You obviously don't understand how trademarks work. Trademarks are made for words or groups of words or logos in regards to a specific area, e.g. "movies" or "cars."
Ford may have no trademark on the name Mustang as related to computer products, but if you create a computer game entitled "Mustang Racer", you can bet your ass that you will be sued for trademark infringement and you will lose.
Another correction: Be, Inc. was granted a trademark for the name "Be", not the word "be."
Actually he lost because "Sting" is not his real name.
From the WIPO decision:
6.6 In light of the fact that the word "sting" is in common usage in the English language, with a number of meanings, this case can be distinguished from the other cases cited above in which the Complainants' personal name was found also to be an unregistered trademark or service mark to which the Uniform Policy applies.
That's the basis of the ruling. If I was a famous performer with a stage name of Beeblefux, it would be considered an unregistered trademark because it is not a common word, not because it is not my given name.
Sting (the musician) sued over a web site using his name (www.sting.com). He lost because "sting" is a common English word. Diablo has been used for hundreds of years and Lamborghini needs to sue Blizzard Entertainment if B.E. wins this idiotic lawsuit.
you just cannot replace a university degree computer science with work experience.
And you just cannot replace work experience with a university degree in computer science. If given the opportunity to hire someone with four years of professional programming experience or someone with a four year CS degree, I will take the person with the experience. I don't need someone who knows language theory, calculus, and how to how to reinvent network stacks. I need someone with practical experience related to the work they will be assigned. I have seen degreed engineers completely blow projects because they lacked the professional experience to be successful. They did not understand schedules, budgets, or office politics. One spent days reinventing something rather than just purchasing a commercial library. He thought it would save us money!
There's no way you'll get this knowledge when just doing programming on the job 5 days a week, without formal studying of the subjects.
What makes you think that universities are able to attract skilled computer science professionals to teach there? Most professors make a pittance compared to what a talented software engineer can make in the private sector.
I dropped out of college to take a software engineering job. I learned far more in that job than I would have ever learned in college. The professors and instructors that I had in college knew less about software/firmware engineering than I did and some of them were downright incompetent. The inefficient, brute-force programming demonstrated by some of them is probably to blame for the code bloat that has caused common business applications to require 650MB CD-ROMS as distribution media.
While it would be absurd to condemn all degreed engineers or college professors, assuming that people with college degrees in computer science will be better software engineers is equally ludicrous.
In a long-anticipated move, many web sites are converting over to the "banner content" model. These web sites consist of full-screen ads with a 468 x 60 pixel banner at the top where all user-requested content is displayed. In order to access these web sites, all that the user needs is Internet Explorer 5.5 (or later), Macromedia Flash and Shockwave, IPIX Viewer, InstallShield's InstallFromTheWeb, Javascript, cookies, RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, Apple Quicktime, Adobe Acrobat, ActiveX, PhotoJam, VivoActive Player, and Liquid MusicPlayer. These web sites will feature a rich, multimedia experience rivalling that found in television commercials. Of course, for maximum enjoyment, a T3 or faster connection is recommended.
By using a two letter subject and a six letter message, you have managed to post something before anyone who wanted to respond intelligently to the article could do so. This must be a proud moment in your life.
Hmmm, let's extrapolate from the past: white male starship captain, older starship captain, black starship captain, woman starship captain... I figure the next one up will be an older, woman black starship captain. Probably not bald, but we can't be sure.
You left out handicapped -- Captain Christopher Pike.
The VERY best thing that could come from all of this is a series without the idiotic holodecks! How many times have we watched a starship almost be destroyed by some type of holodeck problem?
