>"Appearing to believe in a religion is a far cry from passing laws enforcing it."
I will have to respectfully disagree with this idea. While I agree that it is not the same thing, I will not say that it "is a far cry" from it. Some will cry the "Slippery Slope is a fallacy" argument, however in this case, it isn't. One can already see the results of this slippery slope in our society, as evidenced by the recent Congressional vote on the Pledge of Allegiance. If a public religious display has no appearance of authority, why do people feel the need to place them in front governmental locations? The people that feel strongly about these issues should put them up in front of their own houses. If that isn't good enough, then it is obvious that they are trying to use their office as a bully pulpit.
Liberman is free to display his personal religious ornamentation, because we are free to practice religion as we see fit. He is not allowed to inscribe passages from the Torah on his senate seat. There is as you say "a far cry" from an individual displaying their preference and using their power of office to promote that preference.
You are right that Jefferson is not the final word on our nations founding, however I like to point out his bible to stave off the notion that the USA was founded as a Christian nation. Many other founding fathers, notably Franklin and Washington, were not strictly speaking Christian.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
What this means is that Government (and it's all of its various branches) can not even appear to prefer one religion over another. This includes allowing any religious displays. How would you like passages from the Koran in Arabic posted in the courtroom where you were on trial? (or for the PC among us, a religion different from your own) What if your local mayor decided to plant a giant gold Buddha on the front lawn of town hall? That would be seen as a massive waste of tax money, and rightly so.
I'd like to point out the God isn't mentioned in our constitution either. Our founders were mostly influenced by enlightenment philosophy.
I recommend you have look at The Jefferson Bible Where he specifically eliminates all supernatural events, and considers Jesus a philosopher, not god.
Corporate profits are at an all time high. See this chart. From the link:
But with the end of the recession in late 2001,* corporate profits jumped enormously. And they have continued to rise as the lousy labor market has dragged down wages and salaries while greatly-increased productivity has driven value added per worker way, way up.
Immunity's findings clearly show that the best platform for your targets to be running is Microsoft Windows, allowing you unparalleled value for their dollar. This result reinforces the fact that its important to consider more than just licensing fees when your targets choose their OS. Indeed, a variety of factors go into their choice, and over time, Windows has demonstrated itself to be the top contender in the, in both the server and the desktop space for Total Cost of 0wnership.
Where I went to School 20 credits a semester was considered a normal course load. I needed 146 credits to graduate. However, I don't have a CS degree, I have a BE in Civil Engineering. You'll notice in many IT job postings employers ask for candidates with a CS or any engineering degree. I had no trouble making the shift from Engineering to IT.
Of course you can. I myself have seen water come out of a thousand foot deep well. What you can't do is suck up water under vacuum over 1 atm. You can most certainly push water up thousands of feet.
Here is a company that sells pumps that do just that. (See under vertical turbine pumps).
I agree, Microserfs resonated with me as well. I would also like to suggest "Rivethead" Which tells the story of an assembly line worker for GM in the 1970's. It's somewhat dated but was very enlightening.
I'll tell you what you need is a fatty, boombatty blunt! And then I guarantee you'll see a sailboat, an ocean and maybe even some of them big-tittied mermaids doing some of that lesbian shit!
I knew guys that were using DAT's attached to eq's in the early 90's to record Dead shows. I don't know if this counts as prior art, but it does seem to make this patent obvious, as it is well before the 2001 filing date of the patent.
It seems that normal concrete will start emitting plumes of smoke just before it pops
As would burning tar, or any other heavy petroleum derivate.
You're thinking of asphalt. Concrete is a mixture of portland cement, sand and stone. Portland cement is mainly lime, which presumably is what is burning and popping.
Bad driving has little or nothing to do with reflexes or skill. It is arrogance or self-importance that causes the most frustration for ordinary drivers.
I don't care if you can apex the off-ramp at 70 mph, when you cut me off because I'm only doing 15 mph over the limit and not 20. It's the people who change lanes erratically and don't use signals that are dangerous. I've seen people drive around me at a traffic light (over the center line) so they could make an illegal right on red. I see people who treat red lights as stop signs. I've had people scream at me for going through my green light, because they couldn't get through on the red. This is the crap that really aggravates me.
