Geez....why can't the legislatures see we're freaking taxed ENOUGH.
You're a wage earner. You will never be taxed enough. Each dollar that the government seizes is one that it can spend on buying votes rather than you spending it on your "selfish whims" (you know, like feeding your family). Votes are for sale, and the means to buy them are government programs. Votes are the key to power. If you're a politician, then why don't you take someone's money and buy some? If the victim isn't going to vote for you anyway, then you've got nothing to lose!
Both Democrats and Republicans play this hideous game. The ultimate long-term goal is to move 100% of the tax burden to a minority of citizens. That way, every tax increase will be immune from voter resistance. One side will be able to say to 51% of the electorate, "Vote for the other guy and he'll make you pay taxes!"
What I mean to say is that the university's most immediate goal should be continuity of teaching and learning, and therefore people who learn because they like learning for some reason are generally speaking useful to society even if they fail to apply what they have learned in an economically productive way.
In other words, you agree with me that there is no such thing as "education for education's sake." I agree that people who fail to apply what they've leared in an economically productive way (think: art history majors) are still useful: many people hate capitalism and hate the idea that all their hard work in school has no value in the free market. Art history majors need to be held up to some "higher ideal" to give the useless some reason to exist.
But the slogan "education for education's sake" is simplistic, of course. You need a better story than that if you want to pretend you speak with authority on pedagogy.
The slogan is not only simplistic -- it is also false. I like the way you phrased "if you want to pretend you speak with authority." That's what *all* attempts to assert authority are: pretending and then hoping that someone trusts you. Either that, or you can just resort to using force.
It is interesting (and worrying) to see how little people know about how modern schools came into existence, and what their purpose is.
The purpose of schools is a matter of no small controversy. The fact that you speak as if you know what the "True(TM) Purpose of Schools" is merely means that you support a a particular controversial position.
To control education is to decide the national language, the measurement system, the past, etc.
Naturally. Schools are as much about control as they are about "education." In fact, it is trivial to spin control as "education." Many people who claim to use schools to throw off the shackles of tyranny are merely wishing to impose a new tyranny rather than liberate individuals.
Mandatory education is what keeps the nation together.
That is left-wing, statist rhetoric. Right-wing zealots state that marraige is the "glue that holds the nation together." What makes your rhetoric correct and theirs incorrect?
The role of the university is to pass on civilization to the next generation.
This is not education for education's sake. This is education in order to pass on civilization to the next generation. I maintain: education is never an end in and of itself. It is always a means to an end.
A part of the population - preferably the most intelligent part - must learn, review, rephrase, reinvent, translate, and teach for "it's own sake".
I think you put that in double-quotes because you invalidated it with the previous statement. Is education for its own sake, or is it for the sake of passing on civilization? Make up your mind!
That's not learning for learning's sake. That's learning for the sake of enjoying oneself. I maintain: education is never the goal in and of itself. It's always a means to an end. In this case, it's fun.
Which is a great reason for education, in my honest opinion.
That's not learning for learning's sake. It's learning for the sake of satifying your curiousity. As I said, education is always a means to an end and never an end in and of itself.
Whatever happened to learning for learning's sake?
There is no such thing as learning for learning's sake. Every bit of education is merely a means to an end. Eduction is never the end.
Don't believe it? Answer the question: what is the use of learning merely for learning's sake?
A: Because you'll be an educated person!
Q: So what? What does that get me?
A: You'll get to be in society's elite!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: You'll have a greater understanding of the world!
Q: And what does that get me?
A: You'll be able to talk more authoritively on subjects of science, history, and politics!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society? Being able to "talk with more authority" merely means that I'll be able to hold my own in "higher" conversations with "more important" people, right?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: Sinks to invective, talks about me being "anti-education."
The 'increasingly' you have latched onto is in the subordinate clause that follows on from this, where Crichton rows back from the bold rhetorical claim that he wants his audience to remember. RealClimate.org's critique focuses on the main claim, not the weasel words Crichton puts in as a get out of jail card.
"Bold rhetorical claim." "Weasel words." Your rhetoric is not doing you any favors. I don't read what Chrichton wrote while impugning him with the same sinister motives that you do.
So they turned to the IPCC Report that Crichton cited in the bibliography to his novel (and thus can be assumed to have read), which gives a good overview of current research and point to ~150 pages in that report that go into how climatoligists take computer climate models and assess them against RW data.
So a "good overview of current research" and "~150" pages should prove to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that all scientists are good and pure? Since they spout the same things that the haters of capitalism spout with the same pompousness in which you smear Chrichton (and, presumably, anyone who deign doubt the Truth(TM) about Global Warming), I'm not inclined to believe it.
How does this square with Crichton's subsequent claim in this article that such models are no longer being checked against the real world?
I didn't read it that way. But I don't suspect that you'll buy into my interpretation (the same way I don't buy into yours), so I don't feel very motivated to argue my case on this point.
Sadly you have misread the RealClimate writer's intent.
I read their intent as wanting to destroy capitalism. I suffer from this deep mistrust of anyone who champions "Global Warming" and it's going to make your job of convincing me to your point of view very difficult.
If you had bothered to follow the three definitional links that they included in the subsequent sentence you would have found that actually they (or rather, climatologists) define 'climate' as the statistical average of various meterological metrics over a wide area and time, whereas 'weather' is an instance of those self-same metrics for a specific time and location.
So let me get this straight. "Weather" takes place in a smaller location and a smaller time frame, and "climate" takes place in a bigger location and a bigger time frame. If this is the case, then the difference between the two is entirely subjective.
I followed the links you attached. The first two say essentially what I wrote in the previous paragraph. The third explained why differentiating between "weather" and "climate" was necessary in order to accept the Truth(TM) about Global Warming. I'm not impressed by your links.
Thus the 'what you expect' part of the tag refers to the statistical nature of what climate is rather than any predictive attributes it might have, whilst the 'what you get' part of the tag refers to the specificity of what weather is (or will be).
That's nice, but it's not at all what RealClimate.org wrote. Again, they wrote the following: "Climate is what you expect; Weather is what you get." Let's substitute that definition (which I'll assume you agree with, since you haven't disputed it) into your lecture:
"Thus, climate, the 'what you expect' part of the tag, refers to the statistical nature of what climate is rather than any predictive attributes it might have, whilst weahter, the 'what you get' part of the tag, refers to the specificity of what weather is (or will be)."
Is this unfair? Your explanations don't seem to help your case. Perhaps you should just come out and state that what RealClimate.org wrote was incorrect.
So the guy on the news who tells me that tomorrow there's going to be bright sunshine and 70+ temperatures isn't telling me 'what I expect'
Yes he is, you goofball. What you predict is functionally equivalent to what you expect, and the guy on the news telling you that
Crichton statement is that the judging of models based on real-world correlation has ceased. The models are judged by how well they reproduce data (among other things.) The papers cited show examples of models being judged.
I repeat: I repeat: so what? This does *not* show that *in all cases* it is true, and this could very well be precisely what Chrichton is bemoaning. The "I repeat" is in there twice becuase I keep making a point that you ignore. The examples do not disprove Chricton's claim because they are not necessarily represenative of the entire sample.
But Crichton said something much more absolute, and that's where he went awry.
I don't think it was absolute. His statement was, "increasingly," not "entirely" or "all." I think you choose to see an absolutist statement and that is why you think a few examples disprove it. I do not see an absolutist statement and that is why the examples prove nothing to me.
When Crichton says "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?", he compares two predictions. The first is a weather prediction; what's the second prediction?
A weather prediction. I expect you to want to reply, "But see! That's not weather, that's climate!"
Which is a good time to point out a question that you've chosen to ignore: If what you say is true, then why did RealClimate.org define things the way they did (specifically, weather == "what you observe", climate == "what you expect")? This is not a rhetorical question. Answer it!
I think the second blanket statement, that all climate scientists that are presenting evidence that humans are causing global warming are motivated by the destruction of capitalism, requires a conspiracy theory of Crichtion proportions.
