Hm. I got modded up higher than I expected for the parent post. Bear in mind -- although I said:
"If you're one of the people who actually thinks logically and rationally about things: sorry, but you're in a very small minority, which would explain why elections don't turn out the way you'd like."
...this is not the same as saying:
"If you were unhappy with the outcomes of recent public elections in the US, congratulations! You're one of a small number of hyperintelligent people in a super-exclusive group!"
I'm sure some people got the wrong idea, so I just wanted to clear that up.
You are deliberately clouding the subject by picking an issue where two human rights (the rights of the mother to decide over her own body and the rights of the unborn child) clash. There is no such unclarity here.
There must be unclarity, or we wouldn't be having this discussion. Employees of the FBI involved with such a operation apparently don't think there's a problem. And they're just humans like us; they're not fundamentally different somehow.
When anyone says that we "shouldn't throw out the concept of human rights", what they really mean is that we "shouldn't throw out my concept of human rights". After all, everyone's take on it is slightly different. A core ethical issue to one person may be only a peripheral/gray-area issue to another.
The problem is not Republicans, or Democrats, or Greens, or Libertarians, or any other group that decided they'd get some recognition if they labeled themselves with a sophisticated-sounding word.
The problem is that people are stupid. That's all. Personally, yes, I would love to have the freedom to say and think and do whatever I like, but I'm totally unconvinced that people in the US or anywhere else are intellectually equipped to handle anything remotely like freedom.
If you're one of the people who actually thinks logically and rationally about things: sorry, but you're in a very small minority, which would explain why elections don't turn out the way you'd like.
Only according to anti-American Communist Islamic organisations like the UN and Amnesty International. Remember, the people this will be used against are terrorists. You don't support terrorists, do you?
You seem to be forgetting that "human rights" is a human invention, the definition of which changes depending on who you talk to. What you might think is 'obviously' correct someone else might think is 'obviously' wrong.
For example (devil's advocate): you don't support a woman's right to have an abortion, do you? Because, you know, that's a basic human rights violation. Prove that it isn't.
-They don't have a FIXED and lower resolution (and anything running at not-native res looks FUGLY, even with like ClearType and what not)
Is there anything besides old sprite-based games that you need one particular resolution for?
-CRTs have a LOT more contrast
Only until OLED displays are widely available.
-CRTs don't have/get dead/stuck pixels
...they just have phospor for burn-in.
CRTs don't have slow response delays
Good LCDs on the market today are just as usable as CRTs in this regard.
CRTs aren't limited to 18 (eek) or 24bit color, tend to have better color accuracy, wider gamut...
Humans can't see more than 2^24 colors, so I think we're safe with that.
-Good CRTs have a long lifespan, not sure about LCDs
I'd be surprised if LCD lifespan wasn't longer, since they don't require a giant evacuated glass bottle with super-high-voltage guns. If you were describing the design of CRTs to someone unfamiliar with them, they'd think you were telling a joke.
Dtiching my perfectly find 21" CRTs for 21" LCDs would cost me an arm and a leg, would also require me to buy a newer and more expensive spectrometer too.
I suppose they're 'perfectly fine' in the same way that 19th-century telephone voice quality and NTSC video are 'perfectly fine'.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a lot of money wasted to get inferior technology.
You misspelled 'superior'.
You also neglected to mention the facts that CRTs are heavy and bulky, and that only LCDs are an inherently digital design. Analog video/audio signals lick balls.
Dude, you're not thinking. That isn't my argument at all. I don't know where the hell your 'prove a 50% probability' crap came from.
No, you're not thinking. Saying "extraterrestrial intelligence probably exists" implies that you have either calculated (or estimated) the chance of it happening to be greater than 50% because that's what the word 'probably' means. If you were to say "extraterrestrial intelligence probably does not exist", then you're considering the chance to be less than 50%.
No matter HOW improbable intelligent life is, it has happened at least once. Therefore, it is possible. In the vastness of the Universe, asserting that it hasn't happened at least twice is STUPID. No matter how small the chance for life on any given planet, the sheer vastness of the Universe essentially guarantees we are not the only intelligent life. The probability isn't 50%, it's 99.99999... %, going to a very large number of nines.
