Homeopathy, relative to intelligent design, is uncontroversial.
I think you're wrong. Worldwide, it seems that many people who would outright laugh at ID would happily tell you about how wonderful homeopathic substances are. After all, it has a scientific-sounding explanation that almost makes sense to people who failed math and chemistry. It seems OK to believe in that particular brand of magic while belittling other kinds.
BTW, I hope no one read my original post as endorsing homeopathy because that couldn't be further from the truth. I think it's controversial in the sense that it has ardent supporters, not that there's any scientific debate about it.
Debunks all the health scams from homeopathy to ear candling to colloidal silver to chiropracty, all on one convinient page.
Well, I have to say that I've had good luck with a chiropractor for back pain, but I agree with you on their general theory of disease being cause by misalignment. Chiropractor as physical therapist? I'll buy that. Chiropractor for digestive ailments? No thanks.
From Amazon Wii = $324.34 or you camp out for 250$
Now add in [...]
...which ignores the fact that $250.00 gets you a playable system, and you can add the extras on as your time and budget allow. You don't have to drop $599 (the cheap $499 units are sold out) in one lump payment but get to spread it out.
Ars chose a relatively uncontroversial pseudo-science to examine
Homeopathy is controversial, in that some people actually believe it and loudly proclaim its wonders. That's like saying that evolution vs. intelligent design is settled just because science overwhelmingly supports the former, ignoring that many people still believe the latter.
Plan A: Tap "Other", type "s c o o b y d o o", get:
( ) Foo ( ) Bar ( ) Baz (*) Other: scoobydoo
Plan B: Ask for and receive a blank paper ballot like you're use to, complete it, and hand it in just like the people submitting their machine-printed identical ballots.
The voter marks the ballot paper with a pencil. The ballots are counted by hand by human beings.
Better yet, they vote on computer and it prints out a ballot that looks like you wrote it by hand, except that all circles are completely filled in, there are no eraser marks, no smudges, and no streaks from dragging the pencil across the paper. You cast your vote and get something like:
( ) Foo (*) Bar ( ) Baz
or the machine-scannable equivalent. Now, process that ballot in the time-approved and verifiable way of putting it in a locked box for later human counting.
A computer could still track preliminary results that could be published after all other voting precincts had closed, but they would be merely estimates - the paper ballots would be the official record.
Is it any wonder that a cheaper item with a wider target audience would outsell a more expensive item with features aimed towards more hardcore members?
The idea is that no one needs to be root except to run particular commands (using sudo or gksudo).
Throwing in a "me too", I didn't like the way sudo "felt" until I used it for a while, and now that's how I perform routine maintenance on all my gear. In fact, I realized a couple of days ago with some horror that I'd forgotten the root password on my home server. Oh well, time to pwgen and "sudo passwd root" again.
If you do need to run root you will create the root password and log in as root and be able to shoot yourself in the foot if you point the run in the wrong direction (ie: rm -R/. instead of rm -R./).
However, it's not magic.
$ su # rm -R/.
is no more destructive than:
$ sudo rm -R/.
The only thing the latter buys you is a message on your remote logging server if you've set one up.
This actually takes quite a while; for most people, urine is upwards of 98% water.
With all due respect, seawater is 96.5% water but drinking it will kill you painfully. It's that tiny but oh-so-important few percent that will get you.
Why not make a package w/ auto-configurable scripts available for install?
Because then you have to manage the bloat of having two similar systems that are almost but not quite identical.
What part of using your card's 3D acceleration to make your whole desktop faster (and optionally prettier at the same time) sounds bad to you? This is almost universally a good thing.
The charity doesn't have infinite resources. If you had $300 dollars to spend, would you:
(A) Put in place a water system (which lasts for a lifetime) that would provide water directly (so no trekking 20 km), that was sanitary and have money left over to provide some hygiene education
(B) Buy 100 LifeStraws (which last 6 months) for them instead?
I would likely:
(C) Buy 16 lifestraws so that the people I'm helping don't die of dysentery before we get their new water source finished.
I don't think Mr Hetherington is a jackass for rejecting the latter suggestion.
Neither do I. In fact, he's clearly correct that LifeStraws wouldn't be a long-term solution. I think he's a jackass for going out on a tangent about sexual inequality in sub-Saharan Africa rather than recognizing that they could help provide short-term relief until more permanent solutions can be established.
