In the context it is only a 'crass leap' if it is recognized that the money you spend on your enjoyment is not a matter of discussion, presumably because as an advocate of a seemingly noble cause you are exempt from mere wordly contributions.
But that is where you are mistaken. This, to me, is a combination of the free market at work and simple charity. IMO, this show has failed in the market. Charity is typically meant to mean providing financial support for that which cannot support itself. As such, one entirely correct way of looking at this is as an act of charity. But since charity also has as a requisite the notion of selflessness, this falls on its face thereby.
Now, the argument can quite successfully be made that they are simply trying to purchase something that they wish to see. I do not disagree with that. I think the only disagreement comes about as to whether this show has already failed, and whether their efforts are futile, or better spent elsewhere, thereby.
People gathering together the money to pay for something they want IS the market at work.
And that's where the argument lies: is this trekkies getting together to purchase a good, or is this charity, supporting something when the market will not? I think on further consideration that is a little bit of both.
Any penny that you spend on yourself is a moral outrage, hypocrite.
Where was that said or implied, hmm? It's a crass leap of logic to go from "some money is better spent on others" to "all money should be spent on others."
I bet you listen to the government propaganda on the AM band, doncha, and even think yourself open minded.
Except that there will always be needy people, no matter how much you individually give.
Right. I guess the question has morphed into: "Are these fans setting up a charity for out of work Star Trek cast members, or are they trying to pay for something they enjoy?" I think it's a little of both. The show has already failed in the market, and they are attempting to revive it using their own money. Is that paying for a good that they want, or is it needless selfishness?
The more I think about it the more I think I'm going to have to think about it.
And what's so special about the tsunami anyways? People are starving every day, dying from easily cured diseases.
It's an example of a great tragedy. There are, unfortunately, many to choose from.
Quit wasting your money on your PC and cable modem subscription, o pretentious one.
What does that have to do with anything? We're talking about a charity being set up for the benefit of the cast of an unsuccessful TV show, not free enterprise. People must buy things for the economy to continue to function. The fans here, though, are talking about setting up a charity for those who do not need such a thing.
I dont disagree about them being morons. I would never spend the money on that. I think it's stupid. But to criticize them for picking this cause instead of a charity is stupid too.
Not at all. I think to some degree you are conflating judgement with prohibition. I judge them wrong in this, but I would never seek to prohibit them from doing so.
Be that as it may, this is basically a charitable donation being made to satiate the selfish desires of a few zealous fans. Selfishness has its place, but when you move into the realm of charity then you enter into the world of sacrifice for the benefit of others. By setting up this charity they would be subsidizing those who do not need such: the cast and crew of the show, the production managers, etc. There are millions upon millions of people on this planet who live in cardboard boxes. Giving them opportunities is far and away a better thing than subsidizing some tired sci-fi TV show.
Such an argument has merit on it's face, but when you say this you are making a assumptive judgement on the part of the donors. Who's to say that the donors didn't already donate to tsunami relief?
You can't, of course. But the quesiton then becomes: should they give to a TV show, or to the needy? This act is very selfish, IMO, and shows an almost willful blindness to the world around them. TV shows come and go; none are so important that they should become the target for charitable giving.
I know I'm nitpicking but under the same argument, all money spent to produce Battlestar Galactica is also a misappropriation because it's for luxury and therefore should go to tsunami relief.
Neither should receive such money. They will both succeed or fail on their own merits in the market. But investing in people -- by giving to an educational institution, or to a sex education effort -- is not only the right thing to do, but it is far more productive in every sense of the word.
Re:Applescript is such an asstastic language ...
on
Beginning AppleScript
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I guess that I would argue that AppleScript isn't meant for "real" work; that's for Python, Java, Objective C, etc. AppleScript is a scripting language, after all, and therefore my expectations aren't too high for it. I expect it do be able to do simple tasks quickly, and for harder things to be difficult if not impossible.
