No, there is a very good reason, and that is avoidance.
My daughter rides her bike to school, and we checked the DB in Maryland, and saw that one of her potential paths goes right by a sex offender's house. Crimes against kids. So we told her not to go that way. If one moved in next door, I'd simply tell my kids to stay away from him, just like any other stranger.
A previous poster objected on the grounds that most victims know their abusers. And he's right - the stereotypical "flasher in a trench coat" is pretty rare. But that doesn't mean people who start out as strangers don't abuse kids - they just befriend them first. In my daughter's case, how hard would it be for the offender to leave some tacks out on he sidewalk. She gets a flat, and he just happens to be there offering to fix it, or even just make a call for her. Perfectly innocent. 2 weeks later, he's out front and says Hi. Sooner or later, he moves from stranger to aquaintance. Why not just avoid it?
As for the question of shunning? Well, there are plenty of neighbors I don't talk to for reasons that have nothing to do with a sex-offender DB. One can lead a life without being invited to the neighborhood potluck.
I don't condone using the DB as a hit list, or as sources for smear campaigns, but there are legitimate uses for the data. Do the illelgitimate uses outweigh the legitimate ones? If so, please turn in your VCR, tape recorder, Bittorrent client, cd burner, car, and martini glass, please.
"Things like the police and civil society were formed to protect us from each other."
Not exactly. The police exist to deal with crimes AFTER they happen. I forget the case, but there is a Supreme court ruling to the effect that the police cannot be held liable for failing to protect someone from a crime about to occur or occurring. And before you bring up restraining orders, they are a function of the judicial branch, not the executive. Yes, things are blurry, and good cops are certainly going to try to prevent crimes if they can, but that isn't their primary job.
It used to be that the individual was primarily responsible for protecting themselves, but that has gone by the wayside. I cringe when I hear about mass shootings where people simply wait to die, or wait for the police to show up and protect them. One young guy with some balls and some luck could have stopped the Virginia Tech shooter; but all they got was an aging professor who died trying to protect his students (not himself) and a bunch of dead bodies.
As for the "civil society" part, how does one "form" that? I've yet to hear a good definition of what "civil society" is, aside from "a society that is civil". When NPR talks about it, it seems like a code word for artists, intelligentsia, and academics who are bitter about being largely ignored in countries where the rest of the folks (i.e. damned near everyone) have other things on their mind.
Please note that I don't disagree per se about sex offender DB's, but quandary is about the conflict between individual rights - my right to have easy access to public records vs. an ex-offender's right to privacy and personal security. Keeping the plebes away from information that they can't handle isn't part of the equation.
A standard may not have the same direct legal weight as a contract, but it still has weight beyond a bunch of slash geeks bickering. Contracts are often let for items that are "standards compliant". If the standard is loose or poorly written, the vendor can claim standards compliance, even though the product violates the intent of the standard. See OOXML for an example.
So the guy "protected" his son from molestation (even though the risk was pretty damned small), and in return gave his son an absentee father, visits to the penitentiary, almost certain divorce (assuming he was married), and a long span of whispers and looks.
"3. SHOULD This word, or the adjective "RECOMMENDED", mean that there
may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances to ignore a
particular item, but the full implications must be understood and
carefully weighed before choosing a different course.
4. SHOULD NOT This phrase, or the phrase "NOT RECOMMENDED" mean that
there may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances when the
particular behavior is acceptable or even useful, but the full
implications should be understood and the case carefully weighed
before implementing any behavior described with this label."
So it means exactly what I said - precisely nothing. If prefaced by "should", a requirement can be ignored based on criteria set by the implementor, and they can still say it is compliant with the specification.
Use of the word "should", unless under a very strict (and unnatural/contrary to the plain meaning) definition, is simply not a good practice. I would welcome an example of an instance where use of "should" has led to a desired outcome, ESPECIALLY when trying to implement _standardization_.
