May be you should buy him something that will lure him OUT of his chair?
EXACTLY!!! Thank you! Here's my gift rule for significant others:
Do not buy me gifts you think I need. When you ask "What do you want for your birthday" and I say "nothing", I do not mean "nothing" the way you define "nothing" where "nothing" means "I want you to understand me, to consider my needs, to listen to me and to satisfy me with something you thought of based on a subtle hint I gave you eight months ago." I mean nothing. no material objects. Seriously, I've got that covered.
I'm not in a coma, I already know what I need and want. Buying material objects is easy. I've made a good salary for the past twenty years. If I don't already have what you think I need it is because:
I don't need it.
They don't make it yet and I'm too busy to invent it.
What I already have suits me just fine. In fact I probably picked it out myself for specific reasons.
I'm not ready for it yet. I do a sh*t load of research before I buy anything and I have lots of specific, well thought out criteria I am trying to satisfy. I'm weird, my criteria are often weird, you have little hope of guessing them. You're not stupid or anything like that, I'm just weird. Whatever you pick will most likely not be the model I would have picked. Then we have to go through the awkward "No, really... It's great honey, thanks!" routine where I am either stuck with something I don't like or I return it for what I actually did want and you get all upset and emotionally hurt over a meaningless materialistic item.
It's just too damn expensive. I have other budget priorities.
However, the significant other sitting in the chair that you thought wasn't perfect, performing some activity the chair wasn't necessarily ergonomically designed for or with other visual accessories the chair is not equipped with effectively and completely distracting me from the normal mundane tasks the chair usually offers is something I cannot simply go to a store and buy (legally) and just happens to make that chair that you thought not-so-perfect just a bit more perfect.
The chair can also be "refurbished" repeatedly on days other than Father's Day too.
You're intellectually bankrupt. Do some research and arrive at your own conclusions rather than accept the FUD crap from fifty years ago that you heard from zealots.
Radioactive waste from nuclear power plants does not hang around for millions of years, let alone hundreds of millions. In fact, if reprocessed and reburnt correctly the resulting waste decays below background radiation in about 500 years.
I'm not even going to discuss green skies or flying pigs since your presentation of them is simply a fallacious attempt to prop up your vacuous and false opinion.
I agree. I've read lots of posts about "six inch streak of blood is a lot." Is it? really?
I work with lathes, milling machines, chop saws, tools regularly. You'd be amazed at the amount of blood I've left behind on occasion from minor wounds. A small laceration on the finger could bloody up a six inch patch of anything.
That amount of blood on a sleeping bag is unusual but I wouldn't call it a lot.
"You are rude," he said. "You are arrogant. There are not enough words in the English language to describe the way you are."
But the jurors found a word on Monday: guilty.
I'd say it's pretty apparent that the typical geek is smarter and better than the average person on the street. What was proved here is that he isn't stronger than a mob or a single man in a position of political power. The judge is clearly biased by his personal aversion to Mr. Reiser's personality. The mob will similarly be offended by being talked down to. (And if you've been unlucky enough to make it to jury service I think you will agree that they are generally not drawn from the best and brightest.) So this is a trial of "fitting in" and not evidence.
So regardless of no body, very little evidence, more plausible alternatives, etc. The mob just decides to beat up the nerd to "prove" their worth.
I mean really, are there that many/.ers surprised by this behavior? I've lost at least two jobs because of a similar penchant for speaking the obvious truth about the elephant in the room or for being "arrogant" and "not a team player". competency however never seemed to be the issue.
In closing, my opinion is that he did it. But I think this trial is another example of how fscked up our legal system is these days. "Reasonable doubt" has become "We don't like your attitude mister."
This is perhaps the most vacuous debate I have ever seen/. post an article about. But it's a very good discrimintation tool for intelligence:
If you believe mathematical facts exist and operate whether they are known or not and require discovery by analysis, experimentation and critical thinking in order to further our understanding of our universe then you're right. (Yes, I agree the language and symbol used to describe them is invented) In this case please continue to exist.
If, on the other hand, you believe that you have the power to somehow magically create or invent a mathematical fact simply because you thought of it then please take your psychotic god-complex elsewhere and let the rest of us get on with the business of figuring out how things really work and relieve us from having to be frustrated by your delusions of grandeur. In this case please create a cult for you and your followers based on soul-transport and "sacred" kool-aid.
But again, this sequence does nothing for proving that this success is due to Jobs' aggressive, dictatorial style. It is equally plausible that Jobs made some small positive change such has hiring some bright engineers upon his arrival. Or maybe made a decision that all products should be sleek and devoid of buttons and sharp edges and come in pretty colors. Either of those decisions could account for their success, both could be effective despite micromanagement or abusive management. One could argue that you should imagine how much better the products from these people would have been had Jobs had a different attitude. That, as the original respondent said, apple is succeeding despite Jobs.
