Also, I often use constructs like % for i in foo bar baz; do echo somecommand $i; done before removing the 'echo' part.
Me too. Except I'm lazy (used to code Perl a lot, now mostly Korn shell) so I just type ^P^E|sh^M I know it only saves a keystroke or two. However it also makes it easy to type |sudo sh instead, or add another grep to filter out unwanted commands, etc. I guess that counts as a habit.
Does GNU tar have an embedded EMACS as well? (or will GNU tar users have to wait for the next version?)
Well, at least Michael Stutz compensated for the lacking -z in tar by adding a superfluous -1 option to ls at the beginning of a pipe. I think most ls implementations check whether stdout goes to a terminal to decide whether output should be columnized.
Not only is it silly, but the example given in Listing 4 is WRONG: tar xvf -C tmp/a/b/c newarc.tar.gz will not work, unless there is a version of tar which implies -z given -C. (Someone else already mentioned the misplacement of -C as the filename for -f.) And of course, relying on -z options for tar will not work portably (including versions of AIX, though I'm not sure about AIX 5). This is a case where zcat (given a zcat that knows gzip) should be used: zcat arc.tar.gz| tar xvf -
The latter also works nicely across machine boundaries: zcat arc.tar.gz| ssh user@foo 'cd tmp/a/b/c ; tar xvf -' (or, better: cat arc.tar.gz| ssh user@foo 'cd tmp/a/b/c ; zcat|tar xvf -' ) I doubt -C does that. Of course use && instead of ; if there is any doubt whether the directory exists. This way you don't even have to move the tar file if you want to uncompress it on a different machine. (I suppose some GNU guy will read this and add another option --unpack-at-host which does the same, given the already prolific amount of unneccessary options to GNUtar. (Next thing I know, someone will tell me that option already exists.))
Another error: the command in Listing 7 also fails if tmp/a/b/c exists, because it will be in tmp/a/b/c when the tar command is executed, and thus the -C command will try to cd to a most likely nonexisting relative path. Perhaps it would be a good idea using test -d instead of the context-destructive cd for the condition, or maybe use an absolute path for the -C option. So many errors and I have only read less than one third of the "good habits" yet, wow!
I will make a note of the author's name (Michael Stutz) as a person whose statements should not be trusted without thorough scrutiny.
Moses Hansen is certainly a born-again nut, with several screws and bolts loose, but he's also entertaining, which I think is an endearing trait. Also, wihtout a cause to fight against, he'd be lost, so he actually needs pornography more than most. This has been most obvious as he has had a booth at the annual "Erotica" Fair. If I am not mistaken, he was actually sharing the stage with strippers, thundering against sins right after they did a show?
I do miss Jens Jørgen Thorsen (renowned Danish artist) however. We don't have many entertaining provocateurs left on our side anymore. Nobody could paint with his dick like he did.
Anyway, even though there are more moralists than I'd like here (also non-religious ones like Vikebe Manniche) they are more or less balanced out. And I don't worry much about them, just watch them with awareness and curiosity.
No, we probably don't disagree. At least we don't, if we first agree that food is _also_ an object which is consumed. I didn't say sex was *just* an object, or a gratification of a desire, or lust. But it is *also* that. And *sometimes* it may *just* be that. There's nothing terribly wrong with mindlessly consuming a 200 g bar of chocolate or a bag of chips in front of the TV now and then. There's something wrong with it if you do it every day, and in the process become obese and isolated. And it certainly isn't a healthy diet for kids.
The exact same point applies to sex and pornography. Banning pornography and nudity is equivalent to forbidding the display of chips *and* potatos because chips are unhealty. Being a father I certainly agree with you that kids ideally shouldn't be exposed to hard-core SM porn, but I also think that if it should happen, it would be my responsibility to explain it to them in a manner they would understand. And that way I doubt it could harm them. What *would* harm them was if I were to make a big fuss about it, because I was incapable of dealing rationally with it myself.
And exposure to nudity in general, model pictures, music videos, "erotic art", etc, should not be a problem at all, except for the fact that there usually is too much focus on thin models, promoting a bad ideal for girls. Seeing naked people of all sizes, sexes, colors and shapes - including various decorations - is educational, not harmful. Why is it OK to see pubescent African tribal girls with scarification tatoos and bare breasts in National Geographic, but the pierced nipple of Janet Jackson is not OK?
Apologies if you are Texan yourself and offended by ny rant against Texans. Naturally there are always exceptions to the rules. And as the other reply to my post made clear, we Danes certainly have our share of religious (and also non-religious feminist) nutters. I am aware of that. But contrary to Texas, they don't get to make the rules here (at least not yet.) And of course, Texas is a sexually liberated heaven compared to countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia, or China for that matter. This is definitely not only a matter of religion versus non-religion.
By that reasoning, food should be outlawed. After all, food is 100% addictive. I am sure all 6.something billion of us are strongly addicted to food, and prefer to consume it every day. Better outlaw public food consumption, food recipes, restaurants (gastronomic brothels!) etc. Oh, let's not forget air!
Sex, conducted safely (which is more likely the case when performed by well-informed participants) is not unhealthy. You don't die from premarital intercourse. Masturbating while looking at pornography is even less dangerous. You die from smoking. Comparing pornography to tobacco is outrageously silly. Are you a Texan by any chance?
