Ban it. Am I being sarcastic? I don't even know anymore. Probably so, but... It would be too hard to implement such a ban and frankly I'm apposed to all book bans. Instead perhaps we could just remove all the special protections for the faithful from our laws then we can just haul them off to psychiatric facilities for treatment for their dangerous delusions. Child protection services can take their kids to foster homes where they can learn about Reason and Science and learn to distinguish between reality and fantasy.
It seems to me like the real problem lies in the vagueness of determining (prior to standing before a jury) whether or not something is meant only to titillate. I agree that that is a significant flaw/problem with this legislation. However, I would like to suggest that the real problem is that the state is enacting legislation for the purpose of controlling how and when citizens can be titillated.
You are projecting your own ideas/ideals onto the book with your creative interpretations. No, I'm applying common sense and an open mind... But that's exactly what the other guys say and your interpretations are wildly different.
The book is meaningless and/or means anything/everything you want it to. It is therefore not usefull as a guide and is in fact just a tool to reinforce and provide authority for your own opinions/ideas.
The shocking incorrectness is in your interpretation of that book.
That's kind of a problem don't you think? You seem to be under the impression that the book can mean anything you want it to. You interpret a passage one way, someone else interprets it in another possibly contradictory way.
If the book does not mean what it says and people cannot agree on what it means then it is not a useful guide and certainly cannot be considered 'correct' or 'True' in any meaningful way. You are projecting your own ideas/ideals onto the book with your creative interpretations.
Just to be clear, I don't put much stock in any of the nonsense in that book. I certainly don't consider it an authority on anything. I have heard people come up with good and reasonable stories and codes of conduct working from that book. I have have heard just as many cruel and dangerous interpretations from the same damn book. My point is that these millions of people thinking of this book as a source of 'Perfect Truth' are in danger of making terrible decisions because they are working from unreliable data.
who would even care about the whether the war was honest or not? Anyone who values life and liberty. Are you forgetting to include the hundreds of thousands of dead innocents in your analyisis or are you a sociopath?
maybe they should have invited the Internet industry folks like Peer 1, teleglobe, XO, cogent and those guys. Then maybe we could have had some industry insights from major Internet backbone companies who aren't monopoly scum saying sensible things instead of whatever lawyer-hobbled stuff an at&t rep would have been able to say.
Thing is, the bible doesn't actually say anything about evolution or vice versa. They're not at odds with each other. The bible says that god created all the creatures of the world all at once in their current form. (including Man in his own image) Evolution says that the diversity of species came about gradually over billions of years. That Man came to his/her current form by way of natural selection.
Not that I really give a crap. who gives a hoot what a book like that says? how many glaring, even shockingly incorrect statements can a book contain before people will stop referencing it?
What exactly is "the atheistic philosophy of Darwinism"? Darwin's theory of evolution is unequivocally heresy. If you dare to question the word of God in any way then you are an athiest, a servant of the Devil sent to test the faith of Gods children and a communist. It requires a time-frame significantly different from that which your Lord and Saviour conveyed to the world with His word: the Holy Bible.
When God spoke through his disciples he indicated that the world was 10,000 years old and was created in stages over 7 days.
Maybe it was controversial back then, but it sure as heck isn't now Hilarious! I guess you weren't watching when the CNN moderator asked the republican presidential candidate contenders to raise their hands if they thought that the theory of evolution was incorrect.
oh wait, you said 'civilized world'... never mind.
Who gets the contract to do the fiber? How much should be paid to do this contract?
We have well established systems and procedures for competitively selecting contractors. I'm not sure how things work in the USA but here in Canada this would not be a significant obstacle.
Should everyone get it or only dense populations? How dense do the populations have to be?
Everyone gets it. The greater costs for connecting rural users would be offset by the lower costs in more densely populated areas. Again, this is not a major issue as we have as a society tackled this issue for all other infrastructure systems and we always make the same decision. Roads, power lines, phone lines, medical services, postal services, policing... We always choose to subsidize infrastructure for rural citizens from the cities because it is the right decision. (the reasons for this are a long discussion by themselves)
How do we pay for it, do we inflate the currency through debt or do we increase tax?
taxes. I cannot imagine any reason to borrow the money... can you?
I don't recall anyone ever saying "To have a free market, it must be provided by public Government services", a free market can never have any Government regulation or intervention, else it is not a free market.
Well then you must not have taken any economics courses. The government's role in a free market economy is to enact regulations for the purpose of ensuring a level playing field for healthy competition. The term 'free market' as it is commonly used in western society does not refer to anarchy. For example: a local farmer's market is considered a 'free market' however, there are many government regulations governing how/what/and where vendors can operate. This is a good thing which protects consumers and promotes economic growth in the long term.