I have worked for aggressive, dictatorial people before. I am fully convinced that, while they might be able to establish a stable of employees with parental-appeasement issues that work hard and produce to gain the appreciation of an authority figure, there is nothing that will be produced that couldn't be with a fair, comfortable management environment.
Should Jobs get the praise for whatever decision he made that did make apple a success? Of course. Should his management style be adopted by others? No. Not until it's proven that it was the reason for success. I don't believe that proof has been provided and there are far too many other companies such as Google that demonstrate that success is not tied to an abusive management style and thus provide a counter-example sufficient to suggest looking towards other reasons for apple's success.
My damn union just started doing this sort of deceitful, unethical crap. I'm a teacher. Teachers like myself in California are represented by the California Faculty Association (CFA). You do not have to be a member of the union, you can choose not to be. However if you choose not to be then the union still legally charges you 75% of the dues a normal member pays. Their argument is that the union negotiates and defends to the benefit of all employees and thus all employees should pay their fair share, known as an agency fee. Because California is not a right to work state you cannot refuse to pay. If you do then the union can mandate that you be fired.
I would argue that the union doesn't represent me. Every action they take punishes people in my position and is aimed at rewarding the less competent, less educated or lower paid instructors. So what does this all have to with the article?
Starting last month the union started deducting 100% of dues from non-members. These people are not given the same rights and privileges as members. Oh, buried on the second to last page of a yearly CFA report is the information that you can object to the additional 25% if you send a written letter with personal information to the CFA. It's just like the damn phone company. I know they did it just hoping that some percentage wouldn't notice, or wouldn't bother, to send such a letter in.
The thing that really bugs me is how is this even legal??? If they can just arbitrarily take an extra $10.00 from my paycheck why not, $50, $500?? How is it legal to reach into another man's salary and take something that is not legally owed to them?
And why should "artists" be given preferential treatment compared to "inventors"?? Patents have a term of 20 years. period. Not after death and not extendable. Why should "artists" enjoy revenue two and half times as long?
I'll tell you why. Because the world is run by looters. Patents cover things like machines, manufacturing processes and drugs. Everybody acknowledges that without these things people get sick or quality of basic life is diminished. So the looters use their majority to vote that in a short period of time they can take any practical invention they want for free.
Just take the time to look at how much better copyright protects the creators profit compared to the tons of loopholes present that can invalidate a patent.
No, unless the mother saw them take the cookies, or can see the cookies presently, then she cannot *know* the child has cookies. Many past incidences of similar behavior concerning pilfered items or disobeyance have yielded a truth to the accusation after investigation. From this the mother may conclude that this is high probability that the child is again lying. In fact, the mother may view that probability so high as to call it "beyond a reasonable doubt". The child's assumption is actually correct. Mom cannot *know* he's got cookies anymore than she can *know* the the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists.
Yes, circumstantial evidence is evidence. It supports deductions and inferences about what occurred. A truly smart person must weigh circumstantial evidence, hypothesize about all possible conclusions that such evidence supports, evaluate how probable each conclusion is given the body of such evidence and then make a judgment as to whether or not the scenario presented by the prosecutor is the most likely and beyond a reasonable doubt.
Your cookie argument is flawed several ways. The mom can make a judgment without consequence to herself, the community or the child. There is no penalty to her being right or wrong; this is not true for the Reiser case. The mom has the means to coerce the situation and investigate to determine truth. This cannot be done in the Reiser case and therefore you must analyze and act on only the evidence that is available. The cookie case is far too simplistic and common to draw analogies to Mr. Reiser's case.
Yes, smart people are capable of deduction and inference. Ask any magician and they will also tell you that smart people are some of the easiest to trick in to false deductions and incorrect inferences.
you know what I'd do? I'd laugh at him, and then insist he change it to something else.
Wait, let me get this straight.. You, the inexperienced, ignorant college student, would say that, at the interview, to the professional offering to pay you and provide you with experience and a career? Thank you!!! More available positions for people like myself who are talented, experienced, graceful, can do the job and don't have an ego to stroke about a title.
BTW, the vast majority of engineering jobs aren't life critical either. You have a lot to learn, both intellectually and socially.
anyone who is intellectually honest must 'acknowledge, confront and speak []
Right of the bat, this guy loses. This is a fallacy of appeal to either ridcule or flattery. It tries to bias the reader to agree with his conclusion on the basis that anybody who disagrees is stupid or dishonest. It ignores the presentation, truth and analysis of any facts about why protection is good or bad.
