You can not define "Democracy" mathematically, with a precise formula. Its meaning changes over time and with context.
Indeed, and that's exactly what you're trying to do. Many different, incompatible ways of people governing themselves can be democracies. What matters is that decisions are made by the people, but they don't necessarily need to be made by majority vote. All actual democracies, for example, are representative democracies, and they routinely make decisions opposed by the majority of the voters.
For example, the Athenian Democracy only had voting rights for a small part of the population. We wouldn't even consider it a democracy today. And remind me, when did blacks get to vote in the USA? Was it non-democratic before that date, or was it merely that the meaning of democracy had changed over time, and the political system was a little behind?
You misread what I was saying. I put "the people" in quotes because it refers to the group of persons that have a constitutionally defined right to vote. Changing who can vote is not a decision within the democracy, it is a constitutional decision. It usually requires considerably more than a majority of the people, and constitutional decisions are not guaranteed to be democratic.
Sometimes the legislature makes laws that deprive voters of their rights. Such decisions are in violation of the Constitution; as long as the legal and executive branches rectify such problems, our democracy endures. If they are allowed to stand in violation of the Constitution, we basically have anarchy.
(It's debatable whether voting rights for blacks and women were a change to our democracy or were already required by the original US Constitution, but the question is academic at this point.)
Either some restrictions are ok, or we are not currently living in a democracy. It's one or the other.
We live in a democracy and we have restrictions. Such restrictions derive from the ground rules --constitutions--that nations give themselves when they form. Such ground rules are needed for societies to function. There are many forms that those ground rules can take for a society to be democratic, but if you don't have any, you have an anarchy; not even voting is possible without ground rules for how to vote. Prior to having ground rules, such societies are anarchies, and once they start violating their constitutions on a grand scale, they are anarchies again.
Democracy can be both because your definition of democracy is wrong: you define democracy as "anything the people vote for goes" with no other considerations, but that's not what it is. It can't be because no society could function that way.
Well, golly gee! Any other such bright comments, Mr. Obvious?
But perhaps you are unaware that Christians didn't just adopt Roman symbols, they also adopted Roman practices: torture, persecutions of non-Christians, burnings, mass executions, etc. Yeah, the Christians were a jolly bunch after they got to power. So, using an ancient device of execution and torture is actually quite symbolic of what Christianity actually stands for.
I've tried them, and those pen accessories for the iPad/iPhone absolutely suck. You get more precision using a sausage. Don't waste your money.
Hopefully some manufacturer will come out with a decent screen that does both pen input and capacitive touch screen input. The current capacitive touch screen only devices are useless for drawing, sketching, or writing.
In most countries in the world, Google can't offer the service easily. For example, in many countries, telecoms are not obligated to give anybody else access, anybody who wants a phone number needs to register with the government, and/or there are strong requirements for providing data retention and phone tapping.
So, I wouldn't hold my breath for people offering this in other countries. The only way Google could easily do this is if they bought Skype or one of the other big international VoIP providers that have already done the regulatory footwork.
Nice? It took them a year and a half to approve something that tons of other applications have already provided for that long? That's not "nice".
This was a seriously anti-competitive move by Apple, trying to damage Google Voice while favoring their competitors. Fortunately, iPhone is not big enough of a player for that to have mattered much.
Why prefer your relative statement to the one made in the article? We're interested in observing 30 year old black holes, hence the way of describing things in the article is a good one.
"Democracy" is a label. You can change the label, if you like, but it doesn't change the thing.
It's you who is changing the label.
Actually, much of politics is a question of semantics, not logic.
In politics, as in mathematics, you need logic to vet your definitions; definitions that are inconsistent with existing usage or are simply logically inconsistent need to be rejected. The definition you imagine for "democracy" is both.
Either, the people are autonomous, in which case they define that list for themselves, or they are not, in which case you need a higher authority to point to. It seems to me:
You're applying logic yourself, only that yours is broken. You don't need a "higher authority" to place limits on what people can vote on, there are intrinsic limits if you want a consistent and complete definition. Furthermore, your usage simply is inconsistent with actual usage of the term.
Think that through. It means that there has never been a democracy on this planet. There is not one nation where really everyone can vote. True, the subset increases over time, but it is always a subset.
You need to think that through, not me. You're not responding to what I said.
It matters to us. In this case, we are interested in what happens to a black hole right after formation, so we're interested in black holes that are 30 years old in our frame of reference.
