$10 from Amazon in paperback or kindle format, less than that from other sellers, and less than 1/5th that used. That's just one I know to be ridiculous from memory. How is it the same price to pulp a tree, print it, package it, and ship it to my house as it is to copy a digital file and send it over the internet (not even over wireless networks since most of the new Kindle's are WiFi only)?
I'm getting tired of this argument.
You're living in a fantasy world where the price of commodities is always dictated by production costs.
It may be true for expensive physical products, but when the price is low (as $10 is compared to a $500 tablet), the price is dominated by other factors.
Of course, the smart publisher would not sell a license to Amazon. Perhaps it's because my knowledge of the matter is admittedly incomplete, but I fail to see what leg these publishers have to stand on, considering.
Your so-called smart publisher would not value his brains when he has to shut down as a result.
Amazon has a huge edge on ebook sales - ask any publisher how many of their ebooks are sold on Amazon vs all other venues combined.
People don't go for the best products on the market. Everyone I know other than myself bought a Kindle instead of better alternatives. Their argument always was: "Oh, your device may be better, but Amazon has the largest selection."
"OK, what ebooks do you want that can only be bought at Amazon?"
No answer. Because there aren't any. Sure Amazon really does have a larger selection, but no one I personally know wants any of the exclusively Amazon ebooks anyway.
But would a consumer do that analysis? No. Not even when it's pointed out to them before they buy.
Guess how many of these Kindle owners buy ebooks from anywhere other than Amazon?
0.
So yeah, a publisher can say, "Nah, we won't sell on Amazon" to which Jeff Bezos will throw some change their way saying "Here're some pennies for when you become homeless."
I suspect the article is wrong about hunger. Compared to the 80's, the world has fewer famines. The absolute number of hungry people may be up, but as a percentage of the global population, it's probably lower than in the 80's.
That's pretty much the ultimate ""your own fault" approach. There is a fairly widespread subset of th epopulation that thinks that any ailment is the sick person's fault.
I don't know if there's a formal term for it, but I've heard it referred to as the "Just World Fallacy". People assume the world is fair, and thus if something bad happens to someone, it's his fault - either he took actions that led to his misfortune, or he failed to take actions to prevent it.
Basically, people who invoke it need to feel secure about the world. They want to believe such stuff won't happen to them.
Anyway, as for the GP's theories, I've seen research that shows that things like taking care of your health, aerobics, etc are far more likely to help older folks' brains solve problems than keeping them active with technical stuff (mathematics, puzzles, etc).
They changed the immigration rules for Canada in 2008 - now it's tougher to get in unless you're in the right profession.
Mechanical Engineer? Civil? Electrical? Programmer? Sorry, you're not eligible to apply. They reduced the allowed professions to a few. Within engineering I think it's only mining/petroleum (guess why).
If you have a job offer, then it's a different story.
They are issued two 6-month visas and four 1-year visas (not at the same time, but sequentially), where they must be employed at $100,000 or more and have no criminal convictions of any kind
If I were from another part of the world with the skills needed to earn over $100,000, then there's no way I'd accept this kind of deal. Trust me - the US is not the only good place to live that has good jobs. Other countries would give me better deals than 6-month/1-year visas.
I mean, really - you're saying make sure they live with those visas for 5 years and if they maintain all that, they get green cards. So highly qualified workers more or less must "suspend" their life for 5 years just for a green card? Because with one year visas, with the fear that it won't get renewed because someone decided the prevailing salary should be $98,000, no one is going to make any kind of long term investment. Have kids? Well, why should we move to the US and put them in a school where they may quickly get uprooted? Want to buy a house? Bad idea. I may get kicked out in 6 months.
but the real effect is that the $110,000 per year jobs would settle in around $100,000 per year, and immigrants looking to move to the US would aim for the $150,000+ jobs for the extra cushion.
That only emphasizes my point. I defy you to find someone who can thinks he/she can earn $150,000 and is willing to move to another country on a measly one year visa. Heck, if I'm worth that much to you, you better get me a green card in 1 year. Me? If I thought I could earn that much, I'd rather go to Australia, earn $120,000, and am almost guaranteed a permanent residency in 1.5 years than deal with snobby Americans and have the "privilege" of becoming a permanent resident. The Australians probably have better health care, too.
