...it's economics. Getting a pig heart (actually, heart valves, but why quibble) is a lot cheaper and easier than getting a chimpanzee heart, and it works well enough that it's not worth the extra cost to go with something closer, genetically.
This particular experiment was found to have some serious flaws in assumption, and as such is now widely disregarded by most, even most evolutionary biologists. The reason it hasn't been redone is mostly that nobody has enough proof of what conditions were like back then to run the experiment again while avoiding the same flaws.
> I have clearly stated I don't want religious beliefs being forced on anyone.
I hate to be a punk about this, but if this is true then why are you insisting on intelligent design being put forward in public school? I've frankly never encountered ID in a non-Christian setting, and that's a very telling point. If you truly don't want to put forward a particular religious belief, then why is it that nobody in the ID camp makes any realistic effort to separate it from Christian dogma?
The problem is that ID isn't science in any real use of the term. It's philosophy. It has its place in learning, like any other philosophy, but it doesn't belong in a science class because it's philosophy. More importantly, science classes being used to teach the "best of" theory AS DEFINED BY THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD (emphasis added to intercept those who would argue on the basis of philosophy) is not inappropriate.
> But never forget that at some point in history, science was absolutely sure the Earth was the center of the universe. Later, science was absolutely sure time and space were absolute. After that, science was absolutely sure everything propagated through "luminiferous aether." Throughout history, science at any given point has been sure it knew it all, and routinely it's been proven otherwise.
Not only is this conclusion wrong, the analysis is wrong. Firstly, very few scientists have ever thought they "knew it all" or why would they bother pursuing science further? More to the point, though, is that every time science proves to be wrong, it's proven wrong by the very people who profess to science, and although stubbornness does rear its head often, in the face of growing evidence even the most hard-core scientists will eventually say, "my bad" and adopt the new theory. There's painfully little of that going on in Christianity, and most often the tenets that have been "disproven" (the "Earth as center of the universe" thing was a Christian philosophy, by the way, disproven by observational science, so may not be a good example for you to use) the disproof comes from science. In this way, "science" as you use it is much better at self-correcting than you give it credit for.
I hate to stick my nose in this particular debate here, but there's a definition flaw here. "Theorem" and "theory" are not synonyms. Theorem translates in this dabate more closely to "law" than "theory".
> But when you look at more modern computers, you see that floppies are truly useless.
This is a bit limited. Sure, it's useless for two new machines, but every new machine I build, for myself or for clients, has a floppy drive because they're still around. If I get a machine with no floppy drive, I can't get data off of old floppies when a customer's dinosaur system crashes and that's their backup medium. If I build one for a client, they can't move data from the old machines they have around the office to the new machine easily. In ten years, you'll be right, but as long as there's a mix of new and old hardware in the field, it's just so much easier to install an FDD and be done with the trouble.
Although Dun Malg answered part of my question, the other half is that you're the one broadcasting the signal, and asking me to ask directly of a human for permission to use a signal that requests that I use it is about the same as saying that I don't have a right to watch a television broadcast until I call the station and ask a person there if I can do it. Your signal comes to my property and asks me to connect to it. I say, "OK, am I permitted?" and your WAP says, "Sure." Just because you don't consider that a grant of permission doesn't change the fact that most people do.
> A connection may be wide open, but I question whether that amounts to giving blanket permission to the anonymous public to use it; just as leaving a door unlocked does not grant permission to enter. In my view, an open connection does not constitute legal permission to use it.
Again, you're arguing a point that doesn't directly apply. In this case, it's not an open door, it's a connection that's transmitted into my private property that trumps my own signal, and actively announces its presence, and actively requests that people connect to it. To bring it back to your "open door" example, that's like sending someone to my front door telling me your door is open, and asking me if I'd like to come in. That's why it's not as clear as your example suggests. As for your other examples, spam isn't a good example because it's sent to you without your request, where an open WAP actively solicits connections. Viruses and network attacks specifically try to break into something that isn't directly allowing or requesting entry, so again, it's not applicable.
Let me say it again, because you seem to have an incomplete grasp on what an unsecured WAP does: your unsecured WAP transmits off your private property, and the signal it transmits says specifically, "I'm here, do you want access?"
> Yes, because you haven't asked the owner and the owner has not granted permission.
