f I'm looking for a list of sites with a particular topic (e.g. "Everquest"), I use Yahoo.
I'd encourage you, and others looking based on topic, to actuall use the Open Directory Project first. It's passed Yahoo in size, and is usually better maintained. That, and the fact that if you see a category is rather weak, you can always sign up to update it yourself.
If it's not biological, your body won't reject it.
Untrue. When your body rejects something it means it's recognizing it as a foreign body an attacks it. It doesn't matter if it's a transplanted organ, a bacterium, or an LCD screen. If the body's immune system can react with it, then it can detect it and start attacking it.
Slightly off topic, this is why diamondoid is going to be so popular should molecular nanotechnology yield things you can inject into the human body. Diamondoid is completly unreactive to the human body - the immune system will never realize it's there. ---
I would say rather that in the future people might use genetics to modify the human body in order to make it more long-lived, quicker-thinking etc. etc.
There's a reason that genetic engineering of future generations isn't going to be the biggest part of human enhancement. Selfishness. As in people would rather give themselves the longer lifespan, the higher intelligence, then just give it to future generations. I will admit, I have the same feeling. Sure, it would be nice to change the DNA so children born would live for 200 years easily. But I'd rather they work on ways to do it to people alive today - because that can also be applied to the people born in the future.
I want to see what happens in the future so badly... I don't want to die, because I'd miss it. That's one of the biggest reasons I want to keep living longer, and why I hope they put the effort into technologies that can be applied to those of us alive today. ---
Certainly no intelligent species would want to replace itself with machines,
It depends on what you mean by "replace" here. If you mean be wiped out/be made extinct by their own creation, then quite likely no, because it contradicts the inherent survival instinct that it seems a life form would need to be successful. Though if you eliminate that, it still might make sense in the long run.
If you mean make themselves into machines, talking about "uploading" and all that, then it's a very smart thing to do - of course, we're assuming that the machines they would become would be less fragile then their bodies.
But then again, by the time a species gets to a point where they can inhabit mechanical bodies, it seems like they'd be able to manipulate the biological ones just about as well (because when you look at it at the lowest level, they're also just machines).
Biological fundamentalism isn't the best way to look at it. Think of the body as a vehicle for the consciousness, and decide what you'd want to do that way. ---
If it's mechanical that means there must be biological life. Even if a piece of steel grew a brain, it would become biological, would it not? If its a sentient computer, like AI or something, then what the hell made it? If humans, then its not extraterrestrial.
You're missing the point. Just because we meet mechanical life doesn't mean there is some biological life back home using/creating them. They may have self-evolved from a biological form to a mechanical form, and their biological form may be extinct because it was useless in comparison.
Though I think it's just as likely that they would use technology in ways that their form wouldn't really classify as mechanical, nor as biological as we would think of it.
I think the general suggestion is that if we were to meet another form of life, by then they'd have enough technology that they'd be creating a "body" to fit their task, instead of just accepting what they started off with as what they're supposed to have. Being able to do that myself is one reason I'm hoping nanotech shows up here soon... ---
It is much more reasonable to suppose that electronic "life" arose spontaneously than biological life. For example, given a universe in which every single atom represented a useful amino acid, and havin them all recombine a billion times a second (never mind the effects of distance/separation, decay, radiation, gravity, temperature...), you still require a universe nearly three powers of magnitude older than anyone has dared postulate just to bring the odds down to even of life having ever happened once, anywhere.
Computing the odds of life occuring is currently an exercise in futility. It's pasting a lot of assumptions together with a fact or two and proclaiming the result as useful.
For an interesting discussion of the probability of biological life forming spontaneously (abiogenesis), read Lies, Damned lies, Statistics and Probability of Abiogenesis Calculations. It's more aimed at creationists claiming life couldn't have formed on its own, but it's a good article. ---
Read the Fourteenth Amendment. "No state shall make or enforce and law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;..."
That makes it pretty clear that the Constitution applies to state laws. The Supreme Court has upheld this time after time. ---
But local jurisdictions should have every right to put blocking software on their library computers.
Local governments do not have the right to override constitutionally protected freedoms. A city can't decide to ignore freedom of speech any more then they can force everyone to follow the same religion, or forcing a minority to be slaves.
And preventing people from reading/hearing the speech is the same thing as preventing people from presenting those ideas in the first place. ---
Sucks to hear about Williams, cool to hear Sega's still doin' 'em. Howsabout Bally?
