I don't know, but it's a non-sequitur. The Wii doesn't have to be better than the 360, because the only people for whom that is a relevant question are the small number of people who own and frequently use both systems.
I have no idea what you are talking about, but even if I were to grant your premise (which I don't), I would still object that you equate working a job to being a slave. What was your point?
Those things are true, but I think you overestimate the amount of freedom enjoyed in the past. Especially, consider the distribution of freedom among the population.
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."
Huh. Well this is obviously untrue. More Americans enjoy far more liberty today than at any period in American history, perhaps in human history. Yeah, it's not perfect, but we're doing a lot better than our grandparents did, despite the extra government we choose to have.
Bread knives, cars, and dogs are used overwhelmingly for legal and good things. BitTorrent is used overwhelmingly for copyright infringement.
That doesn't make BitTorrent bad, or cars good, but it is a valid distinction to make.
Think of the Betamax case: the Supreme court found that VCRs have "significant non-infringing uses". We probably agree that BitTorrent is like VCRs, with significant non-infringing uses. But the key word is "significant" -- if half of VCRs were used for non-infringing uses, then that's significant. But what if only.01% of BitTorrent is actually used for Linux distros? Is that significant? Probably not.
To me, that doesn't matter. BitTorrent (or VCRs) aren't the problem. But it's a legally and rhetorically valid point to make.
I'm with you on not wanting my habits tracked in general, although I may be interested in some kind of tracking which would benefit me.
But I want to challenge your assertion that they will receive the same ad revenue regardless. Targeted ads are a lot more lucritive than non-targeted ads; and many modern ad forms are sold on a per-impression basis. So, by not viewing ads, you may in fact be reducing their ad revenue. That said, I bet you and I agree that it is a GOOD THING to try to reduce ad revenue. I prefer a market system where there is less advertising, and I would just straight-up pay for goods and serviced.
So the only reason you expect it to be English, is that you are arrogant. Wanna know who else behaves like this? The french.
No! The reason we expect it to be in English, is that we are lazy. It is true that the French are arrogant, but if you look up that word you will see that it implies an exaggerated sense of importance. Whereas the French have exactly that exaggerated sense of importance, Americans merely have a realistic sense of our own importance. Love us or hate us, you've got to admit, we run the fucking world.
Don't worry, though, we're juuuuust about to start declining. Check back in fifteen years when we are sucking our thumbs and crying about our imperial past, like the British. And THEN we will be arrogant, and the Chinese will be lazily demanding programming in Mandarin.
Moving that much infrastructure "three feet uphill" would cost a lot compared to the cost of addressing the problem in the first place.
It would!? Golly, how much?
Of course, we don't know. But my point is more general -- yeah, okay, it costs a lot to get people to move from Manhattan to Brooklyn, but that's not a difficult thing to do. Everyone would just, you know, literally walk up the hill three feet.
Global warming is more scary because of the potential effects on the global plant and ocean life. That's what I fear. But, hey then again, I live at the top of a hill.
I don't really trust an op-ed piece for scientific analysis. I live in Juneau, where we have a local glacier that you can visit right here in the middle of town (and more that you can hike to). That one, the Mendenhall, is receding, and has been since before the industrial revolution. We have our local Juneau Ice Field, which has a whole bunch of glaciers, and the local scientists tell us that one of those glaciers is advancing (for unknown reasons, apparently) but all the others are receding.
I don't know that you mean by a decade's worth of pause. Global temps have been rising for the last decade, and glaciers around these parts have been receding for he last decade.
You have posed the question "Is the sun causing our current warming trend?" This is a great question, one which is natural and obvious to ask. It is also a scientific question -- that is, a question which can be verified or falsified by evidence. Your question also has already been asked by scientists, and in fact scientists have already performed science to determine the answer. I'm a little surprised you haven't heard about it yet, but there is a scientific answer to your scientific question:
NO, THE SUN IS NOT CAUSING THE CURRENT WARMING TREND.
Did you really not know that? or are you intentionally ignoring the vast amount of sound science already performed, by repeating questions which have already been satisfactorily answered?
I live in Alaska, where we have lots of glaciers that extend into the ocean. But glaciers aren't really what we're talking about, we're talking about ice fields, specifically Antarctica and Greenland. (Glaciers are the fingers extending from the hands of icefields.) Icefields exist on land, and that's the problem.
Yeah, the people who use the GP's argument are either being wags, or are completely shitbrained.
