... un-employment rate 3.9%, that is socialism for you, suck it yanks
Indeed.
A few years ago the Conservatards were talking about how we needed to have no social safety net and low taxes because those were the keys to our low unemployment rate. That doesn't appear to be correlating very well now. So now the Libertards are screaming about "freedom". I hope that socialism comes to our land soon.
Again, someone who doesn't understand that his priorities are not the ones of the mainstream consumer electronics user. "Hitting the right notes with the right people" is the only thing that matters, especially when the "right people" are a customer base that just about anyone would give their right arm for. Nobody except the geeks out there care about the things you complain about. The Apple systems work, you can find an application for almost anything you want to do, and the price point is not excessive for the perceived value.
Mainstream engineers with attitudes like yours have had sixty years of computing history (and forty-some odd years since the advent of the personal computer - note, I count this time since Kay's work on Dynapad and the Alto at Xerox PARC) to deliver a good user experience. They have failed. You hype systems (like Windows and Linux) which, although open, force users into the role of system administrator all too often and deliver inconsistent user experiences.
Apple, on the other hand, has succeeded. That they did so by walling the garden makes little difference to their customers. Understand that and you will understand the future. Disregard it and you'll be consigned to the dust heap of history. If you want to fight their closedness, you first have to make your open systems appealing and easy to use. Get a clue, people.
Anyone who can't figure out how to use a roundabout properly is probably too stupid to be allowed to drive (not that being too stupid to be allowed to drive seemed to ever stopped anyone from doing so).
Until science offers a completely predictive model of behavior and thoughts, it would be premature to assume that a soul (in the classical definition) does or doesn't exist.
Wow. Just... wow. This is a pathetically stupid prerequisite. It's like saying that until quantum mechanics offers a completely predictive model of electron transitions in an atom (which, thanks to Heisenberg, we know it can't), it would be premature to assume that angels aren't pushing the electrons about.
Failure of exact prediction is not necessarily a flaw in a theory. In fact, a theory's main contribution is not always via a prediction, but as a framework to narrow down the factors that could be influencing an outcome. Right now, it appears as if modern neural science provides a clean mechanism using only the action of biochemical processes to explain thought and behavior. We have enough experimental data (chopping out parts of brains, etc.) that tells us that we don't need a "soul" to explain this stuff.
Getting back to the topic, given the large number of neurons involved and the analog nature of their operation, it's quite likely that any prediction will be probabilistic in nature and you will never have a "completely predictive" model of behavior and thoughts, but that's not a flaw - do you think that God is still involved because we don't have a "completely predictive" model of biological evolution? Oh yeah, you were prattling on about the "soul" - of course you do.
First, it's ugly. I mean really, helvetic'ish ugly. Second, the holes haven't been designed well - there's a high variability in color tone between the characters that gives an astigmatic dazzle effect and that make the text very fatiguing to read. Third, it doesn't scale well - magnifying by 20% increases the visibility of these flaws.
Not that that's saying much - almost anything (sans Comic Sans) looks better than Arial.
And that being said, I would probably have started by looking at a serif'ed font. Serif'ed fonts are much more legible, especially in large blocks, than sans serif fonts. Having a lighter-faced font would also make legibility a bit more difficult (in the case of the chosen font, this is ameliorated by widening the characters). I would have gone with a light, condensed font like ITC Cheltenham Condensed Light, or ITC Legacy Serif Light Condensed. Or, if I wanted a really retro look with lots of ink savings, something like ITC American Typewriter Light Condensed. Any of the serif'ed fonts are much more legible and, frankly, look classier than any of the "Helvetica redux" sans serif fonts, popular with the computer set these days.
"When you understand something, then you can find the math to express that understanding. The math doesn't provide the understanding."
I agree with this. However, Lamport here is being a bit short-sighted. One of the most useful aspects of mathematics is to take an understanding about a limited number of cases and allow one to formally build that to a proven understanding about a large number of cases. It can also provide insight about potential behavior of a system that might not be obvious from only the initial understanding. Math doesn't provide understanding, but it can extend that understanding.
I'd guess it's more targeted at illegal activity such as 'piracy' and 'copyright infringement'.
And you'd probably be right, given that it's Orrin Hatch that's sponsoring the bill. Orrin has very strong RIAA ties and is a very strong supporter of them.
This is a fairly intrusive, insulting to the legal worker, and unnecessarily burdensome on business set of requirements that have all come into place because Congress writes immigration laws that are broken-by-design, and fails to enforce them effectively.
