I hear from many people who identify themselves as Christians. When I think of Christianity, I think of a faith that at its core, promotes charity, tolerance, generousity, love and peace. Thats not what I see on Washington talk shows, where the so-called "Christian" agenda is often used to push for censorship, attack culture and technology, and force a certain kind of moral values on people who dont necessarily want them. Judaism and the Muslim Faith certainly do this as well, at times, but not nearly in so organized and vocal a way.
First, I would have to say that the kind of demagogic nonsense you associate with the religious right is at least as common in the muslim community as it is in the Christian community. Look at Iran sometime.
Secondly, however, I still think your attitude is irresponsible. If you mean the religious right, then say the religious right! As it so happens, I agree with you. But believe it or not, many many Christians don't agree with the religious right's tactics. It is unfair to associate us with them, even by default.
I still can. Like I can be very skeptical about the neo-humanist nonsense that seems to be the norm around here. Do you people realise the degree to which you are just buying into the zeitgeist?
When I was a teenager, I was an atheist. I went through a bout with Eastern mysticisms (which are mostly godless), then settled into an uneasy agnosticism. As I grew older, this agnosticism declined into atheism. I reasoned that, if there was a God, what evidence could ever convince of his existence?
Then I studied physics. The strongest evidence Iknow for God is the nature of the physical universe. It's not rational evidence: it's emotional, because what is important about the order is not it's existence, but its beauty and (most of all) elegance. I found (and find) the cycles of increasingly useful approximations (Aristotle to Newton, Newton to Einstein, Einstein to Quantum) awesome to behold. And cannot conceive how they could be in the abscense of a creating will.
Ultimately, the existence of will is simpler than physics. As such, if there is one thing uncreated, it seems to me that it must be a will, not the myriad laws of physics, in all their elegant complexit.
So, through this rather tortuous and illogical path, I came to believe in a personal God. How I came to believe that Jesus personified him is another story. The point is that my religion does not stand in opposition to my knowledge of physics (I majored in Physics as an undergrad), but is supported by it. I think the whole "reason vs. religion" debate is nothing but a straw man, just waiting for wide-spread good sense to knock it down.
Christianity, in its truest for, is a religion for outcasts. That our society has subverted it into a new-fangled phariseeism (with the Liberal & Mainline denominations playing the part of the Saducees) is irrelevant.
Christ, when he came, spent most of his time hanging around the people that no one else wanted to hang around with. And you know what else? Jesus Loves Geeks.
Some of the church's leaders are going to have some serious answering to do when Jesus returns.
I just have one question for you sir: on average, how successful are marriages that start out by "living together, in a monogamous and trusting relationship" compared to those who get married, then start having sex? Look it up -- you wouldn't believe me if I told you. Also, it's funny how before anyone would have dreamed of "living together", divorce was rare. Sorry, your contention doesn't hold true to fact.
BTW, biblically speaking there is no such thing as sex before marriage.
Yeesh... I totally forgot about that. I have been swamped (due to work, ministry, and my own little corner of the internet -- more on the last later). I will email you later. Besides -- as I recall I explained my views rather thouroughly in a number of really long mail messages:)
That'll show those snooty FreeBaStarDs to look down at us linux users just because they have a better operating system! Woo hoo! World Domination! Yes!
McNealy, you're next!
For the humor impaired: the statements in this post were said in jest, and are not a threat against anything or anyone. If you can't see this, then losen your tie because you are obviously not getting enough blood to your brain.
To many, your articles seem to be very demagogue-like: calculated to arouse ire in what you perceive your audience to be. To what extent are your opinions for real? Do you/really/ consider yourself a geek, or is that just a pose?
You spend a lot of time bashing the religious beliefs of others, but never share your own. Some would argue that this is nobody elses business, but since you consistently choose to denigrate people of faith, I think I have the right to ask:
Look dude. I have seen many, many examples of sex outside of marriage. How on earth could I avoid it in our culture? And I am adequately convinced that it is not a Good Thing. Do you realize that couple having sex before marriage have something like 15 times the divorce rate of abstaining couples? Numbers.
You have to have seen some of the stuff I've seen.