I just made up Australia. If not them, I don't doubt there would still be better options.
I can't believe how low the teaching level must've got if a machine receives better outcomes than a teacher.
Your lack of objectivity is startling. You're assuming a priori that machines should be worse than teachers. As such you're not in a position to gauge the merits of the study.
Also, comparing to Fermi is silly. Even in Fermi's day most teachers were not as good at instruction as he may have been. The study isn't trying to show that machine guided instruction outperforms the best teachers, but that they outperform most.
But, lets face it: a linux geek that hardly uses linux (as you seem to claim) is NOT a linux geek. Disagree?
Definitely disagree. A Linux geek is one who knows a lot about Linux, and likes it.
I never said he didn't like Linux. I said he hates the available screen readers.
Here, your own words: "So he does all his email, web browsing, etc in Windows, as well as as much programming as he can get away with. For him Linux has been relegated to a toy he plays with once in a while.". So, not a linux geek.
You make it too easy - let me point out a simple flaw in your defintion. According to you, one can only be a geek in one OS (or language, or whatever). Because if you use one OS more than another, you can only be a geek in the one you use more. Hence you can't be, say, a Linux geek and a MacOS geek.
I simply can't see how using Windows more prevents someone from being a geek in another OS. You're invoking false partitioning.
Notwithstanding the other comments, if your co-worker really was a Linux geek, and a programmer, one of the first things you would think he'd do is write some decent screen-reading software for Linux. Given the tiny number of blind programmers compared to sighted ones, who else is going to write the software? The other comments here have already pointed out that most sighted people don't know how to design something for the blind. Maybe that's why every time he tries the software it hasn't improved...it sounds a bit mean, but you kind of only have yourself to blame if you have all the skills and ability required to solve a problem, but then choose not to.
Defensive, aren't we?
1. I didn't say my friend demands that someone should donate their time to make a better OS screen reader. He's merely pointing out that it sucks. You can be a programmer, a Linux geek, and an OS fan and still point out flaws in the system.
2. Really, all it takes to write a decent screen reader is to be a programmer and a Linux geek? So I take it the reason Gimp doesn't come close to a lot of Photoshop's features is that there are few Linux programmers who like photography? And the reason OS OCR software sucks is that people who like scanning stuff are not the ones who care for Open Source? So the people who work on Orca are either not Linux geeks or are not programmers, as according to your claim any one who is both can make a better one?
He uses Linux from the command line. It's not like he has much of an option.
On the other hand, a simple text screen can be "read" with either a Braille terminal or a speech synthesis software.
After installing and configuring JAWS on Windows a couple of times for a blind friend, I can testify that it is the most expensive PoS I have ever seen...
He paid roughly $700 for Jaws. His Braille terminal cost in the thousands (although I think a lot of it was paid for by grants, etc). If someone has to pay out of pocket, Jaws is probably a lot cheaper.
Well, let me clarify that: He bought his Braille terminal a long time ago - perhaps they're cheaper now. However, given how sturdy it's been all these years, the money may have been worth it.
Nevertheless, although he uses his Braille terminal a lot (even in Windows), his experience with Jaws has been much better than using a terminal. I'm guessing it's faster to listen to high speed Jaws than reading by fingers (although I don't recall asking him if that's the case).
I know a lot of people who have that kind of disabilities long for the good old days of DOS 80x25 text screens, and there are tons of programs for Linux that can be really useful even with that kind of screen, starting with alpine, mutt, lynx, links, slrn, vim, emacs, snownews, screen
I can't speak for the other programs, but I did ask him about Lynx, as I have a soft spot for it. He said he used it before going blind, but that it was awful to use afterwords. The reason was that while you can visually differentiate the web page from, say, the commands at the bottom of the screen, a Braille terminal cannot. Good screen readers can, but to an extent the software needs to give cues, and Lynx doesn't. I suggested he try Elinks. I think he did and said it was better, but still, Jaws + Firefox/IE is far more productive for him.
