When I was at primary school, calculators scarcely existed (they tended to have a hand-crank, and, even if we'd been able to afford one, we certainly wouldn't have been allowed to use it - I used to be pretty good at mental arithmetic). By the time I got to high school, I think there were electronic calculators, but, again, we weren't allowed to use them or, for that matter, slide rules. Partly as a consequence of that, I have good numerical skills and a reasonable understanding of maths.
About 25 years ago, I was strapped for cash and answered an ad for a maths tutor for some kid whose mum wanted him to pass 3rd year high school. (It was actually what we call Business Maths, which is basically arithmetic, but never mind.) This kid knew where the sin, cos, etc., buttons were on his calculator, but he had _no_ _fucking_ _idea_ what they represented. Partly perhaps the fault of a teacher who was a bit unclear as well, but largely because he'd been allowed to rely on a calculator for his whole life. Oh, by the way, through no fault of mine, he failed (mostly because he'd rather kick a footy around than do the homework I gave him).
My point, and there is one if you've got this far, is that people who are never given the opportunity to work without a calculator will most likely never develop a deep understanding of mathematics, unless they are exceptionally bright (much brighter than me, for instance).
Huh? When did they rewrite it Java? The last time I used Maple was at university (on SunOS), and I'd be _very_ suprised if it were written in Java then (about 10 years ago). It was pretty nifty, though, for number theoretic stuff (factoring big integers, etc).
We used Matlab (on SunOS) when I did Numerical Analysis at university (about 10 years ago, now). It is really useful as a tool to work on toy problems in numerical analysis, but I suspect it would be too slow for extremely large, real-world problems. The nice thing about it was its general similarity to FORTRAN, the numerical analyst's tool-of-choice (at least, at the time).
No. Even if an open source solution was completely free (which is absurd - you have all kinds of startup costs in training, etc) it would be cheaper by the TCO of the proprietary solution.
Sure, when you're programming this is expected. I'm talking about system administration, which is a bit different. People who administer Windows networks are used to having to use far too many boxes to achieve even quite simple results (because of the truly awful underlying architecture of Windows) and would carry this mindset, and a whole heap of other bad habits they've learnt to get around Windows' awkwardnesses, with them, and therefore do a half-arsed job of administering a unix network.
There's also a fair bit of ice currently sitting on top of Greenland, and more locked up in glaciers all over the place, which will push the water level up some more when it all melts.
I'm unsure why you think signing up to Kyoto will ruin your economy. There are a number of economists' studies out there (and yes, I know most economists especially the neocon zealots are completely disreputable) that purport to show that the economy will be almost completely unaffected (like about 0.1% lower growth rate over 5 years or something).
From what I've observed, most of the people who claim Kyoto will cause the collapse of civilisation as we know it are in the pay of the oil and coal industries, so their statements should be at least treated with caution.
I also remember a certain amount of discussion of global cooling in the '70s. However (and this is a big however), it was pretty much fringe science - there was no consensus. I also seem to recall that the big concern was nuclear winter (ie, if someone let off a whole bunch of nukes, the resultant dust cloud would cause a new ice age), but even this wasn't generally accepted. The big difference now is that it's only those on the fringe (and those who work for the coal and oil industries) who now dispute global warming and its likely consequences.
Back when I was a hippy (30+ years ago), I thought geodesic domes were cool. Now, I'm not so sure. They aren't actually particularly practical (square furniture, etc), and apparently the joints are _really_ hard to make waterproof. Still, for certain specialised purposes (like planetariums), they're a good solution. The buildings in TFA based on vaults look much more practical than a dome of any kind, because you can sit the vault on a vertical wall up to the height of all your cupboards, fridges, etc.
I didn't notice the oil price dropping significantly (you must look at different numbers from the rest of the world), but the stock market will pick up from "certainty" (the certainty that the evil-hearted fuckers who own you are still in control, and will sodomise you yet again). Employument figures are _always_ fraudulent, so you can ignore that. Face it - you've been fucked over. Again.