I don't, however, want to see a crusade that involves keeping, say, gay kids from finding Web sites that tell them that they're not Sick, Weird, and All Alone (no, this is not equivalent to introducing them to pedophiles, say...).
Did I suggest banning gay community sites? I challenge you to site an example where I suggested any such thing. While I disagree with the behaviour, I do not propose to forbid them concourse. What you present is a false dichotomy: you suggest that if we ban hard-core porn, we have to ban gay community. That is silly, and is a horrible misrepresentation of the issue.
Umm, there might be a slight selection effect here. How much of your exposure to folks who have had sex outside of heterosexual marriage took place outside "sexual brokenness recovery ministries"? There's more to "sex outside of heterosexual marriage" than Debbie Does Dallas or Marine Studs on Parade.
Let's just say that I have had ample experience with "sex outside of heterosexual marriage" and leave it at that. (I have little desire to bare my soul to you so you can rip it to pieces). And you know what: you are a fool to suggest otherwise. If you think anyone is a lilly white virgin in this world, then boy have I got some people for you to meet. Christianity is a life-boat for sinners, not a bludgeon for saints.
No, but I think you should realize that merely asserting that belief isn't necessarily going to convince people, and that if somebody starts with different axioms, they're going to draw different conclusions, and they may be very unwilling to allow laws based on the conclusions drawn from your axioms to be put into force.
I do recognize that. Bowever, I am deluded enough to think the average person doesn't really want to see people getting shat upon. And if they want their children to, they can produce it themselves. Call me crazy.
So what else is there? Blacklists aren't reliable and are inherently biased. There's no peer review behind blacklists. Using word filters leads to all sorts of trouble, including banning sites with legitimate redeeming content. Plus, I can easily get pornographic images of the most graphic and grotesque nature past a word filter. (Just name it "Tickle Me Elmo" or something and don't have a single sexual reference on the site except for the pictures.) Ratings systems are easy to circumvent. These are the technologies that the current filters run on, and they don't work.
I disagree. I think blacklists can be done in a non-biased fashion. The problem is that we've left it up to commercial entities (who must keep the list secret as it's their whole business) who do it behind closed doors.
The solution is left as a solution for the student. If you care about freedom, then I suggest you consider working on a project to make your own list. I would if I had time, but sadly I don't and must admit that free speech is less important to me than advancing the kingdom of God.
The answer to this issue is that we should talk, openly and freely. We should educate and inform all those involved, both adults and children. Perhaps with that will we begin down the road to sanity on this issue...
The problem with that idea is that, usually, when people mean "talk, openly and freely", they carry an expectation that I should "tolerate" their view. And usually, they don't mean "tolerate", they mean "condone".
Look -- there are some serious moral issues surrounding sexuality. And Christian western culture is not the first culture to have found sexuality to be a moral issue. I happen to believe, with considerable evidence (having been around sexual brokenness recovery ministries quite a bit), that sex outside of heterosexual marriage is damaging to both society and to the people involved in it. And I believe that pornography is in and of itself harmful, because it encourages these activities, and encourages people to live in a 44DD fantasy world. And I would be horribly dishonest if I said otherwise.
Do you seriously think I should suppress my honestly held opinion that pornography is a serious problem because you happen to disagree with me? That is what most people who sound like you expect to be able to talk "openly".
For the record, I do not have a problem with open discussion of sexuality. But in this open discussion, people with convictions about their morality need to be free to express said opinions. Also, I have very little problem with nudity -- and if your first though on seeing the Venus de Milo is how someone could get off her (or Michelangelo's David -- equal opportunity here!), then I think you need help.
Also, I would challenge you to show me how a "logical" morality can lead to anything but nihilism. How would a "logical" morality prevent me from murdering someone if I were convinced that that was my greatest happiness? It's been tried, and it has failed.
These cases you cite are not a problem: there is an existing "redeeming social value" doctrine (set by the supremes in US vs. Ginsburg around 1960 if memory serves) that adequately covers these cases.
Yeah, the fundamentalists are going to lobby to ban all these. The problem is that by leaving it up to netnanny and obsessing with obscure examples (e.g. the canadien documentery) you are forcing fence-sitters who just can't deal with their children seeing defecation as a sexual act into the censorship camp.
