In true embedded applications (which are built with microcontrollers, not processors), it's usually critical for establishing baud rates. A certain clock speed also may be necessary if you use a single clock source to drive multiple parts on the board which can reduce electrical noise caused by multiple clocks flailing aroumd.
Apart from that, there is no reason to prefer a 100MHz part to a 50MHz one that can do twice as much work per clock cycle.
I agree. That's why I agreed that MIPS vs MIPS and watts vs. watts is a better comparison. I simply pointed out that in real embedded work, clock speeds are often a design criteria. You still look for the best MIPS and power consumption you can get, but constraints on the clock speeds often reduce the field of viable options even if another part might have better MIPS or better power consumption but doesn't meet your clock speed requirements.
Nobody has a functional requirement for a certain clock speed, although they may require performance of at least a certain level or power usage below a certain level.
Of course people have requirements for certain clock speeds. Maybe not in the psuedo-embedded field, but true embedded development (which excludes Linux and Windows-based operating systems which just happen to be running on small form-factor hardware but are otherwise no different than "non-embedded" applications) often requires a certain clock speed.
You're still right that MIPS vs MIPS or watts vs. watts is the best way to compare two processors since two processors can do vastly different quantities of work given the same clock speed. But you're wrong that there can't be functional requirements for clock speeds.
I'm personally getting sick of CNN presenting half of their headline stories as video. I just want the friggin' text, that's why I'm browsing a news site rather than watching their TV channel. Usually I have to wait an hour or two an the same story appears on some other news site in text form.
Me: Oh brother. So when the GOP has a majority, the Democrats cry that they don't have any power to stop anything.
You: I think you need to take civics again. The Democratic majority in congress is very slight. They cannot override a presidential veto.
Oh, I don't need to take civics again. I understand it completely. But you can't possibly be suggesting that the Democrats were making all those promises based on an assumption that they'd win a veto-proof majority. No, they were making promises they knew they couldn't cash. And you can quibble about the Republicans not voting for Democratic agendas, but until you have unanimity within the Democratic party on those same votes, don't blame it on the Republicans.
think people believe they have seen that, but in fact they have not.
All that matters in 2008 is what people believe they've seen. And be thankful that they haven't seen the full range of nonsense that the Democrats would pass if they could. If the people saw that, they'd almost definitely be booted in 2008. Contrary to liberal belief, the majority doesn't want socialized medicine, tax increases, or virtually anything that the Democrats have to offer. You can probably sell them on getting out of Iraq, but that's about the only thing in the Democratic platform that is really compatible with what the American people want. And don't believe the polls--sure, people want free health care, but they don't want to have to pay for that "free" health care with higher taxes, etc. The Democratic platform looks pretty good until you realize it doesn't work in the real world. Democrats keep offering the pipe dream to voters--if they ever get to try the pipe dream, though, the Democrats might not regain power for a generation.
You do realize that the Democrats have a razor-thin majority in the Senate? Usually all it takes is all the Republicans and a handful of Democrats to block these measures. So, stop blaming the Democrats.
Oh brother. So when the GOP has a majority, the Democrats cry that they don't have any power to stop anything. The people obey their wishes and elect a Democratic majority and we still can't blame them?
Face it, this has been a useless Congress and you can't blame it all on the GOP. The Democrats are their own worse enemy and I think you'll be surprised how they pay for their ineptness in 2008. The Democrats would've been much better off having not won in 2006 so the pent up anti-Bushism could have flourished in 2008. People have now seen Democrats "in action", the Congress has a lower approval rating even than Bush, and that is not unimportant going into a presidential election year. To top it off, Democrats have actually convinced themselves that people are completely bailing on the Republican party so they have a certain cockiness to them--they think they can win in 2008 simply because they aren't Republican. They're going to be surprised. They have an advantage in 2008 because they're not Bush, but the Republican party has that advantage too.
Quite a few Republicans voted Democrat in 2006 for Congresscritters (myself included). Don't misinterpret that as meaning that those people would vote for Hillary, Obama, or any other liberal for president.