The other problem with the holodeck was that it was a technology so incongruous with everything else that it was "indistinguishable from magic" and totally destroyed the show's believability. They could take a relatively small room and, through the magic of... magic, make it into a full-size baseball field (DS9) where individual crew members could look at each other and be a hundred yards apart. People could run and run and never hit a wall. They could walk the plank and fall 20 feet into water (TNG - movie). It could reproduce old B&W sci-fi movies (Voyager) and, miraculously, all of the "real people" would see themselves as B&W. But despite the fact that it could manipulate visual perception this way, you still had people parading around the hallways on the way to the holodeck dressed as pirates, cowboys, and 19th century Irishmen. If it could make you see B&W, why couldn't it put a costume on you?
And it was not simply the visual and physical issues. Why was it that the computer, normally barely smart enough to open lift doors on command, could suddenly create completely believable, intelligent, human characters in the holodeck? They could be brilliant scientists and could solve ship problems, but ask that same computer on the bridge to solve the problem and you'd get the equivalent of "that does not compute."
I like science fiction to be science fiction and fantasy to be fantasy -- and never the twain should meet.
If you truly want to improve society and help those that are down, then you need to get out and do it. Convincing others or lobbying to have laws passed that force others to do it not only is wrong by the definition of the founders of this country, but is wrong and amoral by your own definition as you stated above.
What? I often disagree with people on here, but you are one of the few that has succeeding in writing prose that is almost impossible to decipher.
Nonetheless, I will address what I think your points were. I have no intention of donating my life's savings to pay for the medical care of strangers just so that insurance companies can line their pockets. Even if I was willing to, there are not enough people in the U.S. willing to do that to make a difference. That's why we need laws to protect people from genetic discrimination. That is why I have written to my Congressional representatives asking them to pass laws against insurance companies requiring genetic testing.
You remind me of George W. Bush and his "compassionate conservatism" bullshit. That's just code for letting companies run roughshod over people and cutting government services so that the rich can pay less taxes.
What has lead you to believe that our founding fathers were against laws that protected people and promoted the general welfare of U.S. citizens?
We have many laws that limit the actions of corporations in order to protect individuals.
Bill Joy (and the RIAA) want Napster to be held to a different standard than AOL, MSN, Yahoo, and every other online service is held. They are also asking for (and getting) court decisions which run contrary to federal law. According to the Communications Decency Act (which, despite popular belief, was not struck down in total), an Internet service provider cannot be held liable for content posted by their users. For example, if I created a web page on Yahoo and reprinted a copyrighted book there, Yahoo could not be held liable. Napster is not only being held liable for its users' actions, it is being required to determine whether each and every file that its users have made available on their own systems contains copyrighted material -- based solely on the file's name.
In essence, what the courts want Napster to do is limit its users' free speech. Napster is being ordered to prevent you and me from asking and answering the question "Do you have any files with the following pattern in their name?" Napster is simply a search engine not unlike Google or Lycos. Are we going to require that search engines recognize when a searcher is seeking to violate a copyright and prevent that person from finding the material that they seek to infringe?
I know that this sounds cynical, but I believe that if Napster was owned by a corporate giant like AOL or Microsoft, we would have seen a very different set of rulings than we have.
Re:Permission might go into medical release forms
on
Who Owns Your Body?
·
· Score: 3
"The most likely groups to "give consent" for this would be the mentally-ill or retarted..."
I am amused by the ironic mispelling of "retarded" and and the inappropriate hyphenation of "mentally ill."
Soon, everyone will be able to get a test to see what genetic problems they have.
The healthy ones will have little or no interest in many types of insurance.
The unhealthy ones will have a great interest in many types of insurance.
Anyone who voluntarily chooses to do without medical insurance because they are "healthy" is a complete, f****** moron. Do you have any idea what it costs even for simple, commonplace things like appendectomies, setting broken bones, and other common ER procedures that "healthy" people undergo? And it's not like healthy people never develop horrible diseases. They do.
The debate here is not whether you can withhold medical records when applying for insurance (you cannot -- it is called "insurance fraud"). The question is whether the insurance companies and employers should be allowed to force you to take genetic tests for the purposes of denying coverage or increasing premiums.