This is flatly incorrect. When I turn on a laptop with a wireless card, the card senses the WAP and requests permission to connect. The WAP confirms that the connection is allowed, and the two begin communicating. The owner of the WAP has indeed granted permission to connect. It's unreasonable to demand that I assume that permission was inadvertent.
> Specifically, arguments that it is the responsibility of the owner of the wireless hardware to block unwanted use is tantamount to arguing that, because we own the locks, anyone who enters through an unlocked door is not trespassing.
This is that part that's inaccurate. One cannot connect to a WAP without the WAP's specific permission. Even in the default, fully open state, every access connection is a request, and every request is granted. Your argument fails because the true analogy is that you leave a door open with a person sitting next to it, and that person invites anyone who asks to go inside. If you did that at your house, you'd have a hard time convincing anyone that someone who came in was trespassing.
> The issue should be seen from the other point of view: That any use of the wireless connection without the permission of the connection's owner is impermissible.
If your WAP is unsecured, I specifically do have permission. It's granted by the WAP itself. Is it my problem that your WAP is granting permission to connect when you don't want it to? Is it reasonable to demand that I seek further verification when your WAP grants me permission?
> The best solution to all of this is via innovative technology that would allow a wireless connection to identify the specific pieces of hadware allowed to interact with it, and to reject all others.
Securing the WAP with the built-in tools does this. It's also this step that you earlier said should be unnecessary. Which side are you on, again?
> Can someone please post some more analogies? Perhaps something involving a duck and a landmine.
Well, it's like this. If you were walking in a public park, and you stepped on a landmine, would it be a crime if I duck as your dismembered head flew through my personal space? Of course not.
> Am I the only one that thinks it would be cooler to own the "around the world" mileage sign post used throughout the M*A*S*H television series than any of the Star Wars stuff?
It went the way of all ephemera. Remember in the final episode, when everyone went up to it and pulled off their sign to take home? That was the real prop, so you'd just be buying a post.
> From my perspective, a crime that is sexually motivated indicates a much deeper psychological problem in the individual than does a simple robbery or similar crime.
How about arson? Or murder? Or kidnapping? Or assault? Or any of a thousand other crimes that don't always relate to money?
You sound like someone whose hang-ups about sex are clouding your view of the world.
> The question is: Would you be comfortable with having a person who has been convicted of raping five small girls - who has served his sentence - living next door to you and your 8 year old daughter?
Would you be comfortable living next to someone who beat up people for money on five different occasions, and knifed someone during one of the robberies - who has served his sentence - living next to you and your 8 year old daughter? If you are, why have a sex offender registry and not a registry for violent robbery? What does the list solve if it doesn't include everyone who might be a threat? It's a feel-good tactic with no real life purpose other than to convince people they're safer, even though they aren't.
> On a side note, I would love to be molested by a female sex offender.
She's 57 years old, and patently unattractive. She's your supervisor, and tells you that if you don't go to a hotel room with her at lunch, she'll say you screwed up something important at work and you'll be fired. Still thinking you'd love it?
> As far as I am aware, punishment as a deterent has failed to put an end to crime for at least 2000 years now.
I dislike this analysis, since it requires "all or nothing" thinking. The fact that punishment hasn't ended crime does not address the concept that punishment has reduced crime. "Deterrent" is not equal to "preventative" and therefore the fact that deterrents aren't preventatives cannot be used to decry deterrents entirely.
> Let the human rights orgs flame me, but can't we just cut their b**** so it'll be physically impossible for them to do it again?
Ineffective and irreversible, are two reasons. First, removing a man's sex organs doesn't prohibit abuse. One doesn't need a penis to perform oral sex on a boy, or make one's niece pose for pornographic photos. Second, what would you remove in the case of a female offender? Sure, it's relatively rare, but it happens. Third, what if it's discovered that the convict didn't commit the crime after all? He can always be released from prison, but what do you do if you've castrated the wrong fellow?
You need to do better than this. It satisfies vengeance, but it's not much for justice, nor prevention.
> And how do you think the victem feels 10, 20, 30 years later?
As I stated to someone else, being caught urinating in public earns one a "sex offender" tag in the state of Florida. Care to address that situation in terms of the victim, assuming that's not the bum you may have accidentally peed on?
> Probably better than the kid I traumatized by that act..
