See while you're striving to be unique here, you've also created something vague and unspecific.
The virtual personalities tend to rely on just that sort of language. They make statements that are similar to what you get out of mentalists or fortune tellers. Vague language that can mean anything. The listener/user perceives the message as specific to the conversation because the context of the message is left to the listener to associate. That is the trick in such messages.
You can always tell the difference between such AIs and a human being by the level of specificity in the responses. Anyone with a firm grasp of grammar and a working knowledge of how such systems operate can spot the AIs just about instantly.
So here you are... accusing me of being just such an AI... and yet while you're at it... making these statements.
I provided the link I was referring to every time it was asked for actually.
And as to semi coherent ramblings, I thought we were going to use our own words, no? My ramblings have been quite coherent. They have occasionally be tangential but then forum warriors are seeing if they can get away with stupid rhetorical tricks.
They won't... I am a hardened forum warrior myself. None of those tricks are new to me and none of them are hard for me to counter.
So deal honestly or you'll get the tactical response.
Which is why I restated my position so you weren't confused.
You don't get to define my position. That is a straw man. I define my position. You can ask for me to clarify but you don't have the right to actually put words in my mouth, chum.
Now I feel like are going to try and play more rhetorical games here and I'd like to caution you against trying to do that. I'm aware of most of them and they just serve to irritate me without actually having any chance at gaining traction.
Your best bet is to just deal in good faith with me. Short of that, I will go into game mode myself and I'm quite good at them.
One study can prove something and a thousand studies can fail to prove something. Its all down to the quality of the studies in question.
There is a perverse misunderstanding as to how science works. It is not a democracy.
If one scientist says one thing and 1 million say another which is correct? Answer: Not enough information. We don't know which is right because science is not a democracy. If 100 people agreed that gravity worked one way and another thought it worked another way it wouldn't automatically work the majority way because they a majority.
This confuses science with politics.
So yes. One study CAN prove something just as a thousand can fail to prove anything.
I didn't say you couldn't hypothesize and express opinions. I simply pointed out that your opinions lack evidence and therefore they are just opinions.
For example, if I responded that aliens from mars were actually responsible that would hold about the same weight. An opinion without evidence is an opinion without evidence.
If you want evidence you're going to have to get the data. Your lack of evidence is not my problem or fault. You should know that.
Wait, so you don't have scientifically valid statistics to back up your position and because of that it is my fault?
I'm not blaming you. Its not your fault that these statistics have not be treated properly. But they haven't.
This isn't an opinion. You cannot claim that country A and country B is an apples to apples comparison scientifically. And absent that they don't have value.
You are trying to back up a political position with statistics that do not have scientific value. As such, you might as well just say "I believe this because I believe it". You have no scientific evidence. None.
Until you do, this is just your opinion versus mine.
And it is not my fault that you don't have quality information nor am I obligated to accept garbage.
Now in my experience this where people that don't know how to have a discussion get frustrated and start throwing off insults. If you feel that impulse then that is a sign that you've reached the end of your ability to have a discussion. If I'm in error then please continue. But I suspect after realizing your evidence is invalid we don't really have much to discuss.
Which is why Japan has such a low suicide rate... oh wait.
And suicide is very difficult to statistically equate to anything because different regions have very different suicide rates. The variables and factors cannot be limited to "oh they have guns so they will do it more."
No, I am saying they're different populations and unless you compensate for all those differences they cannot be directly compared.
For example, you could not compare the population in NYC in 2014 with the population of Egypt in 2000 BC.
They're too different. You need to compensate for all those differences if you want to make an apples to apples comparision because it isn't an apples to apples comparison.
Furthermore, you have to compensate for differences in methodology.
A great example of this is infant morality. In the US, infant morality is generally counted as the death of a child starting roughly at birth or shortly there after.
But in most countries that is actually called a miscarrage which means they do not count that as infant morality. As such, US infant morality statistics are higher then they would be if they used the standards in other countries. Or if you prefer, most countries have higher infant moralities if they used the US method of counting the statistic.
