Indeed, and I believe when asked "What more can I do?" Christ replied "Sell all you own and give the money to the poor". Unfortunately that particular commandment doesn't gel quite as well with free market libertarianism, so I'm presuming you're going to either ignore or "interpret" (as in, read it to mean "well, donate a little of something to charity, but obviously don't sell all you own" or some such) that one.
I don't really do either. One problem I have with Christians (and non-Christians) trying to interpret what the Bible is teaching is when they pick a single verse or just a few verses without looking at the chapter, and even the book, as a whole.
The verses you quoted from are from Matthew 19. I don't have my Bible handy, but I believe they're verses 19ish to 22ish.
The important verse here is around verse 26, and paraphrased it says that Jesus looked at them and said (paraphrasing again) "With people it's impossible, but with God everything is possible."
Basically, Christ was giving the man the answer that the man wanted from his question "What can I, a person, do?" Christ said do more, but then He finishes with "but man can not do enough, only God can."
It's a great set of verses because it shows that Christ was speaking for God, not for man. Man can do nothing, only God can. The most important verse in the Bible comes a little later in Matthew 24:34 "Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place." He was telling those in His generation that before they are dead and gone, ALL things prophecized would take place. And they did. It was finished before some of those people tasted death -- and man didn't do it.
I accept that people believe that God never existed, and I am in no place to try to prove it to them. I came to believing in God fairly late in life myself, having some deistic beliefs but nothing concrete.
So God used to get involved with people, but no longer does? He used to help save the child from death at the hands of a lunatic, but now he no longer does? What made him stop? If he used to stop suffering, why is there a plethora of evidence of suffering during the period that you claim he was active in the world?
Well, I believe that God only got actively involved with a few people, notably the prophets, and only was involved in building the history of man's lack of ability to follow God's Plan. In fact, I believe that the Old Testament was entirely "designed" to prove that man can NEVER meet God's desires for man, which is why Christ was necessary for all men, believers and non-believers alike.
Some of the suffering may have been judgment by God towards people who had God's plan at hand and refused to follow it. Some of it may just be natural choices those people made. A lot of suffering I see today with my own eyes (and in person) can be avoided in the future if people would take responsibility for their future, rather than rely on others to lead them there. It is sad, and I help as many people as I can, but I also believe that we must prepare for events by being more responsible today.
"Paleo" meaning old, Wesleyan meaning following the path of the Wesleyan movement. Paleo-Wesleyan may have been coined by me, actually, but it generally means Wesleyans who haven't had their faith perverted by the more modern interpretations of the Bible. I work with some Wesleyan congregations that are of both views, actually.
This doesn't make sense to a scientist. You're basically saying causality, chaos, and random interactions are part of God's creation - these very concepts are often the arguments against the existence of God. Or, are you saying that God is involved at some level in the evolution of life. If so, why is God able to get involved in the evolution of life but not able to stop the death of a child at the hands of a maniac?
Considering that I grew up with more scientific training and almost no faith in my young life, I would say it still makes perfect sense.
God created the universe, and the natural laws the universe follows. To think that evolution (macro or micro) isn't part of God's creation would mean that God didn't create everything.
I don't believe God gets involved in the world any longer. My Biblical views show that God is reigning in Heaven, having fulfilled all that He needs to fulfill with His plan for the mortal world. I don't believe God smites people, judges homosexuals, or blesses or curses individuals or groups of individuals. What He did to the ancient Israelites was the end of what He said He would do, and that's it.
Nice statistics, probably written by the teachers' unions.
The definition of literacy has dropped in scope, so today's "literacy" is merely a function of using phonics to read versus being able to comprehend what one has read, and being able to dictate an understanding of what they've read.
Ask any English teacher over the age of 50 what they think of today's literacy rates. They'll generally tell you that kids today are idiots, and most can't comprehend Shakespeare let alone the newspaper.
Actually, if you believed what Christ said, you'd know that this statement is completely false. There are a bunch of verses for you if you're willing to look, however, I suspect you are a Pauline onlyist or worse, one of those that tossed out the bible in favor of a gnostic approach.
I'm not a Pauline only-ist for sure, and I'm not gnostic in any way, shape or form. My Biblical beliefs go back to the beliefs of Origen, Eusebius of Caesarea, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus and other "early fathers" of the early Church.
Read Matt 5 where Messiah said not one jot or tittle will pass from Torah (the law) until all is fulfilled. While I realize you are a Preterist, and think that all scripture was fulfilled by AD 70, you have to also realize that as long as heaven and earth exist, the Torah exists.
The term "Heaven and Earth" throughout the Old Testament, where it was used, referenced the covenantal Jewish "Temple" system, and not the physical heavens and physical earth. It is a common mistake that Futurists make, and one that is quite easily (but time consuming) debated down. When the Temple fell, as Christ prophecized, the Old Covenant passed and brought forth the New Covenant of God. "Heaven and Earth" did pass away.
Additionally, your particular stance makes Christ into a false prophet (Deut 13) who couldn't possibly by the Messiah taught in Torah. Christ's own words should tell you that HE is the one foretold in Torah (John 5:46) I could go on further, if you'd like.
Maybe I misspoke, I'll have to go back to see, but I do concur with what you said and those are my beliefs fully.
As for all the other things mentioned in your post, I generally agree with you. I'd even go much further, I don't think creationism and science are as mutually exclusive as many believe. My kids know and understand more about evolution than most kids their age, and yet are creationists. It hasn't stunted their intellectual growth a single bit, as creationism is more philosophical an argument, while evolution is a scientific one.
But you as a parent have that responsibility, not teacher-leaders. YOU are the true leader of your children until they accept their individual responsibility to lead themselves: for right and for wrong. It is not the President's place to lead, but to follow. It is not a teacher's place to lead, but to follow the path to what the student paid them to teach.
The funniest thing about evolutionism is that it actually teaches people to not be critical, but blindly accept the dogma of the current scientific world, which is hardly scientific. Evolution isn't a fact, yet it is taught that way. It is nothing more than a best guess based upon facts that ignore irregularities. It is useful in the same sense that Newton's gravitational constant is useful, but wrong.
That so true, I concur fully.
Lastly, one day, I'd like a chance to discuss your faith (Christian Preterism) in relationship to mine. I wonder if you have a clue what my faith is.
Any time! We can even do it public via slashdot's user-diary system if you like.
Hi, I've been looking for a Christian who believes evolution poses no problem to Christianity for a few months. May I ask you a question?
You may ask me many questions here or via email, but please note that my views come from actually studying the Bible and Christian/Jewish history. My views were not taught to me by fallible men ("pastors") but by actually reading, pondering, and debating the beliefs out there. While I am a Christian, I am considered a heretic by some, and have been actively excommunicated from some Christian communities.
How do you deal with the problem of original sin? I see the problem as thus: If evolution is true, there was no literal Adam. If there was no Adam, there was no "fall". If there was no fall, what do we require Jesus to "save" us from?
I don't believe in Adam as an actual "first figure." Neither do many Jews or Jewish scholars. Genesis was written (probably by Moses, as handed down by God to him) thousands of years ago. Not many Jews believe that Genesis is "canonical fact" but instead a way for God to explain His desires to the ancient Israelites.
My views on the story of Adam was to explain to the ancient Israelites that man was fallen from God's high standards from the beginning of man's knowledge of himself. It is very possible to weave evolutionary growth (say, from apes if that's your thing) with the story of Adam. Since all men, once they are self-aware, did not meet God's standards for them, they were sinful.
I do not believe Jesus exists to save US from anything. You as a non-believer should have no fear of anything in your future, because the actions of Jesus are in the very VERY far past. There is no judgment for you, there is no "Hell" or wrath of God facing you for eternity. God loves you, because of what Jesus did, whether you believe it or not. I don't believe you need to ask for anything, because the Bible clearly shows me that everyone is forgiven of falling short of God's standards, because of what Jesus did on His first coming (birth, life, death on the cross, resurrection), and what He finished on his second coming (70 AD, the day the ancient Israelites were destroyed and banished forever, never to return). That's done, it's over with. Live in God's glorious Kingdom today (here on Earth) if you like. If you don't like, don't. It's up to you, really, but please don't fear eternal punishment because it isn't in the Bible.
I (as an ex-Christian) deal with this by saying Christianity is not real. I had a long talk with my father (a conservative evangelical minister) over Christmas, and he feels that evolution would completely undermine his faith so he deals with it by saying evolution is not real.
Sadly, the Evangelicals tend to believe in a lot of the Christian false teachings. They haven't read, studied and understood the Bible, it seems. The idea of Hell doesn't exist in the Bible if you actively READ it, and decipher who it was written to and what it spoke about. In fact, much of the Bible today is irrelevant to living today, it is just a great story of God and Man's progression together to where we are today, with a VERY SMALL bit on how we can live to maximize our mortal lives.
I am quite curious how you feel about this issue. I rewrote this post about 4 times but couldn't find words that I was confident implied I'm not looking for a fight, so I'm resorting to this disclaimer. You'll get nothing but polite and (hopefully) well-thought out responses from me. I look forward to your answer!
It's OK, it's a very difficult set of thoughts to write down because there is so much fear of anger and tragic judgment that usually comes from Christians.
Note to Evangelicals: Yes, I know you disagree with me, that's OK. I'm safe in my views, and I have Biblical proof for all of it.
Yes, there are problems with the educational system in the U.S. Big ones, even. But that doesn't mean that we should give up on the idea of a well-educated populace. A few hundred years ago the notion of universal literacy would have been laughable, but we have multiple societies today where literacy approaches 100%. I can't help but hear "why should we teach those slaves to read?" in your question, though I know you didn't mean it that way.
I take exception to the idea that we have anywhere near 100% literacy in the U.S. Reading various blogs today points to me that this is true. Literacy rates have FALLEN since compulsory education has been forced on us. Literacy rates in the 1800s were higher than they are today. Google old English books from that time frame and see if the kids today can comprehend any of it.
We live in a society of Cliff's Notes and txt5p3k, definitely not a literate society. Just because a person comprehends phonics enough to "read" doesn't mean that they are literate.
