Compliments. You set down a rational view of the subject, unlike most comments here. However, living in a country where deadly arms are not legal (Netherlands) I'd like to hear your opinion on this:
Mentioned in some other comments is a comparative study by the American Department of Justice between crime rates in the UK and the US, most notably after Britain introduced stricter gun laws in the '90's. Admittedly, the American DoJ can't (IMO) be seen as a unprejudiced source, but for the sake of argument, let's consider their data correct. The comparison showed that while, surprisingly, the number of violent crimes was higher in the UK ( I can't find an exact figure for this, though ), the number of murders in the states was significantly higher ( more than 5 times actually ). It would seem to me a very logical conclusion that the easy availability of deadly arms combined with a tradition of self-defence in the US would pretty easily explain this significant differance. What are your thoughts on this?
Also, as far as your (numbered) opinions go, I would like to point out some things: 1. Japan has AFAIK one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Most people that have survived a suicide attempt state that they regret having tried it in the first place. Thus, the availability of instant-death tools, like guns, would seem to me to increase the number of succesfull suicide attempts, thus increasing the total number of suicides. The comparison with Japan neatly covers this, but I would say the total rate of suicides in the US is higher than need be because a relatively larger number of suicides succeed.
2. I agree that inner city gang members deaths by deadly arms should not be compared to suburban deaths by gun accidents, but it might well be argued that the easy availability of guns ultimately results in a higher death toll in gang wars. It is easier to kill with a gun than with a knife or with your bare hands, and yes, even if guns could be obtained illegally, this would be more difficult. Also, the higher availability of guns will probably mean that more guns are in circulation in the States, resulting in a higher availability of guns illegally. Also, I think that comparing death by gun accidents to death by swimming pool accidents is bogus. Sure, it's always possible to find something that kills more children than guns, but this is IMO besides the question, because the only valid comparison would be to the number of child lives saved by guns. Only then can you make a rational decision if gun control will, on a balance, save more child's lives or cost more.
3. This argument is invalid for the same reasons as your last comparison. For one thing, doctors save lives or fail to save lives. They may fail to save a life by accident, but the number of lives saved by doctors exceeds the number of lives they are unable to save, therefore medicine is efficient in saving lives. I'd be very surprised if someone comes up with figures that show me that the number of lives saved by guns is higher than the number of lives taken by them.
Yes. My point in this is that these figures seem to point out that in the US, where deadly arms are legal, the use of deadly force in crimes is more common; thus resulting in the higher number ( more than 5 times higher ) of murders in the US, whereas in the UK, where gun laws are stricter, the number of deaths by crime are significantly lower. I wonder if, e.g., a car jacking that results in death would be classified as a murder in the UK or the US? If so, that would probably mean that the overall crime rates for the UK and the US are comparable, however, crimes more often result in death in the States because of the easy availability of deadly arms.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Robbery, assault, burglary and motor vehicle theft rates are lower in the United States than they are in England and Wales, national crime victim surveys conducted in these countries reveal. However, police statistics show murder and rape rates higher in the United States than in England and Wales, according to a new report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) in the United States Department of Justice.
This says to me that you might have a higher chance of being victim of a violent crime in the UK, but you're more likely to be killed or raped in the process in the US.
Gun crimes will happen LESS when guns are outlawed.
See Europe, in which all countries (AFAIK) have severly limited or banned gun ownership for non-professionals and death by weapons is far less common than in North-America and the States in particular.
Diesel engines are actually simpler in a mechanical sense as they have no ignition, these combust by compression. I think your friends just had some bad luck or bad manufactorers.
When I was younger, I had a vacation job in an iron foundry (please don't ask why, the pay was shitty too) and I worked for a while in quality control. There was this old man there who used a hammer to test the newly casted pieces: he just hit them, and based on the sound he could tell if the casting had air pockets in it, or if the iron quality was sub-standard. The electronics which were purchased also for quality control were gathering dust in a corner. This idea of using sound to check connections may be less absurd than it sounds... the old man was always right, even if the electronics weren't.
