One of the reasons Japan isn't doing so hot is that they can't compete as well as they used to now that their labor wages are so high. I find it amazing that any business leader would think by eliminating all competition in their own country they are going to be more competitive on the world market. Since when has IBM or Sun decided that buying out Intel, AMD, and all the other chip makers is going to make them sell more chips in Asia? No, we in America do precisely the opposite. We stab our own domestic companies in the back unless they can do it for cheaper and better. We would happily see IBM, Sun, Intel, and AMD bite the dust if they bit the dust due to a leaner, more aggressive, and better producer.
What Japan should look at instead of conglomeration is lowering the cost of entrepeneuring, and encouraging young people to start companies. Rather than forcing on the youth the ideal of getting into a good college so you can get hired by a good company, they should push on the youth the concept of rebelling against conventional wisdom and inventing new businesses and technology to slay the dragons. This would keep the existing companies competetive because they would have to compete just to keep their domestic revenue. Instead, they are forming a cartel of sorts that will discourage innovation and competition, and the Japanese people are looking the other way. They don't have a culture of entrepeneurship, and they haven't worked to create one. Now they will get screwed by higher prices and crappier products thanks to an unrestricted monopoly. (Phase 2 of the plan, if it isn't obvious, is tariffs or restrictions on imported electronics.)
Maybe the US system of education is doing well for our country precisely because it is so incredibly broken compared to Japan's. People have a much better chance of succeeding economically by entrepeneurship than education and employment in our country. That's why your local independent plumber and painter are making more money than you are and they haven't even seen the inside of a college campus. And the net result is that people in our country know that the only way to be truly fabulously wealthy is to quit your job and go form your own company.
Up until QM, physicists viewed the world the same way almost all scientists had viewed it up until that point: as a giant machine moving according to some fundamental principles of motion. If you look inside a mechanical clock, you'll see a bunch of gears that each follow simple rules of motion but together produce a clock that behaves as you would expect it.
The QM theory troubled Einstein especially because that way of thinking no longer worked anymore. For the first time, there was something truly, and irreducibly, random. Stuff happens, and it happens one way half the time and the other way the other half of the time, and there is nothing anyone in this universe can do about it. What is amazing is that even within this randomness, the "old" order is preserved.
We should keep asking ourselves, "Why?" Why does the universe behave this way? Is this really the end of the story or are there more fundamental principles of motion to understand? We should explore the standard theories and experiment and see how close they are to reality. We ask this question almost knowing we won't get a good answer. But we discover all sorts of neat things along the way.
On the separation of philosophy and physics, they aren't that separated after all. The difference is that physicists go out and do experiments, while philosophers talk about doing experiments. There is a large group of physicists--the theoretical physicists--that really blur the lines between philosophy and physics. What's really interesting is to listen to philosophers and see what they have to say about QM, at least those that really understand it. Yes, you can take physics and treat it as a tool. "We know X, Y, and Z, and that's it." But I am telling you, that isn't interesting. What is really interesting is asking, "Why is X, Y, and Z X, Y, and Z and not A, B, and C?" That's where new ideas come and ground-breaking experiments are proposed.
I sat through a class on particle quantum physics, and I watched as the professor pulled out charts from experiments he personally ran. "This is the predicted behavior. As you can see, it matches up pretty well, within the margins of error. It's always exciting when you get something so right. Except for these completely unexpected spikes here, here, and here. What causes these spikes? We don't know. But whatever it is, it is interesting, and we are spending a great deal of time and effort trying to understand these spikes. I have some ideas, my colleagues have others, and I am sure some of you have your own. I can't predict which ideas are correct and anyone who says they can is a fool. We have to look more and figure things out before we can say for sure what causes these spikes."
We have made significant progress since Aristotle first started writing things down and being methodical about his observations. But we are nowhere near the goal of understanding the universe. And what we do know seems to say we can't ever know what makes up the universe.
You seem to misunderstand Occam's Razor completely. If two alternate theories fit the facts observed, then they are both equally valid, regardless of which one is more complicated. If someone were to discover an alternate theory that is different from QM or NM and that theory fits with observed phenonema equally well, then it would be just as valid as today's theories on mechanics. Occam's Razor says nothing about which theory is more correct or less correct. It only says to cut the fat from your theories and reduce it down to the bar minimum.