With the way organizations like this adhere to biblical writing, one might be able to accuse them of having a book as "god" rather than the apparently supernatural "God of the Gaps" most people seem to engage in their spirituality.
I agree, and I'm a Christian. Biblical writing, especially modern translations, are full of errors because of what common and power-hungry men wanted.
The inerrancy of God seems plausible to me. The in inerrancy of a book seems like sheer insanity.
God is inerrant, that I agree with. The Bible, though, was never MEANT to be "inerrant." Modern Evangelicals call the Bible "The Word", and "The Word" is inerrant in the Bible, but the Bible is not The Word!
For Christians who disagree:
Isaiah 38:4 "Then the word of the LORD came to Isaiah, saying," the word is someone that can speak.
Jeremiah 7:1 "The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, " again, someone that can speak.
Ezekiel 25:1 "And the word of the LORD came to me saying, " same thing.
Zec 6:9 "The word of the LORD also came to me, saying, " Duh.
Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart."
My pastor, who is an Evangelical, holds up the Bible and calls it "the Word" and I cringe. The Word was with God from the beginning, and was God, and was fulfilled by his other name: Jesus. To me, as a Christian, the Word is love. True love, for God, for others, without judgment or hatred or penalty from my hand.
How hard would it be for modern Christians to change from being haters and judges and penalizers, into what Christ truly embodied?
For those who "hate" Christians, would you change your mind if the Christians really loved everyone, and stopped with the stupid harsh judgment and power-mongering that we do today?
You do understand that it was Europe that dumped this religion on us?
No, they didn't. The modern, and very flawed, Evangelical movement was kicked into high gear by some power-hungry madmen by the names of Dwight L. Moody and Cyrus Ingerson Scofield. Moody had a big effect on the British and Irish, actually, promoting their crazed movement there, too.
* I'm a Protestant-leaning Christian, but definitely not of the Evangelical nature. Sadly, most of my friends and family are still under the sway of the madness called the modern Evangelical movement. I also have a soon-to-be-published book (electronic as well) that I'd love to share with slashdot readers who are interested in why it is time for Christianity to take a new direction.
I'm a Christian of the preterist nature. I believe in evolutionary forces as part of God's creation. I don't believe in a 6000-year old Earth (neither do most Jews who hold the Old Testament in a different way than many Christians do). I also think the debate of evolution versus creationism is really repugnant and a waste of time when there are so many other things we can be spending our time on (we meaning "us Christians.")
I can't even begin to count the billions of hours wasted by Christians in living life in ways completely counter to what our God teaches us. Look at the battle over the 10 Commandments, laws of the Israelites' God that have been countermanded by Christ's teaching to a much more simpler set of rules (completely love God first, completely love others second). And yet, when we dig deeper into the "Why" of modern Christian thought, we come up against the same problem that I see in those who are pro-government: we need "leaders" and we need "rules" and we need "penalties" to keep us in line.
What has happened to the powerful individual in today's society? Evolution versus creationism is a debate that strikes at the heart of my question: why is it that we need "teacher-leaders" to stick to a specific standard, rather than what the individual kid in a unique place in their specific city/society needs to be taught? I can't even understand why science is taught to ALL children, along with higher level maths, when the kids today can barely count, let alone read or speak properly. I had a 20-something in my town use a calculator at a checkout line 2 weeks ago when I gave her $21.01 for a $6.06 charge. Unbelievable.
Creationism and evolution are both articles of faith, and really have no purpose for MOST students. Then again, I truly believe that even High School is worthless for 70% of society considering what it is churning out.
All this is fine, but I think we will have to wait another 20+ years for computers to be fast and cheap enough before this becomes a reality.
I'm not sure I agree, only because we're currently considering what horsepower we would need tomorrow to do it the way we do it today. I've looked at the technology many times over 15 years, including writing a few theoretical thoughts that I sold to private developers back in the day. One thing I looked at was a pre-rendered set of values for each object and face that would inflict value changes on other object/faces on the same plane (positive, negative variations). The idea was to use something similar to polarization values to instill a sense of raytrace effect on other objects in the same polarization plane. As far as I know, not much has come of these ideas, but then again I don't pay as much as attention as I did.
As we find new ways to get to the same calculations, or close to it, we can shave quite a bit of processing needs off. Pre-rendering values makes sense, and I think some 3D engines use that idea already. We're not talking about rendering millions of rays through thousands of objects, if you can just segment the object-faces into maybe 3000 planes (or less) and just add or subtract light based on the percentage/distance from other objects. Someone WILL find shortcuts, I'm sure.
The quality/cost is variable, but these things are available today. Shutter glasses, linear and circular polarized glasses, there is a TV on the market right now that offers a degree of 3dness w/o glasses (I can't find the link to it now).
All those technologies are more harmful to true peripheral gaming progression. I've tested all of them, and was even on an alpha committee for some devices going back 10+ years or more.
The biggest problem with peripheral rendering is that it HAS to be directly effected by head tilts. Peripheral images MUST stay peripheral. The only product I ever theorized that would work well would be a headset with 2 panels per eye. The front panel would be your "full front vision" and the second panel would be a circular wrap LCD around the front panel, with the image slightly blurred or reduced in true resolution. If you notice something due "West", meaning on the left middle part of the circular panel, and move your head to look, that vision comes into focus on your main panel, and the rest of the panel shifts its peripheral view. This means real time head-motion sensing, which we've seen can be done successfully. Would gamers use it? Doubtful. Would it be standardized for competitive products to use the same software code? Even more doubtful. But it CAN be done elegantly and usefully.
Its definitely more fun dreaming about what will come in the computer world, than dealing with the "Why the fsck doesn't this work like it should?" today.
fscking pays better than dreaming though.
I tend to disagree. Companies are willing to pay for theoretical products that are outside the box, especially if you have the sofware and hardware knowledge to build a virtual prototype. The big problem is that many employees are fearful of taking the risks to find that reward.
For industry-types out there: I do have about 3 theory papers ready to sell and consult on going deeper into some of these thoughts:)
I was a founder of one of the Midwest's first rendering farms back in 1993, a company that has now moved on to product design. Back then we had Pentium 60s (IIRC) with 64MB of RAM. A single frame of non-ray traced 3D Studio animation took an hour or more. We had probably 40 PCs that handled the rendering, and they'd chug along 20 hours a day spitting out literally seconds of video. I remember our first ray trace sample (can't recall the platform for the PC, though) and it took DAYS to render a single frame.
I do remember that someone found some shortcuts for raytracing, and I wonder if that shortcut is applicable to realtime rendering today. From what I recall, the shortcut was to do the raytracing backwards, from the surface to the light sources. The shortcut didn't take into account ALL reflections, but I remember that it worked wonders for transparent surfaces and simple light sources. I know we investigated this for our business, but at the time we also were considering leaving the industry since the competition was starting to ignite. We did leave a few months early, but it was a smart move on our part rather than continue to invest in ever-faster hardware.
Now, 15 years later, it's finally becoming a reality of sorts, or at least considered.
Many will say that raytracing is NOT important for real time gaming, but I disagree completely. I wrote up a theory on it back in the day on how real time raytracing WOULD add a new layer of intrigue, drama and playability to the gaming world.
First of all, real time raytracing means amazingly complex shadows and reflections. Imagine a gay where you could watch for enemies stealthily by monitoring shadows or reflections -- even shadows and reflections through glass, off of water, or other reflective/transparent materials. It definitely adds some playability and excitement, especially if you find locations that provide a target for those reflections and shadows.
In my opinion, raytracing is not just about visual quality but about adding something that is definitely missing. My biggest problem with gaming has been the lack of peripheral vision (even with wide aspect ratios and funky fisheye effects). If you hunt, you know how important peripheral vision is, combined with truly 3D sound and even atmospheric conditions. Raytracing can definitely aid in rendering atmospheric conditions better (imagine which player would be aided by the sun in the soft fog and who would be harmed by it). It can't overcome the peripheral loss, but by producing truer shadows and reflections, you can overcome some of the gaming negatives by watching for the details.
Of course, I also wrote that we'd likely never see true and complete raytracing in our lives. Maybe I'll be wrong, but "true and complete" raytracing is VERY VERY complicated. Even current non-real time raytracing engines don't account for every reflection, every shadow, every atmospheric condition and every change in movement. Sure, a truly infinite raytracer IS impossible, but I know that with more hardware assistance, it will get better.
My experience over the years was ALWAYS with static images that were raytraced. They looked great, but it wasn't until I experienced raytraced animations (high res, many reflective and transparent layers with multiple light sources and a sun-source) that I really saw the benefit and how it would aid in gaming.
The next step: a truly 3D immersive peripheral video system, maybe a curved paper-thin monitor?
I've been keeping affordability records for my own spending for 12 years and counting. Prices are rising, consistently, by double digits in most areas of spending: energy, food, housing maintenance, etc.
In some areas, pricing seems static (toilet paper, meats/cheese/wheat) until you see that package size or quality has dropped. Cereal boxes get smaller, meat quality is lowered.
Let's agree to compare assets in 10 years. Most people will die indebted, slaves to the banking cartels. Not I/.
Access to credit greatly improves living conditions for who? The middle class. (And the subprimes greatly improves the living conditions of the poor) Imagine the world for the middle class was there no credit, just for the housing. You'd keep putting money aside your whole life to be able to buy a house when you're close to retirement, imagine all the value lost for yourself if you had to wait that long instead of taking a loan...
I'm dumbfounded by your theory here. Easy credit is the reason why the price of used houses goes up in a bubble faster than inflation affects wages. Money supply growth causes prices to rise, savings to deplete in terms of affordability and malinvestments to be made.
I never told people to hoard for decades, just during bubble periods so you can buy assets post-crash at a huge discount.
but because the risk premium on the market is growing (AKA Credit Spreads), therefore the creditors lend money only to people with better profiles, and ask a greater risk premium, this is a normal consequence of a slowing economy, since the risk taken by creditors is higher.
