We would, however, do well to remember that whatever powers we grant to the government we have we also grant to the government we would like to have and to the government we fear.
I'm not just talking about partisan swings in the composition of the government - the difference between Democrats and Republicans, Labor and Conservitive. As Wiemar Germany proved, Despotism - even Facism and Nazism - can rise from a Democratic-Republic.
The assumption that all of your arguments hinge upon is that your government is benevolent now and will continue to be benevolent in the future. This is not necessarily a valid assumption. Governement is eratic, unstable, and often capable of massive and unexpected change.
Much as you would think twice about giving a loaded handgun to a four year old, you should also think twice about expanding the powers of a government.
I'm in no way saying that all government is bad or that all expansions of governmental power are bad -- I'm simply stating that each increase should be measured by its consequences - both immediate and potential.
... which is a pitty. More Americans might start to care about the political process if they did.
That and a steel cage death match between John "Decorated Veteran" Kerry and George "AWOL From the Champaign Squadron" Bush would have been hysterical.
Great read - you'll learn a lot about the history of the search buisness. Slashdot probably did a book review, but I hate trying to find old/. articles.
Has anyone else read "The Search?" In it, the author discusses how Google's search logs could be utilized as a kind of "database of intentions" if you could apply sufficiently sophisticated datamining techniqes to it. In other words - that based on a persons past search history you can construe not just what they searched for, but what they were really LOOKING for - and infer other things that such a person might want or do.
Einstein is also credited with a huge crossover from the theoretical to the applied aspects of physics. As a population, we tend to see the theoretical side of physics as more complex and intimidating, but the applied side as more down to earth and relevant to our day to day lives.
Einstein's work straddled this line within his lifetime, making him a figure of daunting intellectual prowess and yet still accessable (in some small manner) by the average man. Surely this combination of theory and practice has strengthened his legacy.
More over, Einstein lived at the height of the modernist movement in world history - a time when advances in technology could do no wrong. In the minds of many (and they would be wrong) he single-handedly brought about the revolution in the views society holds on technology. While Einstein is not to be entirely credited or blamed for post-modernism, he is often thought of as the turning point by the public at large.
Information technology, more than any other force, has accelerated the theoretical side of physics away from the applied aspects of the same. We are capable of manipulating mathematics with far greater precision and finess than the physical world we inhabit. As a consequence, it would seem unlikely that any physicist will straddle that line between the theoretical and applied worlds in the near future.
While the Crockett was clearly intended as a infantry level nuclear weapon (perhaps the most tactical of tactical nukes) it is incorrect to infer that the United States had a "first strike" posture based on this weapon's existance.
Consider this - the overwhelming majority of US strategic weapons were placed in hardened silos and in nuclear submarines. The Soviet arsonal, in contrast, was deployed on truck-beds and on free-standing launch scaffolds.
Soviet strategic weapons were thus designed for a first strike, being themselves completely unprotected from a US frist strike. The Soviets expected to launch first thus making the hardening of their weapons systems irrelevant.
In most senarios, there are two wars going on at the same time. A simultanious conventional thrust by the Soviets in Europe and a strategic nuclear strike on US assets would be met with US resistance in Europe (incorporating tatical weapons) and a strategic responce from submarines and hardened silos across the United States and other NATO allies.
Europe is the prize in this hypothetical senario - and as such it is unlikely that full yeild strategic weapons would be used in the Europen theater. The Crockett and others like it were designed to deal with massed troop movements without destroying Europe - which was seen as the key to strategic dominance by both the Soviets and the United States.
RSS might be better used with other technologies to provide automated distribution of video and audio content. Right - so that's XML really, as opposed to RSS in the strictest sense -- but then 99% of the planet seems convinced that the world wide web is the Internet.
Bloging could replace MSM, but only with the silver bullet of some kind of agrrigation and filtration device.
In short - if there existed some program that would scan all those RSS feeds and deliver only the stories I gave a shit about - then they might have a chance.
More realisticaly, blogging serves to provide a democritizing influence to the oligarchical strictures of the MSM. The two can work quite effectively together, as we saw in the 2004 election cycle.
Ah! A kindred spirit. You might want to check out fusebox if you haven't allready. I find that the MVC system works wonderfully therein and that fusebox's layout system takes 90% of the headache out of the layout files.
Even though it's built to work primarly with Cold Fusion, there's a Fusebox port - which as long as you don't need to build a HUGE application works really well.
No - because you're still thinking like a computer programmer and not like a computer user. The concept of modular code is totally foreign to the average user. The silver bullet as far as "programming by the masses" is natural language processing and universal data abstraction. Of course, that's a long way off - but if we can ever get a system that understands not just what I'm saying - but what I really MEAN (incorporating context that I don't even directly communicate) then you might have the kind of universally programable system you want.
I'm simply stating that, when the aircraft has serious design problems, a bunch of people have to pick up little shards of metal in the desert.
When the voting machine fails, it might loose a few votes - and then you end up questioning if the test was preformed correctly.
Spectacular failure is less common with software (though not unheard of) and Boeing can't tell you that you're not allowed to look at the wing design when you buy it's airplanes.
