You are absolutely right, more bitching than anything else goes on here. The comment on the User-ID's was more to emphasize that I have seen it grow in the past half year, I am not a User-ID bigot.
Too bad you posted this too late, but you deserve to be modded up for being a voice of reason in a vast intellectual wilderness.
Sound far-fetched? You just mentioned something I noticed too, a lot of pro-MS posts have crept up lately, and I see lots of them coming from 400K+ user-IDs.
Given their history, I don't think it's far-fetched at all...
Interesting. I'm not Jewish myself, but acquaintances (sp?) are, and they tell me a different story. Of course some things will allways be memorization by rote, but that is true of any intellectual pursuit, but I have it on the word of at least one observant Jew that at least his rabbi engaged his students in actual stimulating discussion on the Scriptures, both intellectually and spiritually.
I guess it must be one of those YMMV things then. I'm sorry to hear your experience soured you on religion, but at least you give a reasoned rebuttal, not the blind hatred I tasted in other posts.
Because religion is not an exercise of the body or mind I don't care how enlightened you may think christians are.
I've seen this put forward in this thread before, and quite frankly this is bull, and for two reasons:
You assume that religion equals Christianity, conveniently forgetting Judaism and Islam, to name but two.
More damning: if you know any observant Jews, go ask them how hard they had to study for their bar mitzvah. Let me tell you a secret: quite a lot harder than you have done in your life 'til now, judging from your post.
The freedom to let anyone publish their own content will always lead to mediocrity being published, no matter whether the publisher is an amateur or a professional. Remember Sturgeon's Law?
Really, I don't think MOST people are willing to pay for this sadly necessary excercise in security. By charging for this functionality, Red Hat is reducing the security of a large portion of the installed linux servers.
Actually, this turns out to be not so much of a concern. From the Red Hat Network FAQ:
Registering with Red Hat Network is free and creating system profiles is free. Every customer receives a free Software Manager subscription for one system. Additional subscriptions are $19.95/month for each system.
So the idea that home customers need to pay for security updates is just a teensy bit misleading.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I was kind of amused at all the convoluted ways people were thinking up to the 'different spelling error in every copy'-mechanism, when there is a perfectly good and common utility to circumvent it.
And the dig at Taco's spelling comes naturally after reading/. for awhile:)
From a user's perspective, if they want to get their PC on a network, they want to turn to the page that steps them through getting their PC on a network. They do not want to waste time reading half a dozen How-To's explaining the theory behind TCP/IP.
In my opinion, they had better fscking learn! I am getting sick and tired of people going: "Oh, I thought I was immune to that virus. After all, I am running a firewall, am I not?"
What is causing problems like Melissa, ILoveYou, Anna Kournikova, Sircam and last but not least Code Red is the damn attitude that people shouldn't have to learn even the most basic things about computers and the internet before using them.
What is needed is not a dumbed down install, or a dumbed down GUI, nor even dumbed down documentation. What is needed is documentation and lots of helpful patient people to teach newbies to understand their computer beyond simply "click this, then that, then click Finish".
And a related question: How come XEmacs is better integrated with Gnome than GNU Emacs, considering that Gnome is the official GNU desktop? Is this going to be adressed in version 21 or later?
I don't quite mind them throwing SF and Fantasy in the same section. I do mind the enormous amount of crap Fantasy that is being published tday.
Anyhow, If you like a few newer authors, what about:
Kim Stanley Robinson. The Mars Trilogy is excellent hard SF, unless you don't like politics, because there is a lot of politics in those novels.
Peter F. Hamilton. Did his debut only in 1993, with the excellent Greg Mandel novels, a cross between cyberpunk and classic whodunit mysteries. Also the author of the Night's Dawn trilogy, classic space opera, with again a nice genre crossover into horror.
I'm sure other people will come up with more examples.
And as a last note, I only read 'Starfarers' by Poul Anderson, and it convinced me to start reading more of him. He definitely sounds like a fine author, and I'm saddened to hear of his demise.
Make them relevant, and I don't care what kind of ads you serve up. Problem is I almost never get ads I would ever even click on, let alone buy something from. Google just gave me a sponsored link (autoweb.com) which seems to be what I was actually looking for, though.
Maybe that's because a company that advertises on Google has a clue? They know how Google works, so if they buy the sponsored spot on a query that is related to their business, they will draw the eyes of people who are already looking for their product or service!