Community notification laws affect all sex offenders, and there's a fairly broad definition for that classification. As stated by at least one poster above, getting caught urinating in a public place will get you labelled a "sex offender" in Florida. Now, which kid was traumatized by that act, exactly? Keep in mind that the notification doesn't specify the crime for which you're tagged, just that you are a sex offender. Thirty years from now, how'd you like to face down an employer who won't hire you because of that tag, by trying to say, "Hey, I just peed on a dumpster! It's not like I'm a child rapist!" Since you yourself seem to assume that "sex offender" equates with "child molester", don't you think it's likely that others might as well?
> There is definitely a gray area in there. At the age of 20, how many of you never checked out a high school chick? How many of you never checked out a 16 year old? I'm guessing somewhere around 1% or 2%... There are some VERY well developed 15 and 16 year olds out there that look like they're 18 or 19. When you're 20, jumping down 2 or so years is not a stretch. However, by time you hit 25, you should have grown out of that. Is it right that a 20 year old who has sex with a 16 year old should be GPS-tracked for the rest of their life? Hardly. Now, if that 20 year old went for a 12 year old or something, fine...
Funny you add that last sentence. TFA is discussing such measures for those who are convicted of crimes involving the under-12 set. RTFA.
> All cops carry the readers, and can stop anyone with a gun and check it. In fact, if it's RFID they might not have to even stop you. Just if you seem to be carrying one and their reader doesn't trigger, they stop you. Sure, it's easy to remove the tag - but if you do, as soon as you walk by a policeman you're going to get stopped. This would mean most criminals who did remove the tags would be arrested before they used their untraceable guns.
OK, I have my de-chipped gun in my holster, and I have the ID chip screwed down under the handgrip. Any officer who checks the gun or walks by gets an ID. When I'm ready to walk into the convenience store, one minute in my car with a screwdriver to remove it and pliers to destroy it and my gun is untraceable. Like he said, all the tag does is make the criminals step up a bit.
> No, what we need to do is mandate that a tracking device with a lifetime battery be implanted in a child at birth and removed at age 18. When a child goes missing, five minutes later, the police converge, shoot the person who kidnapped the kid, and the kid arrives home alive, rather than in a body bag dragged from the mud of some swamp in Florida.
The vast majority of kids who are molested are molested by someone they know. More than half are molested by a relative. You propose to tag all kids against the possibility of saving a tiny number of those who are kidnapped by strangers. Here's a few questions about your vaunted idea.
1.) The implantation of the device causes a fatal infection in a child. Who's responsible?
2.) The parents don't want the device implanted for religious reasons. How does this law handle such problems?
3.) Someone wants to hurt your child directly, not kindap him/her. What can be done in the case where the criminal isn't interested in kidnapping the child, but instead in doing him or her direct harm? In arguing that the signal could be encrypted or otherwise protected, can you predict that the device that's going to be inserted into your child today will never be compromised in the 18 years it'll be in place?
4.) Someone works out a method of damaging or disabling the device, or it fails early. Again, do you propose that nobody will figure this out in 18 years, or that new technology won't come around that allows it? How will authorities respond to a child who's "off the grid"? Will they be able to help you if they can't locate your child by GPS? Will you or your child face charges if the device doesn't work, and if it fails because of a defect, how will you defend yourself against such charges? If the device fails early, will your now-13-year-old child be required to go in for surgery to replace it, and who pays for that surgery and for any possible complications? What will prevent kids from disabling it themselves, or for their friends? Will the existence of such a device lead to a situation where someone will rely on it only to find they've lost their child because they weren't vigilant enough, figuring they'd be able to dial in the kid whenever they want? If a kidnapper puts the child in a basement, how will a GPS device realistically help?
In short, your idea is to subject children to a complete removal of personal privacy and expose them to a wide range of dangers to protect them from the very unlikely circumstance that they'll be kidnapped and held by someone who's dumb enough not to be able to prevent a GPS device from allowing police to track them. That's pathetic in the extreme. Try again, and for the sake of the chidren, try harder.
Actual evidence refutes this statement. In fact, child molesters have a significantly lower rate of recidivism than any other crime for which recidivism statstics are kept. Maybe you need to do your homework before you discuss what you've forgotten (or didn't know).
I suspect that, like most people, you think that child molesters are usually strangers who score child after child that they pick out of a crowd because they're serial rapists. In reality, the vast majority of child molesters are relatives, and unless there's a sibling or nephew/niece around, they molest a single victim. Just a small amount of real research will inform you quite well enough to correct your bad assumptions, and then you can begin to address what will really prevent child sex abuse, instead of talking about things you apparently don't understand.
