Our economic system is based on the idea of "profit at all costs." I mean, isn't this what we wanted and fought the cold war for?
Um, no. Our economic system is based on the idea of economic freedom -- which does include the freedom for people and organisations to pursue "profit at all costs" (as long as it's within the law).
The alternative is government bureacrats deciding what the economy should do and -- how shall I put it politely? -- the historic record of such guidance isn't stellar.
...then these bulbs are not just simply a 'good idea'. They are a moral imperative.
LOL. Reach over and push the OFF switch on your computer. If everyone everywhere does this, it will result in untold amounts of oil not burned and greenhouse gases not exhausted into the atmosphere.
One of his most interesting comments: "The model can inform your decisions, but you have to know when to NOT trust the model."
That's a pretty trivial observation. If you understand the model, you know its limits. Once you go beyond this limits the model's outputs are just garbage because it's beyond its capabilities.
To give a simple example, at the time of the Iraqi war (that is, when the US troops were moving to Baghdad) most short-term stock market models were useless. The US market was reacting to daily casualty numbers and not much else. You don't have to be a genius to stop trusting your models at times like this.
Another of his comments on a completely different talk: "Mathematical models are never perfect, but they can be useful."
That's a derivative of a much better quote by George Box: "All models are wrong; some are useful".:-)
If anything, this would be one of the few possible benefits of such a system - the amount of tax you pay could be directly linked to your lifestyle, so people who smoke would pay more because they're probably going to make more use of the NHS than those who don't.
Dear Mr.Smith,
We have noticed from your grocery purchases that this month you did not buy proper amounts of vegetables from our approved Nutritional Excellence(tm) list. Instead you purchased some cakes which, you must realize, are bad for your health. Accordingly, we have no choice but to double your health insurance premiums.
...restricting campaign contributions is not restricting a person's freedom of speeh. They're free to continue to say what they want. They're just not free to buy certain things, like a politicians' vote.
Not that simple:-) Are individuals free to buy TV time? to place ads/statements of their own choosing? Once you get done plugging all the loopholes, the First Amendment problems will be really obvious.
real economic growth (as opposed to pork) works better, because the pork also raises the individuals tax share, whereas real economic growth grows the tax base, reducing the individual tax share.
Pork: I get the Federal government to build, say, 10 bridges and a couple of federal prisons in my constituency. That's money from the outside flowing in plus new jobs paid for with federal money. The tax base is growing:-)
Besides real economic growth does not reduce the individual tax share, because the government's appetite for money does not stay constant over time and, in fact, heavily correlated with that economic growth...
1. Politicians salaries capped at the AVERAGE income of their consitituents. This way, its in their best interests to make sure that people have decent jobs, with decent incomes. Also, when a recession hits, they'll also feel some of the pain, instead of being insulated from it.
Incentive for (much) more pork.
2. Spending of $0.50/voter maximum for any election.
Big First Amendment problems.
3. No contributions from business.
More big First Amendment problems.
4. Maximum contribution of $1k/year from any voter, to be split among ALL contributions they make to all politicians.
Yet more big First Amendment problems. Besides, do you really think this mess is all because of election campaign contributions?
5. No more voter registration along party lines. Either you're elligible to vote, or not. Who you vote for, what party you want to be aligned with, etc., are all your own bloody business.
Um. It is already. Your "party" registration and the way you vote are entirely unrelated.
6. Designate certain bills as "government confidence" votes. If the bill (budgets are good for this) isn't passed, the government falls, and a new election is held.
That comes from a different political system -- one where the head of the government comes from the leading party in the legislature. The USA's political system is not like this at all.
Even easier: since this system will eventually work off infrared frequecise, you merely cover you lens with a substance the reflects or absorbs infrared light. Shouldn't matter to the camera and then you've neutralized the scanning portion, rendering the rest obsolete.
As a matter of fact, most contemporary digital cameras already have a strong infrared filter in front of the CCD -- to compensate for the fact that CCDs are sensitive to infrared but human eyes aren't.
As described, this system will not work against *serious* digital cameras -- digital SLRs. In these cameras the CCD sensor (or, nowadays, more often the CMOS sensor) is hidden behind a mirror till the moment of the shot when the mirror flips away for a fraction of a second.
Not to mention that in order to work the system will need to constantly scan everything with, presumably, beams of visible light. I doubt this will work out well at most places...
Well if you already use GMail, what's a little more personal information? Of course Google can index it and add it to the increasingly large profile of you.
The easy way out is to use Gmail *only* on Internet Explorer, and use Firefox for all the other web browsing, including Google searches. Setting Firefox to specifically deny any and all Google cookies also helps.