Gee, companies that actually think about what they sell and what their customers want! What is this world coming to?
Note: sarcasm is not directed at Andy, but at this whole crazy world altogether (before I get modded into oblivion).
Protecting the rights of citizens includes preventing crime. After all, what is theft other then depriving someone of his right to his own property? And the Benjamin Franklin quote is quite frankly a strawman. You inevitably have to give up a few liberties to live in a community in the first place. Note that old Ben specifically mentions essential liberties. We give our governments the right to deprive us of certain rights, in exchange for rigidly prescribing when the government can actually use that power, ie when we break the law. That is what I mean by the government exists to prevent crime; they prevent it by promptly acting when a crime is in progress, however this is not always practically possible, hence the right to self-defense.
Ok, I can start typing a long answer here, but I'll keep it short. If you want to continue this discussion, I suggest you reply by email, my adress is valid.
I wholly agree that violent crime and gun ownership are seperate things. In fact I agree with you that in places where violent crime is endemic, it might help if the lawful citizens go armed. Altough it is the primary duty of the government to prevent crime, this is in fact rather hard to do, since police can not be everywhere. So self-defense then should be something that is guaranteed to a citizen.
The Netherlands however, do not compare well with the rural US, except perhaps in the mindset of the people living here. I see you want more historical details, I could provide with those. Just drop me an email.
I think looking back on the discussion I think we agree rather well actually. It's been fun talking about this, thanks.
True, but do you know what the effect of even a few inches is on a dike? Ask a Dutch engineer, and he will tell you that he will not be happy should such an eventuality come to pass.
But I have to reason from personal experience, as I have a deep distrust of statistics (they are too easy to lie with), and the Netherlands, with fairly tough gun controls has in fact one of the lowest levels of violent crime in Europe. So the proviso that tougher gun controls == more violent crime does not seem to have a causal relationship.
The point I was trying to make is perhaps reinforced by your argument: in countries where gun ownership is considered normal, any tightening of controls will only benefit the criminals, but as I said, down here gun controls have always been a fact of life, and we don't see any reason for relaxing them.
Oh, BTW, I did agree that automatic weapons argument was a straw man. I know it is a bit of a hot button issue for Americans, but please don't spoil the impression of a rational man you've been providing 'til now.
Do you really want to pay more for gas for your car? Airline tickets? Heating your house?
As I live in the Netherlands, like some 6 million of my countrymen (and I think I can include a couple million of Londoners as well) I would think this vastly preferable over seeing my home flood. So if the cost means a slight tax hike to me, I'll be happy to pay, even if it later turns out to be a false alarm.
Do you realize how much of a raise we're talking about here? A little over 200 feet.
Do you realize what that means for coastal areas? I live below sealevel already, I don't want my government to spend more billions on raising dikes if it can be avoided, thank you very much.
And worse, it is not just the Netherlands (where we are very afraid of rising sealevels, and rightly so), it is also places like London that will suffer.
Maybe global warming and rising sea levels only exist in the minds of alarmists, but I'd rather people played it safe and try to stave of an imaginary disaster, than having the alarmists be right and see my home drown.
Punish abuse. Prosecute those who harm others, regardless of weapon
I tend to agree with your posts (as I said, you seem like a reasonable man), but this seems to be the main problem. If the abuse takes the form of mowing down a schoolyard full of children, it is easy to see why the anti-gun people say that it is the easy availability of automatic weapons that made the perpetrator so dangerous. The fact that his abuse of the 2nd amendment will be punished harshly is no comfort to the survivors.
I think that this is the sticking point in the debate. Sure it will be used as a straw man argument, but it is hard to argue the point that even though it may be punished harshly, firearms abuse has irrevocable consequences, ie dead bodies.
So while I may agree with you, I don't think I agree enough to start pushing for firearms liberalization at home. Perhaps this is, as another poster stated, a uniquely US cultural issue.
I may have phrased that a little carelessly. What I meant is, as it stands now it is the irresponsible (read 'the criminal') that can get their hands on the guns easily. How can you assure that it's not predominantly them that get to carry weapons, without infringing on the rights of all citizens?
So to recap, my question was not meant as a question on the current state of affairs, but as a theoretical question into the ideal state of affairs. As I said, our view in Europe on the US gun issue is heavily skewed by what makes the news, which is not millions of peaceful gun owners, but drive by shootings and paranoid militias.