Why should we have a problem with any other genetic disease, once a test has revealed it's presence?
I am not against charging someone a higher rate if they have already been diagnosed with a disease. What I am against is compelling someone to take a genetic test, essentially adding information to their medical history, and then charging them a higher premium or denying them coverage if the test shows a predisposition to get a disease. If I apply for insurance, the decision as to whether to insure me and the premium I am assigned should be based solely on my existing medical history -- not some insurance company mandated test that attempts to predict whether I am more likely to contract a disease sometime in the future.
I am against charging people extra for risk factors that are beyond their control -- especially when the information is not already a part of their medical history. If they have a disease that has been diagnosed, that's a totally different matter.
It seems to me that the big problem is that people will be able to get genetic tests done personally, and then get insurance policies based on those claims, and then make a fortune because they know precisely what is going to happen to them!
That's called "insurance fraud." You have to provide all of your medical records to the insurance company. It's not like this type of thing was impossible before. There were tests for diabetes, hypoglycemia, hepatitus, malaria, etc. You could get one of these tests done, find out it was positive, and withold the information from your insurance company. This did not bankrupt the insurance industry. They just raised the premiums enough to cover that small percentage that committed fraud.
By the way, how would you "make a fortune" by being susceptible to a disease? You seem to feel that you would have luxury cars, boats, vacation homes, etc. Tell me how.
Everyone assumes this will automatically mean higher premiums. For some yes, for others premiums will be cheaper. Suppose you have genetic resistance to AIDS (yes, there is such a thing), and no genetic predisposition to heart disease or cancer. Wouldn't you like a break on your premiums?
You actually believe that the insurance companies would voluntarily lower your premiums? Screening for illnesses has been improving for decades and medical insurance costs have just gone up while the coverage has gone down.
I do not know of any serious health problems that I have, but I resist going to the doctor until it is absolutely necessary. I don't get physicals or yearly checkups. Why? Because I am afraid that they will uncover some heretofore unknown medical condition and I will be uninsurable for the rest of my life. I will be at the mercy of my existing insurance company as they raise my rates and look for any excuse to drop me. Like many Americans, I don't benefit from the available screening out of fear for my insurability. And that is wrong.
Finally, you equate smoking with genetic predispositions to illnesses. In the former case, it's a choice. In the latter, it's just bad luck. And the purpose of insurance is to financially protect people who are unlucky.
I am appalled by the people who see nothing wrong with genetic testing for insurance. These are often the same people who are infuriated when e-commerce companies violate their privacy by tracking their web surfing habits. If genetic testing is not a violation of your privacy, what is? Do insurers have a right to get the records of your grocery purchases to look for unhealthy foods? Should they be able to test your sexual partners for diseases prior to issuing insurance coverage to you? Do they have a right to the medical history of every member of your immediate family?
Insurance and Society
Insurance is valuable to society. It prevents a certain percentage of society from being financially ruined, unable to pay their mortgage, car loan, or even grocery bills. It is not in society's best interest for those people that most need insurance to be denied it. The argument that anything that increases the profits of insurance companies is good is a ludicrous, amoral one. The interests of society outweigh the bottom line of the insurance industry.
Your Premiums
There is another argument made claiming that it is unfair for "healthy" people to pay higher premiums to provide coverage for those that would be screened out by a genetic test. In addition to being incredibly self-centered and greedy, it shows a basic ignorance and denial. Some percentage of these self-proclaimed healthy people that have some genetic predisposition to some disease. They just don't know it yet. Now, ask yourself when your insurance company every lowered your medical premiums because they had better screening for risks.
The Myth that Genetic Testing is a Necessity
Insurance existed and thrived for decades before there was genetic testing. To claim now that the entire industry will be bankrupt if they cannot subject each and every applicant to a barrage of genetic tests as part of the application is preposterous.