If you're wondering, I live in northern New Jersey. This behavior says nothing about their skill at handling an automobile, and everything about their personality.
While the CIO reads the WSJ, at my company the IT director makes the purchacing decisions, not the CIO. The director makes these decisions based on the recomendations of his staff (namely my boss, among others). Who do you think does the studies and writes the recomendations that are presented to the director? I do, and I read Slashdot. This is the mechanism that mfh is pointing out.
I agree with you, but only to a point. In most cases, your employers will just care that it's done on time and under budget. But what happens when system performance is not acceptable? That's when you've got to figure some things out. Look for performance bottlenecks, etc. Times like this are when a math background (and I consider algorithms to be math) will be a life-saver.
I do enterprise Capacity Planning and Performance Tuning for big databases. (Anywhere from 100 to 1000 Gb) I cannot tell you how often poorly designed application architecture causes nasty performance problems, precisely because management thinks that anyone can connect a web front end to a database. Our typical developer has no idea how to optimize for db performance. The application owners don't like hearing you need to re-design your application, because we can't tune it any further. I am tired of telling them that throwing faster hardware at the problem will not help, as a faster machine will only choke the database harder. It is obvious to me that these "developers" do not have adequate problem solving skills to effectively do their jobs. Their code may be clean, but the application design is so poor that its performance will always suck.
Math (and all problem solving skills)are very important for a developer, otherwise one is just a code monkey.
I hear what you are saying about the "rail of the plotline". My problem with many games is that they are far to linear. Dungeon Siege is an excellent example of such a game. It had great graphics, and good game play but the player has no choices in the story. Compare to any of the Ultimas or Baldur's Gate 2. Plots are important, but for me, I like to have a choice in what missions or quests to do. When these choices effect the outcome of the game so much the better.
I think of the Baldur's Gate 2 story as a spoke and wheel design. One gets to a point in the game and the player is presented with several choices as to what to do next. Some choices lead to new "plot hubs" from which additional plot choices are presented. The ability to go back to previous "plot hubs" is important to me, as I like to complete all of the quests for a given game.
It seems to me that many of the "Greatest Games of all Time" have this non linear behavior.
I didn't mean to sound like an asshole, but I was very busy earlier today and didn't have time to form a more detailed reply.
At some point in the future, the distinction between monitors and TV's will become very blurry. (Some will say this is rapidly approaching) Both will offer very high resolutions, and come in a variety of sizes. My problem is not so much with possible resolutions with TV sets, but with the typical distance one sits away from them.
Even if I had a 60" screen that was capable of 1600 x 1200 (or higher), sitting ten (or more) feet away from it as in a typical living room is not comfortable setting for me to play the types of games I play. (Mostly RTS and RPG, with some FPS) My eyes would have trouble resolving that level of detail at those distances.
While that setup would be excellent for group action gaming, (the strongest genre for consoles as it is) it is wholly unsuitable for other types.
While there are keyboards and mice available for consoles, no one ever seems to talk about the ergonomics of using them with a console.
I play a mix of RTS, RPG and FPS games, and when I play, I want to be sitting comforably at my desk, with my monitor a sharp 1280 x 1024, not on my couch hunched over my coffee table squinting at my low rez tv.
Using a mouse and keyboard in my living room would be an excercise in frustration and back pain.
I don't know if it was a real PSA or just a joke, but I'll tell you this, after reading it I never wanted to even think about Heroin (Never mind use it). So I guess it worked.
IIRC it was in Rolling Stone or Playboy, so it could very well have been a real PSA.
I'm not claiming that these stereotypes are true. My premise is that because there is a stereotype, there must be a grain of truth in there somewhere.
You and I would appear to agree. The sorts of people that read the WSJ are wealthy and conservative. However my point was that it's easy to embrace the idea of giving away 30% (or more) of your earnings for social programs and other liberal causes if the 70% left over is still more than you could ever use.