Nice gushing. Do you have any data to support why a conspiracy theory is necessary in order for some scientists to hate capitalism and champion "global warming is caused by human activity" for the ultimate goal of the destruction of captialism? This is not a rhetorical question!
Have you bounced around the body of climate science writing?
Why would I? I do not trust those scientists!
There are not a lot of blind assertions or unquestioned assumptions anywhere in the peer-reviewed articles; there is skepticism and cross-checking galore. There are people coming up with multiple new approaches to re-measure past phenomenon my independant means. There are articles correcting and refining past observations.
*yawn*
Christians gush similarly about the amount of scholarship that their pet scholars can produce.
It does not strike me as body of science that could be put together by a group of politically motivated anti-capitalists.
You're beating up a strawman. I'm not claiming that a bunch of socialists got together and "put together" a body of science. I'm claiming that there are scientists who have socialist, anti-capitalist leanings, and they are not above using their lofty positions to influence public policy (with the intent of ultimately destroying captialistm). That socialists would gladly use global warming as a means to an end is well documented. A quick googlesearch? turned up a fewlinks.
But you're arguing for my point: science is all about questioning every step, precisely because of human failings.
One of these human failings is that science may be motivated by proving what is already known to be True(TM) rather than observing the world around us and making reasoned
Are you asserting that the models are not judged by how well they reproduce data? The papers cited show that this is not true....
No, I am not asserting that. (I was accusing you of argument by assertion, and that accusation stands.) The papers given by RealClimate.org show that in some cases there were instances where models were not judged by how well they reproduced data. (I'll assume that they show it for the sake of argument -- I have not read them.) I repeat: so what? This does *not* show that *in all cases* it is true, and this could very well be precisely what Chrichton is bemoaning.
When Crichton mentions the prediction that goes out 100 years into the future, is he talking about a weather prediction that went 100 years into the future? No, he's talking about a climate prediction on that time scale.
It is you, not RealClimate.org, who is introducing this notion of "climate prediction" into the discussion. RealClimate.org defined weather as "what you observe" and climate as "what you expect." Do you agree with these definitions? If you do, then you must admit that climate is functionally equivalent to a weather prediction, since both are "what you expect." If you don't, then for what reason are you defending RealClimate.org?
I'm gettin a little suspicious of you here, because I'm pretty sure you know that.
Becuase I won't accept your weak arguments? I was suspicious of you from the get-go, as I am with anyone who champions "global warming is caused by humans." It was you who called RealClimate.org's criticism of Chrichton's paper "detailed" when, in fact, it only raised three criticisms (each of which I've smacked down and you've failed to defend) and did so in a snotty and elitist manner (which means that their argument is weak). I think you called it "detalied" because it says things that you want to hear, not because it is factual, rational, or complete in any way.
No, he's talking about a climate prediction on that time scale. While Crichton carefully avoided using the words "climate prediction", he is in fact comparing a weather prediction against a climate prediction.
I don't buy it. If what you say is true, then why did RealClimate.org define things the way they did (specifically, weather == "what you observe", climate == "what you expect")? Your need to observe some kind of non-obvious and insidious care in Chrichton is noted.
Yes. So I had to say "mostly disjoint" above because scientists sometimes change their focus and move from one side of the fence to others. Still, I read Crichton statement as implying that there was no separation at all, which simply isn't true.
You're backpedaling from your previous "they are separate" claim. You try and whitewash it with an innocuous "fence hopping" that you have made no effort to prove. How do I know it's not just as bad as Chrichton claims it to be? Since I do not trust those scientists making those claims, I'm not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Would you be willing to give the benefit of the doubt to scientists who are on the dole of Big Oil companies? Certainly you can at least somewhat sympathize with my point of view.
Given this lack of absolute isolation, is it possible that the entire field is nothing more than a giant conspiracy of anti-industry, anti-capitalistic scientists (all runaways from the environmental movement) who are all in it together? Personally, I find that hard to swallow, but I will admit it sounds like a good idea for a work of fiction.
I agree! I think it makes much more sense that there are many scientists who are decidedly anti-capitalism and are not above using their scientific pull to destroy what they think is evil. Such scientists and their actions do not depend on this "giant conspiracy" you invent. I have no interest in conspiracy theories.
The whole point of science is nobody should trust anybody.
RealClimate is objecting to the second part: the models are not treated as a reality...in fact, observed data are used to evaluate the performance of climate models.
Argument by assertion.
I maintain (and augment) my argument: RealClimate.org attempted to show that Chrichton's claim that the drunks & lampposts phenomonon was increasing by revealing some examples in which they believed that such a thing did not happen. And what does this show? Nothing! Just because some scientists behave well does not mean all scientists behave well. We would not expect that the priesthood of the Catholic church was free of child molestors merely because the Vatican will uphold its most virtuous priests.
Crichton is drawing a parallel between a weather prediction and a climate prediction. Why would he engage in this false parallel if he's clear about the difference between the two?
Crichton said nothing about "climate prediction." He mentioned "weather prediction" and RealClimate.org defined climate as "weather prediction" (and then acted like superior assholes, a sign of a weak argument).
Chrichton is implying a strong coupling; RealClimate points out that the coupling is weak.
Just how strong is the coupling that Chrichton implies and just how weak does RealClimate.org claim the coupling to be? Does the coupling exceed 15 strength units? Your subjective descriptors have no meaning.
In other words, there are separate groups,
RealClimate.org admits that the groups are not independent. Even you admit that they have a "weak coupling," so I'm not buying your claim of "separate groups."
Crichton implies that the group of people who create models is identical to the group of those who evaluate, and this implication simply isn't true.
Stating is one thing, and showing is another. How do you intend to convince me of this particular claim of falsehood? What evidence will you show me? Will you show me some more virtuous scientists (as the Vatican might show me virtuous priests)?
Personally, I'm skeptical as hell of the "global warming" claims, and I think lots of folks who hate capitalism, hate America, and hate automobiles would love to use it as an excuse to destroy the things they hate. It's no big secret that many anti-capitalists have fled to the environmental movement, and many anti-capitalists may very well be scientists. Why should I assume that their motives are pure? Simply becuase they support that which you already know to be True(TM) is not good enough to convince me.
Let me put it this way. I do not trust the scientists who claim that global warming is caused by human action. The crappy arguments and assholier-than-thou attitude of these scientists weaken my trust even further. How do you intend for me to take their arguments and "data" seriously if I don't trust them? Do you accept the data of scientists who are on the payroll of Big Oil companies as genuine or do you suspect an ulterior motive?
I'm not sure where you get the idea that damming a river or strip mining or clear-cutting forest can't be defined as "negative" to our surroundings, but I'd like to know.
Q: How is strip-mining or clear-cutting negative to the environment?
A: It destroys animals' habitats!
Q: So what?
A: That's bad!
Q: Why?
A: They should live!
Q: Why?
A: So we can study and learn from them!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment after all, right?
A: No, they have a right to life!
Q: Why?
A: Because I don't want to be cruel!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment, after all, right?
A: No, the environment has value in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: Because it's part of my morality!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment, after all, right?
A: (Dissolves into condescending invective.)
Until some other species can reason and assert its rights alongside humanity, every discussion about the environment is about how the environment pleases and serves humanity. It's all about us. I see your argument agaist strip-mining and the argument for strip-mining as two sides of the same coin: either way, a group of humans gets served by the environment. Whether or not matter gets changed from one form to another does not change the fact everyone's fate is death and nothing has any importance in the long run.
I think the reason that your post was modded so highly is because you posted the conclusion that so many people want to hear, which is, essentially, "Chrichton is sloppy at best, mendacious at worst for daring question the Truth about global warming." But, as with so many things, the devil's in the details.
You labeled RealClimate.org's critique as a "detailed examination." But was it really that detailed? I read it, and it seems to me that they are only able to raise three objections, which I will detail here (easy, since there are only three):
1. Chricton claims, "No longer are models judged by how well they reproduce data from the real world-increasingly, models provide the data. As if they were themselves a reality."
