The real solution is to give sexual predators the punishment they truly deserve in the first place, which is life in prison without possibility of parole.
Which may or may not correspond with current lists of "sex offenders".
Those who want to be soft on sex offenders are most likely not parents, and most definitely not parents of a child who has been abused.
Except for those parents who are themselves abusers...
But I would at least offer the suggestion there should be levels of sex offenders. For example: Somebody convicted of statuatory rape where the age difference is less than 4 years would be a different level than somebody who brutally raped an unwilling person.
Thing is that "sex offender" is not a synonym for "rape". It's also quite possible that even some actual rapists who have been caught do not wind up on such lists. The claim that the aim is to "protect the public" makes little sense. It might make a little more sense if vigilantes who use such lists or those who make false accusations of rape (especially resulting in a conviction) had their own names put on them. Of course the sensible thing to do would be to replace any such lists. If someone is really such a danger either keep them in jail for life or have any lifelong bail conditions made an explicit part of their sentence.
By "arbitrary" I mean that copyright and patent monopolies are a creation of government. Government could very well decide that copyright no longer exists and, unlike natural rights, there would be no appeal to a universal notion of human rights.
If the Government in question were the US Federal government. Then there is no confusion at all. Since such laws are allowed, but not mandated, by the US Consitution.
I'm not talking about music in particular, but about the general idea of "I did ABC first, now you cannot do ABC (and a thousand things related to it)".
Or even "I told the Government I did ABC first (they were fooled), now you cannot do ABC (and a thousand things related to it). Even if you actually did ABC first it dosn't matter. Nor does it matter if ABC is itself a variation of something carried out since Neolitic times."
The right of the creator to control their creation is -- correctly -- understood as a human right
Where is this listed as a "human right"? There's also the issue that "control their creation" may well not equate to current concepts of "intellectual property"...
There is no (or there should be no) distinction between tangible, material property and the non-tangible intellectual kind.
So physical "things" are the same as abstract "things"?
Do even/.ers get their science from movies these days?
There's also the question of where does Hollywood get it's science from..
1 atmosphere ~= 14.7 psi. A.45 hangun would likely punch a neat.45 hole in the skin of the plane. That's 0.16 square inches, or just over 2 pounds of total force if it were a vacuum outside and the plane was at 1 atm inside. Of course, neither of those would be true, so it more like 1 pound of force.
The maximum pressure differential with an aircraft is something around 8 psi. N.B. A spacecraft is more likely to be around 11 rather than nearly 15 psi.
The airplane's compressors have enough reserve capacity to pressurize the plane even with a small hole in the skin. There would be air blowing out through the hole, but that's about it.
Aircraft already tend to have lots of tiny holes in both the skin and the rear preassure bulkhead. Made by these things called rivets. Building an aircraft which was totally airtight would only increase the price.
Putting a few bullet holes in the outer skin of the aircraft won't be as exciting as Hollywood makes it out to be.
Actually it could be quite "exciting" for rather different reasons. More a long the lines of getting a free demonstration of how quickly an aircraft can land.
Basically, if you poke a small hole in a pressurized airplane's skin the pressure begins to drop a tiny bit faster than it did before you poked a hole,
Also since the result of a bullet is a neat circular hole there is little chance of the hole enlarging.
and not likely fast enough to even overcome the systems that maintain the pressure.
A bullet hole is tiny compared with the effects of a faulty door seal. It's also rather smaller than the outflow valve(s).
Can we put some restrictions on the ammo that you can carry? It is ok with me if you kill a hijacker, but I don't want you putting holes in the plane.
Maybe if you live in "Hollywood Land". Neat bullet holes in planes are not a big problem (except to the airline), it takes a lot of holes before loss of cabin pressure is any kind of issue. If anything any kind of "special ammo" (or restricted powder charge) may possibly cause more damage to the plane.
And as usual, there is no explanation as to *why* lithium batteries are now illegal to carry
Other than a vague reference to a fire on board a cargo plane. Many pasenger aircraft also carry commercial cargo, especially when there arn't that many passengers on the flight. Thus the real issue here appears to be related to cargo AFAIK there have been no fires related batteries brought on board by passengers or crew.
What is the rationale?
The rationale is probably along the lines of "2007 has been a slow year for both real attacks on aircraft or government/press backed conspiracy theories. So we'd better come up with something to keep our budget!"
The only way you get to ban gambling is if you believe that gambling is morally a bad thing, or if you believe that gambling could damage public order. By allowing some types of gambling, you agree that gambling is not morally a bad thing, and that it is not a danger to order either. Hence, you can't ban gambling, in any form.