I remember hearing about it Williams stopped making pinball machines. That was the biggest disappointment, as they had made, IMHO, the best pinball machines out there. High Speed. Pinbot. Funhouse. Comet/Cyclone/Whirlwind. Earthshaker. Twilight Zone. Addams Family. Star Trek:TNG. Demolition Man. I pumped so much money into those machines for years, always going for them over the machines made by anyone else, because they had such a better feel.
I need to find somewhere around me that has some machines, to see if I can get back into the feel of it. At least until I have the space to pick up a few machines, which I have already determined I am going to do. Who knows, if I feel like being mechanical at any point, I might make a hobby out of fixing old machines, trying to keep pinball alive as long as possible. ---
Oh my god, no, it is most definately NOT dying! Check out Pro Pinball for the best pinball simulations ever created on a computer. The four games of the Pro Pinball series are getting progressively more realistic, down to the ball hitting the glass, expert moves such as bang backs, and incredible complex and GOOD tables... Timeshock! is by far the best pinball game on any computer/game system ever made... I still have a long ways to go to master the thing, and I've been playing the heck out of it for months. ---
It seems that when it comes down to it, when the US Government has to choose between the freedom of the public, and the economic growth of the country (particularly the megacorporations), they always come down on the side of the corporation.
Maybe it's because the corporations are the ones with the owner's certificates to the politicans with their large donations, and they know that the public in general isn't smart enough to realize what they heck they are doing and do anything but perpetuate the system? That when it comes down to it, loyalty has to lie with the people donating large amounts of money because that's the only way to stay in office?
And those of you bashing Clinton about this - first, can you show this is his policy? Second, do you think any other president in recent memory, or either of the republicrat party candidates would do anything different? We all know the shrub's "wonderful" views on freedom... ---
However, on a similar theme, Douglas Adams has started a site to create an "Earth Edition" of his Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy http://www.h2g2.com/.
I've actually tried it, but I found www.everything2.com to be much more interesting, user-friendly, and just all-around better. Heck, they've started adding Project Gutenberg stuff to it - last I checked, there was a lot of freely-available texts that had been entered, from the KJV Bible, to like a third to half of Shakespeare's works, to a lot of Edgar Allen Poe, and even Alice in Wonderland (I forget the actual exact title) - and tons of little stuff besides. ---
E2 has a teeny tiny font that's hard-wired into the system and cannot be changed. It is useless for me.
That was just the default theme, and it appears to have been fixed - I had the same problem for a long time, but now I can use that theme.
If you still have the problem, all you have to do is wade through it long enough to get yourself registered as a user and change the theme to something more readable. ---
www.everything2.com is a similar site - it's got tons of great stuff. Please read the FAW before making any nodes - E2 has an experience system, and it would suck for you if your first efforts at noding were, say, voted into the ground by vengeful elder noders:)
I think E2 is probably the best bet we've got for something like this in the future. The ability for all the users to add content makes it easier and faster to get information in there, since you don't have to wait for some group to get around to it. The system of nodes and writeups allows commentary to be put up with the text, and makes it much easier to find.
Besides, it's run right alongside Slashdot - what do you think those [?] symbols are in the stories? They're links to the term on everything2, because Slashdot is using Everything as a dictionary.
There are already a number of public domain texts that are there, and more are being added constantly. I think this should be the best location for any information... ---
As an AI researcher, I wonder what your take would be on the "Creatures" software products. Do you think they have done anything novel in the AI area, such as simulating a body and it's and it's influence on the brain, which is done as a neural net? Has any of the Creature Labs' work even been noticed by AI researchers?
I ran a Telegard BBS back in 94 with TradeWars 2002 on it. Man, those were the days!
I don't get why everyone used and remembers Telegard, when it was little more than a blatant rip-off of the T.A.G. BBS software, and rather inferior at that... I remember the first time I logged on to a Telegard BBS, right after it's "initial release", and it seemed they had done little more than changed the software name... ---
Does ANYONE remember this precursor to TradeWars 2002? Everyone talks like it's the only trade wars game that's been in existence... I spent many days playing this one, going on long planet-buying sprees when they'd go on sale for 99%, and months later find one of those planets still tucked away in some corner producing away...
Though that doesn't quite match the fun of dumping all your fighters, sneaking in under those 25,000 fighter fleets, and doing some planet-smashing of one of the big players.