When working on an unrelated embedded application that does Ethernet I/O, I had to sniff packets on the network (from an XP machine) while my embedded device was trying to communicate with Vista. I didn't see any flood of packets.
Something's also wrong with Vista, in some cases, in that if you have a device with a static IP address and then you configure it to grab a DHCP address, the device with the new DHCP address can immediately send UDP packets to Vista and Vista *will* receive them. But when Vista tries to send UDP packets back to the DHCP'd IP address, the packets don't go. Vista literally does NOT put them out on the Ethernet. At some point in the future it realizes the IP address changed and then it starts working. But that's amazingly stupid because as soon as it gets a UDP packet with the same MAC address as was previously assigned to a different IP address, it should update the ARP table accordingly.
Vista is screwed in more ways than I could have even imagined, and I can imagine quite a bit.
Network performance is so bad under Vista that I don't use the LAN on any regular basis.
When I first got a Vista laptop about three months ago (when my XP laptop unexpectedly had a motherboard failure), I noticed that music playback was not continuous or smooth. There'd be little breaks in the playback which was extremely annoying. It also seemed weird since my laptop has a dual core. When my XP laptop got back from the shop, I made that my media PC so all music playback is now done off of that laptop while I do my real work on my Vista laptop. So that's how I solved the problem.
But I can definitely vouch for the fact that the network access is slow and there's something wrong the music playback--but the music playback problems I had didn't have anything to do with the network because I wasn't actively using it when I experienced the problems.
At the end of the day, it just comes down to the fact that Vista sucks.
I'd happily ask the question of any politician what their views were on evolution. If they go anywhere near Biblical text for their explanation, they're done.
It's a bogus question anyway. Most politicians will not have read the volumes of research on evolution to know all the details of the theory, nor will they have spent years at seminary becoming theologians to know in great detail what religious says or doesn't say about the theory. As such you're looking for an intelligent, educated response from people that are most likely laymen on both the topics of evolution and religion. Asking a politician his views on evolution is just setting up a brain-dead question that they'll respond to based on what "their people" tell them to say so that "their base" is happy with the answer.
The number of people that really know what evolution does and doesn't say is exceedingly small, and equally so (if not moreso) among politicians.
I said: Plus that solves the other confusing problem of how the whole universe began
You said: Except it doesn't. It just pushes the question further back. If god started the universe, who started god?
Unfortunately, much to the chagrin of those that use that argument, religion and science don't play by the same rules. It is accepted in science that for every effect, there must be a cause. An airplane doesn't just spontaneously explode into existence and neither does an entire universe--except that seems to be what happened. So there are lots of pet theories to explain how that happened or what happened "before time", but none of those theories are particularly satisfying, nor are they any less faith-based than a belief in God.
So who started God? God did. If we assume God exists and created the universe, there's no reason to assume that God is subject to the laws of the universe that we understand. While everything in the physical universe exists because something preceded it, a theoretically spiritual and omnipotent God doesn't necessarily have to adhere to those same physical laws.
I know you'll say that's a cop-out, but it's perfectly reasonable if you do assume the existence of God.
I mean, if he honestly believes the world is only 6000 thousand years old, who knows what other wacky shit he goes to bed with comfortably at night?
Then ask the politician that question: "Do you believe the world is only 6000 years old?" Ask THAT question. But you can have doubts about evolution and not be a religious nutcase.
Oh, and very few people--even Christians--believe he world is 6000 years old so why do you even bother erecting that strawman?
Logical and reasonable people can have differing opinions on lots of issues. Including evolution. That someone might not be believe in evolution (to some degree) doesn't necessarily mean they're illogical or unreasonable. I'd personally be less concerned that someone disagrees with me and more concerned with someone that thinks that arriving at any conclusion other than their own means the other person is illogical and unreasonable. How arrogant are you, exactly?