Because we got our asses kicked in that part of the world trying to do them a favor (we entered vietnam at south vietnams request).
Hahahahahah, dream on dude.
Check your history, America isn't the worlds police. We don't go around saving everyone, it's their job to save themselves.
LOL, you speak as if you personally went to sort out things in Afghanistan (at their request of course). We don't go around saving everyone, we go around saving ourselves and protecting our interests. Anyone who says otherwise is either misinformed or incredibly naieve.
New definition of 'free market'
on
Add-Ons Add Up
·
· Score: 2
As coined by large companies:
Free Market: "The freedom to convince the consumer you offer the lowest prices by aggressive advertisement based on misleading emotional impulses and the freedom to compensate the low, listed, prices by post-charging costumers for things that really should be included in the fees charged up-front."
Or, in plain english, lying about the real price of things.
This is a stupid argument for a whole other reason too, because the DVD is going to be moved anyway, regardless if it's deposible or not, unless you're planning to have a nice landfill in your backyard. Enviromental issue are too often mucked up by this kind of tentative reasoning.
Technolust is taking his point a bit far maybe, but what he's saying, I think, is that having a lot of money ( which MS surely has ) gives you a clear advantage in US courts over somebody having less money. You'd have to find a vaguely plausible claim, but just the threat of forcing the poorer party to take the long and expensive path to justice might scare them off. You'd run a pretty big risk, sueing against MS, that you'd either run out of money before you win your case, or even if you'd win, you'd have no money left to run your business.
It seems to me that Steven Den Beste is comparing Europe's old standard (GSM) with America new-to-be standard CDMA. Why doesn't he compare it with UTMS, which is in all probability going to be the new standard in Europe?
Maybe I'm misinformed, but I find it hard to believe European phone companies will forget about the billions of euro's they invested in buying share's of the bandwidth for UTMS and say, hell, we'll write that investment off and just go for this CDMA standard. Fat chance.
I'm a writer myself, and if someone would do that to my stories I'd go tell them to go and read something else. It's my brain child, and if I put scene thus and so in it, I did it for a reason, and if you don't like it, bad luck. Write something yourself, but don't rape my story. However, a screenplay/ scenario-writer is making a half-product. He knows it's going to be altered in many ways before anybody ever sees the film based on his work. In this case I'm not sure where the artistic responsibility lies, but I guess in Hollywood, this would be with the producer and/or director. They have last say, and if they're all right with people changing things in their stories which might alter the gist and meaning of a film, well, so be it. It does say something I guess about which way of the balance you're on: artistical integrity don't touch my baby or fork over the money please are the two extremities of this balance.
This article brought me into a series of flashbacks involving ( I think ) my old atari 512ST, frustration about not being able to do the thing I wanted with the turtle (can't remember what) and switching to XLisp. I had forgotten all about this stuff, thanks for bringing it back to me!
Jeez, there was a lot of static about this Eugenia person a few days ago in the story about her review of Yast2, and man, now I understand... how serious can you take anyone using a Voodoo 5 card, for christs sake?!
I dunno why Retro Radio insists on using Alambik, probably some commercial reason, because the stream is just mp3's at http://nectarine.ipsyn.net:8002. Alambik seems to be Internet Explorer/ Windows only.
Slashdot Mirror
Compliments. You set down a rational view of the subject, unlike most comments here. However, living in a country where deadly arms are not legal (Netherlands) I'd like to hear your opinion on this:
Mentioned in some other comments is a comparative study by the American Department of Justice between crime rates in the UK and the US, most notably after Britain introduced stricter gun laws in the '90's. Admittedly, the American DoJ can't (IMO) be seen as a unprejudiced source, but for the sake of argument, let's consider their data correct. The comparison showed that while, surprisingly, the number of violent crimes was higher in the UK ( I can't find an exact figure for this, though ), the number of murders in the states was significantly higher ( more than 5 times actually ). It would seem to me a very logical conclusion that the easy availability of deadly arms combined with a tradition of self-defence in the US would pretty easily explain this significant differance. What are your thoughts on this?
