I am not gonna read any of the comments for fear of spoilers.
I have only read a couple of "screenfuls" but it seems rather more well-written than I expected. I think I will read the whole thing(or a substantial subset).
I can sort of guess the plot: Computer(s) take over, leading to a world of disembodied intelligence similar to Kurzweil's "The Age of Spiritual Machines" and interesting consequences ensue, but I am interested in the specific way it unfolds.
Obviously by the time I finish reading this story will be long gone from/. front page, I think this is one of the weaknesses of the weblog medium: it's not easy to have extended discussions.
Re:Painful? Yes. Helps long term? I don't see it.
on
Giant Sucking Noise
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· Score: 1
Totally agree with you on this.
It is amazing the lengths people will go to justify their essentially selfish motives with supposedly altruistic arguments.
Of course free trade will lead to some people losing their jobs, but it leads to other people getting jobs AND cheaper goods and services for the rest of us.
We can use some of the money saved to train the displaced guys for new work, or heck pay them unemployment benefits, but it makes no sense to 'save' someones job indefinitely simply because they feel they 'deserve' it.
That guy in India deserves that job just as much as you do, so whining about the 'unfairness' of it all simply isn't going to cut it. If you want money for training say so. If you just want free money to feed your family say so. It will be discussed and a compromise reached.
As others have pointed out, such things have happened before and no major economic decline occurred. Instead everyone got richer in the end(on average). I predict the same will happen in this case.
Aaah come on, this ain't the New York times we are talking about.
If you want to read 'the paper of record' you go to the so called 'professional media' that actually employ people such as 'fact checkers' before they publish anything.
If you want random crap that may or may not be true, then you come to slashdot.
Besides seriously, if slashdot were to carefully check everything it would take ages, and who really cares?
I mean does anybody believe something JUST because they saw it on slashdot? Well in that case I've got some land in Florida for you...
"Clearly this rider was specific towards one goal. Protect Eli Lilly. But that doesn't mean that there is not a larger idelogical principle in play here."
That is exactly my point. There may be a larger ideological principle involved. But this SPECIFIC piece of legislation is obviously the result of a "relationship" with Eli Lilly. If it had come from ideological principle it would not have been more general in its application.
There was a whole bunch of people like that in my undergrad. It was really sad as they were all bright energetic people.
Apparently they pissed off a couple of years of their lives in a text-based mud. They played the MUD in the school computer lab, so they almost never went home or had any social life outside of their group.
Needless to say they had terrible grades. ONly one of them barely managed to graduate with a 2.0 GPA and he was the brightest of the lot. Another 3 are still there(recovering) and I think 3 dropped out.
I only joined the MUD for a few nights. I ended up playing until 7am neglecting the paper that was due later on that day.
I understand your point, but I think there are some issues that do not fall along neat ideological lines. This includes gray areas such as exactly which regulations should be applied to pharmaceutical companies or how the anti-trust laws should be interpreted in a particular case.
For example Republicans may be hostile to regulations, but they are not necessarily going to push hard against every single regulation if the matter is not clear cut.
Without the financial backing the party may not be pre-disposed to take a strong stand on a particular bill, but once the money has rolled in they will likely push a lot harder than they would otherwise.
A recent notorious example was the addition of the Eli Lilly rider to the Homeland Security Bill. I am sure no politician would have come up with that simply based on their ideological principles.
Re:Wow. How disgusting ( -1 insensitive )
on
ALICE vs. ALICE
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· Score: 2
I seriously think its (B)
Our society has a lot of strong ideas about what constitutes proper "feminine" and "masculine" behavior.
A female geek hardly fit the stereotypes, so they probably feel like they have to be more aggressive in order to "fight back."
Passing the Turing Test is NOT the same as being intelligent. What exactly constitutes "intelligence" is a subject of intensive debate.
It might be possible for a program to pass the Turing Test and still not be considered intelligent according to some other criteria.
Re:Why you shouldn't shop at Walmart
on
Step 2, Groceries
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· Score: 1
Good answers for that last point!
As someone from a "Third World" country, I have often felt these lefty anti-sweatshop people are very very misguided.
Cheap labor is our SOLE competitive advantage, without that, why would anyone want to invest here? Saying that companies should not advantage of the cheap labor is INSANE and harms the people who need and appreciate those jobs the most.
I find your point of view interesting(I guess this is the great Bayesian controversy?)
In my opinion, a system that is wonderful in theory but fails in practice is not exciting at all. I am not against theory, it has its place. But when building a practical system the most important question is:- Does it work?
The article you posted does not support your assertion.
