Hikers and Sailors should always know the manual methods for navigation - Compass, Sextant, use of Charts/Maps, Pacing Sticks/Beads, how to take Bearings and calculate courses, backbearings, etc. At some point, you're going to knock your GPS overboard, get it hit with a falling bit of mast, have its battery run out, etc. Only the undertrained and underprepared venture out into the wilds without proper training and proper fallback procedures. That said, GPS is pretty handy, but you should practice 'old school' nav so that you can revert at a moments notice in case of emergency.
So even when an author says "I didn't mean to represent X as Y", it doesn't make it any less true that X is represented as Y, or that it tells us something about the story, the author, or the characters. it just means the author didn't intend it consciously (or wants to disavow it after the fact).
This is true, but it is a corollary. Of what? Of the fact that meaning is not an absolute, but is in fact subjective. When I look at something and derive meaning from it, that meaning is a combination of the author, his intentions, me, my predilictions and experiences, and probably other random factors. So meaning is more than just 'what was intended' or 'what an observer took from a work'. Meaning is a non-uniform individual experiential matter. And that means that all you can ever say about the meaning of an artwork is what it meant to you and how it conveyed that message to you. Or, I suppose, if you are the author, what it meant to you and what you hoped to get across to others, which may differ markedly from what they took from the work.
Seems to me we focus altogether too much on right/wrong, truth/falsehood type thinking with a single view of meaning. The author is wrong when he says "My work does not mean X" because to someone else, it may very well mean X. All the author can ever say is "I did not intend or my work to mean X". Similarly, critics and commentators and English teachers need to realize that they can't say "His work means Y" and instead should say "I can see Y in his work". Meaning and Art are so subjective as to make the attempt to Objectify the meaning rather laughable.
Perhaps it's time to take off; but where else is any better? I get the impression these days that the only place you can actually be *free* is in a 3rd world country that doesn't have its shit together well enough to properly monitor its citizens. But do you really want to live in such a place?
Come to Canada!
It isn't that our government has any less Machiavellian or Orwellian overtones, but there is one clear cultural distinction between USAians and Canucks:
USAians know their government, if left to its own devices, will inevitably try to get up to something bad and that they have billions of dollars, several federal agencies, lots of legal clout, and a vast repository of competent agents to carry out the intrusive or unpleasant plan.
Canadians know their government, if left to its own devices, will inevitably try to get up to something bad and that they have about twelve dollars, several very confused federal agencies, a minimal modicum of legal clout, and a not too vast repository of questionably competent agents to carry out the intrusive or unpleasant plan.
In short, some folks down South seem paranoid because they fear the government is interested and capable of doing unpleasant things. Up here, we fear their intentions, but we know they're blisteringly inept, squander their money, and essentially are more corrupt and self-serving than competent and ideological, so really, there seems to be a lot less to worry about.
And up here, you can own medical marijuana, get married if you are gay, pretty much watch and say whatever you want, observe the separation of church and state, be of any relgion and fit in our cultural mosaic, wear a beard, a kirpan, a turban, a kilt or a feather head-dress. All of that is true, but there is one restriction: You MUST like hockey.;)
Look at the geography of North America and tell me the divisions aren't legacy politi-code waiting to be re-written.
Alberta and Saskatchewan (and to an extent Manitoba) occupants have more in common with the average occupant of Montana and North Dakota than either group does with their respective Federal Capitals.
The Coasts always have a different culture to the inland, and the Midwest and the Canadian Prairies probably share a lot of values.
Bits of British Columbia could easily merge with Washington, Alaska, and the Yukon. Or Alaska, the Yukon, NWT, and Nunavut could form one big Northern Block.
A friend of mine likes to term a sort of Oregonian North-South state 'Cascadia'. He feels the folks in low pop states with higher rural/urban ratios have more in common with each other than with the Left or Right Coasters.
The New England States and the Maritimes would get along well together. Heck, someone started a tongue-in-cheek campaign in Vermont to become the 11th Province due to close cultural values.
Quebec? Well, its always been its own beastie and will continue to. Texas too could be independent, so could PEI who were tricked (arguably) into Confederation in the first place.
Hawaii could do its own thing too.
Ontario and Wisconsin and Michigan could start to form a nice little state.
Culture seems to be distributed as much East to West as political boundaries seem distributed mostly North/South.
And for all that Americans and Canadians lament our many differences, that's taking the sand in your eye and making it a mountain... we're 95% similar in terms of culture, TV, spending habits, consumption, values, etc. We like to focus on the 5% so we can feel independent and unique, but we largely ignore the 95%.
It's really a pity in some ways that a confederation of municipalities can't run things - then we could do away with these pesky national boundaries. I like visiting the USA, but it gets more painful by the day. And I'm sure the reverse is also true. If we were all one country with a common perimeter, it would solve a lot of problems. So, divide us differently or don't divide us at all... but the current system is a bit out of kilter....
Exoskeletons a la DARPA
The military has been interested in combat exoskeletons for some time. DARPA has been poking its nose around this idea for years.
Good point. In this case, it was quarantining the part of Spybot that interfaced with the browsers. So maybe the rest of spybot is working, but that part is a bit wonky now (or so I remember, it has been quite a while!).
At any rate, it is good to have a heterogeneous mix of tools to deal with incoming threats or annoyances because no one vendor will find/think of everything. It would be nice to have them all implement a common control API though and let some 'mastering' programs manage the execution of the various search and destroy tools in a uniform manner.
You're right about running multiple software levels in your defence against adware, spyware, malware and viruses.
At the same time, these programs don't always coexist well together. I had to laugh (wince) when my Panda anti-virus program decided that Spybot was a potential threat and quarantined it. (I was using Panda mostly for the firewall, because I don't trust the built in XP firewall capabilities). Sometimes these apps just are unknowing about one another, and seeing something out of place, they want to do something about it. Now, of course, the experienced computer user can make some intelligent decisions. But a newbie or your elderly mother might well be challenged to make such decisions and would likely just run things in automatic quarantine mode.
Now, I can still use Spybot, I'm just not sure all of its parts behave as they once did. It still seems to do the job, I just don't know if it is doing as good of job as before.
I'd really like to see a meteor defense started. That is the single most likely thing that could wipe out the whole planet.
If the meteor defense is the most likely thing to wipe out the planet, then I'm firmly against it.:)
China isn't getting into space *exclusively* to study science. Don't kid yourself, as an emerging economic powerhouse, they'll do some science too.