Nobody, who is intellectually honest, *must* acknowledge the truth of anything just because of who or what they are. In fact, I would argue (though, I won't present supporting premises here) that anybody who is intellectually honest has the responsibility to actually evaluate the truth, consequences and ethics of any issue being presented in order to understand the situation as well as possible. Even if one side of the argument is unpopular or traditional. This is the only way that the best decisions for the future can be made on issues such as these.
Must agree? Hardly! Skepticism is a healthy and prudent attitude.
[] would rather feed themselves today than their children tomorrow.
I don't like children. I don't like your children. I choose not to have children and I would like to enjoy MY life now. What makes your children have more rights to a good life than I do?
Please keep your "for the children" propaganda out of my life.
Correct. It is the responsibility of the authors to maintain an objective skepticism. It is they who need to anticipate any skepticism, doubt, or question a peer might raise and prove that their doubt is unfounded and that the theory continues to hold.
Peers may question any aspect of the presentation or experiment and expect a provable answer. If an answer cannot be provided which satisfies the body of the peers then the peers may reject the conclusion as valid. The authors are seeking acceptance of their ideas from a body of peers. The peers are free to accept or reject whatever they want on whatever grounds they choose.
A particularly well accepted method of convincing the body of the peers is to provide enough information that any group of peers may duplicate the experiment. During this duplication they are able to detect or uncover aspects of the test that are biased, false or otherwise invalidate the test. If the duplicating body cannot find such evidence to invalidate the test then are left with the conclusion that the author's test was similar and produced valid results.
In otherwords "prove me wrong!" is a very compelling argument but only if you give the arguer enough rope to hang himself. (metaphorically speaking.)
I'm tired of hearing engineers blamed as being uncreative, uncooperative, stubborn, "need to think out of the box" people. It's a generalization based upon limited knowledge and fear of those people.
The axiom is true of every other field or profession I can think of. Do you think politicians are thinking outside the box these days? Or are they sticking with what worked in the 1920s? How about natural scientists? Einstein went to his grave refusing to believe in quantum entanglement calling it "spooky action at a distance". Marketing people? Have you seen a really different car ad in the past three decades? Accountants? Bound by limitations of math. Their numbers just have to add up and like bridges falling down if you do something shaky you get Enron type accounting.
Oh! you meant children and artists are creative. First, children. They draw on paper and come up with crazy new ideas. Well except that the things they draw can't be built due to physics of materials and usually they're crazy ideas can't be built because they aren't practical enough to be profitable or affordable. They don't have an understanding of constraints and constraints must be factored into any product. Second, artists. Come now... really look at the works of Jackson Pollock. Are his later pieces really that much more outside of his box than his first splatters of paint? I went to a gallery exhibit once and one artist painted nothing but cloud scenes over country sides and the other made nothing but abstract, headless sculptures of narrow shouldered big assed women. No artists do not think outside of their boxes any more than engineers do.
The reality is that the world, people and the universe impose constraints on any projects. As any person gets older they learn what works to keep them alive and what does not and it is very effective. It has been very effective for ten of thousands of years. Do not eat the pretty frogs no matter how hungry you are. "Out side of the box" dictates: "consider that this frog is different." NO! do NOT eat the pretty frogs... period. You are much better off thinking inside of the box.
Engineers are some of the most creative people I have ever met. They are given a goal, often with no direction of how to get there and they must reach that goal while always satisfying very tight constraints. This type of creativity is very hard. It's easy on canvas with paint but a canvas picture of an engine doesn't have to be manufacturable, it doesn't have to be profitable, it doesn't have to produce a certain minimum horsepower, it doesn't have to spin at a certain maximum revolution without seizing the bearings, it doesn't have to be made out of a certain material yet be strong enough and weigh less than a certain amount, it doesn't have to fit in a limited size cavity or connect to other components in a functional way. Yet engineered products have to have enough creativity in them to accomplish all of that and more.
Software engineering is no different. If lines of code are considered like bolts, screws and components; all of which provide some functionality. Then there are as many individual pieces in any application you use today, be it games, Word, Mozilla, than there are in a space shuttle or strokes of a brush by Monet.
The real disappointment is that the art and creativity that engineers produce is rarely recognized or appreciated. And it should be. It is so creative, in fact, that most people don't even know it's there or could understand it even if it was explained to them.
Engineers have their own wu and it is very, very strong.
You're in a classic situation of "We're reorganizing so that executives, accounting and marketing are getting brand new offices/raises/perks/etc. How can we screw the IT guy while making him *think* we're giving him a good office too?"