Not a flame but a curious (and skeptical) comment. You don't provide any references, but a search on Google revealed a possible candidate to represent such findings: http://www.frankwbaker.com/explicit_media.htm. As you don't provide any context, for the sake of argument, I will assume that this Texan study is what you were referring to. Apologies, disclaimers, etc.
Now, pardon me, but I am rather skeptical of any research of this matter conducted in the fatherland of prudes: Texas. Even if the media may show some flesh (mostly in music videos, I presume) the society in general disapproves, meaning that the signals those children and teenagers receive is very mixed. No wonder if they get confused about their sexuality and the role of sexual appeal in interpersonal relations.
In Denmark, there is a far more liberal attitude in general (although by no means completely liberal) and I believe studies here show that the debut age has not been lowered significantly, nor that boys treat girls any worse. If anything, the girls have become more aware of their sexuality. One thing that has been shown, however, is that the adolescents are more experimentative in their sexuality (experimenting with anal sex, for example.) However this can only be considered bad if you consider adolescent experimentation bad in general. In practice, the kids are setting new norms for themselves, and though these norms may be different from those of their parents, they are not implicitly bad or unhealthy. The awareness also means that the teenagers are well-informed about STDs and contraceptives, and teenage pregnancies, while not totally unknown, are not very frequent.
A recent report from Norway showed that as a result of providing free contraceptive pills to women age 16-19, there has been a significant decline in abortions. They are considering extending the offer to the age of 25. Danish health authorities believe that focus should remain on promoting condoms, as they also prevent STDs. In Denmark the rate of abortions (ie. teenage pregnancies, as I believe most of such pregnancies result in an abortion) has increase by 1 over the last decade, and is now 16 in 1000. Compare this with one of the first results I see when I search Google for "teenage pregnancies texas", stating "In 2001, the Texas teen (15-17) pregnancy rate was 46.0/1,000". (http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/famplan/pdf/Teen01.pd f) That's more than four per cent! I apologize for not providing more comparable numbers. Wait, found some: http://www.ugeskriftet.dk/portal/page/portal/LAEGE RDK/UGESKRIFT_FOR_LAEGER/TIDLIGERE_NUMRE/2002/UFL_ 2002_24/UFL__2002_24_35346 - the Danish Medical weekly) This study showed a decline in teenage pregnancies from 9.2/1000 (fertile women age 15-19) in 1986 to 7.7/1000 in 1998 for the county in which the study was performed. The average for all of Denmark may be larger, but still the numbers are significantly lower than in Texas. The only obvious conclusion to me is that Texan teenagers are literally fucked up, not by sexually explicit imagry, but by a sexually repressive, hypocritical and unsound society.
So, to sum up, I belive that your "researchers" are pretty clearly biased. Texans, obviously. If Texan children "don't develop healthy behaviors around sexual issues" (and why should premarital sex not be healthy, if done safely?) it's not because of dirty pictures, but because of a dirtyminded AND narrowminded society. OK, so this turned into a flame after all.
Sex is just as much an "object", as food is. Food can be part of a complex relationship, something you enjoy by yourself, or something you just eat to get instant gratification because you're hungry. May I suggest for you prudent Americans, that you block cooking recipes and other food pages on the web? Af
Although Saudi Arabia is rather worse, Swedes - by Danish standards - are prude and repressed. Norway is even worse. And the homophobic Faeroe Islands are more or less Atlantic talibans, only christian. I frankly don't know about Finland.
I hate it when people use "globally" and "enforced" next to each other.
I sincerely hope that all erotophobic Americans will do what they preach and stop reproducing once and for all. Preferably they should realize like the bald eagle in the Muppet Show, that we are all naked under our clothes, and as a consequence commit suicide.
-Lasse
(Who will not set his foot on U.S. soil until perhaps the day when the First Lady is a black, atheist *lesbian*. Preferably one with a scientific degree in biology.)
For those who don't know: ASN.1 (Abstract Syntax Notation 1) is an ISO syntax notation which I believe was developed for defining packets and other stuff used in the OSI standards suite. It is also used in many popular Internet protocols and standards, such as Z39.50 (WAIS), SNMP, LDAP and PKI. (Just to mention a few.)
There are a few different encoding rules (mappings to binary), and I suppose a readable encoding - even an XML-like encoding - would be possible, although I don't know if one already exists.
Actually, this is the victory for the Mac (from the other blog entry, by Moishe Lettvin):
My team had a very talented UI designer and my particular feature had a good, headstrong program manager with strong ideas about user experience. We had a Mac that we looked to as a paragon of clean UI. Of course the Shell team also had some great UI designers and numerous good, headstrong PMs who valued (I can only assume) simplicity and so on. Perhaps they had a Mac too
Personally, I dislike the Mac OS X interface, and prefer the original system 6/7 interface, the Apple HIG people did lots of great work, and it showed. But in any case, the above quote said all that needed to be said.
Windows 95 = Mac 84, etc.
(The real problem we face today, however, is that nowhere is a new Doug Engelbart, or Alan Kay, or Jef Raskin, or Bruce Tognazzini, or Ted Nelson, etc to be found. Human interface research seems to have stagnated. Apparantly the interface we use now is good enough - worse is always better. What a pity. Oh well, I can get by OK with XFCE and some xterms on my NetBSD laptop.)