> Actually, civilization itself introduces problems with evolution.
Not at all. It simply moves the effect of natural selection around. When civilization doesn't exist, evolution tends to favor physical survival traits. When it does exist, evolution tends to favor intellectual traits.
> Sure, more people give rise to more offspring, but traits that would have terminated certain genetic lineage in the abscence of modern medicine, for example, are allowed to continue and extend into future generations. So, instead of evolution being dominated by survival of the fittest (engendering "best of breed" traits), at best, civilization takes the scatter-gun approach... engender every combination of traits, even bad ones, and let them all continue. It adds to diversity but at such a cost...
The effect isn't realistically a cost, because higher intelligence tends to create problem-solvers. Physical traits that would once have resulted in certain death for a family are suddenly conditions to be fixed or mitigated. Because civilization exists, we see the use in solving problems that we wouldn't otherwise bother with (curing cancer isn't so important when half your tribe can't get sufficient food), and in solving those problems we advance the state of our entire species. Therefore, the diversity that is lent by civilization is beneficial to the continuation of the species, which is what adaptability is all about.
> Why can't they have their cake and eat it too? E.g. shoot you in the back right after you start running, and then stop and pick up the money. It's not as if both you and the money are running in opposite directions and they have to choose between them...
The idea is that most thieves don't want your life, just your cash. If you drop the cash and back away, the thief will just collect the cash and beat it. They won't shoot you to stop you, because they don't want to shoot you (if they did, they wouldn't bother with a holdup, they'd just plug you and rifle your pockets). However, this theory has a down side, in that if you're facing someone with a firearm, you don't want to startle them. In that case, drop the cash and back away slowly, and don't worry about the money. Leaving with your health and an empty wallet is better by far than getting shot at.
Slashdot Mirror
...it's economics. Getting a pig heart (actually, heart valves, but why quibble) is a lot cheaper and easier than getting a chimpanzee heart, and it works well enough that it's not worth the extra cost to go with something closer, genetically.
Virg
This particular experiment was found to have some serious flaws in assumption, and as such is now widely disregarded by most, even most evolutionary biologists. The reason it hasn't been redone is mostly that nobody has enough proof of what conditions were like back then to run the experiment again while avoiding the same flaws.
Virg
> I have clearly stated I don't want religious beliefs being forced on anyone.
I hate to be a punk about this, but if this is true then why are you insisting on intelligent design being put forward in public school? I've frankly never encountered ID in a non-Christian setting, and that's a very telling point. If you truly don't want to put forward a particular religious belief, then why is it that nobody in the ID camp makes any realistic effort to separate it from Christian dogma?
The problem is that ID isn't science in any real use of the term. It's philosophy. It has its place in learning, like any other philosophy, but it doesn't belong in a science class because it's philosophy. More importantly, science classes being used to teach the "best of" theory AS DEFINED BY THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD (emphasis added to intercept those who would argue on the basis of philosophy) is not inappropriate.
> But never forget that at some point in history, science was absolutely sure the Earth was the center of the universe. Later, science was absolutely sure time and space were absolute. After that, science was absolutely sure everything propagated through "luminiferous aether." Throughout history, science at any given point has been sure it knew it all, and routinely it's been proven otherwise.
Not only is this conclusion wrong, the analysis is wrong. Firstly, very few scientists have ever thought they "knew it all" or why would they bother pursuing science further? More to the point, though, is that every time science proves to be wrong, it's proven wrong by the very people who profess to science, and although stubbornness does rear its head often, in the face of growing evidence even the most hard-core scientists will eventually say, "my bad" and adopt the new theory. There's painfully little of that going on in Christianity, and most often the tenets that have been "disproven" (the "Earth as center of the universe" thing was a Christian philosophy, by the way, disproven by observational science, so may not be a good example for you to use) the disproof comes from science. In this way, "science" as you use it is much better at self-correcting than you give it credit for.
Virg
I hate to stick my nose in this particular debate here, but there's a definition flaw here. "Theorem" and "theory" are not synonyms. Theorem translates in this dabate more closely to "law" than "theory".
Virg
No, he's saying that the current administration does not consider the law to be more important than profit.
Virg
> But when you look at more modern computers, you see that floppies are truly useless.
