This was true until yesterday, when hulu.com removed the plaintext PIDs which the xbmc hulu plugin used. Hopefully they will be able to work around it (decrypting the encrypted PIDs) but until then no more hulu on xbmc.
Exactly. I couldnt have said it better myself. I didnt like Hillary too much, but with Bill (even the evil petty Bill that seems to have resurfaced) as "co-President" I would have had much more faith on the rebuilding of this country than this frankly all-flash-no-substance Obama. Didn't the country (much less Democrats) learn anything about voting for a cult of personality? Republicans (and Naderites) did for Bush, and look how that turned out
What gets me is the biggest difference between Bush and other mass murderers. At least Hitler, Stalin, etc. set out to kill people. They had a vision, a plan, and executed (no pun intended) it. They were ruthless, egomaniacal, and yes evil, but they set out to do something and accomplished it, at least for a short time.
Compare this to Bush who can only be considered a plain FOOL. I believe he (unlike his handlers, who probably knew exactly what was going to happen, but didn't care) truly thought he was doing the "good" thing by attacking Saddam and Iraq, that it would be a cakewalk (like most of his life has been, thanks to daddy), and when confronted with the rising death count, shrugged and made himself feel better by thinking he didnt do anything wrong and at least he had good intentions.
Competent evil is at least predictable and can be fought. How do you fight a "aww shucks" nice guy on the surface who bungles everything he does? In the end though there were enough signs from the very beginning that Bush was a complete idiot (anyone who actually bothered to see his Q&A sessions after prepared remarks knows what I mean) that we really have only ourselves to blame.
Nearly half of the voters the first time around decided they would rather have an idiot but "fun" guy in charge than a competent but stiff guy. More than half the second time saw the mess Iraq was, and still thought Bush could handle it better than the other guy. We get the government and leader we deserve.
I think people who say "its not an unfair advantage because he's still too slow" are missing the point. It's unfair because there is a possibility that, without these mechanical legs, he would be even slower. Performing better with mechanical legs than with normal legs is the definition of unfair advantage.
I know the article mentions an MIT study that says there isnt a mechanical advantage, but I find that hard to believe.
I would disagree to a slight degree on this one. I remember reading one Spider-man comic where Peter talks about LED's he attached to his web shooters to let him know when he was running dry. I guess it was related to a plot point, but I think the explanation about Light Emitting Diodes was totally unnecessary, and served only to "enlighten" or "illuminate" because it certainly wasn't entertaining, unless the whole point was to make it seem "real" like the real world, which is also contrary to your point.
In Iron Man I also remember reading some attempts (that were frankly boring because they were trying too hard) to tie Tony's technology to real world devices, like thermocouples (to absorb heat and convert into electricity), transistors that can seemingly do anything, Head Up Displays, etc.
My point is not that these comic books are trying to explain everything in real world technology, but they are also not totally divorced from it, which is I think what you are trying to say.
Holy cow, all that spinning and outright lying and the public opinion concerning Iraq is still abysmal? What would it be like if they didnt have to "buy" the news media?
As a fellow American I must remind you of another imperative---preemptive strikes. I would recommend that the original poster preempt his coworkers and go steal their supplies first. Leave anonymous notes saying you successfully "liberated" the supplies.
I think a lot of the discussion and debate is moot, because neither side has any incentive at all to budge from their views. I am probably more cynical than most, but I think something emotional and basic is going on here, and so long as this undercurrent is there there is no hope for change.
As far as I can tell Creationists/IDers may change their arguments or story, but the one thing that is constant is their FEAR, either of being convinced that there is no God (and hence no salvation) or being shown to have wasted their lives believing in something that is untrue. So long as they are afraid, there is really no hope for the science crowd to convince them otherwise. Who cares about logic and definition of scientific if deep down you are afraid of what happens when you die? No amount of semantic analysis will take away that fear.
I know scientists and their supporters are by no means "better" human beings (I have seen plenty of petty and superficial professors in grad school), but I would posit that the emotion they operate under is CURIOSITY, of the world around them and how things work. I am not sure Creationists/IDers want to convince scientists that they are wrong, they just want to be left alone with their beliefs that assuage their fears. They see the prevalence of science (something I don't see in the US, actually) as a threat to their beliefs, which is why they are very persistent in advancing their cause---keeping their fear contained, NOT promoting their world creation beliefs.
Just a rant, with no solutions. As a cynic, I see this debate---which isn't a debate anywhere else in the world---as one of the signs we are regressing back to fear-riddled agrarian society.
the concept of windows middle then aisle. if you have a particularly slow window passenger in row 5 who needs to put up a roller, he/she will be holding up everybody behind him/her trying to get to their window seats for rows >5.
if anything, the current method (at least for most airlines) of boarding at the rear section first makes more sense. The problems that we currently face are mostly due to either people ignoring the group designations (and the ticket collector not enforcing it) or allowing premium passengers to board first or at any time. Enforce groups assiduously and don't allow premium passengers to board out of order and the current method shouldnt be too bad.
