Also, will the religious rights head explode when Muslims try to use their faith in the same way the Christians are trying too?
Already happened. Awhile back, some state legislature passed a law allowing discussion of religion in public schools as a means of promoting Christianity (though they didn't come out and say that). They then were shocked, SHOCKED that this law was used to allow discussion of Islam. HOW HORRIBLE!!!!
Photographer refuses to take photographs at a gay wedding because of religious beliefs. Will take photos of any other ceremony. Photographer refuses to take photographs at a mixed race wedding because of religious beliefs. Will take photos of any "pure race" ceremony. Photographer refuses to take photographs at a non-white wedding because of "religious" beliefs. Will take photos of any white ceremony.
Don't confuse actual religious freedom with the idiocy that politicians in Indiana are pushing. Real religious freedom is important. Real religious freedom states that nobody should force you to violate your religious beliefs (or lack thereof) because that other person has a different religious view. Without religious freedom, the Christian majority could vote and decide that all Jews, Muslims, Atheists, etc were required to worship Jesus.
The key, though, is that real religious freedom has its limits and the people pushing these laws aren't respecting those limits. I have the freedom to not eat pork since I'm Jewish. Someone who is Christian can't make eating pork a condition of citizenship. However, I also can't use my religious beliefs to ban all pork products. Like all other rights, my rights end when others' begin. Sadly, the people pushing these laws think their religious views should trump all other rights. Of course, if someone denied them services because they worshiped Jesus instead of being Muslim/Atheist/etc, they would cry foul.
I completely agree with the "no right to be free of offense", though. If someone wants to criticize my religious beliefs, they can go right ahead. It's their right. It won't change my beliefs (especially if they are jerks about it) and I might try to offer counter-arguments, but I won't demand that they be silenced for criticizing what I believe in*.
* If their "criticism" calls for hurting/killing people who believe X, though, all bets are off. Threats do not equal discussion.
No, if you use encryption, their job becomes hard. This is bad (as defined by them, not me) because:
A) They want the power to look at everyone anytime they want to make sure you're not a terrorist (or some other criminal). Encryption prevents this.
B) They don't want to have to actually work hard to do their job. Why do research and obtain warrants and deal with privacy-protection measures when you can just trample over everyone to get what you want? The quickest path between point a and point b is a straight line - even if it takes them through your house,
That was my first reaction also. The government likes to speak about terrorism, but ID theft, credit card fraud, and other types of financial crimes are a whole lot more prevalent. Now imagine if encryption were to disappear tomorrow. All those personal details whizzing about the Internet unencrypted? Financial crimes would skyrocket. Either that, or nobody would do business online and a huge sector of the economy would collapse overnight. Even *IF* banning encryption meant all terrorism was stopped the financial cost alone would make it a non-viable option.
The cat is out of the bag. Crypto and its application is an academic subject now, with plenty of companies and open-source projects using the fruit of the work. That is to say, for another ten-fifteen years or so. Then, quantum will start taking it all apart. The amateurs will not have the resources to follow there.
So, basically, the cat is either out of the bag, or dead, and we won't know for another ten-fifteen years, time at which the cat wave collapses.
Great. Now those terrorists are attacking Schrodinger's cat... or not attacking it. I can't tell since I haven't observed the system yet.
If you didn't encrypt your conversation, they could listen in to it, determine you two weren't terrorists, and move on to the next unencrypted conversation or focus on the small number of encrypted ones.
If more people encrypt conversations, though, the government won't be able to rule out that you are a terrorist since they won't be able to listen in on you.
In short, you're guilty until proven innocent and you're making it hard for them to prove you innocent. [mock outrage] How DARE you do that! [/mock outrage]
What they are basically saying is "make our jobs easier for us"
We've been seeing a lot of this recently. From the RIAA/MPAA who would like the ability to get the personal information on multiple people on the flimsiest of evidence of copyright infringement (because actually gathering evidence on each one and suing each person in the appropriate district is too hard) to the government law enforcement agencies who feel that asking a court for a warrant - even when said court never turns them down - is too much effort.
It's one thing to be power-hungry. It's quite another to be power-hungry AND lazy!