I have to say it's disconcerting to see that most of the replies to my comment disregard his experience. Most of the commenters are not blind. Few (except perhaps you) have interacted with one who's tried both Jaws and Orca. So it's ultimately my friend's word against the author of the article (and the comparison isn't even fair as he's not completely blind - screen magnification is useless for my friend). Why support the author and discount my friend? To me it seems like a clear case of wishful thinking. People over here want the open source solution to be better, so they'll disregard claims to the contrary.
Actually, I think that runs counter to the notion of calling someone a "Linux geek."
So, you're saying that if I'm a Linux geek today, go blind tomorrow and can use Linux only with great difficulty afterwards, I need to relinquish my title as geek?
I used to work with a blind programmer. He is a Linux geek. Every year or two he tries the screen readers in Linux, and says they all suck compared to Jaws in Windows (including Orca).
So he does all his email, web browsing, etc in Windows, as well as as much programming as he can get away with. For him Linux has been relegated to a toy he plays with once in a while.
I'm not sure if you meant it as a joke, but exhaustive search can still be used for problems like these. An example would be to categorize all the integers into, say, 10000 groups and then write a program to prove each of those groups...
It's kind of funny how, after all of this griping (from people like me) about lack of Photoshop like single-window mode in Gimp, Photoshop, at least for Mac, defaults to not having an "Application Frame"â" which essentially means that it's not, by default, in single-window mode. It's easy enough to switch back, though.
Thank goodness.
Whenever this comes up, what really irritates me is people pretending that everyone wants single window mode, despite numerous comments in any such discussion stating that their like for multi-windwo mode.
Most Arab states go the extra mile (or kilometer) to make sure that every native person is a Muslim.
We're talking about Lebanon, not most Arab states.
Not sure what your point in providing the Wikipedia link is. It doesn't indicate that most Christians in Lebanon are non-Arabs. More importantly, it doesn't indicate that the % of non-Arab Christians differs significantly from the % of non-Arab Muslims in Lebanon.
And that's supposedly the way women can be treated by the business classes. I certainly would think twice before I subjected myself to such a culture. If you can be a successful entrepreneur, you would provably also succeed in a much more favorable culture.
What you say is true, but a few decades ago women enterpreneurs often faced similar exclusion in the US in the business world. Thankfully, that didn't stop people from investing in the US. And thankfully, it won't stop them from doing so in the Middle East.
It is the stereotype. Please educate yourself on the meaning of the word. Being a stereotype does not mean that it's a misconception.
But let's not pretend that more pitches from women at some conference makes it okay for one of the largest countries of the region to still tell women they can't drive, vote, show their faces in public, or even leave their house without male escort.
And let's not pretend that the article is suggesting that it's OK for women not to drive, vote, etc. Your comment is essentially the same as responding to any positive aspect of the US with "Yes, but let's not pretend it makes it OK for them to invade other countries."
And oh, BTW, name one Arab country that bans women from showing their face in public (with citation). I happen to have lived in Saudi Arabia, and most women don't cover their face in public. And not all of them had male escorts.
Beirut isn't very Arab. It's close to 40% Christian.
Your statement is a textbook example of ignorance related to the Middle East. Arab's aren't Muslims. They're Arabs. Most of those Christians are Arabs.
And to the person who commented that they're a mix of ethnicities: That's equally true about the Muslims in Beirut.
Departments and Centers are typically headed by tenured faculty. Tenured faculty can't be fired.
Yes, but they can still shut down the department. What that usually means is that the faculty will get absorbed into another department, where they'll have less weight to do the research they want (e.g. lab space, etc). That causes some faculty to look for another position.
I don't think he was saying that they fired him - just that he got the message that he wasn't welcome.
Individuals that can bring in grant money are treated like royalty and catered to at universities.
Yes, until they step on the toes of people who have more political power in the university - even if those people don't bring in as much money. That's why it's called politics. This is a reality I saw a lot of when I was there. There are many ways other faculty members can make life difficult for you.