Let's have a philosophical discussion about the existence of stamps then. A stamp is a printed piece of paper, which is collected by stamp collectors. They attribute a value to it, which is not proportional. From a postal point of view, a stamp is merely a convenient mark to place on a letter, to indicate that the sender has paid for its transport to the receiver. The actual payment, that is, the value exchanged in return for the transport, including any surcharge, is in the account of the postal service. This value has nothing to do with the value of the stamp from a collecting point of view. I will assert that the reason stamp collectors collect stamps is the consentual attribution of value to something which is in essence worthless. Never mind that it has a physical representation in shape of a tiny piece of paper. If you made your own tiny pieces of printed paper, no stamp collector would be interested, unless you could convince him that your forgery was the "real" thing. Therefore the physical manifestation is irrelevant to the value attribution. (It is actually difficult to discuss this, because it is deeply irrational.)
This is actually what bothers me most with militant atheists: their obsession with rationality. Any person who claims to be completely rational, is a liar, a hypocrite, and a foolish reductionist. The human mind is complex enough to deal sensibly with irrationality, and fundamentally we act out of irrational desires, not out of de-liberated (pun intended!) argument chains. We can and must deal with meaninglessness every day, every second, and we are surprisingly good at it. So good at it that we can even deceive ourselves into believing this is not the case, believing that we exist in a rational world.
So, as an atheist, I do not believe in any god. I do believe, however that many people act as if a god existed, and that the _concept_ of a god exists. In other words, gods exist in people's minds. I can adapt to this fact, and as long as it doesn't conflict with my interests, I can certainly live with it. I can understand it to some degree. After all, I have my own quirks, or irrational beliefs and desires, that make no sense.
As for _using_ stamps, well, yes. As a knowingly irrational atheist, I can also use "God". Or Santa Claus. Or my invisible friend. Or use "The Force". I don't have to believe in it. Or I can believe, and not believe at the same time. The effect is purely psychological. Of course I don't believe that sheer willpower or belief will directly move a physical object, but only when I use that willpower to do it myself, or convince others to move it for me. But in that way, irrational beliefs resulted in the building of the pyramids, so their power should not be underestimated. Which is what I think most "strong atheists" (or. to use the words of William Bateson: "empty-headed atheists") do.
One way to have divinity influence the physical world is through a random number generator - an entropy source. You simply call all desirable outcomes "divine", and all undesirable outcomes "satanic". Voila! There you have Pascal's proof of God.
I think more atheists should spend some time reading Pascal, Blake, Nietzsche, and Schiller. As far as I can tell, they all possessed profound insight in the psychological importance of irrationality.
Of course your response to an invalid generalization was appropriate, and you are also free to do whatever you want.
Personally, I don't find a conflict between being an atheist, and attending weddings, and other religious ceremonies. I don't _participate_ in them, I am only present as an observer. I find evangelistic or missionary atheism odd. Just as I find organisations for atheists odd. For me, atheism is like non-philately. I don't believe in any kind of god, and I don't collect stamps. I wouldn't join an organisation of non-stamp-collectors, but if I were to visit a friend who is a stamp collector while some other stamp collectors were present, and my friend was going to show his latest achievement in the hobby, I wouldn't make a fuss and leave the room while this happened. I would watch politely, maybe insert a little joke about "a silly obsession with small rectangular bits of paper with jagged edges".
Religion is a disease of the mind, but as such, it is not usually contagious. Especially not if you are immune. A person who can be offended by other people displaying religious behaviour is a person who I would characterize as religious. Atheism as a religion is just as silly and insane as any other religion.
And after their useful time as housing runs out, we could just bury them in abandoned mines, like we do with nuclear waste. The wood wouldn't even need quite the same precautions, as it's not terribly radioactive.
In paleontological times, the Carbon sinks (which I suppose they should be called, rather than CO2 sinks) were what we know today as coal mines and oil fields.
I wonder: does anyone know the approximate amount of CO2 released from the fossile fuels in the relatively short period of time where such fuels have been used? (Since the bronze age, I suppose, at most? Fossile coal would probably have been used since about the same time mining for metals began - metallurgy was probably one of the prime uses for coal, although wood could be used as well.)
We can relatively easily make carbon sinks today, I guess. Stop coal-mining, and start recycling plastics rather than burn them. Use oil only for producing plastics - not for fuel. Use bio-fuels for vehicles. Stop deforestation of the rainforests in particular. Start massive re-forestation. Somebody should think very hard of ways to transform deserts into woodlands. Given that this would eventually become a profitable source for wood, it would also be a way for Africa - the poorest continent, if I'm not mistaken - to achieve prosperity. What is needed is a way to do this quickly.
The second law concerns entropy, and it applies *very* well on QuantumG's silly proposal.
QuantumG said: Use energy to transform CO2 into C and O2. Use fossile fuels. IOW:
C (fossile fuels) + O2 + CO2 -> C (generated carbon) + O2 (generated oxygene) + CO2 (from the burning of the fossil fuel) + E (heat!)
Now, the second law says that you can't avoid getting some heat out of this "equation". Therefore you will need to burn more C with O2 to produce the energy you put into breaking the CO2 link, thus producing more CO2 than you can possibly eliminate.