Another example would be the definition of unemployment. I think you might actually be aware of this one... you will likely be aware that in the US unemployed does not mean merely that you don't have a job. It means that you HAD a job within the last year or so and haven't been able to find work since. If you've never had a job or have been out of work for longer then a year or are simply not even trying to find work then you're not considered unemployed.
Different countries count all these things differently for different reasons. So when one country says something it MEANS different things because the numbers are added up differently. If you do not compensate for those differences you cannot make an apples to apples comparision.
Statistics. Honestly, about 99 percent of the population is incompetent to actually talk about them at all. No offense. But people don't understand them, don't treat them with sufficient respect, and consequently they more often serve as tools to mislead the ignorant.
This sounds like an insult... it isn't. Truly... almost no one knows how to read statistics. Newspapers get them wrong about 90 percent of the time. They frequently don't grasp even the very simple concepts like Causation and Correlation. Happily most Slashdot people seem to get those but that's just the beginning.
People start quoting statistics like it magically makes their opinions scientific. They forget that to make their opinions scientific they have to treat the data like scientific data at every stage.
If you've ever taken chemistry then you might have a notion of how anal you must be to retain the integrity of statistics. You have to be to take everything into consideration.
Simply looking at stats from country A and then looking at stats from country B... seeing that country A has guns and country B doesn't... and then comparing the crime stats is laughably inadequate.
Almost by definition in that situation you're comparing apples with oranges and then blaming the tough orange skin of the orange on the lack of an apple core. The orange isn't going to have an apple core.
Look... Even comparing stats in the US against the US is dubious. After all there are huge demographic differences in the US. Go to rural America for example and its nearly all white people. The distribution of the sexes is different. Typically much more men to women. Where as in the city it is more women to men on average. Ages are different, cultures are different, politics are different.
What I would look into is what about Chicago makes it violent where as what makes rural Montana peaceful?
Go through it all. Compare all the places in the US that have low crime with those that have high crime.
What factors stand out as predictors of crime.
I think that would give you a better insight into the problem then predetermining that it must be guns and then looking for evidence to prove yourself right.
Actually you don't know that since you cannot compare their rates.
They calculate murder differently then we do. The Japanese for example have made a practice of classifying all unsolved murders as "accidental death".
We see these political treatements of statistics in many countries including the US which renders the statistics very hard to read accurately. Because first you have to compensate for distortions.
If you do not compensate at all then you can't use the statistic at all.
I say you can use the US stats against US stats because they're largely suffering from the same issues and therefore it balances out. But across national lines? Not a chance. You need to compensate or you can't do it at all.
No, you cannot compare statistics between countries without compensating for differences in demographics, culture, economics, and a dozen other things.
So no.
Compare parts of the US to parts of the US if you want to talk about the US statistics. You cannot compare states across national lines with any credibility. I say this as someone that deeply understands both these statistics and their comparative methodologies. They are not equivalent. They are different. And simply assuming you can compare them apples to apples is simply wrong.
Not really. A bigger gun doesn't stop a the smaller gun from having the potential to kill you.
A little old lady with a purse pistol versus a big strong man with a magnum is not the same situation as the little old lady with nothing versus a young man that has his youth, his strength, and his fists.
Guns are an equalizer. A sick old woman can engage a young strong man and have a CHANCE of winning. Without the gun... no chance at all. None.
Zero threat. With a gun... its a gamble. Criminals don't like that.
Are we really going to start trading insults? I'm going to ignore your rudeness this one time but for civility sake, I suggest you do not do it again.
As to your statement, we are talking about gun bans. Therefore you could use the registered gun ownership information held by the government.
Compare gun violence in areas with many registered guns versus areas with few.
That is not estimated or arbitrary.
Furthermore, a statistic based on estimated anything means the statistic itself is estimated. And how are these things estimated? Basically it just means the numbers are made up or guessed at which means they're even more worthless.
Come on.
As to links, I provided a link to the study when someone else asked for it. its in one of the other comments. If you care to look at it then you can do so.
In any case your reaction to my point is not unexpected. I am a heretic. You are a god fearing true believer. And you cry "BURN HIM!"...
