There's actually no GWB Sr. Dubya's dad is George Herbert Walker Bush, so it'd be GHWB. Lot's of excellent insight into him and the Bush dynasty is available in an on-line unauthorized biography, available here.
This is a recent legal concept known as the "Property Rights Movement". It's an astroturf movement of mining, manufacturing, and agribusiness interests that are using property rights as a shill for rolling back protections for common resources such as streams. One of their champions is our current Secretary of the Interior, Gale Norton. For a look at some extremist ranting on the issue, check out the West Virginia Farm Bureau. The Institute for Justice also has a page supporting so-called Private Property Rights.
What really identifies this group as bogus is the way they've plastered pictures of black people all over their Web pages. I couldn't find a single issue they espouse that would benefit any condition that disproportionately affects blacks. The Institute for Justice is working to protect the rights of the wealthy.
n.b. I'm not against the rights of property owners. I just believe they end at your property line.
Aren't these the same people who think that limiting the amount of pollution you can dump into a stream from your property amounts to a "taking" of your property?
Sorry, the waterways belong to all the people. One individual should not have the right to ruin it for everyone. If anyone is "taking" anything it is the idividual who degrades a common resource for their own selfish motives.
Geographically Challenged Doofus: Where are you from? Hillbilly: West Virginia. GCD: Oh, I have a friend in Richmond. H: I have a friend in Boston. What the hell does that have to do with anything?!
I'm still waiting for some argument that "not destroying ourselves" is a goal that we should have
Well, in the words of Ren Hoeck, "Stimpy, you've really lost it this time." Survival is a mechanism bred into all creatures through the process of evolution. Man, if I would have realized I was arguing with a religious fanatic I would have stopped wasting my time about four posts back. Bye bye, Christian Taliban. Go stone a harlot or something.
But that takes you into the metaphysical space, where we must allow for a higher authority than Nature itself, that can judge what is natural and what is unnatural.
I'm just arguing for our survival. All that takes is the survival mechanism that nature through evolution has embedded into me. You, however, are making an oblique argument for the existence of God. That argument has been played out. If you think you'll find the truth in a book written by Middle Eastern religious fanatics then knock yourself out. I prefer to look for the truth in the universe around me. End of transmission.
You're the one who wants to impose arbitrary restrictions on real-world endeavors.
It's hardly arbitrary when the goal is to prevent us from destroying ourselves. You seem to believe there's no risk involved in twiddling the knobs of life on earth. The burden of proof should lie on those who whish to deviate from nature's course. Show me the risk is negligible and I'll concede.
Sorry, you've obviously confused me with a luddite. I'm not arguing against technology. Extending man's capabilities using technology is a worthwhile pursuit. Tinkering with the building blocks of life is hubris. Heavier-than-air flight? Hell yes nature is the authority on that. Insects were in flight millions of years before man even knew air existed. An albatross can span the Pacific while barely expending any energy. Planes crash and kill scores of people and we have to go back to the drawing board. Information transmission, storage, and retrieval? Psssst...dude, DNA contains the instructions for building self-replicating, living beings with the ability to choose their mates with whom they transmit their code to their offspring. Can our pathetic computers touch that? Even computer scientists recognize the potential superiority of DNA over silicon for our computing tasks. (Something I have no problem with because it doen't involve creating living, out-of-our-control creatures) If a bit of our technology gets out of hand we can just turn it off and stop using it. Life, on the other hand, is self-replicating. One wrong step and we could be overwhelmed by man-eating "fishberries." What I'm saying is, build all the toys you want but don't try to tinker with nature's toys. We're out of our league there.
Your philosophical meanderings are really getting tiresome. Come back when you have an argument that works in the real world instead of a series of letters that accidentally wondered away from your fingers.
And where, exactly, is it written that fish should not mate with strawberries?
It's written in the very DNA that controls the function of all life on Earth. There are mechanisms in that code that prevent the transfer of genes from one species to another. These mechanisms have been worked out over billions of years of evolution. To think that we can just walk in and circumvent those controls without negative consequences is pure hubris. I see where your argument is going, though. You're saying that we have become the hand of nature. In related news . . . Osama bin Laden is the hand of God and Travis from Taxi Driver will wash all the scum off the sidewalks. I think it would be a good idea if you brought your feet back down to the ground and checked your ego before you completely lose touch with reality.
So it seems your argument is that life is meaningless and that it's no big deal if we accidentally snuff ourselves out. On a cosmic scale you're probably right but we don't live on a cosmic scale. We only live within our pitiful human time scale. I would prefer to extend that time as much as possible. If you want to play Russian roulette do it on your time, not mine.
Nature has been playing Russian Roulette with DNA for billions of years. DNA gets snipped, clipped, and chipped by nature all the time.
OK, then. Let's look at the scoreboard: Nature - a few billion years. Mankind (using nature's method) - a few thousand years. Mankind (bypassing nature's method) - a few decades. Which one is more qualified to tinker? Be careful, Icarus! Your wings are softening.