And staying up late and hitting the auto-dialer at midnight hoping to be the first one in after maintenance to invade the Cabal...
I'd love to get a hold of this one, any version... heck, I'd even take Trade Wars 500 if that could be found.
I don't know what it was, but TradeWars 2002 just never had the same charm...
(We'll ignore that bug-riddled Galactic Warzone, though they tried so hard...) ---
I like driving. I take long car trips just for the sheer pleasure of it. If this freedom is taken away from me I will be very very unhappy.
Oh, I'm sure that, at least for a while, there will be plenty of space for everyone who likes to drive to do so. Of course, it may not be on the public interstates, where it may be mandated to use autosteering. Of course, that would really help traffic problems, and we could end up getting there twice as fast without any congestion much more easily... but if you want to stick to your driving, I'm sure they'll allow you to at least on the side roads. ---
I can't see the purpose in robot cars.... except maybe for people who CAN NOT drive themselves. Whish is what public transport is for.
You're saying that not once have you had to go somewhere, such as a long trip, and not wanted to drive the entire way?
I personally would love to be able to enter my destination and not have to drive the vehicle. And if everyone else was using automated vehicles also, imagine how much safer the road would be - I wonder what percentage of accidents are due to driver error? 99%? I'd stop having to worry about all the idiots on the road. ---
I recently saw the results of a study the UN did to determine which countries have the most freedom. They covered many different areas, from speech and religion, to the economy and the way minorities are treated.
Guess where the US placed? Not even in the top ten. Sweden was number one. ---
The idea of the "ruling elite" is exactly what the dimwits in North Carolina are thinking. They think that a fascist mini-police state in schools is the answer. There is no such thing as a benign dictatorship, because control-freaks *always* want more power.
"ruling elite" does not imply a fascist mini-police state. All it implies is that the people in charge wouldn't come from just anywhere in the public, but have special requirements. Perhaps they go to a special college which concentrates in specific areas that are quite relevant. I know it's not likely to work, but I think that set up correctly it could be much more effective than what we've got now. At least that way maybe we could get the people in charge to understand fundamental principles such as that the government is supposed to protect the rights of the minorities against the tyrrany of the majority - instead of what we've got not, where the tyrrany of the majority votes people in who will attempt to make that tyrrany part of the law.
The public does know better. If you don't think they are capable of voting, then they're aren't really capable consumers either. Do you favor a command economy as well?
If you think they know better, then why do they elect people which are more than happy to sign into law things such as UCITA or the DMCA?
And the economic part is a completely different situation. People are much more able to make competent desicions about themselves and their family then about the direction of the nation. Most people are quite easily able to make desicions that benefit themselves and make things fit more how they think they should be - and they're also just as quick to vote for people who promise the same things, and the key is that what's right for a person isn't necessarily what should be right for a nation.
Besides, how competent of consumers are they really? If they were more competent, maybe they'd realize how much they overpay on things like CDs and stop buying until the companies got the message. ---
You people in america REALLY need to stop this now. The police state is only a matter of time, if patently unjust activities like this are allowed.
Strange how these people still completely fail to address the reasons why people become dangerous. It seems that sweeping up the debris is more acceptable than solving the problem.
You make it sound like, as Americans, we have the ability to stop this. That's not true.
One of the advantages of Democracy is that the people have their say. But that's also one of the big disadvantages, because more often than not the people (in general) don't know that the fsck they're doing. And the politicians who understood what it was all about are also long gone, voted out by the public who doesn't know better.
Sometimes I think that the ideas for a "ruling elite" found in the Foundation series are what we need the most... a group of well-educated people, who don't need to spend all their time giving the people what they want at the expense of what they really need. But there isn't a chance, because people want to have some sort of control. I think they'd rather screw it up on their own then have someone else do things right but without any say from the general public.
I've considered moving out of this country, but unfortunately, there doesn't really seem to be anywhere better. Just different. ---
My only problem with the Matrix came in the scene where they are trying to avoid those big electric squid type things and someone says they are going to use an EMP bomb to disable the critter. At this point, Keanu's character says, "EMP? What's that?" Now, he's been "chosen" because of his skills. Because he is smart, because he is smarter than most, right? Well then how come he doesn't know what an EMP is?