And like most of those before you... you are little more then confused by what you do not understand.
I do not say any of this with malice. I do not hate you. It is a human weakness and you are human.
I only hope that at some point in your life you gain enough introspection to realize limiting this behavior is and how much more you could be if only you allowed yourself to see.
Until that time, like the Hawaiians first seeing Captain Cook's ships you won't understand me. You'll think I'm a cloud or a mirage. Neither I nor my argument are incomprehensible. But you won't understand because your mind is closed.
Till the day you are able to listen, I bid you good day with good cheer.:) --- happy face so you know I really do mean it.
Continuing this discussion with you will only prompt you to cast more unfortunately insults. I would rather have neither of us demean ourselves with that behavior. Let us part as gentlemen until such time as we can continue in good faith.
a 3d printed METAL gun... the machine used to make the gun was not cheap. But in 20 years it will be... the plastic guns already work though they are a little unreliable. The metal ones... who could tell the difference?
The banning argument is dead. From the 3d printing alone it is dead. Indifferent to the statistics, the politics, and the ideology.
The people pushing this need to find another topic. This one is over.
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly. Nonsense phrase that sound like they're a response but are really just garbage.
See while you're striving to be unique here, you've also created something vague and unspecific.
The virtual personalities tend to rely on just that sort of language. They make statements that are similar to what you get out of mentalists or fortune tellers. Vague language that can mean anything. The listener/user perceives the message as specific to the conversation because the context of the message is left to the listener to associate. That is the trick in such messages.
You can always tell the difference between such AIs and a human being by the level of specificity in the responses. Anyone with a firm grasp of grammar and a working knowledge of how such systems operate can spot the AIs just about instantly.
So here you are... accusing me of being just such an AI... and yet while you're at it... making these statements.
Again... thanks for playing.
Somewhere in this car is a chip that is wirelessly communicating with Ford.
Where is it?
Simply insulating the radio transmitter should silence it. Simple task.
And something you might be happy to pay your mechanic to do... heck... some metallic paint might work. Spray the little bastard.
Stubbornness is not a trait that makes you sound more human. To the contrary, it makes you sound more like a robot.
After all... what is more stubborn then a machine?
Thanks for playing.
Really? A bot responding with that level of contextual detail?
If anything, you're more likely to be a bot since that comment is itself more genetic and less contextually relevant.
I swear... arguing with you morons is like boxing toddlers.
Its easy but I feel sort of guilty afterwards...
I provided the link I was referring to every time it was asked for actually.
And as to semi coherent ramblings, I thought we were going to use our own words, no? My ramblings have been quite coherent. They have occasionally be tangential but then forum warriors are seeing if they can get away with stupid rhetorical tricks.
They won't... I am a hardened forum warrior myself. None of those tricks are new to me and none of them are hard for me to counter.
So deal honestly or you'll get the tactical response.
Which is why I restated my position so you weren't confused.
You don't get to define my position. That is a straw man. I define my position. You can ask for me to clarify but you don't have the right to actually put words in my mouth, chum.
Now I feel like are going to try and play more rhetorical games here and I'd like to caution you against trying to do that. I'm aware of most of them and they just serve to irritate me without actually having any chance at gaining traction.
Your best bet is to just deal in good faith with me. Short of that, I will go into game mode myself and I'm quite good at them.
You're not questioning my insight. You said I didn't offer evidence etc. That isn't a failure of insight.
You are trying to insult me but apparently are running off of some script because it contextually makes no sense.
Try again in your own words please.
These things don't actually work. They're curiosities and nothing more.
When they finally develop strong AI... then you might have something. But a non-intelligent system is not going to figure these things out.
One study can prove something and a thousand studies can fail to prove something. Its all down to the quality of the studies in question.
There is a perverse misunderstanding as to how science works. It is not a democracy.
If one scientist says one thing and 1 million say another which is correct? Answer: Not enough information. We don't know which is right because science is not a democracy. If 100 people agreed that gravity worked one way and another thought it worked another way it wouldn't automatically work the majority way because they a majority.
This confuses science with politics.
So yes. One study CAN prove something just as a thousand can fail to prove anything.