Slashdot Mirror
Which of course makes complete bollocks of the 'anti-piracy' argument....
Looks like completely ordinary Perl to me.
Sorry, couldn't resist :)
MartYou are absolutely right, more bitching than anything else goes on here. The comment on the User-ID's was more to emphasize that I have seen it grow in the past half year, I am not a User-ID bigot.
Too bad you posted this too late, but you deserve to be modded up for being a voice of reason in a vast intellectual wilderness.
MartI have a word for that: Astroturfing.
Sound far-fetched? You just mentioned something I noticed too, a lot of pro-MS posts have crept up lately, and I see lots of them coming from 400K+ user-IDs.
Given their history, I don't think it's far-fetched at all...
MartWhat part of Europe are you from?
FYI: The part liberated by the British 21st Army Group.
Sorry for the OT, but you didn't have an email adress, and I can get pretty worked up about this typical US ignorance of history.
Moderators: feel free to mod me down, this post deserves it, but the ignoramus deserved the flame. If you don't believe me, follow the URL.
MartInteresting. I'm not Jewish myself, but acquaintances (sp?) are, and they tell me a different story. Of course some things will allways be memorization by rote, but that is true of any intellectual pursuit, but I have it on the word of at least one observant Jew that at least his rabbi engaged his students in actual stimulating discussion on the Scriptures, both intellectually and spiritually.
I guess it must be one of those YMMV things then. I'm sorry to hear your experience soured you on religion, but at least you give a reasoned rebuttal, not the blind hatred I tasted in other posts.
MartI've seen this put forward in this thread before, and quite frankly this is bull, and for two reasons:
- You assume that religion equals Christianity, conveniently forgetting Judaism and Islam, to name but two.
- More damning: if you know any observant Jews, go ask them how hard they had to study for their bar mitzvah. Let me tell you a secret: quite a lot harder than you have done in your life 'til now, judging from your post.
MartThe freedom to let anyone publish their own content will always lead to mediocrity being published, no matter whether the publisher is an amateur or a professional. Remember Sturgeon's Law?
MartActually, this turns out to be not so much of a concern. From the Red Hat Network FAQ:
So the idea that home customers need to pay for security updates is just a teensy bit misleading.
MartYeah, I know what you mean. I was kind of amused at all the convoluted ways people were thinking up to the 'different spelling error in every copy'-mechanism, when there is a perfectly good and common utility to circumvent it.
And the dig at Taco's spelling comes naturally after reading /. for awhile :)
MartDear CmdrTaco et al, can we please, please, please have some new moderation options? I propose (-1, Too Many Buzzwords) for this one.
MartOr you simply run a spellchecker on the text. All copies have the same spelling, problem solved.
.....Wait a second! Now I know why CmdrTaco's spelling is so bad! It's a copy protection mechanism!
MartIn my opinion, they had better fscking learn! I am getting sick and tired of people going: "Oh, I thought I was immune to that virus. After all, I am running a firewall, am I not?"
What is causing problems like Melissa, ILoveYou, Anna Kournikova, Sircam and last but not least Code Red is the damn attitude that people shouldn't have to learn even the most basic things about computers and the internet before using them.
What is needed is not a dumbed down install, or a dumbed down GUI, nor even dumbed down documentation. What is needed is documentation and lots of helpful patient people to teach newbies to understand their computer beyond simply "click this, then that, then click Finish".
MartAnd a related question: How come XEmacs is better integrated with Gnome than GNU Emacs, considering that Gnome is the official GNU desktop? Is this going to be adressed in version 21 or later?
MartI know of Sturgeon's Law. Unfortunately, it is 95% or more of modern fantasy that is crap. And I happen to like Fantasy, so that is really hurting me.
On the other hand with new writers like Robinson, Hamilton and a few others coming up, my other favourite genre (SF) is doing quite well.
MartI don't quite mind them throwing SF and Fantasy in the same section. I do mind the enormous amount of crap Fantasy that is being published tday.
Anyhow, If you like a few newer authors, what about:
I'm sure other people will come up with more examples.
And as a last note, I only read 'Starfarers' by Poul Anderson, and it convinced me to start reading more of him. He definitely sounds like a fine author, and I'm saddened to hear of his demise.
MartBlockquoth the poster:
Maybe that's because a company that advertises on Google has a clue? They know how Google works, so if they buy the sponsored spot on a query that is related to their business, they will draw the eyes of people who are already looking for their product or service!