We know it took 50 million + 30 years for the light beam and its information to reach us.
First, if "the people" vote to deprive some subset of "the people" of their ability to participate in the democracy, then, after the vote, "the people" aren't voting anymore and the democracy automatically ceases to be a democracy.
Second, democracies need ground rules by which they operate. They are agreed on ahead of time in a constitution, and need to be obeyed afterwards. If people vote to violate those ground rules, the form of government automatically becomes an anarchy and hence ceases to be a democracy.
Third, as a practical matter, democracies are subject to external forces. You can vote for a law to increase the grain harvest five-fold, but that won't feed you. You can vote to kill all the atheists or Jews, or to take over parts of Poland, but that doesn't mean other nations have to tolerate your choice.
So, "the people" can vote whatever they like, but certain votes are either logically inconsistent with democracy (i.e., after the vote, democracy ceases to exist), or they terminate your democracy due to external forces. "Right" or "wrong" has nothing to do with it, it's a question of logic.
As for the matter at hand, Palestinian blasphemy laws are inconsistent with democracy since they deprive non-Muslim citizens of their political rights. In addition, they are also inconsistent with international law and human rights.
Ah, pretty typical: instead of answering my question--"Why should I support any government that wants to kill me?"-- you just make me your foe. No wonder that the case of Palestinians is so hopeless.
There used to be the certainty of a fundamentalist regime. Right now there is merely the potential for one, and the Afghan people have a chance to turn their nation around. I consider that "better off".
I couldn't care less about what conditions Israel imposes. But I think my own government should impose the condition that any Palestinian government respect freedom of speech and freedom of religion before we support a peace settlement involving them.
I just wish the US entered a serious recession, one where they have to actually cut their spending on stupid things, like protecting Israel. Let's see how much Israel lasts doing Krav Maga only.
I'm all for cutting US aid and arms sales to the ME, including Israel. But if you think that's going to weaken Israel significantly, you haven't looked at the military budgets. (Actually a lot of Israel's military, trade, and support comes from Europe.)
"Apparently"? Forget your bias and look at the track record.
The "track record" is spelled out in this news report: the Palestinian authority has the death penalty on atheism and blasphemy.
Judging by the numbers, I seem to run an infinitely higher risk of being killed my Mossad than Hamas.
And for me, it's different. I don't know of any reason the Mossad want to kill me. But obviously (read the article), the Palestinian authorities do have a policy of killing people like me. Why should I support any government that wants to kill me?
What he's saying is that Bush lied, that these wars are not in the US interest, and that the war on terrorism isn't working. And I agree with all of that. It doesn't contradict the observation that Iraq and Afghanistan are better off now than before.
And I do agree the US should withdraw from most of the Middle East, Central Asia, and Europe. Let the Europeans deal themselves with the messes they created on their doorstep, and let the Europeans pay for their own defense.
Myself, all I remember learning from the teachers about the American revolution was how many people had to leave their homes because they didn't agree.
Nothing wrong with that: they chose not to become citizens and not to swear allegiance to the US. The same happens to you anywhere else.
I'm sorry but it is really hard to pay attention to someone that was fed so much propaganda that they honestly believe the bullshit they were fed about being the best.
I understand where you're coming from very well, since most of my schooling was outside the US as well. At some point, however, I started reading up on my own, whereas you just keep repeating the bullshit you were indoctrinated with.
Americas true colours were shown when they supported the French monarchy during the French revolution.
I have no doubt that the US was grateful to King Louis XVI's for his support, but I can't think of any substantial support. What are you thinking of?
Have you read what the Iraqis say about us?... You really imagine the Iraqis saying...'
I don't need to imagine, I have talked to a number of them. Have you?
Over 100K killed from our recent combat there
That's completely wrong. The overwhelming deaths in the Iraq Body Count are civilian-on-civilian violence.
Can you fathom that?... their lives are forfeit...an entire generation lost will be lost....
Yes, I can fathom that, because my parents and relatives lived through much worse in WWII, millions killed in their countries, their lives on hold for a decade, and almost everything destroyed. Their generation wasn't "lost" at all, they got educations, rolled up their sleeves, and had good, productive lives. And they certainly thought getting rid of the fascists was worth it.
They are not specific to one religion, but they are anti-blasphemy laws since they effectively outlaw blasphemy. Under them, an atheist could be convicted for stating that the Prophet was a fraud and a mass murderer (both of which are historically defensible positions). Whatever the intent, such laws are incompatible with freedom of religion.
