Yup the showers are the best. I often say I only really think in the showers (ten minutes of deep thought a day is better than none). I have even suggested putting showers into a workplace (only half-jokingly).
It's the pressure points: like massage or acupuncture. And the running water.
I use the following gage: if 80% of the software will cost (time + money) 1 unit, 90% will cost 2 units, 95% will cost 4 units, etc.
So mister decision-maker, the age-old question: do you want more later/costlier or less now/cheaper?
The fact is that good-enough software is often quite good (especially because the specifications process is so poor in almost any user-focused product that one can waste alot of time making a feature no one actually wanted). This is no slight on the programmers themselves - you CAN be a good programmer and deliver less than perfect s/w because after all you are only human and do like going home in time for dinner.
If the earth could support 12 billion people in 1900 why did it only support 1 billion? You may say it was 'social and political' reasons, but I ask for you to outline how we can change our society or politics.
Please note that agricultural collectivization has proven itself quite insufficient as the massive famines/killings in the Soviet Union in the 30's and China during the Cultural Revolution show. It's not that there were major natural disasters, these famines were caused by societal forces themselves, Stalin and then Mao wanted the rural population to feed the entire country AND for there to be no market economy; but farmers refused to work extra so that their excess food could be stolen and given to the urban populations. The peasentry actually burned their food and killed their livestock instead of having it be taken away by the governments' agents.
Frankly, I think you could have a society without the profit/status motive, without laziness, with unbounded altrusism, but this wouldn't be a homo sapiens society. We could gentically engineer such a people, but it would take technology to do so.
I know little of Australia (except that its population is even more urban/surburban than the US's is), but North America had at most 10 million people in 1500. Today it has 300 million and is one of the major net exporters of food in the world (heck, we pay farmers not to grow more). You could say that if the 10 million people in 1500 had been given the chance they could have grown to 300 in the last 500 years; but this is not true since populations are extremely efficient at filling out their environments to the best of their ability - the Native Americans had hundreds of generations to fill up the New World and they got to 10 million because that's all their technology could do.
I don't have the numbers on hand, but exactly the same thing happened in Australia since 1780, no?
And yes, one of the reasons is massive deforestation (esecially in the East US), but technology is what is making the forests come back (at 0.2% a year in the US, not too shabby, over the last 50 years), because less arable land is needed.
I hope you guys don't think I'm moralizing. I haven't quite decided whether North America is 'better' or worse with 300 million people or 10. Or the earth, with 6 billion now and 10 billion people in 50 (or is it 100) years.
(Completely off-topic: the Amish seem to make really good blueberry muffins. I have one or two a week as I walk to work here in Manhattan. All natural ingredients, of course. Nice and mushy. If you want one, hurry up; blueberry season is winding down (only a couple generations removed from peasant stock, I do know something about the land). Not off-topic: they use modern technology to get them to me, just like all the other vendors.)
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Just noting.
Only one real way to know if you got enough sleep: don't set the alarm. I have one but only use it for early morning travel needs (air/train).
It's the pressure points: like massage or acupuncture. And the running water.
I use the following gage: if 80% of the software will cost (time + money) 1 unit, 90% will cost 2 units, 95% will cost 4 units, etc.
So mister decision-maker, the age-old question: do you want more later/costlier or less now/cheaper?
The fact is that good-enough software is often quite good (especially because the specifications process is so poor in almost any user-focused product that one can waste alot of time making a feature no one actually wanted). This is no slight on the programmers themselves - you CAN be a good programmer and deliver less than perfect s/w because after all you are only human and do like going home in time for dinner.
Please note that agricultural collectivization has proven itself quite insufficient as the massive famines/killings in the Soviet Union in the 30's and China during the Cultural Revolution show. It's not that there were major natural disasters, these famines were caused by societal forces themselves, Stalin and then Mao wanted the rural population to feed the entire country AND for there to be no market economy; but farmers refused to work extra so that their excess food could be stolen and given to the urban populations. The peasentry actually burned their food and killed their livestock instead of having it be taken away by the governments' agents.
Frankly, I think you could have a society without the profit/status motive, without laziness, with unbounded altrusism, but this wouldn't be a homo sapiens society. We could gentically engineer such a people, but it would take technology to do so.
I know little of Australia (except that its population is even more urban/surburban than the US's is), but North America had at most 10 million people in 1500. Today it has 300 million and is one of the major net exporters of food in the world (heck, we pay farmers not to grow more). You could say that if the 10 million people in 1500 had been given the chance they could have grown to 300 in the last 500 years; but this is not true since populations are extremely efficient at filling out their environments to the best of their ability - the Native Americans had hundreds of generations to fill up the New World and they got to 10 million because that's all their technology could do. I don't have the numbers on hand, but exactly the same thing happened in Australia since 1780, no?
And yes, one of the reasons is massive deforestation (esecially in the East US), but technology is what is making the forests come back (at 0.2% a year in the US, not too shabby, over the last 50 years), because less arable land is needed.
I hope you guys don't think I'm moralizing. I haven't quite decided whether North America is 'better' or worse with 300 million people or 10. Or the earth, with 6 billion now and 10 billion people in 50 (or is it 100) years.
(Completely off-topic: the Amish seem to make really good blueberry muffins. I have one or two a week as I walk to work here in Manhattan. All natural ingredients, of course. Nice and mushy. If you want one, hurry up; blueberry season is winding down (only a couple generations removed from peasant stock, I do know something about the land). Not off-topic: they use modern technology to get them to me, just like all the other vendors.)