- RealClimate.org responds with, "Crichton should know that this assertion is false. He cites in the 'bibliography' at the end of his book, the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But he appears unaware, for example..." and then gives examples of models which, in their opinion, do, in fact, model data from the real world.
* Even if what they write is true, it's not enough to disprove Chrichton's claim. Read what he wrote: "increasingly, models provide the data." In order for them to show falsehood, they would have to show that the phenomenon he bemoans is actually decreasing in frequency or, at best, happening at the same rate. Merely providing examples in the way they did is not sufficient to make Chrichton's claim false. Strike one.
2. Chricton claims, "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?"
- RealClimate.org droops to mockery and replies, "Crichton then goes on to make the classic error of confusing 'weather' and 'climate'... As we in this line of research are fond of pointing out to students in our introductory classes, 'Climate is what you expect; Weather is what you get'. Crichton would have been well served if he had read this tutorial on the distinction between the two...."
* RealClimate.org's analysis is as stupid as it is condescending. Again, read what Chrichton wrote! "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead." If "climate," by RealClimate.org's own admission is "what you expect," then that definition is functionally equivalent to a weather prediction. If there be any confusion here, it appears to be coming from RealClimate.org. Strike two.
3. Chrichton claims, "Certainly the increased use of computer models, such as GCMs, cries out for the separation of those who make the models from those who verify them."
- RealClimate.org looks down their nose again and claims, "Again, if Crichton has read the IPCC report, he should be aware of the fact that largely (though admittedly, not completely) independent communities of scientists are involved with..."
* hold on just a minute! If, by RealClimate.org's admission, the communities of science are not completely independent, then how is RealClimate.org so sure that such a phenomenon is not precisely the complaint that Chrichton has? The counterexamples RealClimate.org provides fall outside of that complaint and are, by nature, irrelevent. Strike three.
Is this the best that the "scientists" at RealClimate.org can come up with? Should I expect their writings on the Truth(TM) of Global Warming to be of the same caliber? Anyone who fails to communicate their thoughts without resorting to snotty invective loses huge amounts of credibility with me.
I'm beginning to get the impression that you don't like elitist Lisp advocates.
I don't like elitism, period. I pick on Lisp advocates here on Slashdot because this is the loctation where they most frequently come to put down anyone who isn't they. I have met many elitist Christians, Leftists, OpenBSD advocates, Ph.D.s, the list goes on and on. I simply have no tolerance for anyone talking down to me anymore because in 100 years both they and I will be rotting in the ground. (Actually, I will have been converted to ash after my organs are harvested, but you get the idea.)
To take a concrete example, in C, functions normally return to their caller, because C only uses a single call stack per thread . . . . The linked example shows that if you know how, you can do this kind of thing in C. But most C programmers wouldn't necessarily think to solve a problem that way, because it's not an obvious solution in C.
What's the difference between setjmp/lngjmp and goto? It seems to be a way of interrupting the expected control flow, and I've heard more than one argue that such is indicative of bad design. I'm not doubting your claim that "there are times that it's useful for a function not to return to its caller." Instead, it appears to me that it's a different way of thinking that is not neccessarily worse or better, just different. This goes back to my question (which I now modify): How can learning Scheme benefit my C programming if it represents a fundamentally different way of thinking? The concrete example here seems to violate principles which are sacrosanct in "the C way" and would be labeled as "bad" by people who think in "the C way."
There's an entirely different kind of benefit that the academically-oriented languages also have, which is that they tend to enable problems to be solved without worrying about low-level details.
You lost me. In every job I've worked in, I have had to worry about the low-level details in one way or another. It all comes down to the fact that the computer science depends on hardware to run, and the hardware costs money. It behooves me to be familiar with how the software and hardware interact so that I can get more use out of the hardware, which means get more milage for my money. No business can survive without taking this into account, so what is this magical land where one can write computer programs while remaining completely and deliberately oblivious to the low-level details?
The University. Yes, a university, which often receives plundered money from taxpayers, where there is no such thing as competition, and where professors who snooze lazily in the protective cocoon of tenure can follow their whim without being subjected to the vagaries of the market under which real folks like I must suffer.
I read parts of the first chapter of SICP and I found it interesting and challenging. But it still begs the question: why is learning Scheme required to teach the lessons that are taught in the book? If they apply to general computer science, then why can't they be written in C (in which so much of the world's non-theoretical software is written)? I suspect that answer is, "Because we're MIT, and we're better than you. The reason you want it to be in C is becuase you're a stupid, ignorant dipshit. You're also a capitalist, so you especially suck."
The author of SICP, probably not as forthcoming as I'd wish he'd be, tries to answer my question with this response:
If Lisp is not a mainstream language, why are we using it as the framework for our discussion of programming? Because the language possesses unique features that make it an excellent medium for studying important programming constructs and data structures and for relating them to the linguistic features that support them. The most significant of these features is the fact that Lisp descriptions of processes, called procedures, can themselves be represented and manipulated as Lisp data. The importance of this
The reason I would recommend doing that over learning C++ is that it provides a foundation for understanding any programming language - it'll be easier to learn and understand C++ afterwards. This has been studied in universities - students who go through the more theoretical introduction to CS concepts using Scheme do better on subsequent courses in Java and C++ than students who start out learning the latter languages (I can dig up references if you care).
I want to care, but I feel very skeptical about such studies. Why? Because LISP advocates are such flaming, fucking assholes. They think they're better than everyone else (when they're really just bacteria food like everyone is), so everything they say and write is suspect. Likewise, most LISP advocates congregate and are spawned in MIT, and most of their evangelism comes from there as well. Are these references going to point to studies created by LISP evangelists? If so, then how do I know that such studies were not designed with an agenda (namely, to spread the gospel of LISP to the world)?
One problem Lisp advocates face is, how do you explain to someone that learning Lisp will teach them important things about programming that they don't yet understand? People don't want to believe that, so they respond negatively, and things devolve from there because both sides are human.
I think this is the misconception that LISP evangelists have about me: they think that I am resistant to LISP because I'm an ignorant dipshit who just isn't as smart and awesome as LISP evanglists are. They think that I respond negatively becuase of my ignorant dipshittedness. I repeat: I will not use LISP because its adherents are elitist assholes. I do not respond negatively because "I don't want to believe that LISP will teach me important things," but because I want to spite LISP evangelists who deserve it many times over. If LISP was really as awesome as LISP evangelists claim it to be, then it would not require the mountains upon montains of condescending bullshit that spews incessently from the lofty towers of MIT. It's awesomeness should be self-evident if it really is so great. Instead, we have to hear constantly about how "elegant" LISP is and how stupid everyone else is for not recognizing this "Eternal Truth."
Do you understand what I'm trying to communicate to you? The elitism of LISP's evangelism is counter-productive! Until LISP evangelists learn to be more humble they will continue to be confined in their ivory tower.
My personal experience is that I spent almost 20 years programming in languages like C, C++, Java, and various scripting languages. I developed some successful commercial products in C and C++. But when I read SICP a few years ago, I was intrigued enough to learn more about Scheme, and later some of the more functional languages like ML and OCaml. I only wish I had known about these languages, and the ideas behind them, a long time ago.
You're the nicest LISP advocate I've met so far (though you did attempt to exploit my non-existent lack of self-esteem, which I forgive). What you write here about SICP is interesting enough to make curious, but not informative enough to make me attempt to embark upon it. I've heard many LISP jackasses claim that LISP is "a different way of thinking about programming" that isn't "immediately intuitive." If it is so fundamentally different, then how did it help your programming in C? It seems clear to me that LISP evangelists are very jealous and bitter that C won and LISP lost, so I'm confused that "the LISP way of thinking" would be helpful to "the C way of thinking." Aren't they competitors?
BTW, have you ever wondered why you're so angry at Lisp?