The US has nothing equivalent (the US only has hate crime laws, no hate speech laws), but Europe does.
Saddam Hussein was responsible for genocide against the Kurds, the murder of large number of dissidents, and for the deaths in the various wars he started and their aftermath, probably about 900000 over two decades. Those categories are a subset of what the Iraq Death Count is counting now (it also includes other kind of violence). So, if you compare the numbers, far fewer people are dying now per year than before. It's still a depressing statistic, but it doesn't make sense to point at the current death count and say "if only the US hadn't invaded". And from speaking with Iraqis, my impression is that they generally think Iraq is better off now.
(Incidentally, I was against the Iraq war. I thought even at the time that it was unwise and a waste of money.)
That's because it's not so simple. It was Winston Churchill and the UK that wanted the overthrow of the Iranian government because British oil interests were at stake. The UK simply couldn't do it themselves so they asked the US for help. The US eventually agreed to help in order to strengthen the UK (important for Europe), for a share of the oil profits promised by the UK, and out of genuine strategic interests during the cold war.
By today's standards, what the US did was both a bad idea and morally wrong. But compared to the brutal methods Britain and France were using to hold their failing empires together at the time, the CIA really did very little: some propaganda and misinformation. In any case, whatever responsibility the US has for Iran is shared at least equally with the UK.
I make no demands at all; I just stated the facts as they are on the ground right now: Palestinians need to play by Israel's rules because Israel has the power.
But given that the Palestinian government apparently wants to kill people like me (atheists and people who disrespect Mohammed), why should I support that government? I disagree with what Israel is doing, but at least their government doesn't want to kill me. So why would I want to "even out the playing field"?
Slashdot Mirror
You can not define "Democracy" mathematically, with a precise formula. Its meaning changes over time and with context.
Indeed, and that's exactly what you're trying to do. Many different, incompatible ways of people governing themselves can be democracies. What matters is that decisions are made by the people, but they don't necessarily need to be made by majority vote. All actual democracies, for example, are representative democracies, and they routinely make decisions opposed by the majority of the voters.
For example, the Athenian Democracy only had voting rights for a small part of the population. We wouldn't even consider it a democracy today. And remind me, when did blacks get to vote in the USA? Was it non-democratic before that date, or was it merely that the meaning of democracy had changed over time, and the political system was a little behind?
You misread what I was saying. I put "the people" in quotes because it refers to the group of persons that have a constitutionally defined right to vote. Changing who can vote is not a decision within the democracy, it is a constitutional decision. It usually requires considerably more than a majority of the people, and constitutional decisions are not guaranteed to be democratic.
Sometimes the legislature makes laws that deprive voters of their rights. Such decisions are in violation of the Constitution; as long as the legal and executive branches rectify such problems, our democracy endures. If they are allowed to stand in violation of the Constitution, we basically have anarchy.
(It's debatable whether voting rights for blacks and women were a change to our democracy or were already required by the original US Constitution, but the question is academic at this point.)
Either some restrictions are ok, or we are not currently living in a democracy. It's one or the other.
We live in a democracy and we have restrictions. Such restrictions derive from the ground rules --constitutions--that nations give themselves when they form. Such ground rules are needed for societies to function. There are many forms that those ground rules can take for a society to be democratic, but if you don't have any, you have an anarchy; not even voting is possible without ground rules for how to vote. Prior to having ground rules, such societies are anarchies, and once they start violating their constitutions on a grand scale, they are anarchies again.
Democracy can be both because your definition of democracy is wrong: you define democracy as "anything the people vote for goes" with no other considerations, but that's not what it is. It can't be because no society could function that way.
Well, golly gee! Any other such bright comments, Mr. Obvious?
But perhaps you are unaware that Christians didn't just adopt Roman symbols, they also adopted Roman practices: torture, persecutions of non-Christians, burnings, mass executions, etc. Yeah, the Christians were a jolly bunch after they got to power. So, using an ancient device of execution and torture is actually quite symbolic of what Christianity actually stands for.
I've tried them, and those pen accessories for the iPad/iPhone absolutely suck. You get more precision using a sausage. Don't waste your money.
Hopefully some manufacturer will come out with a decent screen that does both pen input and capacitive touch screen input. The current capacitive touch screen only devices are useless for drawing, sketching, or writing.
