You keep mentioning the likes of Dawkins and I do follow him often, he's not saying a lot of the things you're saying. You seem to be hijacking his points and twisting them for your own ends, I can't say I listen to many of the others you mention, but if you're doing the same with them as you are Dawkins then it doesn't add the weight to your argument that you think it does. You talk about listening to the Iranians, which ones exactly? The ones that have desperately trying to fight their government to liberalise their country? Omid Djalili a famous British comedian who makes light of these sorts of issues because he recognises the sillyness of the likes of Ahmadinejad? You're trying to tar all Iranian's with the brush of the likes of Ahmadinejad - again, this is why you are pursuing far right politics, you're generalising against entire groups of people for your own political ends.
How do you listen to Dawkins and not hear what he has to say? he is against all religions (as am I). He considers Islam to be the most dangerous of them, as do I. With regard to the Iranians. I know plenty personally. I think they are cool and have much to be proud of. However your view is too simplistic (a common theme in your argument). It is not the cool Iranians I'm talking about, it is the Pasdaran and Quds (you know who these are, right?), and the fact they export terror. You keep banging on about how peaceful the Muslims in India are. Well, Muslims are constrained when they are dominated by 800 million pissed off Hindus (who are heartily sick and tired of their fellow Muslims - which you would know if you followed what many Hindus say since they had to resist Muslim aggression for several hundred years).
I believe that good inherently always wins out, because if something like a mass Islamification of the world were to ever become close to reality then people like me would, as my grandfather did against the nazis, fight for our freedom, but again, there's no real threat from that from Islam right now, not even close, and again, in contrast, from the far right, there absolutely is.
Lol. You are wrong. Look at the numbers. With the exception of Russia, there are a few tens of thousands of right wing dickheads about. I'll be generous and give you one hundred thousand active fskers in Europe (again, excluding the massive problem in Russia). There are 1.6 *billion* Muslims in the world and every Friday the majority of them are exposed to shit like this:
Your mistake is thinking this preacher is an extremist. He's not. He is following the mainstream Muslim view that you can find from Birmingham to Jakarta. I have to keep saying it because you keep missing the whole point. Don't listen to what I say, listen to what they say. Have you got that yet? no, you are fixated on me and trying to ad-hominem me so you don't actually have to do any work and go and find out what the Muslims are actually saying. Intellectually lazy.
I believe that good inherently always wins out, because if something like a mass Islamification of the world were to ever become close to reality then people like me would, as my grandfather did against the nazis, fight for our freedom, but again, there's no real threat from that from Islam right now, not even close, and again, in contrast, from the far right, there absolutely is.
With 1.6 billion and growing you think that leaving it until the last minute to protect your freedom will work? The US doesn't believe so and they are much much stronger than puny Britain. Chamberlain's strategy didn't work in 1938 and only a fool would think the same mistake would work now. No wonder Britain is progressively being colonized without a fight when there people too lazy to do the research, let alone stand up for encroachments on their existing rights.
Consider this - replace muslims/Islam with jews/Judaism and recognise that your argument is exactly that used by Nazi apologists in the
You have me wrong. I'm not from the Far Right, I vehemently reject the ideology of the Far Right, and I vehemently reject extremists as you do. In fact, I'm a lefty, but that doesn't mean I lack a spine and will turn a blind eye as most lefties do. What I'm arguing for is to recognize evil for what it is and nip it in the bud, before you and I, or our descendants have to go and do what your grandfather did.
The reason I pick on Islam is because in the last two decades that has become the religion that seeks to impose its will in a violent manner in far more instances than the other religions. This is undeniable. What is also undeniable is that this has become a trend for the worse - thanks to the spread of Wahabism and Salafism taking over from 'moderate' Islamists.
I too have come around to disliking all religions because, thanks to the insights of Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins I've now aware of what is going on in the World. I urge you to listen to what Christopher Hitchens and Dawkins have to say. They are not saying it because they want to hate Muslims. They say what they say because the West is being lied to - both by the propagandists of Islam (where lying is legitimized through a principle called 'taqiyya') and by the Westerners themselves - who mistake Islam as a religion in the same vein as Christianity, Hinduism, Judasim etc. Islam is not, it is a combination of religion and political system, and the commandments of that religion are to take over the World (as I keep saying, go and Google the commandments in the Qur'an; they are actually worse than the disgraceful barbarism of the bible). Before it was less of a problem, the Wahabbi, Salafi and Iranian agenda has always been to spread their flavour of Islam throughout the World. The problem now is that vast gobs of Saudi money have now gone to preaching this and this is why this extremism is spreading so rapidly: from the Arab Sudanese killing the animists in Sudan; the Afghan Taliban and the Pakistani Taliban; the Hamas; elements of the Brotherhood; jihadis still operating in Iraq; jihadis now operating in Syria; Hezbollah; the Chechens; etc etc You can't fight and sustain wars without money, and most of that is coming from the Saudi vs Iranian power play now going on as they strive to first defeat each other in a stealth conflict, and then spread further afield.
From Britain have you not seen the Muslims from your own country shouting, "Death to America! Death to Israel! Death to Britain!". Did you not realise that your schools all serve halal meat in their canteens. Surely you also know of the Sharia courts operating in parallel to your existing courts. Of course, you have read the Qur'an and hadiths and realise that Sharia is completely and fundamentally incompatible with the modern rights of women and homosexuals. Then there is the polygamy that is being legalised in Europe - but only for Muslim men, since they are special and don't have to obey the same rules as the rest of is (to try and apply Engligtenment values to everyone is 'culturally insenstive' don't you know?). Does this not concern you at all? You do realise what we are seeing now is the 'thin end of the wedge' and that no amount of appeasement will stop the incessant demands and progressive Islamicisation of Britain. I have zero issue with Muslims apply their own standards to themselves in the own countries, but when it becomes imposed on others that is where I feel I need to stand and make a statement. There is nothing Far Right in this at all.
Actually, it is worrying that you automatically assume that anyone who defends Enlightenment values is automatically seen as Far Right to you. The Far Right may end up in a similar position, resisting the progressive Islamicization of Britain, but their route to get their is completely different (and IMHO, disgustingly racist).
Don't fume about whether I'm right wing or not (I'm not, I'm like Christopher Hitchens and Pat Condell, instrinsically lefty but infuriated with the moral corrupt
Do you feel that if ICE says something, it must be true? that they'd never be wrong?
Prove that the Antiguan sites were blocked for *censorship* reasons. That is the thrust of your argument. Yes, ICE could lie, if so it should be easy for you to prove it in this case. Can you prove that those sites were innocent? can you prove that they were censored for presumably political reasons? do you believe that that sites should be blocked/taken down if they are involved in international criminal trafficking?
I'm a New Zealander and I'm disgusted the way that my Government has kowtowed in the Kim Dotcom case, and in how the US has behaved. However, he ain't no saint - his site was designed to support piracy. It is a slippery slope between MegaUpload and Google but the difference is *intent*. There are plenty of emails captured (maybe not legally, but that is moot) that show he and his staff encouraged use of the site for piracy. You need more than a fig leaf to defy the law.
We can agree the US should up its game. I'm glad you clarified your position. You may have been thinking in your head that handing over to the UN is a last resort, but that is not what your posts said (I just re-read them). Your posts talk about how the US seized legitimate web businesses and you made the assertion that this was for censorship reasons of some kind (including economic competition I guess). This is false. Please accept this.
and understand why your fear of "the Islamists" is clouding your judgement,
I don't *fear* the Islamists (by this I mean, Hamas, Iran and the Salafis - if you know the differences). What I do is *listen to what they are actually saying* and *watching what they are actually doing* in the court of public opinion, the UN, and in the countries of the World (eg. Bulgaria, Thailand, Georgia, Argentina, India etc etc if you don't know the significance of each of these countries then you haven't been paying attention and shouldn't be commenting about something you don't know about). Now your argument seems to be that because various parts of the UN have no power to enforce resolutions without either a majority or consensus then that means everything is will be ok. Weak argument, IMHO. Even bogus resolutions have been increasingly used for propaganda purposes and have been used to shape public opinion. This has been warping the situation around the world for some time now - and resulting in increased problems and deaths. Just look at the facts and then look for the numerous bogus UN resolutions or commission reports (the Goldstone report being a classic case of assertions without evidence being swallowed by the UN, and then used as if it was factual, even though it was easy to disprove). Then look for the consequences of these bogus UN resolutions or reports - they are inflaming situations around the globe. Shitty internet governance decisions at the ITU will have an impact far greater than the simplistic strictly legalistic interpretation you are talking about. Plus, all it takes are some small changes to the ITU rules and you are in a world of trouble (the same cannot be said for the US, the Free Speech rights in the Constitution that cannot be trumped). These are some of the reasons why the EU, US and people like Vint Cerf are opposed to this move (and I am too).