No their mistake was using federal tax dollars to campaign for Obama.
You can do one of the two.
You can be non-partisan and participate in funded voter drives.
OR
You can be partisan and rely on private funding.
If you use public funds to support a partisan political campaign you are breaking the law.
This is not controversial. The democrats had to work very hard to keep the Acorn members out of jail. This is a settled issue.
I didn't say you couldn't hypothesize and express opinions. I simply pointed out that your opinions lack evidence and therefore they are just opinions.
For example, if I responded that aliens from mars were actually responsible that would hold about the same weight. An opinion without evidence is an opinion without evidence.
If you want evidence you're going to have to get the data. Your lack of evidence is not my problem or fault. You should know that.
Its garbage equation that has ZERO scientific value.
End of discussion.
Wait, so you don't have scientifically valid statistics to back up your position and because of that it is my fault?
I'm not blaming you. Its not your fault that these statistics have not be treated properly. But they haven't.
This isn't an opinion. You cannot claim that country A and country B is an apples to apples comparison scientifically. And absent that they don't have value.
You are trying to back up a political position with statistics that do not have scientific value. As such, you might as well just say "I believe this because I believe it". You have no scientific evidence. None.
Until you do, this is just your opinion versus mine.
And it is not my fault that you don't have quality information nor am I obligated to accept garbage.
Now in my experience this where people that don't know how to have a discussion get frustrated and start throwing off insults. If you feel that impulse then that is a sign that you've reached the end of your ability to have a discussion. If I'm in error then please continue. But I suspect after realizing your evidence is invalid we don't really have much to discuss.
Which is why Japan has such a low suicide rate... oh wait.
And suicide is very difficult to statistically equate to anything because different regions have very different suicide rates. The variables and factors cannot be limited to "oh they have guns so they will do it more."
Actually I pointed out that i had already provided a link to my source and I didn't threaten him.
So... your move.
Technology has rendered your objective obsolete.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7ZYKMBDm4M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drPz6n6UXQY
Accept defeat gracefully.
It is over. Submit.
You can't associate A with B statistically without treating your statistics in a scientific manner. Sorry.
No, I am saying they're different populations and unless you compensate for all those differences they cannot be directly compared.
For example, you could not compare the population in NYC in 2014 with the population of Egypt in 2000 BC.
They're too different. You need to compensate for all those differences if you want to make an apples to apples comparision because it isn't an apples to apples comparison.
Furthermore, you have to compensate for differences in methodology.
A great example of this is infant morality. In the US, infant morality is generally counted as the death of a child starting roughly at birth or shortly there after.
But in most countries that is actually called a miscarrage which means they do not count that as infant morality. As such, US infant morality statistics are higher then they would be if they used the standards in other countries. Or if you prefer, most countries have higher infant moralities if they used the US method of counting the statistic.
Another example would be the definition of unemployment. I think you might actually be aware of this one... you will likely be aware that in the US unemployed does not mean merely that you don't have a job. It means that you HAD a job within the last year or so and haven't been able to find work since. If you've never had a job or have been out of work for longer then a year or are simply not even trying to find work then you're not considered unemployed.
Different countries count all these things differently for different reasons. So when one country says something it MEANS different things because the numbers are added up differently. If you do not compensate for those differences you cannot make an apples to apples comparision.
Statistics. Honestly, about 99 percent of the population is incompetent to actually talk about them at all. No offense. But people don't understand them, don't treat them with sufficient respect, and consequently they more often serve as tools to mislead the ignorant.
This sounds like an insult... it isn't. Truly... almost no one knows how to read statistics. Newspapers get them wrong about 90 percent of the time. They frequently don't grasp even the very simple concepts like Causation and Correlation. Happily most Slashdot people seem to get those but that's just the beginning.
People start quoting statistics like it magically makes their opinions scientific. They forget that to make their opinions scientific they have to treat the data like scientific data at every stage.
If you've ever taken chemistry then you might have a notion of how anal you must be to retain the integrity of statistics. You have to be to take everything into consideration.