Just because people choose to work in a place, doesn't mean the company gets to trample its worker's rights. Besides, it might not have been much of a choice. Suppose someone loses their job and is out of work for awhile. Money gets tight and they need to feed his family. He is offered a job at Amazon and no other prospects are forthcoming. Should he decline the job on principal/due to the non-compete contract clause, thus putting his family in deeper financial peril? Or should he accept the job protecting his family from financial ruin now but at the possible non-compete expense further down the line? Not everyone has a lineup of a dozen companies vying to hire them every time they find themselves unemployed.
I say we get rid of the cockpit entirely, and instead provide a set of virtual controls in every passenger seat's seatback touchscreen. That way the passengers can fly the plane democratically. It will only fly into a mountain if that's what a majority of the passengers want it to do.
But, if the head of a large company is flying, he represents many more people and should get more votes than everyone else.
Everyone is equal, but some people are more equal than others.
Actually, 1 in a million might be too high of an estimate. There were 37.4 million flights scheduled worldwide last year (Source). The summary gives 5 examples from 1999 to present. Let's double that number (and exclude 2015 since this year just started) just to be safe. So 10 incidents in 6 years for an average of 1.6 incidents per year. So the risk of any one flight having a suicidal pilot/co-pilot determined on bringing the plane down is 1 in 22.4 million.
You likely have a greater chance of dying on a plane from a heart attack than from the pilot/co-pilot crashing the plane. It's just that "co-pilot locks out pilot and crashes plane" makes for a juicier news story than "pilot and co-pilot fly planned route with no major issues and land safely just like they did a dozen times the previous week."
And Marriot wanted the ability to block you from using your mobile hotspot, forcing you on the hotel's wireless network for "security reasons." Thankfully, they withdrew the request when it became apparent that a) it wouldn't be granted and b) there was a ton of bad PR being generated by this move. Still, this insecure hotel wi-fi story makes that request even more laughable.
The problem is that the companies told him repeatedly when he was purchasing the home that they would provide service to the house. After his purchase was completed, they decided that they really don't serve that property after all. Why should he pay for the build out when they originally told him that no build out was needed? If the cable company tells you that they'll serve Property X, they should be held accountable to that and be forced to serve Property X - not suddenly decide that this property isn't in their coverage area after all.
As a side note, these companies publish coverage maps and use them to "prove" to the government that there is a vibrant competitive landscape. When it comes time to adhere to these maps' coverage areas, though, they suddenly discover that there are flaws in them. Not that they'll correct the maps or update their coverage areas to adhere to the maps, but just an "oops, we can't cover you anyway."
Great. And then robots decide that humans don't qualify as sentient beings because we can't do twenty digit multiplication in our heads in under 5 seconds.
It was a device to drive a story, nothing more. They aren't real laws, and there's no possible way you could effectively incorporate them into advanced A.I. Just stop it. Stop mentioning them. Stop it.
Not only that, but the stories were specifically about why the Three Laws didn't work.
If you want to write a science fiction story where the robots follow the Three Laws, go right ahead. If you want to propose that actual robots must follow these laws, we'll just be sitting here laughing at you.
If there is a size limit for a quantum computer, I wonder if you could get around this by having a large cluster of them. (Insert standard Beowolf joke here.) Have a classical computer break down the problem into components, send the components to the quantum computers, and then reassemble the results for the user.
I took quantum mechanics in college. I was going for a physics degree at the time. I struggled so much wrapping my brain around quantum mechanics that I dropped that as a major. (Instead, I went into computer science where I was picking up everything with ease.)
The terrorist attack doesn't even need to happen. They just need to "find" a terrorist cell with explosives, plans, etc. all ready to go. Then sow a little fear that others might be out there and their funding/powers will not only be unchallenged, but increased and challenging their authority will be political poison for another decade
Children generally have more time in front of them and therefore are being robbed of more when killed.
Also, children generally have less of a say as to their country's political actions. In democracies, adults can vote. In non-democracies, adults could decide to protest (often risking arrest, imprisonment, or death) or engage in outright rebellion. Depending on their situation, the adults might have a small say in what their country is doing, but it's still something.
Children don't even have this. You can't expect a three year old to march on his nation's capital demanding that the President-For-Life step down because of his militaristic maneuvers. You can't think that a five year old would cast a vote for the opposition party, risking his life and pre-k education to voice his political opposition to the majority party's policies.