Everything he says is something I have witnessed as a grad student.
Even if it is a purely cultural issue, completely separate from the religion of the perpetrators, we wil not be able to identify this conclusively unless reports on honour killings actually list the religion of the perpetrators.
What you're saying is equivalent to requiring the religion be reported of any criminal. We won't know that there isn't something common in the religion of most people who deal drugs unless we collect that information. Or the religion of most people who violate copyright laws.
While we're at it, why not also report their income levels? It often plays a bigger role than religion in many crimes.
And perhaps how many kids they have.
And on and on.
First, most perpetrators of honour killings justify their actions on the basis of their religious beliefs.
Citation needed.
Second, if it turns out that it honour killings are the result of a cultural factor independent of the religion of the perpetrator, reporting the religion of all perpetrators of honour killings would help dispel the impression that it is primarily a Muslim issue.
AKA the "If you've got nothing to hide, you should allow us to search your vehicle" argument. When various studies have pointed out it's not a Muslim issue, and have pointed out it's a cultural issue in a few geographical regions (or by people from those regions), the need to show this is lacking.
You know what's a big problem? Guns and Christianity. Why is it that most gun related homicides in the US involve Christians? I think that the religion of the perpetrator should be reported whenever there's a gun related homicide. Only that way can we dispel the notion that it's not a Christian problem.
Of course, you could point out that a lot of countries with large Christian populations don't have much gun related homicides, but I'll conveniently ignore that just as you would ignore predominantly Muslim areas where honor killing is not an issue.
Going off on a tangent below:
And, you know, it's a fairly pointless discussion until you state what you mean by "honor killing". Many examples given often involve jealousy or simply "looking bad in the society" (boyfriend feels he is being made fun of) - that's not particularly rare in the US (or often in Latin American countries) amongst non-Muslims - yet they're not defined as honor killings.
It's also fairly silly to make honor killings seem like a crime worse than your usual run of the mill homicide, which far outnumbers honor killings. When the US has a significantly higher homicide rate than many countries where honor killings are "common", why is it that the focus is always on the latter? Shouldn't we, according to you, report the religion of anyone who commits homicide in the US? Reducing the homicide rate in the US to that of Turkey, Jordan or Lebanon would be a greater feat than if any of those countries eliminated honor killings. So why does the latter warrant special treatment - even when such a crime occurs in the US or Canada?
If it happens in the US or Canada, at the end of the day, the only relevant issue is whether the justice system found them guilty - just as it is for all homicides.
I couldn't quickly find cases of Christian immigrants to the US/Canada, but it's much easier to find Christian honor killings in their home countries in the Middle East. In Jordan, for example, on a per capita basis, honor killings are more common among Christians than among Muslims.
If there are such cases, then the religion of the perpetrators would be relevant in those cases as well.
I'd love to hear the logic behind that, given that the correlation with geography is much greater than that with religion. Parts of the Muslim/Chrisitian world do not have honor killings, and there isn't anything in their texts in support of it.
He may have committed a crime, but it's debatable whether he violated the oath. Keeping secrets is not part of the oath, and if one has to release classified documents to serve the nation, it is very much in keeping with the oath.
And keeping secrets when it harms the nation is an obvious violation of the oath.
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$10 from Amazon in paperback or kindle format, less than that from other sellers, and less than 1/5th that used. That's just one I know to be ridiculous from memory. How is it the same price to pulp a tree, print it, package it, and ship it to my house as it is to copy a digital file and send it over the internet (not even over wireless networks since most of the new Kindle's are WiFi only)?
I'm getting tired of this argument.
You're living in a fantasy world where the price of commodities is always dictated by production costs.
It may be true for expensive physical products, but when the price is low (as $10 is compared to a $500 tablet), the price is dominated by other factors.
Of course, the smart publisher would not sell a license to Amazon. Perhaps it's because my knowledge of the matter is admittedly incomplete, but I fail to see what leg these publishers have to stand on, considering.
Your so-called smart publisher would not value his brains when he has to shut down as a result.
Amazon has a huge edge on ebook sales - ask any publisher how many of their ebooks are sold on Amazon vs all other venues combined.