You're being irrational, your arguments are based on unsound premises.
Nope. You don't understand the Salafis at all and haven't been watching them at work. It is not simple paranoia on my part, it is careful observation from multiple sources, plus the enlightened observations of folks like Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Pat Condell that have been pointing out the differences between what the Islamic World say (ya know, the dudes that want the ITU change and have been trying to get criticism of religion equated with hate speech), and what they say in their own languages and behind closed doors. Have you done th
You realise the US is a member of certain voting blocs right?
Yes, but *you* miss the point (hence your disingenuous 'weasel words' yourself). The US-led voting bloc (that is, countries sharing Enlightenment values) is outnumbered by the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement combined with the Islamic countries. Just look at the content of many of UN resolutions, they all go against what the US would like. Your antipathy to the US is masking your thinking. Yes the US leads a block, but that is completely irrelevant to the discussion we are having because this block is not the most significant in the UN. The bloc formed by countries that far more intereference in their national Internets has greater numbers. Hence, handing over the Internet to the UN is seen as dangerous for those countries that seek to preserve Enlightenment values (albiet imperfectly). This is why both the EU and US have come out as saying it is a bad idea. It is a shame your thinking is so anti-US biased you simply don't get it.
The WTO found against the US in it's attack on Antiguan gambling sites, and yet despite this the US still continues to censor those sites. It's doing so without even the law on it's side.
Your argument is laughable. Because the US banned Antiguan gambling sites the Internet should be handed over to a voting block heavily influenced by Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, China and other paragons of a free and uncensored Internet. You simply have no idea about what you are arguing for. It just seems you are aguing against the US, but don't really have a decent perspective on the overall issue (nb: I'm not a US citizen, so don't bother with the ad-hominem).
Oh, and by the way. The Antiguan sites were shut down because they were involved in $3 billion dollars worth of fraud and money laundering. A trivial Google seach would have shown you this. Notice how the US also leaves plenty of other gambling sites alone - ya know, the ones not involved in laundering for international criminals. Again, you are so happy to hate the US you don't even bother to check the reason the US shut down those sites (and just as importantly, left all the other gambling sites in the World alone). Perhaps you should take some time to examine your own bias (which leads you to accept facts without looking at the counter-argument in case it has validity), and also take the time to do research rather than simply bash the US (despite it being very fashionable these days by the poorly informed).
So now that your flimsy *censorship* argument has been shot down, do you still think it is a good idea to hand the Internet over to voting blocs that would ban *all gambling* (not just the criminal launderers) ? ya know, like the Islamists? to have an anti-US bias so strong as to not consider a reasonable when it has been presented is pretty lame. Handing the Internet to countries far worse than the US is a complete mistake.
The US does not generally censor. It removes sites for legal reasons *and these legal reasons can be challenged* - all you have to do is hire a lawyer.
The countries that do practice censorship are the ones that form voting blocs in the UN (refer to the video in my first post).
Just because the current regulation of the Internet has flaws does not mean handing it over to the UN would solve the issues. In fact, it is far far more likely to get worse - which is our point. So what is the point you are trying to make, that having the UN regulate the Internet would be better and give more Freedom than now? I don't think that is a realistic position (gambling is very likely to become banned, as is pornography, sites criticising religion, political sites, whistleblowing sites etc etc).
The flaws in the current system should be talked about and corrected (eg. by supporting the EFF and others). Simply handing the Internet over to the control of the UN is not going to solve the issues, in fact it is far more likely to make it worse and you'll have no recourse to correct it (unlike now). So please get real.
When I was an undergrad, I knew a lot of professors in the EE department who used Matlab to do computationally intense signal processing, and I know people in the CS department here who use Matlab for image processing work (and they would rule out both Java and any functional language for that work).
Matlab is ok (I use Octave from time to time). However, it not not really a general purpose solution. If you get to work outside your university you will come up against them. That is part of the problem with our discussion I think. From your post you are an academic working in CS department. Well, I'm an ex-academic (astrophysics) who gained sufficient energy to reach a free state. I work outside of university and get to build real systems in the non-ideal world outside the Ivory Tower. I'm not saying your observations are invalid, they just aren't practical with the variable quality of people you have out here.
With regard to the "extra effort" you suppose. Well, I'm well aware of the psychological limits of working memory because I also am trained in the Information Mapping methodology of technical writing (and have do aviation, where those limits were found). I continue to disagree with you. Making variables and breaking long chains of calls up helps debug unfamiliar code (eg. written by someone else, or yourself many years ago) because the machine can help you with it. You don't have to remember all the variables because you've given them great names like "specificImpulseNetwons" or "annualInterestRate". Note how units become important. I could rant how the CS that I learned as an undergraduate placed emphasis on the wrong things for industry: like worrying about how few lines a toy program can be reduced to; how making yet another language will solve all programming problems (for a specific domain); like proving the algorithmic complexity for some obscure domain. Don't confuse that with teaching students useful things; like always thinking about the units they are working in (failing to do so will famously get your Mars Rover crashed), or how to design stuff to be as simple as possible (so lesser programmers can build and maintain it), how to get sh!t done quickly, give them 'religion' about testing or how to write robust software (hints: test, check your preconditions always, validate input data, assume that the stuff can fail at any time and fall back to a safe checkpoint state, etc).
It is not very useful to continue this debate. You are interested in languages (for the sake of it I would assume, given your career is CS) and in constructs that are easy to teach. I'm interested in getting big projects done, getting them done on time, getting a team to produce it, making it bulletproof, and making it so that it can be deployed and maintained by folks who don't know anything about programming. This is why I recommended Java, and why so many enterprises use it - and because there is not yet a sensible alternative to it (yes, yes, the good is the enemy of the great - but I'd rather choose a good general purpose language over a great limited purpose language because of the enormous economic benefits of re-use).
Don't believe me (I'm a nobody), but listen to Vint Cerf
Look, with regard to the threat to Internet Freedom you don't have to take my word for it. You might take Vint Cerf's though (I'm sure you you know who he is, right?). http://googleblog.blogspot.co.nz/2012/12/keep-internet-free-and-open.html
I'm afraid it appears that it is *you* who has an incomplete understanding of the issue. I hope the link I've provided prompts you to do more research:)
Anti-religious statements are Free Speech criticism and this is not necessarily intolerance
With regard to the anti-Islamic tone of my post. Yes, it is anti-Islamic - because "true" Islam is an evil death cult that is manipulated by the unscrupulous (which is bad enough) and has as a core principle the desire to impose itself on the entire world (that's where it affects me, and I'm have the right to oppose it). The imposition is by force if necessary. Again, I am not saying this on my own authority, but you could listen to what Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Pat Condell or Sam Harris have to say about this. It is very worthwhile to take the time to listen to Hitch on YouTube, he's hilarious yet far more insightful than nearly anyone else you'll come across on the matter (certainly not the poorly informed and woolly-headed apologists you see on mainstream media).
Understanding Salafi Islam
The fact that you don't understand what Islam actually commands shows you don't know diddly about the Qur'an or hadiths (I suggest taking a peruse, as I did), and you certainly are not listening to what the Salafis, Wahabbis, Jihadis are *actually saying* (in short, you have willful cognitive dissonance). Again, you have an incomplete understanding and you desperately need to do some research (which I urge you to do, while the free media still exists:) ). Please do your research. On YouTube find out what the jihadis and salafis are actually saying in arabic (the latter part is very important, the principle of taqiyya means they can and will lie to you in English if it promotes the goals of Islam - again, plenty of examples of this on YouTube if you care to look).
How good human beings are 'bad' in a religious sense
Now I like my friends who are Muslim, they are good people. That doesn't mean I can't dislike Islam and call it out for what it *actually* is (not what its apologists and propagandists would like you to believe it is). Now the fact that you consider an anti-Islamic post to be bad shows you are missing several vital points (no surprise, you are still in 'The Matrix', so to speak).
The first is that you confuse legitimate anti-religious criticism with intolerance. These are not the same! It is a gross and somewhat amateur mistake to think they are.