Think for a second how aware and intelligent YOU'D be after going through the same thing he just went through. I'd have a hard time keeping my wits around me, and would surely have asked the same question.
Besides, he's in a whole new environment, and I'd prefer a person willing to make sure he understands, since there's plenty of chance that things could be different. ---
The only reason why Matrix got the awards it did over Star Wars is because most of the Star Wars effects didn't stand out to the voters. They had seen lightsabres and spaceships and blasters and armies of identical bugs... ah, robots. They hadn't seen the biotech stuff before. They hadn't seen the bullet-dodging, wallwalking bad-@$$ cyber-kung-fu $#!~ before. Sure, we may have, but they haven't and it made an impression.
You hit it exactly here.
Star Wars took existing effects to a all-time high, with more, better, clearer, faster, etc. But when it comes down to it, it was still the same old effects.
However, The Matrix took effects to the next level, with new ideas, procedures, methods, etc.
It's all the difference between mastering what you've got or gambling on something untried. ---
Acutually, it seems rare that you see EVERY song for a given album in MP3 format, so an internet-based distribution model could work, especially if the RIAA would develop a Napster-type program that charged you for each download. I'd be very interested in that. In fact, I'd buy a ton more CD's if they didn't cost so doggone much.
Why a Napster-type program? I think if Napster worked with the artists, they could both benefit.
Here's what I was thinking. Napster could serve a dual purpose. There will always be free.mp3 music files out there, and I mean legally free. Napster could still be used to spread them around like they currently are. This would allow artists to become known, maybe give away a freebie, etc.
Then it would have some sort of protocol for the commercial stuff. Say you're allowed to listen to a song 2 or 3 times to determine if you like it, and then you have to buy it if you want to keep listening. And these songs could be distributed in some sort of protected format until they're bought. And of course, Napster would have some sort of system in place to make sure nobody's distributing unlocked versions of the songs.
It's not foolproof, by any means. But it would take advantage of Napster's popularity and systems to distribute artists' songs to paying customers. Both Napster and the artist could possibly benefit from this.
I know there are plenty of technological problems that would have to be worked out, of course... but it's just the idea. ---
Slashdot Mirror
f I'm looking for a list of sites with a particular topic (e.g. "Everquest"), I use Yahoo.
I'd encourage you, and others looking based on topic, to actuall use the Open Directory Project first. It's passed Yahoo in size, and is usually better maintained. That, and the fact that if you see a category is rather weak, you can always sign up to update it yourself.
---
If it's not biological, your body won't reject it.
Untrue. When your body rejects something it means it's recognizing it as a foreign body an attacks it. It doesn't matter if it's a transplanted organ, a bacterium, or an LCD screen. If the body's immune system can react with it, then it can detect it and start attacking it.
Slightly off topic, this is why diamondoid is going to be so popular should molecular nanotechnology yield things you can inject into the human body. Diamondoid is completly unreactive to the human body - the immune system will never realize it's there.
---
I would say rather that in the future people might use genetics to modify the human body in order to make it more long-lived, quicker-thinking etc. etc.
There's a reason that genetic engineering of future generations isn't going to be the biggest part of human enhancement. Selfishness. As in people would rather give themselves the longer lifespan, the higher intelligence, then just give it to future generations. I will admit, I have the same feeling. Sure, it would be nice to change the DNA so children born would live for 200 years easily. But I'd rather they work on ways to do it to people alive today - because that can also be applied to the people born in the future.
I want to see what happens in the future so badly... I don't want to die, because I'd miss it. That's one of the biggest reasons I want to keep living longer, and why I hope they put the effort into technologies that can be applied to those of us alive today.
---
Certainly no intelligent species would want to replace itself with machines,
It depends on what you mean by "replace" here. If you mean be wiped out/be made extinct by their own creation, then quite likely no, because it contradicts the inherent survival instinct that it seems a life form would need to be successful. Though if you eliminate that, it still might make sense in the long run.
If you mean make themselves into machines, talking about "uploading" and all that, then it's a very smart thing to do - of course, we're assuming that the machines they would become would be less fragile then their bodies.
But then again, by the time a species gets to a point where they can inhabit mechanical bodies, it seems like they'd be able to manipulate the biological ones just about as well (because when you look at it at the lowest level, they're also just machines).
Biological fundamentalism isn't the best way to look at it. Think of the body as a vehicle for the consciousness, and decide what you'd want to do that way.