Re:This helps
on
DDO Goes Solo
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
The end-game in WOW is all about raiding.
On PvE servers, probably. Having never played on one, I can't say:-)
On PvP servers the end-game includes raid dungeons but certainly isn't limited to them.
So yes, its casual to 60 but all the end-game and most of the new content isn't available to casual players.
Again, it depends on what you want from the game. For some people the end-game is raiding and fat loot. For others it's just using WoW as a pretty chat room. Some people treat world PvP as the end-game. It all varies.
Don't try to extrapolate your own preferences onto all people who play WoW.
I don't play WoW because... b) the later missions pretty much require that I always have to have a group with me.
Huh? WoW is one of the most solo-friendly MMORGs in existence. You can perfectly well get to 60 without once being in a group.
No, you won't be able to do raid dungeons solo and so will miss out on some loot, but if you want to casually play a MMORG mostly solo -- WoW is by far your best bet.
Congratulations! Instead of a relatively low noise, moderately power hungry CCD sensor, I now have a relatively high noise, low power CMOS sensor that needs to be cooled to suppress dark current enough to get usable imagery.
Um. Dude. Canon's been using CMOS sensors in its high-end cameras for years. In case you're still wondering, yes, they work quite well without cooling.
but are you really advocating that we provide kids with access to porn as a part of their developmental processes?
Don't see why not. I know some kids, both boys and girls, that had free unfiltered computer-in-your-own-room access to the 'net since the ages of 9-10 or so. None of them had any problems with social development, or finding (and keeping) girlfriends/boyfriends, or much anything else for that matter.
Don't *add* porn, *remove* the violence! If that means that your kids (and you) end up watching less (or no) TV, and skip almost every movie, can you argue that you have been harmed in some way?
Yes, I can. You're creating a little safe and boring artificial world for them. Yet at some point the kids will have to go out into the real world. I'd rather have them be able to deal with that world.
Porn is a trap - it feeds the pleasure centers of the brain, devalues the humanity of the person being used for that pleasure, and damages people's ability to relate to one another in a healthy way.
LOL. "Puritanism - the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." What's wrong with feeding the pleasure centers of the brain?
"devalues the humanity" -- may I suggest you have a very limited concept of humanity..?
"damages people's ability to relate to one another in a healthy way" -- I call bullshit. Any evidence?
In fact, I'll make the opposite statement -- someone who hasn't been exposed to human sexuality till he/she gets married (which is presumably what you are arguing for) will have MAJOR problems with relating to his/her spouse in a healthy way...
A recipercal effect though is that children exposed to pr0n will be exposed to sex much earlier and thus go looking for it.
Spelling aside, you seem to have little knowledge either of human physiology, or of teenagers. Kids begin to get sexual urges when their hormone system restructures at puberty -- porn or no porn. As to "exposed to sex" -- well, if you find me anyone, say, 14 or older who doesn't know what sex is and how it works, I'll show you someone with seriously skewed upbringing and strong probability of major psychological problems later in life.
Someone who spends much time looking at pr0n will develope a reclusive attitude and thus not have the same social development.
That's complete and utter handwaving -- you have any support for that statement?
Come to think of it, replace "pr0n" with "books" (or "TV") -- same effect? No? Why not?
I think he meant Chinese-language TLDs..cn probably isn't very satisfying -- it means using a foreign language to access every website, which doesn't exactly stoke nationalism. What if you had to type a couple of Chinese characters to go anywhere on the Internet?
Oh, goody. So to get to a Chinese site I'll need to learn to type in Chinese? And to get to an Egyptian site -- in Arabic? to a Russian site -- in Russian?
Yes, a great idea. I can already see how internet would work MUCH better this way.
Given the intransigence the U.S. has displayed in the past regarding control of TLDs, this move isn't all that surprising. It is somewhat surprising, however, that China has chosen.com and.net as two of their TLDs, virtually guaranteeing operability problems with the rest of the Internet.
Hmm... you seem to have made some spelling errors...
Given the attitude that the Chinese government has displayed in the past regarding control of information flows (see the Great Firewall), this move isn't all that surprising. And it is not surprising at all that China has chosen.com and.net as two of their TLDs, virtually guaranteeing operability problems with the rest of the Internet.
It's pretty clear the Chinese government wants its own "internet" which it can control and which it can keep separate from the rest of the world. It's a control freaks' power trip.
I may not agree with some of the views of the Chinese government, but if they want Chinese TLDs, they should have them.