This is a bit limited. Sure, it's useless for two new machines, but every new machine I build, for myself or for clients, has a floppy drive because they're still around. If I get a machine with no floppy drive, I can't get data off of old floppies when a customer's dinosaur system crashes and that's their backup medium. If I build one for a client, they can't move data from the old machines they have around the office to the new machine easily. In ten years, you'll be right, but as long as there's a mix of new and old hardware in the field, it's just so much easier to install an FDD and be done with the trouble.
Virg
Although Dun Malg answered part of my question, the other half is that you're the one broadcasting the signal, and asking me to ask directly of a human for permission to use a signal that requests that I use it is about the same as saying that I don't have a right to watch a television broadcast until I call the station and ask a person there if I can do it. Your signal comes to my property and asks me to connect to it. I say, "OK, am I permitted?" and your WAP says, "Sure." Just because you don't consider that a grant of permission doesn't change the fact that most people do.
Virg
> A connection may be wide open, but I question whether that amounts to giving blanket permission to the anonymous public to use it; just as leaving a door unlocked does not grant permission to enter. In my view, an open connection does not constitute legal permission to use it.
Again, you're arguing a point that doesn't directly apply. In this case, it's not an open door, it's a connection that's transmitted into my private property that trumps my own signal, and actively announces its presence, and actively requests that people connect to it. To bring it back to your "open door" example, that's like sending someone to my front door telling me your door is open, and asking me if I'd like to come in. That's why it's not as clear as your example suggests. As for your other examples, spam isn't a good example because it's sent to you without your request, where an open WAP actively solicits connections. Viruses and network attacks specifically try to break into something that isn't directly allowing or requesting entry, so again, it's not applicable.
Let me say it again, because you seem to have an incomplete grasp on what an unsecured WAP does: your unsecured WAP transmits off your private property, and the signal it transmits says specifically, "I'm here, do you want access?"
> Yes, because you haven't asked the owner and the owner has not granted permission.
This is flatly incorrect. When I turn on a laptop with a wireless card, the card senses the WAP and requests permission to connect. The WAP confirms that the connection is allowed, and the two begin communicating. The owner of the WAP has indeed granted permission to connect. It's unreasonable to demand that I assume that permission was inadvertent.
Virg
> Specifically, arguments that it is the responsibility of the owner of the wireless hardware to block unwanted use is tantamount to arguing that, because we own the locks, anyone who enters through an unlocked door is not trespassing.
This is that part that's inaccurate. One cannot connect to a WAP without the WAP's specific permission. Even in the default, fully open state, every access connection is a request, and every request is granted. Your argument fails because the true analogy is that you leave a door open with a person sitting next to it, and that person invites anyone who asks to go inside. If you did that at your house, you'd have a hard time convincing anyone that someone who came in was trespassing.
> The issue should be seen from the other point of view: That any use of the wireless connection without the permission of the connection's owner is impermissible.
If your WAP is unsecured, I specifically do have permission. It's granted by the WAP itself. Is it my problem that your WAP is granting permission to connect when you don't want it to? Is it reasonable to demand that I seek further verification when your WAP grants me permission?
> The best solution to all of this is via innovative technology that would allow a wireless connection to identify the specific pieces of hadware allowed to interact with it, and to reject all others.
Securing the WAP with the built-in tools does this. It's also this step that you earlier said should be unnecessary. Which side are you on, again?
Virg
> Can someone please post some more analogies? Perhaps something involving a duck and a landmine.
Well, it's like this. If you were walking in a public park, and you stepped on a landmine, would it be a crime if I duck as your dismembered head flew through my personal space? Of course not.
See, it's just like that.
Virg
> Am I the only one that thinks it would be cooler to own the "around the world" mileage sign post used throughout the M*A*S*H television series than any of the Star Wars stuff?
It went the way of all ephemera. Remember in the final episode, when everyone went up to it and pulled off their sign to take home? That was the real prop, so you'd just be buying a post.
Sorry.
Virg
> From my perspective, a crime that is sexually motivated indicates a much deeper psychological problem in the individual than does a simple robbery or similar crime.
How about arson? Or murder? Or kidnapping? Or assault? Or any of a thousand other crimes that don't always relate to money?
You sound like someone whose hang-ups about sex are clouding your view of the world.
> I am not a psychologist or psychiatrist.
That's painfully obvious.