Fundamentally, there is a big problem with this argument, along with all the other anti-censorware arguments I have heard. Namely, it completely fails to consider the legitimate concerns of the opposition.
Look at it this way. Let us suppose that you have a twelve year old daughter. Generally speaking, a twelve year old is old enough to walk the block from my house to the library unsupervised -- especially with friends. My twelve year old goes to the library, and tries to access the home page for the whitehouse for a report that she is doing on President Clinton. She goes to some no-name search engine, and types in "white house" -- and promptly gets directed to www.whitehouse.com. A hardcore (whatever that means) porn site.
Now, I would hope that a daughter of mine would say "oops" and go back and look for another site. But given the current resident, a twelve year old girl might suppose that this was the real page:) (Okay, I couldn't resist). She then clicks a couple of links, and is suddenly presented with pictures of people defecating on each other. With page-jacking the high art that it is, this scenario is quite possible. And please remember that the content to which she will likely be exposed would be illegal if done in a public place: have you tried to have sex in the middle of your public library lately?
Now, you say, ah ha! You failed to properly supervise your child! To which I say nonsense. I sent her to a public place, in daylight, accompanied, and she got to see something disgusting. Are you seriously suggesting that I should watch over my children, 24/7, until the day they turn 18, at which point I throw them to the wolves? That would turn me into the kind of ogre you love to portray me as! I would never give my children any freedom or responsibility, for fear they might see something "bad". Of course, my alternative is to expose them to pedophiles. What would you suggest I do? Don't forget that my tax dollars are paying for this.
I'll tell you what I would do, especially if I'm not very bright: I'd demand software to protect my child, or else demand that the internet connection be removed from the library altogether. Which is exactly where we are. The only reason I don't demand this is that I place a higher value on free speech than is probably the average.
As I see it, there are two arguments against censorware:
Censorship, censorship! Horse hockey. Nobody makes libraries carry play-boy. Why should they be force to carry whitehouse.com? What the aussies did might be censorship, although I doubt it. Filters in a public library hardly qualify.
But it censors stuff which shouldn't beThen do better. It's not complicated, just expensive. Spare me the rather sophistical argument about "well... who defines what should be censored". There is a reasonable common sense definition that can be applied and that most people can agree to. One of the key characteristics of it is that the work must have no redeeming social value. Show me a single picture on whitehouse.com that does have redeeming social value and we'll talk.
You're imposing your moral standards on us Darn right I am. But I think you will find that every culture which has maintained a moral standard has had one not too different from mine. Are you seriously suggesting that we should have no moral standards? Or are you seriously suggesting that our society does not have the right to set them? Do you really want to see people having sex on the floor of a public library? What about child molestation? Any NAMBLA members out there? This is where we are going if this argument is taken to it's logical extreme. I am exercising the right I have to promote my moral standard: you can promote yours if you like -- but I do and will continue to think yours (free information at any cost) is wrong.
Let me repeat: I am paying for this material to be in a library. I think the logical alternative to refusing any filtering is for those who object to it to campaign to close the library or never let their children use it. Is that really what you want?
Yeah, that would be what they taught you in high school, wouldn't it? The problem is that, while natural selection seems to be able to provide for incremental improvements within a species, it has not yet been shown to be able to make the kind of massive changes that would promote the existence of so many species.
Things like the eye, blood clotting and so forth would be very unlikely to come about through random chance alone. And the argument that "it can happen if you just give enough time" doesn't jibe with the archeological record -- there have been times in history when new species have popped up left and right. And times, like now, when relatively little innovation was going on. Currently, natural selection alone can't account for this. Which is why many bio types are looking for a better explanation (you can see hints of this debate within some of the posts from people withbio backgrounds).
The fundamental problem is that, as it currently stands, Natural Selection would appear to violate the second law of Thermodynamics (Entropy always increases) -- life requires a great deal of order, and selection for more order is difficult at best..
