That would clearly be a mistake. Noone would develop for Mac OS, because it runs Windows already. OS 2 tried this. It ran Win 3.1 faster than Win 3.1 did by inself. Noone needed to write OS 2 apps.
As a mac user, Windows applications are kludgy, prone to failure, and are put togethor as if the UI was an after thought, designed solely to link a series of code functions togethor. Also, I'm already in the habit of when I download something and it has an installer, I immediately trash it and never install it. No thank you.
"teach them how to use a calculator when they start studying higher maths that actually need one."
I graduated from college in 96. As far as math goes, I've had Calc 3, Differential Equations, and Liner Algebra. I can't recall learning ANYTHING in all of college math that required a calculator. We graphed everything by hand. We reduced/solved all of our equations by hand. I'm quite frankly stumped as to what in the world people use calculators in math for.
I used calculators in Physics and Chem (I ended up doing a chem major), after solving everything by hand and punching in the final result. My calculator can do basic functions (trig, ln, log, n^x), I've never need it for anything else.
"Apple writes all the drivers for OS X in the video department."
I doubt that. Even given that, my point went right over your head. You see, Mac users can't just buy off the shelf PC video cards put them in their macs, even if the mac had drivers for it. The ROM on the card is set for little endian, when macs use big endian. Making Mac cards more expensive (only difference being the rom and the box it came in). IIRC, there are ways of working around this, but they require a lot more patience than I've cared to have.
With the switch to Intel processors, the graphics cards will be physically identical in every way to the ones Windows uses, making using them easier. This means, the premium charge you had no choice to pay for being a mac customer will be gone. As people/companies write drivers for cards, one will be able to use those cards instead of the stock one that came with the mac.
Games are only relevent when you start thinking about APIs. With DirectX being Windows only, I really don't see how it's going to be that much easier to port.
The one issue it might solve is byte order problems (big/little endian) on the graphics cards. Though, theres going to be no guarantee that drivers for OS X for any off the shelf card is actually going to be any good.
It may be some time before Apple gets around to even caring that the Half Life 2 market exists, much less builds machines to compete in that market.
KOTOR 1, I agree with. That game alone would be enough for 9 movies. 1-3 leading up to the events of Malachor V, 4-6 the civil war, 7-9 the fall of Malak. The script is pretty much already written and in my humble opinion better than all of Star Wars 1-6 (even the beloved Empire Strikes Back).
KOTOR 2, not so much. A little too bland, which I attribute to Bioware not making the game. The gameplay mechanics are certainly superior to the first one, but the whole time you are left without a sense of purpose.
As a side note, if you own a Xbox check out Jade Empire (another Bioware creation). Another video that would make an excellent movie.
"So, if you lose some weight, you could slip it off, pass it to your buddy who gets it in contact with his skin within 15 seconds, go do your crime, and get away with it."
Only if the jail is stupid enough to use it as their ONLY security measure. In the context of layered security, even defeatable measures can help. Each layer of security you have, increases the likelyhood of a desired outcome. I see this as a really good idea, as long as the guards splot check the prisoners with something that can pull up a photo.
"Unless we disable the ability to write to the disk (or disable the ability to execute code), viruses aren't going away."
Hence the Unix model of user separation. Extended by OS X by having the OS password protected, even from the admin (admin has to give their own password to install updates). Combine with with having an install standard that makes it difficult to integrate their applications into the OS, and strongly suggests developers stay from.
This is exactly the direction MS should be heading. From the very foundation, things like:
1. Where DLL's are stored, who writes those DLLs
2. The registry (one of the most backwards and overtly complicated things ever invented)
3. Not having a good default for applications to use temp space for profiles and preferences (making some applications only runable by the admin)
4. Purposely setting up the OS in such a way as to make where an application actually installs thing is hard to figure out
5. True user/OS/Application separation (all 3 in separate directories, with separate file permissions). This is very important. Applications do NOT belong in the same file structure as the OS. Period.
