-If such a code is derived and followed, is it signficantly different than a religion? Is the real difference that one admits to being derived by man, while another claims to be derived from deity? -Is it possible for men to derive such a code independantly of religion, given that they will always be informed by religion to some degree?
I see the basic elements, such as "causing suffering" or "harming others" to be predecided moral judgements, and I assume them to be based on common religious themes. Or, I suppose one could make a chicken-and-egg argument, and debate whch came first, the moral code that became religion, or vice-versa.
But my point several levels back was that I believe all moral codes in use today, and any that we could arrive at in the future, would have a basis in past religions.
yes of course; you seem to have missed about two centuries of philosophical debate: start with Kant and keep on reading. You've missed quite a bit, apparently.
So... this would be a very poor substitute for studying 200 years worth of philosophy, but from the link you provided, here is what appears to be a relevant summary:
"With regard to morality, Kant argued that the source of the good lies not in anything outside the human subject, either in nature or given by God, but rather only in a good will. A good will is one that acts in accordance with universal moral laws that the autonomous human being freely gives itself."
If I'm getting the gist, the idea is that the moral code in question does not come from God nor nature, but is an aritrary code derived by man. If someone follows the code, then they are moral (by definition.)
I assume he must have then gone on to come up with some code?
So my question is, how is one of these arbitrary codes practically any different from religion? Especially if one thinks religion is a creation of man?
Hm, so are you of the opinion that religion can have no benefit at all, and that there is a natural moral code completely independant of any religious beliefs?
It's the museum of *natural* history. It's permissible to believe in supernatural history, but it's a category error to suppose that supernatural history deserves a place alongside natural history.
For someone who believes in a creation story, it's a matter of how far back you go. Take the Apple ][. You can have a museum about just the Apple ][ itself, from the directly observable information. I.e. I have an Apple ][, and here are the rules that govern its computation, and here are its circuit designs, etc..
But then people wonder, who created the Apple ][? Is the story complete without knowing how the Apple ][ came about? There will be those who say "I have unearthed from my closet an Apple 1! it is non-functional, and I never finished soldering it together, but we can see the relationship." And others will believe, and declare that the most likely genesis of the Apple ][ is that it evolved over time from the Apple 1, and there's this leap from earlier calculators, and LED football, and we must be missing some of the fossil record or something.
And then there will be those who believe in Woz. They shall say, I have read the writings of Woz, and found them to be true! I have studied the circuit diagrams, and ROM monitor dumps, which can only be the work of a creator. Sure, modern Apple ]['s have floating-point BASIC, and maybe some later creator has added to the Apple ][, but the hand of the Woz in the Apple ][ is clear. There can be no denying the existance of Woz.
Fair enough. And I think that it's only fair that those who aren't religious shouldn't benefit from moral codes. They don't get the right to not be harmed by a more physically powerful opponent. And no holiday presents.
Yup, I thought I had finished reading the article, but I had gotten distracted and didn't read that far. My fault.
I was hoping that Dan had done some remote scanning. When I looked at the rootkit, I noticed that it registered a named pipe, which ought to be remotely reachable, and probably exploitable.
I'm struggling to remember any time I had to type in the sysadmin password when I wasn't installing software.
That's the problem. Clueless mac user is probably expecting to be installing software about then. The CD told them they need a player to see the dancing pigs, for example.
If the school is still responsible for the kids while they are walking home, then the school is doing a lousy job keeping an eye on them.
I suppose the school can try to have whatever policy they like, but I don't think it's any of their business whether the kids violate city ordinances on their own time. I would hope to see such a policy get shot down in a similar manner.
And yet there have been way too many cases where school officials punish a student for something done off-campus. I can think of several on-line posting examples like this one, and one case where a student was suspended because a principal saw her jaywalking around town, or similar.
IMO, if there is no backdoor, there is no rootkit,
You're welcome to your opinion, but be aware that it differs from those that work in the AV industry, InfoSec companies, and Rootkit authors themselves.