I know... Don't give him an office at all. Instead, collocate him with the equipment and trick him into thinking it's his *new*, *cool* "techie" office.
Dude, you're screwed. get another job or some comfy ear plugs.
IANAL. But I've signed a few of these things and I think I understand it pretty well.
Yes. The company owns any invention you make on their time and resources. This is standard. They compensate you with a salary in exchange for the work that you produce while they pay you. They do not own something you make in your garage on weekends as long as that invention does not contain intellectual property owned by the company.
Non-compete agreements in many states are not enforceable except under special circumstances. If the work you do for a following company is of a nature where the work you are performing could be expected of any number of qualified people and not just you then the work is not related to the previous employer. These states argue that a company cannot remove your innate right to make a living based on your general skills. So for instance... I worked for a company doing systems and network administration. I fixed mail servers, configured firewalls, designed and deployed network topologies, kept web servers running and tuned. But there is no proprietary IP in this type work. It can be expected of any systems admin at any similar job. When my position was terminated they required me to sign a non-compete in order to get my severance. (However, the severance was what they legally owed me in back pay and vacation and nothing more but they were dicks.) So I signed because I knew it wasn't enforceable. Any other reasonably experienced systems admin could do what I did. Therefore my skills did not rely on the previous company's IP and therefore the agreement was unenforceable as it would have prevented me from working. I live in California, your state may vary. In other words, In specific states, even in the presence of a non-compete agreement, you can work for a competitor as long as the possibility of transferring proprietary intellectual property from your old company to the new company does not exist.
The histogram charts seem to reveal that you should pick certain balls to increase your chance of winning but this analysis is fundamentally flawed.
Why does 7 appear most frequently? Because everybody *thinks* it's lucky. Notice that 13, a number that a majority of suspicious people believe is unlucky, has about the lowest frequency of wins.
But does believing a number is lucky or unlucky make it so?? In this case... Yes. The numbers published are the winning numbers. For each pot win there are many pot losses that were not analyzed. These losses are what leads to a build up of the pot. The game could yield 13 at exactly the same rate that it yields 7s, but when it yields 13 it is less likely to have a winning ticket because most people avoided 13 and thus it appears less frequently in the list of published winners. Similarly, when it picks seven there is a greater chance that a winning ticket existed because most people pick "lucky 7".
I'm very certain that if you looked at all draws, every game and didn't care about winners or losers then you would see a very, very even distribution of numbers chosen. Weight of the ink and all that garbage is going to be negligible compared to the impact physics imposed during mixing. (And I would be surprised to find that the MegaMillions lottery commission hasn't balanced the balls to a very fine degree by now... just in case.)
As proof of my argument, I submit that for the past 246 draws the number 13 has actually been picked 24 times while 1 has only been picked 20 times. For 56 balls, the chance of being chosen in a draw of 6 balls is 10.714% and therefore we would expect each ball to have appeared 26.36 times. Further the analysis curves of ball 1 through 6 are useless as well. Is it any wonder that ball 1 has a greater frequency than ball 13?? No, because the balls are listed in numerical order, not the order chosen. Very few balls are going to beat 1 for the ball #1 position. This poster needs to go back and take a basic course in probability before wasting our time.
Basically, if you had picked all the "bad" numbers that this study revealed then you would have "scooped" a lot of the pots that had no winning ticket purchased and you would have prevented some of the enormous pots from ever occurring.
An interesting question though is why has ball 47 been picked only 11 times so far? This is well under the expected 26.3. It would be worth computing, given an even distribution, what the chances are of having a ball picked only 11 times in 246 draws. Sort of like what are the chances of Gildenstern flipping a coin heads up 94 times? It's not that it can't happen, it's just HIGHLY improbable. So much so that other improbable circumstances become worthy of assuming to be at play (such as death.) I wonder what the probability for 11 times is and therefore how much should we consider other circumstances affecting its behavior.
When I read the original post I thought "Not this CRAP again! F*cking luddites and philistines! Now I've got to educate another group of idiots about something well understood and basic." But it looks I don't have to. Everybody else is doing a fine job of education.
Yes, CDs are superior to vinyl in every way. Vinyl is not pure analog. The needle has a frequency limit, the vinyl material has a limit to the sizes of peaks and valleys. The recording medium is plastic and thus repsonds differently at different frequencies. So vinyl doesn't record "nuances" any better than a digital CD. In fact the opposite is true.
You mean I would actually be paying to see and hear the performance as a service rather than treat the sequence of air compressions as a good? I mean that would be like... well, like it use to be.