6. Equating ease of use with "less work" and trying to have the OS guess what the user wants to do and perform it for them. A lot of applications are prone to this and love to auto-open things for the user.
Instead of fixing Windows, which is at it's very foundation flawed, MS buys an anti-virus company. MS isn't stupid, nor are it's employees. They have PhDs who know about these issues, but they are ignored in favor of very poor design practices that make an OS that is heavily flawed, and it shows.
"Wasn't porn the whole reason that people wanted a better web browser in the first place?"
Yes, actaully.
Way back in the day, what got me on the web was the fact that Netscape included a USENET reader that could handle inline UUEncoded files. More specifically JPEG. Had I gotten on the Internet any later than I did (91), I wouldn't know anywhere near as much about Unix as I do now. Having to figure out how to make PINE to launch a shell so I could compile tintin and have less limited access to USENET (their default reader had no subscribe feature and only "approved" groups) ended up being the major foundations of a later career.
"Congradulations you just made the GPL unenforceable. Slashbotters simply amaze me."
If it's not in the public domain, you can't distribute it without permission. GPL software would clearly not be able to be distributed without the copyright holders permission. Meaning by default if the GPL is invalid for any reason, it can be only in so far as saying the copyright hold can't GRANT distribution permission under the circumstances the GPL says. The default is the infringer still doesn't have the ability to distribute and loses.
I would also on top of what I originally posted like to see as part of the law, specifically allowing easily verifiable assignment of copyright under distribution licenses (note they are not "use" licenses as in EULA) for collaborative work. This is one thing that I think OSS in general is lacking and sorely needs. Allowing the copyright holder to maintain their copyright and still allow distributation under their rules (note this is VERY different from use). Organizations that exist for this purpose today, may nor may not be reliable 10 years from now.
Using concepts from the film version in your production is a dodgy area.
I'm sorry, everything in the public domain should be fair game. A film with an expired copyright falls in this category. As far as I know, there is no such thing right now. Keep in mind, up until the 20th century in the US, copyrights actually expired. This is exactly how Disney was able to get it's start. It borrowed heavily from material in the public domain, and arguable our culture has seen benifit from this. 20 years is more than fair, considering, if something makes a profit, it usually does so within a few years, usually within one.
The problem with having no public domain and it monolopy it creates, is there is very little incentive for a creator to genuinely make something new. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Loonie Toons (old war times cartoons from these guys are some of my favorites), we have all heard of them. Used again...and again...and again. It's lame, but it's profitable. Familiarity breeds stagnation. In many ways, much of the truely creative material (which usually means higher risk) is relagated to smaller distributation channels. Meaning the majority of society will never see or hear of it. As a result, the west is slowly redefining it's "Folk culture" to a point that it has little meaning. Our society suffers from it.
The guys who wrote the US constitution understood this, but today it's been repaced with market economics and profit. Neither of which puts societial culture and experience in very high esteem, since the "creators" of works are eternal and have, as a collective whole, any understanding of what it's means to be a human who just plays the guitar around a campfire.
1. 15-20 year limit on all copyright 2. All sufficient quotation to talk about a specific copyrighted material allowed. 3. All parody allowed, even if it violates trade dress, or any other contrived notion of property 4. Limited copying for immediate friends and family allowed 5. No EULA's allowed (unless specifically signed by both parties, in person) 6. You can't copyright something that is already in the public domain (silence for example), merely you're specific version of it. (Someone makes a story based of a centuries old fairy tale, you can do the same, even if they get all sorts of trademarks from it)
Catholics: Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
Though correct, not accurate. If you think of "literal" in the sense of the fundamentalist way of thinking about things, you're right. Catholics are a bit fuzzier in their thinking than this. The Christian Bible is good for instructions, historically accurate, but must be understood in the light of faith, the mystery of the cross, and tradition. Within this context, Evolution is understood much in the same way that Higher Criticism is (Pius XII). If it's not useful for faith, it's worthless.