---
If it's mechanical that means there must be biological life. Even if a piece of steel grew a brain, it would become biological, would it not? If its a sentient computer, like AI or something, then what the hell made it? If humans, then its not extraterrestrial.
You're missing the point. Just because we meet mechanical life doesn't mean there is some biological life back home using/creating them. They may have self-evolved from a biological form to a mechanical form, and their biological form may be extinct because it was useless in comparison.
Though I think it's just as likely that they would use technology in ways that their form wouldn't really classify as mechanical, nor as biological as we would think of it.
I think the general suggestion is that if we were to meet another form of life, by then they'd have enough technology that they'd be creating a "body" to fit their task, instead of just accepting what they started off with as what they're supposed to have. Being able to do that myself is one reason I'm hoping nanotech shows up here soon...
---
It is much more reasonable to suppose that electronic "life" arose spontaneously than biological life. For example, given a universe in which every single atom represented a useful amino acid, and havin them all recombine a billion times a second (never mind the effects of distance/separation, decay, radiation, gravity, temperature...), you still require a universe nearly three powers of magnitude older than anyone has dared postulate just to bring the odds down to even of life having ever happened once, anywhere.
Computing the odds of life occuring is currently an exercise in futility. It's pasting a lot of assumptions together with a fact or two and proclaiming the result as useful.
For an interesting discussion of the probability of biological life forming spontaneously (abiogenesis), read Lies, Damned lies, Statistics and Probability of Abiogenesis Calculations. It's more aimed at creationists claiming life couldn't have formed on its own, but it's a good article.
---
THe constitution only protects federally
Read the Fourteenth Amendment. "No state shall make or enforce and law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;..."
That makes it pretty clear that the Constitution applies to state laws. The Supreme Court has upheld this time after time.
---
But local jurisdictions should have every right to put blocking software on their library computers.
Local governments do not have the right to override constitutionally protected freedoms. A city can't decide to ignore freedom of speech any more then they can force everyone to follow the same religion, or forcing a minority to be slaves.
And preventing people from reading/hearing the speech is the same thing as preventing people from presenting those ideas in the first place.
---
Sucks to hear about Williams, cool to hear Sega's still doin' 'em. Howsabout Bally?
I remember hearing about it Williams stopped making pinball machines. That was the biggest disappointment, as they had made, IMHO, the best pinball machines out there. High Speed. Pinbot. Funhouse. Comet/Cyclone/Whirlwind. Earthshaker. Twilight Zone. Addams Family. Star Trek:TNG. Demolition Man. I pumped so much money into those machines for years, always going for them over the machines made by anyone else, because they had such a better feel.
I need to find somewhere around me that has some machines, to see if I can get back into the feel of it. At least until I have the space to pick up a few machines, which I have already determined I am going to do. Who knows, if I feel like being mechanical at any point, I might make a hobby out of fixing old machines, trying to keep pinball alive as long as possible.
---
Even computerized pinball is dying. :-(
Oh my god, no, it is most definately NOT dying! Check out Pro Pinball for the best pinball simulations ever created on a computer. The four games of the Pro Pinball series are getting progressively more realistic, down to the ball hitting the glass, expert moves such as bang backs, and incredible complex and GOOD tables... Timeshock! is by far the best pinball game on any computer/game system ever made... I still have a long ways to go to master the thing, and I've been playing the heck out of it for months.
---
It seems that when it comes down to it, when the US Government has to choose between the freedom of the public, and the economic growth of the country (particularly the megacorporations), they always come down on the side of the corporation.
Maybe it's because the corporations are the ones with the owner's certificates to the politicans with their large donations, and they know that the public in general isn't smart enough to realize what they heck they are doing and do anything but perpetuate the system? That when it comes down to it, loyalty has to lie with the people donating large amounts of money because that's the only way to stay in office?
And those of you bashing Clinton about this - first, can you show this is his policy? Second, do you think any other president in recent memory, or either of the republicrat party candidates would do anything different? We all know the shrub's "wonderful" views on freedom...
---
However, on a similar theme, Douglas Adams has started a site to create an "Earth Edition" of his Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy http://www.h2g2.com/.
I've actually tried it, but I found www.everything2.com to be much more interesting, user-friendly, and just all-around better. Heck, they've started adding Project Gutenberg stuff to it - last I checked, there was a lot of freely-available texts that had been entered, from the KJV Bible, to like a third to half of Shakespeare's works, to a lot of Edgar Allen Poe, and even Alice in Wonderland (I forget the actual exact title) - and tons of little stuff besides.