Virg
> The question is: Would you be comfortable with having a person who has been convicted of raping five small girls - who has served his sentence - living next door to you and your 8 year old daughter?
Would you be comfortable living next to someone who beat up people for money on five different occasions, and knifed someone during one of the robberies - who has served his sentence - living next to you and your 8 year old daughter? If you are, why have a sex offender registry and not a registry for violent robbery? What does the list solve if it doesn't include everyone who might be a threat? It's a feel-good tactic with no real life purpose other than to convince people they're safer, even though they aren't.
Virg
> On a side note, I would love to be molested by a female sex offender.
She's 57 years old, and patently unattractive. She's your supervisor, and tells you that if you don't go to a hotel room with her at lunch, she'll say you screwed up something important at work and you'll be fired. Still thinking you'd love it?
Virg
> As far as I am aware, punishment as a deterent has failed to put an end to crime for at least 2000 years now.
I dislike this analysis, since it requires "all or nothing" thinking. The fact that punishment hasn't ended crime does not address the concept that punishment has reduced crime. "Deterrent" is not equal to "preventative" and therefore the fact that deterrents aren't preventatives cannot be used to decry deterrents entirely.
Virg
> Let the human rights orgs flame me, but can't we just cut their b**** so it'll be physically impossible for them to do it again?
Ineffective and irreversible, are two reasons. First, removing a man's sex organs doesn't prohibit abuse. One doesn't need a penis to perform oral sex on a boy, or make one's niece pose for pornographic photos. Second, what would you remove in the case of a female offender? Sure, it's relatively rare, but it happens. Third, what if it's discovered that the convict didn't commit the crime after all? He can always be released from prison, but what do you do if you've castrated the wrong fellow?
You need to do better than this. It satisfies vengeance, but it's not much for justice, nor prevention.
Virg
> And how do you think the victem feels 10, 20, 30 years later?
As I stated to someone else, being caught urinating in public earns one a "sex offender" tag in the state of Florida. Care to address that situation in terms of the victim, assuming that's not the bum you may have accidentally peed on?
Virg
> Probably better than the kid I traumatized by that act..
Community notification laws affect all sex offenders, and there's a fairly broad definition for that classification. As stated by at least one poster above, getting caught urinating in a public place will get you labelled a "sex offender" in Florida. Now, which kid was traumatized by that act, exactly? Keep in mind that the notification doesn't specify the crime for which you're tagged, just that you are a sex offender. Thirty years from now, how'd you like to face down an employer who won't hire you because of that tag, by trying to say, "Hey, I just peed on a dumpster! It's not like I'm a child rapist!" Since you yourself seem to assume that "sex offender" equates with "child molester", don't you think it's likely that others might as well?
Virg
> I wonder how many people in Florida would fall under the GPS tracking law for similar, relatively harmless reasons?
None. RTFA. The law addresses tracking for offenders convicted of sexual relations with minors under age 12, not all "sex offenders".
Virg
> There is definitely a gray area in there. At the age of 20, how many of you never checked out a high school chick? How many of you never checked out a 16 year old? I'm guessing somewhere around 1% or 2% ... There are some VERY well developed 15 and 16 year olds out there that look like they're 18 or 19. When you're 20, jumping down 2 or so years is not a stretch. However, by time you hit 25, you should have grown out of that. Is it right that a 20 year old who has sex with a 16 year old should be GPS-tracked for the rest of their life? Hardly. Now, if that 20 year old went for a 12 year old or something, fine ...
Funny you add that last sentence. TFA is discussing such measures for those who are convicted of crimes involving the under-12 set. RTFA.
> All cops carry the readers, and can stop anyone with a gun and check it. In fact, if it's RFID they might not have to even stop you. Just if you seem to be carrying one and their reader doesn't trigger, they stop you. Sure, it's easy to remove the tag - but if you do, as soon as you walk by a policeman you're going to get stopped. This would mean most criminals who did remove the tags would be arrested before they used their untraceable guns.
OK, I have my de-chipped gun in my holster, and I have the ID chip screwed down under the handgrip. Any officer who checks the gun or walks by gets an ID. When I'm ready to walk into the convenience store, one minute in my car with a screwdriver to remove it and pliers to destroy it and my gun is untraceable. Like he said, all the tag does is make the criminals step up a bit.