You must be new to statistics. What we have here is a sample of one. One intelligent civilization. Now, a sample of one is not very statistically useful -- all it tells us is that "intelligent life arising is possible". We have no useful data on the numerical likelyhood of such an occurence, so you absolutely cannot say anything like "the probability is XX.XXX%".
I'm not saying that extraterrestrial life does or doesn't exist. All I'm saying is that we have insufficient data to make the call. Yes, the universe is big -- but maybe the inverse of the probability of intelligent life arising is even bigger.
Given those two facts, doubting alien intelligence strikes me as profoundly stupid.
That wouldn't sound dumb if you could demonstrate that the likelyhood of intelligent life arising elsewhere during the same time window as our own civilization is greater than 50%. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you cannot do this.
You can see the failure of this scientific method with a simple real-life example. Hypothesis: there are nine marbles in Sack A. Evidence: compare weight of sack with weight of one individual marble. Theory: There are ten marbles in Sack A. Now think outside the box: There is no foundational principle that says all marbles must weigh something.
That's just silly. You're clearly presuming that the questioner and questionee are in agreement over what constitutes the object to which your terminology refers. Without basic principles like that, we wouldn't even be able to communicate, let alone do science.
So 40% of the people in the US are arrogant enough to think that in an infinite universe they are alone?
You'd better be joking.
(a) It has not been demonstrated that our universe is either infinitely large or contains infinitely large quantities of matter.
(b) Right now, we have a sample of 1 planet on which life arose. None of these people have sufficient data to say whether or not it is 'likely' that life exists elsewhere, so do not criticize the numbers that the poll uncovered. (If you're going to criticize anything, it should be the fact that anyone responded with a simple 'yes' or 'no' to that question.)
(c) Your smug, condescending, self-righteousness is transparent.
Talking about the families of the victims is nothing more than waving a bloody shirt. That tactic is as old as politics, and no more valid. It is unconscionable to me that we allow fear to curtail liberty.
You've just made the arbitrary decision that individual human lives are less important than our general liberties, but that's just conjecture. Suppose I make the opposite determination -- why do you think you're more correct than I am?
to prevent situations in which there was the potential for widespread and systematic abuse of power by an all-controlling central government.
There are plenty of regulations that the federal government has control over; auto safety standards, environmental emissions, census, media broadcasting, etc. Why not a national ID, too?
Marginal increases in safety (and they're VERY marginal) are not worth erosions in liberty.
First of all, a marginal increase in safety would have been enough to save the lives of at least a few of the thousands of victims of terrorist attacks in the past few decades. You'll have a hard time convincing the families of those people that the extra security wouldn't have been "worth it".
Second, removing all security that might threaten someone's idea of liberty is basically the same as sending an open invitation to terrorists. If you can't stop them before they commit the crime, then they'll do whatever they like -- suicide bombers aren't scared of facing punishment for their crime because they're suicide bombers.
Maybe the reason that I'm not outraged by heightened security measures is that I don't have an unrealistic and naive expectation of liberty. People are ignorant, greedy, irrational, and unscientific about life, the universe, and everything -- what combination of those qualities warrants their freedom to do what they please?
Here's a better one: it's not allowed for the Federal government to do it.
Well, I understand that, but I can't help thinking that the majority of the opponents of a national ID are simply calling it on a technicality -- it really feels like they don't want to be catalogued because they're trying to get away with something.
I guess the test of people's motives would be to go through some sort of legitimate process of granting the federal government the right to mandate a national ID, and then see what the complaints are.
Making bombs is easy. Really easy. Outlawing terrorism, and "high security" won't stop a suicide bomber from simply walking to a security checkpoint and blowing himself up.
So, what is your recommendation? Should we back off the security and just let terrorists blow up whatever they like because, in your estimation, security wouldn't stop them anyway?
so if something is good and makes sense, it gets used. If something is bad, we scrap it.
Does this explain why religion exists today? Because it makes so much sense?