As far as the overall phone market is concerned, yeah, iPhone is a bit player. And it's the overall phone market that matters to Google Voice.
In most countries in the world, Google can't offer the service easily. For example, in many countries, telecoms are not obligated to give anybody else access, anybody who wants a phone number needs to register with the government, and/or there are strong requirements for providing data retention and phone tapping.
So, I wouldn't hold my breath for people offering this in other countries. The only way Google could easily do this is if they bought Skype or one of the other big international VoIP providers that have already done the regulatory footwork.
Nice? It took them a year and a half to approve something that tons of other applications have already provided for that long? That's not "nice".
This was a seriously anti-competitive move by Apple, trying to damage Google Voice while favoring their competitors. Fortunately, iPhone is not big enough of a player for that to have mattered much.
Let's see: the symbol of Christianity is an ancient device of execution and torture.
Seems to me it's pretty clear who is using "the devil's" symbology.
Why prefer your relative statement to the one made in the article? We're interested in observing 30 year old black holes, hence the way of describing things in the article is a good one.
"Democracy" is a label. You can change the label, if you like, but it doesn't change the thing.
It's you who is changing the label.
Actually, much of politics is a question of semantics, not logic.
In politics, as in mathematics, you need logic to vet your definitions; definitions that are inconsistent with existing usage or are simply logically inconsistent need to be rejected. The definition you imagine for "democracy" is both.
Either, the people are autonomous, in which case they define that list for themselves, or they are not, in which case you need a higher authority to point to. It seems to me:
You're applying logic yourself, only that yours is broken. You don't need a "higher authority" to place limits on what people can vote on, there are intrinsic limits if you want a consistent and complete definition. Furthermore, your usage simply is inconsistent with actual usage of the term.
Think that through. It means that there has never been a democracy on this planet. There is not one nation where really everyone can vote. True, the subset increases over time, but it is always a subset.
You need to think that through, not me. You're not responding to what I said.
Why does *our frame* matter so?
It matters to us. In this case, we are interested in what happens to a black hole right after formation, so we're interested in black holes that are 30 years old in our frame of reference.
We know it took 50 million + 30 years for the light beam and its information to reach us.
That's still a statement relative to our frame.
First, if "the people" vote to deprive some subset of "the people" of their ability to participate in the democracy, then, after the vote, "the people" aren't voting anymore and the democracy automatically ceases to be a democracy.
Second, democracies need ground rules by which they operate. They are agreed on ahead of time in a constitution, and need to be obeyed afterwards. If people vote to violate those ground rules, the form of government automatically becomes an anarchy and hence ceases to be a democracy.
Third, as a practical matter, democracies are subject to external forces. You can vote for a law to increase the grain harvest five-fold, but that won't feed you. You can vote to kill all the atheists or Jews, or to take over parts of Poland, but that doesn't mean other nations have to tolerate your choice.
So, "the people" can vote whatever they like, but certain votes are either logically inconsistent with democracy (i.e., after the vote, democracy ceases to exist), or they terminate your democracy due to external forces. "Right" or "wrong" has nothing to do with it, it's a question of logic.
As for the matter at hand, Palestinian blasphemy laws are inconsistent with democracy since they deprive non-Muslim citizens of their political rights. In addition, they are also inconsistent with international law and human rights.
OpenOffice doesn't magically become proprietary because of a name change or Oracle.
Just wait until the dust settles. Until then, OpenOffice is fine.
Ah, pretty typical: instead of answering my question--"Why should I support any government that wants to kill me?"-- you just make me your foe. No wonder that the case of Palestinians is so hopeless.
There used to be the certainty of a fundamentalist regime. Right now there is merely the potential for one, and the Afghan people have a chance to turn their nation around. I consider that "better off".
I doubt Colombia has serious qualms about drugs, sex, or hookers. As long as you don't criticize their drug cartels, your domain is probably safe.
If you state it, you're agreeing with it.
I couldn't care less about what conditions Israel imposes. But I think my own government should impose the condition that any Palestinian government respect freedom of speech and freedom of religion before we support a peace settlement involving them.
I just wish the US entered a serious recession, one where they have to actually cut their spending on stupid things, like protecting Israel. Let's see how much Israel lasts doing Krav Maga only.
I'm all for cutting US aid and arms sales to the ME, including Israel. But if you think that's going to weaken Israel significantly, you haven't looked at the military budgets. (Actually a lot of Israel's military, trade, and support comes from Europe.)