I accept most climate predictions on faith, since the details of the science are mostly over my head (the basics are easy to understand). And I totally understand why 3 feet of extra ocean would flood coastal cities and result in the loss of land along the coasts. But I don't understand why, besides the monetary cost, that's such a big deal. So, uh, we have to move uphill? And we only have to move three feet uphill? I don't know, that's not very convincing. Maybe we should be talking about the other, much more scary, effects of global warming.
It's the same at all schools, so that wouldn't work. Also, because going to school is a privilege, not a right, there is very little legal standing to sue in order to be re-admitted (not zero, but very little).
You sound like a very reasonable person. More people should listen to you and take your views seriously. You express yourself clearly and everything you say makes perfect sense. My fairy godmother cast a spell on a frog and turned it into a prince.
In your world, culture dies when there is insufficient profit in further cultural distribution.
We all live in the world you describe, but most of us wish we didn't.
Seriously, I don't know whether or not you were joking, but the world you describe is at once horrifying and familiar. Shit, man, it's a book, not a new mansion. People should be able to access books (and other culture) for cheap or free, for all time. It's a little jarring to hear someone (you) say otherwise.
I know you were probably kidding, but is it "environmentally friendly" to drive your gasoline automobile across town to the used book store? Is that better than the tiny amount of electricity it takes to download an e-text?
It seems pretty clear that the environment benefits every time someone chooses an electronic format of anything, rather than a physical formal of that thing. Printing books on paper requires trees to be cut down, regardless of how warm you feel about "recycling".
In my opinion, however, the environmental impact is irrelevant. If you like paper books, then you should read those; if you like e-books (which to me is very odd), then you should read those.
Slashdot Mirror
I wish MS software were as good as MS hardware. My Microsoft wireless mouse is definitely the best MS product I've ever used, by a wide margin.
I don't know, but it's a non-sequitur. The Wii doesn't have to be better than the 360, because the only people for whom that is a relevant question are the small number of people who own and frequently use both systems.
It could compete in lots of ways. You can't think of any? It could compete on content, format, quality, convenience...
I have no idea what you are talking about, but even if I were to grant your premise (which I don't), I would still object that you equate working a job to being a slave. What was your point?
Those things are true, but I think you overestimate the amount of freedom enjoyed in the past. Especially, consider the distribution of freedom among the population.
Yepp. And there's also value to not learning this stuff.
Guns aren't evil, they're awesome.
Criminals shouldn't be put back on the street, they should be incarcerated in accordance with justice.
America, despite its faults, is still the best and greatest country ever.
Homosexuality is deeply unappealing, but otherwise okay.
Other than that, yeah, you're pretty close.
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have ... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."
Huh. Well this is obviously untrue. More Americans enjoy far more liberty today than at any period in American history, perhaps in human history. Yeah, it's not perfect, but we're doing a lot better than our grandparents did, despite the extra government we choose to have.
Either they're stupid or they think we are.
Both, maybe.
Did you intentionally ignore his point?
Bread knives, cars, and dogs are used overwhelmingly for legal and good things. BitTorrent is used overwhelmingly for copyright infringement.
That doesn't make BitTorrent bad, or cars good, but it is a valid distinction to make.
Think of the Betamax case: the Supreme court found that VCRs have "significant non-infringing uses". We probably agree that BitTorrent is like VCRs, with significant non-infringing uses. But the key word is "significant" -- if half of VCRs were used for non-infringing uses, then that's significant. But what if only .01% of BitTorrent is actually used for Linux distros? Is that significant? Probably not.
To me, that doesn't matter. BitTorrent (or VCRs) aren't the problem. But it's a legally and rhetorically valid point to make.
I'm with you on not wanting my habits tracked in general, although I may be interested in some kind of tracking which would benefit me.
But I want to challenge your assertion that they will receive the same ad revenue regardless. Targeted ads are a lot more lucritive than non-targeted ads; and many modern ad forms are sold on a per-impression basis. So, by not viewing ads, you may in fact be reducing their ad revenue. That said, I bet you and I agree that it is a GOOD THING to try to reduce ad revenue. I prefer a market system where there is less advertising, and I would just straight-up pay for goods and serviced.
So the only reason you expect it to be English, is that you are arrogant. Wanna know who else behaves like this? The french.
No! The reason we expect it to be in English, is that we are lazy. It is true that the French are arrogant, but if you look up that word you will see that it implies an exaggerated sense of importance. Whereas the French have exactly that exaggerated sense of importance, Americans merely have a realistic sense of our own importance. Love us or hate us, you've got to admit, we run the fucking world.