What is being proposed is forcible redistribution of land from white farmers to black farmers with compensation being paid to the white farmers.
Granted, this may or may not be a bad idea, but it hardly amounts to "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide."
Neither does it amount to communism, as in that system all the land would be owned collectively. They are proposing to settle individual families onto this land. Hence: not communism.
Lastly, you are trying to ignore the historical context of how this land was obtained. Do you really expect the native black farmers to ignore how all the fertile land was monopolized by Europeans at the beginning of the last century? I'd say they are being a lot nicer than the Germans were when they were taking the land.
The parent is not off-topic.(If so, it's parent is even more off-topic, and its at +5, Informative!).
Nowhere has "genocide" been proposed, and the article mentions that the "white farmers" were not exactly peaceful in obtaining that land.
What is being proposed is redistribution of fertile land, which is very scarce in Namibia. Whether this is the right thing to do can be debated. But it hardly amounts to "ethnic cleansing" or communism.
Being from Tanzania, I can assure you there are more than a few computer professionals in Africa. Believe it or not, most offices actually have PCs and many have internet access, hence "computer guys" are required to maintain them.
At http://www.wiley.com/legacy/college/phy/halliday32 0005/pdf/leidenfrost_essay.pdf at the end.
"I have long argued that degree-granting programs should employ ''fire-walking'' as a last exam. The chairperson of the program should wait on the far side of a bed of red-hot coals while a degree candidate is forced to walk over the coals. If the candidate's belief in physics is strong enough that the feet are left undamaged, the chairperson hands the candidate a graduation certificate. The test would be more revealing than traditional final exams."
I'm all for it! This will show whether they really believe in the scientific method in their guts. (Fortunately I completed my undergrad in May)
On the Boston-New York-DC corridor Amtrak is doing pretty well.
The price and travel time(once you include getting to and from the airport) are about the same.
On the train you have enough time to read a book, do some work or just enjoy the view, no hassle with airport security and you arrive smack in the center of the city.
For the plane you might have to travel a ways to the airport, get your nail clippers confisticated, then fly for like 30 minutes and then get try to get a cab or something into the city in snarling traffic.
Its really a matter of preference, but it certainly seems that trains are viable in more densely populated areas.
Set Junk Mail Filter to "high" and Junk Mail Deletion to "automatic"
And block as many domains as you can in the block sender list. Every time you receive a new piece of junk add its domain to the blocked list if possible.
I just tried this recently and the spam I had to review went down from a 100 per day to about 10 per day which is much more manageable.
Of course the spammers will probably get more sophisticated and we'll just have to think of something else.
If I your guitar playing brought joy into my life I would be delighted to give you a donation.
If enough people feel that way, that can add up to a lot of money.
If not enough people feel that way then you don't get so much money.
Personally I rarely read Kuroshin so I didn't donate, but if I did feel it was important I would not hesitate to donate say 20 bucks towards Rusty's living expenses.
It all depends on how important the users feel Kuroshin is, and so to me it is a very fair system.
You do not have to release the source code UNLESS you release the binaries. You would not be releasing the binaries UNLESS you are trying to sell the code. Now why would you want to blatantly exploit someone else's code for profit? Why should they allow you?
If you are not trying to sell the code, then what is the harm in releasing the source?
The evidence may not be completely air tight but this article makes a persuasive case. I read this article last night. I had been trying to shed some pounds for a while with little success, now I have a possible explanation.
From this morning I went cold turkey, in fact when I wake up tomorrow I am going to chuck the cereal and bagels in the trash can.
Things I 'll have to give up:-
Pasta - never liked it, except for macaroni and cheese.
Bread- I LOVE bread, especially white bread.
Cereal- I used to eat cereal religiously. No more!
Pizza - OUCH! no pain no gain...
Sugar rich substances ?? cakes, Coke etc. I have to check on this.
The good thing is that you can have a ton of meat and fatty foods, and of course vegetables and fruits.
On the plus side, this will freak my mom out a lot less than becoming a vegetarian or something...
Slashdot Mirror
I am not gonna read any of the comments for fear of spoilers.
/. front page, I think this is one of the weaknesses of the weblog medium: it's not easy to have extended discussions.
I have only read a couple of "screenfuls" but it seems rather more well-written than I expected. I think I will read the whole thing(or a substantial subset).
I can sort of guess the plot: Computer(s) take over, leading to a world of disembodied intelligence similar to Kurzweil's "The Age of Spiritual Machines" and interesting consequences ensue, but I am interested in the specific way it unfolds.
Obviously by the time I finish reading this story will be long gone from
Totally agree with you on this.