Interestingly you don't see the US Government attempting to shut down the likes of the New York Stock Exchange...
And it's your own damn fault if they decide to. I make it a point that whenever I have my vehicle serviced, whether a routine oil change or a more invasive procedure, that I have absolutely nothing of real import left in the vehicle.
It's still theft if they take things from your car. In the same way that it's still theft if your cleaner/babysitter/etc takes things from your house.
when I leave the car at the shop, I empty the glove box of all personal records that are otherwise required to be in the vehicle (the title, registration, etc.).
Do you also check the car after it comes back, possible with a police office present, to ensuer that nothing has been placed in it?
The fact of the matter is, a certain computer company got in a big shit storm for stealing porn/files off of one of their clientell just earlier this year (Circuit City?). Yet somehow they get away with this kind of behaviour AGAIN, only because it is "Child Porn".
In some fucked up conspiracy ran world, one might argue that Circuit City planted the files there.... to try and save face from their earlier transgression....
A simpler motive would be revenge for the customer not having sufficent/right kind of lawful porn on their computer. You only need to consider conspiracies where the evidence actually points to one.
Oh, yeah, and one last thing. Because the repair people committed a crime of computer trespass, the burden of proof is on the state to show that the material was obtained by the defendant and was not placed there by the repair people.
Would a burglar who discovered a murder receive a "get out of jail free" card? A criminal who whilst comitting a crime who "discovers" a more serious crime should still be charged with the crime they committed. Doing so gives them more incentive to plant "evidence" at the scenes of their crimes.
A general note: I believe that there are two cases regarding evidence which should be treated in a different manner: Law-enforcement and "normal" people. If the police searches your house without a warrant everything they come up with should be ignored by the court.
Arguably if such police officers turn up in a criminal court they should automatically be tried for burglary.
But if you ask someone to clean your house for example and he finds a corpse in the basement there should not be a restriction on investigating it. Even if you told him not to go down there, because that's just part of a private contract.
If you explicitally told then not to go down there then that's circumstantial evidence of your guilt. Otherwise they should be treated as likely a suspect as you.
Yes--so if we filter out all lasers in the visible spectrum, and then get the UV lasers, and of course, their predecessor, the maser (microwave freq), and I'm pretty sure there's IR ones too...
Classically "carbon dioxide lasers". More commonly now those in CD players. There are also lasers which produce several frequencies of light at once. Thus by use of dichroic filters (and mirrors) you can get multiple beams from one laser.
You realize of course that you can also blind a pilot with a signal mirror and a powerful flashlight.
There's a short story about about a "death ray" being used to cause someone to drive their car off a mountain road. It's actually the point of the story that this is generated from a perfectly ordinary lamp, rather than being some sort of laser.
As for this incident: I've had a green laser slash across my retina a few times. The result was irritating, but transient: a powerful photo-flash is _FAR_ more obnoxious.
An incandecent lamp in the kW range isn't going to be much fun either.
If an aircraft accidently happened to wander in to the path when I was showing somebody where M31 or Comet 17P/Holmes was, is it a crime?
If the aircraft was flying then it would just as soon fly out of any laser beam. You'd need to have a (near) stationary helicopter. There's also the issue of if the pilot were to deliberatly fly into the beam...
And you're against this...why? A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form.
At least one which claims to be in any way democratic. N.B. this "determined effort" need not be entirely (even primarily) by voting. An elected representative is expected to represent even people who voted against him/her. One very difficult problem is how do you ensure that the voice of regular people is not simply drowned out by professional (and full time) lobby groups... In the case of a federal republic, such as the US, there is also the issue of the federal government intended to be "weak" because plenty of government tasks should be being carried out by state, city or whatever governments.
Don't know why otherwise intelligent people don't get this simple fact. Whether you use paper money or gold or diamonds or cigarettes or whatever, they can only stand-for or represent or reflect the true wealth in the economy. They are not wealth by themselves.
There's a difference between money which represents some kind of commodity and so called "fiat money".
In Roe vs. Wade, SCOTUS ruled that an implied Constitutional right to privacy exists, and thus the 14th amendment proscribes states from banning abortion.
Whether this is the correct interpretation of the Constitution or not is a question that people may discuss.
If nothing else this actually makes some logical sense. In terms of the 14th ammendment trumping the 10th...
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The real solution is to give sexual predators the punishment they truly deserve in the first place, which is life in prison without possibility of parole.
Which may or may not correspond with current lists of "sex offenders".