Really? We now see PRIME borrowers missing payments, AmEx just wrote down $300m on top tier credit lines. Trillions in new dollars have been created, and still exist sitting hoarded in China and India's central banks, but credit is tight. Why? The hoarders are waiting for more price drops! Look who is buying Citibank!
Oh yeah because bubbles are so easy to predict... All those analysts working in banks and other investment firms are just idiots, dada21 knows better.
I've tripled my affordability profile in 5 years. Most people I know are poorer, much poorer in the same time. Analysts are shills for their bosses, duh.
Saving via hoarding keeps you liquid, and ready. I bought a great home (100 year old and solid) for 1X income, not 3X or heaven forbid 5X. I bought an almost new 42" 1080p LCD for half price. I'm buying used gold jewelry for 65% of spot -- with hoarded cash.
Instead of hoarding in cash, you could have hoarded in some other (non-volatile, non-bubble) market, making reasonable interest, and still reaping rewards on the housing market by selling and buying at the right times.
Morally I can't. Saving in a CD, bank account or other regulated market adds reserve capital which allows the fraudulent fractional reserve banks to exist and defraud millions. I won't be a part of it. Instead, I stay debt free, buy gold, invest in local dividend-bearing businesses and hoard cash in various currencies.
I'm certainly not part of the elite you speak of, yet I own a stake (they are called "shares") in various companies, including financial institutions. I make money from interest on my investments. Yes, that money I'm making partially derives from the interest on credit that other people are paying. That makes me neither evil nor elite. That's just how the economy works.
I'd love to see your portfolio; if you're not earning reasonable dividends, your money isn't mqking you money -- you're just gambling, hoping some sucker pays more for your zero-profit generating shares than you paid.
I refuse to buy used stocks that don't pay at least 15-20% dividends. Most of my stocks are private issues on local businesses I can monitor. I've audited some portfolios and found most non-dividend-bearing portfolios lose value against affordability indexes. No thanks.
The fact is that the vast majority of people are included in this system of credit transfer, whether through explicit investment (e.g. playing the stock market), or through other means (anyone with any kind of retirement savings). Yes, the rich control many of the resources (by definition) but wealth and corporate ownership among the lower and middle class have been increasing, not decreasing, over time.
No, they haven't. Per-individual asset-values have dropped due to easy credit. Fewer people own (in full) their homes and cars than in 1997, 1987 and 1977.
Corporate ownership is a shill theory. Instead of paying dividends to shareholders, people are now duped by market indexes that aren't tied to affordability indexes. CxOs, advisors and financial auditing companies (especially since SarbOx passed) reap the real rewards. The shareholders gain little when comparing dollar affordability from stock purchase to sale.
Are you seriously saying that an individual would be better off sticking their money under the mattress rather than investing it? If you don't invest your money, and earn interest above the rate of inflation, then you are actually losing money over time. Even when the interest rate drops, it never drops as low as the "money in mattress" level, which is 0%. I assure you that the "rich elite" are reinvesting every penny they get, thereby contributing to the economy.
The rate of inflation is between 11% and 19% a year since the 90s. Almost all long term investments lose value based on dollar affordability.
Hoarding cash, as dollars, as euros or as grams of gold, gives you fast liquidity to buy assets after an asset sector crash brings real affordability. See my post in this thread regarding how I bought a house for cash after hoarding for 3 years -- I saw a bubble, I hoarded in diversified cash versions, and I struck when the asset I wanted crashed. I jumped the gun 18 months early but we had our eye on an exact home for 6 years and it hit pre-foreclosure, allowing a reasonable short-sale negotiation.
The elite do hoard cash. Yes, they play the markets, too, but most middle class investors have negative total asset value, which a smart investor would never accept.
That's the silliest thing I've seen in a while. Uninvested money just shrivels through inflation. Even in the "buy in down times", almost no one makes money that way, it's a way to lose money.
Inflation, meaning the expansion of money supplying, does devalue hoarded cash during bubble periods. But during the bubble popping periods, after the dead cat bounces, bubbled assets tend to crash below their theoretical equilibrium values, bringing the hoarded cash value to a stronger level.
My home at 1X income this year was 2.5X income in 2005. It fell 60% in dollar value. We paid cash, too, saving us hundreds of thousands in interest over the next 30 years.
My hoarded cash lost value for 3 years, but now its worth 60% more in the housing market.
We also hoard mostly in gold, but since 2005 over half our cash hoardings have been in Euros and Dirhams. I sold all my Euros to buy the house.
Recessions seem bad for gold, but even if its dollar-value falls, its buying power tends to stay solid. Since my income should go up 20% in 2008, a recession in most areas would lead me to hoard even more, maybe 60% of my post-tax income.
Recessions aren't supposed to happen based on Keynesian theory since all the worlds' governments and their central banks have been creating credit in a rate almost never seen before on the global scale. Print money, create jobs, right? Of course, the reality is that the central banks have been creating credit for one specific reason: to transfer wealth from the poor and middle class to the bank-connected elites.
There is no recession -- it's just part of the cycle of credit expansion/contraction that occurs to regularly shift our future wealth to those who have been taking advantage of that credit creation since the 70s, if not earlier. Look at it this way: all that lovely money that was created via credit expansion, and then spent, still exists. If you took a $200,000 HELOC on your home that is now worth $100,000, you likely spent that $200,000 somewhere (Hummer, cruises, clothes, electronic gadgets, new porch, etc). The money didn't just cancel out the debt that was created -- it was spent, and it lined someone's pockets.
The wealthy have been hoarding money for decades. Stick it in the mattress, in the vault, anywhere but in a savings account or in the market where the money would stay in the economies, keeping them at least operating. Now, credit is tight, because those who have it don't want to risk letting the middle class earn it to invest it in their own wealth-growth schemes.
Open Source is likely the sector MOST hurt by a credit crunch. Those without a connection to the IP-monopolized software sector will have a tough time borrowing to develop new software, pay for payrolls, or expand their marketing budgets. They money exists, but it's not easily loaned out until the credit crunch creates a new legion of people who are desperate for a little more debt accessibility. The OSS community may not operate on debt, but I'd doubt it. Most people I know, including small business owners, wouldn't have a meal in their fridge if it wasn't for easy credit.
My business, which generally stays away from OSS, operates on a positive cashflow, paying dividends to its owners, who also operate on a positive cashflow. The software sectors that will stay afloat during a credit crunch are those who are cash positive, and are in no rush to spend it until there are deals to be had.
I can't wait for a big recession, or even a depression. I sat on the sidelines on home ownership for 3 years, and finally bought again this year (after selling 3 years ago at near peak) for 1X my annual income. Easy as pie. In terms of business, I know many little IT companies and marketing companies that are on the verge of falling apart. They have assets, and client books, that are worth significant prices, but since no one is spending right now, their value is dropping. Thankfully, those of us who saved instead of spent, and contracted instead of expanded during a bubble, will have cash that is worth MUCH more than it was worth 2 or 3 years ago.
So it isn't specific sectors that will get hurt or gain ground -- nearly everyone who existed with a negative cashflow or a debt-maintained business plan will get hurt. Their values will drop, and those who held cash or fully-owned assets (land, commercial property, gold, etc) will be ready to swoop in and pick up valuable assets at a deep discount.
Back in the dotcom/dotbomb days, I also stayed on the sidelines. All of my competitors were spinning "Y2K!!!" marketing garbage to clients, who spent lots of money on a non-issue. We, instead, told people it was a non-issue. We didn't go public, try to create useless software, or expand more than 10-15% per year in size. When the SHTF, there were MANY assets we picked up for pennies on the dollar when things exploded.
So if you're an OSS or a closed-source developer, and you're hurting, remember for the next time another bubble grows: stay out of it. Hold cash, pay off your debts faster than you think you should, and be ready for the mass price cuts on things you wanted to buy when you origi
Insightful comment, but a lot of what you propose will have no effect:
1) Copyright should be reduced in duration.
Copyright in the digital age is dead and quite useless. As laborers realize that their real income comes from billing for labor to-be-done, rather than billing for labor already-done, copyright will quickly dissolve to being useless. Artists are laborers, and those who realize that their future incomes will be derived from that which can't be easily duplicated by others will be the ones who profit and stay in business. Performing live is something that others can't easily mimic. Supply and demand, friends. There's a near limitless supply of digital content, so the price falls to near zero. There's a VERY finite supply of the time a specific artist can perform, so their income will come from selling that time to fans (i.e., live concerts or performances). Yes, this creates a real dilemma for writers, but I believe that MOST readers will prefer the artist's accepted printed book rather than the knock-off.
2) The penalties must be adjusted to be reasonable.
The penalties for being caught violating copyright are the least important factor in the situation. The time, and money, spent fighting a legal battle against an organization with a scale of income many MANY times higher than the defendant are the real costs. If you are found guilty of a civil violation, you declare bankruptcy and the judgment goes away. You don't get back the years, and tens of thousands of dollars, that you lost fighting to save your name. Reducing penalties will likely not fix this problem.
3) People must come to respect the rights of property holders, not violate them blindly.
OK, I won't steal the physical CD you have. The minute that I use my labor to duplicate something else, that product is mine. If I see you made a neat toilet, and I spend my hours buying porcelain, laying it into a form, and making my own toilet, you should have little control over how I move my arms, and use my mind, to duplicate the product that I want. Copyright, and other intellectual property restrictions, do little to promote new content or creations. The biggest wall for content creators is distribution, not creation. Millions, even billions of people create content, but only a few are able to distribute it.
I respect the rights of PHYSICAL property holders, but I see no reason why they should control how I think or use my body and tools.
4) Slashdot-crowd must abandon the notion that "not-for-profit" redistribution of someone else's work should be permitted without permission of the rights holder.
Actually, the "not-for-profit" redistribution and re-creation of another person's original thoughts is a positive for the original creator, as it is a free form of marketing and advertising for them. Artists who tour regularly should LOVE people duplicating their digital works to friends and family and co-workers. Studio time is akin to the time (and money) one spends going to college or getting another education. It is what you DO with that education (i.e. studio time) as a long term labor that dictates how you get paid for your education.