Lutherans (all major Synods in America): Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
Episocpals: Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
There are VERY conservative branches of both of these Churches. Though, their conservative elements tend not to be Fundamentalist, as in acceptance of the "Fundamentals of Faith", they CAN be just a Biblical literalist as a run of the mill fundamentalist. Though in the States, the Episcopalians have a LARGE liberal faction.
Methodists: Do believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God, but most do not believe that Evolution contradicts it.
Wrong. Depends on the Methodists and seminary. I think only about 20% of Methodists consider themselves liberal, where the remaining 80% is split 40/40 between the moderates and conservatives. Methodists have a fairly strong Fundamentalist element (as in the dictionary definition of Fundamentalism which includes biblical literalism), though the Higher Critics are tolerated within the church, barely.
Baptists: Mostly believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. Most (not all) Baptist denominations consider Evolution to be contrary to their beliefs.
Along with pretty much anyone else out of the pietist/revivalist/holiness movement do.
I think I hit most of the major ones.
Presbyterians (very similar in make up and belief to methodist), the entire "back to the word of God" non-denominational movement (which is getting quite strong with the youth), all the sub-branches of the holiness movement (AME, Assembly of God).
I think you'd be really surprised by the number of people who are Fundamentalist. You have to understand, most Fundamentalist aren't like the ones on TV. They're "normal", they're your bosses, they run your favorite cafe, they don't go around scaring people and are just as annoyed at the screaming preacher on the corner as you are. Many of them, just don't believe in Evolution, but that's irrelevant, because there are starving people to feed.
This is NOT a necissary constraint for a deity. If we start with the proposition that there is at least one creator deity, that does not necissarily imply omnipotence. This is an invalid assumption.
being ominipotent, the creation, alteration or elimination of any state or states requires zero effort or time.
This does not follow from omnipotence, not expilicitly anyways. The ability to do something does not imply anything about effort, it is merely a statement of what can be accomplished.
given that any action requires zero effort or time, the choice between performing and action and not performing an action for god boils down to only a choice of will or desire, not ability or effort or any other constraint.
thus, action and inaction are, functionally, the same for an omnipotent god.
If you first two postulates necissarily followed from a creator god, you'd have a valid point here.
children starve to death every day.
god does nothing to stop this startvation.
this inaction to prevent said starvation is the same as a direct action to cause it.
deliberately causing children to starve to death is cruel. god is cruel
Devils advocate time on this one. You forgot step 6.5, from God's point of view, what happens on Earth is neccissary something that is matter of concern for the deity. This matter matter of concern is at the very foundation of good vs. evil. This of it like this are YOU evil for killing ants when you step on them?
Even given omnipotence, which isn't necissary for a creator god, there is no reason to declar that the ability to do something implies the need to do something. This deity could be spending all it's time trying to save another deities eternal existence, or something like that.
For many people it can be reduced to political reasons. It's not Microsoft and it still runs on their hardware and does what they need is what's said. Variations of it not being Microsoft are what you will hear most of the time. Open file formats, immediate access to security problems, meets the needs of developers and techs (web sites, database, server, research), just to name a few.
Personally, I've never understood why the GPL and more dinstinctly Linux is talked about the most when the BSDs often work better for a specific task (if I'm running a server, openbsd, secure by default has it's benifits). Which is why I think it's mostly political reasons (notions of "free" and how the GPL takes care to make sure that OSS is always OSS). In that respect, it's not about quality or needs, but a notion of "freeness".
To me a computer is nothing more than a tool, pick the right one for the job, and you'll be okay. If you want to store files for decades (photos, emails, etc), use open formats. Microsoft has become to represent the embodiment of the prevention of the use of open tools. Hence reducing choice.