"Apparently"? Forget your bias and look at the track record.
The "track record" is spelled out in this news report: the Palestinian authority has the death penalty on atheism and blasphemy.
Judging by the numbers, I seem to run an infinitely higher risk of being killed my Mossad than Hamas.
And for me, it's different. I don't know of any reason the Mossad want to kill me. But obviously (read the article), the Palestinian authorities do have a policy of killing people like me. Why should I support any government that wants to kill me?
What he's saying is that Bush lied, that these wars are not in the US interest, and that the war on terrorism isn't working. And I agree with all of that. It doesn't contradict the observation that Iraq and Afghanistan are better off now than before.
And I do agree the US should withdraw from most of the Middle East, Central Asia, and Europe. Let the Europeans deal themselves with the messes they created on their doorstep, and let the Europeans pay for their own defense.
Myself, all I remember learning from the teachers about the American revolution was how many people had to leave their homes because they didn't agree.
Nothing wrong with that: they chose not to become citizens and not to swear allegiance to the US. The same happens to you anywhere else.
I'm sorry but it is really hard to pay attention to someone that was fed so much propaganda that they honestly believe the bullshit they were fed about being the best.
I understand where you're coming from very well, since most of my schooling was outside the US as well. At some point, however, I started reading up on my own, whereas you just keep repeating the bullshit you were indoctrinated with.
Americas true colours were shown when they supported the French monarchy during the French revolution.
I have no doubt that the US was grateful to King Louis XVI's for his support, but I can't think of any substantial support. What are you thinking of?
perhaps you could provide us with an example of a language with clear, concise errors, such that all languages should aspire to?
Just get rid of laziness, type classes, overloading, and monads; ocaml and ML are a lot better in terms of error messages.
Have you read what the Iraqis say about us? ... You really imagine the Iraqis saying...'
I don't need to imagine, I have talked to a number of them. Have you?
Over 100K killed from our recent combat there
That's completely wrong. The overwhelming deaths in the Iraq Body Count are civilian-on-civilian violence.
Can you fathom that? ... their lives are forfeit...an entire generation lost will be lost....
Yes, I can fathom that, because my parents and relatives lived through much worse in WWII, millions killed in their countries, their lives on hold for a decade, and almost everything destroyed. Their generation wasn't "lost" at all, they got educations, rolled up their sleeves, and had good, productive lives. And they certainly thought getting rid of the fascists was worth it.
No...honestly only an American could say this...
Honestly, you seem totally naive to me.
They are not specific to one religion, but they are anti-blasphemy laws since they effectively outlaw blasphemy. Under them, an atheist could be convicted for stating that the Prophet was a fraud and a mass murderer (both of which are historically defensible positions). Whatever the intent, such laws are incompatible with freedom of religion.
The US has nothing equivalent (the US only has hate crime laws, no hate speech laws), but Europe does.
Saddam Hussein was responsible for genocide against the Kurds, the murder of large number of dissidents, and for the deaths in the various wars he started and their aftermath, probably about 900000 over two decades. Those categories are a subset of what the Iraq Death Count is counting now (it also includes other kind of violence). So, if you compare the numbers, far fewer people are dying now per year than before. It's still a depressing statistic, but it doesn't make sense to point at the current death count and say "if only the US hadn't invaded". And from speaking with Iraqis, my impression is that they generally think Iraq is better off now.
(Incidentally, I was against the Iraq war. I thought even at the time that it was unwise and a waste of money.)
That's because it's not so simple. It was Winston Churchill and the UK that wanted the overthrow of the Iranian government because British oil interests were at stake. The UK simply couldn't do it themselves so they asked the US for help. The US eventually agreed to help in order to strengthen the UK (important for Europe), for a share of the oil profits promised by the UK, and out of genuine strategic interests during the cold war.
By today's standards, what the US did was both a bad idea and morally wrong. But compared to the brutal methods Britain and France were using to hold their failing empires together at the time, the CIA really did very little: some propaganda and misinformation. In any case, whatever responsibility the US has for Iran is shared at least equally with the UK.
I make no demands at all; I just stated the facts as they are on the ground right now: Palestinians need to play by Israel's rules because Israel has the power.
But given that the Palestinian government apparently wants to kill people like me (atheists and people who disrespect Mohammed), why should I support that government? I disagree with what Israel is doing, but at least their government doesn't want to kill me. So why would I want to "even out the playing field"?