When food from genetically modified[*] crops is sold unlabeled, and when furthermore GM crops are grown uncontained so that their pollen spreads and contaminates other fields, then sadly we are forced to eat GM crops.
([*]"Genetically engineered" is an incorrect term, since "engineered" implies bottom-up design based on solid understanding of relevant fundamentals, whereas GMOs are randomized cut-and-paste of species' genomes.)
If you're an environmentalist and you vote against the most environmental candidate we've ever seen
But Nader's proposed environmental policies were stronger than Gore's.
I'm just genetically doomed because of my neanderthal genes.
I don't know about the penchant for shiny metal objects, but when I see my prominent brow ridge in the mirror, and feel my occipital bun, the theory that some of us have Neanderthal ancestry sure makes sense to me...
Linking Space Invaders with the tragedy of 9/11 was just in poor taste and lacked any artistic value. It was created to purely shock people, and nothing else.
The artistic statement is pretty clear to me: the "war on terror" works as well as the "war on Space Invaders", in that there's an unlimited number of them and you're going to eventually get blown up. As the Convention write-up put it "the players must prevent the catastrophe by controlling the well- known cannon at the lower screen border with their bodies and firing it using arm movements. Like the original, this trial is ultimately unsuccessful, thus creating an articulated and critical commentary about the current war strategy."
This review says it "may be unsettling, with its blending of archaic gameplay and modern day catastrophe, but it's also an impressive accomplishment in that it delivers complex messages via simple means. Despite its perceived insensitivity, Stanley's ability to use video games as a medium of artistic expression will likely be an important step in the form being taken seriously (by people who take things seriously)."
You might not like that statement, you may disagree with it, you may find the way it's expressed to be in poor taste. But to claim that it has no artistic value, only shock value, is off the mark.
He could of said, "I tried making a statement. You don't understand it or appreciate it. I apologize to all offended". Instead he did not explain anything, but created a cluster fuck of a smoke screen and walked away.
("Could have said" or "could've said", not "could of said". Sorry, pet peeve, and I will now be fated to introduce at least one grammatical error into this post.)
An artist's job is to make art, not to explain it or apologize for it.
They didn't have anything for him, either. Gore and Bush were both rich white guys from political dynasties who supported policies of corporate plutocracy.
At the time, the website www.BillionairesForBushOrGore.com (now a link farm for online poker) pointed out that these similarities:
Father was a powerful Washington insider
Opposes raising the minimum wage to match the cost
of living
Don't tarnish the 99% of sane copyright holders with the stupidity of the noisy 1%.
When it comes to music and to film/video, the noisy 1% hold [*] 99% of the copyrights on the sort of famous works we'd want to include in a time capsule.
Book copyrights are more often held by individuals, or small corporations started by authors; but I believe that publishing contracts usually include some sort of exclusivity clause.
([*] Or claim to hold. If copyright law adhered to the Constitution, only actual authors - not employers, not assignees - could hold copyright.)
Christ is the key because His sacrifice made us right in God's sight DESPITE the fact there are none 'good' or 'perfect'.
I have no interest in a religion featuring a god placated by human sacrifice, thanks.
Let's just say that I'm not going to lose anything by believing in God!
Of course you do. You lose time spent in worship services, if you believe that God will damn you if you don't attend. You lose opportunities for various experiences that may be pleasant, if you believe that God will damn you if you commit certain acts.
And you lose the great intellectual pleasure of the pursuit of truth, when you accept irrational premises about the universe.
Refusing to vote for the guy who lines up with you on a mere 75% of the issues (and would at least be receptive to the other 25%) because he's not pure enough for you, and risking the election going to the guy 100% opposed to everything you believe in is asinine.
If Gore lined up with Nader voters on 75% of the issues, it was his job to make that clear. Instead he kept running to the right, saying time after time that he agreed with Bush.
Obama's making the same mistake, moving to the right and losing his base, to the point that he's blown his lead and it's now neck-and-neck.
The Democrats need to stop being a conservative party if they want to win. And they're only going to learn that if they see people voting for people like Nader.