Those who want to be soft on sex offenders are most likely not parents, and most definitely not parents of a child who has been abused.
Except for those parents who are themselves abusers...
But I would at least offer the suggestion there should be levels of sex offenders. For example: Somebody convicted of statuatory rape where the age difference is less than 4 years would be a different level than somebody who brutally raped an unwilling person.
Thing is that "sex offender" is not a synonym for "rape". It's also quite possible that even some actual rapists who have been caught do not wind up on such lists.
The claim that the aim is to "protect the public" makes little sense. It might make a little more sense if vigilantes who use such lists or those who make false accusations of rape (especially resulting in a conviction) had their own names put on them.
Of course the sensible thing to do would be to replace any such lists. If someone is really such a danger either keep them in jail for life or have any lifelong bail conditions made an explicit part of their sentence.
By "arbitrary" I mean that copyright and patent monopolies are a creation of government. Government could very well decide that copyright no longer exists and, unlike natural rights, there would be no appeal to a universal notion of human rights.
If the Government in question were the US Federal government. Then there is no confusion at all. Since such laws are allowed, but not mandated, by the US Consitution.
I'm not talking about music in particular, but about the general idea of "I did ABC first, now you cannot do ABC (and a thousand things related to it)".
Or even "I told the Government I did ABC first (they were fooled), now you cannot do ABC (and a thousand things related to it). Even if you actually did ABC first it dosn't matter. Nor does it matter if ABC is itself a variation of something carried out since Neolitic times."
The right of the creator to control their creation is -- correctly -- understood as a human right
Where is this listed as a "human right"? There's also the issue that "control their creation" may well not equate to current concepts of "intellectual property"...
There is no (or there should be no) distinction between tangible, material property and the non-tangible intellectual kind.
So physical "things" are the same as abstract "things"?
Do even /.ers get their science from movies these days?
.45 hangun would likely punch a neat .45 hole in the skin of the plane. That's 0.16 square inches, or just over 2 pounds of total force if it were a vacuum outside and the plane was at 1 atm inside. Of course, neither of those would be true, so it more like 1 pound of force.
There's also the question of where does Hollywood get it's science from..
1 atmosphere ~= 14.7 psi. A
The maximum pressure differential with an aircraft is something around 8 psi. N.B. A spacecraft is more likely to be around 11 rather than nearly 15 psi.
The airplane's compressors have enough reserve capacity to pressurize the plane even with a small hole in the skin. There would be air blowing out through the hole, but that's about it.
Aircraft already tend to have lots of tiny holes in both the skin and the rear preassure bulkhead. Made by these things called rivets. Building an aircraft which was totally airtight would only increase the price.
Putting a few bullet holes in the outer skin of the aircraft won't be as exciting as Hollywood makes it out to be.
Actually it could be quite "exciting" for rather different reasons. More a long the lines of getting a free demonstration of how quickly an aircraft can land.
Basically, if you poke a small hole in a pressurized airplane's skin the pressure begins to drop a tiny bit faster than it did before you poked a hole,
Also since the result of a bullet is a neat circular hole there is little chance of the hole enlarging.
and not likely fast enough to even overcome the systems that maintain the pressure.
A bullet hole is tiny compared with the effects of a faulty door seal. It's also rather smaller than the outflow valve(s).
I seriously wish Mythbusters would put a hole in an airliner just to prove you (ok not you, but other people too) wrong.
They already have, it was in episode 10...
Can we put some restrictions on the ammo that you can carry? It is ok with me if you kill a hijacker, but I don't want you putting holes in the plane.
Maybe if you live in "Hollywood Land". Neat bullet holes in planes are not a big problem (except to the airline), it takes a lot of holes before loss of cabin pressure is any kind of issue. If anything any kind of "special ammo" (or restricted powder charge) may possibly cause more damage to the plane.
And as usual, there is no explanation as to *why* lithium batteries are now illegal to carry
Other than a vague reference to a fire on board a cargo plane. Many pasenger aircraft also carry commercial cargo, especially when there arn't that many passengers on the flight.
Thus the real issue here appears to be related to cargo AFAIK there have been no fires related batteries brought on board by passengers or crew.
What is the rationale?
The rationale is probably along the lines of "2007 has been a slow year for both real attacks on aircraft or government/press backed conspiracy theories. So we'd better come up with something to keep our budget!"
The only way you get to ban gambling is if you believe that gambling is morally a bad thing, or if you believe that gambling could damage public order. By allowing some types of gambling, you agree that gambling is not morally a bad thing, and that it is not a danger to order either. Hence, you can't ban gambling, in any form.