I'm not angry at LISP at all! I'm angry at LISP *advocates*, not some inanimate programming language.
Does the condescension you're complaining about bug you because you secretly believe it's valid?
I have far too much self-esteeem for a tactic like that to work on me. Try something else.
Really, there's nothing to be afraid of. I recommending reading SICP (google for it) and opening your mind a little. It'll help your programming career.
I'm not afraid at all. I think elitism sucks. And I have never met a LISP advocate that wasn't an elitist, holier-than-thou, condescending asshole. (The same goes for OpenBSD jackasses.) They deserve to be mocked for it since we all know that our fate is to be food for worms and bacteria and their stupid little programming language won't mean jack shit then.
Furthermore, if I wanted to help my programming career, then I'd learn C++. Why would you reccommend LISP over C++ if your goal is to help me in my programming career?
Their censorship technology is the best in the world, and it would improve production if it was implemented in USA companies. How would it improve production you ask? It will, for example, keep people from reading Slashdot all day.
There is a psychological phenomenon in humans that control-freaks consistenly forget. Anything that you deny to a human appears more desirable to that human. If you say, "You can't do that," then the person being addressed will tend to want to do it *more*, not *less*.
For example, two children are playing. They may be playing in an ocean of toys, but the most attactive toy in the room to Child A will be the toy that Child B is playing with.
For example, the USA has some of the most repressive laws against drug use in the world, yet the USA is also the world's largest consumer of these "forbidden" drugs.
Also consider that "rooting for the underdog" and "fighting against the man" is seen as cool and hip in American culture. The "rebel" and "outlaw" are seen as positive, not negative, figures in American culture. Didn't all us Americans feel some righteous indignation when the Imperial officer seethes, "You rebel scum!" to Han Solo?
Communism, to survive, needs people acting together for the common good.
Who decides what "the common good" is? How do we know what will truly be best for most people? Do we just put our trust in our elected leaders (who insist that yes, they truly know what's best for us)? What if they choose wrong? They are only human, after all.
When one person in a communist group acts with their own interests first, communism stops working so well.
How do you get everyone to NOT act in their own interest at all times? For example, what if my child gets sick and I need to take day off of work to take care of them. Should I be allowed to selfishly take care of my child or selflessly continue my work for the good of everyone (except my child, but we're talking about the *greater* good here)?
Communism, when practiced properly, can be pretty cool. I'm more of a socialist, though;)
When has communism ever been practiced "properly"? I've read more than one communist apologist claim that there has never been a "true" instance of communism, not even one.
I don't like socialism. At all. Can we still be friends?:)
You know, when you set out to make fun of something, it helps if you actually know something about what you're making fun of.
I know some things about LISP! LISP is a language whose advocates are largely elitist university snobs, most of which come from MIT. Outside of that, its use is very limited.
They don't count because Lisp did implement them "way back when". LOOPS (a Xerox PARC OO system, one of the predecessors of CLOS) had a visual forms designer and a refactoring IDE... in 1985.
And the response is, so the fuck what! You sound like the Apple advocate who looks down his nose and proclaims, "But *WE* had the GUI first!" This pleases the MAC advocates, and no one else gives a shit. Likewise your claim pleases the LISP advocates, and no one else gives a shit.
Close, but no cigar. Lisp was invented in the late 1950's, so it's a little over 45 years old today.
So you've had *plenty* of time for advocacy. Behold the pathetic market share of LISP! If it really is as awesome and "elegant" as LISP advocates incessantly claim it to be, then why isn't it more popular? Perhaps it's your elitist and condescending and ass-holier-than-thou evangelism that turns people off.
I find "(+ a b c d e)" shorter and clearer than "a + b + c + d + e", myself.
I can't think of a single time that I've had to add five things in a row. Nor have I ever seen it in anyone else's code. What, again, is the benefit of the stupid infix notation?
One of the reasons Lisp is still around is that it isn't a pure-anything language.
The main reason LISP is still around is the immortal elitism of its ivory-tower proponents.
Lisp invented conditional execution (Fortran at the time had only computed GOTO when Lisp introduced COND), and over the years it has absorbed structured programming, IDEs, and object-oriented programming, usually by helping to invent or extend them.
All that and eight-fucking-million parentheses does not make you any smarter or better than any other programmer.
Yes, Grasshopper, it is good that you are learning to Question Authority. But, you should also Listen to Authority's Response, and if it turns out that Authority is Indeed Correct, you are obliged to Admit It.
I'm surprised it took you until the end of your post to let your true colors show, you condescending asshole. I will never use LISP (or OpenBSD) because of elitist jackasses like you.
Re:I think you're arguing for me, not against me
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Okay, but what about the rest? Font, line spacing, border style, margins, padding? Surely these weren't also decided on an ad-hoc basis? If they were, I don't envy you the maintenance of this site in the future.
I think you're taking it far too seriously. It seems that those who advocate the religion of not naming anything according to how it looks take on faith that every bit of every class will change nine million times every single week, so everything must be named abstractly to the 9 millionth degree. In reality, it's not quite so important. Sometimes doing it "your way" makes for more work, not less.
What's wrong with that is that the guy who said "use the gray box there" will change his mind and want the box to be blue next week.
In which case I would have changed
<div class="grayBox">
into
<div class="blueBox">
I know this happens to violate the "don't name classes in the Evil Way" rule, but seeing as how millions of babies and kittens would NOT die from this decision, I don't feel so worried.
Then your HTML that says div id=grey" will be used to display a blue table. It's not a threat, it's a reality that design changes and it's a shame if you have to change your HTML every time it does.
This sounds like scare-mongering for the purose of protecting the strong desire to be "right" and "correct." In the real reality, it was more likely that the entire site would be redesigned than the grayBox may change into a blueBox. Granted it was not a large site, but there are many such "not large sites" which hire programmers like me, and the "Never name classes according to how they look" is *not* a valid universal rule.
Might as well be using font tags and bgcolors in tds again.
No, classes are still better than font tags and bgcolors. Even when I do it the Heathen(TM) way.
That the angel of death will kill you and your children is also not so much a threat, as a promise.
A promise of the "unfulfilled" variety.
That your boss is never going to change her mind about colors is as likely as you and your children living forever. It may not happen tomorrow, but you cannot argue that death will not eventually happen.
And yet changing "grayBox" to "blueBox" (which never had to happen, which was exactly according to my predictions) would have solved that world-peace destroying problem quite nicely. It seems like the only rule I'm violating is a religious one.
I think you're arguing for me, not against me
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The CSS Anthology
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It helps if the semantic approach is used from the beginning.
Exactly my point. I think that the decision to use the semantic approach from the beginning is a *religious* decision, not a *technical* decision.
is gold new stuff? Does red indicate breaking news?
Those types of questions didn't apply in this case. In some cases, the red looked better than the gold. It's just the color of the box and doesn't necessarily have to imply anything else than what just happens to look good with the other colors on the page.
Which is to say, "blue" is a terrible class name, while "important" or "author" or "definition" or whatever are good ones,
I don't buy it. In my last job, I heard a lot of, "Use the gray box there" (as opposed to the red, green, or gold boxes which were used elsewhere). The box that surrounded the area was never indicatedt o be "important," or regarding an "author" or "defintion." They wanted it to be gray.
So what's wrong with
in this case? I caught a lot of the, "Always use semantic class names or the Angel of Death will certainly kill you and all your children, you dumbass ingrate," and I'm not so impressed by the threats any more.
If you're "scared" of mere markup, I would hate to see your actual coding.
Calling CSS "markup" is disingenuous at best. I think the reason why said "markup" is frightening to programmers is because it is necessarily replete with obscure logic and pretends as hard as it fucking can that it doesn't have any logic within it and there is NO CLEAN WAY TO DEBUG IT.
CSS is as friendly to programmers as a circular saw is to a man's penis.
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Geez....why can't the legislatures see we're freaking taxed ENOUGH.