I mean, if someone says, "I believe God created the world in 6000 years" then I'd be concerned about that person. If a person doesn't believe conventional wisdom regarding every detail of evolution? That doesn't automatically mean that person is quack.
Between evolution and global warming, I'm getting awfully sick of zealots proclaiming the science is settled and that any skeptic is irrational.
So don't argue that. Focus on whether it is "Science" or not.
Who cares what they want to believe in their churches? This is about what gets taught in the science classes of our country.
If it cannot be falsified it is not Science and does NOT belong in a science class.
Whether or not it is science and whether or not it can be falsified has potentially little to do with whether or not it's right. I support the scientific process, but if the scientific process is going to take precedence over even considering what may be right, then science is becoming a religion and that's not good. Whether or not I.D. is science, I think it makes sense to at least mention the possibility in the same class that discusses evolution. Whether it's science or not and whether you like it or not, the topics are related and it makes sense that they be presented together.
No-one can know with absolute conclusive certainty whether or not God exists. Those that believe in God either believe in him on faith, or look at the world and universe around them and make a subjective determination that it's unreasonable to believe it's random chance. Those that don't believe in God look at the same world and universe and make the subjective determination there's nothing amazing about it that requires a God; and in that case, even though that doesn't exclude the possibility of a God, they make a decision essentially also based on faith that God doesn't exist. In the end, there's no way to prove that God does or doesn't exist.
However, people do a disservice to society when they mock a belief system simply because they believe differently. In the end, whether or not we believe in God is simply based on our faith in our own belief system. If you don't believe in God, it's not because science has demonstrated to you that God doesn't exist. You don't believe in God based on faith just as those that believe in God do so also on faith.
Whether or not someone believes in evolution is probably a good question for someone applying for a job as a scientist investigating evolution. I'm not sure it really has anything to do with politics. The only question even somewhat related to evolution that seems applicable is "Will you let your religious beliefs interfere with the way you govern?" That's a more general question that does have relevance.
What are we going to ask politicians next? Whether or not they believe in string theory? That there is a unified theory that will explain everything? Whether or not they believe time travel is possible and, if so, does going back in time change the subsequent timeline or does it cause a paradox that will destroy the universe? Is the answer really 42? Who cares?! They're politicians, not scientists.
I'm more concerned about what a presidential candidate is going to do about Iraq, how they're going to fix social security, whether or not they plan on socializing medicine, and whether or not they will support the separation of church and state while at the same time not ignoring the fact that religion does exist.
And then I saw that it was all from an MD simulation:(
Much like the simulations used for IPCC scaremongering. At the end of the day, a computer simulation can be programmed to generate any result that is desired.
Someone: If you take away the property that the members aren't personally liable, then it's no longer a corporation, but some other type of organization.
Someone else: Right, so get rid of corporations.
Forget that! It's a vicious circle. Aside from it not being easy to get funding, investments, loans, etc. as an individual for business purposes, in this sue-happy society we live in, someone would have to be almost crazy to launch a business under their name. I have my own business and I stand behind my products and services and, to-date, no-one has even threatened to sue me. But that doesn't mean it will never happen or that there will never be a complete jerk of a customer that decides to litigate something that should just be worked out between the two parties.
Despite my best intentions and best efforts, there's no way I'm going to bet my family's economic future on whether or not some *sshole is going to launch a frivolous lawsuit. Which is why I have a business to protect me from personal liability. Not because I'm trying to avoid responsibility, but because it's dangerous to do business any other way.
If we could get some reasonable legal reform passed to reduce lawsuit (perhaps as simple as "loser pays, plus some extra amount to the winner for time and trouble"), then perhaps we'd have fewer absurd lawsuits and at that point it'd be reasonable to talk about holding individuals more legally and personally responsible even if there's a corporate shield. But for the time being, no way. The corporate shield might occasionally protect the bad guys, but it also protects millions of well-meaning entrepreneurs from vicious and frivolous lawsuits that could threaten their family which, in turn, would reduce the number of entrepreneurs. And that'd be a BAD thing.