The second thing is that even if I was intolerant then I still have Free Speech to make my (possibly mistaken) points made. Under Free Speech not only do I have the right to make statements and even offend, but more importantly, everyone else has the right to listen to that speech. By taking away someone's right to speak you take away the right of millions to hear what they have to say - which may be uncomfortable to the authorities, but nevertheless, the truth.
There are plenty of Muslims out there that are good human beings (eg. Italy's head Iman, please do your homework, look him up on YouTube:) ). However, what makes them good human beings makes them 'bad' Muslims - because they disobey the commandments in the Qur'an. All religions (except Jainism) have the same problem, "true believers" are bad while "bad believers" are good humans. That makes the religions flawed, not the humans.
The transfer of Internet regulation to the UN *is a Free Speech* issue. Just because you don't personally foresee the potential pitfalls doesn't mean we cannot.
Kia Ora cuz! I live in New Zealand too (for the benefit of everyone else).
I wholeheartedly support your sentiments. For me the thing is is, ICANN has to obey the laws and courts of the US where Free Speech is protected (vigorously, but outfits like the EFF and supported by the courts). Once the UN gets its mitts on the Internet there is no way anyone can try and influence it. Furthermore, the UN is corrupt in the sense that the resolutions that get passed don't actually match its founding ideals - yet there is nothing the citizens of the World can actually do about it.
Corruption of the UN
Why is the UN this way? unfortunately it is due to past and future conflicts (a legacy of the Cold War, and now influenced by the rise of global Jihad and Salafism). I refer you to this video for an overview (mid-way describes how the Non-Aligned and Islamic movements have joined to form a voting bloc to defeat the interests of the US, Israel and much of the 'Western' World): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7Mupoo1At8
Case History - reasons to oppose the move
Now some on these forums have argued that the ITU has been good at what it does. This is entirely true. However, I would argue that this was precisely because the ITU held no power that it has avoided the manipulating interest of special groups. Once the ITU actually got power could those special interest groups warp the normal process and corrupt the ITU in the same way that voting the UN General Assembly has been corrupted by voting blocs? Well, I'll give two examples for consideration:
ISO was a pretty respected organization. However there was a fiasco several years back where Microsoft essentially stuffed ballots for voting on the Office OpenXML document standard (despite ISO already having adopted the Open Document format as its standard). Lots of 'first time' voters registered for this, chairman barred any dissenting questions from being raised and the standard was forced through. A clear case of a single corporation warping a standards body for its own interests (and arguably, against the interests of the general population of document users, who had a preference for truly open standards).
Second example. The UN is working on making criticism of religion equivalent to hate speech. This means you can't say that the beheading of criminals under Islam's Sharia Law is barbaric, because Muslims will almost certainly wail that they have been offended by your statement. It is an essential part of Free Speech to be able to criticize, even to the point of offense. It is no surprise that the anti-Free Speech advocates who pushed for this are also pushing to move control of the Internet from ICANN (where Free Speech is protected by US law) to the UN ITU - where they can regulate the Internet and *forcibly* prohibit *your* Free Speech.
One doesn't have to be an astrophysicist (although I am/was:) ) to see how these examples are the representative of possible future trouble if the Internet was to slip out from ICANN's protection.
Let's not give up our open Internet, and other Freedoms without making a fuss, eh?
Aarrrrghhh!!!!!111 Surely you would never *teach* students such monstrosities. The idea is to keep it simple, one statement or side effect per line of code. This helps you when you wave your debugger over the code, since it will automagically highlight the result of the statement. This also helps the people reading your program (and source code is meant for people firstly). You are trying to write Java in non-Java different style, no wonder that code you gave is so hideous. Of course, the Java compiler is so damn efficient that extra assignments for debugging and readability are no problem at all - let the machine mash the code, not you. Trying to mash everything into one line is for C and LISP coders (which I was at one time so I recognize the same style), not for someone used to multiple 1080p displays. Newlines really aren't that expensive, dontcha know?
As a language, Java is pretty awful; you are stuck with a single programming paradigm even in cases where that paradigm makes no sense, you are writing enormous amounts of code to express what you are trying to do, and features that programmers in other languages take for granted are just not there (or are very limited). Meanwhile, you have Scala and Clojure on the JVM -- so why not just use these where functional approaches make sense, like for parallel algorithms?
I would argue that Java is more general purpose than Scala or Clojure, at least for the kind of problems I'm often trying to solve (eg. device control, 3D graphics, medical applications, numerical modelling etc). Perhaps Scala and Clojure fit your/people's problem domains, if so, then I have no problem with people using them. Don't mistake that for being useful in the outside (non-teaching) world. Note also that functional constructs do have some overheads that iterative-style code does not (where the latter is not exclusive to, but more in Java's 'style', yeah?). For my problems that are massively iterative (eg. some parts of graphics, numericals) this does make a difference, and the functional constructs are unnatural and used so infrequently to be useless. The usefulness of threading is above this (eg. the multi-threading is coarse grained and limited to a few dozen threads, again functional programming doesn't offer enough of an advantage in this regard).
Back to your teaching. Surely new students follow the deterministic procedural code better at the start than having lots of anonymous closures popping up all over the place? It is more advanced users that like the constructs that bring them home to the Source, that is, LISP.
Yes, they should have used the ternary operator.
No they should not have. The ternary operator is for C programmers making the jump. Again, newlines are not expensive. There is nothing wrong with making an if statement and assigning to a variable. Then give the output of that variable to your function call. One statement or side-effect per line. The compiler can make this fast. Someone who is not you can read the code without thinking about it (unless they are snob, and think the code is too simple and should be slightly obfuscated in the way you have shown). With lines split out in this way you get to put a debugger on the statement you want because multiple statements are not mashed together, and again, the debugger will automagically show you the value of the variable or expression as you move you mouse over it (less clicking is good, yeah?).
If aiming for simplicity is good enough for Einstein and Steve Jobs, then who am I (or you?) to argue? As they say, "You can write bad FORTRAN in any language" and your example proves it. Just because Java (and all other languages) allow obfuscated constructs because people think terse code is better (it's not!) and those that write terse code are better coders (not true, such things are only held in esteem by those lacking several decades of experienc
Actually you don't need functional. Java works fine with multi-threading (well, it does for my daily use). In fact, that is the real strength of the garbage collection model of Java, it can track and manage efficient release of resources in a multi-threaded system. Also Java has direct language support for synchronization mechanisms and extensive library support for multi-thread friendly data structures (Doug Leah is a legend!). Lots and lots of multi-threaded programs get written in Java, without needing functional languages, it's just that we we do write them they do work (after we test for various possible thread-related problems), work well, and we don't have to bitch about needing to change paradigms to get things going (eg. needing to change to functional languages when they are not always the best fit for many classes of problem).
Of course you'll hear those still stuck on legacy languages designed without multi-threading in mind whinging. That doesn't mean there isn't a straightforward, easy to learn language and development platform out there that isn't strong on multi-threading. There is - and it is cross-platform and general purpose too.
Absolute rubbish. Postgesql handles massive data sets and can scale down to run on modest hardware (with a multitude of choices in *free as in beer* operating systems). So I wonder what evidence you have to support your counter-factual statements?
Oracle is indeed king of the heap with regards to power and features. It also costs an insane amount of money. Unless you want to support Larry Ellison's habit of picking up women he wants to shag by offering them Ferraris (or so the stories go), then Postgresql is probably your next best bet.
Interesting comment. MS SQL Server Locking is painful compared to Postgres when you have a huge number of transactions going on (per-page rather than per-row in general). Also, internationalization support in Postgresql is better (in my experience) - which matters if a single server is to provide data for users all over the world. MS SQL Server is fast, but this is for a reason, it cuts corners in some areas. Speed alone is a good enough reason to use SQL Server, but for most uses Postgresql is actually superior (again, in my experience writing global-reach internationalized applications).
Islam and islamic countries won't take over the world by conventional means. How it will happen is the same way it happened to Rome. At the moment there is a creeping process of islamicisation, under the guise of "niceness", "political correctness", "promotion of community cohesion" and other nice-sounding but basically appeasement terms.