I'm not real thrilled about "may" either, but that is more for it's misuse than lack of precise meaning. Spec writers tend to want it to mean "you can do it if you get permission", and get really cranky when the contractor just goes ahead and does it. But legally, "may" means "allowed" - period. Try to get that through some folks' heads, though...
Honestly, if the choice was between "Should" and not referencing it, I'd go for the latter. I deal in construction contracts and specifications, and if there's a word that has done more damage than "should", I'm not aware of it.
Repeat after me:
Shall=imperative May=permissive
That's it. "Should" means "we want it, but making it a requirement will cause a problem, so if you don't do it we're going to whine, but there's nothing we can legally do about it"
Of course, then there's the whole "Shall" vs. "Will" thing, but I don't want to talk about it.
Injecting expertise and intelligence into threads here on Slashdot is simply not done, ESPECIALLY when dicussing Linux, alternative energy sources, or the Satanic nature of the current President.
"not to protect the generation plant, but to protect the city."
That's not what the article said. The problem is that, when power lines and substations go down, the electrical load on the powerplant is drastically lightened. This decreases the load on the generator, which will want to start spining faster. Since the controls for large powerplants simply aren't designed to react that fast, you dump the steam from the boiler to atmosphere or the condenser, which lets the turbine and generator spin down on their own but also takes the plant off line. Then, when the load stabilizes, adjust the boiler output appropriately, re-sync to the grid, and connect.
Imagine driving up a very steep hill, with the engine under heavy load. Now, for some reason, you transmission shifts to neutral. The engine will typically hit redline before you can lift your foot off the accelerator. If this were to happen with relative frequency, you might install a rev limiter on the engine that kills power before hitting the redline, but it doesn't do it particularly gracefully. (I actually just descibed rev limiters in teh days before electronic engine management).
I think the line about "to avoid flooding Los Angeles with electricity that would have nowhere to go", may have mislead you - that's right up there with "a series of tubes" .
I propose a new terminology: Geraldine Job, named after the Lily Tomlin character.
Basically, Comcast is listening to your conversation, deciding that it is going on too long and/or you are talking about something they don't like, and pulling the 1/4" plug, forcing you to repeat the call. And then doing it again.
Don't like it? "Sorry, we're the ISP - we don't have to care."
"No matter what excuse you care to use, it is obvious that a much firmer editorial hand was required."
I've never read Jordan, but if his books are anything like Heinlein's later works, the "firmer editorial hand" comment is spot on. Heinlein reached the point in his career where not only would no one edit his work, no one COULD edit his work - he was the Grand Master, after all.
On the other hand, why bother editing - the book is going to sell a shipload just based on the name, whetehr it be a tigh 500 pages or a meandering 1200.
Now, if someone could only get Tarantino to get his characters to just SHUT THE FUCK UP!!! (Sorry, just saw "Grindhouse" and "Sin City")
I refer you to the quote from TFP: " then learned about base-load energy". So she is saying that she formed her opinion, and went out of her way to convince others her opinion was the correct one, and get policy changed (i.e. "activist") BEFORE she researched her topic. It's not like "base-load" is a new concept.
So yes, if she is a typical example, "all activists are idiot kids who don't know what they're protesting about". She certainly does the professionof activism no favors.
No, the military had THE word in design - the first practical reactors were developed by the Navy. When commercial reactor designs were initiated, they did what every other engineer does - leveraged existing designs. Hell, the first reactor at Shippingsport was basically a Navy propulsion unit.
You are shading your wording to make it sound like some big military conspiracy. Loosen up the tinfoil a bit.
Your last paragraph almost hits it. After she stopped drinking, she was having trouble concentrating and finishing projects. The Doctor diagnosed her with ADD. Turns out there is a relatively strong correlation between alcoholics and adult ADD sufferer's. the theory is that the alcohol, acting as a depressant, medicates the ADD symptoms, "slowing things down" enough for them to get a handle on everyday life. Of course, the problem is that the "cure" is worse than the disease.
Is ADD overdiagnosed? Yep. Does she have it? Perhaps not. But I do know that, if she runs out of her meds, she definitely functions less well, enough to convince me there is some therapeutic effect taking place.