Unless this gets hammered on repeatedly, people will forget, and/or you will fail to educate newer users. Yes, this is/., but even this community suffers from human foibles. Count me amongst those who are satisfied with the status quo, here.
An operating system can be the most secure and uncrashable thing on the planet and nobody is going to give a flying damn if they can't run software they want to use on it.
They can, though. Off the top of my head I can't think of a single widespread consumer application that doesn't have a Mac port. Quicken, MS Office, OO.org, etc. Plus, the most widely used pieces of software today are email clients, web browsers, and chat clients, and all those come with the OS. Hell, Apple wrote the most popular music player around today.
Is the a piece of software you had in mind? The only think I can think of are games, and that's it's own subculture (and I will agree that that is a definite drawback.)
I know that Mac people frequently get labeled with the "zealot" label, but there is something that I have noticed about friends and family who are Windows users: for whatever reasons they are reluctant if not opposed to change, even in the face of all available evidence. It's nothing explicit, but mention OS X or Linux to them and they immediately go on the defensive, as if you are quetioning them and their decision making abilities ("Well, Windows can do that, too."), instead of seeing what you are attempting to do, which is point out some rather important problems with Windows as an OS.
Perhaps this is just human nature. But as a "switcher" who is approaching his one year anniversary with a PowerMac after almost 20 years of Windows and DOS (starting with DOS 2.0!) I can honestly say: Windows users, it's not your fault. Microsoft should be ashamed, not you. Windows sucks, and there are better choices out there for you. Make them! You'll be happy that you did.
By the way, I am not conservative, I am libertarian. Government is meant to serve the people, not the other way around.
Who do you think's in charge, babycakes? You think this adminitration's fiscal policy serves any other purpose than to drown the federal government?
Feh, you're a libertarian, hence a cultist. I, too, was once a libertarian. Then I woke up and realized I was being a complete evangelical asshole and was quite mistaken about a lot of things. Hopefully one day you'll have a similar awakening. In the mean time, go memorize the Preamble. It'll do wonders.
Maybe you like to take a little test.
Man, you're a walking cliche, aren't you? "Here, graph your political beliefs on this simplistic two-dimensional axis!" My beliefs don't graph to a two-dimensional plane, k? They're n-dimensional, and are in no way bound by fundamentalist dogma, whether Christian, libertarian, or "other".
Then again if you believe that government is the answer to all of life's problems, maybe not.
Yes, moo, I believe government should take over every part of the world, moo. All government is good, more is better, moo.
What a stupid fucking thing to believe. Do you REALLY think there are people out there who think that way? Really? Or are you just deluded?
Personally, I believe that the sad state of the education system in the United States IS the result of the NEA close ties to the liberal agenda of the Democratic Party. Simply put, if children were taught to love and honor the free society in which we live, they would be able to see that the liberal agenda espoused by the Democratic Party goes against the very principles of a free society.
Of course you do, because you've swallowed the moronic bullshit spewed by the propagandists day in and day out. Here's the deal, though: by and large Democrats are more supportive of individual liberties. Oh I KNOW what you believe, what you've swallowed.
How many times have you heard a politician, especially one of the Democratic Party, speak of how we must help the less fortunate, or we must "think about the children" some measure is supposed to help?
Not very often at all, actually. In fact, I don't know if I've *ever* heard someone say that. What I *have* heard is conservatives bitch incessantly -- and oh how I do mean "incessantly"-- about what amounts to no more than a strawman, an Emmanuel Goldstein for the 21st century.
News flash, chucky: the emperor has no clothes. The enemy you think exists doesn't. You are being lied to.
The US education system is failing, not because our kids can not learn, but because it is in the best interest of the liberal agenda.
Or maybe, just maybe it's because kids have parents who don't raise them right. Maybe, just maybe we should point the cold finger of blame upon those who have the most influence in their upbringing, those who tell their kids, implicitly or explicitly, that some people don't deserve equal freedoms. Who bring them up believing that all their blame and hate can be directed at them thar nefarious and scary "liberals", instead of bringing them up to believe in equality for all, why liberty is an awesome thing, that justice should be blind, and that democray means that the people can and do have the ultimate voice in government.