BTW, string theory doesn't fit the facts as well as other theories. It is pure speculation and an exercise in mathematics. Yes, the 10 dimensional thing is interesting, but it doesn't explain very much and it is incorrect on several fundamental points. You should know that at any one time in the physics world there are several GUT (Grand Unification Theories) being passed around. Each of them are equally valid until evidence supporting one and discrediting another are found. So, yes, there are several competing theories, each of them different. Note also that Newtonian Mechanics doesn't even explain all phenonema observed in the macro world; and in QM, we know for a fact that there is behavior observed that outright contradicts it. However, it is the best we got, and until someone finds something equally good or better, it's what we're using.
IF water is found on Mars, and IF chemicals that we attribute to biological processes are discovered on Mars, then it is very likely that there was life on Mars, or is life now. Since we can't say one way or the other, we should be looking at both and pretending in one instance that there is no life, and in another that there is. This isn't jumping the gun. Jumping the gun is saying "There is no life on Mars" when we can't tell for sure one way or the other. This is just like physicists saying, "If we find gravity waves, then..." or "If we can observe the Higgs Boson, then..." and then going so far as to teach the theories and explanations in class. Of course, physicists are much more careful in stating facts than biologists and archeaologists. "Yes, running this high-energy experiment could create miniature black holes according to some theories that are somewhat valid. And yes, according to some theories that are somewhat valid this black hole could accumulate mass and destroy the earth. However, there are other theories that say a small black hole would evaporate or that black holes don't even exist and cannot be created."
There are a few Christian denominations that say "no". However, most permit it under specific circumstances.
It is clear that Christians are expected to be subordinate to their government. If that means they are drafted to war, they are expected to fight that war.
It is clear that God himself ordered genocide in Old Testament times. So, if God is just, then in certain circumstances, warfare, and even genocide are just. If you believe God somehow changed between BC and AD, then you have to explain how the definition and meaning of justice can change from one period of time or another, or explain how God can be both just and unjust.
"Thou shalt not kill". But a better translation is "Though shalt not shed innocent blood." In fact, God commanded men to kill people in certain circumstances as mentioned above.
Should Christians defend themselves? "Turn the other cheek" and "give him your cloak also" implies a limit to the number of cheeks to turn and cloaks to give. Jesus commanded his followers to walk an extra mile, not two or three, and certainly not until you work yourself to death. Jesus' commandment to forgive 70x7 could be interpreted to mean forgive those who truly repent 70x7.
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" "By your fruits ye shall know them". I look at our military objectively. I see a group of men who live sacrificing themselves for their friends. From the day they show up to the recruiters office until the day the stop, every moment is spent living as a servant by choice not force. If you want to know how a Christian can reconcile their conscience with bloody hands, ask one of them and listen closely. When you put on that uniform, you might as well paint a great big red circle. According to the Geneva convention, people who wear our country's uniform are valid targets to be slaughtered mercilessly until they surrender. They are literally laying their life down so that we can live in peace and without threat. I think our military is truly the organization that has the best people in our country.
Jesus drove the merchants out of the temple with force. Does that imply Christians are allowed to use force betimes? Jesus once declared that he didn't come to the earth to bring peace, but the sword. Does that mean that Christians are to bring peace to the earth, or the sword? Jesus prophesied of wars and rumors of wars. he prophesied of calamities. Are Christians spectators or will they have to participate?
I would dearly like to have peace with the terrorist world. I intend them no harm, why do they threaten me? Why are they demanding I convert to their perverted version of Islam and abandon my country's ideals? It is suicide to sacrifice one's self, one's family, and one's neighbor on the altar of pointless exercises in futility. It is apparent that by sacrificing ourselves we will not change the minds of the terrorists and convince them to change their ways. In fact, they see forgiveness as a weakness, and their hearts are unmoved. Note that I am talking about the hardened terrorists---not the muslim world. The muslim world we can live peacably with, and largely have, for quite some time.
You are correct that the Moslems and other religions have built pretty good societies. Yes, we owe the Rennaisance to the preserving efforts of Moslem scholars. However, look at the successful societies today. If you walk around Japan, you will notice that while they have still preserved some of their traditions and religion, it is mostly gone today. It is replaced with the Western culture, which is largely influenced by Christian philosophy. The same holds true for every other good society today, from South Africe to Australia to Asia and South America. And look at the European societies. How did such a small bit of land dominate the world so powerfully for such a long time? Why did Spain, France, England, and even the Netherlanders carve up empires so much greater than anything the Romans could hope for? How could they turn around so quickly from being impoverished serfs to an international power?
The secret was that these societies were reborn, in a large way, by their rediscover of classical Christianity. I think the results were most marked in England, were the Bible was freely published and distributed. Even the poorest could cite key scriptures and the middle class owned their own copy of it and referred to it frequently.