How are you going to "enforce them effectively" if you can't positively and quickly identify those who are allowed to be in/work in the country? I know... We'll just round up anyone who looks Hispanic or speaks with a funny accent and send them to Mexico (or China or Russia or some random Middle Eastern country or...).
If the government is going to require companies to use a patented technology, it seems that the only reasonable solution is to remove the patent on it and allow competition in the market place.
The government is saying nothing about requiring this technology. The populace (in the form of a jury) is saying that, if you have a reasonable way to reduce injuries and you willfully do not use it, we're probably going to give people who sue you a buttload of money. Think of it as democracy in action!
When I read TFA, what he said was as predictable as the sunrise the next morning. They were surprised because a Microsoft network had apps that had dependencies on Microsoft products? That there were large numbers of VBA and macros? That vendors weren't particularly gleeful about supporting Linux?
Christ, as clueless as these people were, it's a wonder they're able to migrate their asses to work each morning let alone one OS to another.
Those children are now _normal_. Approximately 25 years ago [and maybe even more recently], no baby born that early had _ever survived_. And now it is happening routinely, in small towns, to the children of "normal" people. Every few years, the youngest surviving baby gets younger. In this country, if my wife went into super-early labor at 25 weeks, they'd not only try to save our baby, but they'd have a good chance, and if they failed, they'd count that in "infant mortality".
Normal gestation is 36 weeks. I was born 10 weeks premature (read 26 weeks gestation) in 1956 and I'm still not dead yet (it did make me a liberal and a manager, though, so maybe that's what you "anti-statists" are scared of). This actually hasn't improved much since then. It might have pushed back by an additional 2 weeks or so over the last 50 years, but they were keeping premies alive then and they'll continue to keep them alive until the insurance companies decide it's too expensive. And, I'm pretty sure that, if you check European average gestation length and the stats underlying them, you'll find a fair number also at that minimum mark. Of course, given your idiotic statement that no baby born that early ever survived until 25 or so years ago, I'm not surprised that you're misinformed about health care in general.
Re:It is bad, wrong way to go about it
on
Health Care Reform
·
· Score: 1
As a citizen I'd be willing to pay for any primary physician's education who would (a) agree to go to an under-served community for 7 years and (b) agreed to have their salary capped at an annual rate of $175K per annum (inflation adjusted, of course) until retirement at age 55. Of course, you will now say that item (a) is slavery and item (b) is immoral because how dare I have the nerve to ask that anyone's capability of making income be limited? Of course, I just see this as the terms of a loan. Which makes it seem like it's not really the loan that's the issue.
And, BTW, I have several medical professionals in my family. One, my father, lived in a rural community in downstate Illinois where he occasionally got paid in meat and vegetables. And he made house calls, too. And you know what? He managed to put six kids through college, buy a multi-million dollar farm, and live a reasonable life where he was a very well respected member of the community. Worked (on average) four ten-twelve hour days a week, and drove thirty miles each way every day to do rounds in the local hospital. And I never heard him complain about what he had to pay to go to medical school.
You know what's the real problem with doctors these days? They're wusses.
The reason health care costs have gotten so out of control in the first place is because patients never look at the costs, because the vast majority of health care is paid for by third parties. So patients demand all the best care and all the tests they want and costs be damned.
You know, I do see what each doctor visit costs my insurance company by reading the EOMBs. In fact I often read them because my insurance company very often does not pay the entire bill, leaving me to pick up a (sometimes) substantial cost to finish the payment that they have started. Not that I know how much in advance a particular treatment will cost. If you could set up a website where you could show that doctor X charges Y dollars for service Z, I'm sure we would all be grateful! However, you will find that those figures vary widely based on factor W - WHO is being charged for the service. And the people doing that are not the consumers, but the providers and the insurance companies.
In addition, I do not think I have ever asked my doctor to provide a test or treatment that he (or she) has not recommended. In fact, because most treatments are painful, inconvenient, risky, or expensive to me (see above), I don't actually go around saying, "I must have an MRI!".
Finally, I do not think that I'm in the minority about this, as most rational people would do the same in my situation of inconsistency and lack of information concerning pricing and downsides of treatment. In short, I think that your story (like those of most conservatives) are fantasies, akin to Reagan's anecdote about the "Cadilac Welfare Queen", which has been roundly debunked. On the other hand, I would be willing to pay a few dollars a month more if it ensured that you received mental health care to bring an end to your delusions. Of course, a cheaper treatment would be to stop watching Fox News. And you wouldn't need to pay anything for that.