It's highly likely, in fact, that some form of economic conscription will come into play (if it hasn't already). If the economy tanks and the unemployment rate rises savagely, the defence forces begin to look fairly attractive, particularly to people with few skills. (That was certainly the case when I joined the Australian Army in 1977).
I never mentioned, or implied, anything about picking up chicks. However, I'm pretty sure it doen't qualify as a formal system, which is what I was discussing.
I'm quite aware that modern business strategies involve subverting the requirements for free markets, and that is exactly why I believe free markets are impossible. It's pretty obvious that someone who's trying to sell you something would prefer you _not_ to have perfect knowledge.
None of this addresses the point I was making, which is that economics is more like theology than science. (I hope I don't sound too snotty here:).
I make a fair bit more than that without doing any management-type stuff. Admittedly they're $A, but $A1 in Australia buys about as much stuff as $US1 in the US, except for cars and petrol.
I never said Euclidean geometry wasn't a reasonable approximation for most purposes, but it really doesn't relate to reality (except in so far as any other model applied to any formal system does).
If you'd ever done any geodetic surveying, you'd also realise that euclidean geometry is pretty rough locally as well, because it ignores curvature of the surface and gravitational effects.
You and I seem to have come to much the same conclusion here. I reckon economics is, like theology, euclidean geometry and the propositional calculus, a formal system, which doesn't really apply to the real world. It certainly isn't a science. You can hear the religious fervour in the voices of the free market boosters (as though pefect knowledge of a market were ever possible) every time they tell us how great free trade, free markets, and the other scams du jour are.
Economists are beneath contempt, as a rule (there are honourable exceptions).
Slashdot Mirror
> ... the people who get the concepts and don't care about the details are the ones driving the creation of new companies, ideas and products.
...
What, kind of like the dot-con bubble? Oh, wait
(Oh, it'd help if you learnt how to spell 'diarrhoea', too.)
When I was at primary school, calculators scarcely existed (they tended to have a hand-crank, and, even if we'd been able to afford one, we certainly wouldn't have been allowed to use it - I used to be pretty good at mental arithmetic). By the time I got to high school, I think there were electronic calculators, but, again, we weren't allowed to use them or, for that matter, slide rules. Partly as a consequence of that, I have good numerical skills and a reasonable understanding of maths.
About 25 years ago, I was strapped for cash and answered an ad for a maths tutor for some kid whose mum wanted him to pass 3rd year high school. (It was actually what we call Business Maths, which is basically arithmetic, but never mind.) This kid knew where the sin, cos, etc., buttons were on his calculator, but he had _no_ _fucking_ _idea_ what they represented. Partly perhaps the fault of a teacher who was a bit unclear as well, but largely because he'd been allowed to rely on a calculator for his whole life. Oh, by the way, through no fault of mine, he failed (mostly because he'd rather kick a footy around than do the homework I gave him).
My point, and there is one if you've got this far, is that people who are never given the opportunity to work without a calculator will most likely never develop a deep understanding of mathematics, unless they are exceptionally bright (much brighter than me, for instance).
Huh? When did they rewrite it Java? The last time I used Maple was at university (on SunOS), and I'd be _very_ suprised if it were written in Java then (about 10 years ago). It was pretty nifty, though, for number theoretic stuff (factoring big integers, etc).
We used Matlab (on SunOS) when I did Numerical Analysis at university (about 10 years ago, now). It is really useful as a tool to work on toy problems in numerical analysis, but I suspect it would be too slow for extremely large, real-world problems. The nice thing about it was its general similarity to FORTRAN, the numerical analyst's tool-of-choice (at least, at the time).
No. Even if an open source solution was completely free (which is absurd - you have all kinds of startup costs in training, etc) it would be cheaper by the TCO of the proprietary solution.
Sure, when you're programming this is expected. I'm talking about system administration, which is a bit different. People who administer Windows networks are used to having to use far too many boxes to achieve even quite simple results (because of the truly awful underlying architecture of Windows) and would carry this mindset, and a whole heap of other bad habits they've learnt to get around Windows' awkwardnesses, with them, and therefore do a half-arsed job of administering a unix network.
But even the bright ones would probably do it badly, because they're used to the unpleasant workarounds Windows forces them into.