The worst-case-scenario with kids is that they can be (at a certain age), taken by force and drafted into a quasi-army, but that still is the adults turning the kids into soldiers, not the kids deciding for themselves that strapping bombs to themselves would be fun to do after they are finished at the playground.
I'm not sure how to take this (lack of tone in text can be a killer).
"Of course, you're a father" because everyone on Slashdot is a geek which means, by definition, we all live in our parents' basement and never see real women in person?
Or
"Of course, you're a father" because everyone on Slashdot is male and no mother would come here at all.
I'm not sure which I should be refuting (or neither). I don't think it's gotten to the point of "Of course, you're a father because everyone on Slashdot is a parent" yet. It would be interesting to see demographic data on how many Slashdotters were married/not married and had kids/didn't have kids. If only to help bust the "living in mom and dad's basement" stereotype.
It had entries for non-barcoded food too. I could eat a banana, enter "banana" and know just how many calories (plus fat, fiber, etc) that banana contained. I could also set up custom entries for when I cooked dinner (which is more frequent than me eating food prepared for me). If I made a taco salad, I could figure out how much one serving was and enter that. Then, all subsequent taco salad meals could use that.
I used the barcode recognition more with ingredients. Add cheese to the dish. Scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're eating. Add pasta to the dish, scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're eating. Add frozen veggies to the dish (which I tend to use more than fresh since they don't go bad as quickly), scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're using. Etc.
Even if you just use estimates, you can still benefit from meal tracking. What I've found tracking apps like this cut down on is mindless snacking. The "I'll just have a handful of these... and maybe a few of those... and a couple of those..." situations that result in people wondering why they can't lose weight.
The best way to lose weight is to burn more calories than you consume. One problem is that it is really easy in our society to consume calories. You just ate a plate of whole wheat pasta with veggies. Healthy right? No, because you likely had about 3 servings of pasta.
I used MyFitnessPal to help me track my calorie intake. One helpful feature is the bar code scanner. You can scan almost any product and get the nutritional information right into your mobile device. I dropped about 20 pounds while using that.
And, just as a reminder, the FCC first enacted extremely weak Net Neutrality regulations (not Title II) that actually wouldn't have done anything. Most of the ISPs liked these "regulations", but Verizon sued to get them overturned. It was *that* case where the court basically said "If you want to do this, you need to use Title II." So the ISPs really only have Verizon to blame for these tougher rules.
Slashdot Mirror
Already happened. Awhile back, some state legislature passed a law allowing discussion of religion in public schools as a means of promoting Christianity (though they didn't come out and say that). They then were shocked, SHOCKED that this law was used to allow discussion of Islam. HOW HORRIBLE!!!!
The problem is where do you draw the line?
Photographer refuses to take photographs at a gay wedding because of religious beliefs. Will take photos of any other ceremony.
Photographer refuses to take photographs at a mixed race wedding because of religious beliefs. Will take photos of any "pure race" ceremony.
Photographer refuses to take photographs at a non-white wedding because of "religious" beliefs. Will take photos of any white ceremony.
Don't confuse actual religious freedom with the idiocy that politicians in Indiana are pushing. Real religious freedom is important. Real religious freedom states that nobody should force you to violate your religious beliefs (or lack thereof) because that other person has a different religious view. Without religious freedom, the Christian majority could vote and decide that all Jews, Muslims, Atheists, etc were required to worship Jesus.
The key, though, is that real religious freedom has its limits and the people pushing these laws aren't respecting those limits. I have the freedom to not eat pork since I'm Jewish. Someone who is Christian can't make eating pork a condition of citizenship. However, I also can't use my religious beliefs to ban all pork products. Like all other rights, my rights end when others' begin. Sadly, the people pushing these laws think their religious views should trump all other rights. Of course, if someone denied them services because they worshiped Jesus instead of being Muslim/Atheist/etc, they would cry foul.
I completely agree with the "no right to be free of offense", though. If someone wants to criticize my religious beliefs, they can go right ahead. It's their right. It won't change my beliefs (especially if they are jerks about it) and I might try to offer counter-arguments, but I won't demand that they be silenced for criticizing what I believe in*.
* If their "criticism" calls for hurting/killing people who believe X, though, all bets are off. Threats do not equal discussion.