It is amazing the lengths people will go to justify their essentially selfish motives with supposedly altruistic arguments.
Of course free trade will lead to some people losing their jobs, but it leads to other people getting jobs AND cheaper goods and services for the rest of us.
We can use some of the money saved to train the displaced guys for new work, or heck pay them unemployment benefits, but it makes no sense to 'save' someones job indefinitely simply because they feel they 'deserve' it.
That guy in India deserves that job just as much as you do, so whining about the 'unfairness' of it all simply isn't going to cut it. If you want money for training say so. If you just want free money to feed your family say so. It will be discussed and a compromise reached.
As others have pointed out, such things have happened before and no major economic decline occurred. Instead everyone got richer in the end(on average). I predict the same will happen in this case.
Aaah come on, this ain't the New York times we are talking about.
...
If you want to read 'the paper of record' you go to the so called 'professional media' that actually employ people such as 'fact checkers' before they publish anything.
If you want random crap that may or may not be true, then you come to slashdot.
Besides seriously, if slashdot were to carefully check everything it would take ages, and who really cares?
I mean does anybody believe something JUST because they saw it on slashdot? Well in that case I've got some land in Florida for you
I didn't think of that.;)
/. crowd is exclusively composed of mature individuals who can exercise the utmost of control over their anti-social impulses. ;)
Well I am sure the
"Clearly this rider was specific towards one goal. Protect Eli Lilly. But that doesn't mean that there is not a larger idelogical principle in play here."
That is exactly my point. There may be a larger ideological principle involved. But this SPECIFIC piece of legislation is obviously the result of a "relationship" with Eli Lilly. If it had come from ideological principle it would not have been more general in its application.
There was a whole bunch of people like that in my undergrad. It was really sad as they were all bright energetic people.
Apparently they pissed off a couple of years of their lives in a text-based mud. They played the MUD in the school computer lab, so they almost never went home or had any social life outside of their group.
Needless to say they had terrible grades. ONly one of them barely managed to graduate with a 2.0 GPA and he was the brightest of the lot. Another 3 are still there(recovering) and I think 3 dropped out.
I only joined the MUD for a few nights. I ended up playing until 7am neglecting the paper that was due later on that day.
I got a D on that paper.
I never really played again after that.
BTW the MUD was:- http://www.muddywaters.org/
I understand your point, but I think there are some issues that do not fall along neat ideological lines. This includes gray areas such as exactly which regulations should be applied to pharmaceutical companies or how the anti-trust laws should be interpreted in a particular case.
For example Republicans may be hostile to regulations, but they are not necessarily going to push hard against every single regulation if the matter is not clear cut.
Without the financial backing the party may not be pre-disposed to take a strong stand on a particular bill, but once the money has rolled in they will likely push a lot harder than they would otherwise.
A recent notorious example was the addition of the Eli Lilly rider to the Homeland Security Bill. I am sure no politician would have come up with that simply based on their ideological principles.
I seriously think its (B)
Our society has a lot of strong ideas about what constitutes proper "feminine" and "masculine" behavior.
A female geek hardly fit the stereotypes, so they probably feel like they have to be more aggressive in order to "fight back."
Passing the Turing Test is NOT the same as being intelligent. What exactly constitutes "intelligence" is a subject of intensive debate.
It might be possible for a program to pass the Turing Test and still not be considered intelligent according to some other criteria.
Good answers for that last point!
As someone from a "Third World" country, I have often felt these lefty anti-sweatshop people are very very misguided.
Cheap labor is our SOLE competitive advantage, without that, why would anyone want to invest here? Saying that companies should not advantage of the cheap labor is INSANE and harms the people who need and appreciate those jobs the most.
I find your point of view interesting(I guess this is the great Bayesian controversy?)
In my opinion, a system that is wonderful in theory but fails in practice is not exciting at all. I am not against theory, it has its place. But when building a practical system the most important question is:- Does it work?
Ah, don't worry about it. I only noticed because I'm from Tanzania, and Kenya just happens to be our next door neighbour.
I'm pretty sure your average slashdotter wouldn't notice something like this.
Yeah, its pretty sad.
/., but its great for karma-whoring!
Funny thing is, I can say basically the same thing on every slashdot story about Africa and STILL get +5 informative.
Says something bad about
In the "business" world, Windows is the major platform(the ISPs use UNIX more).
I'd say a pretty large proportion is pirated, especially the software bought through local distributors who are massive pirates.
The only software that isn't pirated is probably the software that comes preloaded onto the computer(if the PC is imported brand new from the States).
Perhaps that will change as Microsoft implements more security measures(e.g activation, registration etc).