Take a look at Britain. They are further along this path than the US. In Britain school cafeterias only sell halal meat. In Britain sharia courts operate in parallel to the normal courts. In Britain protesters take to the streets and openly chant death to Britain. If we switch countries there was a man beaten by muslims in Australia for drinking beer (beer is a core part of being australian, far more so than most countries). In France we have muslim zones of cities that even the police dare not enter. In the US we have universities (that should be bastions of Free Speech) change their rules so that people cannot shake hands, because muslims said they would be offended. In the United Nations it is becoming a crime to make statements that offend religion (meaning, you can't criticize Islam for the inhuman and barbaric death cult it is) - which is a loss of Free Speech (as Free Speech includes the right to offend, otherwise there is no Free Speech). Then we have mainstream new media afraid to report true events because of the violence that would be perpetrated against them by jihadis. Then we have the United Nations denounce Israel for human rights violations when it is defends its sovereign territory against violent jihadis trying to commit genocide and remove all unbelievers from the region - meanwhile the UN does nothing against the war criminals who deliberately target civilians (as as I write, have new rockets being shipped from Banda Abbas in Iran because satellites have already picked the rocket loading into the ship and it leaving port bound for Sudan, where they are smuggled to Gaza).
Actually, Japan did declare war and it was intended to be delivered just before the Pearl Harbour attack, but the Japanese decoders took too long to decipher the message for it to be delivered in time. The US decoders had intercepted the message and were able to decode most of it - I guess this was probably before the attack since negotiations were going on (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Pearl_Harbor#Japanese_declaration_of_war ). Naturally, the US used this for propaganda purposes without emphasing what really went on (and they didn't want anyone to know they could read Japanese transmissions, did they?).
I don't blame the US government in this, the US citizens at the time could hardly be roused to the massive threat of Imperial Japan (just as they cannot be roused to worry about the threat from growing international militant Islam).
You are right. States not declaring war is bad form - although it is not prohibited or a 'war crime'.
These actions have no military purpose, as far as I understand it they are motivated by hate, religious indoctrination and the need of groups like Hamas to gain prestige to perpetuate their rule.
Unfortunately this is true. There is nothing Israel can do (or interestingly, has done) that can change this. The Qur'an and hadiths command faithful muslims to kill all unbelievers. Only 'bad' muslims ignore these commands (just as 'bad' christians and jews ignore the various bits of insanity in their scriptures). So unfortunately as an Israeli there is nothing you can do, except try not to hurt the innocent and always keep your guard up. Always.
Fortunately the rest of the world is slowly waking up to what is actually going on. It used to be the narrative that the Palestinians were poor victims and there were many protests in the West. In the last bout of fighting only the historically ignorant 'new left' diehards still believe in the helpless Palestinian story. What I found remarkable is that there were so few anti-Israeli protests in the West and very many messages of understanding for the Israeli situation on places such as YouTube. If Israel strives to keep the moral high ground (trying not to hurt the innocent, trying to keep its crazy settlers in check) then the World will notice, and is noticing - for what it is worth.
Don't let the rants of the historically ignorant change get you down:)
Should the allies then have designated the entire german population as enemy combatants?
The Germans were happy to kill Allied civilians. The Allies returned the favour and firebombed whole cities - and I'm glad they did. Whatever had to be done to stop the Nazis from winning had to be done.
Hamas is happy to kill its own and Israeli citizens. When Israel responded in the latest bout, trying not to hurt Palestinian civilians, we get whiners complaining that the IDF is not perfect in weeding out the terrorists from the women and children they're deliberately hiding behind. IMHO this is wrong (both Hamas' actions, and the Western whiners). The war against extremists is something we have to win, and we will have to do whatever it takes. Now this doesn't mean we can ignore the Rules of War and International commitments - it just means that the First Rule of War is to win (not only by military means, also by improving the conditions of moderate Palestinians). But once you have won the war you have to win the peace too.
Israel doesn't claim Gaza. Until recently it was Egyptian, then the Israelis captured it in a war. The Palestinians killed Israelis and fired rockets, stating correctly that it was "occupied". The Israelis unilaterally withdrew from the area in 2005. Fatah and Hamas then fought over the strip, and Hamas won (often by throwing captured Fatah supporters off buildings). Hamas continues to launch terror attacks from there. The (mainstream) Israelis don't claim Gaza, they "mow the lawn" to reduce the number of terror attacks from there against southern Israel. How could you comment and not know this?
However the Israelis made a fundamental mistake that by removing themselves from Gaza that this would satisfy Hamas since it was no longer occupying Gaza. Unfortunately the view of Hamas is that having Israel anywhere in the region is "occupation". Even if the Israelis went back to the pre-1948 borders Hamas would still not be satisfied. They do not and, it appears, will not recognize any right for Israel to exist. They consider Israel's existence as "occupation". No amount of concession or appeasement will satisfy Hamas or induce Hamas to stop its terror attacks.
Now if you think Hamas is bad, worse it yet to come. As horrific as Hamas are to their own people (check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQib6e41N7Y), and terrible to Israelis (doesn't matter if they are women and children or not), the Salafi movement that are growing in Gaza (and in the Islamic World) wants to do the same to you. Their goal is a single government under Allah, called the "Caliphate" and you are standing in their way. Even other muslims who are not considered "islamic enough" are killed without hesitation by Salafis. The Israelis are only the first Western people to be hammered by this madness (of course, lots of muslims have suffered for a long time - but we never bothered to notice). Every other Westerner is next once the Israelis have been taken out. But don't believe me, simply go on to YouTube and listen to the pronouncements of muslims worldwide (in France, Britain, behind closed doors in the US etc etc). Most muslims are good people - but a Salafi mob makes the brutal Taliban look like schoolgirls.
Also don't forget that the Palestinians attempted to take over Jordan (although, if you go back through history, Jordan *is* the eastern part of Palestine, and Palestinians and Jordanians are the same people [apart from the large proportion of Egyptians and Sudanese in what the media calls 'Palestinians']). I digress... Anyway, here's a link for those interested in a snippet of history almost never mentioned in Western media: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
I try my best, within the limitations of a fallible primate - which is why I like your signature quote so much:) Here's a longer-winded gem from the famous Carl Sagan, just in case you haven't come across is before:
In science it often happens that scientists say, "You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken," and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
With regard to the rights of citizens in civilized countries. The laws in each country are starting to influence each other (politicians see ideas from elsewhere). We have to stand together to be strong (lol, this the original definition of fascism, from the symbolic 'fascia' bundle).
Peace (but not appeasement), solidarity (but not fascism), harmony (but not oppression):)
Well put. The reason I called it "fundamental" is because it was one of the principles used to found the colonies. Not the word "privacy" per-se, but that by default the government has no business being in your life. The government does not make tradeoffs granting you liberty vs restrictions they want. The idea is you start free, is it not? you don't have to request your freedoms as concessions from the government, this idea is you are born with them. Now it may not work out like this in practice in the modern world, but innate freedom was part of the ideals founding the US, unless I'm badly mistaken. That is what makes it "fundamental" (for US citizens at least).
While I like your argument to me it seems flawed. You do not actually horse-trade liberties with the government, because the US government cannot take your rights away from you (although they try, slyly). You permit the government to do certain things for the common benefit, it is a concession the people allow, not a negotiation. The government has no inherit right to demand these things from you. It is a subtle but absolutely crucial difference. If one doesn't grasp this difference then one can't make the correct argument, and we'll end up conceeding our own liberties unnecessarily. It is very very important to understand the starting point, the people do not trade liberties with a government entitled to make demands. People allow the government to take actions on their behalf - and the people can change their minds (eg. by electing new representatives that change the laws; such as a coloured president with a dovish and progressive agenda).
The government is allowed to take reasonable actions as a means toward its ends.
The government cannot take actions that are against existing laws. There are laws in the US that protect privacy. So far the court has an injunction that prevents the school from forcing the student to wear RFID. Meanwhile it figures out which of any laws that affect the issue should come into play. Whether or not something is 'reasonable' holds far far less weight then what the statute books say. Again, the US government is not controlled by what is reasonable, it is controlled by statutes. It appears that the court has ruled that the student does not have to submit to surveillance. The same applies to the US government. When they overstep the mark they can be prosecuted based on legal grounds whether what they have done is reasonable or not. This is one reason the US government is petrified of wikileaks and whistleblowers, they know they are doing things they should not.
Implied powers have been a part of our government since the very beginning you can look it up if you want.
Implied powers apply to Congress and relate to powers not explicitly stated in the US Constitution that *are necessary to exercise the powers that are* (explicitly laid out in the Constitution). Any implied powers can be traced back to the Constitution even if not explicitly listed there. I wonder which clause in the Constitution you think allows government (or schools) to conduct routine surveillance on its citizens (pupils). The implied powers do not mean what you think they do. Congress cannot simply make up powers that they want, such as tracking citizens. It has to make a law first if it wants to do that. Furthermore, branches of the government that are not Congress don't have implied power - they have zero power apart from those granted by the legislative branch (that is, they have no implied power, as you appear to claim). A school certainly has no power to compel a student to forgo privacy (as is her claim, and the has agreed with her as it does its research to consider all the relevant legislation).