You're a wage earner. You will never be taxed enough. Each dollar that the government seizes is one that it can spend on buying votes rather than you spending it on your "selfish whims" (you know, like feeding your family). Votes are for sale, and the means to buy them are government programs. Votes are the key to power. If you're a politician, then why don't you take someone's money and buy some? If the victim isn't going to vote for you anyway, then you've got nothing to lose!
Both Democrats and Republicans play this hideous game. The ultimate long-term goal is to move 100% of the tax burden to a minority of citizens. That way, every tax increase will be immune from voter resistance. One side will be able to say to 51% of the electorate, "Vote for the other guy and he'll make you pay taxes!"
What I mean to say is that the university's most immediate goal should be continuity of teaching and learning, and therefore people who learn because they like learning for some reason are generally speaking useful to society even if they fail to apply what they have learned in an economically productive way.
In other words, you agree with me that there is no such thing as "education for education's sake." I agree that people who fail to apply what they've leared in an economically productive way (think: art history majors) are still useful: many people hate capitalism and hate the idea that all their hard work in school has no value in the free market. Art history majors need to be held up to some "higher ideal" to give the useless some reason to exist.
But the slogan "education for education's sake" is simplistic, of course. You need a better story than that if you want to pretend you speak with authority on pedagogy.
The slogan is not only simplistic -- it is also false. I like the way you phrased "if you want to pretend you speak with authority." That's what *all* attempts to assert authority are: pretending and then hoping that someone trusts you. Either that, or you can just resort to using force.
It is interesting (and worrying) to see how little people know about how modern schools came into existence, and what their purpose is.
The purpose of schools is a matter of no small controversy. The fact that you speak as if you know what the "True(TM) Purpose of Schools" is merely means that you support a a particular controversial position.
To control education is to decide the national language, the measurement system, the past, etc.
Naturally. Schools are as much about control as they are about "education." In fact, it is trivial to spin control as "education." Many people who claim to use schools to throw off the shackles of tyranny are merely wishing to impose a new tyranny rather than liberate individuals.
Mandatory education is what keeps the nation together.
That is left-wing, statist rhetoric. Right-wing zealots state that marraige is the "glue that holds the nation together." What makes your rhetoric correct and theirs incorrect?
The role of the university is to pass on civilization to the next generation.
This is not education for education's sake. This is education in order to pass on civilization to the next generation. I maintain: education is never an end in and of itself. It is always a means to an end.
A part of the population - preferably the most intelligent part - must learn, review, rephrase, reinvent, translate, and teach for "it's own sake".
I think you put that in double-quotes because you invalidated it with the previous statement. Is education for its own sake, or is it for the sake of passing on civilization? Make up your mind!
Personal enjoyment.
That's not learning for learning's sake. That's learning for the sake of enjoying oneself. I maintain: education is never the goal in and of itself. It's always a means to an end. In this case, it's fun.
Which is a great reason for education, in my honest opinion.
A: Because it satisfies my desire to know.
That's not learning for learning's sake. It's learning for the sake of satifying your curiousity. As I said, education is always a means to an end and never an end in and of itself.
Whatever happened to learning for learning's sake?
There is no such thing as learning for learning's sake. Every bit of education is merely a means to an end. Eduction is never the end.
Don't believe it? Answer the question: what is the use of learning merely for learning's sake?
A: Because you'll be an educated person!
Q: So what? What does that get me?
A: You'll get to be in society's elite!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: You'll have a greater understanding of the world!
Q: And what does that get me?
A: You'll be able to talk more authoritively on subjects of science, history, and politics!
Q: So then learning is a means to an end -- a means to get into a higher class in society? Being able to "talk with more authority" merely means that I'll be able to hold my own in "higher" conversations with "more important" people, right?
A: No, that's not it! Learning is good in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: Sinks to invective, talks about me being "anti-education."
Will the outcome depend on what the definition of 'IsNot' is not?
The 'increasingly' you have latched onto is in the subordinate clause that follows on from this, where Crichton rows back from the bold rhetorical claim that he wants his audience to remember. RealClimate.org's critique focuses on the main claim, not the weasel words Crichton puts in as a get out of jail card.
"Bold rhetorical claim." "Weasel words." Your rhetoric is not doing you any favors. I don't read what Chrichton wrote while impugning him with the same sinister motives that you do.
So they turned to the IPCC Report that Crichton cited in the bibliography to his novel (and thus can be assumed to have read), which gives a good overview of current research and point to ~150 pages in that report that go into how climatoligists take computer climate models and assess them against RW data.
So a "good overview of current research" and "~150" pages should prove to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that all scientists are good and pure? Since they spout the same things that the haters of capitalism spout with the same pompousness in which you smear Chrichton (and, presumably, anyone who deign doubt the Truth(TM) about Global Warming), I'm not inclined to believe it.
How does this square with Crichton's subsequent claim in this article that such models are no longer being checked against the real world?
I didn't read it that way. But I don't suspect that you'll buy into my interpretation (the same way I don't buy into yours), so I don't feel very motivated to argue my case on this point.
Sadly you have misread the RealClimate writer's intent.
I read their intent as wanting to destroy capitalism. I suffer from this deep mistrust of anyone who champions "Global Warming" and it's going to make your job of convincing me to your point of view very difficult.
If you had bothered to follow the three definitional links that they included in the subsequent sentence you would have found that actually they (or rather, climatologists) define 'climate' as the statistical average of various meterological metrics over a wide area and time, whereas 'weather' is an instance of those self-same metrics for a specific time and location.
So let me get this straight. "Weather" takes place in a smaller location and a smaller time frame, and "climate" takes place in a bigger location and a bigger time frame. If this is the case, then the difference between the two is entirely subjective.
I followed the links you attached. The first two say essentially what I wrote in the previous paragraph. The third explained why differentiating between "weather" and "climate" was necessary in order to accept the Truth(TM) about Global Warming. I'm not impressed by your links.
Thus the 'what you expect' part of the tag refers to the statistical nature of what climate is rather than any predictive attributes it might have, whilst the 'what you get' part of the tag refers to the specificity of what weather is (or will be).
That's nice, but it's not at all what RealClimate.org wrote. Again, they wrote the following: "Climate is what you expect; Weather is what you get." Let's substitute that definition (which I'll assume you agree with, since you haven't disputed it) into your lecture:
"Thus, climate, the 'what you expect' part of the tag, refers to the statistical nature of what climate is rather than any predictive attributes it might have, whilst weahter, the 'what you get' part of the tag, refers to the specificity of what weather is (or will be)."
Is this unfair? Your explanations don't seem to help your case. Perhaps you should just come out and state that what RealClimate.org wrote was incorrect.
So the guy on the news who tells me that tomorrow there's going to be bright sunshine and 70+ temperatures isn't telling me 'what I expect'
Yes he is, you goofball. What you predict is functionally equivalent to what you expect, and the guy on the news telling you that
Crichton statement is that the judging of models based on real-world correlation has ceased. The models are judged by how well they reproduce data (among other things.) The papers cited show examples of models being judged.
.
I repeat: I repeat: so what? This does *not* show that *in all cases* it is true, and this could very well be precisely what Chrichton is bemoaning. The "I repeat" is in there twice becuase I keep making a point that you ignore. The examples do not disprove Chricton's claim because they are not necessarily represenative of the entire sample.
But Crichton said something much more absolute, and that's where he went awry.
I don't think it was absolute. His statement was, "increasingly," not "entirely" or "all." I think you choose to see an absolutist statement and that is why you think a few examples disprove it. I do not see an absolutist statement and that is why the examples prove nothing to me.
When Crichton says "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?", he compares two predictions. The first is a weather prediction; what's the second prediction?
A weather prediction. I expect you to want to reply, "But see! That's not weather, that's climate!"
Which is a good time to point out a question that you've chosen to ignore: If what you say is true, then why did RealClimate.org define things the way they did (specifically, weather == "what you observe", climate == "what you expect")? This is not a rhetorical question. Answer it!