Note that right now the militarization of space has been well on the way, in some sense with GPS (guiding precision weapon strikes) and spy satellites (target location/identification/tracking) and other such 'non WMD' uses of space.
Controlling the 'high ground' has always had advantages in intelligence and planning, and in this case, earth orbit has some profound advantages for seeing what other people are doing. And of course, if you can see what they are doing militarily, you can also spot annoying things they might not like brought up like mass graves, environmental catastrophes, prison camps, army buildups, etc. And you can take a good look at what kind of industrial facilities they are running or setting up. Even with a strictly corporate intelligence perspective, this knowledge is quite valuable (given some inherent ability to interpret the satellite photos with efficacy).
Space was destined to be weaponized the minute it became important to the resource bases or security of major countries. It now is starting to be, hence the trend. Any 'treaties' to block this were conveniences of the moment or dreams and naive ones I suspect. Of course, everyone who isn't in a position to either have a major world interest to defend or the power and technology and money to defend that interest can sit back and complain about how they don't want militarization (obviously they don't since they can't play) or how they'd never do it (unless of course they had the ability to do so, but that's never said).
Besides, on a humorous note, we'll need those weapons when the nasty landmark destroying aliens arrive and they prove resistant to country music, the common cold, and are not Mac-compatible.:)
Jokes aside, any society is going to have a miniscule percentage of really, really sick people. In the past they got jobs as torturers and executioners. Now that we're civil, we've still got those people, and they're still sick bastards. We need better systems in place to catch them before they do any harm. But damned if I know how to do it.
It would probably surprise you to know most executioners and torturers (well, some of the latter, probably most of the former) were not sadistic men. They were, in many cases, salary men - public servants, paid by the city or town or kingdom. They, in some cases, tried to be very scientific about their job, doing it as well as possible because it was a legally mandated punishment - they took no particular glee in the hurt that was caused. Corporal punishment has been around for a long time and has had some success as a deterent. Capital punishment has been around for a long time and has had some success also.
I think most sick people in olden days did the same kind of thing they do today - quietly conducted crimes or became outright brigands and murderers in lawless areas.
However, it's no substitute for the real thing. That also, IMHO, applies in cases like this. You can learn some fundamentals like how to communicate and work in a group (as long as you're on a private server, good luck on a public one) and that taking the time to line up your shot is more effective than spraying like an idiot, but it's still not going to help you any more than a basic lesson on gun usage will, and certainly not going to make you an expert marksman or anything.
No, Ghost Recon might be a bit closer (trying run and shoot is just going to get you dead - using cover, keeping low, firing controlled bursts, using area effect and indirect weapons where you don't care much about collateral damage, etc. - those work and are a bit closer to reality). Still, having been an infantryman, let me say that paintball and good FPS simulators like GR can teach you some useful lessons. Of course, they can teach you lots of really really bad ones. The problem is, someone not formally trained by something like a proper military will never know the difference. And learning to drop a mouse on something and click is not the same physical skill as holding a long arm or sidearm steady and aiming at a moving, possibly firing, target. And in the game, you just hit space and respawn if a round kills you because you made a bad decision. Most of us can't do that in real life.
There is no substitute for the real training, but then most militaries don't train to shoot unarmed civilians.
We're the US' largest trading partner... for now. Soon to be eclipsed by Mexico, I suspect.
And as bad as many people up here thought Bush was (and the attempts to subtly or unsubtly influence the US electorate were sad and pathetic, from Canada and abroad), Kerry would (by the analysts CBC had recruited) have been a worse choice from a trade perspective for Canada. So, as much as I'm not a fan of everything President Bush ever did or perhaps more importantly HOW he did some of what he did, I think in a practical sense, Mr. Bush's election benefits Canada (assuming of course the Democrats would have conducted themselves as they had rhetorically indicated, Re: Canada and Trade).
I know a lot of Americans who support Bush. And contrary to the assertions of a couple of Canadians, I know a lot of Canadians who support him too (in Ontario and probably in Alberta anyway). I don't claim they're in the majority, but most people in this country react with their hearts and their offended sensibilities instead of their heads IMO.
I'd rather appreciate it if any of you Bush-bashers would not try to claim monopoly status on the Canadian sentiment. You neither have that monopoly in point of verifiable fact nor should you claim it in any event. Canada has a diversity of opinion about Mr. Bush. The fact most poll-takers don't get into the rural regions of our country and don't tend to capture working people's views as a rule effectively should give on a little skepticism. And CBC and the Canadian media wouldn't think of brewing up a scandalous difference of opinion now would they? Not our CBC! Never partisan. Never!
I do think it is rather tragic that other countries think they should be running letter writing campaigns and media campaigns to try and influence the US voter. It might not have occured to them, but in a close race, this kind of tactic might backfire. (Or might have backfired, since it is really hard to know...). This is a US matter and the rest of us can have an opinion on it, and even express it, but if we can't behave in a mature and respectful fashion, then it is *us* who looks the Fool.... not our Southern Neighbours.
I don't really care to discuss the merits of B vs. K, but let us just say that I am happy that the US seems to have successfully concluded the excerise of democracy, that the results are clear as they seem to be, and that the voter turnout was high. They've elected a leader and now the matter is for the rest of us to stop whinging and start getting on as well as can be with the new leader, because he's going to be around for a while. Sniping and penny ante jabs will only lead to a less smooth relationship with our Southern Neighbours, and as they still *are* OUR largest trading interest, we might want to think about improving that relationship instead of pissing them off for no good reason.
Although, I do hope that Mr. Bush takes note of the fact that a majority of Americans, even record numbers, support him, but at the same time, a very similar record number do not. That should at least lead to some thought of moderation, one would think. (Of course, not being naive, I don't really expect that - 50% + 1 and you're 100% right, North or South of the border).
Does being an AC mean you can't read? I think I said that NASCAR builds frames under there cars (you don't seem to debate that) and that they allow the NASCAR cars to hit other cars (which might be moving 0 mph or 170mph in the same direction or anything in between) and walls and the occupants sustain no damage. Oddly, for someone who thinks what I said about NASCAR is BS, you basically repeated what I said.