Uh... the point of the original article is that Sony is shipping DRM in the form of a rootkit on their CDs. The rootkit appears to have been licensed from the company you link to. I'm not sure what point you were trying to make. You appear to be agreeing with me that they are the likely sellers of said rootkit.
If you read the article, there's a strong implication that this is a purchased commercial rootkit. Presumably, Sony very deliberately licensed and distributed it.
Mark didn't get into a lot of detail about all of the functions, but he didn't mention any backdoors or phone home functionality.
For that sort of thing, you might be better off pondering the halting problem.
For example, some of us were having a discussion on a secure programming mailing list one day. The halting problems says you can't write a program that can determine if all other possible programs will halt. It made me wonder whether programmers could determine if all programs had security problems or not. We decided that boiled down to whether the human brain was a Turing machine or not.
This is the first musical taste-type service I've tried that has gotten anywhere close to accurate. In fact, I've found around 10 of the last 15 or so rather likeable. And they have the Dance Hall Crashers listed, which is a great sign.
As to questions about "what if you like both foo and bar styles?" You start with one song or band, and it makes a "channel" out of that type. If you want to explore a different genre, I assume you start over.
Who actually did the stealing? The theives, of course.
And yet... if you load your car to a friend, and he doesn't return it when you wanted, the policy and your insurance company do not consider it stolen.
I'm impressed, someone who actually knows how to write a workable policy. Well, workable if you're still trying to keep the machines locked down to a particular config.
My policy would be something more like:
1) Students caught using the admin account with the standard password will have their machines temporarily confiscated, and the admin password changed to a password unique to that machine. 2) Students caught using the new admin account will be made lab assistants.
Slashdot Mirror
But my questions are:
-If such a code is derived and followed, is it signficantly different than a religion? Is the real difference that one admits to being derived by man, while another claims to be derived from deity?
-Is it possible for men to derive such a code independantly of religion, given that they will always be informed by religion to some degree?
I see the basic elements, such as "causing suffering" or "harming others" to be predecided moral judgements, and I assume them to be based on common religious themes. Or, I suppose one could make a chicken-and-egg argument, and debate whch came first, the moral code that became religion, or vice-versa.
But my point several levels back was that I believe all moral codes in use today, and any that we could arrive at in the future, would have a basis in past religions.
yes of course; you seem to have missed about two centuries of philosophical debate: start with Kant and keep on reading. You've missed quite a bit, apparently.
So... this would be a very poor substitute for studying 200 years worth of philosophy, but from the link you provided, here is what appears to be a relevant summary:
"With regard to morality, Kant argued that the source of the good lies not in anything outside the human subject, either in nature or given by God, but rather only in a good will. A good will is one that acts in accordance with universal moral laws that the autonomous human being freely gives itself."
If I'm getting the gist, the idea is that the moral code in question does not come from God nor nature, but is an aritrary code derived by man. If someone follows the code, then they are moral (by definition.)
I assume he must have then gone on to come up with some code?
So my question is, how is one of these arbitrary codes practically any different from religion? Especially if one thinks religion is a creation of man?
Hm, so are you of the opinion that religion can have no benefit at all, and that there is a natural moral code completely independant of any religious beliefs?
It's the museum of *natural* history. It's permissible to believe in supernatural history, but it's a category error to suppose that supernatural history deserves a place alongside natural history.
For someone who believes in a creation story, it's a matter of how far back you go. Take the Apple ][. You can have a museum about just the Apple ][ itself, from the directly observable information. I.e. I have an Apple ][, and here are the rules that govern its computation, and here are its circuit designs, etc..
But then people wonder, who created the Apple ][? Is the story complete without knowing how the Apple ][ came about? There will be those who say "I have unearthed from my closet an Apple 1! it is non-functional, and I never finished soldering it together, but we can see the relationship." And others will believe, and declare that the most likely genesis of the Apple ][ is that it evolved over time from the Apple 1, and there's this leap from earlier calculators, and LED football, and we must be missing some of the fossil record or something.