Let's talk about WHY the countries signed on to the concept of the Geneva convention in the first place. If you read a little history, you'll note that the European powers didn't mind the frequent wars. It was the people who clamored to stop them. They would rather live in peace that see so much bloodshed. It was a religious person who founded the Red Cross, and religious people who began a drive towards world peace by abolishing or limiting warfare. I think if you look at the founding of the League of Nations, you will find the people behind it were very religious Christians who wanted nothing more than to usher in the millenium through peaceful negotiations rather than pointless warfare. It was the relentless efforts of these peace-mongers that convinced the nations as a whole to accept the concepts and to actually agree to it. As it was at the time, none of the heads of state would've liked to see and end to war or at least the worst parts of it.
I think it is a mistake to include Adam Smith in your discussion of non-religious economists. His "Invisible Hand" was an obvious parallel to Nature or God. Regardless, where did this philosophy of "leave others alone so they'll leave you alone" come from? Why didn't Rome have libertarians back in the day? Why, it comes from Christ's teaching of "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". What about the separation of church and state? That came from Jesus' saying, "Render that which is Ceasars to ceasar". He showed that you can be religious and live in a state that was irreligious quite capably. In fact, he proved that it is not the state's job to make people religious or ensure morals are being met. In fact, he probably did more to teach about chastity by forgiving the adultress caught in the act than her execution would've taught.
You missed my point entirely. I wasn't arguing the merits of the possibilities. I was merely pointing them out.
Our sampling of the universe (we only have a good look at one planet in this universe, and very little information on 8 others) means that we don't know enough to say definitively any way. When we start to build up a larger sampling, with a good understanding of extra-solar planets, then we can start saying for sure where exactly life started and whether or not it is confined to our planet or solar system alone. Until then, we are ignorant on the subject, and anyone who supposes otherwise is trusting their guesses more than observation plus logic. On the origins of life, scientists say, "We don't know for sure, but here's our best guess that is subject to change pending more observation." At least the scientists that truly understand the body of evidence we have today.
I find it interesting that you incorrectly use Occam's Razor as a way to reinforce the first notion. Occam's Razor says leave the irrelevant stuff out when explaining something. It doesn't say throw out the more complicated but different explanations. Often the simplest explanation is wrong. Newtonian Mechanics and even Quantum Mechanics is not the complete story of particle motion. Hence the excitement over string theory. Occam's Razor, if it is what you think it is, would state that the classical physics model (pre-Newton: IE, things move, but then they tend to stop after a while) was more correct because it was simpler to explain than Newton's three laws.
While I agree with you that scientists should not have a problem questioning common thinking, unfortunately, history demonstrates otherwise. Even in our enlightened times, people would rather stick with prevailing theories than examine alternate explanations in the face of new evidence. It's almost the same as it was back in Galileo's day, except we are much better at not killing each other based on our beliefs.
You must not know anything about economics. Printing money to pay off billions of dollars of debt would completely destroy the economy. Investors have faith that the US isn't short-sighted enough to cut off their nose to spite their face.
We do print billions of dollars every year, unsecured! We have this group of bankers who decide how much money they're going to print out of thin air every year. We call them the Federal Reserve. Even when they played with our economy by bringing the interest rate way up (thus printing untold trillions in fresh currency, unsecured), we still recovered quite well.
Companies go under, the US does not. You have a huge ammount[sic] of risk if you invest in stocks, and the return can be huge, or a complete loss. The entire country was up in arms when Enron went under because Enron stock was a big part of their retirement fund. IMHO, you have to be stupid to invest money you DEPEND ON in stocks.
Companies ARE the US! Individual companies MAY go under, but in the long run, in average, they do remarkably well. Yes, Enron went down. But I can name you thousands and thousands of companies that didn't. A very large number of them did incredibly well. Look at the stock charts. Take the Dow Jones, for instance. It goes up exponentially over time, at about 20% per year! In my mind, you have to be stupid to not invest free capital in the stock market. I mean, if I told you I can guaranteed give you 20% per year on your money, and I consistently delivered for the past 100 years, why would you put it anywhere else?
Besides, if the stock market really failed, I mean, failed in a way that made the stocks irrecoverable, it would have to be because we were hit with a crippling nuclear attack and no one can rebuild anything. In that scenario, even gold won't be worth much, because there will be nothing to buy.
US bonds generally give you better interest than a bank, and you can get big tax breaks from them, which make them rather more valuable.