Ridiculous standard of perfection? I agree. But does that mean there are no consequences for mistakes?
I once dated a girl that had been roofied at and likely raped. Why do I say likely? Because, when the rape kit was done, either the doctor or the nurse screwed up and used a chemical at 100% instead of the diluted amount - like 10%. This not only "burned away" any evidence of rape, it gave her some pretty nasty scarring on her vulva and inside of her thighs. I saw it up close.
So now, not only is any prosecution of the drunks at the fraternity out of the question, her future sex like is effed up because she's embarrassed to have anyone go down on her. And this is directly because someone stocked the wrong bottle in the rape kit, the nurse didn't double check, and neither did the doctor. And she just should have said "well, mistakes happen?"
If you make a mistake and someone it hurt by it, you make it right. I tell my kids this all the time. I'm not talking about punitive damages, or insane "pain and suffering" awards (sorry, it's not suffering if you can't buy the vacation house if you don't win the lotto^h^h^h^h^h lawsuit). But if damage is done, an honorable person makes it right.
You seem to be confusing causation with responsibility. Whatever the cause of her actions - bad parents, bad genes, or just being bad - she is ultimately responsible for them, and she more or less accepts that.
Just because there may be physiological reasons behind certain behavior doesn't mean that it alleviates personal responsibility. Indeed, it may increase it - if I have a mental illness that is treatable by drugs, I would be clearly irresponsible not to take them, ESPECIALLY since others rely on me.
Unfortunately our legal system and culture have grabbed hold of the causation=responsibility myth. Although it is a little bit schizophrenic about it.
I'm more than a little confused here - who is the "government" and who are the "authorities"? You seem to be implying that there is an organization in Sweden that enforces the laws, collects taxes, and has power over the citizenry, but is not elected and is answerable to no one. Is that the case?
More likely you are describing a standard parliamentary system, where a "government" is a temporary arrangement, and can be formed and dissolved at the whim of the legislature.
We use different terms in the US - the "government" is comprised of every person associated with any act of "governing", i.e. weilding power over the citizenry. Police? Government. Congress? Government. Courts? Government.
In the US, the Government is divided into a number of parts, with powers and limitations defined in teh constitution. So, for instance, members of the Legislature have no authority to give orders to members of the Executive branch. And vice versa. The Legislature can only remove members of the Executive and Judiciary by an extraordinary procedure; as opposed to the Parliamentary system where a simple vote (or series of them) can remove ALL of the Executive for any reason - the "no confidence" vote.
Are there gray areas? Certainly. Are there abuses? Obviously. But a statement like "despise your system if it doesn't provide suitable checks and balances. Which I think it doesn't." shows that you don't really understand the theory and practice of the US form of government, except what you read on Slashdot and hear on your news. That's fine - most Americans are baffled by the Parliamentary system as well. But you won't see nearly the number of Americans on Slashdot blathering about how backward the European system is.
The example of the citation was the link in the parent post.
As for the hypocrisy, it's less content than methods: - The "notability" purge, where things like individual high schools were purges - you know, real buildings with real people - but one can find pages and pages of information about fictional characters. - Wales' statements about "all the world's knowledge" and the notability criteria. - Wales' defense of the "professor of religion" fraud
And now "Don't use it as a reference, but here's references in pre-printed format" - that's like DARE giving out plans for My First Bong.
I know a recovering alcoholic pretty well, and one of her pronounced traits is repeatedly doing the same things that she knows she shouldnt. Keep in mind that the phrase "Insanity is doing the same action over and over again and expecting a different result" comes from AA.
Oddly enough, it only became really pronounced AFTER she stopped drinking - gene activation?
Slashdot Mirror
According to Heinlein, it is actually 6^6^6=1.03144248E28
No, there is a very good reason, and that is avoidance.
My daughter rides her bike to school, and we checked the DB in Maryland, and saw that one of her potential paths goes right by a sex offender's house. Crimes against kids. So we told her not to go that way. If one moved in next door, I'd simply tell my kids to stay away from him, just like any other stranger.