Also, as far as your (numbered) opinions go, I would like to point out some things:
1. Japan has AFAIK one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Most people that have survived a suicide attempt state that they regret having tried it in the first place. Thus, the availability of instant-death tools, like guns, would seem to me to increase the number of succesfull suicide attempts, thus increasing the total number of suicides. The comparison with Japan neatly covers this, but I would say the total rate of suicides in the US is higher than need be because a relatively larger number of suicides succeed.
2. I agree that inner city gang members deaths by deadly arms should not be compared to suburban deaths by gun accidents, but it might well be argued that the easy availability of guns ultimately results in a higher death toll in gang wars. It is easier to kill with a gun than with a knife or with your bare hands, and yes, even if guns could be obtained illegally, this would be more difficult. Also, the higher availability of guns will probably mean that more guns are in circulation in the States, resulting in a higher availability of guns illegally. Also, I think that comparing death by gun accidents to death by swimming pool accidents is bogus. Sure, it's always possible to find something that kills more children than guns, but this is IMO besides the question, because the only valid comparison would be to the number of child lives saved by guns. Only then can you make a rational decision if gun control will, on a balance, save more child's lives or cost more.
3. This argument is invalid for the same reasons as your last comparison. For one thing, doctors save lives or fail to save lives. They may fail to save a life by accident, but the number of lives saved by doctors exceeds the number of lives they are unable to save, therefore medicine is efficient in saving lives. I'd be very surprised if someone comes up with figures that show me that the number of lives saved by guns is higher than the number of lives taken by them.
Yes. My point in this is that these figures seem to point out that in the US, where deadly arms are legal, the use of deadly force in crimes is more common; thus resulting in the higher number ( more than 5 times higher ) of murders in the US, whereas in the UK, where gun laws are stricter, the number of deaths by crime are significantly lower.
I wonder if, e.g., a car jacking that results in death would be classified as a murder in the UK or the US? If so, that would probably mean that the overall crime rates for the UK and the US are comparable, however, crimes more often result in death in the States because of the easy availability of deadly arms.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Robbery, assault,
burglary and motor vehicle theft rates are lower
in the United States than they are in England and
Wales, national crime victim surveys conducted in
these countries reveal. However, police
statistics show murder and rape rates higher in
the United States than in England and Wales,
according to a new report by the Bureau of Justice
Statistics (BJS) in the United States Department
of Justice.
This says to me that you might have a higher chance of being victim of a violent crime in the UK, but you're more likely to be killed or raped in the process in the US.
LOL, yeah, it's a real peak in the statistics, HIV-infected blood murders ....
Gun crimes will happen LESS when guns are outlawed.
See Europe, in which all countries (AFAIK) have severly limited or banned gun ownership for non-professionals and death by weapons is far less common than in North-America and the States in particular.
Diesel engines are actually simpler in a mechanical sense as they have no ignition, these combust by compression. I think your friends just had some bad luck or bad manufactorers.
When I was younger, I had a vacation job in an iron foundry (please don't ask why, the pay was shitty too) and I worked for a while in quality control. There was this old man there who used a hammer to test the newly casted pieces: he just hit them, and based on the sound he could tell if the casting had air pockets in it, or if the iron quality was sub-standard. The electronics which were purchased also for quality control were gathering dust in a corner. ... the old man was always right, even if the electronics weren't.
This idea of using sound to check connections may be less absurd than it sounds
The BBC isn't actually saying to avoid explorer, it's the Mr. Clover they interviewed. There is a differance, you know ...
Because we got our asses kicked in that part of the world trying to do them a favor (we entered vietnam at south vietnams request).
Hahahahahah, dream on dude.