With the approach the MPAA applies, bars, clubs, etc. would be shut down when a couple patrons are arrested for drug dealing or prostitution because they're "enabling" the illegal activity.
You think you're just kidding? Look up the RAVE act...
In this game you start life as a helpless child totally dependent on others for survival. As you gain experience and skills you will have access to more of the game's features, including day care, school, college, and finally a place called "the real world."
Yeah, I've tried it. Not bad graphics, but gameplay sucks. Severe lack of features (like no "save game" and "load game" buttons) is a bummer. I can't really recommend it.
One of the reasons I loved UO and play FFXI now is because its NOT easy, its infact somewhat hard to play. WoW though I just jumped in and without much effort make a lot of gold and have really nice equips to the point there is really nothing seperating me from the rest of the 5 mil.
You are a bit confused. A game being *complicated* to play -- or, better phrased, a game where ability to think confers in-game advantages -- is one thing. A game where it's hard to gain levels/gear/gold is quite another thing.
You're basically saying that "hard to level" implies "hard to play well". That is not so. In hard-to-level games like EQ, FFXI, and such all you need to do is invest time -- and then you'll have all the levels/gear/gold that you want.
Also, there is a big difference between a game that's hard because your opponents are unpredictable -- e.g. PvP -- and a game that's hard only until you memorize the correct sequence for defeating a specific mob (or type of mobs).
Well of course it won't be direct to jail, there will have to be a trial to determine if you are actually guilty, unless the executive branch has some sort of magical power to just throw people into jails without due process.
Umm... yes, it does. Or at least it thinks it does. Did you wake up from some kind of multiyear hibernation? Google for "Jose Padilla" for an update:-)
The AI deosn't necessarily have to be stupid. It could be challenging.
Yeah. In theory it COULD be. But it practice it WILL be mind-bogglingly stupid operating in perfectly predictable and thus boring fashion.
What's the point of all the PvP games?
The point of PvP is to pit one's skill (not twitch skill, but rather combat tactics) against other humans who are unpredictable, inventive, and generally fun to fight.
Slashdot Mirror
Our economic system is based on the idea of "profit at all costs." I mean, isn't this what we wanted and fought the cold war for?
Um, no. Our economic system is based on the idea of economic freedom -- which does include the freedom for people and organisations to pursue "profit at all costs" (as long as it's within the law).
The alternative is government bureacrats deciding what the economy should do and -- how shall I put it politely? -- the historic record of such guidance isn't stellar.
...then these bulbs are not just simply a 'good idea'.
They are a moral imperative.
LOL. Reach over and push the OFF switch on your computer. If everyone everywhere does this, it will result in untold amounts of oil not burned and greenhouse gases not exhausted into the atmosphere.
IT IS A MORAL IMPERATIVE!!1!11!eleven!!
One of his most interesting comments: "The model can inform your decisions, but you have to know when to NOT trust the model."
:-)
That's a pretty trivial observation. If you understand the model, you know its limits. Once you go beyond this limits the model's outputs are just garbage because it's beyond its capabilities.
To give a simple example, at the time of the Iraqi war (that is, when the US troops were moving to Baghdad) most short-term stock market models were useless. The US market was reacting to daily casualty numbers and not much else. You don't have to be a genius to stop trusting your models at times like this.
Another of his comments on a completely different talk: "Mathematical models are never perfect, but they can be useful."
That's a derivative of a much better quote by George Box: "All models are wrong; some are useful".
If that was really true, MMO's would let users pay their monthly fees with virtual gold.
You can do this in Eve.
If anything, this would be one of the few possible benefits of such a system - the amount of tax you pay could be directly linked to your lifestyle, so people who smoke would pay more because they're probably going to make more use of the NHS than those who don't.
Dear Mr.Smith,
We have noticed from your grocery purchases that this month you did not buy proper amounts of vegetables from our approved Nutritional Excellence(tm) list. Instead you purchased some cakes which, you must realize, are bad for your health. Accordingly, we have no choice but to double your health insurance premiums.
Sincerely yours
...restricting campaign contributions is not restricting a person's freedom of speeh. They're free to continue to say what they want. They're just not free to buy certain things, like a politicians' vote.
:-) Are individuals free to buy TV time? to place ads/statements of their own choosing? Once you get done plugging all the loopholes, the First Amendment problems will be really obvious.
:-)
Not that simple
real economic growth (as opposed to pork) works better, because the pork also raises the individuals tax share, whereas real economic growth grows the tax base, reducing the individual tax share.