I doubt a few labs can out-pace the experiments of nature like those probably going on in your body right now.
It's Russian Roulette with a gun that has infinte chambers.
Finite number of bases. Finite number of genes. Finite number of "chambers". Finite chance of shooting ourselves.
We don't allow biotech firms to relase their little Frankensteins into the wild.
Oh, really? Where in the hell are they growing all these biotech crops, then?
We've been playing with DNA ever since we've been raising our own plants and animals.
All within the constraints imposed by nature herself (through the breeding process) to reduce the chances of nasty combinations happening. In nature, fish don't breed with strawberrys. But we don't need no steenking nature.
So if we don't really understand what all this DNA stuff does, why do we allow biotech firms to tinker with it and then release their little Frankensteins into the wild. Seems like Russian Roulette to me.
I love how all these geneticists keep referring to the bits of DNA code they don't understand as "Junk DNA." It reminds me of the ancient Egyptians who, when mummifying a body, would carefully remove and preserve the organs in jars . . . except for the brain. The brain, to them, was just a bunch of gooey junk in the skull to be thrown away because it didn't serve any purpose. The same geneticists now have the ability to tinker with the code of life and release their monstrosities into the environment that we depend on for our very lives. "Here let's see what happens when I do this! Don't worry, I'm a geneticist and I understand DNA completely and all the ramifications of releasing this new creation into the wild." And we thought nuclear (or is that nuke-u-lar) weapons were how we were going to destroy ourselves.
All of you people who believe Novell is bankrupt and dead are just swallowing Microsoft FUD hook, line, and sinker. This is one of their most successfull FUD campaigns. It seems to have worked on you. Novell has large cash reserves and high-quality products. Maybe you should look for yourself instead of letting Balmer explain it to you.
You could probably get ZenWorks to do all of that right now and store it on your own server if you have an "always on" connection for it. ZenWorks is fully integrated with a directory service and is accessible via LDAP and XML. What more could you need?
Slashdot Mirror
There's actually no GWB Sr. Dubya's dad is George Herbert Walker Bush, so it'd be GHWB.
Lot's of excellent insight into him and the Bush dynasty is available in an on-line unauthorized biography, available here.
This is a recent legal concept known as the "Property Rights Movement". It's an astroturf movement of mining, manufacturing, and agribusiness interests that are using property rights as a shill for rolling back protections for common resources such as streams. One of their champions is our current Secretary of the Interior, Gale Norton.
For a look at some extremist ranting on the issue, check out the West Virginia Farm Bureau.
The Institute for Justice also has a page supporting so-called Private Property Rights.
What really identifies this group as bogus is the way they've plastered pictures of black people all over their Web pages. I couldn't find a single issue they espouse that would benefit any condition that disproportionately affects blacks. The Institute for Justice is working to protect the rights of the wealthy.
n.b. I'm not against the rights of property owners. I just believe they end at your property line.
Aren't these the same people who think that limiting the amount of pollution you can dump into a stream from your property amounts to a "taking" of your property?
Sorry, the waterways belong to all the people. One individual should not have the right to ruin it for everyone. If anyone is "taking" anything it is the idividual who degrades a common resource for their own selfish motives.
These are the wacky extremists.
I have a buddy who runs it like this:
Geographically Challenged Doofus: Where are you from?
Hillbilly: West Virginia.
GCD: Oh, I have a friend in Richmond.
H: I have a friend in Boston. What the hell does that have to do with anything?!
Agreed. But their conventional wisdom still considers it useless, whatever they call it (introns, apparently).
I'm still waiting for some argument that "not destroying ourselves" is a goal that we should have
Well, in the words of Ren Hoeck, "Stimpy, you've really lost it this time." Survival is a mechanism bred into all creatures through the process of evolution.
Man, if I would have realized I was arguing with a religious fanatic I would have stopped wasting my time about four posts back. Bye bye, Christian Taliban. Go stone a harlot or something.
But that takes you into the metaphysical space, where we must allow for a higher authority than Nature itself, that can judge what is natural and what is unnatural.
I'm just arguing for our survival. All that takes is the survival mechanism that nature through evolution has embedded into me. You, however, are making an oblique argument for the existence of God. That argument has been played out. If you think you'll find the truth in a book written by Middle Eastern religious fanatics then knock yourself out. I prefer to look for the truth in the universe around me. End of transmission.
You're the one who wants to impose arbitrary restrictions on real-world endeavors.
It's hardly arbitrary when the goal is to prevent us from destroying ourselves. You seem to believe there's no risk involved in twiddling the knobs of life on earth. The burden of proof should lie on those who whish to deviate from nature's course. Show me the risk is negligible and I'll concede.
Sorry, you've obviously confused me with a luddite. I'm not arguing against technology. Extending man's capabilities using technology is a worthwhile pursuit. Tinkering with the building blocks of life is hubris.