I think the second blanket statement, that all climate scientists that are presenting evidence that humans are causing global warming are motivated by the destruction of capitalism, requires a conspiracy theory of Crichtion proportions.
Nice gushing. Do you have any data to support why a conspiracy theory is necessary in order for some scientists to hate capitalism and champion "global warming is caused by human activity" for the ultimate goal of the destruction of captialism? This is not a rhetorical question!
Have you bounced around the body of climate science writing?
Why would I? I do not trust those scientists!
There are not a lot of blind assertions or unquestioned assumptions anywhere in the peer-reviewed articles; there is skepticism and cross-checking galore. There are people coming up with multiple new approaches to re-measure past phenomenon my independant means. There are articles correcting and refining past observations.
*yawn*
Christians gush similarly about the amount of scholarship that their pet scholars can produce.
It does not strike me as body of science that could be put together by a group of politically motivated anti-capitalists.
You're beating up a strawman. I'm not claiming that a bunch of socialists got together and "put together" a body of science. I'm claiming that there are scientists who have socialist, anti-capitalist leanings, and they are not above using their lofty positions to influence public policy (with the intent of ultimately destroying captialistm). That socialists would gladly use global warming as a means to an end is well documented. A quick google search? turned up a few links
But you're arguing for my point: science is all about questioning every step, precisely because of human failings.
One of these human failings is that science may be motivated by proving what is already known to be True(TM) rather than observing the world around us and making reasoned
Are you asserting that the models are not judged by how well they reproduce data? The papers cited show that this is not true....
No, I am not asserting that. (I was accusing you of argument by assertion, and that accusation stands.) The papers given by RealClimate.org show that in some cases there were instances where models were not judged by how well they reproduced data. (I'll assume that they show it for the sake of argument -- I have not read them.) I repeat: so what? This does *not* show that *in all cases* it is true, and this could very well be precisely what Chrichton is bemoaning.
When Crichton mentions the prediction that goes out 100 years into the future, is he talking about a weather prediction that went 100 years into the future? No, he's talking about a climate prediction on that time scale.
It is you, not RealClimate.org, who is introducing this notion of "climate prediction" into the discussion. RealClimate.org defined weather as "what you observe" and climate as "what you expect." Do you agree with these definitions? If you do, then you must admit that climate is functionally equivalent to a weather prediction, since both are "what you expect." If you don't, then for what reason are you defending RealClimate.org?
I'm gettin a little suspicious of you here, because I'm pretty sure you know that.
Becuase I won't accept your weak arguments? I was suspicious of you from the get-go, as I am with anyone who champions "global warming is caused by humans." It was you who called RealClimate.org's criticism of Chrichton's paper "detailed" when, in fact, it only raised three criticisms (each of which I've smacked down and you've failed to defend) and did so in a snotty and elitist manner (which means that their argument is weak). I think you called it "detalied" because it says things that you want to hear, not because it is factual, rational, or complete in any way.
No, he's talking about a climate prediction on that time scale. While Crichton carefully avoided using the words "climate prediction", he is in fact comparing a weather prediction against a climate prediction.
I don't buy it. If what you say is true, then why did RealClimate.org define things the way they did (specifically, weather == "what you observe", climate == "what you expect")? Your need to observe some kind of non-obvious and insidious care in Chrichton is noted.
Yes. So I had to say "mostly disjoint" above because scientists sometimes change their focus and move from one side of the fence to others. Still, I read Crichton statement as implying that there was no separation at all, which simply isn't true.
You're backpedaling from your previous "they are separate" claim. You try and whitewash it with an innocuous "fence hopping" that you have made no effort to prove. How do I know it's not just as bad as Chrichton claims it to be? Since I do not trust those scientists making those claims, I'm not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Would you be willing to give the benefit of the doubt to scientists who are on the dole of Big Oil companies? Certainly you can at least somewhat sympathize with my point of view.
Given this lack of absolute isolation, is it possible that the entire field is nothing more than a giant conspiracy of anti-industry, anti-capitalistic scientists (all runaways from the environmental movement) who are all in it together? Personally, I find that hard to swallow, but I will admit it sounds like a good idea for a work of fiction.
I agree! I think it makes much more sense that there are many scientists who are decidedly anti-capitalism and are not above using their scientific pull to destroy what they think is evil. Such scientists and their actions do not depend on this "giant conspiracy" you invent. I have no interest in conspiracy theories.
The whole point of science is nobody should trust anybody.
What!? That is *not* the p
RealClimate is objecting to the second part: the models are not treated as a reality...in fact, observed data are used to evaluate the performance of climate models.
Argument by assertion.
I maintain (and augment) my argument: RealClimate.org attempted to show that Chrichton's claim that the drunks & lampposts phenomonon was increasing by revealing some examples in which they believed that such a thing did not happen. And what does this show? Nothing! Just because some scientists behave well does not mean all scientists behave well. We would not expect that the priesthood of the Catholic church was free of child molestors merely because the Vatican will uphold its most virtuous priests.
Crichton is drawing a parallel between a weather prediction and a climate prediction. Why would he engage in this false parallel if he's clear about the difference between the two?
Crichton said nothing about "climate prediction." He mentioned "weather prediction" and RealClimate.org defined climate as "weather prediction" (and then acted like superior assholes, a sign of a weak argument).
Chrichton is implying a strong coupling; RealClimate points out that the coupling is weak.
Just how strong is the coupling that Chrichton implies and just how weak does RealClimate.org claim the coupling to be? Does the coupling exceed 15 strength units? Your subjective descriptors have no meaning.
In other words, there are separate groups,
RealClimate.org admits that the groups are not independent. Even you admit that they have a "weak coupling," so I'm not buying your claim of "separate groups."
Crichton implies that the group of people who create models is identical to the group of those who evaluate, and this implication simply isn't true.
Stating is one thing, and showing is another. How do you intend to convince me of this particular claim of falsehood? What evidence will you show me? Will you show me some more virtuous scientists (as the Vatican might show me virtuous priests)?
Personally, I'm skeptical as hell of the "global warming" claims, and I think lots of folks who hate capitalism, hate America, and hate automobiles would love to use it as an excuse to destroy the things they hate. It's no big secret that many anti-capitalists have fled to the environmental movement, and many anti-capitalists may very well be scientists. Why should I assume that their motives are pure? Simply becuase they support that which you already know to be True(TM) is not good enough to convince me.
Let me put it this way. I do not trust the scientists who claim that global warming is caused by human action. The crappy arguments and assholier-than-thou attitude of these scientists weaken my trust even further. How do you intend for me to take their arguments and "data" seriously if I don't trust them? Do you accept the data of scientists who are on the payroll of Big Oil companies as genuine or do you suspect an ulterior motive?
I'm not sure where you get the idea that damming a river or strip mining or clear-cutting forest can't be defined as "negative" to our surroundings, but I'd like to know.
Q: How is strip-mining or clear-cutting negative to the environment?
A: It destroys animals' habitats!
Q: So what?
A: That's bad!
Q: Why?
A: They should live!
Q: Why?
A: So we can study and learn from them!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment after all, right?
A: No, they have a right to life!
Q: Why?
A: Because I don't want to be cruel!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment, after all, right?
A: No, the environment has value in and of itself!
Q: Why?
A: Because it's part of my morality!
Q: Then it really is about us humans, and not about the environment, after all, right?
A: (Dissolves into condescending invective.)
Until some other species can reason and assert its rights alongside humanity, every discussion about the environment is about how the environment pleases and serves humanity. It's all about us. I see your argument agaist strip-mining and the argument for strip-mining as two sides of the same coin: either way, a group of humans gets served by the environment. Whether or not matter gets changed from one form to another does not change the fact everyone's fate is death and nothing has any importance in the long run.
I think the reason that your post was modded so highly is because you posted the conclusion that so many people want to hear, which is, essentially, "Chrichton is sloppy at best, mendacious at worst for daring question the Truth about global warming." But, as with so many things, the devil's in the details.