The fact is, people are intellectually ill-equipped to determine what is it they need to have a functioning society. Is there a single good reason not to have some sort of universal ID? Why is a driver's license OK, but a national ID isn't?
The only specific complaints I've heard have to to with the possibility of someone misusing the personal information stored in this proposed national ID database -- but that's true of any database of personal information.
As nice as it would be to simply have a society comprised of only well-mannered citizens, we don't have any such thing. Even if we did, it wouldn't take too long for someone to realize that, without some serious law enforcement, they could get away with murder.
Everyone complains about our rights being eroded by hardcore anti-crime tactics, etc., but that's the universal penalty for people being greedy and stupid. I don't see any obvious alternative -- if terrorists are willing to actually kill themselves for their nonsense religous convictions, then some pretty strict methods to prevent this from happening must be in place.
I think the same of Ferarri's. I go down to a dealership twice a week, and when I see a Ferarri just sitting there, all lonely, with no owner, I steal the car, and drive it around. It wants to be driven, right?
And while you're off driving this Ferrari, are you denying access to anyone who might be interested in buying it? You sure are. It's NOT THE SAME WITH INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. Your analogy is fatally flawed.
Assuming there is no lost sale, the "crime" of copyright infringement is only a crime by definition. It is not morally wrong and there is no victim.
The article doesn't draw conclusions. Its just an interesting set of data.
How can you say that the data is "interesting" if no conclusions are being drawn? If there's nothing to conclude, then the data is just data -- it's neither interesting nor mundane.
The very fact that an article was written about this implies causality where it does not apply.
On a system where security is very important, it doesn't matter if HyperThreading cures cancer and freshens your breath while you sleep -- if there's a security problem, you can't use it.
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Hm. I got modded up higher than I expected for the parent post. Bear in mind -- although I said:
...this is not the same as saying:
"If you're one of the people who actually thinks logically and rationally about things: sorry, but you're in a very small minority, which would explain why elections don't turn out the way you'd like."
"If you were unhappy with the outcomes of recent public elections in the US, congratulations! You're one of a small number of hyperintelligent people in a super-exclusive group!"
I'm sure some people got the wrong idea, so I just wanted to clear that up.
If for no other reason, video standards must be switched to digital because sending analog audio or video signals is a terrible idea.
Analog signals may be sent over a medium for a distance of exactly 0.0 feet before they start to degrade. This is unacceptable.
Please cut your hair and get a job.
You are deliberately clouding the subject by picking an issue where two human rights (the rights of the mother to decide over her own body and the rights of the unborn child) clash. There is no such unclarity here.
There must be unclarity, or we wouldn't be having this discussion. Employees of the FBI involved with such a operation apparently don't think there's a problem. And they're just humans like us; they're not fundamentally different somehow.
When anyone says that we "shouldn't throw out the concept of human rights", what they really mean is that we "shouldn't throw out my concept of human rights". After all, everyone's take on it is slightly different. A core ethical issue to one person may be only a peripheral/gray-area issue to another.
The problem is not Republicans, or Democrats, or Greens, or Libertarians, or any other group that decided they'd get some recognition if they labeled themselves with a sophisticated-sounding word.
The problem is that people are stupid. That's all. Personally, yes, I would love to have the freedom to say and think and do whatever I like, but I'm totally unconvinced that people in the US or anywhere else are intellectually equipped to handle anything remotely like freedom.
If you're one of the people who actually thinks logically and rationally about things: sorry, but you're in a very small minority, which would explain why elections don't turn out the way you'd like.
"Isn't that a human rights violation?"
Only according to anti-American Communist Islamic organisations like the UN and Amnesty International. Remember, the people this will be used against are terrorists. You don't support terrorists, do you?
You seem to be forgetting that "human rights" is a human invention, the definition of which changes depending on who you talk to. What you might think is 'obviously' correct someone else might think is 'obviously' wrong.
For example (devil's advocate): you don't support a woman's right to have an abortion, do you? Because, you know, that's a basic human rights violation. Prove that it isn't.
for no reason other than being really, really weird. And that shouldn't be a crime in America.