One of the other significant roles for government regulation in a free market is to curtail the formation of monopolies. Monopolies are a natural result of free markets. However, monopolies also destroy free markets. In order to maintain a competitive environment in a market we intervene to thwart the formation of monopolies.
This leads to my main point: There are a number of industries which are 'natural monopolies', by which I mean that the nature of the industry is such that it operates much more efficiently as a single system than it would as a collection of competing systems. Roads are a good example of this. Policing and sewers are also good examples.
We choose to pay for a single national system of roads with tax dollars because it is in our own best interest. In the long term we get more for less and our economy benefits. We pay for our roads with taxes and then we allow private companies to innovate freely and use our national road system to sell us all kinds of services. Everything from taxis to couriers to tour buses to private cars. If you come up with a new product you can put it in a truck and take it to your customers without any hassle because of our national infrastructure.
I don't know how well I am explaining this so let be boil it down to the heart of the matter: There is such a thing as a natural monopoly (google/wikipedia it) An effective solution to the free market destroying qualities of a natural monopoly is to operate that industry as a public system. The fantastically positive economic impact of our decision to do this with our roads and sewers should lead us to consider this solution for other natural monopoly industries. Last-mile telecoms infrastructure is a natural monopoly.
Who gets to use the fiber?
Anyone/everyone who wants to. That is kinda the point.
How much do we charge companies to use this fiber?
Tax rates could be set on a cost-recovery basis.
How do we ensure its being used for the right purposes and companies aren't bidd
You mean if I enter personal information on a free web service run by a reputable organization with a privacy policy which states clearly that my data will be held in strictest confidence and not shown to anyone that agents of the US government may issue a secret order to have my data copied to the NSA without due-process or just-cause and the operators of the web service will be jailed if they even tell their me about it?
Is there lead in the water supply in the USA or what? How can 29% of IT workers support the republicans after two terms of incompetence/evil of epic proportions?
I think it is clear that the bogus routes were added maliciously. The scope of the damage was more than was intended but the intent (to break routing to the youtube IPs from within Pakistan) was by definition a malicious act.
Cisco and so forth are the ones who built things like the "Great Firewall of China" hear, hear. When we do business abroad we should be held accountable to our own laws as well as those of the host country. If it is illegal to dump toxins, employ child labour, build evil systems-of-mass-subjugation (great firewall 'o C) or torture insurgents here at home then you must not be allowed to to those things in other countries.
I have to admit that I do have some small hope that Obama will give us one more chance to fix this country using the ballot box.
If after 4 years of Obama the justice system is still unable to prosecute violations of the law when they are carried out by government agencies then I will officially give up on the first three boxes.
1) Soap: Done. 2) ballot: Done. (we re-elected them? wtf?) 3) jury: Justice depertment refuses to prosecute, federal judges have been deemed not trustworthy enough to consider cases which involve national security (as defined by the suspects). They are now granting retroactive immunity to their contractors.
Every one of the major religions requires that you believe things that the available evidence indicates are false. You proved there is no God? I didn't say there was proof of no god. I cannot prove that there is no God. I also cannot prove that there are no Lepricons. what's your point?
Do you believe everything/anything until it is proven false? How do you decide which made-up things to believe in if you don't require evidence? You believe in God right? so which one? Buddah? Allah? God? Jesus? Thor? How did you determine which one was the one that really exists?
It's great how atheists are convinced everyone who believes something different from them must be wrong and irrational to disagree. You have missed the point. I don't believe anything. I don't have faith. Do you not see the difference between "There is a unicorn in that forest." and "I saw a unicorn in that forest therefore there is a unicorn in that forest."? It is the difference between making conclusions based on evidence and simply believing something.
The whole point sir; is that you have faith. You believe things without evidence. That is the heart of the problem. We can both observe, reason, and then disagree. That's fine. The problem is that religion just makes shit up and asserts that it is True. There is no observation, no reason, no logic. Just "God said so."
I'm an American Muslim... I do find a lot of the comments on Slashdot to be disappointing. ya, it is not exactly hard to become disappointed by slashdot posts for oh so many reasons. (your post was very nice btw)
...whenever anything Islam-related is posted, there are endless tirades painting my faith with a broad brush of extremism and ignorance. Let me explain... it is not because we think you picked the wrong religion or simply because you are different. You and your religion will be mocked because you proclaim a serious belief in invisible sky-wizards.
Every one of the major religions requires that you believe things that the available evidence indicates are false. By having faith in a religion one is displaying an unwillingness or inability to make rational decisions. It is logical and reasonable to fear irrational people because their irrational behaviour can harm us. It is also usually pointless to argue with a person of faith because they have by definition already eschewed logic. Thus we are left with trying to shame you into giving up on the sky-wizards and unhelpfully venting our frustration by saying mean things.