The particulars of the technology are irrelevant. The courts have decided for now that RFID tracking may not be imposed on the student. Yes, I understand the difference between GPS and RFID (I'm an ex-astrophysicist, so probably understand a lot better than most).
Slashdot Mirror
You keep mentioning the likes of Dawkins and I do follow him often, he's not saying a lot of the things you're saying. You seem to be hijacking his points and twisting them for your own ends, I can't say I listen to many of the others you mention, but if you're doing the same with them as you are Dawkins then it doesn't add the weight to your argument that you think it does. You talk about listening to the Iranians, which ones exactly? The ones that have desperately trying to fight their government to liberalise their country? Omid Djalili a famous British comedian who makes light of these sorts of issues because he recognises the sillyness of the likes of Ahmadinejad? You're trying to tar all Iranian's with the brush of the likes of Ahmadinejad - again, this is why you are pursuing far right politics, you're generalising against entire groups of people for your own political ends.
How do you listen to Dawkins and not hear what he has to say? he is against all religions (as am I). He considers Islam to be the most dangerous of them, as do I. With regard to the Iranians. I know plenty personally. I think they are cool and have much to be proud of. However your view is too simplistic (a common theme in your argument). It is not the cool Iranians I'm talking about, it is the Pasdaran and Quds (you know who these are, right?), and the fact they export terror. You keep banging on about how peaceful the Muslims in India are. Well, Muslims are constrained when they are dominated by 800 million pissed off Hindus (who are heartily sick and tired of their fellow Muslims - which you would know if you followed what many Hindus say since they had to resist Muslim aggression for several hundred years).
I believe that good inherently always wins out, because if something like a mass Islamification of the world were to ever become close to reality then people like me would, as my grandfather did against the nazis, fight for our freedom, but again, there's no real threat from that from Islam right now, not even close, and again, in contrast, from the far right, there absolutely is.
Lol. You are wrong. Look at the numbers. With the exception of Russia, there are a few tens of thousands of right wing dickheads about. I'll be generous and give you one hundred thousand active fskers in Europe (again, excluding the massive problem in Russia). There are 1.6 *billion* Muslims in the world and every Friday the majority of them are exposed to shit like this:
Your mistake is thinking this preacher is an extremist. He's not. He is following the mainstream Muslim view that you can find from Birmingham to Jakarta. I have to keep saying it because you keep missing the whole point. Don't listen to what I say, listen to what they say. Have you got that yet? no, you are fixated on me and trying to ad-hominem me so you don't actually have to do any work and go and find out what the Muslims are actually saying. Intellectually lazy.
I believe that good inherently always wins out, because if something like a mass Islamification of the world were to ever become close to reality then people like me would, as my grandfather did against the nazis, fight for our freedom, but again, there's no real threat from that from Islam right now, not even close, and again, in contrast, from the far right, there absolutely is.
With 1.6 billion and growing you think that leaving it until the last minute to protect your freedom will work? The US doesn't believe so and they are much much stronger than puny Britain. Chamberlain's strategy didn't work in 1938 and only a fool would think the same mistake would work now. No wonder Britain is progressively being colonized without a fight when there people too lazy to do the research, let alone stand up for encroachments on their existing rights.
Consider this - replace muslims/Islam with jews/Judaism and recognise that your argument is exactly that used by Nazi apologists in the
You have me wrong. I'm not from the Far Right, I vehemently reject the ideology of the Far Right, and I vehemently reject extremists as you do. In fact, I'm a lefty, but that doesn't mean I lack a spine and will turn a blind eye as most lefties do. What I'm arguing for is to recognize evil for what it is and nip it in the bud, before you and I, or our descendants have to go and do what your grandfather did.
The reason I pick on Islam is because in the last two decades that has become the religion that seeks to impose its will in a violent manner in far more instances than the other religions. This is undeniable. What is also undeniable is that this has become a trend for the worse - thanks to the spread of Wahabism and Salafism taking over from 'moderate' Islamists.
I too have come around to disliking all religions because, thanks to the insights of Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins I've now aware of what is going on in the World. I urge you to listen to what Christopher Hitchens and Dawkins have to say. They are not saying it because they want to hate Muslims. They say what they say because the West is being lied to - both by the propagandists of Islam (where lying is legitimized through a principle called 'taqiyya') and by the Westerners themselves - who mistake Islam as a religion in the same vein as Christianity, Hinduism, Judasim etc. Islam is not, it is a combination of religion and political system, and the commandments of that religion are to take over the World (as I keep saying, go and Google the commandments in the Qur'an; they are actually worse than the disgraceful barbarism of the bible). Before it was less of a problem, the Wahabbi, Salafi and Iranian agenda has always been to spread their flavour of Islam throughout the World. The problem now is that vast gobs of Saudi money have now gone to preaching this and this is why this extremism is spreading so rapidly: from the Arab Sudanese killing the animists in Sudan; the Afghan Taliban and the Pakistani Taliban; the Hamas; elements of the Brotherhood; jihadis still operating in Iraq; jihadis now operating in Syria; Hezbollah; the Chechens; etc etc You can't fight and sustain wars without money, and most of that is coming from the Saudi vs Iranian power play now going on as they strive to first defeat each other in a stealth conflict, and then spread further afield.
From Britain have you not seen the Muslims from your own country shouting, "Death to America! Death to Israel! Death to Britain!". Did you not realise that your schools all serve halal meat in their canteens. Surely you also know of the Sharia courts operating in parallel to your existing courts. Of course, you have read the Qur'an and hadiths and realise that Sharia is completely and fundamentally incompatible with the modern rights of women and homosexuals. Then there is the polygamy that is being legalised in Europe - but only for Muslim men, since they are special and don't have to obey the same rules as the rest of is (to try and apply Engligtenment values to everyone is 'culturally insenstive' don't you know?). Does this not concern you at all? You do realise what we are seeing now is the 'thin end of the wedge' and that no amount of appeasement will stop the incessant demands and progressive Islamicisation of Britain. I have zero issue with Muslims apply their own standards to themselves in the own countries, but when it becomes imposed on others that is where I feel I need to stand and make a statement. There is nothing Far Right in this at all.
Actually, it is worrying that you automatically assume that anyone who defends Enlightenment values is automatically seen as Far Right to you. The Far Right may end up in a similar position, resisting the progressive Islamicization of Britain, but their route to get their is completely different (and IMHO, disgustingly racist).
Don't fume about whether I'm right wing or not (I'm not, I'm like Christopher Hitchens and Pat Condell, instrinsically lefty but infuriated with the moral corrupt
Do you feel that if ICE says something, it must be true? that they'd never be wrong?
Prove that the Antiguan sites were blocked for *censorship* reasons. That is the thrust of your argument. Yes, ICE could lie, if so it should be easy for you to prove it in this case. Can you prove that those sites were innocent? can you prove that they were censored for presumably political reasons? do you believe that that sites should be blocked/taken down if they are involved in international criminal trafficking?
I'm a New Zealander and I'm disgusted the way that my Government has kowtowed in the Kim Dotcom case, and in how the US has behaved. However, he ain't no saint - his site was designed to support piracy. It is a slippery slope between MegaUpload and Google but the difference is *intent*. There are plenty of emails captured (maybe not legally, but that is moot) that show he and his staff encouraged use of the site for piracy. You need more than a fig leaf to defy the law.