Which is more difficult to believe? That guys like Saul of Tarsus decided, 'hey, I'm tired of stoning these Christians; I'm gonna become one instead!' or that they he actually received a vision?
So Saul had a nervous breakdown and a hallucination. So what? It's not like stories of visions are unique to Christianity. Why should be believe that Saul had a "genuine" vision and that Mohammad didn't, or that Joseph Smith didn't, or that Ellen G. White didn't, or that Wovoka didn't?
That ignorant Judean fishermen thought it better to be tortured to death than to enjoy an old age surrounded by their grandchildren, or that they actually believed what they preached first-hand knowledge of?
So they believed it. So what? People believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories, in the competence of George W, Bush, in astrology, in alien abductions, and that the moon landings were faked. Plenty of people have gone to their deaths on false beliefs. A few examples: plenty of Christian Scientists have died when when they turned to their belief in care rather than to medical care, some Lakota Sioux beleived that their "Ghost shirts" were bullet-proof, and the Society of Right and Harmonious Fists thought that millions of "spirit soldiers" would show up on their side.
And if it is significant, then why do you call its creator(s) and/or to whomever they transfered the ownership "assholes"?
An artist, writer, or inventor can be an asshole and still produce, or be involved in the production of, a great work. Disney exploited his employees, and called the Screen Actors Guild a Communist front during the HUAC days; that doesn't make Fantasia any less great.
Copyright is not ownership, calling it such falls into the mire of the "intellectual property" meme.
The fact that a creator transfered copyright to someone tells you nothing about the recipient's assholery.
they banned religion in china, you know, and replaced it with the teachings of socialism
In point of fact, the Chinese government officially recognizes Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism, and in recent years has organized international forums on Buddhism and Taoism.
Socialism is an economic practice which is orthogonal to religion. Some forms of socialism (the state socialism of Stalin and of Mao) were authoritarian systems which restricted religion; but there is are various forms of "religious socialism". And certainly libertarian socialism would place no limits on religious liberty.
Name another steel skyscraper fire where the building collapsed.
Name another steel skyscraper fire that was in any way similar to the WTC 7 disaster, where a fire with multiple ignition points was allowed to burn out of control for hours.
According to TFA, "The investigators also reported that if the city water main had not been cut by the collapse of World Trade Center towers 1 and 2 (WTC 1 and WTC 2), operating sprinklers in WTC 7 would likely have prevented its collapse."
With any luck, we'll never see a set of circumstances like WTC 7 (or, fate forfend, WTC 1 & 2) again.
And that's also exactly what's necessary for any system to "work completely" - can't check that something works if its behavior isn't precisely specified.
The conditions necessary to be able to state that a bit of hardware "works completely" are the same as those necessary to support free software - conformance to a published interface specification.
The link you gave talks about the impossibility of cooking an egg on sun-heated asphalt, because eggs require a temperature of 158 deg. F, and asphalt is a poor conductor of heat.
The poster was talking about cooking unknown substances (down-thread, he says pancakes) on rock of unknown composition.
The impossibility of cooking eggs on sun-heated asphalt is not informative of the possibility of cooking pancakes on sun-heated rock.
So I'd advise you to tone down your accusations that the poster was lying or misunderstanding their observations.
Don't tell that to a Ralph Nader voter in Florida or New Hampshire.....
What about Nader voters? They're not responsibile for the crappy campain that Gore ran, for the fraud that gave Florida to Bush, nor for the inaction of Democratic senators who let it pass.
We've got van mounted miniguns that can shoot thousands of bullets per minute and are completely mobile. Terrorist actions could win the fight in theory, but in reality it's much harder to fight as a terrorist because the collateral damage turns the population against you
Deploying a heavy weaponry to take out a small cell of freedom fighters is a terrorist action, one that tends to turn the population against the government because of the collateral damage.
Insurgencies can "work", for certain definitions of "work", against modern armies, Vietnam being the classical example.
I want Congress to impeach these motherfuckers and put them in the jail cells they so richly deserve.