The article you posted does not support your assertion.
What is being proposed is forcible redistribution of land from white farmers to black farmers with compensation being paid to the white farmers.
Granted, this may or may not be a bad idea, but it hardly amounts to "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide."
Neither does it amount to communism, as in that system all the land would be owned collectively. They are proposing to settle individual families onto this land. Hence: not communism.
Lastly, you are trying to ignore the historical context of how this land was obtained. Do you really expect the native black farmers to ignore how all the fertile land was monopolized by Europeans at the beginning of the last century?
I'd say they are being a lot nicer than the Germans were when they were taking the land.
Your post is inflammatory and just plain wrong.
The parent is not off-topic.(If so, it's parent is even more off-topic, and its at +5, Informative!).
Nowhere has "genocide" been proposed, and the article mentions that the "white farmers" were not exactly peaceful in obtaining that land.
What is being proposed is redistribution of fertile land, which is very scarce in Namibia. Whether this is the right thing to do can be debated. But it hardly amounts to "ethnic cleansing" or communism.
Funny, ha ha.
Being from Tanzania, I can assure you there are more than a few computer professionals in Africa. Believe it or not, most offices actually have PCs and many have internet access, hence "computer guys" are required to maintain them.
I presume you are referring to Jomo Kenyatta.
Unfortunately he died more than 20 years ago.
And he was president of Kenya, which is on the opposite side of the continent from Namibia.
The scammers have gotten really bold, if they don't even bother to match the president with the country!;)
At http://www.wiley.com/legacy/college/phy/halliday32 0005/pdf/leidenfrost_essay.pdf at the end.
"I have long argued that degree-granting programs should employ ''fire-walking'' as a last exam. The chairperson of the program should wait on the far side of a bed of red-hot coals while a degree candidate is forced to walk over the coals. If the candidate's belief in physics is strong
enough that the feet are left undamaged, the chairperson hands the candidate a graduation certificate. The test would be more revealing than traditional final exams."
I'm all for it! This will show whether they really believe in the scientific method in their guts.
(Fortunately I completed my undergrad in May)
Good one!
On a serious note, its nice to see that he won't be sharing a cell with Bubba, who is serving 3 life sentences for a triple murder.
I wish him all the best.
That depends on the route.
On the Boston-New York-DC corridor Amtrak is doing pretty well.
The price and travel time(once you include getting to and from the airport) are about the same.
On the train you have enough time to read a book, do some work or just enjoy the view, no hassle with airport security and you arrive smack in the center of the city.
For the plane you might have to travel a ways to the airport, get your nail clippers confisticated, then fly for like 30 minutes and then get try to get a cab or something into the city in snarling traffic.
Its really a matter of preference, but it certainly seems that trains are viable in more densely populated areas.
Set Junk Mail Filter to "high" and Junk Mail Deletion to "automatic"
And block as many domains as you can in the block sender list. Every time you receive a new piece of junk add its domain to the blocked list if possible.
I just tried this recently and the spam I had to review went down from a 100 per day to about 10 per day which is much more manageable.
Of course the spammers will probably get more sophisticated and we'll just have to think of something else.
If I your guitar playing brought joy into my life I would be delighted to give you a donation.
If enough people feel that way, that can add up to a lot of money.
If not enough people feel that way then you don't get so much money.
Personally I rarely read Kuroshin so I didn't donate, but if I did feel it was important I would not hesitate to donate say 20 bucks towards Rusty's living expenses.
It all depends on how important the users feel Kuroshin is, and so to me it is a very fair system.
I don't understand what you are saying.
You do not have to release the source code UNLESS you release the binaries. You would not be releasing the binaries UNLESS you are trying to sell the code. Now why would you want to blatantly exploit someone else's code for profit? Why should they allow you?
If you are not trying to sell the code, then what is the harm in releasing the source?
The evidence may not be completely air tight but this article makes a persuasive case. I read this article last night. I had been trying to shed some pounds for a while with little success, now I have a possible explanation.
From this morning I went cold turkey, in fact when I wake up tomorrow I am going to chuck the cereal and bagels in the trash can.
Things I 'll have to give up:-
Pasta - never liked it, except for macaroni and cheese.
Bread- I LOVE bread, especially white bread.
Cereal- I used to eat cereal religiously. No more!
Pizza - OUCH! no pain no gain...
Sugar rich substances ?? cakes, Coke etc. I have to check on this.
The good thing is that you can have a ton of meat and fatty foods, and of course vegetables and fruits.
On the plus side, this will freak my mom out a lot less than becoming a vegetarian or something...