What most irks me is the mindset that if an idea doesn't cure every aspect of a particular ill, then it's worse than current practices (which also don't fix everything). There's often a lot to be said for incremental upgrades, particularly when they give you a new capability (such as cheap, immediate relief in this case) that you haven't had before.
OK, so have a "test box". I myself have one. Guess what cable never get's plugged into it? That's right, the ethernet cable. If I'm doing something that requires the use of my in-house LAN, guess what gets unplugged....that's right, my connection to the outside world.
That's infallible. Until, of course, Windows gets peer-to-peer updating.
Test box: Hi everyone!
Main box: Hey! Got WGA 543.64 yet?
Test box: No. Good?
Main box: Sure! Here you go.
I was thinking about Dune and stillsuits on warm day and realized that I must have missed something. How would those work in a hot environment anyway? Since we sweat to remain cool, how much heat could you give off without allowing any of that water to evaporate?
the worst part about this, is that lifestraw was invented to help people in third-world countries (hence the low cost), as well as people in catastrophe-hit areas, and then a greedy swine comes along.
Before you get worked up, wait and see how the market reacts. I predict that a few people with more money than common sense will buy these ridiculously expensive filters, but not enough to cover costs. The rest of us will make due with bleach, iodine pills, and el-cheapo LifeStraw-like filters. It'd be like making a $2,000 pup tent. Sure, a few people would buy them because they equate cost with suitability, but it probably wouldn't catch on with us regular folk.
(a DANISH invention) (g00gle it, if you don't believe me)
However, a spokesman for UK charity WaterAid, which works to supply clean water and sanitation in 17 of the world's poorest countries, condemned the device as overly expensive, and said it was not a real solution.
The organisation's Paul Hetherington said that while he thought the LifeStraw is an 'amazing-sounding idea,' he did not ultimately think it would help.
"$3.50 sounds like very little to you and me - but most people in those countries earn less than one dollar a day, with which they have to feed their families," he said.
He added that he felt the problem is that many people live very far away from their water, often walking a total of 20km or more carrying a weight of 25 kilos.
"That's what takes it out of them - the long journey," he explained.
"The LifeStraw isn't going to prevent that long journey, even if it does improve the water they drink.
"They're not going to have the education, because they're not going to have the time. It's girls in particular who suffer, because it's women and girls who have to collect the water.
"It only costs a charity like WaterAid £15 per person to provide them with water, sanitation and hygiene education, which, provided there is decent water resource management in the country, will last them a lifetime.
"At that rate, $3.50 is expensive."
Of course, if "there is decent water resource management in the country" in the first place, none of this would be necessary. And never mind that if I'd have to make a trek for water anyway, I'd prefer it to be clean when I got there.
If the LifeStraw at $3.00 will actually hurt women and girls and not solve the rest of society's ills, I can only imagine what Mr. Hetherington would think about a model that cost 100x more.
Slashdot Mirror
I think you're wrong. Worldwide, it seems that many people who would outright laugh at ID would happily tell you about how wonderful homeopathic substances are. After all, it has a scientific-sounding explanation that almost makes sense to people who failed math and chemistry. It seems OK to believe in that particular brand of magic while belittling other kinds.
BTW, I hope no one read my original post as endorsing homeopathy because that couldn't be further from the truth. I think it's controversial in the sense that it has ardent supporters, not that there's any scientific debate about it.
Well, I have to say that I've had good luck with a chiropractor for back pain, but I agree with you on their general theory of disease being cause by misalignment. Chiropractor as physical therapist? I'll buy that. Chiropractor for digestive ailments? No thanks.
...which ignores the fact that $250.00 gets you a playable system, and you can add the extras on as your time and budget allow. You don't have to drop $599 (the cheap $499 units are sold out) in one lump payment but get to spread it out.
Which reminds me, that "Head On" junk advertised on TV is homeopathic. My advice is to use bottled water instead:
"Evian: apply it directly to the gullible"
Homeopathy is controversial, in that some people actually believe it and loudly proclaim its wonders. That's like saying that evolution vs. intelligent design is settled just because science overwhelmingly supports the former, ignoring that many people still believe the latter.
Plan A: Tap "Other", type "s c o o b y d o o", get:
Plan B: Ask for and receive a blank paper ballot like you're use to, complete it, and hand it in just like the people submitting their machine-printed identical ballots.
The potential to cost more than twice as much as the alternatives.
The potential to find new and creative ways to abuse customers.
The potential to lock buyers into Yet Another Stupid Sony Format.
No, I don't really mind seeing that potential get buried.