Furthermore, if I'm in a crash and the other guys car doesn't survive but mine does, I'll feel real sorry they didn't invest in a safe car. Speaking of BS, it isn't that fact that keeps them from being street legal - there are a variety of other reasons far more mundane that prevent street legal status. But many cars from other racing series' *are* street legal, and most of them do the same thing and build in additional crash protection for the occupants - roll bars/cages, side impact supports, additional structural members, etc.
Next time you want to shoot down someone's point, you might actually want to read it first. But then, reading might be tough for the average AC....
Try 3200+ lbs. Take a look at average car weights. 2500 is on the very low side even for most alleged sportscars.
In top gear, I'd possibly be able to stop the car as it isn't very powerful (0.67 ratio). In third gear (also capable of 100 kph... I can do it in second gear if I'm in a real hurry), the ratio is more like 1.33. Still, the car does not stop quickly from 60mph. It might be able to stop under full throttle, quite possibly. And the brakes probably wouldn't start a fire from overheating in that time. But the amount by which the brakes outstrip the full throttle output isn't such a large margin that the stop would be quick and painless....
I'd have to have an accelerometer in the car to tell you if it can cut 0.8gs braking. I would not have thought so as that would suggest my seatbelt should be pushing back on me with around 190 lbs pressure given my weight. I don't think it is.
I find it interesting that the first thing they do in NASCAR is build a frame under these frameless-unit-body wonders when they want to make them into cars that can hit a cement wall or other cars at 170mph and you can walk away from the crash.
I watched a PBS special where they talked to the crash guys who study NASCAR crashes and work on engineering safer cars. They have dramatically different (IIRC) opinions of how cars should be designed to survive high speed collisions than the current automakers or the NTHSA.
Sadly, I have no bibliographic material so I can't contribute a link to verify this controvery.
I recall my father talking about spring-steel bumpers and citing at least one case he knew of where a spring steel bumper backed up by 6000 lbs of car had sheared off a tree rather than crumpling. The occupants were unhurt and the vehicle could be driven away.
Contrast this with many 8 mph accidents in mall parking lots. And look at skyrocketing insurance costs - they've studied low-speed impacts on most modern cars and SUVs from an insurance PoV, and the costs are waaay up. A lot of these low-speed accidents, if taken in an older car, would result in no significant damage to the occupants and no significant damage to the car - I myself have *flattened* an iron parking sign (via a fishtail in the winter) in a 66 Olds Delta 88 with nothing worse than a minute crimp in the fenderwell trim moulding. If I tried that in my new Mustang, I'd be looking at $500-2000 damage I'd guess.
So, crash ratings mean something. This is why some number of people prefer pickup trucks, along with the better visibility. I did refer to those stats when I bought my Mustang, which at the time had one of the better front impact ratings. It's not a bad idea to study these things, but crumple zones are no panacea, and can leave a car that would otherwise be manouverable disabled during a multiple impact collision scenario. They also can drive everyones insurance up... to a questionable end. There are other approaches to the problem and the current prevailing approach is not necessarily the only or even best approach.
Not sure about that. I drive a Mustang GT and I consider it to have 'marginal' breaking for its mass. That is to say, the 10.5" (or so) brakes just don't cut the mustard. If they'd put on the bigger disks, I've seen as large as 13" on 18" wheels, or a higher pressure pump, she'd stop a lot faster.
Said car also has 225 hp nominally and maintains cruise control up a fairly steep hill even down around 1500 rpm, which is nowhere near the power band for the car.
If the car was running full tilt throttle open, I think she'd keep climbing or at best hold even with the brakes locked on. I'd be surprised if it didn't more than double my stopping distance. It isn't worth the engine wear or brakes to prove the point, but I have a good gut feeling having seen how she stops normally.
I also note that the car is a standard with a mechanical clutch. I wouldn't buy any other form of transmission in a vehicle, if I could at all avoid it. If I press in the clutch, it disengages. There is no 'if... and... or wherefor...". That's my ultimate defence - in goes the clutch, and steer steer steer. Coast to a stop.
The problem is partly this: Leverage. With the hydraulics down for the count due to the pump being out of operation, you'll find it gets very hard to steer a several ton mass of metal, even rolling on wheels.
In the olden days, if you look at the elder cars, they put large diameter steering wheels on cars, which provided a lot of leverage in these kinds of situations (many such cars didn't even *have* power steering!). They were actually harder to muscle about at slow velocity than at higher speeds. But it could be done, and the larger the wheel, the greater the mechanical advantage given to the driver.
This of course makes the modern trend of putting these dinky racing steering wheels on cars even funnier...
Damn! Mine is a wee bit older and didn't come with the enclosure to turn it into a full-sized USB key (mind you, still works, just no lanyard or cap, so I carry it in the credit card thing). If NewEgg shipped outside of USA, they'd have a sale. Now I have to go look for that package in the Great White North. I'm very happy with my flashdrive, so I have no idea why the price is down, but I'm happy about it! Thanks for the info!
Now I just need to find out if I can run Ghost or Drive Image or something from a USB Key and then connect to my USB hard drive to recover an image - I'm trying to develop an external backup (full image) capability for my XP box, since I always (despite firewalls and such) fear for its longevity...
Ah yes, trust an AC to catch the missing word. I bear my humiliation with good humour. I meant "Han NOT shooting first" of course. Yes, good catch, even if you weren't willing to attach your name to the sniping.;)
Badnarik is correct when he compares the two major candidates' views, essentially saying it does not matter for whom one votes. Policy is close enough that it is the same.
True enough. Even true here north of your border, though you would have to put some different names out there. However, it is evident in democracies these days that a centrist viewpoint gets you a greater appeal and more votes. So everyone moves to the center.
Yes, that does make them look very similar. But looking *different* is not necessarily looking better. It would be a bit naive IMO to believe that different = better necessarily. The reality is different is different, maybe better, maybe a lot worse.
In this case, I have to say that I fancy myself a moderate libertarian in politics, not too well represented in the Great White North. But having said that, National Parks, helping out international organizations instead of having your head buried in the sand, and naively (IMO) assuming that corporate entities and large groups don't have a power to exploit individuals is rather an unsophisticated and inaccurate perception of the real world.
To say "you wouldn't buy a paper if someone said you couldn't write X upon it" is perhaps true if X were *really* a big loss and you didn't really need the paper for other reasons. In truth, these things work by erosion - X starts out small, and works incrementally larger. It's why most of us sign EULAs that say "you can pretty much install what you want, download whatever data you need, and limit my usage as you desire" because we really don't care - we want the other features of the products or are forced to by circumstance. That won't go away in a Libertarian future and if the Libertarian philosophy involves everybody and their cousin wising up to the nature of things... well... I wouldn't be holding your breath for that change....