...when people outside of the religion have the audacity to tell Muslims what is and isn't antiquated or kosher. I don't want to tell you how your religion's rules should be written. I want to tell you that the entire concept of faith and religion is antiquated and should be abandoned for your own good and the good of humanity. I do not have to be a member of any particular sect or ethnic group to make this statement.
Slashdot Mirror
Your nerd-fu is strong. I salute you!
Instead perhaps we could just remove all the special protections for the faithful from our laws then we can just haul them off to psychiatric facilities for treatment for their dangerous delusions.
Child protection services can take their kids to foster homes where they can learn about Reason and Science and learn to distinguish between reality and fantasy.
That is the best idea I have heard in a long time.
However, I would like to suggest that the real problem is that the state is enacting legislation for the purpose of controlling how and when citizens can be titillated.
You have misunderstood the word 'bricked'.
look it up
The book is meaningless and/or means anything/everything you want it to.
It is therefore not usefull as a guide and is in fact just a tool to reinforce and provide authority for your own opinions/ideas.
You seem to be under the impression that the book can mean anything you want it to.
You interpret a passage one way, someone else interprets it in another possibly contradictory way.
If the book does not mean what it says and people cannot agree on what it means then it is not a useful guide and certainly cannot be considered 'correct' or 'True' in any meaningful way.
You are projecting your own ideas/ideals onto the book with your creative interpretations.
Just to be clear, I don't put much stock in any of the nonsense in that book. I certainly don't consider it an authority on anything.
I have heard people come up with good and reasonable stories and codes of conduct working from that book. I have have heard just as many cruel and dangerous interpretations from the same damn book. My point is that these millions of people thinking of this book as a source of 'Perfect Truth' are in danger of making terrible decisions because they are working from unreliable data.
Are you forgetting to include the hundreds of thousands of dead innocents in your analyisis or are you a sociopath?
Yes. f-ing yes.
maybe they should have invited the Internet industry folks like Peer 1, teleglobe, XO, cogent and those guys.
Then maybe we could have had some industry insights from major Internet backbone companies who aren't monopoly scum saying sensible things instead of whatever lawyer-hobbled stuff an at&t rep would have been able to say.
Evolution says that the diversity of species came about gradually over billions of years.
That Man came to his/her current form by way of natural selection.
These are contradictory assertions. I'd be very interested in which book, chapter and verse says that the world is 10,000 years old. My understanding is that you can calculate it using the information provided.
http://www.albatrus.org/english/theology/creation/biblical_age_earth.htm
Not that I really give a crap.
who gives a hoot what a book like that says?
how many glaring, even shockingly incorrect statements can a book contain before people will stop referencing it?
It requires a time-frame significantly different from that which your Lord and Saviour conveyed to the world with His word: the Holy Bible.
When God spoke through his disciples he indicated that the world was 10,000 years old and was created in stages over 7 days.
I guess you weren't watching when the CNN moderator asked the republican presidential candidate contenders to raise their hands if they thought that the theory of evolution was incorrect.
oh wait, you said 'civilized world'... never mind.
Who gets the contract to do the fiber? How much should be paid to do this contract?
We have well established systems and procedures for competitively selecting contractors.
I'm not sure how things work in the USA but here in Canada this would not be a significant obstacle.
Should everyone get it or only dense populations? How dense do the populations have to be?
Everyone gets it.
The greater costs for connecting rural users would be offset by the lower costs in more densely populated areas.
Again, this is not a major issue as we have as a society tackled this issue for all other infrastructure systems and we always make the same decision.
Roads, power lines, phone lines, medical services, postal services, policing...
We always choose to subsidize infrastructure for rural citizens from the cities because it is the right decision.
(the reasons for this are a long discussion by themselves)
How do we pay for it, do we inflate the currency through debt or do we increase tax?
taxes.
I cannot imagine any reason to borrow the money... can you?
I don't recall anyone ever saying "To have a free market, it must be provided by public Government services", a free market can never have any Government regulation or intervention, else it is not a free market.
Well then you must not have taken any economics courses.
The government's role in a free market economy is to enact regulations for the purpose of ensuring a level playing field for healthy competition.
The term 'free market' as it is commonly used in western society does not refer to anarchy.
For example: a local farmer's market is considered a 'free market' however, there are many government regulations governing how/what/and where vendors can operate. This is a good thing which protects consumers and promotes economic growth in the long term.
One of the other significant roles for government regulation in a free market is to curtail the formation of monopolies.
Monopolies are a natural result of free markets. However, monopolies also destroy free markets.
In order to maintain a competitive environment in a market we intervene to thwart the formation of monopolies.
This leads to my main point: There are a number of industries which are 'natural monopolies', by which I mean that the nature of the industry is such that it operates much more efficiently as a single system than it would as a collection of competing systems.
Roads are a good example of this.
Policing and sewers are also good examples.
We choose to pay for a single national system of roads with tax dollars because it is in our own best interest.