The hospitals, which initially reported their breaches separately, were left with no one to sue.
No-one to sue? Oh my gosh, it's the end of the world! How can there possibly be no-one to sue? No business or individual is complete if they don't have someone to sue. Oh, the humanity!
We can start with the fact that macro-evolution (as defined by biologists, and not creationists) has been observed (that is to say, evolution beyond the species level).
This is kind of a questionable achievement. Since biologists define what a "species" is ("a group of related organisms that share a more or less distinctive form and are capable of interbreeding") and since biologists define what "macroevolution" is ("Evolution at or above the species level"), it doesn't necessarily follow that observed macro-evolution is enough to conclude that all known species occurred through such evolution. This is akin to saying "I define space as anything above 500 feet. I know the moon is in space. I know I can shoot a bullet with my gun higher than 500 feet. Therefore I conclude that I can shoot the moon with my gun."
I can definitely imagine how microevolution could lead to a situation where organisms might no longer be able to breed. I'm not sure that necessarily convinces me that this will lead to some of the organisms sprouting wings and others sprouting trunks.
This is the root of why evolution is a well-supported scientific theory. It's nice to have a single line of data, but when you get to evidentiary lines that fit together as well as the fossil and genetic data does, I don't think it's any great leap of any kind to state "Here is evidence for common descent".
Again, Devil's advocate: "I don't think it's any great leap of any kind to state 'Here is evidence for a common creator.'"
If I see two very similar looking programs with similar programming style, comments, etc. I can either conclude that one evolved from the other. I could also conclude that they were written independently by the same programmer.
There's nothing positive in their claims, simply just fallaciously-formulated arguments against everything from the Big Bang to the formation of the first cell.
True enough. And while that might mean their claims aren't scientifically, it doesn't necessarily mean they're wrong.
Except that it doesn't really. If the timeframe Earth has been around is 1/1000th of the average time you'd expect the abiogenetic process to yeild life on average, well that's ok. There are likely to be 1000s of Earth-like planets in the galaxy. All those stochastic molecular events are not only taking place on the surface of primative earth, but every other primative earthlike planet in the universe. It only has to happen once for us to be here and puzzle at how rare we are. I mean, the chances of winning the lottery are extremely low, but someone usually wins.
You're going to have to do a lot better than that. That argument is no more convincing, on its face, than saying that God created life. In fact, I'd personally say the odds of God creating life are higher than 1 in 1000 so if I have to choose between competing theories with no proof, I'll go with God. Plus that solves the other confusing problem of how the whole universe began, something which your 1 in 1000 lottery doesn't get us any closer to answering.
just can never wrap my head around how anybody can think for a moment that abiogenesis, which by all accounts is actually pretty trivial (though we don't know what things actually did it for us), is somehow so amazing that we need to outsource the problem to space.
By "all accounts" it is "pretty trivial?" What accounts are you speaking of? Most accounts I've seen basically say "it must be possible because it happened"--not exactly a stellar argument, excuse the pun. I haven't seen anyone say it was trivial, much less demonstrated that opinion to be true. How life began is one of the biggest question marks in science precisely because it isn't trivial. In fact, the question of how life started is probably second only to how the universe began. Lots of pet theories out there, but precious little agreement and even less proof.
I do agree, though, that there's no reason to "offsource" the problem to comets. I have a hard time believing that a small, cold (even with radiation) clump of ice is somehow a more optimal place for life to begin than a warm planet 90 million aways from a star.
The real problem with cases like this is that there is enormous consumer desire for a product (and therefore high profit possibilities), but the barrier to entry is so large that it inherently stifles competition.
When enormous consumer desire reaches such a high point, the barriers to entry will be broken. When cable and telephone own the last mile, satellite comes along and does a run-around. When none of them meet the needs or desires, cellular service starts popping up and offering Internet access. And then along comes city-wide WiFi.