No, if you use encryption, their job becomes hard. This is bad (as defined by them, not me) because:
A) They want the power to look at everyone anytime they want to make sure you're not a terrorist (or some other criminal). Encryption prevents this.
B) They don't want to have to actually work hard to do their job. Why do research and obtain warrants and deal with privacy-protection measures when you can just trample over everyone to get what you want? The quickest path between point a and point b is a straight line - even if it takes them through your house,
That was my first reaction also. The government likes to speak about terrorism, but ID theft, credit card fraud, and other types of financial crimes are a whole lot more prevalent. Now imagine if encryption were to disappear tomorrow. All those personal details whizzing about the Internet unencrypted? Financial crimes would skyrocket. Either that, or nobody would do business online and a huge sector of the economy would collapse overnight. Even *IF* banning encryption meant all terrorism was stopped the financial cost alone would make it a non-viable option.
Great. Now those terrorists are attacking Schrodinger's cat... or not attacking it. I can't tell since I haven't observed the system yet.
If you didn't encrypt your conversation, they could listen in to it, determine you two weren't terrorists, and move on to the next unencrypted conversation or focus on the small number of encrypted ones.
If more people encrypt conversations, though, the government won't be able to rule out that you are a terrorist since they won't be able to listen in on you.
In short, you're guilty until proven innocent and you're making it hard for them to prove you innocent. [mock outrage] How DARE you do that! [/mock outrage]
We've been seeing a lot of this recently. From the RIAA/MPAA who would like the ability to get the personal information on multiple people on the flimsiest of evidence of copyright infringement (because actually gathering evidence on each one and suing each person in the appropriate district is too hard) to the government law enforcement agencies who feel that asking a court for a warrant - even when said court never turns them down - is too much effort.
It's one thing to be power-hungry. It's quite another to be power-hungry AND lazy!
Just because people choose to work in a place, doesn't mean the company gets to trample its worker's rights. Besides, it might not have been much of a choice. Suppose someone loses their job and is out of work for awhile. Money gets tight and they need to feed his family. He is offered a job at Amazon and no other prospects are forthcoming. Should he decline the job on principal/due to the non-compete contract clause, thus putting his family in deeper financial peril? Or should he accept the job protecting his family from financial ruin now but at the possible non-compete expense further down the line? Not everyone has a lineup of a dozen companies vying to hire them every time they find themselves unemployed.
But, if the head of a large company is flying, he represents many more people and should get more votes than everyone else.
Everyone is equal, but some people are more equal than others.
Whatever you do, though, don't put a cat in the cockpit.
*cat walks across control panel flipping random switches*
*planes engines explode plunging everyone to their death*
*somehow, cat survives*
Actually, 1 in a million might be too high of an estimate. There were 37.4 million flights scheduled worldwide last year (Source). The summary gives 5 examples from 1999 to present. Let's double that number (and exclude 2015 since this year just started) just to be safe. So 10 incidents in 6 years for an average of 1.6 incidents per year. So the risk of any one flight having a suicidal pilot/co-pilot determined on bringing the plane down is 1 in 22.4 million.
You likely have a greater chance of dying on a plane from a heart attack than from the pilot/co-pilot crashing the plane. It's just that "co-pilot locks out pilot and crashes plane" makes for a juicier news story than "pilot and co-pilot fly planned route with no major issues and land safely just like they did a dozen times the previous week."
And Marriot wanted the ability to block you from using your mobile hotspot, forcing you on the hotel's wireless network for "security reasons." Thankfully, they withdrew the request when it became apparent that a) it wouldn't be granted and b) there was a ton of bad PR being generated by this move. Still, this insecure hotel wi-fi story makes that request even more laughable.
The problem is that the companies told him repeatedly when he was purchasing the home that they would provide service to the house. After his purchase was completed, they decided that they really don't serve that property after all. Why should he pay for the build out when they originally told him that no build out was needed? If the cable company tells you that they'll serve Property X, they should be held accountable to that and be forced to serve Property X - not suddenly decide that this property isn't in their coverage area after all.
As a side note, these companies publish coverage maps and use them to "prove" to the government that there is a vibrant competitive landscape. When it comes time to adhere to these maps' coverage areas, though, they suddenly discover that there are flaws in them. Not that they'll correct the maps or update their coverage areas to adhere to the maps, but just an "oops, we can't cover you anyway."