Check your history, America isn't the worlds police. We don't go around saving everyone, it's their job to save themselves.
LOL, you speak as if you personally went to sort out things in Afghanistan (at their request of course). We don't go around saving everyone, we go around saving ourselves and protecting our interests. Anyone who says otherwise is either misinformed or incredibly naieve.
As coined by large companies:
Free Market: "The freedom to convince the consumer you offer the lowest prices by aggressive advertisement based on misleading emotional impulses and the freedom to compensate the low, listed, prices by post-charging costumers for things that really should be included in the fees charged up-front."
Or, in plain english, lying about the real price of things.
This is a stupid argument for a whole other reason too, because the DVD is going to be moved anyway, regardless if it's deposible or not, unless you're planning to have a nice landfill in your backyard. Enviromental issue are too often mucked up by this kind of tentative reasoning.
Yeah, I've known a fetching cat. The poor animal was raised with only dogs as companions, which explains a lot.
Well, anything you can make for $40 I can break for free!
Beat that!
Also seen yesterday on slashdot ...
"Discussing this document with a US citizen
...
may be an offence."
I'd would've liked to post a comment here, but I would like to keep the option open of coming to the US somewhere in the future, so
__CENSORED__
Technolust is taking his point a bit far maybe, but what he's saying, I think, is that having a lot of money ( which MS surely has ) gives you a clear advantage in US courts over somebody having less money. You'd have to find a vaguely plausible claim, but just the threat of forcing the poorer party to take the long and expensive path to justice might scare them off. You'd run a pretty big risk, sueing against MS, that you'd either run out of money before you win your case, or even if you'd win, you'd have no money left to run your business.
For the factually obsessed:
It wasn't actually Schröder making the comparison, but the minister of Justice of his cabinet.
It seems to me that Steven Den Beste is comparing Europe's old standard (GSM) with America new-to-be standard CDMA. Why doesn't he compare it with UTMS, which is in all probability going to be the new standard in Europe?
Maybe I'm misinformed, but I find it hard to believe European phone companies will forget about the billions of euro's they invested in buying share's of the bandwidth for UTMS and say, hell, we'll write that investment off and just go for this CDMA standard. Fat chance.
Heheh, nice site, it's like a mirror-image of slashdot, albeit much smaller. This is one of the first posts my eyes fell on:
#2 By donpacman (56 Posts) at 9/26/2002 2:58:29 AM At least it's not Linux.
Never on my machine.
Pay less get less
I do manual checkups on the girl next door =)
I'm a writer myself, and if someone would do that to my stories I'd go tell them to go and read something else. It's my brain child, and if I put scene thus and so in it, I did it for a reason, and if you don't like it, bad luck. Write something yourself, but don't rape my story.
However, a screenplay/ scenario-writer is making a half-product. He knows it's going to be altered in many ways before anybody ever sees the film based on his work. In this case I'm not sure where the artistic responsibility lies, but I guess in Hollywood, this would be with the producer and/or director. They have last say, and if they're all right with people changing things in their stories which might alter the gist and meaning of a film, well, so be it. It does say something I guess about which way of the balance you're on: artistical integrity don't touch my baby or fork over the money please are the two extremities of this balance.
This article brought me into a series of flashbacks involving ( I think ) my old atari 512ST, frustration about not being able to do the thing I wanted with the turtle (can't remember what) and switching to XLisp. I had forgotten all about this stuff, thanks for bringing it back to me!
Jeez, there was a lot of static about this Eugenia person a few days ago in the story about her review of Yast2, and man, now I understand ... how serious can you take anyone using a Voodoo 5 card, for christs sake?!
... by glueing the earphones to the ears of the reviewers. Disposable reviewers will be needed, though.
I dunno why Retro Radio insists on using Alambik, probably some commercial reason, because the stream is just mp3's
at http://nectarine.ipsyn.net:8002.
Alambik seems to be Internet Explorer/ Windows only.