We can agree the US should up its game. I'm glad you clarified your position. You may have been thinking in your head that handing over to the UN is a last resort, but that is not what your posts said (I just re-read them). Your posts talk about how the US seized legitimate web businesses and you made the assertion that this was for censorship reasons of some kind (including economic competition I guess). This is false. Please accept this.
and understand why your fear of "the Islamists" is clouding your judgement,
I don't *fear* the Islamists (by this I mean, Hamas, Iran and the Salafis - if you know the differences). What I do is *listen to what they are actually saying* and *watching what they are actually doing* in the court of public opinion, the UN, and in the countries of the World (eg. Bulgaria, Thailand, Georgia, Argentina, India etc etc if you don't know the significance of each of these countries then you haven't been paying attention and shouldn't be commenting about something you don't know about). Now your argument seems to be that because various parts of the UN have no power to enforce resolutions without either a majority or consensus then that means everything is will be ok. Weak argument, IMHO. Even bogus resolutions have been increasingly used for propaganda purposes and have been used to shape public opinion. This has been warping the situation around the world for some time now - and resulting in increased problems and deaths. Just look at the facts and then look for the numerous bogus UN resolutions or commission reports (the Goldstone report being a classic case of assertions without evidence being swallowed by the UN, and then used as if it was factual, even though it was easy to disprove). Then look for the consequences of these bogus UN resolutions or reports - they are inflaming situations around the globe. Shitty internet governance decisions at the ITU will have an impact far greater than the simplistic strictly legalistic interpretation you are talking about. Plus, all it takes are some small changes to the ITU rules and you are in a world of trouble (the same cannot be said for the US, the Free Speech rights in the Constitution that cannot be trumped). These are some of the reasons why the EU, US and people like Vint Cerf are opposed to this move (and I am too).
You're being irrational, your arguments are based on unsound premises.
Nope. You don't understand the Salafis at all and haven't been watching them at work. It is not simple paranoia on my part, it is careful observation from multiple sources, plus the enlightened observations of folks like Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Pat Condell that have been pointing out the differences between what the Islamic World say (ya know, the dudes that want the ITU change and have been trying to get criticism of religion equated with hate speech), and what they say in their own languages and behind closed doors. Have you done th
You realise the US is a member of certain voting blocs right?
Yes, but *you* miss the point (hence your disingenuous 'weasel words' yourself). The US-led voting bloc (that is, countries sharing Enlightenment values) is outnumbered by the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement combined with the Islamic countries. Just look at the content of many of UN resolutions, they all go against what the US would like. Your antipathy to the US is masking your thinking. Yes the US leads a block, but that is completely irrelevant to the discussion we are having because this block is not the most significant in the UN. The bloc formed by countries that far more intereference in their national Internets has greater numbers. Hence, handing over the Internet to the UN is seen as dangerous for those countries that seek to preserve Enlightenment values (albiet imperfectly). This is why both the EU and US have come out as saying it is a bad idea. It is a shame your thinking is so anti-US biased you simply don't get it.
The WTO found against the US in it's attack on Antiguan gambling sites, and yet despite this the US still continues to censor those sites. It's doing so without even the law on it's side.
Your argument is laughable. Because the US banned Antiguan gambling sites the Internet should be handed over to a voting block heavily influenced by Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, China and other paragons of a free and uncensored Internet. You simply have no idea about what you are arguing for. It just seems you are aguing against the US, but don't really have a decent perspective on the overall issue (nb: I'm not a US citizen, so don't bother with the ad-hominem).
Oh, and by the way. The Antiguan sites were shut down because they were involved in $3 billion dollars worth of fraud and money laundering. A trivial Google seach would have shown you this. Notice how the US also leaves plenty of other gambling sites alone - ya know, the ones not involved in laundering for international criminals. Again, you are so happy to hate the US you don't even bother to check the reason the US shut down those sites (and just as importantly, left all the other gambling sites in the World alone). Perhaps you should take some time to examine your own bias (which leads you to accept facts without looking at the counter-argument in case it has validity), and also take the time to do research rather than simply bash the US (despite it being very fashionable these days by the poorly informed).
So now that your flimsy *censorship* argument has been shot down, do you still think it is a good idea to hand the Internet over to voting blocs that would ban *all gambling* (not just the criminal launderers) ? ya know, like the Islamists? to have an anti-US bias so strong as to not consider a reasonable when it has been presented is pretty lame. Handing the Internet to countries far worse than the US is a complete mistake.
The US does not generally censor. It removes sites for legal reasons *and these legal reasons can be challenged* - all you have to do is hire a lawyer.
The countries that do practice censorship are the ones that form voting blocs in the UN (refer to the video in my first post).
Just because the current regulation of the Internet has flaws does not mean handing it over to the UN would solve the issues. In fact, it is far far more likely to get worse - which is our point. So what is the point you are trying to make, that having the UN regulate the Internet would be better and give more Freedom than now? I don't think that is a realistic position (gambling is very likely to become banned, as is pornography, sites criticising religion, political sites, whistleblowing sites etc etc).
The flaws in the current system should be talked about and corrected (eg. by supporting the EFF and others). Simply handing the Internet over to the control of the UN is not going to solve the issues, in fact it is far more likely to make it worse and you'll have no recourse to correct it (unlike now). So please get real.
When I was an undergrad, I knew a lot of professors in the EE department who used Matlab to do computationally intense signal processing, and I know people in the CS department here who use Matlab for image processing work (and they would rule out both Java and any functional language for that work).
Matlab is ok (I use Octave from time to time). However, it not not really a general purpose solution. If you get to work outside your university you will come up against them. That is part of the problem with our discussion I think. From your post you are an academic working in CS department. Well, I'm an ex-academic (astrophysics) who gained sufficient energy to reach a free state. I work outside of university and get to build real systems in the non-ideal world outside the Ivory Tower. I'm not saying your observations are invalid, they just aren't practical with the variable quality of people you have out here.
With regard to the "extra effort" you suppose. Well, I'm well aware of the psychological limits of working memory because I also am trained in the Information Mapping methodology of technical writing (and have do aviation, where those limits were found). I continue to disagree with you. Making variables and breaking long chains of calls up helps debug unfamiliar code (eg. written by someone else, or yourself many years ago) because the machine can help you with it. You don't have to remember all the variables because you've given them great names like "specificImpulseNetwons" or "annualInterestRate". Note how units become important. I could rant how the CS that I learned as an undergraduate placed emphasis on the wrong things for industry: like worrying about how few lines a toy program can be reduced to; how making yet another language will solve all programming problems (for a specific domain); like proving the algorithmic complexity for some obscure domain. Don't confuse that with teaching students useful things; like always thinking about the units they are working in (failing to do so will famously get your Mars Rover crashed), or how to design stuff to be as simple as possible (so lesser programmers can build and maintain it), how to get sh!t done quickly, give them 'religion' about testing or how to write robust software (hints: test, check your preconditions always, validate input data, assume that the stuff can fail at any time and fall back to a safe checkpoint state, etc).
It is not very useful to continue this debate. You are interested in languages (for the sake of it I would assume, given your career is CS) and in constructs that are easy to teach. I'm interested in getting big projects done, getting them done on time, getting a team to produce it, making it bulletproof, and making it so that it can be deployed and maintained by folks who don't know anything about programming. This is why I recommended Java, and why so many enterprises use it - and because there is not yet a sensible alternative to it (yes, yes, the good is the enemy of the great - but I'd rather choose a good general purpose language over a great limited purpose language because of the enormous economic benefits of re-use).
Don't believe me (I'm a nobody), but listen to Vint Cerf :)
Look, with regard to the threat to Internet Freedom you don't have to take my word for it. You might take Vint Cerf's though (I'm sure you you know who he is, right?). http://googleblog.blogspot.co.nz/2012/12/keep-internet-free-and-open.html
I'm afraid it appears that it is *you* who has an incomplete understanding of the issue. I hope the link I've provided prompts you to do more research
Anti-religious statements are Free Speech criticism and this is not necessarily intolerance
With regard to the anti-Islamic tone of my post. Yes, it is anti-Islamic - because "true" Islam is an evil death cult that is manipulated by the unscrupulous (which is bad enough) and has as a core principle the desire to impose itself on the entire world (that's where it affects me, and I'm have the right to oppose it). The imposition is by force if necessary. Again, I am not saying this on my own authority, but you could listen to what Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Pat Condell or Sam Harris have to say about this. It is very worthwhile to take the time to listen to Hitch on YouTube, he's hilarious yet far more insightful than nearly anyone else you'll come across on the matter (certainly not the poorly informed and woolly-headed apologists you see on mainstream media).
Understanding Salafi Islam :) ). Please do your research. On YouTube find out what the jihadis and salafis are actually saying in arabic (the latter part is very important, the principle of taqiyya means they can and will lie to you in English if it promotes the goals of Islam - again, plenty of examples of this on YouTube if you care to look).