Just because a guy spent 4 years in college doesn't mean I should pay him $50,000 a year. Just because a band spent 4 years working on an album doesn't mean that their recorded work is worth a single penny to me. The laws of supply and demand, while restricted by ridiculous IP laws, will still win out in the long run.
The RIAA is worthless, and many bands that I work with and am friends with realize that already. The only bands who care are the ones who sold their souls to their management companies in exchange for access to the monopolized distribution sectors (radio, TV, large distro magazines) which are already going the way of the do-do. Radio, TV and large distro mags will soon be worthless in the next digital era.
You're right about sugar being a big cause of obesity (not fat), but McDonald's isn't really to blame. When I met my (now) wife, I had never been a big carb eater. I was always a meat & cheese kinda guy. She introduced me to pasta, sugary snacks, potato chips, and other stuff. I went from my "anorexic" 140lbs to 190lbs in less than a year. When I realized I was fat, I thought it was because I was eating too many fatty foods, so I cut my fats out entirely. I gained even more weight. Thanks to Dr. Atkins and about 12 months of diet research, I then proceeded to reduce my sugars, increase fiber and healthy fats, and I lost my weight back to 140-150lbs. Some of my meals were at McDonalds, too. At one point, I ate McD's almost every day, and continued to lose weight while getting my blood pressure and bad cholesterol levels lower.
Americans are sickeningly fat, but it isn't video games or McDonalds -- its their love of sugar and sugar-like products (HFCS). I can't believe how many unbelievably fat people I know, and I know I'll have to pay for their early retirement because they won't stop shoving candy into their mouths. Cola soda is candy. "Healthy" Granola is candy. Most of the products on Weight Watchers are candy. Don't these fat people see that they're not only killing themselves, but they're putting the cost on me and others who decide to live healthy?
Here's a reason why I detest single-payer healthcare: because people will have LESS reason to live a healthy lifestyle. I haven't been to the doctor in years except for my annual checkup. I haven't been sick in years, either. And yet I know my health costs go up because of the people who refuse to look into what ails them in terms of weight problems.
I just got back from India last night, spending 2 weeks or so in Mumbai, Maharashtra, and in Colva Beach, Goa. I love India, and have a home in Mumbai on a busy street. My wife joined me for the first time, and she can't wait to go back (she's a very white blond gal).
The traffic SEEMS nuts, but it isn't. It flows and moves with amazing grace, not chaos. Pollution is TERRIBLE, but it isn't just cars and trucks. Once you are familiar with how the roads work, crossing busy streets is easy, and driving isn't too bad. I generally hire a private car for the weeks I spend there each year, but I've driven myself and have little concern for what some people consider a lack of safety standards.
The Tata cars are great. The Nano will be awesome, considering how many families drives 4-to-a-motorcycle in the worst monsoon weather. The biggest polluters, it seems, are the government's buses, which are ancient and kick out more smoke than the next 50 cars combined. The cabs I used were mostly non-gas and non-diesel (I believe LP or something like it, as I videotaped a refill station and heard the sound of high pressure tanks being filled). No smoke came out of the exhausts like the cities' garbage trucks and buses.
I love India with a passion, and am planning on working out of my home there for 2+ months a year. The profit margins are amazing, the lack of regulation leads people to push themselves harder, making people wealthy for working hard. I see smiles on even the poorest laborers' faces. I interviewed one young man who pushed a two-wheel 1 ton moving "cart" with some brothers. He made around $1.50 per day, and he said it was the most money anyone in his family made. I asked him what he did with the money, and he said he SAVED IT so he could start a business. He lived with 9 others in his extended family, and had to deal with a 1 hour train ride in each direction just to push a 1 ton cart around by hand.
I spoke with kids working in the Americanized starbucks-style coffee house. These guys made $3 a day, and they were considered wealthy by friends. We interviewed a film crew at the Bollywood area, and many of them worked more than 70 hours a week, but were able to save more than 50% of their meager salaries.
Food was excellent. Service was amazing. The level of cleanliness in even the public airport has grown by leaps and bounds in just 2 years. I visit every winter (Chicago winter), and just can't believe how happy the poor and lower class seem with all the options available to work.
Tata will destroy the American car companies because they are producing what the market wants, not what government requires. Yes, the Nano may see unsafe, but the 10 accidents I witnessed in Mumbai were all related to the same problem: bad, potholed roads. That's not a carmaker's problem. On the road my home is on (Napean Sea Road in a ritzy district), the road outside my house is maintained by our family and the neighbors. THe main part of the road is fixed slowly and politically, but we make sure that the curbside area is maintained perfectly. The bank down the street from my house had 10 laborers using pick-axes to redo the road, and within 10 days it was good as new.
India, backwards in many ways, but sometimes moving forwards means not understanding how humans work. We want opportunities, and when we find them, we utilize them to better our lives. It's when government gets in the way that people get sad, burdened with debt, and see no hope for the future.
It was VERY hard to come home. We spent 5 days in Paris total on the trip (going and coming), and 3 days in Dubai. It is very sad when returning to the US brings back the views of people with frowns and anger. When my pro-socialist friends tell me maybe I should move away if I hate the American nationalist-socialist system, now I have a good response: maybe I will.
Newspapers still have a virtual monopoly on one aspect of newsmaking: digging deep, traveling, researching, and fact-checking. Unfortunately, MOST newspapers are just regurgitators of whatever the AP or other news-wires spend big bucks to write. The days of the old traveling reporter seem to be short, but there are still a few out there who really work hard to get the news.
The Internet, on the other hand, is still a beacon of opinion, without much digging. Facts aren't checked (not that all mainstream press outlet do much of that), biases are obvious, and many bloggers just preach to the choir. That's an area that isn't likely to change.
The big item of interest, though, is always financial: "Can I do this, and can I make money at it?" I think the obvious answer for almost all forms of media is: YES, and more of a yes than any time in the past. For two generations, musicians tended to only make money when they were corporately owned. Now, individual groups can make money just by promoting themselves and their tours online. The same is true with journalism, or even movie making. Heck, the Ron Paul girl has made five figures just taking her clothes off and promoting the candidate. Amazing. Soon, we'll see theatre and acting groups rendering their own sitcoms on YouTube for a small profit, but they still won't have the backend that the mainstream companies do: script-writers, fact-checkers, editors, sound people, crew, etc.
I like the new age, because it does open up options for the individual to earn a living. I know quite a few people who now make almost 6-figures annual blogging (but they're working 50-60 hours a week on their sites!). I know more than one band who is making more than 6-figures annual with no record label contract. I know a graphic designer or two who are making a decent living by drawing cartoon characters for individual companies, churches and organizations and not having to "slave" 40 hours a week for Disney or another employer.
I do think the classifieds HAVE to go away, but I don't think Craigslist is necessarily the answer or the final option. The web will likely move to a more object-oriented fashion, rather than purely single HTML endlinks. I've always theorized that particular web pages will be broken down to segments of information, designated with content variables ("tags"), that will be easily integrated into the desktop sites of others. I know Microsoft tried this eons ago, and it failed, but the web wasn't ready.
Why should I post an ad to craiglist for a 2001 Toro lawnmower for sale in zip code 60031, when I can just pop in an object into my MySpace, or my blog, or another site, signifying an object for-sale, the price, the zip code, etc, and allow Google or other search engines to point interested buyers to that particular object? Maybe we'll have sites that integrate all those similar objects into a mash-up of information to utilize for other people's needs (like we're now seeing with websites that mash-up data from various non-similar sites of data).
The answer in the long-run is not another market or company that takes over information disperal, but the individualization of data in an object form for many individuals or organizations to provide for new markets to develop. A personal blog may be composed of 20 individual objects, all with their own tags, all distributable in their own singular nature to be re-displayed on various sites for whatever purpose.
Methinks HTML is dying, fast. Even the Web 2.0 stuff seems to be ready for extinction. A new day, a new web, will really harm the Web 2.0 companies that are still focusing on the page, instead of breaking down the individual content within the page.
Who has money for the energy bill from Christmas lights? Our household is very financially secure, but I'm not looking to spend thousands over the season to run the lights. My neighbor, who isn't really decked out as much as some, said his bill will be over $600 more this months for his lighting scheme. OUCH.
I'm sure the environmentalists will cry foul, and I understand that philosophy, but for me, the lights are putting more demand on electricity, which means I'll pay a higher bill myself.
The wife and I do like to see the more extravagant lighting setups out there, but we have noticed that some homes aren't running them 7 days a week. Wonder if its an electrical bill concern.
I completely understand that part -- our own home(s) are moving to get off the electric grid, but not for ecological reasons (we want to save money as the dollar plummets).
Solar isn't clean, that's for sure. The 3 solar-panel investors we speak with have told us of the ecological burdens of producing solar panels. We're still moving to solar (and to geothermal A/C and heat) for our primary residence to lower the long-term cost of energy, but we know that we're likely causing as much damage to the environment elsewhere to bring our cost-reductions home, over the long run.
We have a few greenie friends who really think they're saving the environment, but the more I research it, the more it seems that there is nothing you can truly do to reduce your carbon footprint, even if it seems logical. There are too many parameters to wade through to calculate what a certain mode of transportation or energy generation costs.
I'd love one of those basement-nukes, even if it cost $5b. Run the thing at 5c/KwH, and feed the rest of the power back to the grid for a nice refund each month. After a decade of inflation, I wonder how much energy would cost.
I also don't feel safe in some of the lighter cars. My favorite car happens to be a diesel Land Rover, but it's outside of my price range. I do like feeling safe, and I like something that can handle Chicago winters. Our little Subaru (2.0l I4) is fairly decent on gas mileage, but I'd love a diesel if they ever started making one. It handles great in snow and ice, is definitely safe (my wife totalled one of my Subarus years ago at 75MPH and walked away), but it's still no eco-friendly machine.
For me, the best reduction of polluting we've done is cut our driving significantly, but we travel by plane much more than before, so I'm sure that's a negative reduction:)
Slashdot Mirror
Indeed, and I believe when asked "What more can I do?" Christ replied "Sell all you own and give the money to the poor". Unfortunately that particular commandment doesn't gel quite as well with free market libertarianism, so I'm presuming you're going to either ignore or "interpret" (as in, read it to mean "well, donate a little of something to charity, but obviously don't sell all you own" or some such) that one.