Disagree. Have you seen how weird he is?
-They don't have a FIXED and lower resolution (and anything running at not-native res looks FUGLY, even with like ClearType and what not)
...they just have phospor for burn-in.
Is there anything besides old sprite-based games that you need one particular resolution for?
-CRTs have a LOT more contrast
Only until OLED displays are widely available.
-CRTs don't have/get dead/stuck pixels
CRTs don't have slow response delays
Good LCDs on the market today are just as usable as CRTs in this regard.
CRTs aren't limited to 18 (eek) or 24bit color, tend to have better color accuracy, wider gamut...
Humans can't see more than 2^24 colors, so I think we're safe with that.
-Good CRTs have a long lifespan, not sure about LCDs
I'd be surprised if LCD lifespan wasn't longer, since they don't require a giant evacuated glass bottle with super-high-voltage guns. If you were describing the design of CRTs to someone unfamiliar with them, they'd think you were telling a joke.
Dtiching my perfectly find 21" CRTs for 21" LCDs would cost me an arm and a leg, would also require me to buy a newer and more expensive spectrometer too.
I suppose they're 'perfectly fine' in the same way that 19th-century telephone voice quality and NTSC video are 'perfectly fine'.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a lot of money wasted to get inferior technology.
You misspelled 'superior'.
You also neglected to mention the facts that CRTs are heavy and bulky, and that only LCDs are an inherently digital design. Analog video/audio signals lick balls.
Dude, you're not thinking. That isn't my argument at all. I don't know where the hell your 'prove a 50% probability' crap came from.
No, you're not thinking. Saying "extraterrestrial intelligence probably exists" implies that you have either calculated (or estimated) the chance of it happening to be greater than 50% because that's what the word 'probably' means. If you were to say "extraterrestrial intelligence probably does not exist", then you're considering the chance to be less than 50%.
No matter HOW improbable intelligent life is, it has happened at least once. Therefore, it is possible. In the vastness of the Universe, asserting that it hasn't happened at least twice is STUPID. No matter how small the chance for life on any given planet, the sheer vastness of the Universe essentially guarantees we are not the only intelligent life. The probability isn't 50%, it's 99.99999... %, going to a very large number of nines.
You must be new to statistics. What we have here is a sample of one. One intelligent civilization. Now, a sample of one is not very statistically useful -- all it tells us is that "intelligent life arising is possible". We have no useful data on the numerical likelyhood of such an occurence, so you absolutely cannot say anything like "the probability is XX.XXX%".
I'm not saying that extraterrestrial life does or doesn't exist. All I'm saying is that we have insufficient data to make the call. Yes, the universe is big -- but maybe the inverse of the probability of intelligent life arising is even bigger.
Given those two facts, doubting alien intelligence strikes me as profoundly stupid.
That wouldn't sound dumb if you could demonstrate that the likelyhood of intelligent life arising elsewhere during the same time window as our own civilization is greater than 50%. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you cannot do this.
You can see the failure of this scientific method with a simple real-life example. Hypothesis: there are nine marbles in Sack A. Evidence: compare weight of sack with weight of one individual marble. Theory: There are ten marbles in Sack A. Now think outside the box: There is no foundational principle that says all marbles must weigh something.
That's just silly. You're clearly presuming that the questioner and questionee are in agreement over what constitutes the object to which your terminology refers. Without basic principles like that, we wouldn't even be able to communicate, let alone do science.
So 40% of the people in the US are arrogant enough to think that in an infinite universe they are alone?
You'd better be joking.
(a) It has not been demonstrated that our universe is either infinitely large or contains infinitely large quantities of matter.
(b) Right now, we have a sample of 1 planet on which life arose. None of these people have sufficient data to say whether or not it is 'likely' that life exists elsewhere, so do not criticize the numbers that the poll uncovered. (If you're going to criticize anything, it should be the fact that anyone responded with a simple 'yes' or 'no' to that question.)
(c) Your smug, condescending, self-righteousness is transparent.