Great. And then robots decide that humans don't qualify as sentient beings because we can't do twenty digit multiplication in our heads in under 5 seconds.
Not only that, but the stories were specifically about why the Three Laws didn't work.
If you want to write a science fiction story where the robots follow the Three Laws, go right ahead. If you want to propose that actual robots must follow these laws, we'll just be sitting here laughing at you.
If there is a size limit for a quantum computer, I wonder if you could get around this by having a large cluster of them. (Insert standard Beowolf joke here.) Have a classical computer break down the problem into components, send the components to the quantum computers, and then reassemble the results for the user.
I took quantum mechanics in college. I was going for a physics degree at the time. I struggled so much wrapping my brain around quantum mechanics that I dropped that as a major. (Instead, I went into computer science where I was picking up everything with ease.)
You can't fool me. Albert Einstein actually said that. It was after he successfully defended the Alamo from invading British forces in 1792.
The terrorist attack doesn't even need to happen. They just need to "find" a terrorist cell with explosives, plans, etc. all ready to go. Then sow a little fear that others might be out there and their funding/powers will not only be unchallenged, but increased and challenging their authority will be political poison for another decade
Also, children generally have less of a say as to their country's political actions. In democracies, adults can vote. In non-democracies, adults could decide to protest (often risking arrest, imprisonment, or death) or engage in outright rebellion. Depending on their situation, the adults might have a small say in what their country is doing, but it's still something.
Children don't even have this. You can't expect a three year old to march on his nation's capital demanding that the President-For-Life step down because of his militaristic maneuvers. You can't think that a five year old would cast a vote for the opposition party, risking his life and pre-k education to voice his political opposition to the majority party's policies.
The worst-case-scenario with kids is that they can be (at a certain age), taken by force and drafted into a quasi-army, but that still is the adults turning the kids into soldiers, not the kids deciding for themselves that strapping bombs to themselves would be fun to do after they are finished at the playground.
I'm not sure how to take this (lack of tone in text can be a killer).
"Of course, you're a father" because everyone on Slashdot is a geek which means, by definition, we all live in our parents' basement and never see real women in person?
Or
"Of course, you're a father" because everyone on Slashdot is male and no mother would come here at all.
I'm not sure which I should be refuting (or neither). I don't think it's gotten to the point of "Of course, you're a father because everyone on Slashdot is a parent" yet. It would be interesting to see demographic data on how many Slashdotters were married/not married and had kids/didn't have kids. If only to help bust the "living in mom and dad's basement" stereotype.
It had entries for non-barcoded food too. I could eat a banana, enter "banana" and know just how many calories (plus fat, fiber, etc) that banana contained. I could also set up custom entries for when I cooked dinner (which is more frequent than me eating food prepared for me). If I made a taco salad, I could figure out how much one serving was and enter that. Then, all subsequent taco salad meals could use that.
I used the barcode recognition more with ingredients. Add cheese to the dish. Scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're eating. Add pasta to the dish, scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're eating. Add frozen veggies to the dish (which I tend to use more than fresh since they don't go bad as quickly), scan barcode, figure out how much per serving we're using. Etc.
Even if you just use estimates, you can still benefit from meal tracking. What I've found tracking apps like this cut down on is mindless snacking. The "I'll just have a handful of these... and maybe a few of those... and a couple of those..." situations that result in people wondering why they can't lose weight.
The best way to lose weight is to burn more calories than you consume. One problem is that it is really easy in our society to consume calories. You just ate a plate of whole wheat pasta with veggies. Healthy right? No, because you likely had about 3 servings of pasta.
I used MyFitnessPal to help me track my calorie intake. One helpful feature is the bar code scanner. You can scan almost any product and get the nutritional information right into your mobile device. I dropped about 20 pounds while using that.
And, just as a reminder, the FCC first enacted extremely weak Net Neutrality regulations (not Title II) that actually wouldn't have done anything. Most of the ISPs liked these "regulations", but Verizon sued to get them overturned. It was *that* case where the court basically said "If you want to do this, you need to use Title II." So the ISPs really only have Verizon to blame for these tougher rules.