Don't worry, though. All cognitive dissonance can be quieted just by tuning your radio to your local government propagandist. You can forget everything you read here and go about believing in your Orwellian reality.
The first rule of conservativism is you do not question conservativism.
Wouldn't it be far wiser to build solar panels in orbit, use them to power Microwaves, and avoid the attenuation in the atmosphere?
Well, from TFA:
The feat would require a 60-megawatt microwave beam with a similar diameter to the sail.
Now, I'm no EE, so somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm thinking that generating that much power from solar cells would be an undertaking in and of itself. You'd be hard pressed to generate that much energy in space.
If you cannot tell the difference, then we have nothing to talk about.
We have noting to talk about because like almost all conservatives you jump at the first available opportunity to bury your head in the sand whenever nasty-nasty cognitive dissonance rears its ugly head. In other words: you're too big of a chickenshit to face opposition.
Maybe if instead of worrying about teenagers knowing how to use a condom and teaching them to be properly sensitive to the subculture du jour, you spent your efforts in communicating why freedom of speech applies to political viewpoints you don't agree with, and why it is of tantamount importance and that if you stop shitting on every conservative you meet then we might actually get along here.
You know, I always hear about the ACLU defending Rush Limbaugh, the KKK, and other fascists whenever their freedoms are being curtailed. But I never hear about conservatives doing the same. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise you're just bringing up the same tired old strawmen.
And for the record, while I personally shit on conservatives, its purely for pleasure. The shitting stops when the legislature is in session, for I believe in the freedom of *all* mankind, not just my ideological brethren.
Yet, when told of the exact text of the First Amendment, more than one in three high school students said it goes "too far" in the rights it guarantees. Only half of the students said newspapers should be allowed to publish freely without government approval of stories.
People die to defend these rights, and some of our students don't even know what these rights are?
Hey conservatives! Maybe if instead of worrying about absitence only education and attacking Darwinism you spent your efforts in communicating why and how we are a free society, and why that is of tantamount importance, we could all get along here, hm? Cuz I'll be honest with you, I'll stand shoulder to shoulder with James "Spongebob Is Gay" Dobson if it means we get the message out loud and clear about the Bill of RIghts.
One thing that I hope Apple winds up incorporating into their laptops is something that a friend of mine has on his Dell. It's a special "DVD only" mode where it switches over from being a general purpose computer to a DVD player only, and the battery life is increased substantially thereby.
This seems to be a good idea. We use our PB as a DVD player frequently at night in bed*, and a power cord is annoying. Having this would be just another nice touch, and I couldn't imagine it would be that hard to engineer.
* And to head off the juveniles: Yes, sometimes we do watch porn.
You're right, of course, and few people would argue differently. My point is that education is not a panacea: the German people of the 1930's and 40's were for the most part very well educated, yet nonetheless they willingly and even eagerly took part in the most horrific crimes against man.
Look, I'm all for tools to make our lives easier. But if someone doesn't know their native tongue well enough to write a complete, well-formed sentence, grammar and spelling checkers just exacerbate the problem. Maybe I'm being somewhat Luddite-ish, but I believe that a firm grasp of language allows for clearer thought, not just A's on papers in college and high school.
Moral of the story: Grammar checkers -- when they even work -- perpetuate stupidity.
I don't think Bush is a Christian at all. I think he's a religious zealot, but nothing he has done has led me to believe he is a Christian. He is zealous about the free market and his own being, not Christ.
The planet will be fine. It's been here for billions of years.
It's part of a natural change
Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/Fox News told me different, and they're experts on the climate whose opinion I have every reason to trust.
I think it's funny when liberals scream about the environment.