I don't propose an explanation for these things (no, I'm not a creationist): I just am smart enough to know when I don't know. From everything I've seen, if you can unreservedly affirm any current theory for speciazation, yhen you don't know enough about the field. This guy sounds like a crackpot -- but unless I've read his book, I'm not qualified to an opinion, am I?
As someone who's administered quite a few RS/6000's, let me comment: JFS rocks. I repeat, JFS rocks. I have/never/ seen lost data from it (including hazardous environments with flakey power). It is fast, efficient. Reboots take minutes instead of hours. It works great as a substrate for large database files.
In short, it is very cool. It is much better that the crap Sun gives us by default, and while I don't know much about SGI's XFS, my impression of SGI's has generally been that they suck and are slow.
Time to buy some IBM stock (anyone taking bets on whether IBM swallows redhat?)
Scientists were shocked yesterday at the discovery of two lonely geeks in New Zealand. These geeks, working alone for years, finally explained the existence of ball lightning, thereby removing the last barrier to a new age where geeks will rule the earth.
Religious leaders around the world were knocked on their antiquated rear-ends at the news. Finally, it has been proved beyond a doubt that a phenomenon mistaken by three ignorant peasants in France in the 14th century for the prescence of God was in fact just a ball of silicon! Religious leaders around the world will no longer be able to oppress people with their narrow-minded, antiquated ideas about right and wrong based on these putative sightings of deity.
Dare we hope that this will finally usher in the end of religion? That we can have an age based on stark individualism and rampant materialism? That silicon will finally defeat the oppressors that have held we^H^H (oops -- too grammatical) us geeks down for millenia?
One thing is sure: nothing can ever be the same now that we have explained a rare meterological phenomenon! (Interesting article. BTW, I saw ball lightning once -- no, I didn't think it was God. But it was one of the freakiest things I've ever seen. Let the moderation begin!)
Corel just doesn't get opensource. Am I really the only person posting on this article who sees a problem with Corel forking the Wine project (for that is what they've done)? Granted, under the BSDish license being used by Wine, it's legit: but it seems indicative that COrel are not really on the ball in terms of cooperating with the community.
If they were, they would work as part of the Wine team, and use the Wine teams CVS server. How much time is going to be wasted re-integrating their changes into the existing Wine tree? How much time has been wasted on duplicate bugfixes.
How on earth is this post flamebait? Overrated? Possibly. Redundant? Maybe, but not when I posted it. Flame Bait? Who was I flaming? C'mon -- I challenge you to name someone that I was flaming or encouraging to flame!
The US better get in gear. The fact that Chinese are trying to do this clearly indicates that they see the massive economic advantages awaiting above the stratosphere.
For, as Robert Heinlein put it, "There may not be intelligent life on mars, but I can assure you that there is intelligent life in Beijing".
I have yet to have anyone convince me that there will be any substantial practical advantage to the HURD over Linux in the long term. And we've been waiting for it to arrive for/at least/ 10 years.
I'm open to being convinced - but will need to be convinced.
Before everyone starts talking about domain squatting, I should point out that this guy registered these domains to/protect/ them from half-baked websites. In fact, when he sold linux.com, he did not sell to the highest bidder -- on of the biggest bidders was Microsoft.
I don't think is the same thing that (for exampl) domainbank does. So go easy onhim.
Slashdot Mirror
Secondly, however, I still think your attitude is irresponsible. If you mean the religious right, then say the religious right! As it so happens, I agree with you. But believe it or not, many many Christians don't agree with the religious right's tactics. It is unfair to associate us with them, even by default.
Vagueness is the last refuge of incompetence.
--
Sheep.
--
Then I studied physics. The strongest evidence Iknow for God is the nature of the physical universe. It's not rational evidence: it's emotional, because what is important about the order is not it's existence, but its beauty and (most of all) elegance. I found (and find) the cycles of increasingly useful approximations (Aristotle to Newton, Newton to Einstein, Einstein to Quantum) awesome to behold. And cannot conceive how they could be in the abscense of a creating will.
Ultimately, the existence of will is simpler than physics. As such, if there is one thing uncreated, it seems to me that it must be a will, not the myriad laws of physics, in all their elegant complexit.