People don't go for the best products on the market. Everyone I know other than myself bought a Kindle instead of better alternatives. Their argument always was: "Oh, your device may be better, but Amazon has the largest selection."
"OK, what ebooks do you want that can only be bought at Amazon?"
No answer. Because there aren't any. Sure Amazon really does have a larger selection, but no one I personally know wants any of the exclusively Amazon ebooks anyway.
But would a consumer do that analysis? No. Not even when it's pointed out to them before they buy.
Guess how many of these Kindle owners buy ebooks from anywhere other than Amazon?
0.
So yeah, a publisher can say, "Nah, we won't sell on Amazon" to which Jeff Bezos will throw some change their way saying "Here're some pennies for when you become homeless."
I suspect the article is wrong about hunger. Compared to the 80's, the world has fewer famines. The absolute number of hungry people may be up, but as a percentage of the global population, it's probably lower than in the 80's.
According to who, Microsoft? Gee, I can't think of any reason they might want to lie about this.
That argument applies equally well to all those who whine about low pay and not being able to get a job.
That's pretty much the ultimate ""your own fault" approach. There is a fairly widespread subset of th epopulation that thinks that any ailment is the sick person's fault.
I don't know if there's a formal term for it, but I've heard it referred to as the "Just World Fallacy". People assume the world is fair, and thus if something bad happens to someone, it's his fault - either he took actions that led to his misfortune, or he failed to take actions to prevent it.
Basically, people who invoke it need to feel secure about the world. They want to believe such stuff won't happen to them.
Anyway, as for the GP's theories, I've seen research that shows that things like taking care of your health, aerobics, etc are far more likely to help older folks' brains solve problems than keeping them active with technical stuff (mathematics, puzzles, etc).
They changed the immigration rules for Canada in 2008 - now it's tougher to get in unless you're in the right profession.
Mechanical Engineer? Civil? Electrical? Programmer? Sorry, you're not eligible to apply. They reduced the allowed professions to a few. Within engineering I think it's only mining/petroleum (guess why).
If you have a job offer, then it's a different story.
They are issued two 6-month visas and four 1-year visas (not at the same time, but sequentially), where they must be employed at $100,000 or more and have no criminal convictions of any kind
If I were from another part of the world with the skills needed to earn over $100,000, then there's no way I'd accept this kind of deal. Trust me - the US is not the only good place to live that has good jobs. Other countries would give me better deals than 6-month/1-year visas.
I mean, really - you're saying make sure they live with those visas for 5 years and if they maintain all that, they get green cards. So highly qualified workers more or less must "suspend" their life for 5 years just for a green card? Because with one year visas, with the fear that it won't get renewed because someone decided the prevailing salary should be $98,000, no one is going to make any kind of long term investment. Have kids? Well, why should we move to the US and put them in a school where they may quickly get uprooted? Want to buy a house? Bad idea. I may get kicked out in 6 months.
but the real effect is that the $110,000 per year jobs would settle in around $100,000 per year, and immigrants looking to move to the US would aim for the $150,000+ jobs for the extra cushion.
That only emphasizes my point. I defy you to find someone who can thinks he/she can earn $150,000 and is willing to move to another country on a measly one year visa. Heck, if I'm worth that much to you, you better get me a green card in 1 year. Me? If I thought I could earn that much, I'd rather go to Australia, earn $120,000, and am almost guaranteed a permanent residency in 1.5 years than deal with snobby Americans and have the "privilege" of becoming a permanent resident. The Australians probably have better health care, too.
I just made up Australia. If not them, I don't doubt there would still be better options.
I can't believe how low the teaching level must've got if a machine receives better outcomes than a teacher.
Your lack of objectivity is startling. You're assuming a priori that machines should be worse than teachers. As such you're not in a position to gauge the merits of the study.
Also, comparing to Fermi is silly. Even in Fermi's day most teachers were not as good at instruction as he may have been. The study isn't trying to show that machine guided instruction outperforms the best teachers, but that they outperform most.