Do conservatives just not think there are consequences, or does it just appear that way? "Pollute the environment? Don't worry about it. Dump motor oil on your lawn, screw it. Make a liberal cry. Hahaha. Torture innocents? Eh. Has to be done. Drive up the national debt? C'est l'vie. Declare war for no good reason? They love us for it, the liberal media lies if they say any different."
I thought America was founded by *scientists*, non? The prevailing scientific opinion is that global warming is real and dangerous. Where'd these religious zealots come from, and when do we start shooting?
Slashdot Mirror
In the context it is only a 'crass leap' if it is recognized that the money you spend on your enjoyment is not a matter of discussion, presumably because as an advocate of a seemingly noble cause you are exempt from mere wordly contributions.
But that is where you are mistaken. This, to me, is a combination of the free market at work and simple charity. IMO, this show has failed in the market. Charity is typically meant to mean providing financial support for that which cannot support itself. As such, one entirely correct way of looking at this is as an act of charity. But since charity also has as a requisite the notion of selflessness, this falls on its face thereby.
Now, the argument can quite successfully be made that they are simply trying to purchase something that they wish to see. I do not disagree with that. I think the only disagreement comes about as to whether this show has already failed, and whether their efforts are futile, or better spent elsewhere, thereby.
People gathering together the money to pay for something they want IS the market at work.
And that's where the argument lies: is this trekkies getting together to purchase a good, or is this charity, supporting something when the market will not? I think on further consideration that is a little bit of both.
Is your version of a better world that europeans and NAs donate ALL money to the third world and keep nothing for themselves?
No. That's reductionist and dumb.
Any penny that you spend on yourself is a moral outrage, hypocrite.
Where was that said or implied, hmm? It's a crass leap of logic to go from "some money is better spent on others" to "all money should be spent on others."
I bet you listen to the government propaganda on the AM band, doncha, and even think yourself open minded.
Except that there will always be needy people, no matter how much you individually give.
Right. I guess the question has morphed into: "Are these fans setting up a charity for out of work Star Trek cast members, or are they trying to pay for something they enjoy?" I think it's a little of both. The show has already failed in the market, and they are attempting to revive it using their own money. Is that paying for a good that they want, or is it needless selfishness?
The more I think about it the more I think I'm going to have to think about it.
And what's so special about the tsunami anyways? People are starving every day, dying from easily cured diseases.
It's an example of a great tragedy. There are, unfortunately, many to choose from.
Quit wasting your money on your PC and cable modem subscription, o pretentious one.
What does that have to do with anything? We're talking about a charity being set up for the benefit of the cast of an unsuccessful TV show, not free enterprise. People must buy things for the economy to continue to function. The fans here, though, are talking about setting up a charity for those who do not need such a thing.
I dont disagree about them being morons. I would never spend the money on that. I think it's stupid. But to criticize them for picking this cause instead of a charity is stupid too.
Not at all. I think to some degree you are conflating judgement with prohibition. I judge them wrong in this, but I would never seek to prohibit them from doing so.
Be that as it may, this is basically a charitable donation being made to satiate the selfish desires of a few zealous fans. Selfishness has its place, but when you move into the realm of charity then you enter into the world of sacrifice for the benefit of others. By setting up this charity they would be subsidizing those who do not need such: the cast and crew of the show, the production managers, etc. There are millions upon millions of people on this planet who live in cardboard boxes. Giving them opportunities is far and away a better thing than subsidizing some tired sci-fi TV show.
Such an argument has merit on it's face, but when you say this you are making a assumptive judgement on the part of the donors. Who's to say that the donors didn't already donate to tsunami relief?
You can't, of course. But the quesiton then becomes: should they give to a TV show, or to the needy? This act is very selfish, IMO, and shows an almost willful blindness to the world around them. TV shows come and go; none are so important that they should become the target for charitable giving.
I know I'm nitpicking but under the same argument, all money spent to produce Battlestar Galactica is also a misappropriation because it's for luxury and therefore should go to tsunami relief.