I'm glad the libertarians exist. Taken in moderation, they've got some good ideas, like many parties. Taken entire, they give one pause (again, like many parties). This seems like the political equivalent of the technology argument in favour of heterogenous product suites for greater security....
I'm saddened to see Han shooting first, because it is a historical revision of a much loved character. He's the rough-around-the-edges loner who discovers something bigger than himself and who ends up showing he really is a good guy. But without a bit of the perception of him as scoundrel and Grey Hat, his transition to mostly White Hat is less profound.
The truth is, with the exception of cleaning up the bluescreening around the models, the new versions haven't added much for the better. The original three had a powerful story with a number of iconic and mythologic themes. Everything George has done to them (yes TO them...) since has been a pretty bad idea.
And his latest product is visually stimulating and absolutely devoid of other quality.
And George himself is turning into (we're giving him the benefit of the doubt in the early days) a self-absorbed prima donna and a bit of a pratt to boot.:(
Another great example of how to ride great beginnings into mediocre endings.
But as I said in my post title, this isn't Lucas' first example to revise SW history. Ask for a copy of the Star Wars Christmas Special at your local Blockbuster. Good luck... George has pretty much seen to it that this was more or less only to survive in old bootlegged versions. It wasn't great art (far from it), but it is just further evidence of trying to revise the past.... and about as well thought out.
Ha ha ha ha! Oh man, Please give the author mod points for a sense of humour. Let me guess, our march towards the future has been a non-stop improvement in the state of the world eh? Yep, no more violence, war, internecine strife, and we've invested in cures more than ways to damage one another.... ah Progress!
Don't take me too seriously, but the idea that we (who live an ecologically unsustainable lifestyle) are somehow superior and 'moving forward' as opposed to the various indigenous peoples who do live a sustainable lifestyle that respects the environment is more than vaguely funny - it is positively rib-busting!
[i]The dinosaurs were primitive, and when a meteor came to destroy earth, they couldn't do anything about it. The amish are just as primitive in the respect. The more advanced nations among us have the ability to detect and in some cases deflect such a threat with fusion bombs.[/i]
You'd of course have some sort of evidence to back up the claim that we have the ability to deflect threats with fusion bombs? Based of course upon the prior attempts?
There are still many things we 'so called' advanced folks can't deal with - global catastrophes still fall in this category and will for the forseeable future.
On the issue at hand, never equate living a basic lifestyle with living an unsatisfying one or one which is in some way 'coming up short'. The Amish around Ontario contribute lots of wonderful produce to the markets, and in this day and age where everyone is getting down on GMOs and on all sorts of things that commercial industry feeds animals, their stuff looks pretty darn good. And if you need to see fine quality woodworking, don't look to Ikea....
I find it refreshing that our society has enough space in it to allow people the choice to pursue different paradigms for life. The Amish don't hurt me, and their presence enriches the diversity of our world. And they're generally of the school of thought that if they want to buy something, they don't use a credit card - they pay cash. Debt isn't a big desire of theirs. So in many ways, they make ideal customers too, for a smaller range of products admittedly.
As someone who has cast off traditional cable TV and the cell phone as baneful wastes of time (he says with some sense or irony as he types on/. *grin*), I can see the desire to evict time wasting and zero-value-adding technologies from ones life. More complex, more fast-paced, more feature rich... these don't necessarily make a life better. They just make it... newer... more glitzy... and possibly not any better really.
Of course, I'm not a Luddite nor Amish. I am learning how to work wood, but I also live for the day I can have a low cost high speed connection in rural Ontario. It's a matter of picking what you want in and out of your life and all of us make those decisions on a daily basis, we just tend not to make quite the same choices as the Amish. Live and let live, says I.
I'm a big believer in Direct Demoncracy. Not because I think of it as a Panacea, and not because it doesn't have pitfalls. I'm sort of (as a Canadian) a moderate Libertarian with no party to represent me. But having said that, Anarchy per se is unworkable. I've read L. N. Smith and a few other notables in this line of supposition, but ultimately as long as bands of bad guys (or those who want to fend them off, but end up taking over anyway) are banding together and enforcing their will, then Anarchy won't work.
Direct democracy, backed up by strong institutions and a legal framework and enforcement arms just might.
I am pessimistic, but I think pessimism (as a historical view) is more well-supported than optimism!:)
I would *love* to think that solutions could be reached to all conflict without violence. As an Aikidoka, that would be the fondest realization of my Art. But I also acknowledge this requires the participants to want this to happen and that often is not the case - preversely, we cling to our pain, our offense, and our pride, and this leads us to further violence. And once a cycle is in place, once the violence is self-generating and systemic, it would be hard to remove.
I don't necessarily believe that we excercised anything akin to all the possible diplomatic options before the current imbroglio. This little situation was certainly not handled as well as it might have been. Add to which we may well not (in retrospect) have had even the actual causes we may have thought we did at the time.
However, you'd have a hard time convincing me that the war against the Nazis was unust. You'd have a hard time convincing me that a war against the Khmer Rouge, against the Genocidal Rawandan militants, etc. was unjust. Yes, they might lead to further injustices and that might be something to keep a wide eye open for. Yes, unjust things inherently occur in warfare. But sometimes a smaller injustice (or the intent to see a smaller injustice in place) must be weighted against a current larger injustice.
That is probably how I would weight just and unjust war. If the goal is liberation, if the best effort has a reasonable chance of success, and if all efforts are made to limit collateral effects (never entirely successful), then some initiations of conflict are actually for the better, IMO.
Does that justify the current situation? Nope. But to say that situation didn't need sorted out or that we had no business there, I reject. I reject it because human injustices were being perpetrated and although some bad things have happened, bad things were already happening. And one can't help but think they had to be stopped.
The problem with Anarchy, to come back to that in closing, is not that some of us wouldn't try it (though I hate to say it but a system of economics actually does make more sense than barter and assigned-at-the-moment costings), but that unless *ALL* of us tried it, it wouldn't go anywhere. And I don't see that happening any time soon. (I come full circle to my pessimism!)
Thanks for the wonderful discussion.