"You're saying there is some fundamental difference between "the most primal of neural bundles" and the brain that implements the "intelligence" of ours"
That's exactly what I'm saying. The post I was responding to seemed to be talking up this particular research to the point of claiming it was ground breaking. It's no more ground breaking or a sign of intelligence than the AI in Sim Ant.
"Take this program -- http://www.stanford.edu/~dil/invariance/ -- for example. It's gone largely unnoticed, yet it is concrete proof of a huge breakthrough in computer intelligence."
No, it's not. What this guy is probably doing is a simple cross correlation (CC). If the image is correct, it's added to the dendagram for an eventual multi-reference based CC (with some sort of eigen value comparison or simple CC value comparision).
Scientists do this stuff all the time in order to look at LARGE data sets and make some sense of them. The most primal of neural bundles do the biological equivalent of this all the time, it's not a sign of intelligence.
Duh, everyone knows only those socialist over in Europe actually do things like this.
It really is disheartening when I run into to people who don't understand the inherent value of cooperation, especially as it applies to legimate government interests. It's american in so far as it expresses the will of the population. So people unfortunately have been convinced that the people don't have the same rights/privledges as the "professions" do. Society has been sectioned off, we consume, they make and how dare we cross that line.
"Trust me, scientists cannot format a paper for publishing, don't want to, and shouldn't be required to."
I don't know what "scientists" you've been talking to, you have a wierd view of it all works. I'm a chemist. I've worked in Physics, Physical Biochem, and Physical Chem, all research positions. In all three of those cases, LaTeX was the standard, from formatting your own dissertation to journal submissions.
"Also, how is the author supposed to know how his or her article fits into the journal?"
Um, templates. That's why LaTeX is used. No WYSISYG editors are needed, just output to postscript and send it to your printer for proofing. You'd obviously be surprised at what a physical scientist can do. It's why it's not uncommon for people in my field to leave it and move on to something that pays better. The guy who runs the physical network in my building has a PhD in Biology.
While date certainly isn't the plural of anecdote, I'm going to pipe in here. I've been collecting music for 17 years. For the past year I've been encoding my Vinyl (obscure hardcore/punk and old war time jazz), which is about 200 or so albums. Before that I did my tapes (about 100 so). I have approximately 300 CDs. Every single one of those CD and tapes sits in a closet thanks to mp3s. No more need of a complicated stereo to play them on, though I do like playing records.
I'm an exception to the rule, but don't assume people don't have "40 legit gigs". Some of us have more.
" Where does "journalism" stop and "somebody just writing something down" start?"
There is no difference. The amount of money or the amount of people reading a publication is entirely irrelevant to whether or not the publication is a journalistic source. People handing out "zines" on a street corner are only different in terms of quality than those of larger media outlets. Laws that grant corporations privileges should also also apply to the lone citizen voice, or there should be no such privileges at all.
In my mind, this case has nothing to do with whether or not Think Secret is a journalistic source, that's merely assumed. It's a question of whether protection of confidential sources applies in the case when one knowning receives trade secrets from that source and publishes them for all to see. We don't need artifical predugeces in this, where somehow, by magic, being a "recognized" corporate entity gives you special protection. Freedom applies to everyone, not just those who has the greater number of resources.
I got on the web when Mosaic was the way to do it. In all that time, I've never bought a single web browser (you could download Netscape for free from their site, yet it was sold in the store). I've never bought a plugin. I've always considered web browsers free. I think most people see the web that way. I don't see how these guys are going to make a profit.
Anything they come up with for Firefox will be copied by the OSS community and offered as a free download.
Slashdot Mirror
That would clearly be a mistake. Noone would develop for Mac OS, because it runs Windows already. OS 2 tried this. It ran Win 3.1 faster than Win 3.1 did by inself. Noone needed to write OS 2 apps.
As a mac user, Windows applications are kludgy, prone to failure, and are put togethor as if the UI was an after thought, designed solely to link a series of code functions togethor. Also, I'm already in the habit of when I download something and it has an installer, I immediately trash it and never install it. No thank you.