In the long term we get more for less and our economy benefits.
We pay for our roads with taxes and then we allow private companies to innovate freely and use our national road system to sell us all kinds of services. Everything from taxis to couriers to tour buses to private cars.
If you come up with a new product you can put it in a truck and take it to your customers without any hassle because of our national infrastructure.
I don't know how well I am explaining this so let be boil it down to the heart of the matter:
There is such a thing as a natural monopoly (google/wikipedia it)
An effective solution to the free market destroying qualities of a natural monopoly is to operate that industry as a public system.
The fantastically positive economic impact of our decision to do this with our roads and sewers should lead us to consider this solution for other natural monopoly industries.
Last-mile telecoms infrastructure is a natural monopoly.
Who gets to use the fiber?
Anyone/everyone who wants to. That is kinda the point.
How much do we charge companies to use this fiber?
Tax rates could be set on a cost-recovery basis.
How do we ensure its being used for the right purposes and companies aren't bidd
The market is broken by the last-mile monopolies.
The solution is fiber to every building as public infrastructure.
Then we can have a proper free market for Internet services over that fiber.
You mean if I enter personal information on a free web service run by a reputable organization with a privacy policy which states clearly that my data will be held in strictest confidence and not shown to anyone that agents of the US government may issue a secret order to have my data copied to the NSA without due-process or just-cause and the operators of the web service will be jailed if they even tell their me about it?
Is there lead in the water supply in the USA or what?
How can 29% of IT workers support the republicans after two terms of incompetence/evil of epic proportions?
I concur.
While we're on the subject; have you read about the JPMorgan / Bear-sterns deal?
holy questionable goings-on batman!
The scope of the damage was more than was intended but the intent (to break routing to the youtube IPs from within Pakistan) was by definition a malicious act. Cisco and so forth are the ones who built things like the "Great Firewall of China" hear, hear.
When we do business abroad we should be held accountable to our own laws as well as those of the host country.
If it is illegal to dump toxins, employ child labour, build evil systems-of-mass-subjugation (great firewall 'o C) or torture insurgents here at home then you must not be allowed to to those things in other countries.
I have to admit that I do have some small hope that Obama will give us one more chance to fix this country using the ballot box.
If after 4 years of Obama the justice system is still unable to prosecute violations of the law when they are carried out by government agencies then I will officially give up on the first three boxes.
1) Soap: Done.
2) ballot: Done. (we re-elected them? wtf?)
3) jury: Justice depertment refuses to prosecute, federal judges have been deemed not trustworthy enough to consider cases which involve national security (as defined by the suspects). They are now granting retroactive immunity to their contractors.
It is all over folks.
The rule of law has now been abandoned completely.
The US government no longer even pretends to obey the law.
Your government just dropped its drawers and shat on your constitution.
Retroactive immunity for violations of the constitution.
I'd call that high treason.
I cannot prove that there is no God.
I also cannot prove that there are no Lepricons. what's your point?
Do you believe everything/anything until it is proven false?
How do you decide which made-up things to believe in if you don't require evidence?
You believe in God right? so which one? Buddah? Allah? God? Jesus? Thor? How did you determine which one was the one that really exists? It's great how atheists are convinced everyone who believes something different from them must be wrong and irrational to disagree. You have missed the point. I don't believe anything.
I don't have faith.
Do you not see the difference between "There is a unicorn in that forest." and "I saw a unicorn in that forest therefore there is a unicorn in that forest."?
It is the difference between making conclusions based on evidence and simply believing something.
The whole point sir; is that you have faith. You believe things without evidence.
That is the heart of the problem.
We can both observe, reason, and then disagree. That's fine.
The problem is that religion just makes shit up and asserts that it is True.
There is no observation, no reason, no logic. Just "God said so."
(your post was very nice btw)
...whenever anything Islam-related is posted, there are endless tirades painting my faith with a broad brush of extremism and ignorance. Let me explain... it is not because we think you picked the wrong religion or simply because you are different.You and your religion will be mocked because you proclaim a serious belief in invisible sky-wizards.
Every one of the major religions requires that you believe things that the available evidence indicates are false.
By having faith in a religion one is displaying an unwillingness or inability to make rational decisions.
It is logical and reasonable to fear irrational people because their irrational behaviour can harm us.
It is also usually pointless to argue with a person of faith because they have by definition already eschewed logic.
Thus we are left with trying to shame you into giving up on the sky-wizards and unhelpfully venting our frustration by saying mean things.
...when people outside of the religion have the audacity to tell Muslims what is and isn't antiquated or kosher. I don't want to tell you how your religion's rules should be written. I want to tell you that the entire concept of faith and religion is antiquated and should be abandoned for your own good and the good of humanity.I do not have to be a member of any particular sect or ethnic group to make this statement.
hah! he said george bush, not 'us' or 'some westerner with half a brain'