In fact, where advancement is needed the most, the incentive for profit is increased, because, unsurprisingly, the chance for big rewards leads people to take big risks.
Risks are called that for a reason. If Boeing wants to take risks developing an aircraft that's their buisness. We're not (supposed to be) obligated to buy it - and if it crashes into the desert, it's abundantly clear that it didn't work.
But voting machines are a different beast. If they don't work (and this is only more of a problem without a paper trail) it's very difficult to prove it. So the real question is this -- do we want people taking risks with the electoral process?
Ultimately there needs to be some metric by which Diebold's (and it's competitors') machines are judged. In the absence of that metric, a free market is impossible and they are quite literally taking risks with our Republic.
I started bloging in February of 2004 and, at the time, I wasn't really happy with any of the bloging software packages out there - so I wrote my own. I'm not claiming it's iron clad, and it's certainly not for everyone but as it turns out, writing your own isn't all that difficult.
I had problems with blog spammers for a while, but implementing even a simple captcha system solved that problem.
Over all, I really enjoyed the project. I think I spend a lot more time writing for my blog because I know the software is something I built and so I have more invested personally in it. If you find yourself looking at the offerings out there and don't really feel all that happy with any of them, I strongly recomend trying your own hand at it. Blog software isn't all that hard to write and having total control over the engine makes the whole site more personal.
Re:Sensationalist Journalism?
on
A Flu Pandemic?
·
· Score: 1
Or we could treat the young victims with a mild dose of Prednisone or some other immunosuppresent steroid.
Re:Seriously : you *can* eat chicken meat.
on
A Flu Pandemic?
·
· Score: 1
Can't eat chicken -- might get bird flu Can't eat beef -- might get mad cow Can't eat pork - might get trichanosis
Vegetarians! The other other white meat.
Re:No, I've just studied it.
on
A Flu Pandemic?
·
· Score: 1
How about even worse... lets postulate 10 years of incubation with a 100% untreated mortality rate, transmissible by fluid but not aerosol.
Wait... that's HIV/AIDS!
So what would happen? Well it would suck to live in Africa.
Slashdot Mirror
Your men are already dead
We would, however, do well to remember that whatever powers we grant to the government we have we also grant to the government we would like to have and to the government we fear.
I'm not just talking about partisan swings in the composition of the government - the difference between Democrats and Republicans, Labor and Conservitive. As Wiemar Germany proved, Despotism - even Facism and Nazism - can rise from a Democratic-Republic.
The assumption that all of your arguments hinge upon is that your government is benevolent now and will continue to be benevolent in the future. This is not necessarily a valid assumption. Governement is eratic, unstable, and often capable of massive and unexpected change.
Much as you would think twice about giving a loaded handgun to a four year old, you should also think twice about expanding the powers of a government.
I'm in no way saying that all government is bad or that all expansions of governmental power are bad -- I'm simply stating that each increase should be measured by its consequences - both immediate and potential.
That's in large part because a big chunk of Europe also belived it -- and used Enigma machines to encrypt diplomatic traffic well into the 1960s.
We declasified the break because the machines went out of service.
... which is a pitty. More Americans might start to care about the political process if they did.
That and a steel cage death match between John "Decorated Veteran" Kerry and George "AWOL From the Champaign Squadron" Bush would have been hysterical.
Sorry. The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture (Hardcover) (Clicky-pops).
/. articles.
Great read - you'll learn a lot about the history of the search buisness. Slashdot probably did a book review, but I hate trying to find old
Has anyone else read "The Search?" In it, the author discusses how Google's search logs could be utilized as a kind of "database of intentions" if you could apply sufficiently sophisticated datamining techniqes to it. In other words - that based on a persons past search history you can construe not just what they searched for, but what they were really LOOKING for - and infer other things that such a person might want or do.
Scary
It's not a coincidence that military ambitian and space exploration go hand in hand.
What message do you think the Soviets got when we hit the Sea of Tranquility with a rocket? "We can hit the moon, we can for damn sure hit Moscow."
Einstein is also credited with a huge crossover from the theoretical to the applied aspects of physics. As a population, we tend to see the theoretical side of physics as more complex and intimidating, but the applied side as more down to earth and relevant to our day to day lives.
Einstein's work straddled this line within his lifetime, making him a figure of daunting intellectual prowess and yet still accessable (in some small manner) by the average man. Surely this combination of theory and practice has strengthened his legacy.
More over, Einstein lived at the height of the modernist movement in world history - a time when advances in technology could do no wrong. In the minds of many (and they would be wrong) he single-handedly brought about the revolution in the views society holds on technology. While Einstein is not to be entirely credited or blamed for post-modernism, he is often thought of as the turning point by the public at large.
Information technology, more than any other force, has accelerated the theoretical side of physics away from the applied aspects of the same. We are capable of manipulating mathematics with far greater precision and finess than the physical world we inhabit. As a consequence, it would seem unlikely that any physicist will straddle that line between the theoretical and applied worlds in the near future.
While the Crockett was clearly intended as a infantry level nuclear weapon (perhaps the most tactical of tactical nukes) it is incorrect to infer that the United States had a "first strike" posture based on this weapon's existance.