In other words, the only way to use coal to reduce CO2 levels (or more precisely, not increasing it) is by NOT burning it. Seems obvious, doesn't it?
Whoever moderated the original post with this wacky excuse for an idea "Insightful" ought to be taken out and strangled, at least that would reduce CO2 emissions a little bit.
Further, using _any_ terrestrial energy source - even Uranium fission, or Hydrogen fusion, or geothermic for that matter - would *contribute* to global warming (although I don't know whether the use of fusion as an energy source to split CO2 might eventually be a good idea.) There are only two ways to *reduce* global warming. One is by _binding_ the *influx* solar energy chemically in organic compounds that can be stored safely: Wood. This will also reduce CO2. The other is to radiate energy back out into space.
Regarding Scandinavian countries, in the past I would have said that they would be cool too, but seeing this movie (it's called The Celebration in the US, and it shows on IFC once in a while) it kind of gave me a different perspective on racial relations there (at least in Denmark).
I suppose we Danes are guilty of the same error very often. And I admit I haven't seen the movie. But forming opinions on all Danes (or Americans) based on what you see in a movie isn't really being well-informed, is it? There is no doubt that we have our share of bigots and racists, but our bigotry (and I also speak for myself here, I can't say I'm entirely without prejudice) tends more to be directed against cultures rather than races. Being American, I doubt there would be any problem.
I would like to share my disagreement. At least if you by:
Look, all this business of going back and forth and criticizing each others religion is going to go nowhere.
mean that religion should not be criticized.
All religion is irrational. Now, there's nothing wrong with irrationality per se, and I suppose it is a fundamental condition of human existence to have irrational beliefs, and even atheists - like myself - have sometimes to act on basis of argumentation for which there is no complete rational backing: in other words based on irrational beliefs.
However, such irrational beliefs should be abandoned whenever they are no longer required - because in the meantime better argumentation has been found, or the argumentation has been shown to be invalid after all.
The trouble with irrational beliefs which are institutionalized into religions (whether "proper" theistic religions of scripture, or other forms of institution, such as the personal cult surrounding Kim Jong Il in North Korea, or Stalin in the Soviet Union), is that such institutions tend to be self-assertive and self-preserving. In other words they force the participants in such belief institutions to give up the rational behaviour of abandoning an irrational belief when no longer useful.
Now, this does not itself imply that religion should be criticized. After all, irrational beliefs which are not useful could be just like the large amount of inactive DNA in our genes - it doesn't matter much that it's there. There is obviously little harm done if you don't want to eat pork for irrational reasons. Alas, not all the beliefs, and the further auxiliary beliefs which have been institutionalized to form and support the religion itself, are necessarily harmless.
This is problematic in particular with religions of scripture, because with just an oral tradition, rejection is easier to achieve. This is seen - and even considered deplorable - with "primitive" cultures such as those in Amazonas, and various places around the Pacific. The problem here is that along with the irrational beliefs, the cultural *history* (which is considered interesting and worth preserving) is also lost.
With religious books, however, there is a great risk that the text becomes static. In case of the bible, the old testament (shared to some extent with the jews) is an adaption of far older mythology, and probably some new stuff added. (By Moses?) The Christian texts were transscribed and retold - and edited - over the first millenium.
Then the formalized ortodox churches established a culture with a huge hierarchy and bureaucracy (for example the Vatican), which maintains the "canon", and revises what is current church policy - and thereby current "right" irrational belief. This maintains a fairly static text, while still allowing a degree of flexibility. Therefore Christianity can at least to some extent cope with the continuously evolving rational explanations of reality. In that light, Lutheran reformation was not as much a religious transformation as it was a political transformation, allowing more and more rational and secular "nations" to reject the hierarchical control with the pope at the top. The resulting competition between reformed and orthodox church ensured that at least a sufficient sense of reality would prevail, and gave room for rationalistic movement: if not causing renaissance, then certainly supporting it.
The problem remains that the flexibility of these religions isn't enough - after all they are still fundamentally irrational institutions. Therefore they continue to hold unreasonable views on "modern" phenomena, like evolution, birth control, sexuality, to name just a few important examples. As they are today balanced by a strong rationalistic tradition, they have to accept facts - though reluctantly - as they are discovered, if they want to continue their coexistence with the rational side of modern society. Still, where there is an obvious conflict, the rational side is
But insulation means being fried during summertime, and no insulation means being frozen during winter, but even having insulation means being cold during winter as few houses have central heating.
How stupid. I believe we have a somewhat comparable climate in Denmark (to NZ, that is.) But since the 1973 oil crisis, Danish houses have been built with more and more insulation, to the point that many houses built today are "zero-energy" houses. This means they are insulated so well, that in winter, the body heat from the inhabitants, together with the heat from lighting and cooking is sufficient to heat the house.
So you will fry in hot summers, right? No of course not. Keep the door shut and the windows closed during the day, and the insulation will keep the inside temperature well below that outside. Why is it that noone can understand that insulation works just as well keeping heat out? No need for air conditioning either (another energy-waster.)
Slashdot Mirror
Me too. Except I'm lazy (used to code Perl a lot, now mostly Korn shell) so I just type ^P^E|sh^M
I know it only saves a keystroke or two. However it also makes it easy to type |sudo sh instead, or
add another grep to filter out unwanted commands, etc. I guess that counts as a habit.