I don't see why Japan and China would think getting tax breaks by buying bonds would make them more attractive. They pay 0 in taxes to the US government anyway.
But think of this! Look at the Dow Jones average over the past 100 years. A far safer bet would've been to sink those trillions of dollars into American companies. Instead, the Japanese and Chinese are buying some of the worst investments in America! You can't find a serious trader whose principal strategy is to buy American debt.
YES, we will repay the debt. But guess what? On average, an American company will succeed fantastically! Why they trust the taxpayers and not our business leaders is a mystery to me.
Bottom line is, if the Japanese invested like Warren Buffet, they wouldn't have any national debt and would have money coming out of their ears they wouldn't know what to do with like Warren Buffet. They would have all this cash and capital and wonder, "What in the world can I do with this?"
In the vast realm of possibilities that all agree with the current theories of evolution, these are some of the interesting ones I've heard of or thought of. These are all possibilities. Nobody can say what the likelihood of each are, except that they are all really, really improbable.
(1) Life was generated on earth, evolved on earth, and stayed on earth. No interplanetary travel of life. To discover life on Mars would suggest that life tends to develop on most planets with earth-like mass and orbits. Thus, the earth is not unique, where are the intelligent aliens?
(2) Life was not generated on earth, but somewhere else, and was transplanted to earth, where it further evolved. The mechanics of the actual transport can range from a stray meteor causing bacteria or fungus to be ejected into the upper atmosphere and beyond, to some intelligent species actually transplanting life intentionally or not.
(3) Life was generated on earth, and from earth it spread. Again, the mechanics could be a stray meteor to the actions of intelligent life.
Stretch your mind and think of the possibilities. Are we really alone in this cold, dark universe, or have other species evolved over time? Are we the most advanced that Homo Sapiens has ever been (IE, is Atlantis more than a myth?) Have there been other intelligent species before Homo Sapiens that could have been space-faring? With the understanding that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, there can be a whole lot going on around us that we are totally ignorant of.
Now, common thinking is that earth is a unique thing, life started here and evolved here, and we 21st century animals are the pinnacle of our race and indeed any race that has ever lived on this planet. But why is this common thinking? If we discover evidence that even hints at any one of these assumptions being wrong, do we dare question common thinking? Any sane scientist would have to answer, "Yes!"
Thirty years ago the idea of finding life ANYWHERE but here was equally preposterous. We thought our solar system was one in a billion because it had a rock large enough to sustain life around it. But we started studying the stars and guess what? The number of stars out there with planets that are roughly earth's mass and earth's distance from the sun is surprisingly large. Even binary stars have planets around them, which people thought was impossible!
I'm just saying that even though nobody actually believes we will find any type of intelligent life on Mars, let alone HUMAN life, it is in the realm of possibilities (however infinitessimally small!)
I've been using KMail for quite a while now. I don't clearly remember why I chose it above the alternatives. However, I believe it was a combination of the following things.
(1) KMail is mature. It can handle a variety of mail delivery systems properly. In particular, it handles my setup extremely well. (The others do equally well, however.)
(2) KMail integrates well into the KDE platform. If you're using KDE, you'll probably like KMail. If you're not, then it probably won't work for you.
(3) KMail seems to be snappier and less memory hungry than Evolution and Thunderbird. (I haven't used recent versions of Thunderbird, so this may not be true.)
(4) KMail handles HTML and Outlook mail reasonably well. It doesn't try to pressure me to use HTML format, but it does pretty well with it anyway.
(5) I tried for a while to use the command line MUAs. Mutt was my best fit, but it had weaknesses where KMail had strengths. I think KMail does a reasonable job of keeping the UNIX philosophy in that it doesn't try to do everything, just reading and delivering mail.
(6) KMail seems more intuitive. The keyboard settings seemed to fit my style, whereas the others don't quite match well.
(7) KMail has reasonable support for mailing lists. The others may have good support to, it's just that I haven't been able to get them to work together too well.
Ultimately, it comes down to choice. I don't expect many people to have similar experiences to mine.
Sorry to rain on everyone's parades here, but to find any signs of life on Mars would really damage the current theory of how life got to be here.
See, the chances of life spontaneously being created on a planet is so astronomically small as to be almost impossible. The universe is vast, and finding a handful of other planets in different galaxies that also bore life at one point in their histories would corroborate this. In fact, finding no planets with any signs of life corroborates it even better.