The Role of Government
Because the goals of the insurance industry are often not in line with the best interests of society, the government needs to put limits on the insurance companies. In this case, the government has a duty to step in and prevent large portions of society from being denied medical coverage, or even employment, because of a genetic predisposition to an illness.
Applying for medical insurance, whether individually or through an employer, should not trigger a form of genetic Russian Roulette where you go in for a battery of tests and are faced with financial ruin if one comes up positive. While insurance companies need unfettered access to your existing medical records in order to write health insurance policies, the government should deny them the ability to create new health records through additional testing -- genetic and otherwise.
If we permit genetic testing, should infants be tested and, if found to have a gene for some devastating illness, be put into an uninsurable genetic underclass -- destined to be financially ruined? Would we carry it further and deny them schooling, Medicare, and social programs (why spend tax dollars on someone who will probably die at a young age?). Should employers be allowed to refuse to hire them in order to keep from training someone who will probably die soon. Should family members be forced into bankruptcy in order to pay for the medical care of their genetically-flawed loved one?
As I have said before, we are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for themselves and die.
Well, my hat's off to you. You have a sense of humor. The microwave is your most efficient way to heat food and coffee. In the summer, it also does not heat your whole apartment while heating your food/beverage.
I have a Palm, also, and I use rechargeable NiMH batteries. It's as much for cost and convenience as conservation, but it's less toxic landfill mass nonetheless. I really think that we, as a society, should ban all carbon-zinc and alkaline batteries. NiMH are more efficient, environmentally friendly, and convenient. Sure, you pay $8 for two (it would go down if they became a necessity rather than an option), but you use them hundreds, if not thousands, of times.
I have less faith in solar power than hydroelectric and windmills for generating power for home use..
BTW, most/. people don't like the sig, but I'm glad you did.
Motorized vehicles are banned from almost all bike paths, so that's out. Most beaches prohibit motorized vehicles. With no suspension, your knees and ankles would be shot in about 15 minutes of off-road trail use (plus the tires are too small to clear big roots, holes, etc.) What about on the street? Well, it has too much power to be classified as a moped. It doesn't have the DOT-approved lights, turn signals, brakes, etc. needed for a street motorcycle. It certainly could not pass any of the safety requirements for a car. It looks like it could be fun, but I can't imagine where one would ride it in the U.S.
We ar currently suffering an energy crisis, yet are confronted every day by new ways of entertaining ourselves, working, and processing information- each of which consumes fossil fuels or electricity, the majority of which comes from fossil fuels.
So, where did you get a computer that consumes no electricity while it processes information for your work and entertainment?
In practice, if someone does have an axe to grind, they won't be convinced by any rational argument about the topic, as their motivation for continuing the argument has nothing to do with getting at the truth.
You do not understand the purpose of public debate. It is not to convince your opponent that he is wrong. It is to convince the observers that your opponent is wrong. Ad hominem attacks sway only weak-minded people.
But I have pretty much given up arguing with crazy people
An ad hominem attack is one where you attack the arguer on the basis of something both personal and irrelevant. For example, calling you ugly and smelly would be an ad hominem attack. The claim that you have an axe to grind, however, may be personal but it's sure not irrelevant.
My personal motivations, real or imagined, are completely irrelevent to the debate. In fact, the link you provided has a perfect analogy to this situation. In that, a priest's anti-abortion arguments are dismissed out of hand because of his religious beliefs. When you attack a person's motivation for making an argument rather than the substance of his argument, it is an ad hominem attack.
You could make this whole debate thing more challenging by not providing links that disprove your arguments.
We are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for
themselves and die.
What can I say? I'm honored.
BTW: I'm not anti-Linux. I even run it on one of my home machines. I just wish that there was some way to provide more quality control. Certain people should not be contributing to the open source effort.
I hope that you apply for insurance, are tested and found to have a genetic predisposition to a disease, are denied the insurance, are offered a policy that Bill Gates could not afford, exhaust your life's savings paying for medical care after you are stricken with a disease, exhaust your family's savings as they try to cover the costs, die because you could no longer afford the care necessary to keep you alive, and leave your children penniless and horribly in debt.