-Lasse
Does GNU tar have an embedded EMACS as well? (or will GNU tar users have to wait for the next version?)
Well, at least Michael Stutz compensated for the lacking -z in tar by adding a superfluous -1 option to ls at the beginning of a pipe. I think most ls implementations check whether stdout goes to a terminal to decide whether output should be columnized.
-Lasse
Not only is it silly, but the example given in Listing 4 is WRONG: tar xvf -C tmp/a/b/c newarc.tar.gz will not work, unless there is a version of tar which implies -z given -C. (Someone else already mentioned the misplacement of -C as the filename for -f.) And of course, relying on -z options for tar will not work portably (including versions of AIX, though I'm not sure about AIX 5). This is a case where zcat (given a zcat that knows gzip) should be used: zcat arc.tar.gz| tar xvf -
The latter also works nicely across machine boundaries: zcat arc.tar.gz| ssh user@foo 'cd tmp/a/b/c ; tar xvf -' (or, better: cat arc.tar.gz| ssh user@foo 'cd tmp/a/b/c ; zcat|tar xvf -' ) I doubt -C does that. Of course use && instead of ; if there is any doubt whether the directory exists. This way you don't even have to move the tar file if you want to uncompress it on a different machine. (I suppose some GNU guy will read this and add another option --unpack-at-host which does the same, given the already prolific amount of unneccessary options to GNUtar. (Next thing I know, someone will tell me that option already exists.))
Another error: the command in Listing 7 also fails if tmp/a/b/c exists, because it will be in tmp/a/b/c when the tar command is executed, and thus the -C command will try to cd to a most likely nonexisting relative path. Perhaps it would be a good idea using test -d instead of the context-destructive cd for the condition, or maybe use an absolute path for the -C option. So many errors and I have only read less than one third of the "good habits" yet, wow!
I will make a note of the author's name (Michael Stutz) as a person whose statements should not be trusted without thorough scrutiny.
-Lasse
How *dare* you compare PHP with a C-47/DC3?
If the DC3 was anything like PHP, it would be permanently grounded.
There's no programming language worthy of comparison with the DC3. Not even LISP.
-Lasse
Moses Hansen is certainly a born-again nut, with several screws and bolts loose, but he's also entertaining, which I think is an endearing trait. Also, wihtout a cause to fight against, he'd be lost, so he actually needs pornography more than most. This has been most obvious as he has had a booth at the annual "Erotica" Fair. If I am not mistaken, he was actually sharing the stage with strippers, thundering against sins right after they did a show?
I do miss Jens Jørgen Thorsen (renowned Danish artist) however. We don't have many entertaining provocateurs left on our side anymore. Nobody could paint with his dick like he did.
Anyway, even though there are more moralists than I'd like here (also non-religious ones like Vikebe Manniche) they are more or less balanced out. And I don't worry much about them, just watch them with awareness and curiosity.
-Lasse
No, we probably don't disagree. At least we don't, if we first agree that food is _also_ an object which is consumed. I didn't say sex was *just* an object, or a gratification of a desire, or lust. But it is *also* that. And *sometimes* it may *just* be that. There's nothing terribly wrong with mindlessly consuming a 200 g bar of chocolate or a bag of chips in front of the TV now and then. There's something wrong with it if you do it every day, and in the process become obese and isolated. And it certainly isn't a healthy diet for kids.
The exact same point applies to sex and pornography. Banning pornography and nudity is equivalent to forbidding the display of chips *and* potatos because chips are unhealty. Being a father I certainly agree with you that kids ideally shouldn't be exposed to hard-core SM porn, but I also think that if it should happen, it would be my responsibility to explain it to them in a manner they would understand. And that way I doubt it could harm them. What *would* harm them was if I were to make a big fuss about it, because I was incapable of dealing rationally with it myself.
And exposure to nudity in general, model pictures, music videos, "erotic art", etc, should not be a problem at all, except for the fact that there usually is too much focus on thin models, promoting a bad ideal for girls. Seeing naked people of all sizes, sexes, colors and shapes - including various decorations - is educational, not harmful. Why is it OK to see pubescent African tribal girls with scarification tatoos and bare breasts in National Geographic, but the pierced nipple of Janet Jackson is not OK?
Apologies if you are Texan yourself and offended by ny rant against Texans. Naturally there are always exceptions to the rules. And as the other reply to my post made clear, we Danes certainly have our share of religious (and also non-religious feminist) nutters. I am aware of that. But contrary to Texas, they don't get to make the rules here (at least not yet.) And of course, Texas is a sexually liberated heaven compared to countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia, or China for that matter. This is definitely not only a matter of religion versus non-religion.
-Lasse
By that reasoning, food should be outlawed. After all, food is 100% addictive. I am sure all 6.something billion of us are strongly addicted to food, and prefer to consume it every day. Better outlaw public food consumption, food recipes, restaurants (gastronomic brothels!) etc. Oh, let's not forget air!
Sex, conducted safely (which is more likely the case when performed by well-informed participants) is not unhealthy. You don't die from premarital intercourse. Masturbating while looking at pornography is even less dangerous. You die from smoking. Comparing pornography to tobacco is outrageously silly. Are you a Texan by any chance?