---
E2 has a teeny tiny font that's hard-wired into the system and cannot be changed. It is useless for me.
That was just the default theme, and it appears to have been fixed - I had the same problem for a long time, but now I can use that theme.
If you still have the problem, all you have to do is wade through it long enough to get yourself registered as a user and change the theme to something more readable.
---
www.everything2.com is a similar site - it's got tons of great stuff. Please read the FAW before making any nodes - E2 has an experience system, and it would suck for you if your first efforts at noding were, say, voted into the ground by vengeful elder noders :)
I think E2 is probably the best bet we've got for something like this in the future. The ability for all the users to add content makes it easier and faster to get information in there, since you don't have to wait for some group to get around to it. The system of nodes and writeups allows commentary to be put up with the text, and makes it much easier to find.
Besides, it's run right alongside Slashdot - what do you think those [?] symbols are in the stories? They're links to the term on everything2, because Slashdot is using Everything as a dictionary.
There are already a number of public domain texts that are there, and more are being added constantly. I think this should be the best location for any information...
---
As an AI researcher, I wonder what your take would be on the "Creatures" software products. Do you think they have done anything novel in the AI area, such as simulating a body and it's and it's influence on the brain, which is done as a neural net? Has any of the Creature Labs' work even been noticed by AI researchers?
---
I ran a Telegard BBS back in 94 with TradeWars 2002 on it. Man, those were the days!
I don't get why everyone used and remembers Telegard, when it was little more than a blatant rip-off of the T.A.G. BBS software, and rather inferior at that... I remember the first time I logged on to a Telegard BBS, right after it's "initial release", and it seemed they had done little more than changed the software name...
---
Does ANYONE remember this precursor to TradeWars 2002? Everyone talks like it's the only trade wars game that's been in existence... I spent many days playing this one, going on long planet-buying sprees when they'd go on sale for 99%, and months later find one of those planets still tucked away in some corner producing away...
Though that doesn't quite match the fun of dumping all your fighters, sneaking in under those 25,000 fighter fleets, and doing some planet-smashing of one of the big players.
And staying up late and hitting the auto-dialer at midnight hoping to be the first one in after maintenance to invade the Cabal...
I'd love to get a hold of this one, any version... heck, I'd even take Trade Wars 500 if that could be found.
I don't know what it was, but TradeWars 2002 just never had the same charm...
(We'll ignore that bug-riddled Galactic Warzone, though they tried so hard...)
---
I like driving. I take long car trips just for the sheer pleasure of it. If this freedom is taken away from me I will be very very unhappy.
Oh, I'm sure that, at least for a while, there will be plenty of space for everyone who likes to drive to do so. Of course, it may not be on the public interstates, where it may be mandated to use autosteering. Of course, that would really help traffic problems, and we could end up getting there twice as fast without any congestion much more easily... but if you want to stick to your driving, I'm sure they'll allow you to at least on the side roads.
---
I can't see the purpose in robot cars.... except maybe for people who CAN NOT drive themselves. Whish is what public transport is for.
You're saying that not once have you had to go somewhere, such as a long trip, and not wanted to drive the entire way?
I personally would love to be able to enter my destination and not have to drive the vehicle. And if everyone else was using automated vehicles also, imagine how much safer the road would be - I wonder what percentage of accidents are due to driver error? 99%? I'd stop having to worry about all the idiots on the road.
---
the US is still the most free country around.
Bzzt. Wrong answer.
I recently saw the results of a study the UN did to determine which countries have the most freedom. They covered many different areas, from speech and religion, to the economy and the way minorities are treated.
Guess where the US placed? Not even in the top ten. Sweden was number one.
---
The idea of the "ruling elite" is exactly what the dimwits in North Carolina are thinking. They think that a fascist mini-police state in schools is the answer. There is no such thing as a benign dictatorship, because control-freaks *always* want more power.
"ruling elite" does not imply a fascist mini-police state. All it implies is that the people in charge wouldn't come from just anywhere in the public, but have special requirements. Perhaps they go to a special college which concentrates in specific areas that are quite relevant. I know it's not likely to work, but I think that set up correctly it could be much more effective than what we've got now. At least that way maybe we could get the people in charge to understand fundamental principles such as that the government is supposed to protect the rights of the minorities against the tyrrany of the majority - instead of what we've got not, where the tyrrany of the majority votes people in who will attempt to make that tyrrany part of the law.