And then there will be those who believe in Woz. They shall say, I have read the writings of Woz, and found them to be true! I have studied the circuit diagrams, and ROM monitor dumps, which can only be the work of a creator. Sure, modern Apple ]['s have floating-point BASIC, and maybe some later creator has added to the Apple ][, but the hand of the Woz in the Apple ][ is clear. There can be no denying the existance of Woz.
Fair enough. And I think that it's only fair that those who aren't religious shouldn't benefit from moral codes. They don't get the right to not be harmed by a more physically powerful opponent. And no holiday presents.
Yup, I thought I had finished reading the article, but I had gotten distracted and didn't read that far. My fault.
I was hoping that Dan had done some remote scanning. When I looked at the rootkit, I noticed that it registered a named pipe, which ought to be remotely reachable, and probably exploitable.
What did you do to check? Are you checking DNS Cache status, or are you scanning over RPC for the named pipe it installs?
I'm struggling to remember any time I had to type in the sysadmin password when I wasn't installing software.
That's the problem. Clueless mac user is probably expecting to be installing software about then. The CD told them they need a player to see the dancing pigs, for example.
Interesting. Does that mean the school has any responsibilities during the trip home, too?
If the school is still responsible for the kids while they are walking home, then the school is doing a lousy job keeping an eye on them.
I suppose the school can try to have whatever policy they like, but I don't think it's any of their business whether the kids violate city ordinances on their own time. I would hope to see such a policy get shot down in a similar manner.
And yet there have been way too many cases where school officials punish a student for something done off-campus. I can think of several on-line posting examples like this one, and one case where a student was suspended because a principal saw her jaywalking around town, or similar.
I'm happy to see this ruling.
IMO, if there is no backdoor, there is no rootkit,
You're welcome to your opinion, but be aware that it differs from those that work in the AV industry, InfoSec companies, and Rootkit authors themselves.
Uh... the point of the original article is that Sony is shipping DRM in the form of a rootkit on their CDs. The rootkit appears to have been licensed from the company you link to. I'm not sure what point you were trying to make. You appear to be agreeing with me that they are the likely sellers of said rootkit.
If you read the article, there's a strong implication that this is a purchased commercial rootkit. Presumably, Sony very deliberately licensed and distributed it.
Mark didn't get into a lot of detail about all of the functions, but he didn't mention any backdoors or phone home functionality.
I use spamassassin on my server and junkmatcher on my client.
So, what did it cost you for the extra resources to run those?
Will I be notified, if they find out I'm a victim??
The pills didn't work?
For that sort of thing, you might be better off pondering the halting problem.
For example, some of us were having a discussion on a secure programming mailing list one day. The halting problems says you can't write a program that can determine if all other possible programs will halt. It made me wonder whether programmers could determine if all programs had security problems or not. We decided that boiled down to whether the human brain was a Turing machine or not.
Oh. So it's not "make two rolls of quarters, so they are all on their edges"?
This is the first musical taste-type service I've tried that has gotten anywhere close to accurate. In fact, I've found around 10 of the last 15 or so rather likeable. And they have the Dance Hall Crashers listed, which is a great sign.
As to questions about "what if you like both foo and bar styles?" You start with one song or band, and it makes a "channel" out of that type. If you want to explore a different genre, I assume you start over.
It's also full songs, decent quality.
Overall, pretty nice.
Who actually did the stealing? The theives, of course.
And yet... if you load your car to a friend, and he doesn't return it when you wanted, the policy and your insurance company do not consider it stolen.
I'm impressed, someone who actually knows how to write a workable policy. Well, workable if you're still trying to keep the machines locked down to a particular config.
My policy would be something more like:
1) Students caught using the admin account with the standard password will have their machines temporarily confiscated, and the admin password changed to a password unique to that machine.
2) Students caught using the new admin account will be made lab assistants.
That's one popular theory. But I suspect we're too into the instant gratification for that kind of thing nowadays.
You mean like Ebola mutating into another species ... um, sure, that worked really well ...
Oh? Did we give up and all die off already?
I dunno, what if such a mutation cropped up on its own without any help from us? I imagine we'd figure it out and handle it either way.
Are they using the intelligent design method, or the waiting around to see what happens on its own method?