What a sick, greedy bastard you are to suggest that insurance company profits are so important that people should be subjected to invasive genetic testing in an attempt to weed out those who might actually need the insurance.
I think that many people are confused about the purpose of insurance. Insurance cannot protect you from everything bad. It can only protect you from things which nobody can predict.
You are the one who is confused. Applying for medical insurance should not trigger a form of genetic Russian Roulette where you go in for a battery of tests and are faced with financial ruin if one comes up positive. While insurance companies need access to your existing medical records in order to write health and life insurance policies, they should be denied the option of creating new health records with additional testing.
In your world of genetic discrimination, where would you draw the line? Should infants be tested and, if found to have a gene for some devastating illness, be put into an uninsurable genetic underclass -- destined to be financially ruined? Maybe you could carry it further and deny them schooling, Medicare, and social programs (why spend tax dollars on someone who will probably die at a young age?). Perhaps employers could refuse to hire them in order to keep from training someone who will probably die soon. Should family members be forced into bankruptcy in order to pay for the medical care that their genetically-flawed family members need?
We are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for themselves and die. If you are lucky enough to remain healthy, your insurance premiums should help someone who is not so fortunate. If given the choice of lowering your insurance premiums or of providing medical and life insurance to those less fortunate, I would choose the latter.
Slashdot Mirror
Ford may have no trademark on the name Mustang as related to computer products, but if you create a computer game entitled "Mustang Racer", you can bet your ass that you will be sued for trademark infringement and you will lose.
Another correction: Be, Inc. was granted a trademark for the name "Be", not the word "be."
From the WIPO decision:
6.6 In light of the fact that the word "sting" is in common usage in the English language, with a number of meanings, this case can be distinguished from the other cases cited above in which the Complainants' personal name was found also to be an unregistered trademark or service mark to which the Uniform Policy applies.
That's the basis of the ruling. If I was a famous performer with a stage name of Beeblefux, it would be considered an unregistered trademark because it is not a common word, not because it is not my given name.
So, how much does it suck to be so wrong?
Sting (the musician) sued over a web site using his name (www.sting.com). He lost because "sting" is a common English word. Diablo has been used for hundreds of years and Lamborghini needs to sue Blizzard Entertainment if B.E. wins this idiotic lawsuit.
And you just cannot replace work experience with a university degree in computer science. If given the opportunity to hire someone with four years of professional programming experience or someone with a four year CS degree, I will take the person with the experience. I don't need someone who knows language theory, calculus, and how to how to reinvent network stacks. I need someone with practical experience related to the work they will be assigned. I have seen degreed engineers completely blow projects because they lacked the professional experience to be successful. They did not understand schedules, budgets, or office politics. One spent days reinventing something rather than just purchasing a commercial library. He thought it would save us money!
There's no way you'll get this knowledge when just doing programming on the job 5 days a week, without formal studying of the subjects.
What makes you think that universities are able to attract skilled computer science professionals to teach there? Most professors make a pittance compared to what a talented software engineer can make in the private sector.
I dropped out of college to take a software engineering job. I learned far more in that job than I would have ever learned in college. The professors and instructors that I had in college knew less about software/firmware engineering than I did and some of them were downright incompetent. The inefficient, brute-force programming demonstrated by some of them is probably to blame for the code bloat that has caused common business applications to require 650MB CD-ROMS as distribution media.
While it would be absurd to condemn all degreed engineers or college professors, assuming that people with college degrees in computer science will be better software engineers is equally ludicrous.
