"It is virtually impossible to find any respectable scientist who will disagree, anymore."
And no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge. You are not talking about science (although you are talking about scientists). You are talking about politics. (Or religion. Which is basically the same thing.)
Psh. But it's not Windows, so it's not a real computer.
Whoops, forgot to close my sarcasm tag.
Good for you. I'm gonna have to go by the PDX FreeGeek and volunteer. It's been on my "hey oughtta do that" list for a while, and it's time I make it happen.
So, what? FreeGeek should instead install and support whichever version of Windows has an activation sticker on the box?
What? There isn't an activation sticker? Oh well, might as well set this computer on fire, because it sure couldn't be useful with a Free operating system on it...
"less than 5 percent of all computers"
So what? It works on the one very inexpensive computer that somebody taught them how to use. That's not nothin'.
Re:Applying logic seen on Slashdot
on
Free Geek Robbed
·
· Score: 1
OK, so how is stealing a couple hundred thousand credit card numbers analogous to a couple dozen laptops?
"by consuming their goods you are complicit in their acts."
I don't agree. Collective accountability is lousy morals. I would indeed support better mechanisms to inform consumers. I look forward to those mechanisms being more readily available.
I'd love to have a personal relationship with somebody I pay to make my clothes. Unfortunately, I can't afford bespoke clothing. I don't have any way of ensuring that my clothes are made equitably, but I would support mechanisms that assist me with that.
"No, not stupid- but certainly ignorant if you think everything's just hunky dory out there in free market land."
I didn't say hunky dory. I did say that more people have more wealth today than at any point in history. More people having more wealth is Good.
"If you have radically fewer services overall- what will you do when the people who need those services come beating your door down? Shoot them all?"
Why are they beating down MY door? And, yes, if they try to take stuff that's mine, I will defend myself. The correct solution to this problem is not for me to have nothing, but for them to not try to take other peoples' stuff.
"It's preventative insurance against a much larger cost in the future. Fail to pay that cost, and you'll just be stuck with the much bigger bill."
I don't disagree with you. I do assert that the bill is growing, and I'm not getting any more for my money, and I don't think that's OK.
Well golly, thanks for that, Waffle Iron. I appreciate your clearing that up for me. I wonder if there are people who are well qualified to make those judgements? Hmmm....
"You can't live in America anymore without oppressing *somebody*- even if that person is a half a world away."
I decline to take responsibility for the bad acts of people I do not know. Sorry. I do my best to avoid products I know to be built by slave labor, but I cannot act with perfect information.
"You've never been outside of the United States, have you? Or even just down to your local homeless congregation center?"
Are you serious? You think that just because I don't agree with you, I must be stupid and ignorant? If there was a mechanism to make the poor better off, while not making everybody poor, I would support it. The least bad mechanism to that aim is market economies, not command economies.
"No it isn't- it's still people banding together to assert their rights at the expense of their neighbors."
Keeping my neighbor from stealing my food is not asserting my rights at the expense of anybody. It's just asserting my rights. You don't have a right to my food.
"The only difference between a private enterprise and a government is in who owns it."
Agreed. And, ideally, The People own the government. I wish to return to that ideal.
"Only a strongly regulated small economy that prevents liars and theives from profiting can build a middle class- and the best way to do that is to allow vigilanteism. The free enterprise allows liars and theieves to prosper from their own ability; the command economy allows liars and theives to use government to do their bidding."
I don't necessarily disagree with you, but how do you make sure vigilantes are good actors? What's to prevent the rich or the poor from being vigilantes against YOU, for any value of you?
I don't care about class. Classes don't have rights. The only rights are those that adhere to individuals.
"I look to history on that score. "
OK, so those two periods had robed people in masks knifing bad actors?
"It's not a silly assertion at all- low taxes on the rich allow them to keep the non-rich from moving into their circle effectively. It's been that way in every society since Babylon."
Why do you continue to assume I'm only talking about tax cuts for the rich? I'm not rich, and I want to pay less taxes.