IMHO, many of the people who read the WSJ do not consider themselves wealthy (though they would qualify by most definitions) and have a conservative outlook, while people who are stupendously wealthy (and are aware of this) would be more inclined to support liberal causes. Again as you say these are not hard and fast rules, and there are many exceptions, and while stereotypes and never wholly true, they can provide useful information.
In my own life, I have found that as I make more money I have grown more liberal. I am aware that at my end of the economic spectrum this is unusual. (I am not even moderately wealthy yet, but I hope to be someday.)
It seems to me, it is much easier to be liberal when one is wealthy. Why else would there be a "rich east coast liberal" stereotype? I have also observed that it is the moderately wealthy (who would like to cross over into the super-rich category), that are more likely to be fiscally conservative.
You're probably right. I have fond memories of it in the '86 - '88 time frame. Everyone I knew at the time had a//c or a IIe, and that's all we used. I knew one guy that had an 8088 clone, but none of us were impressed by its crappy CGA color. I guess that this too is a matter of perspective.
I have to agree. I read Nuromancer in the late '80s back when my Apple//c was state of the art. It blew me away. Up until that point there had been nothing like it. I thought it interesting about Gibson's comment about the lack of cell phones. I'm not sure if after rereading it I would have noticed their absence in the book, but that may be because when I first read it, cell phones weren't very common. I guess it's a matter of perspective. On a side note, I have always wanted to name a server Wintermute, but have always figured I would feel like a tool if I actually did.
If anyone is looking for additional early cyberpunk, I recommend Daniel Keys Moran. His books seem to be back in print.
I have 19" and 15" CRTs running of my ATI 9700 pro. As the ATI cards will not run in span mode, I'm SOL for most games. I use the second 15" for various things, but I don't use it often, it mostly just sits there turned off. My old monitor was otherwise just collecting dust, and I have a big desk, so at least I get some use out of it now.
What I would really like to see is a RTS that uses the second monitor as a status and logistics display. Map, unit info, unit construction menus etc. Hopfully it would be able to display at a diferent resolution than the first, so I don't need the span mode.
Slashdot Mirror
>"Appearing to believe in a religion is a far cry from passing laws enforcing it."
I will have to respectfully disagree with this idea. While I agree that it is not the same thing, I will not say that it "is a far cry" from it. Some will cry the "Slippery Slope is a fallacy" argument, however in this case, it isn't. One can already see the results of this slippery slope in our society, as evidenced by the recent Congressional vote on the Pledge of Allegiance. If a public religious display has no appearance of authority, why do people feel the need to place them in front governmental locations? The people that feel strongly about these issues should put them up in front of their own houses. If that isn't good enough, then it is obvious that they are trying to use their office as a bully pulpit.
Liberman is free to display his personal religious ornamentation, because we are free to practice religion as we see fit. He is not allowed to inscribe passages from the Torah on his senate seat. There is as you say "a far cry" from an individual displaying their preference and using their power of office to promote that preference.
You are right that Jefferson is not the final word on our nations founding, however I like to point out his bible to stave off the notion that the USA was founded as a Christian nation. Many other founding fathers, notably Franklin and Washington, were not strictly speaking Christian.
The reasoning is right there in your post.
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
What this means is that Government (and it's all of its various branches) can not even appear to prefer one religion over another. This includes allowing any religious displays. How would you like passages from the Koran in Arabic posted in the courtroom where you were on trial? (or for the PC among us, a religion different from your own) What if your local mayor decided to plant a giant gold Buddha on the front lawn of town hall? That would be seen as a massive waste of tax money, and rightly so.
I'd like to point out the God isn't mentioned in our constitution either. Our founders were mostly influenced by enlightenment philosophy.
I recommend you have look at The Jefferson Bible Where he specifically eliminates all supernatural events, and considers Jesus a philosopher, not god.
Corporate profits are at an all time high. See this chart. From the link:
But with the end of the recession in late 2001,* corporate profits jumped enormously. And they have continued to rise as the lousy labor market has dragged down wages and salaries while greatly-increased productivity has driven value added per worker way, way up.
You seem to have missed the joke....