A previous poster objected on the grounds that most victims know their abusers. And he's right - the stereotypical "flasher in a trench coat" is pretty rare. But that doesn't mean people who start out as strangers don't abuse kids - they just befriend them first. In my daughter's case, how hard would it be for the offender to leave some tacks out on he sidewalk. She gets a flat, and he just happens to be there offering to fix it, or even just make a call for her. Perfectly innocent. 2 weeks later, he's out front and says Hi. Sooner or later, he moves from stranger to aquaintance. Why not just avoid it?
As for the question of shunning? Well, there are plenty of neighbors I don't talk to for reasons that have nothing to do with a sex-offender DB. One can lead a life without being invited to the neighborhood potluck.
I don't condone using the DB as a hit list, or as sources for smear campaigns, but there are legitimate uses for the data. Do the illelgitimate uses outweigh the legitimate ones? If so, please turn in your VCR, tape recorder, Bittorrent client, cd burner, car, and martini glass, please.
"Things like the police and civil society were formed to protect us from each other."
Not exactly. The police exist to deal with crimes AFTER they happen. I forget the case, but there is a Supreme court ruling to the effect that the police cannot be held liable for failing to protect someone from a crime about to occur or occurring. And before you bring up restraining orders, they are a function of the judicial branch, not the executive. Yes, things are blurry, and good cops are certainly going to try to prevent crimes if they can, but that isn't their primary job.
It used to be that the individual was primarily responsible for protecting themselves, but that has gone by the wayside. I cringe when I hear about mass shootings where people simply wait to die, or wait for the police to show up and protect them. One young guy with some balls and some luck could have stopped the Virginia Tech shooter; but all they got was an aging professor who died trying to protect his students (not himself) and a bunch of dead bodies.
As for the "civil society" part, how does one "form" that? I've yet to hear a good definition of what "civil society" is, aside from "a society that is civil". When NPR talks about it, it seems like a code word for artists, intelligentsia, and academics who are bitter about being largely ignored in countries where the rest of the folks (i.e. damned near everyone) have other things on their mind.
Please note that I don't disagree per se about sex offender DB's, but quandary is about the conflict between individual rights - my right to have easy access to public records vs. an ex-offender's right to privacy and personal security. Keeping the plebes away from information that they can't handle isn't part of the equation.
A standard may not have the same direct legal weight as a contract, but it still has weight beyond a bunch of slash geeks bickering. Contracts are often let for items that are "standards compliant". If the standard is loose or poorly written, the vendor can claim standards compliance, even though the product violates the intent of the standard. See OOXML for an example.
(But...)
Does anybody really know what time it is?
Does anybody really care?
(that)
Time has come today! TIME!!
Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day.
(even though)
Time is on my side.
So the guy "protected" his son from molestation (even though the risk was pretty damned small), and in return gave his son an absentee father, visits to the penitentiary, almost certain divorce (assuming he was married), and a long span of whispers and looks.
Oh yeah, he made a GREAT choice - a real bargain.
"3. SHOULD This word, or the adjective "RECOMMENDED", mean that there
may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances to ignore a
particular item, but the full implications must be understood and
carefully weighed before choosing a different course.
4. SHOULD NOT This phrase, or the phrase "NOT RECOMMENDED" mean that
there may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances when the
particular behavior is acceptable or even useful, but the full
implications should be understood and the case carefully weighed
before implementing any behavior described with this label."
So it means exactly what I said - precisely nothing. If prefaced by "should", a requirement can be ignored based on criteria set by the implementor, and they can still say it is compliant with the specification.
Use of the word "should", unless under a very strict (and unnatural/contrary to the plain meaning) definition, is simply not a good practice. I would welcome an example of an instance where use of "should" has led to a desired outcome, ESPECIALLY when trying to implement _standardization_.
I'm not real thrilled about "may" either, but that is more for it's misuse than lack of precise meaning. Spec writers tend to want it to mean "you can do it if you get permission", and get really cranky when the contractor just goes ahead and does it. But legally, "may" means "allowed" - period. Try to get that through some folks' heads, though...