Virg
> No, what we need to do is mandate that a tracking device with a lifetime battery be implanted in a child at birth and removed at age 18. When a child goes missing, five minutes later, the police converge, shoot the person who kidnapped the kid, and the kid arrives home alive, rather than in a body bag dragged from the mud of some swamp in Florida.
The vast majority of kids who are molested are molested by someone they know. More than half are molested by a relative. You propose to tag all kids against the possibility of saving a tiny number of those who are kidnapped by strangers. Here's a few questions about your vaunted idea.
1.) The implantation of the device causes a fatal infection in a child. Who's responsible?
2.) The parents don't want the device implanted for religious reasons. How does this law handle such problems?
3.) Someone wants to hurt your child directly, not kindap him/her. What can be done in the case where the criminal isn't interested in kidnapping the child, but instead in doing him or her direct harm? In arguing that the signal could be encrypted or otherwise protected, can you predict that the device that's going to be inserted into your child today will never be compromised in the 18 years it'll be in place?
4.) Someone works out a method of damaging or disabling the device, or it fails early. Again, do you propose that nobody will figure this out in 18 years, or that new technology won't come around that allows it? How will authorities respond to a child who's "off the grid"? Will they be able to help you if they can't locate your child by GPS? Will you or your child face charges if the device doesn't work, and if it fails because of a defect, how will you defend yourself against such charges? If the device fails early, will your now-13-year-old child be required to go in for surgery to replace it, and who pays for that surgery and for any possible complications? What will prevent kids from disabling it themselves, or for their friends? Will the existence of such a device lead to a situation where someone will rely on it only to find they've lost their child because they weren't vigilant enough, figuring they'd be able to dial in the kid whenever they want? If a kidnapper puts the child in a basement, how will a GPS device realistically help?
In short, your idea is to subject children to a complete removal of personal privacy and expose them to a wide range of dangers to protect them from the very unlikely circumstance that they'll be kidnapped and held by someone who's dumb enough not to be able to prevent a GPS device from allowing police to track them. That's pathetic in the extreme. Try again, and for the sake of the chidren, try harder.
Virg
> Most child molesters cannot be rehabilitated.
Actual evidence refutes this statement. In fact, child molesters have a significantly lower rate of recidivism than any other crime for which recidivism statstics are kept. Maybe you need to do your homework before you discuss what you've forgotten (or didn't know).
I suspect that, like most people, you think that child molesters are usually strangers who score child after child that they pick out of a crowd because they're serial rapists. In reality, the vast majority of child molesters are relatives, and unless there's a sibling or nephew/niece around, they molest a single victim. Just a small amount of real research will inform you quite well enough to correct your bad assumptions, and then you can begin to address what will really prevent child sex abuse, instead of talking about things you apparently don't understand.
> Actually, civilization itself introduces problems with evolution.
Not at all. It simply moves the effect of natural selection around. When civilization doesn't exist, evolution tends to favor physical survival traits. When it does exist, evolution tends to favor intellectual traits.
> Sure, more people give rise to more offspring, but traits that would have terminated certain genetic lineage in the abscence of modern medicine, for example, are allowed to continue and extend into future generations. So, instead of evolution being dominated by survival of the fittest (engendering "best of breed" traits), at best, civilization takes the scatter-gun approach... engender every combination of traits, even bad ones, and let them all continue. It adds to diversity but at such a cost...
The effect isn't realistically a cost, because higher intelligence tends to create problem-solvers. Physical traits that would once have resulted in certain death for a family are suddenly conditions to be fixed or mitigated. Because civilization exists, we see the use in solving problems that we wouldn't otherwise bother with (curing cancer isn't so important when half your tribe can't get sufficient food), and in solving those problems we advance the state of our entire species. Therefore, the diversity that is lent by civilization is beneficial to the continuation of the species, which is what adaptability is all about.
Virg
> Why can't they have their cake and eat it too? E.g. shoot you in the back right after you start running, and then stop and pick up the money. It's not as if both you and the money are running in opposite directions and they have to choose between them...
The idea is that most thieves don't want your life, just your cash. If you drop the cash and back away, the thief will just collect the cash and beat it. They won't shoot you to stop you, because they don't want to shoot you (if they did, they wouldn't bother with a holdup, they'd just plug you and rifle your pockets). However, this theory has a down side, in that if you're facing someone with a firearm, you don't want to startle them. In that case, drop the cash and back away slowly, and don't worry about the money. Leaving with your health and an empty wallet is better by far than getting shot at.
Virg