I'm sorry, but where there is demand, there will be competition. Even Microsoft continues to lose market even though they had/have a monopoly. If there's a place it's hard to maintain a monopoly, it's technology. Some bright person with a pair of venture capitalists is always ready to make a buck and punch a hole right through whatever apparent monopoly exists.
When I was younger, I was obsessed with sound quality. And it was frustrating because that was when all I had was tapes and sound quality perfection was impossible. CDs came along and the biggest problem with the early ones--especially in cars--was that they skipped. So even "perfection" wasn't perfect.
Compared to the problems of the past, the imperfections of sound quality in MP3s is nothing. I'll take a 256kbit MP3 to a cassette tape or a skipping CD any day of the year, no question. And that same MP3 is played from my hard drive at home, from a CD-ROM in my car, or to an iPod Nano strapped to my arms when I'm riding my bike. And when I hear some nifty music I like in a song I'm listening to, I often load it in Goldwave and slow it down to 80% speed to hear the intricate details of the section of music. Am I missing music? Nope, I'm enjoying it a lot more and a lot more often than I did 10-20 years ago.
I agree with you. This guy sounds like someone that is worried about the future viability of his career more than any real concern about music. Music is a lot more than 5Hz to 20,000Hz. The fact that he's apparently more concerned with the encoding than the content that is being encoded speaks volumes.
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In true embedded applications (which are built with microcontrollers, not processors), it's usually critical for establishing baud rates. A certain clock speed also may be necessary if you use a single clock source to drive multiple parts on the board which can reduce electrical noise caused by multiple clocks flailing aroumd.
I agree. That's why I agreed that MIPS vs MIPS and watts vs. watts is a better comparison. I simply pointed out that in real embedded work, clock speeds are often a design criteria. You still look for the best MIPS and power consumption you can get, but constraints on the clock speeds often reduce the field of viable options even if another part might have better MIPS or better power consumption but doesn't meet your clock speed requirements.
Of course people have requirements for certain clock speeds. Maybe not in the psuedo-embedded field, but true embedded development (which excludes Linux and Windows-based operating systems which just happen to be running on small form-factor hardware but are otherwise no different than "non-embedded" applications) often requires a certain clock speed.
You're still right that MIPS vs MIPS or watts vs. watts is the best way to compare two processors since two processors can do vastly different quantities of work given the same clock speed. But you're wrong that there can't be functional requirements for clock speeds.
It's the void people. It may be mined, but at least the Planet Kobol (which looks a lot like Egypt) is on the other side!
I'm personally getting sick of CNN presenting half of their headline stories as video. I just want the friggin' text, that's why I'm browsing a news site rather than watching their TV channel. Usually I have to wait an hour or two an the same story appears on some other news site in text form.
Oh, I don't need to take civics again. I understand it completely. But you can't possibly be suggesting that the Democrats were making all those promises based on an assumption that they'd win a veto-proof majority. No, they were making promises they knew they couldn't cash. And you can quibble about the Republicans not voting for Democratic agendas, but until you have unanimity within the Democratic party on those same votes, don't blame it on the Republicans.
All that matters in 2008 is what people believe they've seen. And be thankful that they haven't seen the full range of nonsense that the Democrats would pass if they could. If the people saw that, they'd almost definitely be booted in 2008. Contrary to liberal belief, the majority doesn't want socialized medicine, tax increases, or virtually anything that the Democrats have to offer. You can probably sell them on getting out of Iraq, but that's about the only thing in the Democratic platform that is really compatible with what the American people want. And don't believe the polls--sure, people want free health care, but they don't want to have to pay for that "free" health care with higher taxes, etc. The Democratic platform looks pretty good until you realize it doesn't work in the real world. Democrats keep offering the pipe dream to voters--if they ever get to try the pipe dream, though, the Democrats might not regain power for a generation.
Oh brother. So when the GOP has a majority, the Democrats cry that they don't have any power to stop anything. The people obey their wishes and elect a Democratic majority and we still can't blame them?