"teach them how to use a calculator when they start studying higher maths that actually need one."
I graduated from college in 96. As far as math goes, I've had Calc 3, Differential Equations, and Liner Algebra. I can't recall learning ANYTHING in all of college math that required a calculator. We graphed everything by hand. We reduced/solved all of our equations by hand. I'm quite frankly stumped as to what in the world people use calculators in math for.
I used calculators in Physics and Chem (I ended up doing a chem major), after solving everything by hand and punching in the final result. My calculator can do basic functions (trig, ln, log, n^x), I've never need it for anything else.
Calculators don't belong in math classes. At all.
"Apple writes all the drivers for OS X in the video department."
I doubt that. Even given that, my point went right over your head. You see, Mac users can't just buy off the shelf PC video cards put them in their macs, even if the mac had drivers for it. The ROM on the card is set for little endian, when macs use big endian. Making Mac cards more expensive (only difference being the rom and the box it came in). IIRC, there are ways of working around this, but they require a lot more patience than I've cared to have.
With the switch to Intel processors, the graphics cards will be physically identical in every way to the ones Windows uses, making using them easier. This means, the premium charge you had no choice to pay for being a mac customer will be gone. As people/companies write drivers for cards, one will be able to use those cards instead of the stock one that came with the mac.
Games are only relevent when you start thinking about APIs. With DirectX being Windows only, I really don't see how it's going to be that much easier to port.
The one issue it might solve is byte order problems (big/little endian) on the graphics cards. Though, theres going to be no guarantee that drivers for OS X for any off the shelf card is actually going to be any good.
It may be some time before Apple gets around to even caring that the Half Life 2 market exists, much less builds machines to compete in that market.
KOTOR 1, I agree with. That game alone would be enough for 9 movies. 1-3 leading up to the events of Malachor V, 4-6 the civil war, 7-9 the fall of Malak. The script is pretty much already written and in my humble opinion better than all of Star Wars 1-6 (even the beloved Empire Strikes Back).
KOTOR 2, not so much. A little too bland, which I attribute to Bioware not making the game. The gameplay mechanics are certainly superior to the first one, but the whole time you are left without a sense of purpose.
As a side note, if you own a Xbox check out Jade Empire (another Bioware creation). Another video that would make an excellent movie.
"So, if you lose some weight, you could slip it off, pass it to your buddy who gets it in contact with his skin within 15 seconds, go do your crime, and get away with it."
Only if the jail is stupid enough to use it as their ONLY security measure. In the context of layered security, even defeatable measures can help. Each layer of security you have, increases the likelyhood of a desired outcome. I see this as a really good idea, as long as the guards splot check the prisoners with something that can pull up a photo.
"Unless we disable the ability to write to the disk (or disable the ability to execute code), viruses aren't going away."
Hence the Unix model of user separation. Extended by OS X by having the OS password protected, even from the admin (admin has to give their own password to install updates). Combine with with having an install standard that makes it difficult to integrate their applications into the OS, and strongly suggests developers stay from.
This is exactly the direction MS should be heading. From the very foundation, things like:
1. Where DLL's are stored, who writes those DLLs
2. The registry (one of the most backwards and overtly complicated things ever invented)
3. Not having a good default for applications to use temp space for profiles and preferences (making some applications only runable by the admin)
4. Purposely setting up the OS in such a way as to make where an application actually installs thing is hard to figure out
5. True user/OS/Application separation (all 3 in separate directories, with separate file permissions). This is very important. Applications do NOT belong in the same file structure as the OS. Period.
6. Equating ease of use with "less work" and trying to have the OS guess what the user wants to do and perform it for them. A lot of applications are prone to this and love to auto-open things for the user.
Instead of fixing Windows, which is at it's very foundation flawed, MS buys an anti-virus company. MS isn't stupid, nor are it's employees. They have PhDs who know about these issues, but they are ignored in favor of very poor design practices that make an OS that is heavily flawed, and it shows.