Heavier-than-air flight? Hell yes nature is the authority on that. Insects were in flight millions of years before man even knew air existed. An albatross can span the Pacific while barely expending any energy. Planes crash and kill scores of people and we have to go back to the drawing board.
Information transmission, storage, and retrieval? Psssst...dude, DNA contains the instructions for building self-replicating, living beings with the ability to choose their mates with whom they transmit their code to their offspring. Can our pathetic computers touch that? Even computer scientists recognize the potential superiority of DNA over silicon for our computing tasks. (Something I have no problem with because it doen't involve creating living, out-of-our-control creatures)
If a bit of our technology gets out of hand we can just turn it off and stop using it. Life, on the other hand, is self-replicating. One wrong step and we could be overwhelmed by man-eating "fishberries." What I'm saying is, build all the toys you want but don't try to tinker with nature's toys. We're out of our league there.
Your philosophical meanderings are really getting tiresome. Come back when you have an argument that works in the real world instead of a series of letters that accidentally wondered away from your fingers.
And where, exactly, is it written that fish should not mate with strawberries?
It's written in the very DNA that controls the function of all life on Earth. There are mechanisms in that code that prevent the transfer of genes from one species to another. These mechanisms have been worked out over billions of years of evolution. To think that we can just walk in and circumvent those controls without negative consequences is pure hubris.
I see where your argument is going, though. You're saying that we have become the hand of nature. In related news . . . Osama bin Laden is the hand of God and Travis from Taxi Driver will wash all the scum off the sidewalks. I think it would be a good idea if you brought your feet back down to the ground and checked your ego before you completely lose touch with reality.
So it seems your argument is that life is meaningless and that it's no big deal if we accidentally snuff ourselves out. On a cosmic scale you're probably right but we don't live on a cosmic scale. We only live within our pitiful human time scale. I would prefer to extend that time as much as possible. If you want to play Russian roulette do it on your time, not mine.
Nature has been playing Russian Roulette with DNA for billions of years. DNA gets snipped, clipped, and chipped by nature all the time.
OK, then. Let's look at the scoreboard:
Nature - a few billion years.
Mankind (using nature's method) - a few thousand years.
Mankind (bypassing nature's method) - a few decades.
Which one is more qualified to tinker? Be careful, Icarus! Your wings are softening.
I doubt a few labs can out-pace the experiments of nature like those probably going on in your body right now.
Have you been peeking in my window?
It's Russian Roulette with a gun that has infinte chambers.
Finite number of bases. Finite number of genes. Finite number of "chambers". Finite chance of shooting ourselves.
We don't allow biotech firms to relase their little Frankensteins into the wild.
Oh, really? Where in the hell are they growing all these biotech crops, then?
We've been playing with DNA ever since we've been raising our own plants and animals.
All within the constraints imposed by nature herself (through the breeding process) to reduce the chances of nasty combinations happening. In nature, fish don't breed with strawberrys. But we don't need no steenking nature.
So if we don't really understand what all this DNA stuff does, why do we allow biotech firms to tinker with it and then release their little Frankensteins into the wild. Seems like Russian Roulette to me.
I love how all these geneticists keep referring to the bits of DNA code they don't understand as "Junk DNA." It reminds me of the ancient Egyptians who, when mummifying a body, would carefully remove and preserve the organs in jars . . . except for the brain. The brain, to them, was just a bunch of gooey junk in the skull to be thrown away because it didn't serve any purpose.
The same geneticists now have the ability to tinker with the code of life and release their monstrosities into the environment that we depend on for our very lives. "Here let's see what happens when I do this! Don't worry, I'm a geneticist and I understand DNA completely and all the ramifications of releasing this new creation into the wild." And we thought nuclear (or is that nuke-u-lar) weapons were how we were going to destroy ourselves.
I don't get it.
That's funny because it's true. You really don't get it.
Someone has already patented sending textures over the net.
If only we could find our own Adolf Hitler to pull us out of this current recession and set us back on track by conquering the western hemisphere.
He's already in office, dude.
Weren't you in Steely Dan along with Walter Fagen?
My dad possibly exaggerated in a typical father-son style story, but hey, I'm always open for abuse.
...evidently. Especially if you had a father who enjoyed torturing animals.
All of you people who believe Novell is bankrupt and dead are just swallowing Microsoft FUD hook, line, and sinker. This is one of their most successfull FUD campaigns. It seems to have worked on you.
Novell has large cash reserves and high-quality products. Maybe you should look for yourself instead of letting Balmer explain it to you.
It's also been up for about 40 days straight now.
Only a friend of Bill would brag about 40 days of uptime.
You could probably get ZenWorks to do all of that right now and store it on your own server if you have an "always on" connection for it. ZenWorks is fully integrated with a directory service and is accessible via LDAP and XML. What more could you need?
Also see ZENworks Keeps Handheld Costs Down, Security Up
. . .considering that Microsoft has put an emoticon at the end of its latest OS . . .
XP