Still waiting for a /. article that doesn't turn into a political discussion...
Since you apparently missed the headline, this one is about aliens.
Talking about the families of the victims is nothing more than waving a bloody shirt. That tactic is as old as politics, and no more valid. It is unconscionable to me that we allow fear to curtail liberty.
You've just made the arbitrary decision that individual human lives are less important than our general liberties, but that's just conjecture. Suppose I make the opposite determination -- why do you think you're more correct than I am?
to prevent situations in which there was the potential for widespread and systematic abuse of power by an all-controlling central government.
There are plenty of regulations that the federal government has control over; auto safety standards, environmental emissions, census, media broadcasting, etc. Why not a national ID, too?
Marginal increases in safety (and they're VERY marginal) are not worth erosions in liberty.
First of all, a marginal increase in safety would have been enough to save the lives of at least a few of the thousands of victims of terrorist attacks in the past few decades. You'll have a hard time convincing the families of those people that the extra security wouldn't have been "worth it".
Second, removing all security that might threaten someone's idea of liberty is basically the same as sending an open invitation to terrorists. If you can't stop them before they commit the crime, then they'll do whatever they like -- suicide bombers aren't scared of facing punishment for their crime because they're suicide bombers.
Maybe the reason that I'm not outraged by heightened security measures is that I don't have an unrealistic and naive expectation of liberty. People are ignorant, greedy, irrational, and unscientific about life, the universe, and everything -- what combination of those qualities warrants their freedom to do what they please?
Here's a better one: it's not allowed for the Federal government to do it.
Well, I understand that, but I can't help thinking that the majority of the opponents of a national ID are simply calling it on a technicality -- it really feels like they don't want to be catalogued because they're trying to get away with something.
I guess the test of people's motives would be to go through some sort of legitimate process of granting the federal government the right to mandate a national ID, and then see what the complaints are.
Making bombs is easy. Really easy. Outlawing terrorism, and "high security" won't stop a suicide bomber from simply walking to a security checkpoint and blowing himself up.
So, what is your recommendation? Should we back off the security and just let terrorists blow up whatever they like because, in your estimation, security wouldn't stop them anyway?
so if something is good and makes sense, it gets used. If something is bad, we scrap it.
Does this explain why religion exists today? Because it makes so much sense?
The fact is, people are intellectually ill-equipped to determine what is it they need to have a functioning society. Is there a single good reason not to have some sort of universal ID? Why is a driver's license OK, but a national ID isn't?
The only specific complaints I've heard have to to with the possibility of someone misusing the personal information stored in this proposed national ID database -- but that's true of any database of personal information.
As nice as it would be to simply have a society comprised of only well-mannered citizens, we don't have any such thing. Even if we did, it wouldn't take too long for someone to realize that, without some serious law enforcement, they could get away with murder.
Everyone complains about our rights being eroded by hardcore anti-crime tactics, etc., but that's the universal penalty for people being greedy and stupid. I don't see any obvious alternative -- if terrorists are willing to actually kill themselves for their nonsense religous convictions, then some pretty strict methods to prevent this from happening must be in place.
What is your complaint, exactly? You'd like to be able to get away with crimes?
Cut your hair and get a job!
I think the same of Ferarri's. I go down to a dealership twice a week, and when I see a Ferarri just sitting there, all lonely, with no owner, I steal the car, and drive it around. It wants to be driven, right?
And while you're off driving this Ferrari, are you denying access to anyone who might be interested in buying it? You sure are. It's NOT THE SAME WITH INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. Your analogy is fatally flawed.
Assuming there is no lost sale, the "crime" of copyright infringement is only a crime by definition. It is not morally wrong and there is no victim.
The article doesn't draw conclusions. Its just an interesting set of data.
How can you say that the data is "interesting" if no conclusions are being drawn? If there's nothing to conclude, then the data is just data -- it's neither interesting nor mundane.
The very fact that an article was written about this implies causality where it does not apply.
On a system where security is very important, it doesn't matter if HyperThreading cures cancer and freshens your breath while you sleep -- if there's a security problem, you can't use it.