FTFA:
Summary
Immunity's findings clearly show that the best platform for your targets to be running is Microsoft Windows, allowing you unparalleled value for their dollar. This result reinforces the fact that its important to consider more than just licensing fees when your targets choose their OS. Indeed, a variety of factors go into their choice, and over time, Windows has demonstrated itself to be the top contender in the, in both the server and the desktop space for Total Cost of 0wnership.
(Emphasis mine)
Where I went to School 20 credits a semester was considered a normal course load. I needed 146 credits to graduate. However, I don't have a CS degree, I have a BE in Civil Engineering. You'll notice in many IT job postings employers ask for candidates with a CS or any engineering degree. I had no trouble making the shift from Engineering to IT.
Of course you can. I myself have seen water come out of a thousand foot deep well. What you can't do is suck up water under vacuum over 1 atm. You can most certainly push water up thousands of feet.
Here is a company that sells pumps that do just that. (See under vertical turbine pumps).
I agree, Microserfs resonated with me as well. I would also like to suggest "Rivethead" Which tells the story of an assembly line worker for GM in the 1970's. It's somewhat dated but was very enlightening.
Ob. Mallrats quote:
I'll tell you what you need is a fatty, boombatty blunt! And then I guarantee you'll see a sailboat, an ocean and maybe even some of them big-tittied mermaids doing some of that lesbian shit!
I knew guys that were using DAT's attached to eq's in the early 90's to record Dead shows. I don't know if this counts as prior art, but it does seem to make this patent obvious, as it is well before the 2001 filing date of the patent.
It seems that normal concrete will start emitting plumes of smoke just before it pops
As would burning tar, or any other heavy petroleum derivate.
You're thinking of asphalt. Concrete is a mixture of portland cement, sand and stone. Portland cement is mainly lime, which presumably is what is burning and popping.
Bad driving has little or nothing to do with reflexes or skill. It is arrogance or self-importance that causes the most frustration for ordinary drivers.
I don't care if you can apex the off-ramp at 70 mph, when you cut me off because I'm only doing 15 mph over the limit and not 20. It's the people who change lanes erratically and don't use signals that are dangerous. I've seen people drive around me at a traffic light (over the center line) so they could make an illegal right on red. I see people who treat red lights as stop signs. I've had people scream at me for going through my green light, because they couldn't get through on the red. This is the crap that really aggravates me.
If you're wondering, I live in northern New Jersey. This behavior says nothing about their skill at handling an automobile, and everything about their personality.
At the moment, I'm trying to get a few of these opteron based servers in for testing to run oracle on linux to replace some of our aging unix servers.
I do enterprise Capacity Planning and Performance Tuning for big databases. (Anywhere from 100 to 1000 Gb) I cannot tell you how often poorly designed application architecture causes nasty performance problems, precisely because management thinks that anyone can connect a web front end to a database. Our typical developer has no idea how to optimize for db performance. The application owners don't like hearing you need to re-design your application, because we can't tune it any further. I am tired of telling them that throwing faster hardware at the problem will not help, as a faster machine will only choke the database harder. It is obvious to me that these "developers" do not have adequate problem solving skills to effectively do their jobs. Their code may be clean, but the application design is so poor that its performance will always suck.
Math (and all problem solving skills)are very important for a developer, otherwise one is just a code monkey.
I hear what you are saying about the "rail of the plotline". My problem with many games is that they are far to linear. Dungeon Siege is an excellent example of such a game. It had great graphics, and good game play but the player has no choices in the story. Compare to any of the Ultimas or Baldur's Gate 2. Plots are important, but for me, I like to have a choice in what missions or quests to do. When these choices effect the outcome of the game so much the better.
I think of the Baldur's Gate 2 story as a spoke and wheel design. One gets to a point in the game and the player is presented with several choices as to what to do next. Some choices lead to new "plot hubs" from which additional plot choices are presented. The ability to go back to previous "plot hubs" is important to me, as I like to complete all of the quests for a given game.
It seems to me that many of the "Greatest Games of all Time" have this non linear behavior.
I didn't mean to sound like an asshole, but I was very busy earlier today and didn't have time to form a more detailed reply.