That, of course, would require a competent, courageous, and non-corrupt Congress. Which in our case, we have not got.
So I want the voters to toss out the bums inhabiting Congress.
That, of course, would require an educated, informed, and engaged electorate. Which in our case, we have not got.
So, waiting for the whole thing to go to hell, "I want to get my kicks before the whole shithouse goes up in flames", as the Lizard King put it. And if it comes down to violence - and it might - I want to take as many of those bastards responsible for the destruction of this fine nation out with me as I can when I go.
Sorry for the self-followup, but clarifying a possibly significant typo: "according to TFA, the La Nina cycle behind this cooling is caused by increased sea temperatures in the western Pacific". The mangled syntax caused by my omission may have made it seem that La Nina was causing sea temperatures to have increased, when is the other way around.
If these predictions are correct, there must be a lot of planetary heat being stored away somewhere
IANA climatologist, but perhaps that heat is going into melting ice, or warming of the oceans. Indeed, according to TFA, the La Nina cycle behind this cooling is caused increased sea temperatures in the western Pacific.
"Warmest year of the 21st century" (still the 10th warmest since 1850, according to TFA - your assertation of "an unusually cold year" is highly bogus) only applies to measured temperatures on land, not to the total average temperature of the atmosphere, lithosphere, and hydrosphere.
I attribute the most basic problem with telecommuting failures to be a lack of a manager's ability to accurately identify what a good metric is, with respect to measuring production.
But telecommuting doesn't make this any better or worse.
The question a manager should be asking is, "Are we getting our money's worth out of this person?" Knowing that I show up at the office every day tells you nothing about this.
Demands were made that this information not be published because the person was worried about how it would affect their reputation. I honestly dont think it ever occured to them to avoid the actual driving while intoxicated to avoid that damaged reputation.
This being before the trial, it had not been established that the person had been driving while intoxicated. Indeed, the legal presumption was of innocence.
A developer gets a spec. He designs a solution and quotes the spec. Assuming he's given the green light, he schedules the projects start date and sets some milestones.
Sometimes. Sometimes, management gives you a deadline with the spec, and you don't have the ability to set your own schedule.
And sometimes, the spec is something like "Somewhere in the jungle is a river. Build a suspension bridge over it."
"Do you have a map of the jungle?"
"No, it's unexplored."
"Do you know how wide the river is?"
"No. I told you, the jungle is unexplored."
"Is there a road through the jungle to the river?"
"No. The jungle is unexplored. But look, you've built dozens on bridges, just tell me how long it will take to build this one! Give me a schedule with some deliverables."
The video of "Emily" is not some from-scratch animation. It's very closely based on live footage. This is digital image make-up, not animation. "The end of actors?" Hardly. Feh.
Slashdot Mirror
When food from genetically modified[*] crops is sold unlabeled, and when furthermore GM crops are grown uncontained so that their pollen spreads and contaminates other fields, then sadly we are forced to eat GM crops.
([*]"Genetically engineered" is an incorrect term, since "engineered" implies bottom-up design based on solid understanding of relevant fundamentals, whereas GMOs are randomized cut-and-paste of species' genomes.)
But Nader's proposed environmental policies were stronger than Gore's.
I don't know about the penchant for shiny metal objects, but when I see my prominent brow ridge in the mirror, and feel my occipital bun, the theory that some of us have Neanderthal ancestry sure makes sense to me...
The artistic statement is pretty clear to me: the "war on terror" works as well as the "war on Space Invaders", in that there's an unlimited number of them and you're going to eventually get blown up. As the Convention write-up put it "the players must prevent the catastrophe by controlling the well- known cannon at the lower screen border with their bodies and firing it using arm movements. Like the original, this trial is ultimately unsuccessful, thus creating an articulated and critical commentary about the current war strategy."
This review says it "may be unsettling, with its blending of archaic gameplay and modern day catastrophe, but it's also an impressive accomplishment in that it delivers complex messages via simple means. Despite its perceived insensitivity, Stanley's ability to use video games as a medium of artistic expression will likely be an important step in the form being taken seriously (by people who take things seriously)."