... As we in this line of research are fond of pointing out to students in our introductory classes, 'Climate is what you expect; Weather is what you get'. Crichton would have been well served if he had read this tutorial on the distinction between the two...."
You labeled RealClimate.org's critique as a "detailed examination." But was it really that detailed? I read it, and it seems to me that they are only able to raise three objections, which I will detail here (easy, since there are only three):
1. Chricton claims, "No longer are models judged by how well they reproduce data from the real world-increasingly, models provide the data. As if they were themselves a reality."
- RealClimate.org responds with, "Crichton should know that this assertion is false. He cites in the 'bibliography' at the end of his book, the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But he appears unaware, for example..." and then gives examples of models which, in their opinion, do, in fact, model data from the real world.
* Even if what they write is true, it's not enough to disprove Chrichton's claim. Read what he wrote: "increasingly, models provide the data." In order for them to show falsehood, they would have to show that the phenomenon he bemoans is actually decreasing in frequency or, at best, happening at the same rate. Merely providing examples in the way they did is not sufficient to make Chrichton's claim false. Strike one.
2. Chricton claims, "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead. Now we're asked to believe a prediction that goes out 100 years into the future?"
- RealClimate.org droops to mockery and replies, "Crichton then goes on to make the classic error of confusing 'weather' and 'climate'
* RealClimate.org's analysis is as stupid as it is condescending. Again, read what Chrichton wrote! "Nobody believes a weather prediction twelve hours ahead." If "climate," by RealClimate.org's own admission is "what you expect," then that definition is functionally equivalent to a weather prediction. If there be any confusion here, it appears to be coming from RealClimate.org. Strike two.
3. Chrichton claims, "Certainly the increased use of computer models, such as GCMs, cries out for the separation of those who make the models from those who verify them."
- RealClimate.org looks down their nose again and claims, "Again, if Crichton has read the IPCC report, he should be aware of the fact that largely (though admittedly, not completely) independent communities of scientists are involved with..."
* hold on just a minute! If, by RealClimate.org's admission, the communities of science are not completely independent, then how is RealClimate.org so sure that such a phenomenon is not precisely the complaint that Chrichton has? The counterexamples RealClimate.org provides fall outside of that complaint and are, by nature, irrelevent. Strike three.
Is this the best that the "scientists" at RealClimate.org can come up with? Should I expect their writings on the Truth(TM) of Global Warming to be of the same caliber? Anyone who fails to communicate their thoughts without resorting to snotty invective loses huge amounts of credibility with me.
... respond to you in e-mail? I want to take this relationship to the next level.
(Yes, I'm trying to be funny, but I am serious about wanting your e-mail address so I may respond to you.)
I'm beginning to get the impression that you don't like elitist Lisp advocates.
I don't like elitism, period. I pick on Lisp advocates here on Slashdot because this is the loctation where they most frequently come to put down anyone who isn't they. I have met many elitist Christians, Leftists, OpenBSD advocates, Ph.D.s, the list goes on and on. I simply have no tolerance for anyone talking down to me anymore because in 100 years both they and I will be rotting in the ground. (Actually, I will have been converted to ash after my organs are harvested, but you get the idea.)
To take a concrete example, in C, functions normally return to their caller, because C only uses a single call stack per thread . . . . The linked example shows that if you know how, you can do this kind of thing in C. But most C programmers wouldn't necessarily think to solve a problem that way, because it's not an obvious solution in C.
What's the difference between setjmp/lngjmp and goto? It seems to be a way of interrupting the expected control flow, and I've heard more than one argue that such is indicative of bad design. I'm not doubting your claim that "there are times that it's useful for a function not to return to its caller." Instead, it appears to me that it's a different way of thinking that is not neccessarily worse or better, just different. This goes back to my question (which I now modify): How can learning Scheme benefit my C programming if it represents a fundamentally different way of thinking? The concrete example here seems to violate principles which are sacrosanct in "the C way" and would be labeled as "bad" by people who think in "the C way."
There's an entirely different kind of benefit that the academically-oriented languages also have, which is that they tend to enable problems to be solved without worrying about low-level details.
You lost me. In every job I've worked in, I have had to worry about the low-level details in one way or another. It all comes down to the fact that the computer science depends on hardware to run, and the hardware costs money. It behooves me to be familiar with how the software and hardware interact so that I can get more use out of the hardware, which means get more milage for my money. No business can survive without taking this into account, so what is this magical land where one can write computer programs while remaining completely and deliberately oblivious to the low-level details?
The University. Yes, a university, which often receives plundered money from taxpayers, where there is no such thing as competition, and where professors who snooze lazily in the protective cocoon of tenure can follow their whim without being subjected to the vagaries of the market under which real folks like I must suffer.
I read parts of the first chapter of SICP and I found it interesting and challenging. But it still begs the question: why is learning Scheme required to teach the lessons that are taught in the book? If they apply to general computer science, then why can't they be written in C (in which so much of the world's non-theoretical software is written)? I suspect that answer is, "Because we're MIT, and we're better than you. The reason you want it to be in C is becuase you're a stupid, ignorant dipshit. You're also a capitalist, so you especially suck."
The author of SICP, probably not as forthcoming as I'd wish he'd be, tries to answer my question with this response:
If Lisp is not a mainstream language, why are we using it as the framework for our discussion of programming? Because the language possesses unique features that make it an excellent medium for studying important programming constructs and data structures and for relating them to the linguistic features that support them. The most significant of these features is the fact that Lisp descriptions of processes, called procedures, can themselves be represented and manipulated as Lisp data. The importance of this
The reason I would recommend doing that over learning C++ is that it provides a foundation for understanding any programming language - it'll be easier to learn and understand C++ afterwards. This has been studied in universities - students who go through the more theoretical introduction to CS concepts using Scheme do better on subsequent courses in Java and C++ than students who start out learning the latter languages (I can dig up references if you care).
I want to care, but I feel very skeptical about such studies. Why? Because LISP advocates are such flaming, fucking assholes. They think they're better than everyone else (when they're really just bacteria food like everyone is), so everything they say and write is suspect. Likewise, most LISP advocates congregate and are spawned in MIT, and most of their evangelism comes from there as well. Are these references going to point to studies created by LISP evangelists? If so, then how do I know that such studies were not designed with an agenda (namely, to spread the gospel of LISP to the world)?
One problem Lisp advocates face is, how do you explain to someone that learning Lisp will teach them important things about programming that they don't yet understand? People don't want to believe that, so they respond negatively, and things devolve from there because both sides are human.
I think this is the misconception that LISP evangelists have about me: they think that I am resistant to LISP because I'm an ignorant dipshit who just isn't as smart and awesome as LISP evanglists are. They think that I respond negatively becuase of my ignorant dipshittedness. I repeat: I will not use LISP because its adherents are elitist assholes. I do not respond negatively because "I don't want to believe that LISP will teach me important things," but because I want to spite LISP evangelists who deserve it many times over. If LISP was really as awesome as LISP evangelists claim it to be, then it would not require the mountains upon montains of condescending bullshit that spews incessently from the lofty towers of MIT. It's awesomeness should be self-evident if it really is so great. Instead, we have to hear constantly about how "elegant" LISP is and how stupid everyone else is for not recognizing this "Eternal Truth."
Do you understand what I'm trying to communicate to you? The elitism of LISP's evangelism is counter-productive! Until LISP evangelists learn to be more humble they will continue to be confined in their ivory tower.
My personal experience is that I spent almost 20 years programming in languages like C, C++, Java, and various scripting languages. I developed some successful commercial products in C and C++. But when I read SICP a few years ago, I was intrigued enough to learn more about Scheme, and later some of the more functional languages like ML and OCaml. I only wish I had known about these languages, and the ideas behind them, a long time ago.