I don't really do either. One problem I have with Christians (and non-Christians) trying to interpret what the Bible is teaching is when they pick a single verse or just a few verses without looking at the chapter, and even the book, as a whole.
The verses you quoted from are from Matthew 19. I don't have my Bible handy, but I believe they're verses 19ish to 22ish.
The important verse here is around verse 26, and paraphrased it says that Jesus looked at them and said (paraphrasing again) "With people it's impossible, but with God everything is possible."
Basically, Christ was giving the man the answer that the man wanted from his question "What can I, a person, do?" Christ said do more, but then He finishes with "but man can not do enough, only God can."
It's a great set of verses because it shows that Christ was speaking for God, not for man. Man can do nothing, only God can. The most important verse in the Bible comes a little later in Matthew 24:34 "Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place." He was telling those in His generation that before they are dead and gone, ALL things prophecized would take place. And they did. It was finished before some of those people tasted death -- and man didn't do it.
I accept that people believe that God never existed, and I am in no place to try to prove it to them. I came to believing in God fairly late in life myself, having some deistic beliefs but nothing concrete.
So God used to get involved with people, but no longer does? He used to help save the child from death at the hands of a lunatic, but now he no longer does? What made him stop? If he used to stop suffering, why is there a plethora of evidence of suffering during the period that you claim he was active in the world?
Well, I believe that God only got actively involved with a few people, notably the prophets, and only was involved in building the history of man's lack of ability to follow God's Plan. In fact, I believe that the Old Testament was entirely "designed" to prove that man can NEVER meet God's desires for man, which is why Christ was necessary for all men, believers and non-believers alike.
Some of the suffering may have been judgment by God towards people who had God's plan at hand and refused to follow it. Some of it may just be natural choices those people made. A lot of suffering I see today with my own eyes (and in person) can be avoided in the future if people would take responsibility for their future, rather than rely on others to lead them there. It is sad, and I help as many people as I can, but I also believe that we must prepare for events by being more responsible today.
"Paleo" meaning old, Wesleyan meaning following the path of the Wesleyan movement. Paleo-Wesleyan may have been coined by me, actually, but it generally means Wesleyans who haven't had their faith perverted by the more modern interpretations of the Bible. I work with some Wesleyan congregations that are of both views, actually.
Looking forward to your email!
This doesn't make sense to a scientist. You're basically saying causality, chaos, and random interactions are part of God's creation - these very concepts are often the arguments against the existence of God. Or, are you saying that God is involved at some level in the evolution of life. If so, why is God able to get involved in the evolution of life but not able to stop the death of a child at the hands of a maniac?
Considering that I grew up with more scientific training and almost no faith in my young life, I would say it still makes perfect sense.
God created the universe, and the natural laws the universe follows. To think that evolution (macro or micro) isn't part of God's creation would mean that God didn't create everything.
I don't believe God gets involved in the world any longer. My Biblical views show that God is reigning in Heaven, having fulfilled all that He needs to fulfill with His plan for the mortal world. I don't believe God smites people, judges homosexuals, or blesses or curses individuals or groups of individuals. What He did to the ancient Israelites was the end of what He said He would do, and that's it.
Nice statistics, probably written by the teachers' unions.
The definition of literacy has dropped in scope, so today's "literacy" is merely a function of using phonics to read versus being able to comprehend what one has read, and being able to dictate an understanding of what they've read.
Ask any English teacher over the age of 50 what they think of today's literacy rates. They'll generally tell you that kids today are idiots, and most can't comprehend Shakespeare let alone the newspaper.
Actually, if you believed what Christ said, you'd know that this statement is completely false. There are a bunch of verses for you if you're willing to look, however, I suspect you are a Pauline onlyist or worse, one of those that tossed out the bible in favor of a gnostic approach.
I'm not a Pauline only-ist for sure, and I'm not gnostic in any way, shape or form. My Biblical beliefs go back to the beliefs of Origen, Eusebius of Caesarea, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus and other "early fathers" of the early Church.
Read Matt 5 where Messiah said not one jot or tittle will pass from Torah (the law) until all is fulfilled. While I realize you are a Preterist, and think that all scripture was fulfilled by AD 70, you have to also realize that as long as heaven and earth exist, the Torah exists.
The term "Heaven and Earth" throughout the Old Testament, where it was used, referenced the covenantal Jewish "Temple" system, and not the physical heavens and physical earth. It is a common mistake that Futurists make, and one that is quite easily (but time consuming) debated down. When the Temple fell, as Christ prophecized, the Old Covenant passed and brought forth the New Covenant of God. "Heaven and Earth" did pass away.
Additionally, your particular stance makes Christ into a false prophet (Deut 13) who couldn't possibly by the Messiah taught in Torah. Christ's own words should tell you that HE is the one foretold in Torah (John 5:46) I could go on further, if you'd like.
Maybe I misspoke, I'll have to go back to see, but I do concur with what you said and those are my beliefs fully.
As for all the other things mentioned in your post, I generally agree with you. I'd even go much further, I don't think creationism and science are as mutually exclusive as many believe. My kids know and understand more about evolution than most kids their age, and yet are creationists. It hasn't stunted their intellectual growth a single bit, as creationism is more philosophical an argument, while evolution is a scientific one.
But you as a parent have that responsibility, not teacher-leaders. YOU are the true leader of your children until they accept their individual responsibility to lead themselves: for right and for wrong. It is not the President's place to lead, but to follow. It is not a teacher's place to lead, but to follow the path to what the student paid them to teach.
The funniest thing about evolutionism is that it actually teaches people to not be critical, but blindly accept the dogma of the current scientific world, which is hardly scientific. Evolution isn't a fact, yet it is taught that way. It is nothing more than a best guess based upon facts that ignore irregularities. It is useful in the same sense that Newton's gravitational constant is useful, but wrong.
That so true, I concur fully.
Lastly, one day, I'd like a chance to discuss your faith (Christian Preterism) in relationship to mine. I wonder if you have a clue what my faith is.
Any time! We can even do it public via slashdot's user-diary system if you like.
As for your faith, I'm guessing Paleo-Wesleyan?
Hi, I've been looking for a Christian who believes evolution poses no problem to Christianity for a few months. May I ask you a question?
You may ask me many questions here or via email, but please note that my views come from actually studying the Bible and Christian/Jewish history. My views were not taught to me by fallible men ("pastors") but by actually reading, pondering, and debating the beliefs out there. While I am a Christian, I am considered a heretic by some, and have been actively excommunicated from some Christian communities.
How do you deal with the problem of original sin? I see the problem as thus: If evolution is true, there was no literal Adam. If there was no Adam, there was no "fall". If there was no fall, what do we require Jesus to "save" us from?
I don't believe in Adam as an actual "first figure." Neither do many Jews or Jewish scholars. Genesis was written (probably by Moses, as handed down by God to him) thousands of years ago. Not many Jews believe that Genesis is "canonical fact" but instead a way for God to explain His desires to the ancient Israelites.
My views on the story of Adam was to explain to the ancient Israelites that man was fallen from God's high standards from the beginning of man's knowledge of himself. It is very possible to weave evolutionary growth (say, from apes if that's your thing) with the story of Adam. Since all men, once they are self-aware, did not meet God's standards for them, they were sinful.
I do not believe Jesus exists to save US from anything. You as a non-believer should have no fear of anything in your future, because the actions of Jesus are in the very VERY far past. There is no judgment for you, there is no "Hell" or wrath of God facing you for eternity. God loves you, because of what Jesus did, whether you believe it or not. I don't believe you need to ask for anything, because the Bible clearly shows me that everyone is forgiven of falling short of God's standards, because of what Jesus did on His first coming (birth, life, death on the cross, resurrection), and what He finished on his second coming (70 AD, the day the ancient Israelites were destroyed and banished forever, never to return). That's done, it's over with. Live in God's glorious Kingdom today (here on Earth) if you like. If you don't like, don't. It's up to you, really, but please don't fear eternal punishment because it isn't in the Bible.
I (as an ex-Christian) deal with this by saying Christianity is not real. I had a long talk with my father (a conservative evangelical minister) over Christmas, and he feels that evolution would completely undermine his faith so he deals with it by saying evolution is not real.
Sadly, the Evangelicals tend to believe in a lot of the Christian false teachings. They haven't read, studied and understood the Bible, it seems. The idea of Hell doesn't exist in the Bible if you actively READ it, and decipher who it was written to and what it spoke about. In fact, much of the Bible today is irrelevant to living today, it is just a great story of God and Man's progression together to where we are today, with a VERY SMALL bit on how we can live to maximize our mortal lives.
I am quite curious how you feel about this issue. I rewrote this post about 4 times but couldn't find words that I was confident implied I'm not looking for a fight, so I'm resorting to this disclaimer. You'll get nothing but polite and (hopefully) well-thought out responses from me. I look forward to your answer!
It's OK, it's a very difficult set of thoughts to write down because there is so much fear of anger and tragic judgment that usually comes from Christians.
Note to Evangelicals: Yes, I know you disagree with me, that's OK. I'm safe in my views, and I have Biblical proof for all of it.
Yes, there are problems with the educational system in the U.S. Big ones, even. But that doesn't mean that we should give up on the idea of a well-educated populace. A few hundred years ago the notion of universal literacy would have been laughable, but we have multiple societies today where literacy approaches 100%. I can't help but hear "why should we teach those slaves to read?" in your question, though I know you didn't mean it that way.
I take exception to the idea that we have anywhere near 100% literacy in the U.S. Reading various blogs today points to me that this is true. Literacy rates have FALLEN since compulsory education has been forced on us. Literacy rates in the 1800s were higher than they are today. Google old English books from that time frame and see if the kids today can comprehend any of it.
We live in a society of Cliff's Notes and txt5p3k, definitely not a literate society. Just because a person comprehends phonics enough to "read" doesn't mean that they are literate.