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Hikers and Sailors should always know the manual methods for navigation - Compass, Sextant, use of Charts/Maps, Pacing Sticks/Beads, how to take Bearings and calculate courses, backbearings, etc. At some point, you're going to knock your GPS overboard, get it hit with a falling bit of mast, have its battery run out, etc. Only the undertrained and underprepared venture out into the wilds without proper training and proper fallback procedures. That said, GPS is pretty handy, but you should practice 'old school' nav so that you can revert at a moments notice in case of emergency.
NMerriam says:
So even when an author says "I didn't mean to represent X as Y", it doesn't make it any less true that X is represented as Y, or that it tells us something about the story, the author, or the characters. it just means the author didn't intend it consciously (or wants to disavow it after the fact).
This is true, but it is a corollary. Of what? Of the fact that meaning is not an absolute, but is in fact subjective. When I look at something and derive meaning from it, that meaning is a combination of the author, his intentions, me, my predilictions and experiences, and probably other random factors. So meaning is more than just 'what was intended' or 'what an observer took from a work'. Meaning is a non-uniform individual experiential matter. And that means that all you can ever say about the meaning of an artwork is what it meant to you and how it conveyed that message to you. Or, I suppose, if you are the author, what it meant to you and what you hoped to get across to others, which may differ markedly from what they took from the work.
Seems to me we focus altogether too much on right/wrong, truth/falsehood type thinking with a single view of meaning. The author is wrong when he says "My work does not mean X" because to someone else, it may very well mean X. All the author can ever say is "I did not intend or my work to mean X". Similarly, critics and commentators and English teachers need to realize that they can't say "His work means Y" and instead should say "I can see Y in his work". Meaning and Art are so subjective as to make the attempt to Objectify the meaning rather laughable.
Perhaps it's time to take off; but where else is any better? I get the impression these days that the only place you can actually be *free* is in a 3rd world country that doesn't have its shit together well enough to properly monitor its citizens. But do you really want to live in such a place?
;)
Come to Canada!
It isn't that our government has any less Machiavellian or Orwellian overtones, but there is one clear cultural distinction between USAians and Canucks:
USAians know their government, if left to its own devices, will inevitably try to get up to something bad and that they have billions of dollars, several federal agencies, lots of legal clout, and a vast repository of competent agents to carry out the intrusive or unpleasant plan.
Canadians know their government, if left to its own devices, will inevitably try to get up to something bad and that they have about twelve dollars, several very confused federal agencies, a minimal modicum of legal clout, and a not too vast repository of questionably competent agents to carry out the intrusive or unpleasant plan.
In short, some folks down South seem paranoid because they fear the government is interested and capable of doing unpleasant things. Up here, we fear their intentions, but we know they're blisteringly inept, squander their money, and essentially are more corrupt and self-serving than competent and ideological, so really, there seems to be a lot less to worry about.
And up here, you can own medical marijuana, get married if you are gay, pretty much watch and say whatever you want, observe the separation of church and state, be of any relgion and fit in our cultural mosaic, wear a beard, a kirpan, a turban, a kilt or a feather head-dress. All of that is true, but there is one restriction: You MUST like hockey.
Look at the geography of North America and tell me the divisions aren't legacy politi-code waiting to be re-written.
Alberta and Saskatchewan (and to an extent Manitoba) occupants have more in common with the average occupant of Montana and North Dakota than either group does with their respective Federal Capitals.
The Coasts always have a different culture to the inland, and the Midwest and the Canadian Prairies probably share a lot of values.
Bits of British Columbia could easily merge with Washington, Alaska, and the Yukon. Or Alaska, the Yukon, NWT, and Nunavut could form one big Northern Block.
A friend of mine likes to term a sort of Oregonian North-South state 'Cascadia'. He feels the folks in low pop states with higher rural/urban ratios have more in common with each other than with the Left or Right Coasters.
The New England States and the Maritimes would get along well together. Heck, someone started a tongue-in-cheek campaign in Vermont to become the 11th Province due to close cultural values.
Quebec? Well, its always been its own beastie and will continue to. Texas too could be independent, so could PEI who were tricked (arguably) into Confederation in the first place.
Hawaii could do its own thing too.
Ontario and Wisconsin and Michigan could start to form a nice little state.
Culture seems to be distributed as much East to West as political boundaries seem distributed mostly North/South.
And for all that Americans and Canadians lament our many differences, that's taking the sand in your eye and making it a mountain... we're 95% similar in terms of culture, TV, spending habits, consumption, values, etc. We like to focus on the 5% so we can feel independent and unique, but we largely ignore the 95%.
It's really a pity in some ways that a confederation of municipalities can't run things - then we could do away with these pesky national boundaries. I like visiting the USA, but it gets more painful by the day. And I'm sure the reverse is also true. If we were all one country with a common perimeter, it would solve a lot of problems. So, divide us differently or don't divide us at all... but the current system is a bit out of kilter....
Exoskeletons a la DARPA The military has been interested in combat exoskeletons for some time. DARPA has been poking its nose around this idea for years.
Good point. In this case, it was quarantining the part of Spybot that interfaced with the browsers. So maybe the rest of spybot is working, but that part is a bit wonky now (or so I remember, it has been quite a while!).
At any rate, it is good to have a heterogeneous mix of tools to deal with incoming threats or annoyances because no one vendor will find/think of everything. It would be nice to have them all implement a common control API though and let some 'mastering' programs manage the execution of the various search and destroy tools in a uniform manner.
You're right about running multiple software levels in your defence against adware, spyware, malware and viruses.
At the same time, these programs don't always coexist well together. I had to laugh (wince) when my Panda anti-virus program decided that Spybot was a potential threat and quarantined it. (I was using Panda mostly for the firewall, because I don't trust the built in XP firewall capabilities). Sometimes these apps just are unknowing about one another, and seeing something out of place, they want to do something about it. Now, of course, the experienced computer user can make some intelligent decisions. But a newbie or your elderly mother might well be challenged to make such decisions and would likely just run things in automatic quarantine mode.
Now, I can still use Spybot, I'm just not sure all of its parts behave as they once did. It still seems to do the job, I just don't know if it is doing as good of job as before.
I'd really like to see a meteor defense started. That is the single most likely thing that could wipe out the whole planet. If the meteor defense is the most likely thing to wipe out the planet, then I'm firmly against it. :)
China isn't getting into space *exclusively* to study science. Don't kid yourself, as an emerging economic powerhouse, they'll do some science too.