Neither should receive such money. They will both succeed or fail on their own merits in the market. But investing in people -- by giving to an educational institution, or to a sex education effort -- is not only the right thing to do, but it is far more productive in every sense of the word.
I guess that I would argue that AppleScript isn't meant for "real" work; that's for Python, Java, Objective C, etc. AppleScript is a scripting language, after all, and therefore my expectations aren't too high for it. I expect it do be able to do simple tasks quickly, and for harder things to be difficult if not impossible.
If you use a Mac, you might want to check out Unison. It's pay-for-play, but is probably the best GUI newsreader I've run across.
Unless this gets hammered on repeatedly, people will forget, and/or you will fail to educate newer users. Yes, this is /., but even this community suffers from human foibles. Count me amongst those who are satisfied with the status quo, here.
An operating system can be the most secure and uncrashable thing on the planet and nobody is going to give a flying damn if they can't run software they want to use on it.
They can, though. Off the top of my head I can't think of a single widespread consumer application that doesn't have a Mac port. Quicken, MS Office, OO.org, etc. Plus, the most widely used pieces of software today are email clients, web browsers, and chat clients, and all those come with the OS. Hell, Apple wrote the most popular music player around today.
Is the a piece of software you had in mind? The only think I can think of are games, and that's it's own subculture (and I will agree that that is a definite drawback.)
Perhaps this is just human nature. But as a "switcher" who is approaching his one year anniversary with a PowerMac after almost 20 years of Windows and DOS (starting with DOS 2.0!) I can honestly say: Windows users, it's not your fault. Microsoft should be ashamed, not you. Windows sucks, and there are better choices out there for you. Make them! You'll be happy that you did.
By the way, I am not conservative, I am libertarian. Government is meant to serve the people, not the other way around.
Who do you think's in charge, babycakes? You think this adminitration's fiscal policy serves any other purpose than to drown the federal government?
Feh, you're a libertarian, hence a cultist. I, too, was once a libertarian. Then I woke up and realized I was being a complete evangelical asshole and was quite mistaken about a lot of things. Hopefully one day you'll have a similar awakening. In the mean time, go memorize the Preamble. It'll do wonders.
Maybe you like to take a little test.
Man, you're a walking cliche, aren't you? "Here, graph your political beliefs on this simplistic two-dimensional axis!" My beliefs don't graph to a two-dimensional plane, k? They're n-dimensional, and are in no way bound by fundamentalist dogma, whether Christian, libertarian, or "other".
Then again if you believe that government is the answer to all of life's problems, maybe not.
Yes, moo, I believe government should take over every part of the world, moo. All government is good, more is better, moo.
What a stupid fucking thing to believe. Do you REALLY think there are people out there who think that way? Really? Or are you just deluded?
Personally, I believe that the sad state of the education system in the United States IS the result of the NEA close ties to the liberal agenda of the Democratic Party. Simply put, if children were taught to love and honor the free society in which we live, they would be able to see that the liberal agenda espoused by the Democratic Party goes against the very principles of a free society.
Of course you do, because you've swallowed the moronic bullshit spewed by the propagandists day in and day out. Here's the deal, though: by and large Democrats are more supportive of individual liberties. Oh I KNOW what you believe, what you've swallowed.
How many times have you heard a politician, especially one of the Democratic Party, speak of how we must help the less fortunate, or we must "think about the children" some measure is supposed to help?
Not very often at all, actually. In fact, I don't know if I've *ever* heard someone say that. What I *have* heard is conservatives bitch incessantly -- and oh how I do mean "incessantly"-- about what amounts to no more than a strawman, an Emmanuel Goldstein for the 21st century.
News flash, chucky: the emperor has no clothes. The enemy you think exists doesn't. You are being lied to.
The US education system is failing, not because our kids can not learn, but because it is in the best interest of the liberal agenda.