Interestingly you don't see the US Government attempting to shut down the likes of the New York Stock Exchange...
And it's your own damn fault if they decide to. I make it a point that whenever I have my vehicle serviced, whether a routine oil change or a more invasive procedure, that I have absolutely nothing of real import left in the vehicle.
It's still theft if they take things from your car. In the same way that it's still theft if your cleaner/babysitter/etc takes things from your house.
when I leave the car at the shop, I empty the glove box of all personal records that are otherwise required to be in the vehicle (the title, registration, etc.).
Do you also check the car after it comes back, possible with a police office present, to ensuer that nothing has been placed in it?
The fact of the matter is, a certain computer company got in a big shit storm for stealing porn/files off of one of their clientell just earlier this year (Circuit City?). Yet somehow they get away with this kind of behaviour AGAIN, only because it is "Child Porn".
In some fucked up conspiracy ran world, one might argue that Circuit City planted the files there.... to try and save face from their earlier transgression....
A simpler motive would be revenge for the customer not having sufficent/right kind of lawful porn on their computer.
You only need to consider conspiracies where the evidence actually points to one.
Oh, yeah, and one last thing. Because the repair people committed a crime of computer trespass, the burden of proof is on the state to show that the material was obtained by the defendant and was not placed there by the repair people.
Would a burglar who discovered a murder receive a "get out of jail free" card? A criminal who whilst comitting a crime who "discovers" a more serious crime should still be charged with the crime they committed. Doing so gives them more incentive to plant "evidence" at the scenes of their crimes.
A general note: I believe that there are two cases regarding evidence which should be treated in a different manner: Law-enforcement and "normal" people. If the police searches your house without a warrant everything they come up with should be ignored by the court.
Arguably if such police officers turn up in a criminal court they should automatically be tried for burglary.
But if you ask someone to clean your house for example and he finds a corpse in the basement there should not be a restriction on investigating it. Even if you told him not to go down there, because that's just part of a private contract.
If you explicitally told then not to go down there then that's circumstantial evidence of your guilt. Otherwise they should be treated as likely a suspect as you.
Just because someone comes up with a patentable idea, doesn't mean it's a GOOD idea.
Similarly there may well be plenty of good ideas which arn't patentable.
Yes--so if we filter out all lasers in the visible spectrum, and then get the UV lasers, and of course, their predecessor, the maser (microwave freq), and I'm pretty sure there's IR ones too...
Classically "carbon dioxide lasers". More commonly now those in CD players.
There are also lasers which produce several frequencies of light at once. Thus by use of dichroic filters (and mirrors) you can get multiple beams from one laser.
You realize of course that you can also blind a pilot with a signal mirror and a powerful flashlight.
There's a short story about about a "death ray" being used to cause someone to drive their car off a mountain road. It's actually the point of the story that this is generated from a perfectly ordinary lamp, rather than being some sort of laser.
As for this incident: I've had a green laser slash across my retina a few times. The result was irritating, but transient: a powerful photo-flash is _FAR_ more obnoxious.
An incandecent lamp in the kW range isn't going to be much fun either.
If an aircraft accidently happened to wander in to the path when I was showing somebody where M31 or Comet 17P/Holmes was, is it a crime?
If the aircraft was flying then it would just as soon fly out of any laser beam. You'd need to have a (near) stationary helicopter.
There's also the issue of if the pilot were to deliberatly fly into the beam...
And you're against this...why? A government should be "weak" enough that it cannot survive a determined effort from its citizens to change its form.
At least one which claims to be in any way democratic. N.B. this "determined effort" need not be entirely (even primarily) by voting. An elected representative is expected to represent even people who voted against him/her. One very difficult problem is how do you ensure that the voice of regular people is not simply drowned out by professional (and full time) lobby groups...
In the case of a federal republic, such as the US, there is also the issue of the federal government intended to be "weak" because plenty of government tasks should be being carried out by state, city or whatever governments.
Don't know why otherwise intelligent people don't get this simple fact. Whether you use paper money or gold or diamonds or cigarettes or whatever, they can only stand-for or represent or reflect the true wealth in the economy. They are not wealth by themselves.
There's a difference between money which represents some kind of commodity and so called "fiat money".
In Roe vs. Wade, SCOTUS ruled that an implied Constitutional right to privacy exists, and thus the 14th amendment proscribes states from banning abortion.
Whether this is the correct interpretation of the Constitution or not is a question that people may discuss.
If nothing else this actually makes some logical sense. In terms of the 14th ammendment trumping the 10th...