In a long-anticipated move, many web sites are converting over to the "banner content" model. These web sites consist of full-screen ads with a 468 x 60 pixel banner at the top where all user-requested content is displayed. In order to access these web sites, all that the user needs is Internet Explorer 5.5 (or later), Macromedia Flash and Shockwave, IPIX Viewer, InstallShield's InstallFromTheWeb, Javascript, cookies, RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, Apple Quicktime, Adobe Acrobat, ActiveX, PhotoJam, VivoActive Player, and Liquid MusicPlayer. These web sites will feature a rich, multimedia experience rivalling that found in television commercials. Of course, for maximum enjoyment, a T3 or faster connection is recommended.
Not as surprising as a version of Windows that was solid enough for commercial use...
By using a two letter subject and a six letter message, you have managed to post something before anyone who wanted to respond intelligently to the article could do so. This must be a proud moment in your life.
Grow up.
You left out handicapped -- Captain Christopher Pike.
The VERY best thing that could come from all of this is a series without the idiotic holodecks! How many times have we watched a starship almost be destroyed by some type of holodeck problem?
The other problem with the holodeck was that it was a technology so incongruous with everything else that it was "indistinguishable from magic" and totally destroyed the show's believability. They could take a relatively small room and, through the magic of... magic, make it into a full-size baseball field (DS9) where individual crew members could look at each other and be a hundred yards apart. People could run and run and never hit a wall. They could walk the plank and fall 20 feet into water (TNG - movie). It could reproduce old B&W sci-fi movies (Voyager) and, miraculously, all of the "real people" would see themselves as B&W. But despite the fact that it could manipulate visual perception this way, you still had people parading around the hallways on the way to the holodeck dressed as pirates, cowboys, and 19th century Irishmen. If it could make you see B&W, why couldn't it put a costume on you?
And it was not simply the visual and physical issues. Why was it that the computer, normally barely smart enough to open lift doors on command, could suddenly create completely believable, intelligent, human characters in the holodeck? They could be brilliant scientists and could solve ship problems, but ask that same computer on the bridge to solve the problem and you'd get the equivalent of "that does not compute."
I like science fiction to be science fiction and fantasy to be fantasy -- and never the twain should meet.
What? I often disagree with people on here, but you are one of the few that has succeeding in writing prose that is almost impossible to decipher.
Nonetheless, I will address what I think your points were. I have no intention of donating my life's savings to pay for the medical care of strangers just so that insurance companies can line their pockets. Even if I was willing to, there are not enough people in the U.S. willing to do that to make a difference. That's why we need laws to protect people from genetic discrimination. That is why I have written to my Congressional representatives asking them to pass laws against insurance companies requiring genetic testing.
You remind me of George W. Bush and his "compassionate conservatism" bullshit. That's just code for letting companies run roughshod over people and cutting government services so that the rich can pay less taxes.
What has lead you to believe that our founding fathers were against laws that protected people and promoted the general welfare of U.S. citizens? We have many laws that limit the actions of corporations in order to protect individuals.
In essence, what the courts want Napster to do is limit its users' free speech. Napster is being ordered to prevent you and me from asking and answering the question "Do you have any files with the following pattern in their name?" Napster is simply a search engine not unlike Google or Lycos. Are we going to require that search engines recognize when a searcher is seeking to violate a copyright and prevent that person from finding the material that they seek to infringe?
I know that this sounds cynical, but I believe that if Napster was owned by a corporate giant like AOL or Microsoft, we would have seen a very different set of rulings than we have.
I am amused by the ironic mispelling of "retarded" and and the inappropriate hyphenation of "mentally ill."
The healthy ones will have little or no interest in many types of insurance.
The unhealthy ones will have a great interest in many types of insurance.
Anyone who voluntarily chooses to do without medical insurance because they are "healthy" is a complete, f****** moron. Do you have any idea what it costs even for simple, commonplace things like appendectomies, setting broken bones, and other common ER procedures that "healthy" people undergo? And it's not like healthy people never develop horrible diseases. They do.
The debate here is not whether you can withhold medical records when applying for insurance (you cannot -- it is called "insurance fraud"). The question is whether the insurance companies and employers should be allowed to force you to take genetic tests for the purposes of denying coverage or increasing premiums.