-Lasse
Not a flame but a curious (and skeptical) comment. You don't provide any references, but a search on Google revealed a possible candidate to represent such findings: http://www.frankwbaker.com/explicit_media.htm. As you don't provide any context, for the sake of argument, I will assume that this Texan study is what you were referring to. Apologies, disclaimers, etc.
Now, pardon me, but I am rather skeptical of any research of this matter conducted in the fatherland of prudes: Texas. Even if the media may show some flesh (mostly in music videos, I presume) the society in general disapproves, meaning that the signals those children and teenagers receive is very mixed. No wonder if they get confused about their sexuality and the role of sexual appeal in interpersonal relations.
In Denmark, there is a far more liberal attitude in general (although by no means completely liberal) and I believe studies here show that the debut age has not been lowered significantly, nor that boys treat girls any worse. If anything, the girls have become more aware of their sexuality. One thing that has been shown, however, is that the adolescents are more experimentative in their sexuality (experimenting with anal sex, for example.) However this can only be considered bad if you consider adolescent experimentation bad in general. In practice, the kids are setting new norms for themselves, and though these norms may be different from those of their parents, they are not implicitly bad or unhealthy. The awareness also means that the teenagers are well-informed about STDs and contraceptives, and teenage pregnancies, while not totally unknown, are not very frequent.
A recent report from Norway showed that as a result of providing free contraceptive pills to women age 16-19, there has been a significant decline in abortions. They are considering extending the offer to the age of 25. Danish health authorities believe that focus should remain on promoting condoms, as they also prevent STDs. In Denmark the rate of abortions (ie. teenage pregnancies, as I believe most of such pregnancies result in an abortion) has increase by 1 over the last decade, and is now 16 in 1000. Compare this with one of the first results I see when I search Google for "teenage pregnancies texas", stating "In 2001, the Texas teen (15-17) pregnancy rate was 46.0/1,000". (http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/famplan/pdf/Teen01.pd f) That's more than four per cent! I apologize for not providing more comparable numbers. Wait, found some: http://www.ugeskriftet.dk/portal/page/portal/LAEGE RDK/UGESKRIFT_FOR_LAEGER/TIDLIGERE_NUMRE/2002/UFL_ 2002_24/UFL__2002_24_35346 - the Danish Medical weekly) This study showed a decline in teenage pregnancies from 9.2/1000 (fertile women age 15-19) in 1986 to 7.7/1000 in 1998 for the county in which the study was performed. The average for all of Denmark may be larger, but still the numbers are significantly lower than in Texas. The only obvious conclusion to me is that Texan teenagers are literally fucked up, not by sexually explicit imagry, but by a sexually repressive, hypocritical and unsound society.
So, to sum up, I belive that your "researchers" are pretty clearly biased. Texans, obviously. If Texan children "don't develop healthy behaviors around sexual issues" (and why should premarital sex not be healthy, if done safely?) it's not because of dirty pictures, but because of a dirtyminded AND narrowminded society. OK, so this turned into a flame after all.
Sex is just as much an "object", as food is. Food can be part of a complex relationship, something you enjoy by yourself, or something you just eat to get instant gratification because you're hungry. May I suggest for you prudent Americans, that you block cooking recipes and other food pages on the web? Af
Although Saudi Arabia is rather worse, Swedes - by Danish standards - are prude and repressed. Norway is even worse. And the homophobic Faeroe Islands are more or less Atlantic talibans, only christian. I frankly don't know about Finland.
I hate it when people use "globally" and "enforced" next to each other.
-Lasse
I sincerely hope that all erotophobic Americans will do what they preach and stop reproducing once and for all. Preferably they should realize like the bald eagle in the Muppet Show, that we are all naked under our clothes, and as a consequence commit suicide.
-Lasse
(Who will not set his foot on U.S. soil until perhaps the day when the First Lady is a black, atheist *lesbian*. Preferably one with a scientific degree in biology.)
I agree completely: ASN.1 rules!
For those who don't know: ASN.1 (Abstract Syntax Notation 1) is an ISO syntax notation which I believe was developed for defining packets and other stuff used in the OSI standards suite. It is also used in many popular Internet protocols and standards, such as Z39.50 (WAIS), SNMP, LDAP and PKI. (Just to mention a few.)
There are a few different encoding rules (mappings to binary), and I suppose a readable encoding - even an XML-like encoding - would be possible, although I don't know if one already exists.
-Lasse
Personally, I dislike the Mac OS X interface, and prefer the original system 6/7 interface, the Apple HIG people did lots of great work, and it showed. But in any case, the above quote said all that needed to be said.
Windows 95 = Mac 84, etc.
(The real problem we face today, however, is that nowhere is a new Doug Engelbart, or Alan Kay, or Jef Raskin, or Bruce Tognazzini, or Ted Nelson, etc to be found. Human interface research seems to have stagnated. Apparantly the interface we use now is good enough - worse is always better. What a pity. Oh well, I can get by OK with XFCE and some xterms on my NetBSD laptop.)
-Lasse
Are you saying that carcinogens cause cancer?
Wow, who would have thought that!
-Lasse
Don't their significantly smaller brains compensate for the hat size?