Face it, this has been a useless Congress and you can't blame it all on the GOP. The Democrats are their own worse enemy and I think you'll be surprised how they pay for their ineptness in 2008. The Democrats would've been much better off having not won in 2006 so the pent up anti-Bushism could have flourished in 2008. People have now seen Democrats "in action", the Congress has a lower approval rating even than Bush, and that is not unimportant going into a presidential election year. To top it off, Democrats have actually convinced themselves that people are completely bailing on the Republican party so they have a certain cockiness to them--they think they can win in 2008 simply because they aren't Republican. They're going to be surprised. They have an advantage in 2008 because they're not Bush, but the Republican party has that advantage too.
Quite a few Republicans voted Democrat in 2006 for Congresscritters (myself included). Don't misinterpret that as meaning that those people would vote for Hillary, Obama, or any other liberal for president.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
When working on an unrelated embedded application that does Ethernet I/O, I had to sniff packets on the network (from an XP machine) while my embedded device was trying to communicate with Vista. I didn't see any flood of packets.
Something's also wrong with Vista, in some cases, in that if you have a device with a static IP address and then you configure it to grab a DHCP address, the device with the new DHCP address can immediately send UDP packets to Vista and Vista *will* receive them. But when Vista tries to send UDP packets back to the DHCP'd IP address, the packets don't go. Vista literally does NOT put them out on the Ethernet. At some point in the future it realizes the IP address changed and then it starts working. But that's amazingly stupid because as soon as it gets a UDP packet with the same MAC address as was previously assigned to a different IP address, it should update the ARP table accordingly.
Vista is screwed in more ways than I could have even imagined, and I can imagine quite a bit.
Network performance is so bad under Vista that I don't use the LAN on any regular basis.
When I first got a Vista laptop about three months ago (when my XP laptop unexpectedly had a motherboard failure), I noticed that music playback was not continuous or smooth. There'd be little breaks in the playback which was extremely annoying. It also seemed weird since my laptop has a dual core. When my XP laptop got back from the shop, I made that my media PC so all music playback is now done off of that laptop while I do my real work on my Vista laptop. So that's how I solved the problem.
But I can definitely vouch for the fact that the network access is slow and there's something wrong the music playback--but the music playback problems I had didn't have anything to do with the network because I wasn't actively using it when I experienced the problems.
At the end of the day, it just comes down to the fact that Vista sucks.
Consensus is not science. I believe in God and have my reservations about evolution, but not because I believe in God.
It's a bogus question anyway. Most politicians will not have read the volumes of research on evolution to know all the details of the theory, nor will they have spent years at seminary becoming theologians to know in great detail what religious says or doesn't say about the theory. As such you're looking for an intelligent, educated response from people that are most likely laymen on both the topics of evolution and religion. Asking a politician his views on evolution is just setting up a brain-dead question that they'll respond to based on what "their people" tell them to say so that "their base" is happy with the answer.
The number of people that really know what evolution does and doesn't say is exceedingly small, and equally so (if not moreso) among politicians.
Unfortunately, much to the chagrin of those that use that argument, religion and science don't play by the same rules. It is accepted in science that for every effect, there must be a cause. An airplane doesn't just spontaneously explode into existence and neither does an entire universe--except that seems to be what happened. So there are lots of pet theories to explain how that happened or what happened "before time", but none of those theories are particularly satisfying, nor are they any less faith-based than a belief in God.
So who started God? God did. If we assume God exists and created the universe, there's no reason to assume that God is subject to the laws of the universe that we understand. While everything in the physical universe exists because something preceded it, a theoretically spiritual and omnipotent God doesn't necessarily have to adhere to those same physical laws.
I know you'll say that's a cop-out, but it's perfectly reasonable if you do assume the existence of God.
Then ask the politician that question: "Do you believe the world is only 6000 years old?" Ask THAT question. But you can have doubts about evolution and not be a religious nutcase.
Oh, and very few people--even Christians--believe he world is 6000 years old so why do you even bother erecting that strawman?