Go out and see your local philharmonic. I mean if you want to pay for talent, imagine having to put on the kind of performance they do. One and a half live performances a week for half the year. Oh yeah... your "set" might include a single movement lasting over 4 hours. ("For Philip Guston", composer: Morton Feldman. Or his unrecorded six hour String Quartet No. 2, the bows are never lifted off the strings.) In general movements are longer than rock/top-40/rap and close to scores of performers are expected to play in tune and in sync. Beethoven's ninth symphony, fourth movement is 25 minutes.
Yes. it's a service. Anybody can make several "takes" and then keep only the best one to sell. The value is in the talents of the performers. That is a service.
Any device with the precision necessary to reliably hit a power collector continuously will surely have the ability to target any other point reliably with similar precision.
yes, if it works for power transmission then it will make a really good weapon. The downside is that in order to target a power collector that is stationary then the orbiting
collector would probably be in geosynchronous orbit. If the power collector is located in the US then, as a weapon, the device would be limited to hitting targets located in the US,
Mexico and South America. I think that would be its largest drawback: It would be a weapon that is most effective at hitting its own people.
Slashdot Mirror
EXACTLY!!! Thank you! Here's my gift rule for significant others:
Do not buy me gifts you think I need. When you ask "What do you want for your birthday" and I say "nothing", I do not mean "nothing" the way you define "nothing" where "nothing" means "I want you to understand me, to consider my needs, to listen to me and to satisfy me with something you thought of based on a subtle hint I gave you eight months ago." I mean nothing. no material objects. Seriously, I've got that covered.
I'm not in a coma, I already know what I need and want. Buying material objects is easy. I've made a good salary for the past twenty years. If I don't already have what you think I need it is because:However, the significant other sitting in the chair that you thought wasn't perfect, performing some activity the chair wasn't necessarily ergonomically designed for or with other visual accessories the chair is not equipped with effectively and completely distracting me from the normal mundane tasks the chair usually offers is something I cannot simply go to a store and buy (legally) and just happens to make that chair that you thought not-so-perfect just a bit more perfect.
The chair can also be "refurbished" repeatedly on days other than Father's Day too.I don't have any kids (you insensitive clod!)
[by resolute choice].
You're intellectually bankrupt. Do some research and arrive at your own conclusions rather than accept the FUD crap from fifty years ago that you heard from zealots.
Radioactive waste from nuclear power plants does not hang around for millions of years, let alone hundreds of millions. In fact, if reprocessed and reburnt correctly the resulting waste decays below background radiation in about 500 years.
I'm not even going to discuss green skies or flying pigs since your presentation of them is simply a fallacious attempt to prop up your vacuous and false opinion.
boo-TAY!!
I agree. I've read lots of posts about "six inch streak of blood is a lot." Is it? really?
I work with lathes, milling machines, chop saws, tools regularly. You'd be amazed at the amount of blood I've left behind on occasion from minor wounds. A small laceration on the finger could bloody up a six inch patch of anything.
That amount of blood on a sleeping bag is unusual but I wouldn't call it a lot.
"You are rude," he said. "You are arrogant. There are not enough words in the English language to describe the way you are."
But the jurors found a word on Monday: guilty.
I'd say it's pretty apparent that the typical geek is smarter and better than the average person on the street. What was proved here is that he isn't stronger than a mob or a single man in a position of political power. The judge is clearly biased by his personal aversion to Mr. Reiser's personality. The mob will similarly be offended by being talked down to. (And if you've been unlucky enough to make it to jury service I think you will agree that they are generally not drawn from the best and brightest.) So this is a trial of "fitting in" and not evidence.
So regardless of no body, very little evidence, more plausible alternatives, etc. The mob just decides to beat up the nerd to "prove" their worth.
I mean really, are there that many /.ers surprised by this behavior? I've lost at least two jobs because of a similar penchant for speaking the obvious truth about the elephant in the room or for being "arrogant" and "not a team player". competency however never seemed to be the issue.
In closing, my opinion is that he did it. But I think this trial is another example of how fscked up our legal system is these days. "Reasonable doubt" has become "We don't like your attitude mister."
It is also the use of accurate and descriptive symbol names.
Database database("data.txt");
if (database.empty())
is a lot more readable (i.e. literate) than
DB d("data.txt");
if (d.e())
This is perhaps the most vacuous debate I have ever seen /. post an article about. But it's a very good discrimintation tool for intelligence:
If you believe mathematical facts exist and operate whether they are known or not and require discovery by analysis, experimentation and critical thinking in order to further our understanding of our universe then you're right. (Yes, I agree the language and symbol used to describe them is invented) In this case please continue to exist.