You are proposing a false equivalency. Olbermann has at most a 30-minute rant where he blasts the other side. Fox news has (at least) three hours a day of a hate-fest in their top-3 evening hosts (Beck, Hannity, and O'Reilly) and that's not counting the slantedness of the rest of the reporting (MSNBC, due to the MS and NBC parts - who don't want to lose their mainstream credibility - has been required to actually moderate and balance their reporting during the daytime hours). So sure, Olbermann provides a cup of sludge. Fox News provides gallons each day. I would think anyone on Slashdot would understand how quantities work.
Maybe these litigious companies will realize, one day, there's a reason why.
Why? The public in general hates the lawyers, not the people who hire them. In fact, the lawyers are acting as a defensive shield for the public scorn that should be heaped on the organizations that hire them to carry out their legal asshattery. As long as people hate the lawyers without questioning who stands behind them, the organizations that hire them will continue to get off scot free.
Which ones are you talking about? Both Fluke and Tektronix still exist (though the latter not in its former glory) and Boeing was still in business last time I checked (albeit with HQ now in Chicago). As is Mentor Graphics, etc., etc. And I've actually worked for a couple of those...
You know, in every discussion about IP, some dork posts this quote. Not that it's a bad quote, but for God's sake, anyone who hasn't seen this by now must (a) be unable to read, (b) has been in a coma for the past ten years, or (c) has Alzheimer's, so they don't remember it. In any case, it is no longer interesting, informative, funny, or any other of the positive moderation accolades it has been given. Please everyone, when you see this quote posted for the billionth time, mark it down, not because it's inherently bad, but because it's getting dreadfully boring. I tend to think "-1 Redundant" would be appropriate.
Slashdot Mirror
... un-employment rate 3.9%, that is socialism for you, suck it yanks
Indeed.
A few years ago the Conservatards were talking about how we needed to have no social safety net and low taxes because those were the keys to our low unemployment rate. That doesn't appear to be correlating very well now. So now the Libertards are screaming about "freedom". I hope that socialism comes to our land soon.
Again, someone who doesn't understand that his priorities are not the ones of the mainstream consumer electronics user. "Hitting the right notes with the right people" is the only thing that matters, especially when the "right people" are a customer base that just about anyone would give their right arm for. Nobody except the geeks out there care about the things you complain about. The Apple systems work, you can find an application for almost anything you want to do, and the price point is not excessive for the perceived value.
Mainstream engineers with attitudes like yours have had sixty years of computing history (and forty-some odd years since the advent of the personal computer - note, I count this time since Kay's work on Dynapad and the Alto at Xerox PARC) to deliver a good user experience. They have failed. You hype systems (like Windows and Linux) which, although open, force users into the role of system administrator all too often and deliver inconsistent user experiences.
Apple, on the other hand, has succeeded. That they did so by walling the garden makes little difference to their customers. Understand that and you will understand the future. Disregard it and you'll be consigned to the dust heap of history. If you want to fight their closedness, you first have to make your open systems appealing and easy to use. Get a clue, people.
Anyone who can't figure out how to use a roundabout properly is probably too stupid to be allowed to drive (not that being too stupid to be allowed to drive seemed to ever stopped anyone from doing so).
It's OK... If you're an American who holds Democratic views, you shouldn't be comfortable working for folks like that anyway.
We will get you pirates and prove that Global Warming is a hoax, once and for all!!!
Either that or we'll finally kill off Usenet - win-win, either way.
Until science offers a completely predictive model of behavior and thoughts, it would be premature to assume that a soul (in the classical definition) does or doesn't exist.
Wow. Just... wow. This is a pathetically stupid prerequisite. It's like saying that until quantum mechanics offers a completely predictive model of electron transitions in an atom (which, thanks to Heisenberg, we know it can't), it would be premature to assume that angels aren't pushing the electrons about.
Failure of exact prediction is not necessarily a flaw in a theory. In fact, a theory's main contribution is not always via a prediction, but as a framework to narrow down the factors that could be influencing an outcome. Right now, it appears as if modern neural science provides a clean mechanism using only the action of biochemical processes to explain thought and behavior. We have enough experimental data (chopping out parts of brains, etc.) that tells us that we don't need a "soul" to explain this stuff.