With the way organizations like this adhere to biblical writing, one might be able to accuse them of having a book as "god" rather than the apparently supernatural "God of the Gaps" most people seem to engage in their spirituality.
I agree, and I'm a Christian. Biblical writing, especially modern translations, are full of errors because of what common and power-hungry men wanted.
The inerrancy of God seems plausible to me. The in inerrancy of a book seems like sheer insanity.
God is inerrant, that I agree with. The Bible, though, was never MEANT to be "inerrant." Modern Evangelicals call the Bible "The Word", and "The Word" is inerrant in the Bible, but the Bible is not The Word!
For Christians who disagree:
Isaiah 38:4 "Then the word of the LORD came to Isaiah, saying," the word is someone that can speak.
Jeremiah 7:1 "The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, " again, someone that can speak.
Ezekiel 25:1 "And the word of the LORD came to me saying, " same thing.
Zec 6:9 "The word of the LORD also came to me, saying, " Duh.
Hebrews 4:12 "For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart."
My pastor, who is an Evangelical, holds up the Bible and calls it "the Word" and I cringe. The Word was with God from the beginning, and was God, and was fulfilled by his other name: Jesus. To me, as a Christian, the Word is love. True love, for God, for others, without judgment or hatred or penalty from my hand.
How hard would it be for modern Christians to change from being haters and judges and penalizers, into what Christ truly embodied?
For those who "hate" Christians, would you change your mind if the Christians really loved everyone, and stopped with the stupid harsh judgment and power-mongering that we do today?
You do understand that it was Europe that dumped this religion on us?
No, they didn't. The modern, and very flawed, Evangelical movement was kicked into high gear by some power-hungry madmen by the names of Dwight L. Moody and Cyrus Ingerson Scofield. Moody had a big effect on the British and Irish, actually, promoting their crazed movement there, too.
* I'm a Protestant-leaning Christian, but definitely not of the Evangelical nature. Sadly, most of my friends and family are still under the sway of the madness called the modern Evangelical movement. I also have a soon-to-be-published book (electronic as well) that I'd love to share with slashdot readers who are interested in why it is time for Christianity to take a new direction.
I'm a Christian of the preterist nature. I believe in evolutionary forces as part of God's creation. I don't believe in a 6000-year old Earth (neither do most Jews who hold the Old Testament in a different way than many Christians do). I also think the debate of evolution versus creationism is really repugnant and a waste of time when there are so many other things we can be spending our time on (we meaning "us Christians.")
I can't even begin to count the billions of hours wasted by Christians in living life in ways completely counter to what our God teaches us. Look at the battle over the 10 Commandments, laws of the Israelites' God that have been countermanded by Christ's teaching to a much more simpler set of rules (completely love God first, completely love others second). And yet, when we dig deeper into the "Why" of modern Christian thought, we come up against the same problem that I see in those who are pro-government: we need "leaders" and we need "rules" and we need "penalties" to keep us in line.
What has happened to the powerful individual in today's society? Evolution versus creationism is a debate that strikes at the heart of my question: why is it that we need "teacher-leaders" to stick to a specific standard, rather than what the individual kid in a unique place in their specific city/society needs to be taught? I can't even understand why science is taught to ALL children, along with higher level maths, when the kids today can barely count, let alone read or speak properly. I had a 20-something in my town use a calculator at a checkout line 2 weeks ago when I gave her $21.01 for a $6.06 charge. Unbelievable.
Creationism and evolution are both articles of faith, and really have no purpose for MOST students. Then again, I truly believe that even High School is worthless for 70% of society considering what it is churning out.
All this is fine, but I think we will have to wait another 20+ years for computers to be fast and cheap enough before this becomes a reality.
:)
I'm not sure I agree, only because we're currently considering what horsepower we would need tomorrow to do it the way we do it today. I've looked at the technology many times over 15 years, including writing a few theoretical thoughts that I sold to private developers back in the day. One thing I looked at was a pre-rendered set of values for each object and face that would inflict value changes on other object/faces on the same plane (positive, negative variations). The idea was to use something similar to polarization values to instill a sense of raytrace effect on other objects in the same polarization plane. As far as I know, not much has come of these ideas, but then again I don't pay as much as attention as I did.
As we find new ways to get to the same calculations, or close to it, we can shave quite a bit of processing needs off. Pre-rendering values makes sense, and I think some 3D engines use that idea already. We're not talking about rendering millions of rays through thousands of objects, if you can just segment the object-faces into maybe 3000 planes (or less) and just add or subtract light based on the percentage/distance from other objects. Someone WILL find shortcuts, I'm sure.
The quality/cost is variable, but these things are available today. Shutter glasses, linear and circular polarized glasses, there is a TV on the market right now that offers a degree of 3dness w/o glasses (I can't find the link to it now).
All those technologies are more harmful to true peripheral gaming progression. I've tested all of them, and was even on an alpha committee for some devices going back 10+ years or more.
The biggest problem with peripheral rendering is that it HAS to be directly effected by head tilts. Peripheral images MUST stay peripheral. The only product I ever theorized that would work well would be a headset with 2 panels per eye. The front panel would be your "full front vision" and the second panel would be a circular wrap LCD around the front panel, with the image slightly blurred or reduced in true resolution. If you notice something due "West", meaning on the left middle part of the circular panel, and move your head to look, that vision comes into focus on your main panel, and the rest of the panel shifts its peripheral view. This means real time head-motion sensing, which we've seen can be done successfully. Would gamers use it? Doubtful. Would it be standardized for competitive products to use the same software code? Even more doubtful. But it CAN be done elegantly and usefully.
Its definitely more fun dreaming about what will come in the computer world, than dealing with the "Why the fsck doesn't this work like it should?" today.
fscking pays better than dreaming though.
I tend to disagree. Companies are willing to pay for theoretical products that are outside the box, especially if you have the sofware and hardware knowledge to build a virtual prototype. The big problem is that many employees are fearful of taking the risks to find that reward.
For industry-types out there: I do have about 3 theory papers ready to sell and consult on going deeper into some of these thoughts
I was a founder of one of the Midwest's first rendering farms back in 1993, a company that has now moved on to product design. Back then we had Pentium 60s (IIRC) with 64MB of RAM. A single frame of non-ray traced 3D Studio animation took an hour or more. We had probably 40 PCs that handled the rendering, and they'd chug along 20 hours a day spitting out literally seconds of video. I remember our first ray trace sample (can't recall the platform for the PC, though) and it took DAYS to render a single frame.
I do remember that someone found some shortcuts for raytracing, and I wonder if that shortcut is applicable to realtime rendering today. From what I recall, the shortcut was to do the raytracing backwards, from the surface to the light sources. The shortcut didn't take into account ALL reflections, but I remember that it worked wonders for transparent surfaces and simple light sources. I know we investigated this for our business, but at the time we also were considering leaving the industry since the competition was starting to ignite. We did leave a few months early, but it was a smart move on our part rather than continue to invest in ever-faster hardware.
Now, 15 years later, it's finally becoming a reality of sorts, or at least considered.
Many will say that raytracing is NOT important for real time gaming, but I disagree completely. I wrote up a theory on it back in the day on how real time raytracing WOULD add a new layer of intrigue, drama and playability to the gaming world.
First of all, real time raytracing means amazingly complex shadows and reflections. Imagine a gay where you could watch for enemies stealthily by monitoring shadows or reflections -- even shadows and reflections through glass, off of water, or other reflective/transparent materials. It definitely adds some playability and excitement, especially if you find locations that provide a target for those reflections and shadows.
In my opinion, raytracing is not just about visual quality but about adding something that is definitely missing. My biggest problem with gaming has been the lack of peripheral vision (even with wide aspect ratios and funky fisheye effects). If you hunt, you know how important peripheral vision is, combined with truly 3D sound and even atmospheric conditions. Raytracing can definitely aid in rendering atmospheric conditions better (imagine which player would be aided by the sun in the soft fog and who would be harmed by it). It can't overcome the peripheral loss, but by producing truer shadows and reflections, you can overcome some of the gaming negatives by watching for the details.
Of course, I also wrote that we'd likely never see true and complete raytracing in our lives. Maybe I'll be wrong, but "true and complete" raytracing is VERY VERY complicated. Even current non-real time raytracing engines don't account for every reflection, every shadow, every atmospheric condition and every change in movement. Sure, a truly infinite raytracer IS impossible, but I know that with more hardware assistance, it will get better.
My experience over the years was ALWAYS with static images that were raytraced. They looked great, but it wasn't until I experienced raytraced animations (high res, many reflective and transparent layers with multiple light sources and a sun-source) that I really saw the benefit and how it would aid in gaming.
The next step: a truly 3D immersive peripheral video system, maybe a curved paper-thin monitor?
5%? By who's metric?
I've been keeping affordability records for my own spending for 12 years and counting. Prices are rising, consistently, by double digits in most areas of spending: energy, food, housing maintenance, etc.
In some areas, pricing seems static (toilet paper, meats/cheese/wheat) until you see that package size or quality has dropped. Cereal boxes get smaller, meat quality is lowered.
Let's agree to compare assets in 10 years. Most people will die indebted, slaves to the banking cartels. Not I/.
Access to credit greatly improves living conditions for who? The middle class. (And the subprimes greatly improves the living conditions of the poor) Imagine the world for the middle class was there no credit, just for the housing. You'd keep putting money aside your whole life to be able to buy a house when you're close to retirement, imagine all the value lost for yourself if you had to wait that long instead of taking a loan...
I'm dumbfounded by your theory here. Easy credit is the reason why the price of used houses goes up in a bubble faster than inflation affects wages. Money supply growth causes prices to rise, savings to deplete in terms of affordability and malinvestments to be made.
I never told people to hoard for decades, just during bubble periods so you can buy assets post-crash at a huge discount.
but because the risk premium on the market is growing (AKA Credit Spreads), therefore the creditors lend money only to people with better profiles, and ask a greater risk premium, this is a normal consequence of a slowing economy, since the risk taken by creditors is higher.