I am not against charging someone a higher rate if they have already been diagnosed with a disease. What I am against is compelling someone to take a genetic test, essentially adding information to their medical history, and then charging them a higher premium or denying them coverage if the test shows a predisposition to get a disease. If I apply for insurance, the decision as to whether to insure me and the premium I am assigned should be based solely on my existing medical history -- not some insurance company mandated test that attempts to predict whether I am more likely to contract a disease sometime in the future.
I am against charging people extra for risk factors that are beyond their control -- especially when the information is not already a part of their medical history. If they have a disease that has been diagnosed, that's a totally different matter.
That's called "insurance fraud." You have to provide all of your medical records to the insurance company. It's not like this type of thing was impossible before. There were tests for diabetes, hypoglycemia, hepatitus, malaria, etc. You could get one of these tests done, find out it was positive, and withold the information from your insurance company. This did not bankrupt the insurance industry. They just raised the premiums enough to cover that small percentage that committed fraud.
By the way, how would you "make a fortune" by being susceptible to a disease? You seem to feel that you would have luxury cars, boats, vacation homes, etc. Tell me how.
You actually believe that the insurance companies would voluntarily lower your premiums? Screening for illnesses has been improving for decades and medical insurance costs have just gone up while the coverage has gone down.
I do not know of any serious health problems that I have, but I resist going to the doctor until it is absolutely necessary. I don't get physicals or yearly checkups. Why? Because I am afraid that they will uncover some heretofore unknown medical condition and I will be uninsurable for the rest of my life. I will be at the mercy of my existing insurance company as they raise my rates and look for any excuse to drop me. Like many Americans, I don't benefit from the available screening out of fear for my insurability. And that is wrong.
Finally, you equate smoking with genetic predispositions to illnesses. In the former case, it's a choice. In the latter, it's just bad luck. And the purpose of insurance is to financially protect people who are unlucky.
I am appalled by the people who see nothing wrong with genetic testing for insurance. These are often the same people who are infuriated when e-commerce companies violate their privacy by tracking their web surfing habits. If genetic testing is not a violation of your privacy, what is? Do insurers have a right to get the records of your grocery purchases to look for unhealthy foods? Should they be able to test your sexual partners for diseases prior to issuing insurance coverage to you? Do they have a right to the medical history of every member of your immediate family?
Insurance and Society
Insurance is valuable to society. It prevents a certain percentage of society from being financially ruined, unable to pay their mortgage, car loan, or even grocery bills. It is not in society's best interest for those people that most need insurance to be denied it. The argument that anything that increases the profits of insurance companies is good is a ludicrous, amoral one. The interests of society outweigh the bottom line of the insurance industry.
Your Premiums
There is another argument made claiming that it is unfair for "healthy" people to pay higher premiums to provide coverage for those that would be screened out by a genetic test. In addition to being incredibly self-centered and greedy, it shows a basic ignorance and denial. Some percentage of these self-proclaimed healthy people that have some genetic predisposition to some disease. They just don't know it yet. Now, ask yourself when your insurance company every lowered your medical premiums because they had better screening for risks.
The Myth that Genetic Testing is a Necessity
Insurance existed and thrived for decades before there was genetic testing. To claim now that the entire industry will be bankrupt if they cannot subject each and every applicant to a barrage of genetic tests as part of the application is preposterous.
The Role of Government
Because the goals of the insurance industry are often not in line with the best interests of society, the government needs to put limits on the insurance companies. In this case, the government has a duty to step in and prevent large portions of society from being denied medical coverage, or even employment, because of a genetic predisposition to an illness.
Applying for medical insurance, whether individually or through an employer, should not trigger a form of genetic Russian Roulette where you go in for a battery of tests and are faced with financial ruin if one comes up positive. While insurance companies need unfettered access to your existing medical records in order to write health insurance policies, the government should deny them the ability to create new health records through additional testing -- genetic and otherwise.