-Lasse
(who will never set foot in the US, nor in the UK now, it seems. Pity: contrary to the US, there are places in Britain I'd love to visit.)
Inferiority complex?
-Lasse
Let's have a philosophical discussion about the existence of stamps then. A stamp is a printed piece of paper, which is collected by stamp collectors. They attribute a value to it, which is not proportional. From a postal point of view, a stamp is merely a convenient mark to place on a letter, to indicate that the sender has paid for its transport to the receiver. The actual payment, that is, the value exchanged in return for the transport, including any surcharge, is in the account of the postal service. This value has nothing to do with the value of the stamp from a collecting point of view. I will assert that the reason stamp collectors collect stamps is the consentual attribution of value to something which is in essence worthless. Never mind that it has a physical representation in shape of a tiny piece of paper. If you made your own tiny pieces of printed paper, no stamp collector would be interested, unless you could convince him that your forgery was the "real" thing. Therefore the physical manifestation is irrelevant to the value attribution. (It is actually difficult to discuss this, because it is deeply irrational.)
This is actually what bothers me most with militant atheists: their obsession with rationality. Any person who claims to be completely rational, is a liar, a hypocrite, and a foolish reductionist. The human mind is complex enough to deal sensibly with irrationality, and fundamentally we act out of irrational desires, not out of de-liberated (pun intended!) argument chains. We can and must deal with meaninglessness every day, every second, and we are surprisingly good at it. So good at it that we can even deceive ourselves into believing this is not the case, believing that we exist in a rational world.
So, as an atheist, I do not believe in any god. I do believe, however that many people act as if a god existed, and that the _concept_ of a god exists. In other words, gods exist in people's minds. I can adapt to this fact, and as long as it doesn't conflict with my interests, I can certainly live with it. I can understand it to some degree. After all, I have my own quirks, or irrational beliefs and desires, that make no sense.
As for _using_ stamps, well, yes. As a knowingly irrational atheist, I can also use "God". Or Santa Claus. Or my invisible friend. Or use "The Force". I don't have to believe in it. Or I can believe, and not believe at the same time. The effect is purely psychological. Of course I don't believe that sheer willpower or belief will directly move a physical object, but only when I use that willpower to do it myself, or convince others to move it for me. But in that way, irrational beliefs resulted in the building of the pyramids, so their power should not be underestimated. Which is what I think most "strong atheists" (or. to use the words of William Bateson: "empty-headed atheists") do.
One way to have divinity influence the physical world is through a random number generator - an entropy source. You simply call all desirable outcomes "divine", and all undesirable outcomes "satanic". Voila! There you have Pascal's proof of God.
I think more atheists should spend some time reading Pascal, Blake, Nietzsche, and Schiller. As far as I can tell, they all possessed profound insight in the psychological importance of irrationality.
-Lasse
Of course your response to an invalid generalization was appropriate, and you are also free to do whatever you want.
Personally, I don't find a conflict between being an atheist, and attending weddings, and other religious ceremonies. I don't _participate_ in them, I am only present as an observer. I find evangelistic or missionary atheism odd. Just as I find organisations for atheists odd. For me, atheism is like non-philately. I don't believe in any kind of god, and I don't collect stamps. I wouldn't join an organisation of non-stamp-collectors, but if I were to visit a friend who is a stamp collector while some other stamp collectors were present, and my friend was going to show his latest achievement in the hobby, I wouldn't make a fuss and leave the room while this happened. I would watch politely, maybe insert a little joke about "a silly obsession with small rectangular bits of paper with jagged edges".
Religion is a disease of the mind, but as such, it is not usually contagious. Especially not if you are immune. A person who can be offended by other people displaying religious behaviour is a person who I would characterize as religious. Atheism as a religion is just as silly and insane as any other religion.
-Lasse
And after their useful time as housing runs out, we could just bury them in abandoned mines, like we do with nuclear waste. The wood wouldn't even need quite the same precautions, as it's not terribly radioactive.
-Lasse
In paleontological times, the Carbon sinks (which I suppose they should be called, rather than CO2 sinks) were what we know today as coal mines and oil fields.
I wonder: does anyone know the approximate amount of CO2 released from the fossile fuels in the relatively short period of time where such fuels have been used? (Since the bronze age, I suppose, at most? Fossile coal would probably have been used since about the same time mining for metals began - metallurgy was probably one of the prime uses for coal, although wood could be used as well.)
We can relatively easily make carbon sinks today, I guess. Stop coal-mining, and start recycling plastics rather than burn them. Use oil only for producing plastics - not for fuel. Use bio-fuels for vehicles. Stop deforestation of the rainforests in particular. Start massive re-forestation. Somebody should think very hard of ways to transform deserts into woodlands. Given that this would eventually become a profitable source for wood, it would also be a way for Africa - the poorest continent, if I'm not mistaken - to achieve prosperity. What is needed is a way to do this quickly.
-Lasse
Oh, my Goddess, this is hilarious.
The second law concerns entropy, and it applies *very* well on QuantumG's silly proposal.
QuantumG said: Use energy to transform CO2 into C and O2. Use fossile fuels. IOW:
C (fossile fuels) + O2 + CO2 -> C (generated carbon) + O2 (generated oxygene) + CO2 (from the burning of the fossil fuel) + E (heat!)