Pork: I get the Federal government to build, say, 10 bridges and a couple of federal prisons in my constituency. That's money from the outside flowing in plus new jobs paid for with federal money. The tax base is growing
Besides real economic growth does not reduce the individual tax share, because the government's appetite for money does not stay constant over time and, in fact, heavily correlated with that economic growth...
1. Politicians salaries capped at the AVERAGE income of their consitituents. This way, its in their best interests to make sure that people have decent jobs, with decent incomes. Also, when a recession hits, they'll also feel some of the pain, instead of being insulated from it.
Incentive for (much) more pork.
2. Spending of $0.50/voter maximum for any election.
Big First Amendment problems.
3. No contributions from business.
More big First Amendment problems.
4. Maximum contribution of $1k/year from any voter, to be split among ALL contributions they make to all politicians.
Yet more big First Amendment problems. Besides, do you really think this mess is all because of election campaign contributions?
5. No more voter registration along party lines. Either you're elligible to vote, or not. Who you vote for, what party you want to be aligned with, etc., are all your own bloody business.
Um. It is already. Your "party" registration and the way you vote are entirely unrelated.
6. Designate certain bills as "government confidence" votes. If the bill (budgets are good for this) isn't passed, the government falls, and a new election is held.
That comes from a different political system -- one where the head of the government comes from the leading party in the legislature. The USA's political system is not like this at all.
Even easier: since this system will eventually work off infrared frequecise, you merely cover you lens with a substance the reflects or absorbs infrared light. Shouldn't matter to the camera and then you've neutralized the scanning portion, rendering the rest obsolete.
As a matter of fact, most contemporary digital cameras already have a strong infrared filter in front of the CCD -- to compensate for the fact that CCDs are sensitive to infrared but human eyes aren't.
As described, this system will not work against *serious* digital cameras -- digital SLRs. In these cameras the CCD sensor (or, nowadays, more often the CMOS sensor) is hidden behind a mirror till the moment of the shot when the mirror flips away for a fraction of a second.
Not to mention that in order to work the system will need to constantly scan everything with, presumably, beams of visible light. I doubt this will work out well at most places...
which will allow parents to keep track of their cell phone-carrying children
We are all NSA's children...
Well if you already use GMail, what's a little more personal information? Of course Google can index it and add it to the increasingly large profile of you.
The easy way out is to use Gmail *only* on Internet Explorer, and use Firefox for all the other web browsing, including Google searches. Setting Firefox to specifically deny any and all Google cookies also helps.
The end-game in WOW is all about raiding.
:-)
On PvE servers, probably. Having never played on one, I can't say
On PvP servers the end-game includes raid dungeons but certainly isn't limited to them.
So yes, its casual to 60 but all the end-game and most of the new content isn't available to casual players.
Again, it depends on what you want from the game. For some people the end-game is raiding and fat loot. For others it's just using WoW as a pretty chat room. Some people treat world PvP as the end-game. It all varies.
Don't try to extrapolate your own preferences onto all people who play WoW.
I don't play WoW because ... b) the later missions pretty much require that I always have to have a group with me.
Huh? WoW is one of the most solo-friendly MMORGs in existence. You can perfectly well get to 60 without once being in a group.
No, you won't be able to do raid dungeons solo and so will miss out on some loot, but if you want to casually play a MMORG mostly solo -- WoW is by far your best bet.
Congratulations! Instead of a relatively low noise, moderately power hungry CCD sensor, I now have a relatively high noise, low power CMOS sensor that needs to be cooled to suppress dark current enough to get usable imagery.
Um. Dude. Canon's been using CMOS sensors in its high-end cameras for years. In case you're still wondering, yes, they work quite well without cooling.
but are you really advocating that we provide kids with access to porn as a part of their developmental processes?
Don't see why not. I know some kids, both boys and girls, that had free unfiltered computer-in-your-own-room access to the 'net since the ages of 9-10 or so. None of them had any problems with social development, or finding (and keeping) girlfriends/boyfriends, or much anything else for that matter.
Don't *add* porn, *remove* the violence! If that means that your kids (and you) end up watching less (or no) TV, and skip almost every movie, can you argue that you have been harmed in some way?
Yes, I can. You're creating a little safe and boring artificial world for them. Yet at some point the kids will have to go out into the real world. I'd rather have them be able to deal with that world.
Porn is a trap - it feeds the pleasure centers of the brain, devalues the humanity of the person being used for that pleasure, and damages people's ability to relate to one another in a healthy way.
LOL. "Puritanism - the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." What's wrong with feeding the pleasure centers of the brain?
"devalues the humanity" -- may I suggest you have a very limited concept of humanity..?