The public does know better. If you don't think they are capable of voting, then they're aren't really capable consumers either. Do you favor a command economy as well?
If you think they know better, then why do they elect people which are more than happy to sign into law things such as UCITA or the DMCA?
And the economic part is a completely different situation. People are much more able to make competent desicions about themselves and their family then about the direction of the nation. Most people are quite easily able to make desicions that benefit themselves and make things fit more how they think they should be - and they're also just as quick to vote for people who promise the same things, and the key is that what's right for a person isn't necessarily what should be right for a nation.
Besides, how competent of consumers are they really? If they were more competent, maybe they'd realize how much they overpay on things like CDs and stop buying until the companies got the message.
---
This is absolutely disgusting.
You people in america REALLY need to stop this now. The police state is only a matter of time, if patently unjust activities like this are allowed.
Strange how these people still completely fail to address the reasons why people become dangerous. It seems that sweeping up the debris is more acceptable than solving the problem.
You make it sound like, as Americans, we have the ability to stop this. That's not true.
One of the advantages of Democracy is that the people have their say. But that's also one of the big disadvantages, because more often than not the people (in general) don't know that the fsck they're doing. And the politicians who understood what it was all about are also long gone, voted out by the public who doesn't know better.
Sometimes I think that the ideas for a "ruling elite" found in the Foundation series are what we need the most... a group of well-educated people, who don't need to spend all their time giving the people what they want at the expense of what they really need. But there isn't a chance, because people want to have some sort of control. I think they'd rather screw it up on their own then have someone else do things right but without any say from the general public.
I've considered moving out of this country, but unfortunately, there doesn't really seem to be anywhere better. Just different.
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My only problem with the Matrix came in the scene where they are trying to avoid those big electric squid type things and someone says they are going to use an EMP bomb to disable the critter. At this point, Keanu's character says, "EMP? What's that?" Now, he's been "chosen" because of his skills. Because he is smart, because he is smarter than most, right? Well then how come he doesn't know what an EMP is?
Think for a second how aware and intelligent YOU'D be after going through the same thing he just went through. I'd have a hard time keeping my wits around me, and would surely have asked the same question.
Besides, he's in a whole new environment, and I'd prefer a person willing to make sure he understands, since there's plenty of chance that things could be different.
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The only reason why Matrix got the awards it did over Star Wars is because most of the Star Wars effects didn't stand out to the voters. They had seen lightsabres and spaceships and blasters and armies of identical bugs... ah, robots. They hadn't seen the biotech stuff before. They hadn't seen the bullet-dodging, wallwalking bad-@$$ cyber-kung-fu $#!~ before. Sure, we may have, but they haven't and it made an impression.
You hit it exactly here.
Star Wars took existing effects to a all-time high, with more, better, clearer, faster, etc. But when it comes down to it, it was still the same old effects.
However, The Matrix took effects to the next level, with new ideas, procedures, methods, etc.
It's all the difference between mastering what you've got or gambling on something untried.
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Acutually, it seems rare that you see EVERY song for a given album in MP3 format, so an internet-based distribution model could work, especially if the RIAA would develop a Napster-type program that charged you for each download. I'd be very interested in that. In fact, I'd buy a ton more CD's if they didn't cost so doggone much.
.mp3 music files out there, and I mean legally free. Napster could still be used to spread them around like they currently are. This would allow artists to become known, maybe give away a freebie, etc.
Why a Napster-type program? I think if Napster worked with the artists, they could both benefit.
Here's what I was thinking. Napster could serve a dual purpose. There will always be free
Then it would have some sort of protocol for the commercial stuff. Say you're allowed to listen to a song 2 or 3 times to determine if you like it, and then you have to buy it if you want to keep listening. And these songs could be distributed in some sort of protected format until they're bought. And of course, Napster would have some sort of system in place to make sure nobody's distributing unlocked versions of the songs.
It's not foolproof, by any means. But it would take advantage of Napster's popularity and systems to distribute artists' songs to paying customers. Both Napster and the artist could possibly benefit from this.
I know there are plenty of technological problems that would have to be worked out, of course... but it's just the idea.
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