"Wasn't porn the whole reason that people wanted a better web browser in the first place?"
Yes, actaully.
Way back in the day, what got me on the web was the fact that Netscape included a USENET reader that could handle inline UUEncoded files. More specifically JPEG. Had I gotten on the Internet any later than I did (91), I wouldn't know anywhere near as much about Unix as I do now. Having to figure out how to make PINE to launch a shell so I could compile tintin and have less limited access to USENET (their default reader had no subscribe feature and only "approved" groups) ended up being the major foundations of a later career.
Who says porn is bad for you.
"Congradulations you just made the GPL unenforceable. Slashbotters simply amaze me."
If it's not in the public domain, you can't distribute it without permission. GPL software would clearly not be able to be distributed without the copyright holders permission. Meaning by default if the GPL is invalid for any reason, it can be only in so far as saying the copyright hold can't GRANT distribution permission under the circumstances the GPL says. The default is the infringer still doesn't have the ability to distribute and loses.
I would also on top of what I originally posted like to see as part of the law, specifically allowing easily verifiable assignment of copyright under distribution licenses (note they are not "use" licenses as in EULA) for collaborative work. This is one thing that I think OSS in general is lacking and sorely needs. Allowing the copyright holder to maintain their copyright and still allow distributation under their rules (note this is VERY different from use). Organizations that exist for this purpose today, may nor may not be reliable 10 years from now.
Using concepts from the film version in your production is a dodgy area.
I'm sorry, everything in the public domain should be fair game. A film with an expired copyright falls in this category. As far as I know, there is no such thing right now. Keep in mind, up until the 20th century in the US, copyrights actually expired. This is exactly how Disney was able to get it's start. It borrowed heavily from material in the public domain, and arguable our culture has seen benifit from this. 20 years is more than fair, considering, if something makes a profit, it usually does so within a few years, usually within one.
The problem with having no public domain and it monolopy it creates, is there is very little incentive for a creator to genuinely make something new. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Loonie Toons (old war times cartoons from these guys are some of my favorites), we have all heard of them. Used again...and again...and again. It's lame, but it's profitable. Familiarity breeds stagnation. In many ways, much of the truely creative material (which usually means higher risk) is relagated to smaller distributation channels. Meaning the majority of society will never see or hear of it. As a result, the west is slowly redefining it's "Folk culture" to a point that it has little meaning. Our society suffers from it.
The guys who wrote the US constitution understood this, but today it's been repaced with market economics and profit. Neither of which puts societial culture and experience in very high esteem, since the "creators" of works are eternal and have, as a collective whole, any understanding of what it's means to be a human who just plays the guitar around a campfire.
1. 15-20 year limit on all copyright
2. All sufficient quotation to talk about a specific copyrighted material allowed.
3. All parody allowed, even if it violates trade dress, or any other contrived notion of property
4. Limited copying for immediate friends and family allowed
5. No EULA's allowed (unless specifically signed by both parties, in person)
6. You can't copyright something that is already in the public domain (silence for example), merely you're specific version of it. (Someone makes a story based of a centuries old fairy tale, you can do the same, even if they get all sorts of trademarks from it)
You don't get 2-6 if I don't get number 1.
Didn't BeOS do this? Don't a great deal of modern operating systems do this? I fail to see the innovation.
Where do you live, anyway?
Let's break it down, shall we?
Catholics: Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
Though correct, not accurate. If you think of "literal" in the sense of the fundamentalist way of thinking about things, you're right. Catholics are a bit fuzzier in their thinking than this. The Christian Bible is good for instructions, historically accurate, but must be understood in the light of faith, the mystery of the cross, and tradition. Within this context, Evolution is understood much in the same way that Higher Criticism is (Pius XII). If it's not useful for faith, it's worthless.
Lutherans (all major Synods in America): Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
Episocpals: Do not believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God. Believe in Evolution.