Simply looking at stats from country A and then looking at stats from country B... seeing that country A has guns and country B doesn't... and then comparing the crime stats is laughably inadequate.
Almost by definition in that situation you're comparing apples with oranges and then blaming the tough orange skin of the orange on the lack of an apple core. The orange isn't going to have an apple core.
Look... Even comparing stats in the US against the US is dubious. After all there are huge demographic differences in the US. Go to rural America for example and its nearly all white people. The distribution of the sexes is different. Typically much more men to women. Where as in the city it is more women to men on average. Ages are different, cultures are different, politics are different.
What I would look into is what about Chicago makes it violent where as what makes rural Montana peaceful?
Go through it all. Compare all the places in the US that have low crime with those that have high crime.
What factors stand out as predictors of crime.
I think that would give you a better insight into the problem then predetermining that it must be guns and then looking for evidence to prove yourself right.
Actually you don't know that since you cannot compare their rates.
They calculate murder differently then we do. The Japanese for example have made a practice of classifying all unsolved murders as "accidental death".
We see these political treatements of statistics in many countries including the US which renders the statistics very hard to read accurately. Because first you have to compensate for distortions.
If you do not compensate at all then you can't use the statistic at all.
I say you can use the US stats against US stats because they're largely suffering from the same issues and therefore it balances out. But across national lines? Not a chance. You need to compensate or you can't do it at all.
No, you cannot compare statistics between countries without compensating for differences in demographics, culture, economics, and a dozen other things.
So no.
Compare parts of the US to parts of the US if you want to talk about the US statistics. You cannot compare states across national lines with any credibility. I say this as someone that deeply understands both these statistics and their comparative methodologies. They are not equivalent. They are different. And simply assuming you can compare them apples to apples is simply wrong.
Not really. A bigger gun doesn't stop a the smaller gun from having the potential to kill you.
A little old lady with a purse pistol versus a big strong man with a magnum is not the same situation as the little old lady with nothing versus a young man that has his youth, his strength, and his fists.
Guns are an equalizer. A sick old woman can engage a young strong man and have a CHANCE of winning. Without the gun... no chance at all. None.
Zero threat. With a gun... its a gamble. Criminals don't like that.
would you mind just saying what you mean. I'd rather not look at a german google translated link... :)
Are we really going to start trading insults? I'm going to ignore your rudeness this one time but for civility sake, I suggest you do not do it again.
As to your statement, we are talking about gun bans. Therefore you could use the registered gun ownership information held by the government.
Compare gun violence in areas with many registered guns versus areas with few.
That is not estimated or arbitrary.
Furthermore, a statistic based on estimated anything means the statistic itself is estimated. And how are these things estimated? Basically it just means the numbers are made up or guessed at which means they're even more worthless.
Come on.
As to links, I provided a link to the study when someone else asked for it. its in one of the other comments. If you care to look at it then you can do so.
In any case your reaction to my point is not unexpected. I am a heretic. You are a god fearing true believer. And you cry "BURN HIM!"...
And like most of those before you... you are little more then confused by what you do not understand.
I do not say any of this with malice. I do not hate you. It is a human weakness and you are human.
I only hope that at some point in your life you gain enough introspection to realize limiting this behavior is and how much more you could be if only you allowed yourself to see.
Until that time, like the Hawaiians first seeing Captain Cook's ships you won't understand me. You'll think I'm a cloud or a mirage. Neither I nor my argument are incomprehensible. But you won't understand because your mind is closed.
Till the day you are able to listen, I bid you good day with good cheer. :) --- happy face so you know I really do mean it.
Continuing this discussion with you will only prompt you to cast more unfortunately insults. I would rather have neither of us demean ourselves with that behavior. Let us part as gentlemen until such time as we can continue in good faith.
and to prove your point and mine:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7ZYKMBDm4M
a 3d printed METAL gun... the machine used to make the gun was not cheap. But in 20 years it will be... the plastic guns already work though they are a little unreliable. The metal ones... who could tell the difference?
The banning argument is dead. From the 3d printing alone it is dead. Indifferent to the statistics, the politics, and the ideology.
The people pushing this need to find another topic. This one is over.