But, lets face it: a linux geek that hardly uses linux (as you seem to claim) is NOT a linux geek. Disagree?
Definitely disagree. A Linux geek is one who knows a lot about Linux, and likes it.
I never said he didn't like Linux. I said he hates the available screen readers.
Here, your own words: "So he does all his email, web browsing, etc in Windows, as well as as much programming as he can get away with. For him Linux has been relegated to a toy he plays with once in a while.". So, not a linux geek.
You make it too easy - let me point out a simple flaw in your defintion. According to you, one can only be a geek in one OS (or language, or whatever). Because if you use one OS more than another, you can only be a geek in the one you use more. Hence you can't be, say, a Linux geek and a MacOS geek.
I simply can't see how using Windows more prevents someone from being a geek in another OS. You're invoking false partitioning.
It's a pathetic definition.
Notwithstanding the other comments, if your co-worker really was a Linux geek, and a programmer, one of the first things you would think he'd do is write some decent screen-reading software for Linux. Given the tiny number of blind programmers compared to sighted ones, who else is going to write the software? The other comments here have already pointed out that most sighted people don't know how to design something for the blind. Maybe that's why every time he tries the software it hasn't improved...it sounds a bit mean, but you kind of only have yourself to blame if you have all the skills and ability required to solve a problem, but then choose not to.
Defensive, aren't we?
1. I didn't say my friend demands that someone should donate their time to make a better OS screen reader. He's merely pointing out that it sucks. You can be a programmer, a Linux geek, and an OS fan and still point out flaws in the system.
2. Really, all it takes to write a decent screen reader is to be a programmer and a Linux geek? So I take it the reason Gimp doesn't come close to a lot of Photoshop's features is that there are few Linux programmers who like photography? And the reason OS OCR software sucks is that people who like scanning stuff are not the ones who care for Open Source? So the people who work on Orca are either not Linux geeks or are not programmers, as according to your claim any one who is both can make a better one?
He uses Linux from the command line. It's not like he has much of an option.
On the other hand, a simple text screen can be "read" with either a Braille terminal or a speech synthesis software.
After installing and configuring JAWS on Windows a couple of times for a blind friend, I can testify that it is the most expensive PoS I have ever seen...
He paid roughly $700 for Jaws. His Braille terminal cost in the thousands (although I think a lot of it was paid for by grants, etc). If someone has to pay out of pocket, Jaws is probably a lot cheaper.
Well, let me clarify that: He bought his Braille terminal a long time ago - perhaps they're cheaper now. However, given how sturdy it's been all these years, the money may have been worth it.
Nevertheless, although he uses his Braille terminal a lot (even in Windows), his experience with Jaws has been much better than using a terminal. I'm guessing it's faster to listen to high speed Jaws than reading by fingers (although I don't recall asking him if that's the case).
I know a lot of people who have that kind of disabilities long for the good old days of DOS 80x25 text screens, and there are tons of programs for Linux that can be really useful even with that kind of screen, starting with alpine, mutt, lynx, links, slrn, vim, emacs, snownews, screen
I can't speak for the other programs, but I did ask him about Lynx, as I have a soft spot for it. He said he used it before going blind, but that it was awful to use afterwords. The reason was that while you can visually differentiate the web page from, say, the commands at the bottom of the screen, a Braille terminal cannot. Good screen readers can, but to an extent the software needs to give cues, and Lynx doesn't. I suggested he try Elinks. I think he did and said it was better, but still, Jaws + Firefox/IE is far more productive for him.
I have to say it's disconcerting to see that most of the replies to my comment disregard his experience. Most of the commenters are not blind. Few (except perhaps you) have interacted with one who's tried both Jaws and Orca. So it's ultimately my friend's word against the author of the article (and the comparison isn't even fair as he's not completely blind - screen magnification is useless for my friend). Why support the author and discount my friend? To me it seems like a clear case of wishful thinking. People over here want the open source solution to be better, so they'll disregard claims to the contrary.
Actually, I think that runs counter to the notion of calling someone a "Linux geek."
So, you're saying that if I'm a Linux geek today, go blind tomorrow and can use Linux only with great difficulty afterwards, I need to relinquish my title as geek?