:)
Note that right now the militarization of space has been well on the way, in some sense with GPS (guiding precision weapon strikes) and spy satellites (target location/identification/tracking) and other such 'non WMD' uses of space.
Controlling the 'high ground' has always had advantages in intelligence and planning, and in this case, earth orbit has some profound advantages for seeing what other people are doing. And of course, if you can see what they are doing militarily, you can also spot annoying things they might not like brought up like mass graves, environmental catastrophes, prison camps, army buildups, etc. And you can take a good look at what kind of industrial facilities they are running or setting up. Even with a strictly corporate intelligence perspective, this knowledge is quite valuable (given some inherent ability to interpret the satellite photos with efficacy).
Space was destined to be weaponized the minute it became important to the resource bases or security of major countries. It now is starting to be, hence the trend. Any 'treaties' to block this were conveniences of the moment or dreams and naive ones I suspect. Of course, everyone who isn't in a position to either have a major world interest to defend or the power and technology and money to defend that interest can sit back and complain about how they don't want militarization (obviously they don't since they can't play) or how they'd never do it (unless of course they had the ability to do so, but that's never said).
Besides, on a humorous note, we'll need those weapons when the nasty landmark destroying aliens arrive and they prove resistant to country music, the common cold, and are not Mac-compatible.
Jokes aside, any society is going to have a miniscule percentage of really, really sick people. In the past they got jobs as torturers and executioners. Now that we're civil, we've still got those people, and they're still sick bastards. We need better systems in place to catch them before they do any harm. But damned if I know how to do it.
It would probably surprise you to know most executioners and torturers (well, some of the latter, probably most of the former) were not sadistic men. They were, in many cases, salary men - public servants, paid by the city or town or kingdom. They, in some cases, tried to be very scientific about their job, doing it as well as possible because it was a legally mandated punishment - they took no particular glee in the hurt that was caused. Corporal punishment has been around for a long time and has had some success as a deterent. Capital punishment has been around for a long time and has had some success also.
I think most sick people in olden days did the same kind of thing they do today - quietly conducted crimes or became outright brigands and murderers in lawless areas.
However, it's no substitute for the real thing. That also, IMHO, applies in cases like this. You can learn some fundamentals like how to communicate and work in a group (as long as you're on a private server, good luck on a public one) and that taking the time to line up your shot is more effective than spraying like an idiot, but it's still not going to help you any more than a basic lesson on gun usage will, and certainly not going to make you an expert marksman or anything.
No, Ghost Recon might be a bit closer (trying run and shoot is just going to get you dead - using cover, keeping low, firing controlled bursts, using area effect and indirect weapons where you don't care much about collateral damage, etc. - those work and are a bit closer to reality). Still, having been an infantryman, let me say that paintball and good FPS simulators like GR can teach you some useful lessons. Of course, they can teach you lots of really really bad ones. The problem is, someone not formally trained by something like a proper military will never know the difference. And learning to drop a mouse on something and click is not the same physical skill as holding a long arm or sidearm steady and aiming at a moving, possibly firing, target. And in the game, you just hit space and respawn if a round kills you because you made a bad decision. Most of us can't do that in real life.
There is no substitute for the real training, but then most militaries don't train to shoot unarmed civilians.
We're the US' largest trading partner... for now. Soon to be eclipsed by Mexico, I suspect. And as bad as many people up here thought Bush was (and the attempts to subtly or unsubtly influence the US electorate were sad and pathetic, from Canada and abroad), Kerry would (by the analysts CBC had recruited) have been a worse choice from a trade perspective for Canada. So, as much as I'm not a fan of everything President Bush ever did or perhaps more importantly HOW he did some of what he did, I think in a practical sense, Mr. Bush's election benefits Canada (assuming of course the Democrats would have conducted themselves as they had rhetorically indicated, Re: Canada and Trade). I know a lot of Americans who support Bush. And contrary to the assertions of a couple of Canadians, I know a lot of Canadians who support him too (in Ontario and probably in Alberta anyway). I don't claim they're in the majority, but most people in this country react with their hearts and their offended sensibilities instead of their heads IMO. I'd rather appreciate it if any of you Bush-bashers would not try to claim monopoly status on the Canadian sentiment. You neither have that monopoly in point of verifiable fact nor should you claim it in any event. Canada has a diversity of opinion about Mr. Bush. The fact most poll-takers don't get into the rural regions of our country and don't tend to capture working people's views as a rule effectively should give on a little skepticism. And CBC and the Canadian media wouldn't think of brewing up a scandalous difference of opinion now would they? Not our CBC! Never partisan. Never! I do think it is rather tragic that other countries think they should be running letter writing campaigns and media campaigns to try and influence the US voter. It might not have occured to them, but in a close race, this kind of tactic might backfire. (Or might have backfired, since it is really hard to know...). This is a US matter and the rest of us can have an opinion on it, and even express it, but if we can't behave in a mature and respectful fashion, then it is *us* who looks the Fool.... not our Southern Neighbours. I don't really care to discuss the merits of B vs. K, but let us just say that I am happy that the US seems to have successfully concluded the excerise of democracy, that the results are clear as they seem to be, and that the voter turnout was high. They've elected a leader and now the matter is for the rest of us to stop whinging and start getting on as well as can be with the new leader, because he's going to be around for a while. Sniping and penny ante jabs will only lead to a less smooth relationship with our Southern Neighbours, and as they still *are* OUR largest trading interest, we might want to think about improving that relationship instead of pissing them off for no good reason. Although, I do hope that Mr. Bush takes note of the fact that a majority of Americans, even record numbers, support him, but at the same time, a very similar record number do not. That should at least lead to some thought of moderation, one would think. (Of course, not being naive, I don't really expect that - 50% + 1 and you're 100% right, North or South of the border).
Does being an AC mean you can't read? I think I said that NASCAR builds frames under there cars (you don't seem to debate that) and that they allow the NASCAR cars to hit other cars (which might be moving 0 mph or 170mph in the same direction or anything in between) and walls and the occupants sustain no damage. Oddly, for someone who thinks what I said about NASCAR is BS, you basically repeated what I said.
Furthermore, if I'm in a crash and the other guys car doesn't survive but mine does, I'll feel real sorry they didn't invest in a safe car. Speaking of BS, it isn't that fact that keeps them from being street legal - there are a variety of other reasons far more mundane that prevent street legal status. But many cars from other racing series' *are* street legal, and most of them do the same thing and build in additional crash protection for the occupants - roll bars/cages, side impact supports, additional structural members, etc.