However, if we find life on our next door neighbor, we have some explaining to do. How did life get there? Was it transplanted from earth? Or was earth life transplanted from Mars? If life can propogate across the void of space between earth and Mars, what's to stop it from propogating across solar systems and perhaps even galaxies in astronomical time scales? How old is life anyway, and where did it really come from?
All of a sudden, earth won't seem so unique anymore. And we'll start wondering why SETI hasn't turned anything up yet.
Now, if we found HUMAN life on Mars, that would really destroy all of the ongoing theories of the origins of life on earth. Either we are a spacefaring species and thus earth is not our home, or somehow, despite all odds, humanity has evolved on two separate planets that just happen to be right next to each other.
I can't predict reliably one way or the other, but my guesses are that Mars is a dead as the moon. As with anything in science, it's the surprises that are interesting here.
This is why MySQL is bad. Rather than actually approach ACID compliance, they kind of gloss over it as if it's not important. Within a single transaction there is exactly one version of the table any process should see. It's that way with any real database. Why should it be any different for MySQL?
I know that Oracle handles this with rollback segments. It keeps around the old rows that were deleted or modified and resurrects them for old processes that shouldn't see the recent stuff. PostgreSQL just adds new rows to the tables and keeps a record of which transactions should see which rows. I'm not sure how DB2 does it but I am certain it is something like the above two. And if MS-SQL doesn't do this, I would be very surprised.
Until MySQL does transactions right, or even attempts to, it's a toy database. They aren't going to find a magical way to get around this. They should listen to the academics on databases because it is a well-understood problem and has withstood the test of time.
Let's assume that the headline is true. "Bush spied on Americans". Yeah, the problem is.... what exactly? Why is it wrong to spy on Americans, especially when we feel that those so-called "Americans" are collaborating with an enemy whose MO is to infiltrate a nation to attack it from within?
Tell me, exactly, how Bush is supposed to catch and kill domestic terrorists without spying on Americans?
In my mind, security trumps liberty. Are we handing over our liberty for security's sake? No. But when you are a threat to our security, you have no liberties. If you donate 1 shiny red cent to any organization tied to any terrorist organization, if you speak oiut encouraging people to attack America or its interests, you are no longer entitled to your liberties. You are an enemy of the state and the people of the US, and should be spied on day and night without excuse.
Ask yourself, "By what reason does my government consider it necessary to collect this information?" The reason is clear: terrorism. Yes, it is a real threat, and no, it is not going away anytime soon.
It's time you told the government that the people are quite capable of defeating domestic terrorists without the invasion of privacy. I suggest you start learn Arabic and start gathering information for the government. Turn in those you suspect of terrorism along with the evidence you, a private citizen, collected. That way, it won't be the government that has to take away your rights, it will be you doing it to each other. But whom do you trust more? The guy down the street or the guy who calls himself PM?
Bottom line is, in America we take responsibility for our safety. We buy guns and learn how to use them. We report suspicious activity. When someone is being hurt, we don't hurry by. We are invasive to each other and we don't respect other's right to privacy. Privacy to do what? Blow us up? Heck no.
That's why we've been able to keep terrorism in check here at home. We as a people are largely vigilant, making the government's job easy.
The trouble comes when you tell your government: Give me the blessings of security but I don't want to lift a finger. Then the government does what it has to: invades your liberty to give you a bit of security.
Europe, if you want to know why we elected a cowboy for president, go watch some old Westerns in black and white. Imagine yourself as one of the townswomen, afraid to go out at night. Imagine yourself as the banker living in fear of the gang coming down and greeting you with a stick of dynamite. You'll see why we like our cowboys, and why we encourage our young men to pick up guns and kill the bad guys.
It fascinates me to no end how people familiar with Christianity can ever blame the religion for the failings of its followers.
Jesus built his entire ministry on the fallacy of hypocrisy. No hypocrite could be considered a Christian! And yet hypocrisy is somehow a Christian attribute?
Look around at modern philosophy, where modern is anything after the 1300s. Name ONE significant contribution to modern society that allowed the creation of super societies the planet couldn't even imagine that isn't contributed by Christianity. The bottom line, the internet wouldn't exist had it not been for Christ's humble teachings 2,000 years ago.
Modern governments are the implementation of a Christian ideal. We've been working on the idea of how to run a country the way Christ would ever since Rome became the Holy Roman Empire. Economics is fundamentally a Christian philosophy that teaches us to not meddle in each other's affairs. War in the modern world is waged according to Christian ideals. That's why we can't abuse prisoners with Abu Ghraib and shrug it off easily, and that's why everybody in the US does some serious introspection before waging it. (Abraham Lincoln retorted to someone who hoped that God was on their side that it would be better if we were on God's side.) The Marshall Plan is the practice of the Christian ideal of "Love thy enemy".