Well, if the Shuttle program (which was a design-by-committee charlie foxtrot extraordinaire) yielded one of the best rocket engines currently available (which it did), why not use that engine?
NASA works the way NASA works because that's the way Congress likes it. Sometimes, you get Apollo. Sometimes, you get Shuttle. I hope that the Ares program yields results more like Apollo, although I think the moon is a waste of resources.
Mars, baby. Whoever gets there first gets to name it.
With radically fewer services overall, and what services are provided are locally accountable, you could in fact realize a tax savings.
However, this scenario is at least as idealistic as Marx's, and equally unlikely to occur. So, since I do not have nor do I seek power over my fellow man, you have nothing to worry about.
OK, so 'splain to me how the Historically Underutilized Business statutes that are abused all over the place are OK, but renting to whoever you want is not?
I'm not in favor of bigotry. I am in favor of liberty. Liberty is much more important than preventing people from believing disgusting lies.
No no no! I don't like any of that stuff, I like Stryper! Stryper ROCKS! I want to see Stryper and Ozzy in a Battle of the Bands, and have Ozzy find Jesus and get saved by Stryper! And then Bryan Eno could show up and play his synthesizer for, like, two hours, and everybody could take a nap!
Slashdot Mirror
Just figuring that out, are you?
"It is virtually impossible to find any respectable scientist who will disagree, anymore."
And no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge. You are not talking about science (although you are talking about scientists). You are talking about politics. (Or religion. Which is basically the same thing.)
That's freakin' funny. +1 You Rule.
Psh. But it's not Windows, so it's not a real computer.
Whoops, forgot to close my sarcasm tag.
Good for you. I'm gonna have to go by the PDX FreeGeek and volunteer. It's been on my "hey oughtta do that" list for a while, and it's time I make it happen.
So, what? FreeGeek should instead install and support whichever version of Windows has an activation sticker on the box?
What? There isn't an activation sticker? Oh well, might as well set this computer on fire, because it sure couldn't be useful with a Free operating system on it...
"less than 5 percent of all computers"
So what? It works on the one very inexpensive computer that somebody taught them how to use. That's not nothin'.
OK, so how is stealing a couple hundred thousand credit card numbers analogous to a couple dozen laptops?
Just curious.
"Even low-balling the value of my free time, I could probably go out and buy a brand new system for that"
Then you're probably not the sort of person who needs to go down to FreeGeek to get a computer, are you?
*head asplode*
Where do you get your numbers? Serious question.
"by consuming their goods you are complicit in their acts."
I don't agree. Collective accountability is lousy morals. I would indeed support better mechanisms to inform consumers. I look forward to those mechanisms being more readily available.
I'd love to have a personal relationship with somebody I pay to make my clothes. Unfortunately, I can't afford bespoke clothing. I don't have any way of ensuring that my clothes are made equitably, but I would support mechanisms that assist me with that.
"No, not stupid- but certainly ignorant if you think everything's just hunky dory out there in free market land."
I didn't say hunky dory. I did say that more people have more wealth today than at any point in history. More people having more wealth is Good.
Take it up with the Air Force. They're the ones that decided they needed a winged orbiter to steal satellites. There's nothing wrong with the engines.
Wrong submit button again.
"If you have radically fewer services overall- what will you do when the people who need those services come beating your door down? Shoot them all?"
Why are they beating down MY door? And, yes, if they try to take stuff that's mine, I will defend myself. The correct solution to this problem is not for me to have nothing, but for them to not try to take other peoples' stuff.
"It's preventative insurance against a much larger cost in the future. Fail to pay that cost, and you'll just be stuck with the much bigger bill."
I don't disagree with you. I do assert that the bill is growing, and I'm not getting any more for my money, and I don't think that's OK.
"You buy clothes from China don't you?"
Not when I can avoid it, no. Are you telling me that the only place with sweatshops is China, and if I just avoid Chinese clothes, I'm OK?