If, on the other hand, you believe that you have the power to somehow magically create or invent a mathematical fact simply because you thought of it then please take your psychotic god-complex elsewhere and let the rest of us get on with the business of figuring out how things really work and relieve us from having to be frustrated by your delusions of grandeur. In this case please create a cult for you and your followers based on soul-transport and "sacred" kool-aid.
"much greater ass" did you say?
Farce = ass * ??
But again, this sequence does nothing for proving that this success is due to Jobs' aggressive, dictatorial style. It is equally plausible that Jobs made some small positive change such has hiring some bright engineers upon his arrival. Or maybe made a decision that all products should be sleek and devoid of buttons and sharp edges and come in pretty colors. Either of those decisions could account for their success, both could be effective despite micromanagement or abusive management. One could argue that you should imagine how much better the products from these people would have been had Jobs had a different attitude. That, as the original respondent said, apple is succeeding despite Jobs.
I have worked for aggressive, dictatorial people before. I am fully convinced that, while they might be able to establish a stable of employees with parental-appeasement issues that work hard and produce to gain the appreciation of an authority figure, there is nothing that will be produced that couldn't be with a fair, comfortable management environment.
Should Jobs get the praise for whatever decision he made that did make apple a success? Of course. Should his management style be adopted by others? No. Not until it's proven that it was the reason for success. I don't believe that proof has been provided and there are far too many other companies such as Google that demonstrate that success is not tied to an abusive management style and thus provide a counter-example sufficient to suggest looking towards other reasons for apple's success.
My damn union just started doing this sort of deceitful, unethical crap. I'm a teacher. Teachers like myself in California are represented by the California Faculty Association (CFA). You do not have to be a member of the union, you can choose not to be. However if you choose not to be then the union still legally charges you 75% of the dues a normal member pays. Their argument is that the union negotiates and defends to the benefit of all employees and thus all employees should pay their fair share, known as an agency fee. Because California is not a right to work state you cannot refuse to pay. If you do then the union can mandate that you be fired.
I would argue that the union doesn't represent me. Every action they take punishes people in my position and is aimed at rewarding the less competent, less educated or lower paid instructors. So what does this all have to with the article?
Starting last month the union started deducting 100% of dues from non-members. These people are not given the same rights and privileges as members. Oh, buried on the second to last page of a yearly CFA report is the information that you can object to the additional 25% if you send a written letter with personal information to the CFA. It's just like the damn phone company. I know they did it just hoping that some percentage wouldn't notice, or wouldn't bother, to send such a letter in.
The thing that really bugs me is how is this even legal??? If they can just arbitrarily take an extra $10.00 from my paycheck why not, $50, $500?? How is it legal to reach into another man's salary and take something that is not legally owed to them?
Ayn Rand had it right.
And why should "artists" be given preferential treatment compared to "inventors"?? Patents have a term of 20 years. period. Not after death and not extendable. Why should "artists" enjoy revenue two and half times as long?
I'll tell you why. Because the world is run by looters. Patents cover things like machines, manufacturing processes and drugs. Everybody acknowledges that without these things people get sick or quality of basic life is diminished. So the looters use their majority to vote that in a short period of time they can take any practical invention they want for free.
Just take the time to look at how much better copyright protects the creators profit compared to the tons of loopholes present that can invalidate a patent.
No, unless the mother saw them take the cookies, or can see the cookies presently, then she cannot *know* the child has cookies. Many past incidences of similar behavior concerning pilfered items or disobeyance have yielded a truth to the accusation after investigation. From this the mother may conclude that this is high probability that the child is again lying. In fact, the mother may view that probability so high as to call it "beyond a reasonable doubt". The child's assumption is actually correct. Mom cannot *know* he's got cookies anymore than she can *know* the the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists.
Yes, circumstantial evidence is evidence. It supports deductions and inferences about what occurred. A truly smart person must weigh circumstantial evidence, hypothesize about all possible conclusions that such evidence supports, evaluate how probable each conclusion is given the body of such evidence and then make a judgment as to whether or not the scenario presented by the prosecutor is the most likely and beyond a reasonable doubt.
Your cookie argument is flawed several ways. The mom can make a judgment without consequence to herself, the community or the child. There is no penalty to her being right or wrong; this is not true for the Reiser case. The mom has the means to coerce the situation and investigate to determine truth. This cannot be done in the Reiser case and therefore you must analyze and act on only the evidence that is available. The cookie case is far too simplistic and common to draw analogies to Mr. Reiser's case.
Yes, smart people are capable of deduction and inference. Ask any magician and they will also tell you that smart people are some of the easiest to trick in to false deductions and incorrect inferences.
Wait, let me get this straight.. You, the inexperienced, ignorant college student, would say that, at the interview, to the professional offering to pay you and provide you with experience and a career? Thank you!!! More available positions for people like myself who are talented, experienced, graceful, can do the job and don't have an ego to stroke about a title.