Or, for intelligent design types:
Windows is the end result of Noah saving a pair of jackasses.
You're "that guy" at parties, aren't you?
Better yet, they vote on computer and it prints out a ballot that looks like you wrote it by hand, except that all circles are completely filled in, there are no eraser marks, no smudges, and no streaks from dragging the pencil across the paper. You cast your vote and get something like:
or the machine-scannable equivalent. Now, process that ballot in the time-approved and verifiable way of putting it in a locked box for later human counting.
A computer could still track preliminary results that could be published after all other voting precincts had closed, but they would be merely estimates - the paper ballots would be the official record.
Any holes in this?
Who knew, William Shatner, wrote, tech articles?
Correction:
"We had a valid copy, and why should we have to prove it to Autodesk?"
If that's an unceasing chucklefest for you, then I'm pretty sure you need to get out more.
It is to Sony, apparently.
Throwing in a "me too", I didn't like the way sudo "felt" until I used it for a while, and now that's how I perform routine maintenance on all my gear. In fact, I realized a couple of days ago with some horror that I'd forgotten the root password on my home server. Oh well, time to pwgen and "sudo passwd root" again.
If you do need to run root you will create the root password and log in as root and be able to shoot yourself in the foot if you point the run in the wrong direction (ie: rm -RHowever, it's not magic.
is no more destructive than:
The only thing the latter buys you is a message on your remote logging server if you've set one up.
Then gasp! don't turn that stuff on. This doesn't have to be that complicated.
With all due respect, seawater is 96.5% water but drinking it will kill you painfully. It's that tiny but oh-so-important few percent that will get you.
Because then you have to manage the bloat of having two similar systems that are almost but not quite identical.
What part of using your card's 3D acceleration to make your whole desktop faster (and optionally prettier at the same time) sounds bad to you? This is almost universally a good thing.
The charity doesn't have infinite resources. If you had $300 dollars to spend, would you:
(A) Put in place a water system (which lasts for a lifetime) that would provide water directly (so no trekking 20 km), that was sanitary and have money left over to provide some hygiene education
(B) Buy 100 LifeStraws (which last 6 months) for them instead?
I would likely:
(C) Buy 16 lifestraws so that the people I'm helping don't die of dysentery before we get their new water source finished.
I don't think Mr Hetherington is a jackass for rejecting the latter suggestion.Neither do I. In fact, he's clearly correct that LifeStraws wouldn't be a long-term solution. I think he's a jackass for going out on a tangent about sexual inequality in sub-Saharan Africa rather than recognizing that they could help provide short-term relief until more permanent solutions can be established.
What most irks me is the mindset that if an idea doesn't cure every aspect of a particular ill, then it's worse than current practices (which also don't fix everything). There's often a lot to be said for incremental upgrades, particularly when they give you a new capability (such as cheap, immediate relief in this case) that you haven't had before.
So as long as it's windy, and the wind is cooler than your body temperature, you won't die painfully? And this works on Dune?
That's infallible. Until, of course, Windows gets peer-to-peer updating.
Test box: Hi everyone!
Main box: Hey! Got WGA 543.64 yet?
Test box: No. Good?
Main box: Sure! Here you go.
Yes, but how would they offload the waste heat, since the warm moist air couldn't just blow away into the atmosphere?
Totally off-topic:
I was thinking about Dune and stillsuits on warm day and realized that I must have missed something. How would those work in a hot environment anyway? Since we sweat to remain cool, how much heat could you give off without allowing any of that water to evaporate?
Before you get worked up, wait and see how the market reacts. I predict that a few people with more money than common sense will buy these ridiculously expensive filters, but not enough to cover costs. The rest of us will make due with bleach, iodine pills, and el-cheapo LifeStraw-like filters. It'd be like making a $2,000 pup tent. Sure, a few people would buy them because they equate cost with suitability, but it probably wouldn't catch on with us regular folk.
(a DANISH invention) (g00gle it, if you don't believe me)We believe you, no need to get defensive. :-)
I seriously hope he chokes on itSweet, sweet irony.
And on that subject, jackasses like this are why it's hard to help anyone:
Of course, if "there is decent water resource management in the country" in the first place, none of this would be necessary. And never mind that if I'd have to make a trek for water anyway, I'd prefer it to be clean when I got there.
If the LifeStraw at $3.00 will actually hurt women and girls and not solve the rest of society's ills, I can only imagine what Mr. Hetherington would think about a model that cost 100x more.