You might not like that statement, you may disagree with it, you may find the way it's expressed to be in poor taste. But to claim that it has no artistic value, only shock value, is off the mark.
("Could have said" or "could've said", not "could of said". Sorry, pet peeve, and I will now be fated to introduce at least one grammatical error into this post.)
An artist's job is to make art, not to explain it or apologize for it.
They didn't have anything for him, either. Gore and Bush were both rich white guys from political dynasties who supported policies of corporate plutocracy.
At the time, the website www.BillionairesForBushOrGore.com (now a link farm for online poker) pointed out that these similarities:
Yes, we now know that Bush is a brain-damaged cretin. But not drawing a clear distinction with a brain-damaged cretin was Gore's failing.
When it comes to music and to film/video, the noisy 1% hold [*] 99% of the copyrights on the sort of famous works we'd want to include in a time capsule.
Book copyrights are more often held by individuals, or small corporations started by authors; but I believe that publishing contracts usually include some sort of exclusivity clause.
([*] Or claim to hold. If copyright law adhered to the Constitution, only actual authors - not employers, not assignees - could hold copyright.)
I have no interest in a religion featuring a god placated by human sacrifice, thanks.
Of course you do. You lose time spent in worship services, if you believe that God will damn you if you don't attend. You lose opportunities for various experiences that may be pleasant, if you believe that God will damn you if you commit certain acts.
And you lose the great intellectual pleasure of the pursuit of truth, when you accept irrational premises about the universe.
If Gore lined up with Nader voters on 75% of the issues, it was his job to make that clear. Instead he kept running to the right, saying time after time that he agreed with Bush.
Obama's making the same mistake, moving to the right and losing his base, to the point that he's blown his lead and it's now neck-and-neck.
The Democrats need to stop being a conservative party if they want to win. And they're only going to learn that if they see people voting for people like Nader.
So Saul had a nervous breakdown and a hallucination. So what? It's not like stories of visions are unique to Christianity. Why should be believe that Saul had a "genuine" vision and that Mohammad didn't, or that Joseph Smith didn't, or that Ellen G. White didn't, or that Wovoka didn't?
So they believed it. So what? People believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories, in the competence of George W, Bush, in astrology, in alien abductions, and that the moon landings were faked. Plenty of people have gone to their deaths on false beliefs. A few examples: plenty of Christian Scientists have died when when they turned to their belief in care rather than to medical care, some Lakota Sioux beleived that their "Ghost shirts" were bullet-proof, and the Society of Right and Harmonious Fists thought that millions of "spirit soldiers" would show up on their side.
An artist, writer, or inventor can be an asshole and still produce, or be involved in the production of, a great work. Disney exploited his employees, and called the Screen Actors Guild a Communist front during the HUAC days; that doesn't make Fantasia any less great.
Copyright is not ownership, calling it such falls into the mire of the "intellectual property" meme.
The fact that a creator transfered copyright to someone tells you nothing about the recipient's assholery.
In point of fact, the Chinese government officially recognizes Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism, and in recent years has organized international forums on Buddhism and Taoism.
Socialism is an economic practice which is orthogonal to religion. Some forms of socialism (the state socialism of Stalin and of Mao) were authoritarian systems which restricted religion; but there is are various forms of "religious socialism". And certainly libertarian socialism would place no limits on religious liberty.
Name another steel skyscraper fire that was in any way similar to the WTC 7 disaster, where a fire with multiple ignition points was allowed to burn out of control for hours.
According to TFA, "The investigators also reported that if the city water main had not been cut by the collapse of World Trade Center towers 1 and 2 (WTC 1 and WTC 2), operating sprinklers in WTC 7 would likely have prevented its collapse."
With any luck, we'll never see a set of circumstances like WTC 7 (or, fate forfend, WTC 1 & 2) again.
My CPU conforms to a documented and published interface, which is all that is necessary for it to support free software.
And that's also exactly what's necessary for any system to "work completely" - can't check that something works if its behavior isn't precisely specified.