You're the nicest LISP advocate I've met so far (though you did attempt to exploit my non-existent lack of self-esteem, which I forgive). What you write here about SICP is interesting enough to make curious, but not informative enough to make me attempt to embark upon it. I've heard many LISP jackasses claim that LISP is "a different way of thinking about programming" that isn't "immediately intuitive." If it is so fundamentally different, then how did it help your programming in C? It seems clear to me that LISP evangelists are very jealous and bitter that C won and LISP lost, so I'm confused that "the LISP way of thinking" would be helpful to "the C way of thinking." Aren't they competitors?
BTW, have you ever wondered why you're so angry at Lisp?
I'm not angry at LISP at all! I'm angry at LISP *advocates*, not some inanimate programming language.
Does the condescension you're complaining about bug you because you secretly believe it's valid?
I have far too much self-esteeem for a tactic like that to work on me. Try something else.
Really, there's nothing to be afraid of. I recommending reading SICP (google for it) and opening your mind a little. It'll help your programming career.
I'm not afraid at all. I think elitism sucks. And I have never met a LISP advocate that wasn't an elitist, holier-than-thou, condescending asshole. (The same goes for OpenBSD jackasses.) They deserve to be mocked for it since we all know that our fate is to be food for worms and bacteria and their stupid little programming language won't mean jack shit then.
Furthermore, if I wanted to help my programming career, then I'd learn C++. Why would you reccommend LISP over C++ if your goal is to help me in my programming career?
Their censorship technology is the best in the world, and it would improve production if it was implemented in USA companies. How would it improve production you ask? It will, for example, keep people from reading Slashdot all day.
There is a psychological phenomenon in humans that control-freaks consistenly forget. Anything that you deny to a human appears more desirable to that human. If you say, "You can't do that," then the person being addressed will tend to want to do it *more*, not *less*.
For example, two children are playing. They may be playing in an ocean of toys, but the most attactive toy in the room to Child A will be the toy that Child B is playing with.
For example, the USA has some of the most repressive laws against drug use in the world, yet the USA is also the world's largest consumer of these "forbidden" drugs.
Also consider that "rooting for the underdog" and "fighting against the man" is seen as cool and hip in American culture. The "rebel" and "outlaw" are seen as positive, not negative, figures in American culture. Didn't all us Americans feel some righteous indignation when the Imperial officer seethes, "You rebel scum!" to Han Solo?
Communism, to survive, needs people acting together for the common good.
;)
:)
Who decides what "the common good" is? How do we know what will truly be best for most people? Do we just put our trust in our elected leaders (who insist that yes, they truly know what's best for us)? What if they choose wrong? They are only human, after all.
When one person in a communist group acts with their own interests first, communism stops working so well.
How do you get everyone to NOT act in their own interest at all times? For example, what if my child gets sick and I need to take day off of work to take care of them. Should I be allowed to selfishly take care of my child or selflessly continue my work for the good of everyone (except my child, but we're talking about the *greater* good here)?
Communism, when practiced properly, can be pretty cool. I'm more of a socialist, though
When has communism ever been practiced "properly"? I've read more than one communist apologist claim that there has never been a "true" instance of communism, not even one.
I don't like socialism. At all. Can we still be friends?
You know, when you set out to make fun of something, it helps if you actually know something about what you're making fun of.
... in 1985.
I know some things about LISP! LISP is a language whose advocates are largely elitist university snobs, most of which come from MIT. Outside of that, its use is very limited.
They don't count because Lisp did implement them "way back when". LOOPS (a Xerox PARC OO system, one of the predecessors of CLOS) had a visual forms designer and a refactoring IDE
And the response is, so the fuck what! You sound like the Apple advocate who looks down his nose and proclaims, "But *WE* had the GUI first!" This pleases the MAC advocates, and no one else gives a shit. Likewise your claim pleases the LISP advocates, and no one else gives a shit.
Close, but no cigar. Lisp was invented in the late 1950's, so it's a little over 45 years old today.
So you've had *plenty* of time for advocacy. Behold the pathetic market share of LISP! If it really is as awesome and "elegant" as LISP advocates incessantly claim it to be, then why isn't it more popular? Perhaps it's your elitist and condescending and ass-holier-than-thou evangelism that turns people off.
I find "(+ a b c d e)" shorter and clearer than "a + b + c + d + e", myself.
I can't think of a single time that I've had to add five things in a row. Nor have I ever seen it in anyone else's code. What, again, is the benefit of the stupid infix notation?
One of the reasons Lisp is still around is that it isn't a pure-anything language.
The main reason LISP is still around is the immortal elitism of its ivory-tower proponents.
Lisp invented conditional execution (Fortran at the time had only computed GOTO when Lisp introduced COND), and over the years it has absorbed structured programming, IDEs, and object-oriented programming, usually by helping to invent or extend them.
All that and eight-fucking-million parentheses does not make you any smarter or better than any other programmer.
Yes, Grasshopper, it is good that you are learning to Question Authority. But, you should also Listen to Authority's Response, and if it turns out that Authority is Indeed Correct, you are obliged to Admit It.
I'm surprised it took you until the end of your post to let your true colors show, you condescending asshole. I will never use LISP (or OpenBSD) because of elitist jackasses like you.
Okay, but what about the rest? Font, line spacing, border style, margins, padding? Surely these weren't also decided on an ad-hoc basis? If they were, I don't envy you the maintenance of this site in the future.
I think you're taking it far too seriously. It seems that those who advocate the religion of not naming anything according to how it looks take on faith that every bit of every class will change nine million times every single week, so everything must be named abstractly to the 9 millionth degree. In reality, it's not quite so important. Sometimes doing it "your way" makes for more work, not less.
In which case I would have changedintoI know this happens to violate the "don't name classes in the Evil Way" rule, but seeing as how millions of babies and kittens would NOT die from this decision, I don't feel so worried.
Then your HTML that says div id=grey" will be used to display a blue table. It's not a threat, it's a reality that design changes and it's a shame if you have to change your HTML every time it does.
This sounds like scare-mongering for the purose of protecting the strong desire to be "right" and "correct." In the real reality, it was more likely that the entire site would be redesigned than the grayBox may change into a blueBox. Granted it was not a large site, but there are many such "not large sites" which hire programmers like me, and the "Never name classes according to how they look" is *not* a valid universal rule.
Might as well be using font tags and bgcolors in tds again.
No, classes are still better than font tags and bgcolors. Even when I do it the Heathen(TM) way.
That the angel of death will kill you and your children is also not so much a threat, as a promise.
A promise of the "unfulfilled" variety.
That your boss is never going to change her mind about colors is as likely as you and your children living forever. It may not happen tomorrow, but you cannot argue that death will not eventually happen.
And yet changing "grayBox" to "blueBox" (which never had to happen, which was exactly according to my predictions) would have solved that world-peace destroying problem quite nicely. It seems like the only rule I'm violating is a religious one.
It helps if the semantic approach is used from the beginning.
Exactly my point. I think that the decision to use the semantic approach from the beginning is a *religious* decision, not a *technical* decision.
is gold new stuff? Does red indicate breaking news?
Those types of questions didn't apply in this case. In some cases, the red looked better than the gold. It's just the color of the box and doesn't necessarily have to imply anything else than what just happens to look good with the other colors on the page.
Which is to say, "blue" is a terrible class name, while "important" or "author" or "definition" or whatever are good ones,
I don't buy it. In my last job, I heard a lot of, "Use the gray box there" (as opposed to the red, green, or gold boxes which were used elsewhere). The box that surrounded the area was never indicatedt o be "important," or regarding an "author" or "defintion." They wanted it to be gray.
So what's wrong with in this case? I caught a lot of the, "Always use semantic class names or the Angel of Death will certainly kill you and all your children, you dumbass ingrate," and I'm not so impressed by the threats any more.
If you're "scared" of mere markup, I would hate to see your actual coding.
Calling CSS "markup" is disingenuous at best. I think the reason why said "markup" is frightening to programmers is because it is necessarily replete with obscure logic and pretends as hard as it fucking can that it doesn't have any logic within it and there is NO CLEAN WAY TO DEBUG IT.
CSS is as friendly to programmers as a circular saw is to a man's penis.