This is true globalization, if japanese news gets hosted in countries such as the US to avoid government oversight while American music/movies/porn gets hosted in countries like Japan to avoid the RIAA/MPAA/etc.
I don't get the point of this. Do you mean installing apache, MySQL, cygwin, and whatever else (in my case, Zope/Plone and svn/trac) is not easy to do on a Windows server box?
Or that performance is worse than running the same apps on a linux box?
I actually don't mind using Windows as a low to mid level server, although I don't worry about ActiveDirectory or Windows domain controllers.
I wonder how efficiency ratings are measured? If it's number of patents processed, then there is an incentive to rubber stamp applications (pass a lot, fail a lot, or come up with a semi-random scheme).
Really though, with the years you've invested in your engineering degree would you want to go straight to a paper shuffling job right out of school?
impedance? I know we are all supposed to be geeks here, but talking about complex resistance seems out of place. Perhaps you meant impediment?
I personally do think impulsive is stupid, depending on the degree. I've bought a lot of gadgets on a whim and later regretted it, thinking (belatedly) that it was stupid.
As far as I am concerned the quote is pretty true. When I was a poor grad student I would impulsively go out and buy $20-$30 games. As I've gotten wealthier, my threshold goes up, and I now impulsively buy $100-$200 gadgets. Lately though I've come back down to $20-$30 things.
I must have been multitasking reading this, because I first thought you wrote "freeskin" which immediately made me think you meant "foreskin." Now what I was multitasking with I won't say...
I assume by the tone and content of your post you are a "conservative." What coup have you lived through?
I also assume that you do not hate the "current incumbent President" but you are more than willing to gun him down with your personally owned firearm should he decide to declare martial law?
I agree pretty much with what you said. His firstmost concern was preserving the union. Lincoln gets a lot of credit for ending slavery, but that was not the moral imperative that preserving the nation was (he really "freed" only the slaves in the South that he didnt have control over anyway). I do believe he felt slavery to be immoral, but in the early years (read: when he was trying to get elected) he said a lot of racist (in our modern eyes at least) things which he probably didn't mean. That was really what my point was. He had a professional commitment to preserve the union which he took very seriously, and did not let his personal dislike of slavery to get in the way of doing his job as president. He said what the majority of people wanted to hear at the time (blacks and whites are not equal, etc.) in order to actually do some good for the entire nation.
Contrast that to our "leaders" today. I don't mean just Bush, but he is a good example. His personal feelings (reduce taxes no matter what, make rich friends richer, cozy up to family friends in Saudi Arabia, etc.) are what is driving his entire presidency, and his administration spins and twists the truth to fit his personal feelings, not the other way around. Unfortunately, democrats are pretty close to this as well (especially the current crop of presidential candidates), but I think there are not many people as singularly focused on "my way or the high way, facts be damned" as Bush is.
I think it is the nature of the beast that all politicians lie, and twist the truth so that they say what we want to hear. Even Lincoln, IMHO the best president ever, did so. The only difference is he did it to do what he thought was best for the country. With Bush I think he does whatever he does to benefit himself and his cronies, the country be damned.
How to tell? Look at past behavior. Sure, Bush was always the guy you would like to go out for drinks with (vice Gore or Kerry) but since he was an adult he never truly worked hard at anything, and all of his failures were bailed out by his father. What kind of leader would he be? Well exactly the kind of president we have now.
So really it isnt Bush's fault, but our fault (the "majority" of voters at least) for worrying more about likeability than past history.
Government has another vital role that you alluded to in you "sad fact of life."
Sure, if there were no government then it couldnt take "so much money in taxes" But without a police force and laws, there will be "dogs" and "parasites" taking as much, if not more from you.
I'm sure people will say "well if I had a gun I will protect myself and my property" but there will always be someone bigger carrying a bigger gun.
I know you said you aren't libertarian, so this isn't directed to, but to deluded libertarians.
are you also aware that there were enough facts and analyses and at least a few low level FBI personnel that "connected the dots" all with existing systems before 9/11? The only problem was the institutional behavior of mid-level managers ignoring what subordinates push up.
So I really think these new data collection schemes are the administration's goal to check up on the domestic populace and weed out the real enemies (in their eyes anyway), which are Democrats, libertarians, and any other non-neocon or non-Republican.
Slashdot Mirror
Not a dumb question, but if it's like San Diego's system, the bus would have a bike rack in front that you can use on the way to work.
This was true until yesterday, when hulu.com removed the plaintext PIDs which the xbmc hulu plugin used. Hopefully they will be able to work around it (decrypting the encrypted PIDs) but until then no more hulu on xbmc.