If we permit genetic testing, should infants be tested and, if found to have a gene for some devastating illness, be put into an uninsurable genetic underclass -- destined to be financially ruined? Would we carry it further and deny them schooling, Medicare, and social programs (why spend tax dollars on someone who will probably die at a young age?). Should employers be allowed to refuse to hire them in order to keep from training someone who will probably die soon. Should family members be forced into bankruptcy in order to pay for the medical care of their genetically-flawed loved one?
As I have said before, we are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for themselves and die.
I have a Palm, also, and I use rechargeable NiMH batteries. It's as much for cost and convenience as conservation, but it's less toxic landfill mass nonetheless. I really think that we, as a society, should ban all carbon-zinc and alkaline batteries. NiMH are more efficient, environmentally friendly, and convenient. Sure, you pay $8 for two (it would go down if they became a necessity rather than an option), but you use them hundreds, if not thousands, of times.
I have less faith in solar power than hydroelectric and windmills for generating power for home use..
BTW, most /. people don't like the sig, but I'm glad you did.
Motorized vehicles are banned from almost all bike paths, so that's out. Most beaches prohibit motorized vehicles. With no suspension, your knees and ankles would be shot in about 15 minutes of off-road trail use (plus the tires are too small to clear big roots, holes, etc.) What about on the street? Well, it has too much power to be classified as a moped. It doesn't have the DOT-approved lights, turn signals, brakes, etc. needed for a street motorcycle. It certainly could not pass any of the safety requirements for a car. It looks like it could be fun, but I can't imagine where one would ride it in the U.S.
So, where did you get a computer that consumes no electricity while it processes information for your work and entertainment?
You do not understand the purpose of public debate. It is not to convince your opponent that he is wrong. It is to convince the observers that your opponent is wrong. Ad hominem attacks sway only weak-minded people.
But I have pretty much given up arguing with crazy people
And that, class, was an ad hominem attack.
My personal motivations, real or imagined, are completely irrelevent to the debate. In fact, the link you provided has a perfect analogy to this situation. In that, a priest's anti-abortion arguments are dismissed out of hand because of his religious beliefs. When you attack a person's motivation for making an argument rather than the substance of his argument, it is an ad hominem attack.
You could make this whole debate thing more challenging by not providing links that disprove your arguments.
We are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for themselves and die.
What can I say? I'm honored.
BTW: I'm not anti-Linux. I even run it on one of my home machines. I just wish that there was some way to provide more quality control. Certain people should not be contributing to the open source effort.
Many men underestimate how hard it is to drive while wearing high-heels and stockings. It has taken me years of practice to get good at it...
What a sick, greedy bastard you are to suggest that insurance company profits are so important that people should be subjected to invasive genetic testing in an attempt to weed out those who might actually need the insurance.
You are the one who is confused. Applying for medical insurance should not trigger a form of genetic Russian Roulette where you go in for a battery of tests and are faced with financial ruin if one comes up positive. While insurance companies need access to your existing medical records in order to write health and life insurance policies, they should be denied the option of creating new health records with additional testing.
In your world of genetic discrimination, where would you draw the line? Should infants be tested and, if found to have a gene for some devastating illness, be put into an uninsurable genetic underclass -- destined to be financially ruined? Maybe you could carry it further and deny them schooling, Medicare, and social programs (why spend tax dollars on someone who will probably die at a young age?). Perhaps employers could refuse to hire them in order to keep from training someone who will probably die soon. Should family members be forced into bankruptcy in order to pay for the medical care that their genetically-flawed family members need?
We are supposed to be members of a civilization, not pack animals that leave the weak to fend for themselves and die. If you are lucky enough to remain healthy, your insurance premiums should help someone who is not so fortunate. If given the choice of lowering your insurance premiums or of providing medical and life insurance to those less fortunate, I would choose the latter.