Honestly, if the choice was between "Should" and not referencing it, I'd go for the latter. I deal in construction contracts and specifications, and if there's a word that has done more damage than "should", I'm not aware of it.
Repeat after me:
Shall=imperative
May=permissive
That's it. "Should" means "we want it, but making it a requirement will cause a problem, so if you don't do it we're going to whine, but there's nothing we can legally do about it"
Of course, then there's the whole "Shall" vs. "Will" thing, but I don't want to talk about it.
Injecting expertise and intelligence into threads here on Slashdot is simply not done, ESPECIALLY when dicussing Linux, alternative energy sources, or the Satanic nature of the current President.
"not to protect the generation plant, but to protect the city."
That's not what the article said. The problem is that, when power lines and substations go down, the electrical load on the powerplant is drastically lightened. This decreases the load on the generator, which will want to start spining faster. Since the controls for large powerplants simply aren't designed to react that fast, you dump the steam from the boiler to atmosphere or the condenser, which lets the turbine and generator spin down on their own but also takes the plant off line. Then, when the load stabilizes, adjust the boiler output appropriately, re-sync to the grid, and connect.
Imagine driving up a very steep hill, with the engine under heavy load. Now, for some reason, you transmission shifts to neutral. The engine will typically hit redline before you can lift your foot off the accelerator. If this were to happen with relative frequency, you might install a rev limiter on the engine that kills power before hitting the redline, but it doesn't do it particularly gracefully. (I actually just descibed rev limiters in teh days before electronic engine management).
I think the line about "to avoid flooding Los Angeles with electricity that would have nowhere to go", may have mislead you - that's right up there with "a series of tubes" .
Do you get your diploma by mail, with full credit for "life experience"?
Or does your college have the word "community" in the title?
Dammit, "Ernestine"! Geraldine was the Flip Wilson character of the same era.
I propose a new terminology: Geraldine Job, named after the Lily Tomlin character.
Basically, Comcast is listening to your conversation, deciding that it is going on too long and/or you are talking about something they don't like, and pulling the 1/4" plug, forcing you to repeat the call. And then doing it again.
Don't like it? "Sorry, we're the ISP - we don't have to care."
"No matter what excuse you care to use, it is obvious that a much firmer editorial hand was required."
I've never read Jordan, but if his books are anything like Heinlein's later works, the "firmer editorial hand" comment is spot on. Heinlein reached the point in his career where not only would no one edit his work, no one COULD edit his work - he was the Grand Master, after all.
On the other hand, why bother editing - the book is going to sell a shipload just based on the name, whetehr it be a tigh 500 pages or a meandering 1200.
Now, if someone could only get Tarantino to get his characters to just SHUT THE FUCK UP!!! (Sorry, just saw "Grindhouse" and "Sin City")
Next Question?
I refer you to the quote from TFP: " then learned about base-load energy". So she is saying that she formed her opinion, and went out of her way to convince others her opinion was the correct one, and get policy changed (i.e. "activist") BEFORE she researched her topic. It's not like "base-load" is a new concept.
So yes, if she is a typical example, "all activists are idiot kids who don't know what they're protesting about". She certainly does the professionof activism no favors.
"military had a word in the design"
No, the military had THE word in design - the first practical reactors were developed by the Navy. When commercial reactor designs were initiated, they did what every other engineer does - leveraged existing designs. Hell, the first reactor at Shippingsport was basically a Navy propulsion unit.
You are shading your wording to make it sound like some big military conspiracy. Loosen up the tinfoil a bit.
"Anyone suspect Friedrike is a member of PITA?"
While I'm sure Friederike is indeed a Pain In The Ass, I didn't think membership in a society was required.
Very apropos typo.
Your last paragraph almost hits it. After she stopped drinking, she was having trouble concentrating and finishing projects. The Doctor diagnosed her with ADD. Turns out there is a relatively strong correlation between alcoholics and adult ADD sufferer's. the theory is that the alcohol, acting as a depressant, medicates the ADD symptoms, "slowing things down" enough for them to get a handle on everyday life. Of course, the problem is that the "cure" is worse than the disease.