I haven't RTF article, but I don't need to-facts don't matter.
Exactly. I couldnt have said it better myself. I didnt like Hillary too much, but with Bill (even the evil petty Bill that seems to have resurfaced) as "co-President" I would have had much more faith on the rebuilding of this country than this frankly all-flash-no-substance Obama. Didn't the country (much less Democrats) learn anything about voting for a cult of personality? Republicans (and Naderites) did for Bush, and look how that turned out
What gets me is the biggest difference between Bush and other mass murderers. At least Hitler, Stalin, etc. set out to kill people. They had a vision, a plan, and executed (no pun intended) it. They were ruthless, egomaniacal, and yes evil, but they set out to do something and accomplished it, at least for a short time.
Compare this to Bush who can only be considered a plain FOOL. I believe he (unlike his handlers, who probably knew exactly what was going to happen, but didn't care) truly thought he was doing the "good" thing by attacking Saddam and Iraq, that it would be a cakewalk (like most of his life has been, thanks to daddy), and when confronted with the rising death count, shrugged and made himself feel better by thinking he didnt do anything wrong and at least he had good intentions.
Competent evil is at least predictable and can be fought. How do you fight a "aww shucks" nice guy on the surface who bungles everything he does? In the end though there were enough signs from the very beginning that Bush was a complete idiot (anyone who actually bothered to see his Q&A sessions after prepared remarks knows what I mean) that we really have only ourselves to blame.
Nearly half of the voters the first time around decided they would rather have an idiot but "fun" guy in charge than a competent but stiff guy. More than half the second time saw the mess Iraq was, and still thought Bush could handle it better than the other guy. We get the government and leader we deserve.
I think people who say "its not an unfair advantage because he's still too slow" are missing the point. It's unfair because there is a possibility that, without these mechanical legs, he would be even slower. Performing better with mechanical legs than with normal legs is the definition of unfair advantage.
I know the article mentions an MIT study that says there isnt a mechanical advantage, but I find that hard to believe.
I would disagree to a slight degree on this one. I remember reading one Spider-man comic where Peter talks about LED's he attached to his web shooters to let him know when he was running dry. I guess it was related to a plot point, but I think the explanation about Light Emitting Diodes was totally unnecessary, and served only to "enlighten" or "illuminate" because it certainly wasn't entertaining, unless the whole point was to make it seem "real" like the real world, which is also contrary to your point.
In Iron Man I also remember reading some attempts (that were frankly boring because they were trying too hard) to tie Tony's technology to real world devices, like thermocouples (to absorb heat and convert into electricity), transistors that can seemingly do anything, Head Up Displays, etc.
My point is not that these comic books are trying to explain everything in real world technology, but they are also not totally divorced from it, which is I think what you are trying to say.
Holy cow, all that spinning and outright lying and the public opinion concerning Iraq is still abysmal? What would it be like if they didnt have to "buy" the news media?
As a fellow American I must remind you of another imperative---preemptive strikes. I would recommend that the original poster preempt his coworkers and go steal their supplies first. Leave anonymous notes saying you successfully "liberated" the supplies.
I think a lot of the discussion and debate is moot, because neither side has any incentive at all to budge from their views. I am probably more cynical than most, but I think something emotional and basic is going on here, and so long as this undercurrent is there there is no hope for change.
As far as I can tell Creationists/IDers may change their arguments or story, but the one thing that is constant is their FEAR, either of being convinced that there is no God (and hence no salvation) or being shown to have wasted their lives believing in something that is untrue. So long as they are afraid, there is really no hope for the science crowd to convince them otherwise. Who cares about logic and definition of scientific if deep down you are afraid of what happens when you die? No amount of semantic analysis will take away that fear.
I know scientists and their supporters are by no means "better" human beings (I have seen plenty of petty and superficial professors in grad school), but I would posit that the emotion they operate under is CURIOSITY, of the world around them and how things work. I am not sure Creationists/IDers want to convince scientists that they are wrong, they just want to be left alone with their beliefs that assuage their fears. They see the prevalence of science (something I don't see in the US, actually) as a threat to their beliefs, which is why they are very persistent in advancing their cause---keeping their fear contained, NOT promoting their world creation beliefs.
Just a rant, with no solutions. As a cynic, I see this debate---which isn't a debate anywhere else in the world---as one of the signs we are regressing back to fear-riddled agrarian society.
the concept of windows middle then aisle. if you have a particularly slow window passenger in row 5 who needs to put up a roller, he/she will be holding up everybody behind him/her trying to get to their window seats for rows >5.
if anything, the current method (at least for most airlines) of boarding at the rear section first makes more sense. The problems that we currently face are mostly due to either people ignoring the group designations (and the ticket collector not enforcing it) or allowing premium passengers to board first or at any time. Enforce groups assiduously and don't allow premium passengers to board out of order and the current method shouldnt be too bad.