Or maybe, just maybe it's because kids have parents who don't raise them right. Maybe, just maybe we should point the cold finger of blame upon those who have the most influence in their upbringing, those who tell their kids, implicitly or explicitly, that some people don't deserve equal freedoms. Who bring them up believing that all their blame and hate can be directed at them thar nefarious and scary "liberals", instead of bringing them up to believe in equality for all, why liberty is an awesome thing, that justice should be blind, and that democray means that the people can and do have the ultimate voice in government.
Don't worry, though. All cognitive dissonance can be quieted just by tuning your radio to your local government propagandist. You can forget everything you read here and go about believing in your Orwellian reality.
The first rule of conservativism is you do not question conservativism.
Wouldn't it be far wiser to build solar panels in orbit, use them to power Microwaves, and avoid the attenuation in the atmosphere?
Well, from TFA:
The feat would require a 60-megawatt microwave beam with a similar diameter to the sail.
Now, I'm no EE, so somebody please correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm thinking that generating that much power from solar cells would be an undertaking in and of itself. You'd be hard pressed to generate that much energy in space.
If you cannot tell the difference, then we have nothing to talk about.
We have noting to talk about because like almost all conservatives you jump at the first available opportunity to bury your head in the sand whenever nasty-nasty cognitive dissonance rears its ugly head. In other words: you're too big of a chickenshit to face opposition.
Maybe if instead of worrying about teenagers knowing how to use a condom and teaching them to be properly sensitive to the subculture du jour, you spent your efforts in communicating why freedom of speech applies to political viewpoints you don't agree with, and why it is of tantamount importance and that if you stop shitting on every conservative you meet then we might actually get along here.
You know, I always hear about the ACLU defending Rush Limbaugh, the KKK, and other fascists whenever their freedoms are being curtailed. But I never hear about conservatives doing the same. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise you're just bringing up the same tired old strawmen.
And for the record, while I personally shit on conservatives, its purely for pleasure. The shitting stops when the legislature is in session, for I believe in the freedom of *all* mankind, not just my ideological brethren.
My PowerBook can easily play a full normal-length movie (no LotR, though) off its battery, can't yours?
Yes. But the option would be nice were I to want to watch LotR on a laptop. Whether I would want to or not is another matter entirely...
People die to defend these rights, and some of our students don't even know what these rights are?
Hey conservatives! Maybe if instead of worrying about absitence only education and attacking Darwinism you spent your efforts in communicating why and how we are a free society, and why that is of tantamount importance, we could all get along here, hm? Cuz I'll be honest with you, I'll stand shoulder to shoulder with James "Spongebob Is Gay" Dobson if it means we get the message out loud and clear about the Bill of RIghts.
One thing that I hope Apple winds up incorporating into their laptops is something that a friend of mine has on his Dell. It's a special "DVD only" mode where it switches over from being a general purpose computer to a DVD player only, and the battery life is increased substantially thereby.
This seems to be a good idea. We use our PB as a DVD player frequently at night in bed*, and a power cord is annoying. Having this would be just another nice touch, and I couldn't imagine it would be that hard to engineer.
* And to head off the juveniles: Yes, sometimes we do watch porn.
You're right, of course, and few people would argue differently. My point is that education is not a panacea: the German people of the 1930's and 40's were for the most part very well educated, yet nonetheless they willingly and even eagerly took part in the most horrific crimes against man.
Moral of the story: Grammar checkers -- when they even work -- perpetuate stupidity.
I don't think Bush is a Christian at all. I think he's a religious zealot, but nothing he has done has led me to believe he is a Christian. He is zealous about the free market and his own being, not Christ.
Do conservatives just not think there are consequences, or does it just appear that way? "Pollute the environment? Don't worry about it. Dump motor oil on your lawn, screw it. Make a liberal cry. Hahaha. Torture innocents? Eh. Has to be done. Drive up the national debt? C'est l'vie. Declare war for no good reason? They love us for it, the liberal media lies if they say any different."
I thought America was founded by *scientists*, non? The prevailing scientific opinion is that global warming is real and dangerous. Where'd these religious zealots come from, and when do we start shooting?