Next time you want to shoot down someone's point, you might actually want to read it first. But then, reading might be tough for the average AC....
Try 3200+ lbs. Take a look at average car weights. 2500 is on the very low side even for most alleged sportscars. In top gear, I'd possibly be able to stop the car as it isn't very powerful (0.67 ratio). In third gear (also capable of 100 kph... I can do it in second gear if I'm in a real hurry), the ratio is more like 1.33. Still, the car does not stop quickly from 60mph. It might be able to stop under full throttle, quite possibly. And the brakes probably wouldn't start a fire from overheating in that time. But the amount by which the brakes outstrip the full throttle output isn't such a large margin that the stop would be quick and painless.... I'd have to have an accelerometer in the car to tell you if it can cut 0.8gs braking. I would not have thought so as that would suggest my seatbelt should be pushing back on me with around 190 lbs pressure given my weight. I don't think it is.
I find it interesting that the first thing they do in NASCAR is build a frame under these frameless-unit-body wonders when they want to make them into cars that can hit a cement wall or other cars at 170mph and you can walk away from the crash.
I watched a PBS special where they talked to the crash guys who study NASCAR crashes and work on engineering safer cars. They have dramatically different (IIRC) opinions of how cars should be designed to survive high speed collisions than the current automakers or the NTHSA.
Sadly, I have no bibliographic material so I can't contribute a link to verify this controvery.
I recall my father talking about spring-steel bumpers and citing at least one case he knew of where a spring steel bumper backed up by 6000 lbs of car had sheared off a tree rather than crumpling. The occupants were unhurt and the vehicle could be driven away.
Contrast this with many 8 mph accidents in mall parking lots. And look at skyrocketing insurance costs - they've studied low-speed impacts on most modern cars and SUVs from an insurance PoV, and the costs are waaay up. A lot of these low-speed accidents, if taken in an older car, would result in no significant damage to the occupants and no significant damage to the car - I myself have *flattened* an iron parking sign (via a fishtail in the winter) in a 66 Olds Delta 88 with nothing worse than a minute crimp in the fenderwell trim moulding. If I tried that in my new Mustang, I'd be looking at $500-2000 damage I'd guess.
So, crash ratings mean something. This is why some number of people prefer pickup trucks, along with the better visibility. I did refer to those stats when I bought my Mustang, which at the time had one of the better front impact ratings. It's not a bad idea to study these things, but crumple zones are no panacea, and can leave a car that would otherwise be manouverable disabled during a multiple impact collision scenario. They also can drive everyones insurance up... to a questionable end. There are other approaches to the problem and the current prevailing approach is not necessarily the only or even best approach.
Not sure about that. I drive a Mustang GT and I consider it to have 'marginal' breaking for its mass. That is to say, the 10.5" (or so) brakes just don't cut the mustard. If they'd put on the bigger disks, I've seen as large as 13" on 18" wheels, or a higher pressure pump, she'd stop a lot faster.
Said car also has 225 hp nominally and maintains cruise control up a fairly steep hill even down around 1500 rpm, which is nowhere near the power band for the car.
If the car was running full tilt throttle open, I think she'd keep climbing or at best hold even with the brakes locked on. I'd be surprised if it didn't more than double my stopping distance. It isn't worth the engine wear or brakes to prove the point, but I have a good gut feeling having seen how she stops normally.
I also note that the car is a standard with a mechanical clutch. I wouldn't buy any other form of transmission in a vehicle, if I could at all avoid it. If I press in the clutch, it disengages. There is no 'if... and... or wherefor...". That's my ultimate defence - in goes the clutch, and steer steer steer. Coast to a stop.
The problem is partly this: Leverage. With the hydraulics down for the count due to the pump being out of operation, you'll find it gets very hard to steer a several ton mass of metal, even rolling on wheels.
In the olden days, if you look at the elder cars, they put large diameter steering wheels on cars, which provided a lot of leverage in these kinds of situations (many such cars didn't even *have* power steering!). They were actually harder to muscle about at slow velocity than at higher speeds. But it could be done, and the larger the wheel, the greater the mechanical advantage given to the driver.
This of course makes the modern trend of putting these dinky racing steering wheels on cars even funnier...
Damn! Mine is a wee bit older and didn't come with the enclosure to turn it into a full-sized USB key (mind you, still works, just no lanyard or cap, so I carry it in the credit card thing). If NewEgg shipped outside of USA, they'd have a sale. Now I have to go look for that package in the Great White North. I'm very happy with my flashdrive, so I have no idea why the price is down, but I'm happy about it! Thanks for the info! Now I just need to find out if I can run Ghost or Drive Image or something from a USB Key and then connect to my USB hard drive to recover an image - I'm trying to develop an external backup (full image) capability for my XP box, since I always (despite firewalls and such) fear for its longevity...
Ah yes, trust an AC to catch the missing word. I bear my humiliation with good humour. I meant "Han NOT shooting first" of course. Yes, good catch, even if you weren't willing to attach your name to the sniping. ;)
Badnarik is correct when he compares the two major candidates' views, essentially saying it does not matter for whom one votes. Policy is close enough that it is the same.
True enough. Even true here north of your border, though you would have to put some different names out there. However, it is evident in democracies these days that a centrist viewpoint gets you a greater appeal and more votes. So everyone moves to the center.
Yes, that does make them look very similar. But looking *different* is not necessarily looking better. It would be a bit naive IMO to believe that different = better necessarily. The reality is different is different, maybe better, maybe a lot worse.
In this case, I have to say that I fancy myself a moderate libertarian in politics, not too well represented in the Great White North. But having said that, National Parks, helping out international organizations instead of having your head buried in the sand, and naively (IMO) assuming that corporate entities and large groups don't have a power to exploit individuals is rather an unsophisticated and inaccurate perception of the real world.
To say "you wouldn't buy a paper if someone said you couldn't write X upon it" is perhaps true if X were *really* a big loss and you didn't really need the paper for other reasons. In truth, these things work by erosion - X starts out small, and works incrementally larger. It's why most of us sign EULAs that say "you can pretty much install what you want, download whatever data you need, and limit my usage as you desire" because we really don't care - we want the other features of the products or are forced to by circumstance. That won't go away in a Libertarian future and if the Libertarian philosophy involves everybody and their cousin wising up to the nature of things... well... I wouldn't be holding your breath for that change....