TFA stated explicitly that Open Source _is_ cheaper, by quite a margin.
How about "country music"?
There's also a fair bit of ice currently sitting on top of Greenland, and more locked up in glaciers all over the place, which will push the water level up some more when it all melts.
Isn't Lomborg an economist? Most of them don't really understand the maths they use.
I'm pretty sure his work has been very thoroughly debunked - by scientists.
I'm unsure why you think signing up to Kyoto will ruin your economy. There are a number of economists' studies out there (and yes, I know most economists especially the neocon zealots are completely disreputable) that purport to show that the economy will be almost completely unaffected (like about 0.1% lower growth rate over 5 years or something).
From what I've observed, most of the people who claim Kyoto will cause the collapse of civilisation as we know it are in the pay of the oil and coal industries, so their statements should be at least treated with caution.
The same way they do now - influence peddling and bribery.
I also remember a certain amount of discussion of global cooling in the '70s. However (and this is a big however), it was pretty much fringe science - there was no consensus. I also seem to recall that the big concern was nuclear winter (ie, if someone let off a whole bunch of nukes, the resultant dust cloud would cause a new ice age), but even this wasn't generally accepted. The big difference now is that it's only those on the fringe (and those who work for the coal and oil industries) who now dispute global warming and its likely consequences.
Back when I was a hippy (30+ years ago), I thought geodesic domes were cool. Now, I'm not so sure. They aren't actually particularly practical (square furniture, etc), and apparently the joints are _really_ hard to make waterproof. Still, for certain specialised purposes (like planetariums), they're a good solution. The buildings in TFA based on vaults look much more practical than a dome of any kind, because you can sit the vault on a vertical wall up to the height of all your cupboards, fridges, etc.
I didn't notice the oil price dropping significantly (you must look at different numbers from the rest of the world), but the stock market will pick up from "certainty" (the certainty that the evil-hearted fuckers who own you are still in control, and will sodomise you yet again). Employument figures are _always_ fraudulent, so you can ignore that. Face it - you've been fucked over. Again.
It's highly likely, in fact, that some form of economic conscription will come into play (if it hasn't already). If the economy tanks and the unemployment rate rises savagely, the defence forces begin to look fairly attractive, particularly to people with few skills. (That was certainly the case when I joined the Australian Army in 1977).
> Sometimes, one must work from within the system to garner sufficient respect and attention to be able to breed resistance against the status quo.
You sound like a Trotskyite. (This is not meant to be perjorative, btw.)
That's their job. Someone has to do it.
I never mentioned, or implied, anything about picking up chicks. However, I'm pretty sure it doen't qualify as a formal system, which is what I was discussing.
:).
I'm quite aware that modern business strategies involve subverting the requirements for free markets, and that is exactly why I believe free markets are impossible. It's pretty obvious that someone who's trying to sell you something would prefer you _not_ to have perfect knowledge.
None of this addresses the point I was making, which is that economics is more like theology than science. (I hope I don't sound too snotty here
However, TFA _did_ mention that they had medical devices running Windows. This strikes me as being dangerously stupid.
I make a fair bit more than that without doing any management-type stuff. Admittedly they're $A, but $A1 in Australia buys about as much stuff as $US1 in the US, except for cars and petrol.
I never said Euclidean geometry wasn't a reasonable approximation for most purposes, but it really doesn't relate to reality (except in so far as any other model applied to any formal system does).
If you'd ever done any geodetic surveying, you'd also realise that euclidean geometry is pretty rough locally as well, because it ignores curvature of the surface and gravitational effects.
You and I seem to have come to much the same conclusion here. I reckon economics is, like theology, euclidean geometry and the propositional calculus, a formal system, which doesn't really apply to the real world. It certainly isn't a science. You can hear the religious fervour in the voices of the free market boosters (as though pefect knowledge of a market were ever possible) every time they tell us how great free trade, free markets, and the other scams du jour are.
Economists are beneath contempt, as a rule (there are honourable exceptions).
Yeah, but - realistically - who in their right mind would want to be a manager anyway?