The fact that you don't understand what Islam actually commands shows you don't know diddly about the Qur'an or hadiths (I suggest taking a peruse, as I did), and you certainly are not listening to what the Salafis, Wahabbis, Jihadis are *actually saying* (in short, you have willful cognitive dissonance). Again, you have an incomplete understanding and you desperately need to do some research (which I urge you to do, while the free media still exists
How good human beings are 'bad' in a religious sense
Now I like my friends who are Muslim, they are good people. That doesn't mean I can't dislike Islam and call it out for what it *actually* is (not what its apologists and propagandists would like you to believe it is). Now the fact that you consider an anti-Islamic post to be bad shows you are missing several vital points (no surprise, you are still in 'The Matrix', so to speak).
It's pe
Kia Ora cuz! I live in New Zealand too (for the benefit of everyone else).
I wholeheartedly support your sentiments. For me the thing is is, ICANN has to obey the laws and courts of the US where Free Speech is protected (vigorously, but outfits like the EFF and supported by the courts). Once the UN gets its mitts on the Internet there is no way anyone can try and influence it. Furthermore, the UN is corrupt in the sense that the resolutions that get passed don't actually match its founding ideals - yet there is nothing the citizens of the World can actually do about it.
Corruption of the UN
Why is the UN this way? unfortunately it is due to past and future conflicts (a legacy of the Cold War, and now influenced by the rise of global Jihad and Salafism). I refer you to this video for an overview (mid-way describes how the Non-Aligned and Islamic movements have joined to form a voting bloc to defeat the interests of the US, Israel and much of the 'Western' World):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7Mupoo1At8
Case History - reasons to oppose the move
Now some on these forums have argued that the ITU has been good at what it does. This is entirely true. However, I would argue that this was precisely because the ITU held no power that it has avoided the manipulating interest of special groups. Once the ITU actually got power could those special interest groups warp the normal process and corrupt the ITU in the same way that voting the UN General Assembly has been corrupted by voting blocs? Well, I'll give two examples for consideration:
One doesn't have to be an astrophysicist (although I am/was :) ) to see how these examples are the representative of possible future trouble if the Internet was to slip out from ICANN's protection.
Let's not give up our open Internet, and other Freedoms without making a fuss, eh?
someObj.someMethod(if(x == 2) { 5; } else { 10; });
Aarrrrghhh!!!!!111 Surely you would never *teach* students such monstrosities. The idea is to keep it simple, one statement or side effect per line of code. This helps you when you wave your debugger over the code, since it will automagically highlight the result of the statement. This also helps the people reading your program (and source code is meant for people firstly). You are trying to write Java in non-Java different style, no wonder that code you gave is so hideous. Of course, the Java compiler is so damn efficient that extra assignments for debugging and readability are no problem at all - let the machine mash the code, not you. Trying to mash everything into one line is for C and LISP coders (which I was at one time so I recognize the same style), not for someone used to multiple 1080p displays. Newlines really aren't that expensive, dontcha know?
As a language, Java is pretty awful; you are stuck with a single programming paradigm even in cases where that paradigm makes no sense, you are writing enormous amounts of code to express what you are trying to do, and features that programmers in other languages take for granted are just not there (or are very limited). Meanwhile, you have Scala and Clojure on the JVM -- so why not just use these where functional approaches make sense, like for parallel algorithms?
I would argue that Java is more general purpose than Scala or Clojure, at least for the kind of problems I'm often trying to solve (eg. device control, 3D graphics, medical applications, numerical modelling etc). Perhaps Scala and Clojure fit your/people's problem domains, if so, then I have no problem with people using them. Don't mistake that for being useful in the outside (non-teaching) world. Note also that functional constructs do have some overheads that iterative-style code does not (where the latter is not exclusive to, but more in Java's 'style', yeah?). For my problems that are massively iterative (eg. some parts of graphics, numericals) this does make a difference, and the functional constructs are unnatural and used so infrequently to be useless. The usefulness of threading is above this (eg. the multi-threading is coarse grained and limited to a few dozen threads, again functional programming doesn't offer enough of an advantage in this regard).
Back to your teaching. Surely new students follow the deterministic procedural code better at the start than having lots of anonymous closures popping up all over the place? It is more advanced users that like the constructs that bring them home to the Source, that is, LISP.
Yes, they should have used the ternary operator.
No they should not have. The ternary operator is for C programmers making the jump. Again, newlines are not expensive. There is nothing wrong with making an if statement and assigning to a variable. Then give the output of that variable to your function call. One statement or side-effect per line. The compiler can make this fast. Someone who is not you can read the code without thinking about it (unless they are snob, and think the code is too simple and should be slightly obfuscated in the way you have shown). With lines split out in this way you get to put a debugger on the statement you want because multiple statements are not mashed together, and again, the debugger will automagically show you the value of the variable or expression as you move you mouse over it (less clicking is good, yeah?).
If aiming for simplicity is good enough for Einstein and Steve Jobs, then who am I (or you?) to argue? As they say, "You can write bad FORTRAN in any language" and your example proves it. Just because Java (and all other languages) allow obfuscated constructs because people think terse code is better (it's not!) and those that write terse code are better coders (not true, such things are only held in esteem by those lacking several decades of experienc
Actually you don't need functional. Java works fine with multi-threading (well, it does for my daily use). In fact, that is the real strength of the garbage collection model of Java, it can track and manage efficient release of resources in a multi-threaded system. Also Java has direct language support for synchronization mechanisms and extensive library support for multi-thread friendly data structures (Doug Leah is a legend!). Lots and lots of multi-threaded programs get written in Java, without needing functional languages, it's just that we we do write them they do work (after we test for various possible thread-related problems), work well, and we don't have to bitch about needing to change paradigms to get things going (eg. needing to change to functional languages when they are not always the best fit for many classes of problem).
Of course you'll hear those still stuck on legacy languages designed without multi-threading in mind whinging. That doesn't mean there isn't a straightforward, easy to learn language and development platform out there that isn't strong on multi-threading. There is - and it is cross-platform and general purpose too.
Absolute rubbish. Postgesql handles massive data sets and can scale down to run on modest hardware (with a multitude of choices in *free as in beer* operating systems). So I wonder what evidence you have to support your counter-factual statements?
Oracle is indeed king of the heap with regards to power and features. It also costs an insane amount of money. Unless you want to support Larry Ellison's habit of picking up women he wants to shag by offering them Ferraris (or so the stories go), then Postgresql is probably your next best bet.
Interesting comment. MS SQL Server Locking is painful compared to Postgres when you have a huge number of transactions going on (per-page rather than per-row in general). Also, internationalization support in Postgresql is better (in my experience) - which matters if a single server is to provide data for users all over the world. MS SQL Server is fast, but this is for a reason, it cuts corners in some areas. Speed alone is a good enough reason to use SQL Server, but for most uses Postgresql is actually superior (again, in my experience writing global-reach internationalized applications).
Islam and islamic countries won't take over the world by conventional means. How it will happen is the same way it happened to Rome. At the moment there is a creeping process of islamicisation, under the guise of "niceness", "political correctness", "promotion of community cohesion" and other nice-sounding but basically appeasement terms.
Take a look at Britain. They are further along this path than the US. In Britain school cafeterias only sell halal meat. In Britain sharia courts operate in parallel to the normal courts. In Britain protesters take to the streets and openly chant death to Britain. If we switch countries there was a man beaten by muslims in Australia for drinking beer (beer is a core part of being australian, far more so than most countries). In France we have muslim zones of cities that even the police dare not enter. In the US we have universities (that should be bastions of Free Speech) change their rules so that people cannot shake hands, because muslims said they would be offended. In the United Nations it is becoming a crime to make statements that offend religion (meaning, you can't criticize Islam for the inhuman and barbaric death cult it is) - which is a loss of Free Speech (as Free Speech includes the right to offend, otherwise there is no Free Speech). Then we have mainstream new media afraid to report true events because of the violence that would be perpetrated against them by jihadis. Then we have the United Nations denounce Israel for human rights violations when it is defends its sovereign territory against violent jihadis trying to commit genocide and remove all unbelievers from the region - meanwhile the UN does nothing against the war criminals who deliberately target civilians (as as I write, have new rockets being shipped from Banda Abbas in Iran because satellites have already picked the rocket loading into the ship and it leaving port bound for Sudan, where they are smuggled to Gaza).
So, our laws and customs are slowly being islamicised by the 'political correct'. There is no need for the jihadis to physically conquer the US, because islamic law will already be in place before they get there. And very very few people are even awake to what is happening. Those that are warning of the danger are often silenced, read this article for some facts (although the article itself is hyperbole): http://themuslimissue.wordpress.com/2012/11/20/obama-admin-pentagon-islam-expert-fired-for-telling-the-truth-about-islamist-infiltration-in-white-house-and-caliphate-plan/
The words you want to look at in Google is: "Caliphate" and "Salafism". The troubles in the world become less random once you are aware of these :)
Excellent point!