I'm glad the libertarians exist. Taken in moderation, they've got some good ideas, like many parties. Taken entire, they give one pause (again, like many parties). This seems like the political equivalent of the technology argument in favour of heterogenous product suites for greater security....
I'm saddened to see Han shooting first, because it is a historical revision of a much loved character. He's the rough-around-the-edges loner who discovers something bigger than himself and who ends up showing he really is a good guy. But without a bit of the perception of him as scoundrel and Grey Hat, his transition to mostly White Hat is less profound.
:(
The truth is, with the exception of cleaning up the bluescreening around the models, the new versions haven't added much for the better. The original three had a powerful story with a number of iconic and mythologic themes. Everything George has done to them (yes TO them...) since has been a pretty bad idea.
And his latest product is visually stimulating and absolutely devoid of other quality.
And George himself is turning into (we're giving him the benefit of the doubt in the early days) a self-absorbed prima donna and a bit of a pratt to boot.
Another great example of how to ride great beginnings into mediocre endings.
But as I said in my post title, this isn't Lucas' first example to revise SW history. Ask for a copy of the Star Wars Christmas Special at your local Blockbuster. Good luck... George has pretty much seen to it that this was more or less only to survive in old bootlegged versions. It wasn't great art (far from it), but it is just further evidence of trying to revise the past.... and about as well thought out.
I think George has been turned to the Dork Side.
Ha ha ha ha! Oh man, Please give the author mod points for a sense of humour. Let me guess, our march towards the future has been a non-stop improvement in the state of the world eh? Yep, no more violence, war, internecine strife, and we've invested in cures more than ways to damage one another.... ah Progress!
Don't take me too seriously, but the idea that we (who live an ecologically unsustainable lifestyle) are somehow superior and 'moving forward' as opposed to the various indigenous peoples who do live a sustainable lifestyle that respects the environment is more than vaguely funny - it is positively rib-busting!
[i]The dinosaurs were primitive, and when a meteor came to destroy earth, they couldn't do anything about it. The amish are just as primitive in the respect. The more advanced nations among us have the ability to detect and in some cases deflect such a threat with fusion bombs.[/i]
/. *grin*), I can see the desire to evict time wasting and zero-value-adding technologies from ones life. More complex, more fast-paced, more feature rich... these don't necessarily make a life better. They just make it... newer... more glitzy... and possibly not any better really.
You'd of course have some sort of evidence to back up the claim that we have the ability to deflect threats with fusion bombs? Based of course upon the prior attempts?
There are still many things we 'so called' advanced folks can't deal with - global catastrophes still fall in this category and will for the forseeable future.
On the issue at hand, never equate living a basic lifestyle with living an unsatisfying one or one which is in some way 'coming up short'. The Amish around Ontario contribute lots of wonderful produce to the markets, and in this day and age where everyone is getting down on GMOs and on all sorts of things that commercial industry feeds animals, their stuff looks pretty darn good. And if you need to see fine quality woodworking, don't look to Ikea....
I find it refreshing that our society has enough space in it to allow people the choice to pursue different paradigms for life. The Amish don't hurt me, and their presence enriches the diversity of our world. And they're generally of the school of thought that if they want to buy something, they don't use a credit card - they pay cash. Debt isn't a big desire of theirs. So in many ways, they make ideal customers too, for a smaller range of products admittedly.
As someone who has cast off traditional cable TV and the cell phone as baneful wastes of time (he says with some sense or irony as he types on
Of course, I'm not a Luddite nor Amish. I am learning how to work wood, but I also live for the day I can have a low cost high speed connection in rural Ontario. It's a matter of picking what you want in and out of your life and all of us make those decisions on a daily basis, we just tend not to make quite the same choices as the Amish. Live and let live, says I.
Pardon me for having missed the fact I was set to HTML format and didn't add any paragraph tags. URK! That's ugly....
I'm a big believer in Direct Demoncracy. Not because I think of it as a Panacea, and not because it doesn't have pitfalls. I'm sort of (as a Canadian) a moderate Libertarian with no party to represent me. But having said that, Anarchy per se is unworkable. I've read L. N. Smith and a few other notables in this line of supposition, but ultimately as long as bands of bad guys (or those who want to fend them off, but end up taking over anyway) are banding together and enforcing their will, then Anarchy won't work. Direct democracy, backed up by strong institutions and a legal framework and enforcement arms just might. I am pessimistic, but I think pessimism (as a historical view) is more well-supported than optimism! :)
I would *love* to think that solutions could be reached to all conflict without violence. As an Aikidoka, that would be the fondest realization of my Art. But I also acknowledge this requires the participants to want this to happen and that often is not the case - preversely, we cling to our pain, our offense, and our pride, and this leads us to further violence. And once a cycle is in place, once the violence is self-generating and systemic, it would be hard to remove.
I don't necessarily believe that we excercised anything akin to all the possible diplomatic options before the current imbroglio. This little situation was certainly not handled as well as it might have been. Add to which we may well not (in retrospect) have had even the actual causes we may have thought we did at the time.
However, you'd have a hard time convincing me that the war against the Nazis was unust. You'd have a hard time convincing me that a war against the Khmer Rouge, against the Genocidal Rawandan militants, etc. was unjust. Yes, they might lead to further injustices and that might be something to keep a wide eye open for. Yes, unjust things inherently occur in warfare. But sometimes a smaller injustice (or the intent to see a smaller injustice in place) must be weighted against a current larger injustice.
That is probably how I would weight just and unjust war. If the goal is liberation, if the best effort has a reasonable chance of success, and if all efforts are made to limit collateral effects (never entirely successful), then some initiations of conflict are actually for the better, IMO.
Does that justify the current situation? Nope. But to say that situation didn't need sorted out or that we had no business there, I reject. I reject it because human injustices were being perpetrated and although some bad things have happened, bad things were already happening. And one can't help but think they had to be stopped.
The problem with Anarchy, to come back to that in closing, is not that some of us wouldn't try it (though I hate to say it but a system of economics actually does make more sense than barter and assigned-at-the-moment costings), but that unless *ALL* of us tried it, it wouldn't go anywhere. And I don't see that happening any time soon. (I come full circle to my pessimism!)
Thanks for the wonderful discussion.