"damages people's ability to relate to one another in a healthy way" -- I call bullshit. Any evidence?
In fact, I'll make the opposite statement -- someone who hasn't been exposed to human sexuality till he/she gets married (which is presumably what you are arguing for) will have MAJOR problems with relating to his/her spouse in a healthy way...
A recipercal effect though is that children exposed to pr0n will be exposed to sex much earlier and thus go looking for it.
Spelling aside, you seem to have little knowledge either of human physiology, or of teenagers. Kids begin to get sexual urges when their hormone system restructures at puberty -- porn or no porn. As to "exposed to sex" -- well, if you find me anyone, say, 14 or older who doesn't know what sex is and how it works, I'll show you someone with seriously skewed upbringing and strong probability of major psychological problems later in life.
Someone who spends much time looking at pr0n will develope a reclusive attitude and thus not have the same social development.
That's complete and utter handwaving -- you have any support for that statement?
Come to think of it, replace "pr0n" with "books" (or "TV") -- same effect? No? Why not?
For english speaking people, it makes more sense to have TLDs in english. For Chinese speaking people, it makes more sense to have them in chinese.
I think you're seriously confused between what are TLDs and what are domain names.
I think he meant Chinese-language TLDs. .cn probably isn't very satisfying -- it means using a foreign language to access every website, which doesn't exactly stoke nationalism. What if you had to type a couple of Chinese characters to go anywhere on the Internet?
Oh, goody. So to get to a Chinese site I'll need to learn to type in Chinese? And to get to an Egyptian site -- in Arabic? to a Russian site -- in Russian?
Yes, a great idea. I can already see how internet would work MUCH better this way.
Given the intransigence the U.S. has displayed in the past regarding control of TLDs, this move isn't all that surprising. It is somewhat surprising, however, that China has chosen .com and .net as two of their TLDs, virtually guaranteeing operability problems with the rest of the Internet.
.com and .net as two of their TLDs, virtually guaranteeing operability problems with the rest of the Internet.
Hmm... you seem to have made some spelling errors...
Given the attitude that the Chinese government has displayed in the past regarding control of information flows (see the Great Firewall), this move isn't all that surprising. And it is not surprising at all that China has chosen
I can't help but view this as the fault of the US
.cn TLD is?
LOL. You're funny.
It's pretty clear the Chinese government wants its own "internet" which it can control and which it can keep separate from the rest of the world. It's a control freaks' power trip.
I may not agree with some of the views of the Chinese government, but if they want Chinese TLDs, they should have them.
What do you think the
With the approach the MPAA applies, bars, clubs, etc. would be shut down when a couple patrons are arrested for drug dealing or prostitution because they're "enabling" the illegal activity.
You think you're just kidding? Look up the RAVE act...
Welcome to Real Life.
In this game you start life as a helpless child totally dependent on others for survival. As you gain experience and skills you will have access to more of the game's features, including day care, school, college, and finally a place called "the real world."
Yeah, I've tried it. Not bad graphics, but gameplay sucks. Severe lack of features (like no "save game" and "load game" buttons) is a bummer. I can't really recommend it.
One of the reasons I loved UO and play FFXI now is because its NOT easy, its infact somewhat hard to play. WoW though I just jumped in and without much effort make a lot of gold and have really nice equips to the point there is really nothing seperating me from the rest of the 5 mil.
You are a bit confused. A game being *complicated* to play -- or, better phrased, a game where ability to think confers in-game advantages -- is one thing. A game where it's hard to gain levels/gear/gold is quite another thing.
You're basically saying that "hard to level" implies "hard to play well". That is not so. In hard-to-level games like EQ, FFXI, and such all you need to do is invest time -- and then you'll have all the levels/gear/gold that you want.
Also, there is a big difference between a game that's hard because your opponents are unpredictable -- e.g. PvP -- and a game that's hard only until you memorize the correct sequence for defeating a specific mob (or type of mobs).
Well of course it won't be direct to jail, there will have to be a trial to determine if you are actually guilty, unless the executive branch has some sort of magical power to just throw people into jails without due process.
:-)
Umm... yes, it does. Or at least it thinks it does. Did you wake up from some kind of multiyear hibernation? Google for "Jose Padilla" for an update
The AI deosn't necessarily have to be stupid. It could be challenging.
Yeah. In theory it COULD be. But it practice it WILL be mind-bogglingly stupid operating in perfectly predictable and thus boring fashion.
What's the point of all the PvP games?
The point of PvP is to pit one's skill (not twitch skill, but rather combat tactics) against other humans who are unpredictable, inventive, and generally fun to fight.