Extremist much?
I used to work with a blind programmer. He is a Linux geek. Every year or two he tries the screen readers in Linux, and says they all suck compared to Jaws in Windows (including Orca).
So he does all his email, web browsing, etc in Windows, as well as as much programming as he can get away with. For him Linux has been relegated to a toy he plays with once in a while.
I'm not sure if you meant it as a joke, but exhaustive search can still be used for problems like these. An example would be to categorize all the integers into, say, 10000 groups and then write a program to prove each of those groups...
It's kind of funny how, after all of this griping (from people like me) about lack of Photoshop like single-window mode in Gimp, Photoshop, at least for Mac, defaults to not having an "Application Frame"â" which essentially means that it's not, by default, in single-window mode. It's easy enough to switch back, though.
Thank goodness.
Whenever this comes up, what really irritates me is people pretending that everyone wants single window mode, despite numerous comments in any such discussion stating that their like for multi-windwo mode.
Most Arab states go the extra mile (or kilometer) to make sure that every native person is a Muslim.
We're talking about Lebanon, not most Arab states.
Not sure what your point in providing the Wikipedia link is. It doesn't indicate that most Christians in Lebanon are non-Arabs. More importantly, it doesn't indicate that the % of non-Arab Christians differs significantly from the % of non-Arab Muslims in Lebanon.
And that's supposedly the way women can be treated by the business classes. I certainly would think twice before I subjected myself to such a culture. If you can be a successful entrepreneur, you would provably also succeed in a much more favorable culture.
What you say is true, but a few decades ago women enterpreneurs often faced similar exclusion in the US in the business world. Thankfully, that didn't stop people from investing in the US. And thankfully, it won't stop them from doing so in the Middle East.
In Saudi Arabia, that's *not* just a stereotype.
It is the stereotype. Please educate yourself on the meaning of the word. Being a stereotype does not mean that it's a misconception.
But let's not pretend that more pitches from women at some conference makes it okay for one of the largest countries of the region to still tell women they can't drive, vote, show their faces in public, or even leave their house without male escort.
And let's not pretend that the article is suggesting that it's OK for women not to drive, vote, etc. Your comment is essentially the same as responding to any positive aspect of the US with "Yes, but let's not pretend it makes it OK for them to invade other countries."
And oh, BTW, name one Arab country that bans women from showing their face in public (with citation). I happen to have lived in Saudi Arabia, and most women don't cover their face in public. And not all of them had male escorts.
Beirut isn't very Arab. It's close to 40% Christian.
Your statement is a textbook example of ignorance related to the Middle East. Arab's aren't Muslims. They're Arabs. Most of those Christians are Arabs.
And to the person who commented that they're a mix of ethnicities: That's equally true about the Muslims in Beirut.
I actually switched from mutt to the notmuch interface in Emacs last year. I had planned to drop mutt altogether for 2 years prior to that.
Mutt is fairly good, but it just became ridiculously stagnant. Long standing requests were not addressed.
Does it still not allow you to Fcc to more than one file? If so: Pathetic.
I forget what my second major gripe against it was...
Of course, notmuch in Emacs has its own warts as well, but somehow I think I can fix them using Elisp more easily than fixing mutt using C.
In some ways, I'm glad it took a while for notmuch support in mutt to come out. Had it been there a year ago, I may still have been stuck with mutt.
Departments and Centers are typically headed by tenured faculty. Tenured faculty can't be fired.
Yes, but they can still shut down the department. What that usually means is that the faculty will get absorbed into another department, where they'll have less weight to do the research they want (e.g. lab space, etc). That causes some faculty to look for another position.
I don't think he was saying that they fired him - just that he got the message that he wasn't welcome.
Individuals that can bring in grant money are treated like royalty and catered to at universities.
Yes, until they step on the toes of people who have more political power in the university - even if those people don't bring in as much money. That's why it's called politics. This is a reality I saw a lot of when I was there. There are many ways other faculty members can make life difficult for you.
Everything he says is something I have witnessed as a grad student.