At some point in the future, the distinction between monitors and TV's will become very blurry. (Some will say this is rapidly approaching) Both will offer very high resolutions, and come in a variety of sizes. My problem is not so much with possible resolutions with TV sets, but with the typical distance one sits away from them.
Even if I had a 60" screen that was capable of 1600 x 1200 (or higher), sitting ten (or more) feet away from it as in a typical living room is not comfortable setting for me to play the types of games I play. (Mostly RTS and RPG, with some FPS) My eyes would have trouble resolving that level of detail at those distances.
While that setup would be excellent for group action gaming, (the strongest genre for consoles as it is) it is wholly unsuitable for other types.
A 1080i TV 10 feet away will not provide as much detail as a monitor 18 inches away.
While there are keyboards and mice available for consoles, no one ever seems to talk about the ergonomics of using them with a console.
I play a mix of RTS, RPG and FPS games, and when I play, I want to be sitting comforably at my desk, with my monitor a sharp 1280 x 1024, not on my couch hunched over my coffee table squinting at my low rez tv.
Using a mouse and keyboard in my living room would be an excercise in frustration and back pain.
I don't know if it was a real PSA or just a joke, but I'll tell you this, after reading it I never wanted to even think about Heroin (Never mind use it). So I guess it worked.
IIRC it was in Rolling Stone or Playboy, so it could very well have been a real PSA.
I remember an old full page PSA in some magazine:
The truly evil thing about heroin is it doesn't always kill you. Sometimes it just turns you into Keith Richards.
My own theory is that he died in 1969 and nobody told him yet. Either that or he's a vampire.
The modern version of these groups are called keiretsu, and are simply affiliated companies much like their western counterparts.
I'm not claiming that these stereotypes are true. My premise is that because there is a stereotype, there must be a grain of truth in there somewhere.
You and I would appear to agree. The sorts of people that read the WSJ are wealthy and conservative. However my point was that it's easy to embrace the idea of giving away 30% (or more) of your earnings for social programs and other liberal causes if the 70% left over is still more than you could ever use.
IMHO, many of the people who read the WSJ do not consider themselves wealthy (though they would qualify by most definitions) and have a conservative outlook, while people who are stupendously wealthy (and are aware of this) would be more inclined to support liberal causes. Again as you say these are not hard and fast rules, and there are many exceptions, and while stereotypes and never wholly true, they can provide useful information.
In my own life, I have found that as I make more money I have grown more liberal. I am aware that at my end of the economic spectrum this is unusual. (I am not even moderately wealthy yet, but I hope to be someday.)
It seems to me, it is much easier to be liberal when one is wealthy. Why else would there be a "rich east coast liberal" stereotype? I have also observed that it is the moderately wealthy (who would like to cross over into the super-rich category), that are more likely to be fiscally conservative.
You're probably right. I have fond memories of it in the '86 - '88 time frame. Everyone I knew at the time had a //c or a IIe, and that's all we used. I knew one guy that had an 8088 clone, but none of us were impressed by its crappy CGA color. I guess that this too is a matter of perspective.
I have to agree. I read Nuromancer in the late '80s back when my Apple //c was state of the art. It blew me away. Up until that point there had been nothing like it. I thought it interesting about Gibson's comment about the lack of cell phones. I'm not sure if after rereading it I would have noticed their absence in the book, but that may be because when I first read it, cell phones weren't very common. I guess it's a matter of perspective. On a side note, I have always wanted to name a server Wintermute, but have always figured I would feel like a tool if I actually did.
If anyone is looking for additional early cyberpunk, I recommend Daniel Keys Moran. His books seem to be back in print.
I have 19" and 15" CRTs running of my ATI 9700 pro. As the ATI cards will not run in span mode, I'm SOL for most games. I use the second 15" for various things, but I don't use it often, it mostly just sits there turned off. My old monitor was otherwise just collecting dust, and I have a big desk, so at least I get some use out of it now.
What I would really like to see is a RTS that uses the second monitor as a status and logistics display. Map, unit info, unit construction menus etc. Hopfully it would be able to display at a diferent resolution than the first, so I don't need the span mode.