So, through this rather tortuous and illogical path, I came to believe in a personal God. How I came to believe that Jesus personified him is another story. The point is that my religion does not stand in opposition to my knowledge of physics (I majored in Physics as an undergrad), but is supported by it. I think the whole "reason vs. religion" debate is nothing but a straw man, just waiting for wide-spread good sense to knock it down.
--
Christianity, as a moral system, is not based in the fear of hell. If you think it is, thenyou know nothing aboutit.
--
Christ, when he came, spent most of his time hanging around the people that no one else wanted to hang around with. And you know what else? Jesus Loves Geeks.
Some of the church's leaders are going to have some serious answering to do when Jesus returns.
--
BTW, biblically speaking there is no such thing as sex before marriage.
--
--
McNealy, you're next!
For the humor impaired: the statements in this post were said in jest, and are not a threat against anything or anyone. If you can't see this, then losen your tie because you are obviously not getting enough blood to your brain.
--
--
--
--
You have to have seen some of the stuff I've seen.
Did I suggest banning gay community sites? I challenge you to site an example where I suggested any such thing. While I disagree with the behaviour, I do not propose to forbid them concourse. What you present is a false dichotomy: you suggest that if we ban hard-core porn, we have to ban gay community. That is silly, and is a horrible misrepresentation of the issue.--
--
The solution is left as a solution for the student. If you care about freedom, then I suggest you consider working on a project to make your own list. I would if I had time, but sadly I don't and must admit that free speech is less important to me than advancing the kingdom of God.
--
Look -- there are some serious moral issues surrounding sexuality. And Christian western culture is not the first culture to have found sexuality to be a moral issue. I happen to believe, with considerable evidence (having been around sexual brokenness recovery ministries quite a bit), that sex outside of heterosexual marriage is damaging to both society and to the people involved in it. And I believe that pornography is in and of itself harmful, because it encourages these activities, and encourages people to live in a 44DD fantasy world. And I would be horribly dishonest if I said otherwise.
Do you seriously think I should suppress my honestly held opinion that pornography is a serious problem because you happen to disagree with me? That is what most people who sound like you expect to be able to talk "openly".
For the record, I do not have a problem with open discussion of sexuality. But in this open discussion, people with convictions about their morality need to be free to express said opinions. Also, I have very little problem with nudity -- and if your first though on seeing the Venus de Milo is how someone could get off her (or Michelangelo's David -- equal opportunity here!), then I think you need help.
Also, I would challenge you to show me how a "logical" morality can lead to anything but nihilism. How would a "logical" morality prevent me from murdering someone if I were convinced that that was my greatest happiness? It's been tried, and it has failed.
--
Yeah, the fundamentalists are going to lobby to ban all these. The problem is that by leaving it up to netnanny and obsessing with obscure examples (e.g. the canadien documentery) you are forcing fence-sitters who just can't deal with their children seeing defecation as a sexual act into the censorship camp.
--
Look at it this way. Let us suppose that you have a twelve year old daughter. Generally speaking, a twelve year old is old enough to walk the block from my house to the library unsupervised -- especially with friends. My twelve year old goes to the library, and tries to access the home page for the whitehouse for a report that she is doing on President Clinton. She goes to some no-name search engine, and types in "white house" -- and promptly gets directed to www.whitehouse.com. A hardcore (whatever that means) porn site.
Now, I would hope that a daughter of mine would say "oops" and go back and look for another site. But given the current resident, a twelve year old girl might suppose that this was the real page :) (Okay, I couldn't resist). She then clicks a couple of links, and is suddenly presented with pictures of people defecating on each other. With page-jacking the high art that it is, this scenario is quite possible. And please remember that the content to which she will likely be exposed would be illegal if done in a public place: have you tried to have sex in the middle of your public library lately?
Now, you say, ah ha! You failed to properly supervise your child! To which I say nonsense. I sent her to a public place, in daylight, accompanied, and she got to see something disgusting. Are you seriously suggesting that I should watch over my children, 24/7, until the day they turn 18, at which point I throw them to the wolves? That would turn me into the kind of ogre you love to portray me as! I would never give my children any freedom or responsibility, for fear they might see something "bad". Of course, my alternative is to expose them to pedophiles. What would you suggest I do? Don't forget that my tax dollars are paying for this.