Getting back to the topic, given the large number of neurons involved and the analog nature of their operation, it's quite likely that any prediction will be probabilistic in nature and you will never have a "completely predictive" model of behavior and thoughts, but that's not a flaw - do you think that God is still involved because we don't have a "completely predictive" model of biological evolution? Oh yeah, you were prattling on about the "soul" - of course you do.
Why not use it?
First, it's ugly. I mean really, helvetic'ish ugly. Second, the holes haven't been designed well - there's a high variability in color tone between the characters that gives an astigmatic dazzle effect and that make the text very fatiguing to read. Third, it doesn't scale well - magnifying by 20% increases the visibility of these flaws.
Not that that's saying much - almost anything (sans Comic Sans) looks better than Arial.
And that being said, I would probably have started by looking at a serif'ed font. Serif'ed fonts are much more legible, especially in large blocks, than sans serif fonts. Having a lighter-faced font would also make legibility a bit more difficult (in the case of the chosen font, this is ameliorated by widening the characters). I would have gone with a light, condensed font like ITC Cheltenham Condensed Light, or ITC Legacy Serif Light Condensed. Or, if I wanted a really retro look with lots of ink savings, something like ITC American Typewriter Light Condensed. Any of the serif'ed fonts are much more legible and, frankly, look classier than any of the "Helvetica redux" sans serif fonts, popular with the computer set these days.
"When you understand something, then you can find the math to express that understanding. The math doesn't provide the understanding."
I agree with this. However, Lamport here is being a bit short-sighted. One of the most useful aspects of mathematics is to take an understanding about a limited number of cases and allow one to formally build that to a proven understanding about a large number of cases. It can also provide insight about potential behavior of a system that might not be obvious from only the initial understanding. Math doesn't provide understanding, but it can extend that understanding.
I'd guess it's more targeted at illegal activity such as 'piracy' and 'copyright infringement'.
And you'd probably be right, given that it's Orrin Hatch that's sponsoring the bill. Orrin has very strong RIAA ties and is a very strong supporter of them.
This is a fairly intrusive, insulting to the legal worker, and unnecessarily burdensome on business set of requirements that have all come into place because Congress writes immigration laws that are broken-by-design, and fails to enforce them effectively.
How are you going to "enforce them effectively" if you can't positively and quickly identify those who are allowed to be in/work in the country? I know... We'll just round up anyone who looks Hispanic or speaks with a funny accent and send them to Mexico (or China or Russia or some random Middle Eastern country or...).
If the government is going to require companies to use a patented technology, it seems that the only reasonable solution is to remove the patent on it and allow competition in the market place.
The government is saying nothing about requiring this technology. The populace (in the form of a jury) is saying that, if you have a reasonable way to reduce injuries and you willfully do not use it, we're probably going to give people who sue you a buttload of money. Think of it as democracy in action!
Very true, by the sound of the blog most of their problems stem from how poorly the systems were managed before.
If they weren't smart enough to do the research to know this before they started, they were unqualified to do the migration.
When I read TFA, what he said was as predictable as the sunrise the next morning. They were surprised because a Microsoft network had apps that had dependencies on Microsoft products? That there were large numbers of VBA and macros? That vendors weren't particularly gleeful about supporting Linux?
Christ, as clueless as these people were, it's a wonder they're able to migrate their asses to work each morning let alone one OS to another.
Comedy-f'king-Central
That's because comedy has a well-known liberal bias (just ask Dennis Miller).
Those children are now _normal_. Approximately 25 years ago [and maybe even more recently], no baby born that early had _ever survived_. And now it is happening routinely, in small towns, to the children of "normal" people. Every few years, the youngest surviving baby gets younger. In this country, if my wife went into super-early labor at 25 weeks, they'd not only try to save our baby, but they'd have a good chance, and if they failed, they'd count that in "infant mortality".
Normal gestation is 36 weeks. I was born 10 weeks premature (read 26 weeks gestation) in 1956 and I'm still not dead yet (it did make me a liberal and a manager, though, so maybe that's what you "anti-statists" are scared of). This actually hasn't improved much since then. It might have pushed back by an additional 2 weeks or so over the last 50 years, but they were keeping premies alive then and they'll continue to keep them alive until the insurance companies decide it's too expensive. And, I'm pretty sure that, if you check European average gestation length and the stats underlying them, you'll find a fair number also at that minimum mark. Of course, given your idiotic statement that no baby born that early ever survived until 25 or so years ago, I'm not surprised that you're misinformed about health care in general.