Is ADD overdiagnosed? Yep. Does she have it? Perhaps not. But I do know that, if she runs out of her meds, she definitely functions less well, enough to convince me there is some therapeutic effect taking place.
Ridiculous standard of perfection? I agree. But does that mean there are no consequences for mistakes?
I once dated a girl that had been roofied at and likely raped. Why do I say likely? Because, when the rape kit was done, either the doctor or the nurse screwed up and used a chemical at 100% instead of the diluted amount - like 10%. This not only "burned away" any evidence of rape, it gave her some pretty nasty scarring on her vulva and inside of her thighs. I saw it up close.
So now, not only is any prosecution of the drunks at the fraternity out of the question, her future sex like is effed up because she's embarrassed to have anyone go down on her. And this is directly because someone stocked the wrong bottle in the rape kit, the nurse didn't double check, and neither did the doctor. And she just should have said "well, mistakes happen?"
If you make a mistake and someone it hurt by it, you make it right. I tell my kids this all the time. I'm not talking about punitive damages, or insane "pain and suffering" awards (sorry, it's not suffering if you can't buy the vacation house if you don't win the lotto^h^h^h^h^h lawsuit). But if damage is done, an honorable person makes it right.
You seem to be confusing causation with responsibility. Whatever the cause of her actions - bad parents, bad genes, or just being bad - she is ultimately responsible for them, and she more or less accepts that.
Just because there may be physiological reasons behind certain behavior doesn't mean that it alleviates personal responsibility. Indeed, it may increase it - if I have a mental illness that is treatable by drugs, I would be clearly irresponsible not to take them, ESPECIALLY since others rely on me.
Unfortunately our legal system and culture have grabbed hold of the causation=responsibility myth. Although it is a little bit schizophrenic about it.
I'm more than a little confused here - who is the "government" and who are the "authorities"? You seem to be implying that there is an organization in Sweden that enforces the laws, collects taxes, and has power over the citizenry, but is not elected and is answerable to no one. Is that the case?
More likely you are describing a standard parliamentary system, where a "government" is a temporary arrangement, and can be formed and dissolved at the whim of the legislature.
We use different terms in the US - the "government" is comprised of every person associated with any act of "governing", i.e. weilding power over the citizenry. Police? Government. Congress? Government. Courts? Government.
In the US, the Government is divided into a number of parts, with powers and limitations defined in teh constitution. So, for instance, members of the Legislature have no authority to give orders to members of the Executive branch. And vice versa. The Legislature can only remove members of the Executive and Judiciary by an extraordinary procedure; as opposed to the Parliamentary system where a simple vote (or series of them) can remove ALL of the Executive for any reason - the "no confidence" vote.
Are there gray areas? Certainly. Are there abuses? Obviously. But a statement like "despise your system if it doesn't provide suitable checks and balances. Which I think it doesn't." shows that you don't really understand the theory and practice of the US form of government, except what you read on Slashdot and hear on your news. That's fine - most Americans are baffled by the Parliamentary system as well. But you won't see nearly the number of Americans on Slashdot blathering about how backward the European system is.
The example of the citation was the link in the parent post.
As for the hypocrisy, it's less content than methods:
- The "notability" purge, where things like individual high schools were purges - you know, real buildings with real people - but one can find pages and pages of information about fictional characters.
- Wales' statements about "all the world's knowledge" and the notability criteria.
- Wales' defense of the "professor of religion" fraud
And now "Don't use it as a reference, but here's references in pre-printed format" - that's like DARE giving out plans for My First Bong.
I know a recovering alcoholic pretty well, and one of her pronounced traits is repeatedly doing the same things that she knows she shouldnt. Keep in mind that the phrase "Insanity is doing the same action over and over again and expecting a different result" comes from AA.
Oddly enough, it only became really pronounced AFTER she stopped drinking - gene activation?