Even if it is a purely cultural issue, completely separate from the religion of the perpetrators, we wil not be able to identify this conclusively unless reports on honour killings actually list the religion of the perpetrators.
What you're saying is equivalent to requiring the religion be reported of any criminal. We won't know that there isn't something common in the religion of most people who deal drugs unless we collect that information. Or the religion of most people who violate copyright laws.
While we're at it, why not also report their income levels? It often plays a bigger role than religion in many crimes.
And perhaps how many kids they have.
And on and on.
First, most perpetrators of honour killings justify their actions on the basis of their religious beliefs.
Citation needed.
Second, if it turns out that it honour killings are the result of a cultural factor independent of the religion of the perpetrator, reporting the religion of all perpetrators of honour killings would help dispel the impression that it is primarily a Muslim issue.
AKA the "If you've got nothing to hide, you should allow us to search your vehicle" argument. When various studies have pointed out it's not a Muslim issue, and have pointed out it's a cultural issue in a few geographical regions (or by people from those regions), the need to show this is lacking.
You know what's a big problem? Guns and Christianity. Why is it that most gun related homicides in the US involve Christians? I think that the religion of the perpetrator should be reported whenever there's a gun related homicide. Only that way can we dispel the notion that it's not a Christian problem.
Of course, you could point out that a lot of countries with large Christian populations don't have much gun related homicides, but I'll conveniently ignore that just as you would ignore predominantly Muslim areas where honor killing is not an issue.
Going off on a tangent below:
And, you know, it's a fairly pointless discussion until you state what you mean by "honor killing". Many examples given often involve jealousy or simply "looking bad in the society" (boyfriend feels he is being made fun of) - that's not particularly rare in the US (or often in Latin American countries) amongst non-Muslims - yet they're not defined as honor killings.
It's also fairly silly to make honor killings seem like a crime worse than your usual run of the mill homicide, which far outnumbers honor killings. When the US has a significantly higher homicide rate than many countries where honor killings are "common", why is it that the focus is always on the latter? Shouldn't we, according to you, report the religion of anyone who commits homicide in the US? Reducing the homicide rate in the US to that of Turkey, Jordan or Lebanon would be a greater feat than if any of those countries eliminated honor killings. So why does the latter warrant special treatment - even when such a crime occurs in the US or Canada?
If it happens in the US or Canada, at the end of the day, the only relevant issue is whether the justice system found them guilty - just as it is for all homicides.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaswinder_Kaur_Sidhu
Not Hindu, but Sikh.
This article gives more examples:
http://www.chakranews.com/honour-killings-in-canada-an-undeniable-reality/2035
Another report points out that 16% of honor killings in North America are not by Muslims:
http://www.meforum.org/2646/worldwide-trends-in-honor-killings
I couldn't quickly find cases of Christian immigrants to the US/Canada, but it's much easier to find Christian honor killings in their home countries in the Middle East. In Jordan, for example, on a per capita basis, honor killings are more common among Christians than among Muslims.
If there are such cases, then the religion of the perpetrators would be relevant in those cases as well.
I'd love to hear the logic behind that, given that the correlation with geography is much greater than that with religion. Parts of the Muslim/Chrisitian world do not have honor killings, and there isn't anything in their texts in support of it.
Did you know that the only media outlet that's printed that they're muslim in the US was fox?
And I'm still trying to figure out why, given that their being Afghan had more to do with it than their being Muslim.
Are you suggesting that when Hindu women in Canada/US get "honor killed", we should be outraged that they're not mentioning that they are Muslim?
Or that when Christian Arab women in Europe get "honor killed" we should be outraged that they're not being labeled Muslim?
I mean, if it's an honor killing, it has to have something to do with Muslims, right? Even if the perpetrators are Hindus or Christians?
So...I take it you watch a lot of Fox News?
But he did violate his oath
He may have committed a crime, but it's debatable whether he violated the oath. Keeping secrets is not part of the oath, and if one has to release classified documents to serve the nation, it is very much in keeping with the oath.
And keeping secrets when it harms the nation is an obvious violation of the oath.