I'll tell you what I would do, especially if I'm not very bright: I'd demand software to protect my child, or else demand that the internet connection be removed from the library altogether. Which is exactly where we are. The only reason I don't demand this is that I place a higher value on free speech than is probably the average.
As I see it, there are two arguments against censorware:
- Censorship, censorship! Horse hockey. Nobody makes libraries carry play-boy. Why should they be force to carry whitehouse.com? What the aussies did might be censorship, although I doubt it. Filters in a public library hardly qualify.
- But it censors stuff which shouldn't beThen do better. It's not complicated, just expensive. Spare me the rather sophistical argument about "well... who defines what should be censored". There is a reasonable common sense definition that can be applied and that most people can agree to. One of the key characteristics of it is that the work must have no redeeming social value. Show me a single picture on whitehouse.com that does have redeeming social value and we'll talk.
- You're imposing your moral standards on us Darn right I am. But I think you will find that every culture which has maintained a moral standard has had one not too different from mine. Are you seriously suggesting that we should have no moral standards? Or are you seriously suggesting that our society does not have the right to set them? Do you really want to see people having sex on the floor of a public library? What about child molestation? Any NAMBLA members out there? This is where we are going if this argument is taken to it's logical extreme. I am exercising the right I have to promote my moral standard: you can promote yours if you like -- but I do and will continue to think yours (free information at any cost) is wrong.
Let me repeat: I am paying for this material to be in a library. I think the logical alternative to refusing any filtering is for those who object to it to campaign to close the library or never let their children use it. Is that really what you want?--
Things like the eye, blood clotting and so forth would be very unlikely to come about through random chance alone. And the argument that "it can happen if you just give enough time" doesn't jibe with the archeological record -- there have been times in history when new species have popped up left and right. And times, like now, when relatively little innovation was going on. Currently, natural selection alone can't account for this. Which is why many bio types are looking for a better explanation (you can see hints of this debate within some of the posts from people withbio backgrounds).
The fundamental problem is that, as it currently stands, Natural Selection would appear to violate the second law of Thermodynamics (Entropy always increases) -- life requires a great deal of order, and selection for more order is difficult at best..
I don't propose an explanation for these things (no, I'm not a creationist): I just am smart enough to know when I don't know. From everything I've seen, if you can unreservedly affirm any current theory for speciazation, yhen you don't know enough about the field. This guy sounds like a crackpot -- but unless I've read his book, I'm not qualified to an opinion, am I?
In short, it is very cool. It is much better that the crap Sun gives us by default, and while I don't know much about SGI's XFS, my impression of SGI's has generally been that they suck and are slow.
Time to buy some IBM stock (anyone taking bets on whether IBM swallows redhat?)
Religious leaders around the world were knocked on their antiquated rear-ends at the news. Finally, it has been proved beyond a doubt that a phenomenon mistaken by three ignorant peasants in France in the 14th century for the prescence of God was in fact just a ball of silicon! Religious leaders around the world will no longer be able to oppress people with their narrow-minded, antiquated ideas about right and wrong based on these putative sightings of deity.
Dare we hope that this will finally usher in the end of religion? That we can have an age based on stark individualism and rampant materialism? That silicon will finally defeat the oppressors that have held we^H^H (oops -- too grammatical) us geeks down for millenia?
One thing is sure: nothing can ever be the same now that we have explained a rare meterological phenomenon! (Interesting article. BTW, I saw ball lightning once -- no, I didn't think it was God. But it was one of the freakiest things I've ever seen. Let the moderation begin!)
If they were, they would work as part of the Wine team, and use the Wine teams CVS server. How much time is going to be wasted re-integrating their changes into the existing Wine tree? How much time has been wasted on duplicate bugfixes.
*sigh*
For, as Robert Heinlein put it, "There may not be intelligent life on mars, but I can assure you that there is intelligent life in Beijing".
I'm open to being convinced - but will need to be convinced.
I don't think is the same thing that (for exampl) domainbank does. So go easy onhim.