Really? We now see PRIME borrowers missing payments, AmEx just wrote down $300m on top tier credit lines. Trillions in new dollars have been created, and still exist sitting hoarded in China and India's central banks, but credit is tight. Why? The hoarders are waiting for more price drops! Look who is buying Citibank!
Oh yeah because bubbles are so easy to predict... All those analysts working in banks and other investment firms are just idiots, dada21 knows better.
I've tripled my affordability profile in 5 years. Most people I know are poorer, much poorer in the same time. Analysts are shills for their bosses, duh.
Saving via hoarding keeps you liquid, and ready. I bought a great home (100 year old and solid) for 1X income, not 3X or heaven forbid 5X. I bought an almost new 42" 1080p LCD for half price. I'm buying used gold jewelry for 65% of spot -- with hoarded cash.
Instead of hoarding in cash, you could have hoarded in some other (non-volatile, non-bubble) market, making reasonable interest, and still reaping rewards on the housing market by selling and buying at the right times.
Morally I can't. Saving in a CD, bank account or other regulated market adds reserve capital which allows the fraudulent fractional reserve banks to exist and defraud millions. I won't be a part of it. Instead, I stay debt free, buy gold, invest in local dividend-bearing businesses and hoard cash in various currencies.
When a truly full reserve bank starts up, I'm there.
I'm certainly not part of the elite you speak of, yet I own a stake (they are called "shares") in various companies, including financial institutions. I make money from interest on my investments. Yes, that money I'm making partially derives from the interest on credit that other people are paying. That makes me neither evil nor elite. That's just how the economy works.
I'd love to see your portfolio; if you're not earning reasonable dividends, your money isn't mqking you money -- you're just gambling, hoping some sucker pays more for your zero-profit generating shares than you paid.
I refuse to buy used stocks that don't pay at least 15-20% dividends. Most of my stocks are private issues on local businesses I can monitor. I've audited some portfolios and found most non-dividend-bearing portfolios lose value against affordability indexes. No thanks.
The fact is that the vast majority of people are included in this system of credit transfer, whether through explicit investment (e.g. playing the stock market), or through other means (anyone with any kind of retirement savings). Yes, the rich control many of the resources (by definition) but wealth and corporate ownership among the lower and middle class have been increasing, not decreasing, over time.
No, they haven't. Per-individual asset-values have dropped due to easy credit. Fewer people own (in full) their homes and cars than in 1997, 1987 and 1977.
Corporate ownership is a shill theory. Instead of paying dividends to shareholders, people are now duped by market indexes that aren't tied to affordability indexes. CxOs, advisors and financial auditing companies (especially since SarbOx passed) reap the real rewards. The shareholders gain little when comparing dollar affordability from stock purchase to sale.
Are you seriously saying that an individual would be better off sticking their money under the mattress rather than investing it? If you don't invest your money, and earn interest above the rate of inflation, then you are actually losing money over time. Even when the interest rate drops, it never drops as low as the "money in mattress" level, which is 0%. I assure you that the "rich elite" are reinvesting every penny they get, thereby contributing to the economy.
The rate of inflation is between 11% and 19% a year since the 90s. Almost all long term investments lose value based on dollar affordability.
Hoarding cash, as dollars, as euros or as grams of gold, gives you fast liquidity to buy assets after an asset sector crash brings real affordability. See my post in this thread regarding how I bought a house for cash after hoarding for 3 years -- I saw a bubble, I hoarded in diversified cash versions, and I struck when the asset I wanted crashed. I jumped the gun 18 months early but we had our eye on an exact home for 6 years and it hit pre-foreclosure, allowing a reasonable short-sale negotiation.
The elite do hoard cash. Yes, they play the markets, too, but most middle class investors have negative total asset value, which a smart investor would never accept.
That's the silliest thing I've seen in a while. Uninvested money just shrivels through inflation. Even in the "buy in down times", almost no one makes money that way, it's a way to lose money.
Inflation, meaning the expansion of money supplying, does devalue hoarded cash during bubble periods. But during the bubble popping periods, after the dead cat bounces, bubbled assets tend to crash below their theoretical equilibrium values, bringing the hoarded cash value to a stronger level.
My home at 1X income this year was 2.5X income in 2005. It fell 60% in dollar value. We paid cash, too, saving us hundreds of thousands in interest over the next 30 years.
My hoarded cash lost value for 3 years, but now its worth 60% more in the housing market.
We also hoard mostly in gold, but since 2005 over half our cash hoardings have been in Euros and Dirhams. I sold all my Euros to buy the house.
Recessions seem bad for gold, but even if its dollar-value falls, its buying power tends to stay solid. Since my income should go up 20% in 2008, a recession in most areas would lead me to hoard even more, maybe 60% of my post-tax income.
Remember, stagflation is good for hoarders.
Recessions aren't supposed to happen based on Keynesian theory since all the worlds' governments and their central banks have been creating credit in a rate almost never seen before on the global scale. Print money, create jobs, right? Of course, the reality is that the central banks have been creating credit for one specific reason: to transfer wealth from the poor and middle class to the bank-connected elites.
There is no recession -- it's just part of the cycle of credit expansion/contraction that occurs to regularly shift our future wealth to those who have been taking advantage of that credit creation since the 70s, if not earlier. Look at it this way: all that lovely money that was created via credit expansion, and then spent, still exists. If you took a $200,000 HELOC on your home that is now worth $100,000, you likely spent that $200,000 somewhere (Hummer, cruises, clothes, electronic gadgets, new porch, etc). The money didn't just cancel out the debt that was created -- it was spent, and it lined someone's pockets.
The wealthy have been hoarding money for decades. Stick it in the mattress, in the vault, anywhere but in a savings account or in the market where the money would stay in the economies, keeping them at least operating. Now, credit is tight, because those who have it don't want to risk letting the middle class earn it to invest it in their own wealth-growth schemes.
Open Source is likely the sector MOST hurt by a credit crunch. Those without a connection to the IP-monopolized software sector will have a tough time borrowing to develop new software, pay for payrolls, or expand their marketing budgets. They money exists, but it's not easily loaned out until the credit crunch creates a new legion of people who are desperate for a little more debt accessibility. The OSS community may not operate on debt, but I'd doubt it. Most people I know, including small business owners, wouldn't have a meal in their fridge if it wasn't for easy credit.
My business, which generally stays away from OSS, operates on a positive cashflow, paying dividends to its owners, who also operate on a positive cashflow. The software sectors that will stay afloat during a credit crunch are those who are cash positive, and are in no rush to spend it until there are deals to be had.
I can't wait for a big recession, or even a depression. I sat on the sidelines on home ownership for 3 years, and finally bought again this year (after selling 3 years ago at near peak) for 1X my annual income. Easy as pie. In terms of business, I know many little IT companies and marketing companies that are on the verge of falling apart. They have assets, and client books, that are worth significant prices, but since no one is spending right now, their value is dropping. Thankfully, those of us who saved instead of spent, and contracted instead of expanded during a bubble, will have cash that is worth MUCH more than it was worth 2 or 3 years ago.
So it isn't specific sectors that will get hurt or gain ground -- nearly everyone who existed with a negative cashflow or a debt-maintained business plan will get hurt. Their values will drop, and those who held cash or fully-owned assets (land, commercial property, gold, etc) will be ready to swoop in and pick up valuable assets at a deep discount.
Back in the dotcom/dotbomb days, I also stayed on the sidelines. All of my competitors were spinning "Y2K!!!" marketing garbage to clients, who spent lots of money on a non-issue. We, instead, told people it was a non-issue. We didn't go public, try to create useless software, or expand more than 10-15% per year in size. When the SHTF, there were MANY assets we picked up for pennies on the dollar when things exploded.
So if you're an OSS or a closed-source developer, and you're hurting, remember for the next time another bubble grows: stay out of it. Hold cash, pay off your debts faster than you think you should, and be ready for the mass price cuts on things you wanted to buy when you origi
Insightful comment, but a lot of what you propose will have no effect:
1) Copyright should be reduced in duration.
Copyright in the digital age is dead and quite useless. As laborers realize that their real income comes from billing for labor to-be-done, rather than billing for labor already-done, copyright will quickly dissolve to being useless. Artists are laborers, and those who realize that their future incomes will be derived from that which can't be easily duplicated by others will be the ones who profit and stay in business. Performing live is something that others can't easily mimic. Supply and demand, friends. There's a near limitless supply of digital content, so the price falls to near zero. There's a VERY finite supply of the time a specific artist can perform, so their income will come from selling that time to fans (i.e., live concerts or performances). Yes, this creates a real dilemma for writers, but I believe that MOST readers will prefer the artist's accepted printed book rather than the knock-off.
2) The penalties must be adjusted to be reasonable.
The penalties for being caught violating copyright are the least important factor in the situation. The time, and money, spent fighting a legal battle against an organization with a scale of income many MANY times higher than the defendant are the real costs. If you are found guilty of a civil violation, you declare bankruptcy and the judgment goes away. You don't get back the years, and tens of thousands of dollars, that you lost fighting to save your name. Reducing penalties will likely not fix this problem.
3) People must come to respect the rights of property holders, not violate them blindly.
OK, I won't steal the physical CD you have. The minute that I use my labor to duplicate something else, that product is mine. If I see you made a neat toilet, and I spend my hours buying porcelain, laying it into a form, and making my own toilet, you should have little control over how I move my arms, and use my mind, to duplicate the product that I want. Copyright, and other intellectual property restrictions, do little to promote new content or creations. The biggest wall for content creators is distribution, not creation. Millions, even billions of people create content, but only a few are able to distribute it.
I respect the rights of PHYSICAL property holders, but I see no reason why they should control how I think or use my body and tools.
4) Slashdot-crowd must abandon the notion that "not-for-profit" redistribution of someone else's work should be permitted without permission of the rights holder.
Actually, the "not-for-profit" redistribution and re-creation of another person's original thoughts is a positive for the original creator, as it is a free form of marketing and advertising for them. Artists who tour regularly should LOVE people duplicating their digital works to friends and family and co-workers. Studio time is akin to the time (and money) one spends going to college or getting another education. It is what you DO with that education (i.e. studio time) as a long term labor that dictates how you get paid for your education.