Logical and reasonable people can have differing opinions on lots of issues. Including evolution. That someone might not be believe in evolution (to some degree) doesn't necessarily mean they're illogical or unreasonable. I'd personally be less concerned that someone disagrees with me and more concerned with someone that thinks that arriving at any conclusion other than their own means the other person is illogical and unreasonable. How arrogant are you, exactly?
I mean, if someone says, "I believe God created the world in 6000 years" then I'd be concerned about that person. If a person doesn't believe conventional wisdom regarding every detail of evolution? That doesn't automatically mean that person is quack.
Between evolution and global warming, I'm getting awfully sick of zealots proclaiming the science is settled and that any skeptic is irrational.
Whether or not it is science and whether or not it can be falsified has potentially little to do with whether or not it's right. I support the scientific process, but if the scientific process is going to take precedence over even considering what may be right, then science is becoming a religion and that's not good. Whether or not I.D. is science, I think it makes sense to at least mention the possibility in the same class that discusses evolution. Whether it's science or not and whether you like it or not, the topics are related and it makes sense that they be presented together.
No-one can know with absolute conclusive certainty whether or not God exists. Those that believe in God either believe in him on faith, or look at the world and universe around them and make a subjective determination that it's unreasonable to believe it's random chance. Those that don't believe in God look at the same world and universe and make the subjective determination there's nothing amazing about it that requires a God; and in that case, even though that doesn't exclude the possibility of a God, they make a decision essentially also based on faith that God doesn't exist. In the end, there's no way to prove that God does or doesn't exist.
However, people do a disservice to society when they mock a belief system simply because they believe differently. In the end, whether or not we believe in God is simply based on our faith in our own belief system. If you don't believe in God, it's not because science has demonstrated to you that God doesn't exist. You don't believe in God based on faith just as those that believe in God do so also on faith.
Whether or not someone believes in evolution is probably a good question for someone applying for a job as a scientist investigating evolution. I'm not sure it really has anything to do with politics. The only question even somewhat related to evolution that seems applicable is "Will you let your religious beliefs interfere with the way you govern?" That's a more general question that does have relevance.
What are we going to ask politicians next? Whether or not they believe in string theory? That there is a unified theory that will explain everything? Whether or not they believe time travel is possible and, if so, does going back in time change the subsequent timeline or does it cause a paradox that will destroy the universe? Is the answer really 42? Who cares?! They're politicians, not scientists.
I'm more concerned about what a presidential candidate is going to do about Iraq, how they're going to fix social security, whether or not they plan on socializing medicine, and whether or not they will support the separation of church and state while at the same time not ignoring the fact that religion does exist.
Much like the simulations used for IPCC scaremongering. At the end of the day, a computer simulation can be programmed to generate any result that is desired.
Forget that! It's a vicious circle. Aside from it not being easy to get funding, investments, loans, etc. as an individual for business purposes, in this sue-happy society we live in, someone would have to be almost crazy to launch a business under their name. I have my own business and I stand behind my products and services and, to-date, no-one has even threatened to sue me. But that doesn't mean it will never happen or that there will never be a complete jerk of a customer that decides to litigate something that should just be worked out between the two parties.
Despite my best intentions and best efforts, there's no way I'm going to bet my family's economic future on whether or not some *sshole is going to launch a frivolous lawsuit. Which is why I have a business to protect me from personal liability. Not because I'm trying to avoid responsibility, but because it's dangerous to do business any other way.
If we could get some reasonable legal reform passed to reduce lawsuit (perhaps as simple as "loser pays, plus some extra amount to the winner for time and trouble"), then perhaps we'd have fewer absurd lawsuits and at that point it'd be reasonable to talk about holding individuals more legally and personally responsible even if there's a corporate shield. But for the time being, no way. The corporate shield might occasionally protect the bad guys, but it also protects millions of well-meaning entrepreneurs from vicious and frivolous lawsuits that could threaten their family which, in turn, would reduce the number of entrepreneurs. And that'd be a BAD thing.
