pxvw eh "L" ru "D". Dq dsrvwursklchg vlqjoh-ohwwhu vxiila lv suredeob "v" ru "w". Hyhubwklqj hovh iroorzv qlfhob iurp wkdw...
Ah, electrochromic technology. That's neat stuff, especially the LBL-developed material that uses power to change the tinting, and holds its current tint when the power is removed.
You're right, it's still expensive, but the costs are coming down. We're already seeing electrochromics being used for auto-dimming rearview mirrors on everything from VWs to Buicks, and it's showing up in larger panels on show cars like the Cadillac Imaj and Mercedes Maybach. There's also a big push (and a US DOE Initiative) for developing electrochromic windows to make buildings more efficient.
Well, it's not conclusive, but the "Identifying Components" diagram on p 87 of the User Guide shows separate cables for HDD0 and HDD1. Might mean they've got separate buses...
It's a move back to pre-renaissance feudal days, but on a global scale. We can only hope that there'll be a similar cultural revolution to the renaissance in the near future.
What scares me is that the same thing happened as recently as the late 1800s - early 1900s. Have we not learned anything from history? When I look at the corporate power during the 20s, with the monopolies, company towns, and "robber barons", I can easily envision our current corporations doing the same thing. Perhaps in a little different manner, though: the government would probably be actively involved rather than taking the hands-off attitude of the 20s.
The Great Depression was the main event that broke the feudal pattern of the era. The unchecked power of the corporations eventually resulted in a crisis that caused general harm to society. Unfortunately, unless the majority of the populace suffers as a result of the feudalism, it's rare to see the public outcry that's needed to bring about change. As long as most people are doing okay, and have opportunities for advancement, they stick with the status quo. It's only when the bottom falls out completely that there's a strong motivation for change.
I don't know what scares me more about our current situation: that we may have to face something as devastating as the Great Depression before we'll see significant structural change, or that the policies and programs that are currently in place might be just enough to stave off such devastation and preserve the feudal status quo.
The demise of the rampant scarcity economy via nuclear fusion and nanotechnology or some other technological brreakthrough would jump start such a revolution nicely.
Hmmm...that might be true, but only if the general public truly understands the change. But like you said, we're seeing true scarcity replaced by artificial scarcity. As long as those who value a scarcity-based economy are able to generate this artificial scarcity and convince the public that it's just as real as the physical scarcity, then it won't matter. An artificial scarcity that's generally accepted will work just as well as a true scarcity.
Artificial scarcity is already a reality. And there are so many ways to create it:
And the scary thing is that all you have to do to create an artificial scarcity on a resources is to tie it economically, contractually or technologically to something that is already scarce. It doesn't really matter whether the existing scarcity is real or artificial, either. The tying will propagate the scarcity equally well.
Okay, call me a cynic, but I can't see this cycle of artificial scarcity being easily broken by the development of any technology, no matter how wonderful it may be.
I'd have to agree. As much as I distrust government's motivation, I distrust corporations' motivation even more. At least some people go into government wanting to improve society. I doubt that happens very often in corporations.
No, the solution isn't less government oversight of the corporations. It's more societal oversight of government. Seems like we've got an awful lot of corporate oversight of government, and very little societal oversight. Somehow, we (citizens, geeks, whoever) have to figure out effective ways to distribute clues to our representatives. Try to get them to understand how some of these policies and decisions will truly affect society, and keep reminding them that they're our representatives rather than the corporations'.
[Okay, enough preaching to the choir, eh?]