Actually, Japan did declare war and it was intended to be delivered just before the Pearl Harbour attack, but the Japanese decoders took too long to decipher the message for it to be delivered in time. The US decoders had intercepted the message and were able to decode most of it - I guess this was probably before the attack since negotiations were going on (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Pearl_Harbor#Japanese_declaration_of_war ). Naturally, the US used this for propaganda purposes without emphasing what really went on (and they didn't want anyone to know they could read Japanese transmissions, did they?).
I don't blame the US government in this, the US citizens at the time could hardly be roused to the massive threat of Imperial Japan (just as they cannot be roused to worry about the threat from growing international militant Islam).
You are right. States not declaring war is bad form - although it is not prohibited or a 'war crime'.
These actions have no military purpose, as far as I understand it they are motivated by hate, religious indoctrination and the need of groups like Hamas to gain prestige to perpetuate their rule.
Unfortunately this is true. There is nothing Israel can do (or interestingly, has done) that can change this. The Qur'an and hadiths command faithful muslims to kill all unbelievers. Only 'bad' muslims ignore these commands (just as 'bad' christians and jews ignore the various bits of insanity in their scriptures). So unfortunately as an Israeli there is nothing you can do, except try not to hurt the innocent and always keep your guard up. Always.
Fortunately the rest of the world is slowly waking up to what is actually going on. It used to be the narrative that the Palestinians were poor victims and there were many protests in the West. In the last bout of fighting only the historically ignorant 'new left' diehards still believe in the helpless Palestinian story. What I found remarkable is that there were so few anti-Israeli protests in the West and very many messages of understanding for the Israeli situation on places such as YouTube. If Israel strives to keep the moral high ground (trying not to hurt the innocent, trying to keep its crazy settlers in check) then the World will notice, and is noticing - for what it is worth.
Don't let the rants of the historically ignorant change get you down :)
Should the allies then have designated the entire german population as enemy combatants?
The Germans were happy to kill Allied civilians. The Allies returned the favour and firebombed whole cities - and I'm glad they did. Whatever had to be done to stop the Nazis from winning had to be done.
Hamas is happy to kill its own and Israeli citizens. When Israel responded in the latest bout, trying not to hurt Palestinian civilians, we get whiners complaining that the IDF is not perfect in weeding out the terrorists from the women and children they're deliberately hiding behind. IMHO this is wrong (both Hamas' actions, and the Western whiners). The war against extremists is something we have to win, and we will have to do whatever it takes. Now this doesn't mean we can ignore the Rules of War and International commitments - it just means that the First Rule of War is to win (not only by military means, also by improving the conditions of moderate Palestinians). But once you have won the war you have to win the peace too.
Israel doesn't claim Gaza. Until recently it was Egyptian, then the Israelis captured it in a war. The Palestinians killed Israelis and fired rockets, stating correctly that it was "occupied". The Israelis unilaterally withdrew from the area in 2005. Fatah and Hamas then fought over the strip, and Hamas won (often by throwing captured Fatah supporters off buildings). Hamas continues to launch terror attacks from there. The (mainstream) Israelis don't claim Gaza, they "mow the lawn" to reduce the number of terror attacks from there against southern Israel. How could you comment and not know this?
However the Israelis made a fundamental mistake that by removing themselves from Gaza that this would satisfy Hamas since it was no longer occupying Gaza. Unfortunately the view of Hamas is that having Israel anywhere in the region is "occupation". Even if the Israelis went back to the pre-1948 borders Hamas would still not be satisfied. They do not and, it appears, will not recognize any right for Israel to exist. They consider Israel's existence as "occupation". No amount of concession or appeasement will satisfy Hamas or induce Hamas to stop its terror attacks.
Now if you think Hamas is bad, worse it yet to come. As horrific as Hamas are to their own people (check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQib6e41N7Y), and terrible to Israelis (doesn't matter if they are women and children or not), the Salafi movement that are growing in Gaza (and in the Islamic World) wants to do the same to you. Their goal is a single government under Allah, called the "Caliphate" and you are standing in their way. Even other muslims who are not considered "islamic enough" are killed without hesitation by Salafis. The Israelis are only the first Western people to be hammered by this madness (of course, lots of muslims have suffered for a long time - but we never bothered to notice). Every other Westerner is next once the Israelis have been taken out. But don't believe me, simply go on to YouTube and listen to the pronouncements of muslims worldwide (in France, Britain, behind closed doors in the US etc etc). Most muslims are good people - but a Salafi mob makes the brutal Taliban look like schoolgirls.
Also don't forget that the Palestinians attempted to take over Jordan (although, if you go back through history, Jordan *is* the eastern part of Palestine, and Palestinians and Jordanians are the same people [apart from the large proportion of Egyptians and Sudanese in what the media calls 'Palestinians']). I digress ... Anyway, here's a link for those interested in a snippet of history almost never mentioned in Western media:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
Many thanks.
I try my best, within the limitations of a fallible primate - which is why I like your signature quote so much :) Here's a longer-winded gem from the famous Carl Sagan, just in case you haven't come across is before:
In science it often happens that scientists say, "You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken," and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
With regard to the rights of citizens in civilized countries. The laws in each country are starting to influence each other (politicians see ideas from elsewhere). We have to stand together to be strong (lol, this the original definition of fascism, from the symbolic 'fascia' bundle).
Peace (but not appeasement), solidarity (but not fascism), harmony (but not oppression) :)
Well put. The reason I called it "fundamental" is because it was one of the principles used to found the colonies. Not the word "privacy" per-se, but that by default the government has no business being in your life. The government does not make tradeoffs granting you liberty vs restrictions they want. The idea is you start free, is it not? you don't have to request your freedoms as concessions from the government, this idea is you are born with them. Now it may not work out like this in practice in the modern world, but innate freedom was part of the ideals founding the US, unless I'm badly mistaken. That is what makes it "fundamental" (for US citizens at least).
While I like your argument to me it seems flawed. You do not actually horse-trade liberties with the government, because the US government cannot take your rights away from you (although they try, slyly). You permit the government to do certain things for the common benefit, it is a concession the people allow, not a negotiation. The government has no inherit right to demand these things from you. It is a subtle but absolutely crucial difference. If one doesn't grasp this difference then one can't make the correct argument, and we'll end up conceeding our own liberties unnecessarily. It is very very important to understand the starting point, the people do not trade liberties with a government entitled to make demands. People allow the government to take actions on their behalf - and the people can change their minds (eg. by electing new representatives that change the laws; such as a coloured president with a dovish and progressive agenda).
The government is allowed to take reasonable actions as a means toward its ends.
The government cannot take actions that are against existing laws. There are laws in the US that protect privacy. So far the court has an injunction that prevents the school from forcing the student to wear RFID. Meanwhile it figures out which of any laws that affect the issue should come into play. Whether or not something is 'reasonable' holds far far less weight then what the statute books say. Again, the US government is not controlled by what is reasonable, it is controlled by statutes. It appears that the court has ruled that the student does not have to submit to surveillance. The same applies to the US government. When they overstep the mark they can be prosecuted based on legal grounds whether what they have done is reasonable or not. This is one reason the US government is petrified of wikileaks and whistleblowers, they know they are doing things they should not.
Implied powers have been a part of our government since the very beginning you can look it up if you want.
Implied powers apply to Congress and relate to powers not explicitly stated in the US Constitution that *are necessary to exercise the powers that are* (explicitly laid out in the Constitution). Any implied powers can be traced back to the Constitution even if not explicitly listed there. I wonder which clause in the Constitution you think allows government (or schools) to conduct routine surveillance on its citizens (pupils). The implied powers do not mean what you think they do. Congress cannot simply make up powers that they want, such as tracking citizens. It has to make a law first if it wants to do that. Furthermore, branches of the government that are not Congress don't have implied power - they have zero power apart from those granted by the legislative branch (that is, they have no implied power, as you appear to claim). A school certainly has no power to compel a student to forgo privacy (as is her claim, and the has agreed with her as it does its research to consider all the relevant legislation).
The particulars of the technology are irrelevant. The courts have decided for now that RFID tracking may not be imposed on the student. Yes, I understand the difference between GPS and RFID (I'm an ex-astrophysicist, so probably understand a lot better than most).