"If so, you're seeking power over your fellow man."
No, I'm seeking a shirt.
Well golly, thanks for that, Waffle Iron. I appreciate your clearing that up for me. I wonder if there are people who are well qualified to make those judgements? Hmmm....
"You can't live in America anymore without oppressing *somebody*- even if that person is a half a world away."
I decline to take responsibility for the bad acts of people I do not know. Sorry. I do my best to avoid products I know to be built by slave labor, but I cannot act with perfect information.
"You've never been outside of the United States, have you? Or even just down to your local homeless congregation center?"
Are you serious? You think that just because I don't agree with you, I must be stupid and ignorant? If there was a mechanism to make the poor better off, while not making everybody poor, I would support it. The least bad mechanism to that aim is market economies, not command economies.
"No it isn't- it's still people banding together to assert their rights at the expense of their neighbors."
Keeping my neighbor from stealing my food is not asserting my rights at the expense of anybody. It's just asserting my rights. You don't have a right to my food.
"The only difference between a private enterprise and a government is in who owns it."
Agreed. And, ideally, The People own the government. I wish to return to that ideal.
"Only a strongly regulated small economy that prevents liars and theives from profiting can build a middle class- and the best way to do that is to allow vigilanteism. The free enterprise allows liars and theieves to prosper from their own ability; the command economy allows liars and theives to use government to do their bidding."
I don't necessarily disagree with you, but how do you make sure vigilantes are good actors? What's to prevent the rich or the poor from being vigilantes against YOU, for any value of you?
I don't care about class. Classes don't have rights. The only rights are those that adhere to individuals.
"I look to history on that score. "
OK, so those two periods had robed people in masks knifing bad actors?
"It's not a silly assertion at all- low taxes on the rich allow them to keep the non-rich from moving into their circle effectively. It's been that way in every society since Babylon."
Why do you continue to assume I'm only talking about tax cuts for the rich? I'm not rich, and I want to pay less taxes.
Well, if the Shuttle program (which was a design-by-committee charlie foxtrot extraordinaire) yielded one of the best rocket engines currently available (which it did), why not use that engine?
NASA works the way NASA works because that's the way Congress likes it. Sometimes, you get Apollo. Sometimes, you get Shuttle. I hope that the Ares program yields results more like Apollo, although I think the moon is a waste of resources.
Mars, baby. Whoever gets there first gets to name it.
With radically fewer services overall, and what services are provided are locally accountable, you could in fact realize a tax savings.
However, this scenario is at least as idealistic as Marx's, and equally unlikely to occur. So, since I do not have nor do I seek power over my fellow man, you have nothing to worry about.
OK. I'm a Christian, and I'm here to tell you that the people who said that were not Christians, and have no understanding of morality.
Just because there are stupid people doesn't mean that you're the only smart one.
OK, so 'splain to me how the Historically Underutilized Business statutes that are abused all over the place are OK, but renting to whoever you want is not?
I'm not in favor of bigotry. I am in favor of liberty. Liberty is much more important than preventing people from believing disgusting lies.
No no no! I don't like any of that stuff, I like Stryper! Stryper ROCKS! I want to see Stryper and Ozzy in a Battle of the Bands, and have Ozzy find Jesus and get saved by Stryper! And then Bryan Eno could show up and play his synthesizer for, like, two hours, and everybody could take a nap!
Keep going. I'm fascinated. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. Let's proceed from the assumption that I'm a Stryper fan.
Brian Eno?
Wow. Um, OK.
What's it like to spend your life compensating for a microscopic ween?
Way to take one for the team, Sparky. You go on with your bad self.
Tool.
I can't read what you didn't write, and you didn't write anything useful.
Son, you need a hug.
Um, yeah, you said whore. Got it. Trying to figure out what that has to do with our discussion of government.
You've either made the most oblique "government is a bunch of whores" joke ever, or you're really, really bad at constructing a cogent thought.
On second thought, those two alternatives are not mutually exclusive...