This is true globalization, if japanese news gets hosted in countries such as the US to avoid government oversight while American music/movies/porn gets hosted in countries like Japan to avoid the RIAA/MPAA/etc.
Not really, in that People's Republic of China and Democratic People's Republic of Korea are neither.
I don't get the point of this. Do you mean installing apache, MySQL, cygwin, and whatever else (in my case, Zope/Plone and svn/trac) is not easy to do on a Windows server box?
Or that performance is worse than running the same apps on a linux box?
I actually don't mind using Windows as a low to mid level server, although I don't worry about ActiveDirectory or Windows domain controllers.
I wonder how efficiency ratings are measured? If it's number of patents processed, then there is an incentive to rubber stamp applications (pass a lot, fail a lot, or come up with a semi-random scheme).
Really though, with the years you've invested in your engineering degree would you want to go straight to a paper shuffling job right out of school?
Star Trek TOS had this as an episode too, and I am sure it wasn't the first time this thought was expressed.
32.823352272542484276756074858822 + 1 bits, so 5 bytes
impedance? I know we are all supposed to be geeks here, but talking about complex resistance seems out of place. Perhaps you meant impediment?
I personally do think impulsive is stupid, depending on the degree. I've bought a lot of gadgets on a whim and later regretted it, thinking (belatedly) that it was stupid.
As far as I am concerned the quote is pretty true. When I was a poor grad student I would impulsively go out and buy $20-$30 games. As I've gotten wealthier, my threshold goes up, and I now impulsively buy $100-$200 gadgets. Lately though I've come back down to $20-$30 things.
I must have been multitasking reading this, because I first thought you wrote "freeskin" which immediately made me think you meant "foreskin." Now what I was multitasking with I won't say...
I assume by the tone and content of your post you are a "conservative." What coup have you lived through?
I also assume that you do not hate the "current incumbent President" but you are more than willing to gun him down with your personally owned firearm should he decide to declare martial law?
since the second time around he legitimately won the vote, not only were there people who didn't learn, there were people who got stupid too
I agree pretty much with what you said. His firstmost concern was preserving the union. Lincoln gets a lot of credit for ending slavery, but that was not the moral imperative that preserving the nation was (he really "freed" only the slaves in the South that he didnt have control over anyway). I do believe he felt slavery to be immoral, but in the early years (read: when he was trying to get elected) he said a lot of racist (in our modern eyes at least) things which he probably didn't mean. That was really what my point was. He had a professional commitment to preserve the union which he took very seriously, and did not let his personal dislike of slavery to get in the way of doing his job as president. He said what the majority of people wanted to hear at the time (blacks and whites are not equal, etc.) in order to actually do some good for the entire nation.
Contrast that to our "leaders" today. I don't mean just Bush, but he is a good example. His personal feelings (reduce taxes no matter what, make rich friends richer, cozy up to family friends in Saudi Arabia, etc.) are what is driving his entire presidency, and his administration spins and twists the truth to fit his personal feelings, not the other way around. Unfortunately, democrats are pretty close to this as well (especially the current crop of presidential candidates), but I think there are not many people as singularly focused on "my way or the high way, facts be damned" as Bush is.
I think it is the nature of the beast that all politicians lie, and twist the truth so that they say what we want to hear. Even Lincoln, IMHO the best president ever, did so. The only difference is he did it to do what he thought was best for the country. With Bush I think he does whatever he does to benefit himself and his cronies, the country be damned.
How to tell? Look at past behavior. Sure, Bush was always the guy you would like to go out for drinks with (vice Gore or Kerry) but since he was an adult he never truly worked hard at anything, and all of his failures were bailed out by his father. What kind of leader would he be? Well exactly the kind of president we have now.
So really it isnt Bush's fault, but our fault (the "majority" of voters at least) for worrying more about likeability than past history.
Government has another vital role that you alluded to in you "sad fact of life."
Sure, if there were no government then it couldnt take "so much money in taxes" But without a police force and laws, there will be "dogs" and "parasites" taking as much, if not more from you.
I'm sure people will say "well if I had a gun I will protect myself and my property" but there will always be someone bigger carrying a bigger gun.
I know you said you aren't libertarian, so this isn't directed to, but to deluded libertarians.
are you also aware that there were enough facts and analyses and at least a few low level FBI personnel that "connected the dots" all with existing systems before 9/11? The only problem was the institutional behavior of mid-level managers ignoring what subordinates push up.
So I really think these new data collection schemes are the administration's goal to check up on the domestic populace and weed out the real enemies (in their eyes anyway), which are Democrats, libertarians, and any other non-neocon or non-Republican.