Consider this - the overwhelming majority of US strategic weapons were placed in hardened silos and in nuclear submarines. The Soviet arsonal, in contrast, was deployed on truck-beds and on free-standing launch scaffolds.
Soviet strategic weapons were thus designed for a first strike, being themselves completely unprotected from a US frist strike. The Soviets expected to launch first thus making the hardening of their weapons systems irrelevant.
In most senarios, there are two wars going on at the same time. A simultanious conventional thrust by the Soviets in Europe and a strategic nuclear strike on US assets would be met with US resistance in Europe (incorporating tatical weapons) and a strategic responce from submarines and hardened silos across the United States and other NATO allies.
Europe is the prize in this hypothetical senario - and as such it is unlikely that full yeild strategic weapons would be used in the Europen theater. The Crockett and others like it were designed to deal with massed troop movements without destroying Europe - which was seen as the key to strategic dominance by both the Soviets and the United States.
RSS is lost on text - because it is text itself.
RSS might be better used with other technologies to provide automated distribution of video and audio content. Right - so that's XML really, as opposed to RSS in the strictest sense -- but then 99% of the planet seems convinced that the world wide web is the Internet.
Bloging could replace MSM, but only with the silver bullet of some kind of agrrigation and filtration device.
In short - if there existed some program that would scan all those RSS feeds and deliver only the stories I gave a shit about - then they might have a chance.
More realisticaly, blogging serves to provide a democritizing influence to the oligarchical strictures of the MSM. The two can work quite effectively together, as we saw in the 2004 election cycle.
They'll tell you, very politely, to go away the first few times you try. Be persistant.
Ah! A kindred spirit. You might want to check out fusebox if you haven't allready. I find that the MVC system works wonderfully therein and that fusebox's layout system takes 90% of the headache out of the layout files.
Even though it's built to work primarly with Cold Fusion, there's a Fusebox port - which as long as you don't need to build a HUGE application works really well.
Code reusability and generality is key
No - because you're still thinking like a computer programmer and not like a computer user. The concept of modular code is totally foreign to the average user. The silver bullet as far as "programming by the masses" is natural language processing and universal data abstraction. Of course, that's a long way off - but if we can ever get a system that understands not just what I'm saying - but what I really MEAN (incorporating context that I don't even directly communicate) then you might have the kind of universally programable system you want.
And those jerks will be the first against the wall when it comes*.
* Encyclopedia Galactica: Volume 23. Published 3241, Sirius Quadrent.
I still think there's something deeply wrong with the fact that I have to pay postage on my taxes.
Though to be fair, if my father in law didn't have to pay postage, he'd mail the IRS pennies.
I guess I got lost in my own point there.
I'm simply stating that, when the aircraft has serious design problems, a bunch of people have to pick up little shards of metal in the desert.
When the voting machine fails, it might loose a few votes - and then you end up questioning if the test was preformed correctly.
Spectacular failure is less common with software (though not unheard of) and Boeing can't tell you that you're not allowed to look at the wing design when you buy it's airplanes.
In fact, where advancement is needed the most, the incentive for profit is increased, because, unsurprisingly, the chance for big rewards leads people to take big risks.
Risks are called that for a reason. If Boeing wants to take risks developing an aircraft that's their buisness. We're not (supposed to be) obligated to buy it - and if it crashes into the desert, it's abundantly clear that it didn't work.
But voting machines are a different beast. If they don't work (and this is only more of a problem without a paper trail) it's very difficult to prove it. So the real question is this -- do we want people taking risks with the electoral process?
Ultimately there needs to be some metric by which Diebold's (and it's competitors') machines are judged. In the absence of that metric, a free market is impossible and they are quite literally taking risks with our Republic.
Sorry about that. I'd just done an age advancement so I had five of them on hand and they were mining just north of my city.
n n00b bt 1 do byt my thm sr
I started bloging in February of 2004 and, at the time, I wasn't really happy with any of the bloging software packages out there - so I wrote my own. I'm not claiming it's iron clad, and it's certainly not for everyone but as it turns out, writing your own isn't all that difficult.
I had problems with blog spammers for a while, but implementing even a simple captcha system solved that problem.
Over all, I really enjoyed the project. I think I spend a lot more time writing for my blog because I know the software is something I built and so I have more invested personally in it. If you find yourself looking at the offerings out there and don't really feel all that happy with any of them, I strongly recomend trying your own hand at it. Blog software isn't all that hard to write and having total control over the engine makes the whole site more personal.
Or we could treat the young victims with a mild dose of Prednisone or some other immunosuppresent steroid.
Can't eat chicken -- might get bird flu
Can't eat beef -- might get mad cow
Can't eat pork - might get trichanosis
Vegetarians! The other other white meat.
How about even worse... lets postulate 10 years of incubation with a 100% untreated mortality rate, transmissible by fluid but not aerosol.
Wait... that's HIV/AIDS!
So what would happen? Well it would suck to live in Africa.
Then our society will be divided into two classes: (1) those in jail, and (2) those who aren't in jail yet.
Fixed that for you.