Don't worry, though, we're juuuuust about to start declining. Check back in fifteen years when we are sucking our thumbs and crying about our imperial past, like the British. And THEN we will be arrogant, and the Chinese will be lazily demanding programming in Mandarin.
Moving that much infrastructure "three feet uphill" would cost a lot compared to the cost of addressing the problem in the first place.
It would!? Golly, how much?
Of course, we don't know. But my point is more general -- yeah, okay, it costs a lot to get people to move from Manhattan to Brooklyn, but that's not a difficult thing to do. Everyone would just, you know, literally walk up the hill three feet.
Global warming is more scary because of the potential effects on the global plant and ocean life. That's what I fear. But, hey then again, I live at the top of a hill.
I don't really trust an op-ed piece for scientific analysis. I live in Juneau, where we have a local glacier that you can visit right here in the middle of town (and more that you can hike to). That one, the Mendenhall, is receding, and has been since before the industrial revolution. We have our local Juneau Ice Field, which has a whole bunch of glaciers, and the local scientists tell us that one of those glaciers is advancing (for unknown reasons, apparently) but all the others are receding.
I don't know that you mean by a decade's worth of pause. Global temps have been rising for the last decade, and glaciers around these parts have been receding for he last decade.
You have posed the question "Is the sun causing our current warming trend?" This is a great question, one which is natural and obvious to ask. It is also a scientific question -- that is, a question which can be verified or falsified by evidence. Your question also has already been asked by scientists, and in fact scientists have already performed science to determine the answer. I'm a little surprised you haven't heard about it yet, but there is a scientific answer to your scientific question:
NO, THE SUN IS NOT CAUSING THE CURRENT WARMING TREND.
Did you really not know that? or are you intentionally ignoring the vast amount of sound science already performed, by repeating questions which have already been satisfactorily answered?
That is contrary to my understanding of the data. Can you show data for that? This is the data I'm familiar with: data
I live in Alaska, where we have lots of glaciers that extend into the ocean. But glaciers aren't really what we're talking about, we're talking about ice fields, specifically Antarctica and Greenland. (Glaciers are the fingers extending from the hands of icefields.) Icefields exist on land, and that's the problem.
Yeah, the people who use the GP's argument are either being wags, or are completely shitbrained.
I accept most climate predictions on faith, since the details of the science are mostly over my head (the basics are easy to understand). And I totally understand why 3 feet of extra ocean would flood coastal cities and result in the loss of land along the coasts. But I don't understand why, besides the monetary cost, that's such a big deal. So, uh, we have to move uphill? And we only have to move three feet uphill? I don't know, that's not very convincing. Maybe we should be talking about the other, much more scary, effects of global warming.
Golly, the chances of that can't be more than, say, one in ten.
Lots of contemptable things are legal.
True that. And many wonderful things are illegal.
Luckily, the vast majority of laws are good laws. We should really focus on the remaining bad ones.
It's the same at all schools, so that wouldn't work. Also, because going to school is a privilege, not a right, there is very little legal standing to sue in order to be re-admitted (not zero, but very little).
Yah. I second that with a similar story in a similar college with a similar friend and a similar crazy ex-girlfriend.
I know colleges aren't courts of law, but the amount of deference given to the accuser makes it inevitable that false accusations will be common.
We all told my friend to sue the girl. He decided not to do that.
You sound like a very reasonable person. More people should listen to you and take your views seriously. You express yourself clearly and everything you say makes perfect sense. My fairy godmother cast a spell on a frog and turned it into a prince.
In your world, culture dies when there is insufficient profit in further cultural distribution.
We all live in the world you describe, but most of us wish we didn't.
Seriously, I don't know whether or not you were joking, but the world you describe is at once horrifying and familiar. Shit, man, it's a book, not a new mansion. People should be able to access books (and other culture) for cheap or free, for all time. It's a little jarring to hear someone (you) say otherwise.
I know you were probably kidding, but is it "environmentally friendly" to drive your gasoline automobile across town to the used book store? Is that better than the tiny amount of electricity it takes to download an e-text?
It seems pretty clear that the environment benefits every time someone chooses an electronic format of anything, rather than a physical formal of that thing. Printing books on paper requires trees to be cut down, regardless of how warm you feel about "recycling".
In my opinion, however, the environmental impact is irrelevant. If you like paper books, then you should read those; if you like e-books (which to me is very odd), then you should read those.