BTW, the vast majority of engineering jobs aren't life critical either. You have a lot to learn, both intellectually and socially.
Right of the bat, this guy loses. This is a fallacy of appeal to either ridcule or flattery. It tries to bias the reader to agree with his conclusion on the basis that anybody who disagrees is stupid or dishonest. It ignores the presentation, truth and analysis of any facts about why protection is good or bad.
Nobody, who is intellectually honest, *must* acknowledge the truth of anything just because of who or what they are. In fact, I would argue (though, I won't present supporting premises here) that anybody who is intellectually honest has the responsibility to actually evaluate the truth, consequences and ethics of any issue being presented in order to understand the situation as well as possible. Even if one side of the argument is unpopular or traditional. This is the only way that the best decisions for the future can be made on issues such as these.
Must agree? Hardly! Skepticism is a healthy and prudent attitude.
I don't like children. I don't like your children. I choose not to have children and I would like to enjoy MY life now. What makes your children have more rights to a good life than I do?
Please keep your "for the children" propaganda out of my life.
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Correct. It is the responsibility of the authors to maintain an objective skepticism. It is they who need to anticipate any skepticism, doubt, or question a peer might raise and prove that their doubt is unfounded and that the theory continues to hold.
Peers may question any aspect of the presentation or experiment and expect a provable answer. If an answer cannot be provided which satisfies the body of the peers then the peers may reject the conclusion as valid. The authors are seeking acceptance of their ideas from a body of peers. The peers are free to accept or reject whatever they want on whatever grounds they choose.
A particularly well accepted method of convincing the body of the peers is to provide enough information that any group of peers may duplicate the experiment. During this duplication they are able to detect or uncover aspects of the test that are biased, false or otherwise invalidate the test. If the duplicating body cannot find such evidence to invalidate the test then are left with the conclusion that the author's test was similar and produced valid results.
In otherwords "prove me wrong!" is a very compelling argument but only if you give the arguer enough rope to hang himself. (metaphorically speaking.)
I'm tired of hearing engineers blamed as being uncreative, uncooperative, stubborn, "need to think out of the box" people. It's a generalization based upon limited knowledge and fear of those people.
The axiom is true of every other field or profession I can think of. Do you think politicians are thinking outside the box these days? Or are they sticking with what worked in the 1920s? How about natural scientists? Einstein went to his grave refusing to believe in quantum entanglement calling it "spooky action at a distance". Marketing people? Have you seen a really different car ad in the past three decades? Accountants? Bound by limitations of math. Their numbers just have to add up and like bridges falling down if you do something shaky you get Enron type accounting.
Oh! you meant children and artists are creative. First, children. They draw on paper and come up with crazy new ideas. Well except that the things they draw can't be built due to physics of materials and usually they're crazy ideas can't be built because they aren't practical enough to be profitable or affordable. They don't have an understanding of constraints and constraints must be factored into any product. Second, artists. Come now... really look at the works of Jackson Pollock. Are his later pieces really that much more outside of his box than his first splatters of paint? I went to a gallery exhibit once and one artist painted nothing but cloud scenes over country sides and the other made nothing but abstract, headless sculptures of narrow shouldered big assed women. No artists do not think outside of their boxes any more than engineers do.
The reality is that the world, people and the universe impose constraints on any projects. As any person gets older they learn what works to keep them alive and what does not and it is very effective. It has been very effective for ten of thousands of years. Do not eat the pretty frogs no matter how hungry you are. "Out side of the box" dictates: "consider that this frog is different." NO! do NOT eat the pretty frogs... period. You are much better off thinking inside of the box.
Engineers are some of the most creative people I have ever met. They are given a goal, often with no direction of how to get there and they must reach that goal while always satisfying very tight constraints. This type of creativity is very hard. It's easy on canvas with paint but a canvas picture of an engine doesn't have to be manufacturable, it doesn't have to be profitable, it doesn't have to produce a certain minimum horsepower, it doesn't have to spin at a certain maximum revolution without seizing the bearings, it doesn't have to be made out of a certain material yet be strong enough and weigh less than a certain amount, it doesn't have to fit in a limited size cavity or connect to other components in a functional way. Yet engineered products have to have enough creativity in them to accomplish all of that and more.
Software engineering is no different. If lines of code are considered like bolts, screws and components; all of which provide some functionality. Then there are as many individual pieces in any application you use today, be it games, Word, Mozilla, than there are in a space shuttle or strokes of a brush by Monet.