The conditions necessary to be able to state that a bit of hardware "works completely" are the same as those necessary to support free software - conformance to a published interface specification.
Is it good if, in addition, the hardware is free (as in freedom)? Sure. But that's not necessary for it to support free software.
The link you gave talks about the impossibility of cooking an egg on sun-heated asphalt, because eggs require a temperature of 158 deg. F, and asphalt is a poor conductor of heat.
The poster was talking about cooking unknown substances (down-thread, he says pancakes) on rock of unknown composition.
The impossibility of cooking eggs on sun-heated asphalt is not informative of the possibility of cooking pancakes on sun-heated rock.
So I'd advise you to tone down your accusations that the poster was lying or misunderstanding their observations.
Wrong way around. What's the point of buying hardware that isn't supported by free software?
Hardware with proprietary specs and that relies on proprietary drivers, does not "work completely".
What about Nader voters? They're not responsibile for the crappy campain that Gore ran, for the fraud that gave Florida to Bush, nor for the inaction of Democratic senators who let it pass.
Main three? The top three are # Christianity (2.1 billion), Islam: (1.5 billion), and what the adherents.com refers to as "Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist" (1.1 billion). Skipping over the secular/none of the above category, Hinduism (900 million) would be next.
Judaism is way down the list at number 12 (14 million). Calling it one of the main three is far off base.
Deploying a heavy weaponry to take out a small cell of freedom fighters is a terrorist action, one that tends to turn the population against the government because of the collateral damage.
Insurgencies can "work", for certain definitions of "work", against modern armies, Vietnam being the classical example.
I want Congress to impeach these motherfuckers and put them in the jail cells they so richly deserve.
That, of course, would require a competent, courageous, and non-corrupt Congress. Which in our case, we have not got.
So I want the voters to toss out the bums inhabiting Congress.
That, of course, would require an educated, informed, and engaged electorate. Which in our case, we have not got.
So, waiting for the whole thing to go to hell, "I want to get my kicks before the whole shithouse goes up in flames", as the Lizard King put it. And if it comes down to violence - and it might - I want to take as many of those bastards responsible for the destruction of this fine nation out with me as I can when I go.
Sorry for the self-followup, but clarifying a possibly significant typo: "according to TFA, the La Nina cycle behind this cooling is caused by increased sea temperatures in the western Pacific". The mangled syntax caused by my omission may have made it seem that La Nina was causing sea temperatures to have increased, when is the other way around.
IANA climatologist, but perhaps that heat is going into melting ice, or warming of the oceans. Indeed, according to TFA, the La Nina cycle behind this cooling is caused increased sea temperatures in the western Pacific.
"Warmest year of the 21st century" (still the 10th warmest since 1850, according to TFA - your assertation of "an unusually cold year" is highly bogus) only applies to measured temperatures on land, not to the total average temperature of the atmosphere, lithosphere, and hydrosphere.
But telecommuting doesn't make this any better or worse.
The question a manager should be asking is, "Are we getting our money's worth out of this person?" Knowing that I show up at the office every day tells you nothing about this.
Well, you could always use a Java applet.
Or implement another language - say, Python - in a Java applet.
But few seem to have had a burning desire to do so. Javascript, bless it's heart, actually works pretty well now.
This being before the trial, it had not been established that the person had been driving while intoxicated. Indeed, the legal presumption was of innocence.
Sometimes. Sometimes, management gives you a deadline with the spec, and you don't have the ability to set your own schedule.
And sometimes, the spec is something like "Somewhere in the jungle is a river. Build a suspension bridge over it."
"Do you have a map of the jungle?"
"No, it's unexplored."
"Do you know how wide the river is?"
"No. I told you, the jungle is unexplored."
"Is there a road through the jungle to the river?"
"No. The jungle is unexplored. But look, you've built dozens on bridges, just tell me how long it will take to build this one! Give me a schedule with some deliverables."
The video of "Emily" is not some from-scratch animation. It's very closely based on live footage. This is digital image make-up, not animation. "The end of actors?" Hardly. Feh.