There are VERY conservative branches of both of these Churches. Though, their conservative elements tend not to be Fundamentalist, as in acceptance of the "Fundamentals of Faith", they CAN be just a Biblical literalist as a run of the mill fundamentalist. Though in the States, the Episcopalians have a LARGE liberal faction.
Methodists: Do believe that the entire Bible is the literal word of God, but most do not believe that Evolution contradicts it.
Wrong. Depends on the Methodists and seminary. I think only about 20% of Methodists consider themselves liberal, where the remaining 80% is split 40/40 between the moderates and conservatives. Methodists have a fairly strong Fundamentalist element (as in the dictionary definition of Fundamentalism which includes biblical literalism), though the Higher Critics are tolerated within the church, barely.
Baptists: Mostly believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. Most (not all) Baptist denominations consider Evolution to be contrary to their beliefs.
Along with pretty much anyone else out of the pietist/revivalist/holiness movement do.
I think I hit most of the major ones.
Presbyterians (very similar in make up and belief to methodist), the entire "back to the word of God" non-denominational movement (which is getting quite strong with the youth), all the sub-branches of the holiness movement (AME, Assembly of God).
I think you'd be really surprised by the number of people who are Fundamentalist. You have to understand, most Fundamentalist aren't like the ones on TV. They're "normal", they're your bosses, they run your favorite cafe, they don't go around scaring people and are just as annoyed at the screaming preacher on the corner as you are. Many of them, just don't believe in Evolution, but that's irrelevant, because there are starving people to feed.
I hate to interject reason here.
highly unlikely.
god is omnipotent
This is NOT a necissary constraint for a deity. If we start with the proposition that there is at least one creator deity, that does not necissarily imply omnipotence. This is an invalid assumption.
being ominipotent, the creation, alteration or elimination of any state or states requires zero effort or time.
This does not follow from omnipotence, not expilicitly anyways. The ability to do something does not imply anything about effort, it is merely a statement of what can be accomplished.
given that any action requires zero effort or time, the choice between performing and action and not performing an action for god boils down to only a choice of will or desire, not ability or effort or any other constraint.
thus, action and inaction are, functionally, the same for an omnipotent god.
If you first two postulates necissarily followed from a creator god, you'd have a valid point here.
children starve to death every day.
god does nothing to stop this startvation.
this inaction to prevent said starvation is the same as a direct action to cause it.
deliberately causing children to starve to death is cruel.
god is cruel
Devils advocate time on this one. You forgot step 6.5, from God's point of view, what happens on Earth is neccissary something that is matter of concern for the deity. This matter matter of concern is at the very foundation of good vs. evil. This of it like this are YOU evil for killing ants when you step on them?
Even given omnipotence, which isn't necissary for a creator god, there is no reason to declar that the ability to do something implies the need to do something. This deity could be spending all it's time trying to save another deities eternal existence, or something like that.
For many people it can be reduced to political reasons. It's not Microsoft and it still runs on their hardware and does what they need is what's said. Variations of it not being Microsoft are what you will hear most of the time. Open file formats, immediate access to security problems, meets the needs of developers and techs (web sites, database, server, research), just to name a few.
Personally, I've never understood why the GPL and more dinstinctly Linux is talked about the most when the BSDs often work better for a specific task (if I'm running a server, openbsd, secure by default has it's benifits). Which is why I think it's mostly political reasons (notions of "free" and how the GPL takes care to make sure that OSS is always OSS). In that respect, it's not about quality or needs, but a notion of "freeness".
To me a computer is nothing more than a tool, pick the right one for the job, and you'll be okay. If you want to store files for decades (photos, emails, etc), use open formats. Microsoft has become to represent the embodiment of the prevention of the use of open tools. Hence reducing choice.
"You're saying there is some fundamental difference between "the most primal of neural bundles" and the brain that implements the "intelligence" of ours"
That's exactly what I'm saying. The post I was responding to seemed to be talking up this particular research to the point of claiming it was ground breaking. It's no more ground breaking or a sign of intelligence than the AI in Sim Ant.