Gee, companies that actually think about what they sell and what their customers want! What is this world coming to?
Note: sarcasm is not directed at Andy, but at this whole crazy world altogether (before I get modded into oblivion).
Ok, final answer here.
Protecting the rights of citizens includes preventing crime. After all, what is theft other then depriving someone of his right to his own property? And the Benjamin Franklin quote is quite frankly a strawman. You inevitably have to give up a few liberties to live in a community in the first place. Note that old Ben specifically mentions essential liberties. We give our governments the right to deprive us of certain rights, in exchange for rigidly prescribing when the government can actually use that power, ie when we break the law. That is what I mean by the government exists to prevent crime; they prevent it by promptly acting when a crime is in progress, however this is not always practically possible, hence the right to self-defense.
MartOk, I can start typing a long answer here, but I'll keep it short. If you want to continue this discussion, I suggest you reply by email, my adress is valid.
I wholly agree that violent crime and gun ownership are seperate things. In fact I agree with you that in places where violent crime is endemic, it might help if the lawful citizens go armed. Altough it is the primary duty of the government to prevent crime, this is in fact rather hard to do, since police can not be everywhere. So self-defense then should be something that is guaranteed to a citizen.
The Netherlands however, do not compare well with the rural US, except perhaps in the mindset of the people living here. I see you want more historical details, I could provide with those. Just drop me an email.
I think looking back on the discussion I think we agree rather well actually. It's been fun talking about this, thanks.
MartHehehe,
True, but do you know what the effect of even a few inches is on a dike? Ask a Dutch engineer, and he will tell you that he will not be happy should such an eventuality come to pass.
MartSorry Bob,
But I have to reason from personal experience, as I have a deep distrust of statistics (they are too easy to lie with), and the Netherlands, with fairly tough gun controls has in fact one of the lowest levels of violent crime in Europe. So the proviso that tougher gun controls == more violent crime does not seem to have a causal relationship.
The point I was trying to make is perhaps reinforced by your argument: in countries where gun ownership is considered normal, any tightening of controls will only benefit the criminals, but as I said, down here gun controls have always been a fact of life, and we don't see any reason for relaxing them.
Oh, BTW, I did agree that automatic weapons argument was a straw man. I know it is a bit of a hot button issue for Americans, but please don't spoil the impression of a rational man you've been providing 'til now.
MartAs I live in the Netherlands, like some 6 million of my countrymen (and I think I can include a couple million of Londoners as well) I would think this vastly preferable over seeing my home flood. So if the cost means a slight tax hike to me, I'll be happy to pay, even if it later turns out to be a false alarm.
MartDo you realize what that means for coastal areas? I live below sealevel already, I don't want my government to spend more billions on raising dikes if it can be avoided, thank you very much.
And worse, it is not just the Netherlands (where we are very afraid of rising sealevels, and rightly so), it is also places like London that will suffer.
Maybe global warming and rising sea levels only exist in the minds of alarmists, but I'd rather people played it safe and try to stave of an imaginary disaster, than having the alarmists be right and see my home drown.
MartI tend to agree with your posts (as I said, you seem like a reasonable man), but this seems to be the main problem. If the abuse takes the form of mowing down a schoolyard full of children, it is easy to see why the anti-gun people say that it is the easy availability of automatic weapons that made the perpetrator so dangerous. The fact that his abuse of the 2nd amendment will be punished harshly is no comfort to the survivors.
I think that this is the sticking point in the debate. Sure it will be used as a straw man argument, but it is hard to argue the point that even though it may be punished harshly, firearms abuse has irrevocable consequences, ie dead bodies.
So while I may agree with you, I don't think I agree enough to start pushing for firearms liberalization at home. Perhaps this is, as another poster stated, a uniquely US cultural issue.
MartBob,
I may have phrased that a little carelessly. What I meant is, as it stands now it is the irresponsible (read 'the criminal') that can get their hands on the guns easily. How can you assure that it's not predominantly them that get to carry weapons, without infringing on the rights of all citizens?
So to recap, my question was not meant as a question on the current state of affairs, but as a theoretical question into the ideal state of affairs. As I said, our view in Europe on the US gun issue is heavily skewed by what makes the news, which is not millions of peaceful gun owners, but drive by shootings and paranoid militias.
Mart