The real disappointment is that the art and creativity that engineers produce is rarely recognized or appreciated. And it should be. It is so creative, in fact, that most people don't even know it's there or could understand it even if it was explained to them.
Engineers have their own wu and it is very, very strong.
You're in a classic situation of "We're reorganizing so that executives, accounting and marketing are getting brand new offices/raises/perks/etc. How can we screw the IT guy while making him *think* we're giving him a good office too?"
I know... Don't give him an office at all. Instead, collocate him with the equipment and trick him into thinking it's his *new*, *cool* "techie" office.
Dude, you're screwed. get another job or some comfy ear plugs.
The histogram charts seem to reveal that you should pick certain balls to increase your chance of winning but this analysis is fundamentally flawed.
Why does 7 appear most frequently? Because everybody *thinks* it's lucky. Notice that 13, a number that a majority of suspicious people believe is unlucky, has about the lowest frequency of wins.
But does believing a number is lucky or unlucky make it so?? In this case... Yes. The numbers published are the winning numbers. For each pot win there are many pot losses that were not analyzed. These losses are what leads to a build up of the pot. The game could yield 13 at exactly the same rate that it yields 7s, but when it yields 13 it is less likely to have a winning ticket because most people avoided 13 and thus it appears less frequently in the list of published winners. Similarly, when it picks seven there is a greater chance that a winning ticket existed because most people pick "lucky 7".
I'm very certain that if you looked at all draws, every game and didn't care about winners or losers then you would see a very, very even distribution of numbers chosen. Weight of the ink and all that garbage is going to be negligible compared to the impact physics imposed during mixing. (And I would be surprised to find that the MegaMillions lottery commission hasn't balanced the balls to a very fine degree by now... just in case.)
As proof of my argument, I submit that for the past 246 draws the number 13 has actually been picked 24 times while 1 has only been picked 20 times. For 56 balls, the chance of being chosen in a draw of 6 balls is 10.714% and therefore we would expect each ball to have appeared 26.36 times. Further the analysis curves of ball 1 through 6 are useless as well. Is it any wonder that ball 1 has a greater frequency than ball 13?? No, because the balls are listed in numerical order, not the order chosen. Very few balls are going to beat 1 for the ball #1 position. This poster needs to go back and take a basic course in probability before wasting our time.
Basically, if you had picked all the "bad" numbers that this study revealed then you would have "scooped" a lot of the pots that had no winning ticket purchased and you would have prevented some of the enormous pots from ever occurring.
An interesting question though is why has ball 47 been picked only 11 times so far? This is well under the expected 26.3. It would be worth computing, given an even distribution, what the chances are of having a ball picked only 11 times in 246 draws. Sort of like what are the chances of Gildenstern flipping a coin heads up 94 times? It's not that it can't happen, it's just HIGHLY improbable. So much so that other improbable circumstances become worthy of assuming to be at play (such as death.) I wonder what the probability for 11 times is and therefore how much should we consider other circumstances affecting its behavior.
When I read the original post I thought "Not this CRAP again! F*cking luddites and philistines! Now I've got to educate another group of idiots about something well understood and basic." But it looks I don't have to. Everybody else is doing a fine job of education.
Yes, CDs are superior to vinyl in every way. Vinyl is not pure analog. The needle has a frequency limit, the vinyl material has a limit to the sizes of peaks and valleys. The recording medium is plastic and thus repsonds differently at different frequencies. So vinyl doesn't record "nuances" any better than a digital CD. In fact the opposite is true.
You mean I would actually be paying to see and hear the performance as a service rather than treat the sequence of air compressions as a good? I mean that would be like... well, like it use to be.
Go out and see your local philharmonic. I mean if you want to pay for talent, imagine having to put on the kind of performance they do. One and a half live performances a week for half the year. Oh yeah... your "set" might include a single movement lasting over 4 hours. ("For Philip Guston", composer: Morton Feldman. Or his unrecorded six hour String Quartet No. 2, the bows are never lifted off the strings.) In general movements are longer than rock/top-40/rap and close to scores of performers are expected to play in tune and in sync. Beethoven's ninth symphony, fourth movement is 25 minutes.
Yes. it's a service. Anybody can make several "takes" and then keep only the best one to sell. The value is in the talents of the performers. That is a service.
Any device with the precision necessary to reliably hit a power collector continuously will surely have the ability to target any other point reliably with similar precision.
yes, if it works for power transmission then it will make a really good weapon. The downside is that in order to target a power collector that is stationary then the orbiting collector would probably be in geosynchronous orbit. If the power collector is located in the US then, as a weapon, the device would be limited to hitting targets located in the US, Mexico and South America. I think that would be its largest drawback: It would be a weapon that is most effective at hitting its own people.