Just because a guy spent 4 years in college doesn't mean I should pay him $50,000 a year. Just because a band spent 4 years working on an album doesn't mean that their recorded work is worth a single penny to me. The laws of supply and demand, while restricted by ridiculous IP laws, will still win out in the long run.
The RIAA is worthless, and many bands that I work with and am friends with realize that already. The only bands who care are the ones who sold their souls to their management companies in exchange for access to the monopolized distribution sectors (radio, TV, large distro magazines) which are already going the way of the do-do. Radio, TV and large distro mags will soon be worthless in the next digital era.
You're right about sugar being a big cause of obesity (not fat), but McDonald's isn't really to blame. When I met my (now) wife, I had never been a big carb eater. I was always a meat & cheese kinda guy. She introduced me to pasta, sugary snacks, potato chips, and other stuff. I went from my "anorexic" 140lbs to 190lbs in less than a year. When I realized I was fat, I thought it was because I was eating too many fatty foods, so I cut my fats out entirely. I gained even more weight. Thanks to Dr. Atkins and about 12 months of diet research, I then proceeded to reduce my sugars, increase fiber and healthy fats, and I lost my weight back to 140-150lbs. Some of my meals were at McDonalds, too. At one point, I ate McD's almost every day, and continued to lose weight while getting my blood pressure and bad cholesterol levels lower.
Americans are sickeningly fat, but it isn't video games or McDonalds -- its their love of sugar and sugar-like products (HFCS). I can't believe how many unbelievably fat people I know, and I know I'll have to pay for their early retirement because they won't stop shoving candy into their mouths. Cola soda is candy. "Healthy" Granola is candy. Most of the products on Weight Watchers are candy. Don't these fat people see that they're not only killing themselves, but they're putting the cost on me and others who decide to live healthy?
Here's a reason why I detest single-payer healthcare: because people will have LESS reason to live a healthy lifestyle. I haven't been to the doctor in years except for my annual checkup. I haven't been sick in years, either. And yet I know my health costs go up because of the people who refuse to look into what ails them in terms of weight problems.
I just got back from India last night, spending 2 weeks or so in Mumbai, Maharashtra, and in Colva Beach, Goa. I love India, and have a home in Mumbai on a busy street. My wife joined me for the first time, and she can't wait to go back (she's a very white blond gal).
The traffic SEEMS nuts, but it isn't. It flows and moves with amazing grace, not chaos. Pollution is TERRIBLE, but it isn't just cars and trucks. Once you are familiar with how the roads work, crossing busy streets is easy, and driving isn't too bad. I generally hire a private car for the weeks I spend there each year, but I've driven myself and have little concern for what some people consider a lack of safety standards.
The Tata cars are great. The Nano will be awesome, considering how many families drives 4-to-a-motorcycle in the worst monsoon weather. The biggest polluters, it seems, are the government's buses, which are ancient and kick out more smoke than the next 50 cars combined. The cabs I used were mostly non-gas and non-diesel (I believe LP or something like it, as I videotaped a refill station and heard the sound of high pressure tanks being filled). No smoke came out of the exhausts like the cities' garbage trucks and buses.
I love India with a passion, and am planning on working out of my home there for 2+ months a year. The profit margins are amazing, the lack of regulation leads people to push themselves harder, making people wealthy for working hard. I see smiles on even the poorest laborers' faces. I interviewed one young man who pushed a two-wheel 1 ton moving "cart" with some brothers. He made around $1.50 per day, and he said it was the most money anyone in his family made. I asked him what he did with the money, and he said he SAVED IT so he could start a business. He lived with 9 others in his extended family, and had to deal with a 1 hour train ride in each direction just to push a 1 ton cart around by hand.
I spoke with kids working in the Americanized starbucks-style coffee house. These guys made $3 a day, and they were considered wealthy by friends. We interviewed a film crew at the Bollywood area, and many of them worked more than 70 hours a week, but were able to save more than 50% of their meager salaries.
Food was excellent. Service was amazing. The level of cleanliness in even the public airport has grown by leaps and bounds in just 2 years. I visit every winter (Chicago winter), and just can't believe how happy the poor and lower class seem with all the options available to work.
Tata will destroy the American car companies because they are producing what the market wants, not what government requires. Yes, the Nano may see unsafe, but the 10 accidents I witnessed in Mumbai were all related to the same problem: bad, potholed roads. That's not a carmaker's problem. On the road my home is on (Napean Sea Road in a ritzy district), the road outside my house is maintained by our family and the neighbors. THe main part of the road is fixed slowly and politically, but we make sure that the curbside area is maintained perfectly. The bank down the street from my house had 10 laborers using pick-axes to redo the road, and within 10 days it was good as new.
India, backwards in many ways, but sometimes moving forwards means not understanding how humans work. We want opportunities, and when we find them, we utilize them to better our lives. It's when government gets in the way that people get sad, burdened with debt, and see no hope for the future.
It was VERY hard to come home. We spent 5 days in Paris total on the trip (going and coming), and 3 days in Dubai. It is very sad when returning to the US brings back the views of people with frowns and anger. When my pro-socialist friends tell me maybe I should move away if I hate the American nationalist-socialist system, now I have a good response: maybe I will.
Newspapers still have a virtual monopoly on one aspect of newsmaking: digging deep, traveling, researching, and fact-checking. Unfortunately, MOST newspapers are just regurgitators of whatever the AP or other news-wires spend big bucks to write. The days of the old traveling reporter seem to be short, but there are still a few out there who really work hard to get the news.
The Internet, on the other hand, is still a beacon of opinion, without much digging. Facts aren't checked (not that all mainstream press outlet do much of that), biases are obvious, and many bloggers just preach to the choir. That's an area that isn't likely to change.
The big item of interest, though, is always financial: "Can I do this, and can I make money at it?" I think the obvious answer for almost all forms of media is: YES, and more of a yes than any time in the past. For two generations, musicians tended to only make money when they were corporately owned. Now, individual groups can make money just by promoting themselves and their tours online. The same is true with journalism, or even movie making. Heck, the Ron Paul girl has made five figures just taking her clothes off and promoting the candidate. Amazing. Soon, we'll see theatre and acting groups rendering their own sitcoms on YouTube for a small profit, but they still won't have the backend that the mainstream companies do: script-writers, fact-checkers, editors, sound people, crew, etc.
I like the new age, because it does open up options for the individual to earn a living. I know quite a few people who now make almost 6-figures annual blogging (but they're working 50-60 hours a week on their sites!). I know more than one band who is making more than 6-figures annual with no record label contract. I know a graphic designer or two who are making a decent living by drawing cartoon characters for individual companies, churches and organizations and not having to "slave" 40 hours a week for Disney or another employer.
I do think the classifieds HAVE to go away, but I don't think Craigslist is necessarily the answer or the final option. The web will likely move to a more object-oriented fashion, rather than purely single HTML endlinks. I've always theorized that particular web pages will be broken down to segments of information, designated with content variables ("tags"), that will be easily integrated into the desktop sites of others. I know Microsoft tried this eons ago, and it failed, but the web wasn't ready.
Why should I post an ad to craiglist for a 2001 Toro lawnmower for sale in zip code 60031, when I can just pop in an object into my MySpace, or my blog, or another site, signifying an object for-sale, the price, the zip code, etc, and allow Google or other search engines to point interested buyers to that particular object? Maybe we'll have sites that integrate all those similar objects into a mash-up of information to utilize for other people's needs (like we're now seeing with websites that mash-up data from various non-similar sites of data).
The answer in the long-run is not another market or company that takes over information disperal, but the individualization of data in an object form for many individuals or organizations to provide for new markets to develop. A personal blog may be composed of 20 individual objects, all with their own tags, all distributable in their own singular nature to be re-displayed on various sites for whatever purpose.
Methinks HTML is dying, fast. Even the Web 2.0 stuff seems to be ready for extinction. A new day, a new web, will really harm the Web 2.0 companies that are still focusing on the page, instead of breaking down the individual content within the page.
Who has money for the energy bill from Christmas lights? Our household is very financially secure, but I'm not looking to spend thousands over the season to run the lights. My neighbor, who isn't really decked out as much as some, said his bill will be over $600 more this months for his lighting scheme. OUCH.
I'm sure the environmentalists will cry foul, and I understand that philosophy, but for me, the lights are putting more demand on electricity, which means I'll pay a higher bill myself.
The wife and I do like to see the more extravagant lighting setups out there, but we have noticed that some homes aren't running them 7 days a week. Wonder if its an electrical bill concern.
I completely understand that part -- our own home(s) are moving to get off the electric grid, but not for ecological reasons (we want to save money as the dollar plummets).
:)
Solar isn't clean, that's for sure. The 3 solar-panel investors we speak with have told us of the ecological burdens of producing solar panels. We're still moving to solar (and to geothermal A/C and heat) for our primary residence to lower the long-term cost of energy, but we know that we're likely causing as much damage to the environment elsewhere to bring our cost-reductions home, over the long run.
We have a few greenie friends who really think they're saving the environment, but the more I research it, the more it seems that there is nothing you can truly do to reduce your carbon footprint, even if it seems logical. There are too many parameters to wade through to calculate what a certain mode of transportation or energy generation costs.
I'd love one of those basement-nukes, even if it cost $5b. Run the thing at 5c/KwH, and feed the rest of the power back to the grid for a nice refund each month. After a decade of inflation, I wonder how much energy would cost.
I also don't feel safe in some of the lighter cars. My favorite car happens to be a diesel Land Rover, but it's outside of my price range. I do like feeling safe, and I like something that can handle Chicago winters. Our little Subaru (2.0l I4) is fairly decent on gas mileage, but I'd love a diesel if they ever started making one. It handles great in snow and ice, is definitely safe (my wife totalled one of my Subarus years ago at 75MPH and walked away), but it's still no eco-friendly machine.
For me, the best reduction of polluting we've done is cut our driving significantly, but we travel by plane much more than before, so I'm sure that's a negative reduction