Now, the second law says that you can't avoid getting some heat out of this "equation". Therefore you will need to burn more C with O2 to produce the energy you put into breaking the CO2 link, thus producing more CO2 than you can possibly eliminate.
In other words, the only way to use coal to reduce CO2 levels (or more precisely, not increasing it) is by NOT burning it. Seems obvious, doesn't it?
Whoever moderated the original post with this wacky excuse for an idea "Insightful" ought to be taken out and strangled, at least that would reduce CO2 emissions a little bit.
Further, using _any_ terrestrial energy source - even Uranium fission, or Hydrogen fusion, or geothermic for that matter - would *contribute* to global warming (although I don't know whether the use of fusion as an energy source to split CO2 might eventually be a good idea.) There are only two ways to *reduce* global warming. One is by _binding_ the *influx* solar energy chemically in organic compounds that can be stored safely: Wood. This will also reduce CO2. The other is to radiate energy back out into space.
-Lasse
I am not. I am mocking the kiwis for not having well built, insulated houses when their climate obviously makes them desirable.
-Lasse
We agree, it would seem.
:-) :-)
Still, I like to think that we are as close to a practical Utopia as realistically possible.
Even the Swedes and Norwegians envy us!
-Lasse
I suppose we Danes are guilty of the same error very often. And I admit I haven't seen the movie. But forming opinions on all Danes (or Americans) based on what you see in a movie isn't really being well-informed, is it? There is no doubt that we have our share
of bigots and racists, but our bigotry (and I also speak for myself here, I can't say I'm entirely without prejudice) tends more to be directed against cultures rather than races. Being American, I doubt there would be any problem.
-Lasse
mean that religion should not be criticized.
All religion is irrational. Now, there's nothing wrong with irrationality per se, and I suppose it is a fundamental condition of human existence to have irrational beliefs, and even atheists - like myself - have sometimes to act on basis of argumentation for which there is no complete rational backing: in other words based on irrational beliefs.
However, such irrational beliefs should be abandoned whenever they are no longer required - because in the meantime better argumentation has been found, or the argumentation has been shown to be invalid after all.
The trouble with irrational beliefs which are institutionalized into religions (whether "proper" theistic religions of scripture, or other forms of institution, such as the personal cult surrounding Kim Jong Il in North Korea, or Stalin in the Soviet Union), is that such institutions tend to be self-assertive and self-preserving. In other words they force the participants in such belief institutions to give up the rational behaviour of abandoning an irrational belief when no longer useful.
Now, this does not itself imply that religion should be criticized. After all, irrational beliefs which are not useful could be just like the large amount of inactive DNA in our genes - it doesn't matter much that it's there. There is obviously little harm done if you don't want to eat pork for irrational reasons. Alas, not all the beliefs, and the further auxiliary beliefs which have been institutionalized to form and support the religion itself, are necessarily harmless.
This is problematic in particular with religions of scripture, because with just an oral tradition, rejection is easier to achieve. This is seen - and even considered deplorable - with "primitive" cultures such as those in Amazonas, and various places around the Pacific. The problem here is that along with the irrational beliefs, the cultural *history* (which is considered interesting and worth preserving) is also lost.
With religious books, however, there is a great risk that the text becomes static. In case of the bible, the old testament (shared to some extent with the jews) is an adaption of far older mythology, and probably some new stuff added. (By Moses?) The Christian texts were transscribed and retold - and edited - over the first millenium.
Then the formalized ortodox churches established a culture with a huge hierarchy and bureaucracy (for example the Vatican), which maintains the "canon", and revises what is current church policy - and thereby current "right" irrational belief. This maintains a fairly static text, while still allowing a degree of flexibility. Therefore Christianity can at least to some extent cope with the continuously evolving rational explanations of reality. In that light, Lutheran reformation was not as much a religious transformation as it was a political transformation, allowing more and more rational and secular "nations" to reject the hierarchical control with the pope at the top. The resulting competition between reformed and orthodox church ensured that at least a sufficient sense of reality would prevail, and gave room for rationalistic movement: if not causing renaissance, then certainly supporting it.
The problem remains that the flexibility of these religions isn't enough - after all they are still fundamentally irrational institutions. Therefore they continue to hold unreasonable views on "modern" phenomena, like evolution, birth control, sexuality, to name just a few important examples. As they are today balanced by a strong rationalistic tradition, they have to accept facts - though reluctantly - as they are discovered, if they want to continue their coexistence with the rational side of modern society. Still, where there is an obvious conflict, the rational side is
But insulation means being fried during summertime, and no insulation means being frozen during winter, but even having insulation means being cold during winter as few houses have central heating.
How stupid. I believe we have a somewhat comparable climate in Denmark (to NZ, that is.) But since the 1973 oil crisis, Danish houses have been built with more and more insulation, to the point that many houses built today are "zero-energy" houses. This means they are insulated so well, that in winter, the body heat from the inhabitants, together with the heat from lighting and cooking is sufficient to heat the house.
So you will fry in hot summers, right? No of course not. Keep the door shut and the windows closed during the day, and the insulation will keep the inside temperature well below that outside. Why is it that noone can understand that insulation works just as well keeping heat out? No need for air conditioning either (another energy-waster.)
-Lasse