No-one to sue? Oh my gosh, it's the end of the world! How can there possibly be no-one to sue? No business or individual is complete if they don't have someone to sue. Oh, the humanity!
It's great to get a hold of a human if you need to. But most of the time I'd actually prefer email as long as someone actually responds to the email.
Devil's advocate here...
This is kind of a questionable achievement. Since biologists define what a "species" is ("a group of related organisms that share a more or less distinctive form and are capable of interbreeding") and since biologists define what "macroevolution" is ("Evolution at or above the species level"), it doesn't necessarily follow that observed macro-evolution is enough to conclude that all known species occurred through such evolution. This is akin to saying "I define space as anything above 500 feet. I know the moon is in space. I know I can shoot a bullet with my gun higher than 500 feet. Therefore I conclude that I can shoot the moon with my gun."
I can definitely imagine how microevolution could lead to a situation where organisms might no longer be able to breed. I'm not sure that necessarily convinces me that this will lead to some of the organisms sprouting wings and others sprouting trunks.
Again, Devil's advocate: "I don't think it's any great leap of any kind to state 'Here is evidence for a common creator.'"
If I see two very similar looking programs with similar programming style, comments, etc. I can either conclude that one evolved from the other. I could also conclude that they were written independently by the same programmer.
True enough. And while that might mean their claims aren't scientifically, it doesn't necessarily mean they're wrong.
You're going to have to do a lot better than that. That argument is no more convincing, on its face, than saying that God created life. In fact, I'd personally say the odds of God creating life are higher than 1 in 1000 so if I have to choose between competing theories with no proof, I'll go with God. Plus that solves the other confusing problem of how the whole universe began, something which your 1 in 1000 lottery doesn't get us any closer to answering.
By "all accounts" it is "pretty trivial?" What accounts are you speaking of? Most accounts I've seen basically say "it must be possible because it happened"--not exactly a stellar argument, excuse the pun. I haven't seen anyone say it was trivial, much less demonstrated that opinion to be true. How life began is one of the biggest question marks in science precisely because it isn't trivial. In fact, the question of how life started is probably second only to how the universe began. Lots of pet theories out there, but precious little agreement and even less proof.
I do agree, though, that there's no reason to "offsource" the problem to comets. I have a hard time believing that a small, cold (even with radiation) clump of ice is somehow a more optimal place for life to begin than a warm planet 90 million aways from a star.
When enormous consumer desire reaches such a high point, the barriers to entry will be broken. When cable and telephone own the last mile, satellite comes along and does a run-around. When none of them meet the needs or desires, cellular service starts popping up and offering Internet access. And then along comes city-wide WiFi.
I'm sorry, but where there is demand, there will be competition. Even Microsoft continues to lose market even though they had/have a monopoly. If there's a place it's hard to maintain a monopoly, it's technology. Some bright person with a pair of venture capitalists is always ready to make a buck and punch a hole right through whatever apparent monopoly exists.
When I was younger, I was obsessed with sound quality. And it was frustrating because that was when all I had was tapes and sound quality perfection was impossible. CDs came along and the biggest problem with the early ones--especially in cars--was that they skipped. So even "perfection" wasn't perfect.
Compared to the problems of the past, the imperfections of sound quality in MP3s is nothing. I'll take a 256kbit MP3 to a cassette tape or a skipping CD any day of the year, no question. And that same MP3 is played from my hard drive at home, from a CD-ROM in my car, or to an iPod Nano strapped to my arms when I'm riding my bike. And when I hear some nifty music I like in a song I'm listening to, I often load it in Goldwave and slow it down to 80% speed to hear the intricate details of the section of music. Am I missing music? Nope, I'm enjoying it a lot more and a lot more often than I did 10-20 years ago.
I agree with you. This guy sounds like someone that is worried about the future viability of his career more than any real concern about music. Music is a lot more than 5Hz to 20,000Hz. The fact that he's apparently more concerned with the encoding than the content that is being encoded speaks volumes.