As a citizen I'd be willing to pay for any primary physician's education who would (a) agree to go to an under-served community for 7 years and (b) agreed to have their salary capped at an annual rate of $175K per annum (inflation adjusted, of course) until retirement at age 55. Of course, you will now say that item (a) is slavery and item (b) is immoral because how dare I have the nerve to ask that anyone's capability of making income be limited? Of course, I just see this as the terms of a loan. Which makes it seem like it's not really the loan that's the issue.
And, BTW, I have several medical professionals in my family. One, my father, lived in a rural community in downstate Illinois where he occasionally got paid in meat and vegetables. And he made house calls, too. And you know what? He managed to put six kids through college, buy a multi-million dollar farm, and live a reasonable life where he was a very well respected member of the community. Worked (on average) four ten-twelve hour days a week, and drove thirty miles each way every day to do rounds in the local hospital. And I never heard him complain about what he had to pay to go to medical school.
You know what's the real problem with doctors these days? They're wusses.
The reason health care costs have gotten so out of control in the first place is because patients never look at the costs, because the vast majority of health care is paid for by third parties. So patients demand all the best care and all the tests they want and costs be damned.
You know, I do see what each doctor visit costs my insurance company by reading the EOMBs. In fact I often read them because my insurance company very often does not pay the entire bill, leaving me to pick up a (sometimes) substantial cost to finish the payment that they have started. Not that I know how much in advance a particular treatment will cost. If you could set up a website where you could show that doctor X charges Y dollars for service Z, I'm sure we would all be grateful! However, you will find that those figures vary widely based on factor W - WHO is being charged for the service. And the people doing that are not the consumers, but the providers and the insurance companies.
In addition, I do not think I have ever asked my doctor to provide a test or treatment that he (or she) has not recommended. In fact, because most treatments are painful, inconvenient, risky, or expensive to me (see above), I don't actually go around saying, "I must have an MRI!".
Finally, I do not think that I'm in the minority about this, as most rational people would do the same in my situation of inconsistency and lack of information concerning pricing and downsides of treatment. In short, I think that your story (like those of most conservatives) are fantasies, akin to Reagan's anecdote about the "Cadilac Welfare Queen", which has been roundly debunked. On the other hand, I would be willing to pay a few dollars a month more if it ensured that you received mental health care to bring an end to your delusions. Of course, a cheaper treatment would be to stop watching Fox News. And you wouldn't need to pay anything for that.
You are proposing a false equivalency. Olbermann has at most a 30-minute rant where he blasts the other side. Fox news has (at least) three hours a day of a hate-fest in their top-3 evening hosts (Beck, Hannity, and O'Reilly) and that's not counting the slantedness of the rest of the reporting (MSNBC, due to the MS and NBC parts - who don't want to lose their mainstream credibility - has been required to actually moderate and balance their reporting during the daytime hours). So sure, Olbermann provides a cup of sludge. Fox News provides gallons each day. I would think anyone on Slashdot would understand how quantities work.
... what's left for the US other than the formation of a military-enforced trade hegemony?
Wait!!! I saw that movie! It led to all sorts of awful things! Like Jar Jar! And the next two movies!
I think I speak for all of us when I say, "NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!"
My wife just heard the word VIRUS and threw me out of the house.
Maybe these litigious companies will realize, one day, there's a reason why.
Why? The public in general hates the lawyers, not the people who hire them. In fact, the lawyers are acting as a defensive shield for the public scorn that should be heaped on the organizations that hire them to carry out their legal asshattery. As long as people hate the lawyers without questioning who stands behind them, the organizations that hire them will continue to get off scot free.
Which ones are you talking about? Both Fluke and Tektronix still exist (though the latter not in its former glory) and Boeing was still in business last time I checked (albeit with HQ now in Chicago). As is Mentor Graphics, etc., etc. And I've actually worked for a couple of those...
You know, in every discussion about IP, some dork posts this quote. Not that it's a bad quote, but for God's sake, anyone who hasn't seen this by now must (a) be unable to read, (b) has been in a coma for the past ten years, or (c) has Alzheimer's, so they don't remember it. In any case, it is no longer interesting, informative, funny, or any other of the positive moderation accolades it has been given. Please everyone, when you see this quote posted for the billionth time, mark it down, not because it's inherently bad, but because it's getting dreadfully boring. I tend to think "-1 Redundant" would be appropriate.
When the only thing your country produces s stuff like the latest Britney Spears CD...
... you don't have to worry about IP laws because no one would want to steal it anyway.