"Take this program -- http://www.stanford.edu/~dil/invariance/ -- for example. It's gone largely unnoticed, yet it is concrete proof of a huge breakthrough in computer intelligence."
No, it's not. What this guy is probably doing is a simple cross correlation (CC). If the image is correct, it's added to the dendagram for an eventual multi-reference based CC (with some sort of eigen value comparison or simple CC value comparision).
Scientists do this stuff all the time in order to look at LARGE data sets and make some sense of them. The most primal of neural bundles do the biological equivalent of this all the time, it's not a sign of intelligence.
"I have a period every other day or so when my line goes down mysteriously"
You should get a doctor to check that out.
SCO wanted to adjorn the court so they could file more complaints. The judge says no to both.
10Q is a quartly report.
Samuel Palmisano, the guy wanted to force into deposition, is the CEO of IBM.
I really do wonder how much longer SCO can survive.
Duh, everyone knows only those socialist over in Europe actually do things like this.
It really is disheartening when I run into to people who don't understand the inherent value of cooperation, especially as it applies to legimate government interests. It's american in so far as it expresses the will of the population. So people unfortunately have been convinced that the people don't have the same rights/privledges as the "professions" do. Society has been sectioned off, we consume, they make and how dare we cross that line.
"I use a mac (*), every click is a midle click!"
Funny, but I use middle click in Safari to open a link in a new tab.
"Trust me, scientists cannot format a paper for publishing, don't want to, and shouldn't be required to."
I don't know what "scientists" you've been talking to, you have a wierd view of it all works. I'm a chemist. I've worked in Physics, Physical Biochem, and Physical Chem, all research positions. In all three of those cases, LaTeX was the standard, from formatting your own dissertation to journal submissions.
"Also, how is the author supposed to know how his or her article fits into the journal?"
Um, templates. That's why LaTeX is used. No WYSISYG editors are needed, just output to postscript and send it to your printer for proofing. You'd obviously be surprised at what a physical scientist can do. It's why it's not uncommon for people in my field to leave it and move on to something that pays better. The guy who runs the physical network in my building has a PhD in Biology.
"I seriously doubt you own 40 legit gigs."
While date certainly isn't the plural of anecdote, I'm going to pipe in here. I've been collecting music for 17 years. For the past year I've been encoding my Vinyl (obscure hardcore/punk and old war time jazz), which is about 200 or so albums. Before that I did my tapes (about 100 so). I have approximately 300 CDs. Every single one of those CD and tapes sits in a closet thanks to mp3s. No more need of a complicated stereo to play them on, though I do like playing records.
I'm an exception to the rule, but don't assume people don't have "40 legit gigs". Some of us have more.
" Where does "journalism" stop and "somebody just writing something down" start?"
There is no difference. The amount of money or the amount of people reading a publication is entirely irrelevant to whether or not the publication is a journalistic source. People handing out "zines" on a street corner are only different in terms of quality than those of larger media outlets. Laws that grant corporations privileges should also also apply to the lone citizen voice, or there should be no such privileges at all.
In my mind, this case has nothing to do with whether or not Think Secret is a journalistic source, that's merely assumed. It's a question of whether protection of confidential sources applies in the case when one knowning receives trade secrets from that source and publishes them for all to see. We don't need artifical predugeces in this, where somehow, by magic, being a "recognized" corporate entity gives you special protection. Freedom applies to everyone, not just those who has the greater number of resources.
I got on the web when Mosaic was the way to do it. In all that time, I've never bought a single web browser (you could download Netscape for free from their site, yet it was sold in the store). I've never bought a plugin. I've always considered web browsers free. I think most people see the web that way. I don't see how these guys are going to make a profit.
Anything they come up with for Firefox will be copied by the OSS community and offered as a free download.
Good luck