There is a reason that the Moslems and Buddhists and Shintoists and Hindus have never built the kind of society that we are enjoying now today. The best that these religions have born is a third-world shadow of the Christian society we have today. Why? It is simply because they are ultimately incorrect. Only Christianity has the right combination of justice and mercy and plays out in the end valuing the follower over the preacher. Christians don't go around killing people of other faiths because they are of a different faith. They don't long for transcending this world, but rather conquering it through righteousness. They don't believe in fairy tales and they don't worship dead pieces of rock and wood. And they don't go around telling people that they are poor because God said so and there's nothing they can ever do about it. And as we learn how to be better Christians, our society is improving. Remember, even as late as the 60's and the Civil Rights Movement, it was a Christian political issue, with Martin Luther King himself being a preacher by trade.
There is only one hope for mankind, and it is Christianity. Rather than fighting the religion, or the establishments of religion, which Jesus himself never did, fight to make yourself a better Christian, and fight to make others better by perfect love. Sacrifice yourself, your time, your money, your talents, and anything else you have to serve those around you. That is the ultimate ideal, and the only path to happiness.
The sad and funny thing about macro-economics is that they ignore where wealth is actually created.
I've studied long and hard about the so-called problems of trade imbalance. All I can see is a bunch of people asserting things without backing them up. I've looked at historical examples of trade imbalances. I can't see how it is a bad thing, even in the long run.
In America, wealth is generated with EVERY TRANSACTION in trade. Every little thing you buy in the store, every time you put your money in the bank, or take it out, or buy a stock or sell it, or make a house payment, etc... wealth is generated. Someone gave you something that is worth more to you than it was to them, and in exchange, you gave them something worth more to them than you. If it weren't so, the trade would not have occurred. In fact, even NOT TRADING creates wealth.
Only in America do people understand this at a common-sensical level. We know that by buying groceries, we generate wealth. By staying home and eating leftovers, we generate wealth. Boycotting creates wealth (because well-behaved companies are more valuable to society than ill-behaved ones). Donating to charity creates wealth (because we value charitable acts and are willing to spend money on it). We don't buy into this "buy! buy! buy!" consumerism because we know it is not right. It is only when we take our hard-earned cash and spend it on things MORE valuable to us than cash that we are helping the economy.
No other country in the world has such an economy. All other economies put on limits or they misinform the people about what is needed to generate wealth. The net effect is that people make decisions that actually reduce the wealth in the country.
I find it mildly humorous that the US has been able to get foreign countries to buy our debt when we can print as much of it as we like at any time. Any country that has a long-term strategy of buying American debt is in for a surprise one of these days. Besides, the bonds don't even pay very well! Americans won't buy them because their return is too low. They'd rather buy shares in an American company, because almost any company does better than American bonds.
Add to that that our economy is growing faster than our interest rates, so that our collective debt to GDP ratio today is lower than it was 20 years ago, and you see why Americans are more than willing to borrow as much money as possible from anyone stupid enough to lend it to us rather than invest in their own country. If China and Japan were really smart, they would be buying American companies or even their own companies. They'd get a better return, the money would flow back into their own country, and then find its way back into their own coffers.
In the end, the US wins in any scenario. If the rest of the world should stop trading with us, they'll lose a lot more than we would.
In my experience, as someone with a high IQ, IQ has little or nothing to do with success or even smarts. I've looked around myself and I see people with average IQs perform better than myself and IQ-equivalent peers. Why? Because they work harder.
In the end, it's not what you are given that determines your success. It is what you do with it. And that means work.
You're going to want to separate out your web server if you are going to face any real load. A good mod_perl implementation with a PostgreSQL (or even MySQL) can give you the kind of dynamic speeds you need. Since the AJAX queries usually translate to a single call, you can probably get much more performance than the older style where each page had to make several queries.
To serve up the webpage, I think you should go with a static HTTP server if you can. If you can't I would use a different server because there are different queries and a different load characteristic. For starters, people can wait 2 seconds while a new page loads, but they will get antsy if they have to wait more than 1/2 a second for a trivial AJAX query to complete.
The simple answer is Microsoft has no incentive to provide software that works. They only want to provide software that will get people to dump bucketloads of cash on the Microsoft campus. Until people value software that works (which we know from experience they don't -- except rare customers) this won't change.
The Free Software community identified this problem a long time ago. They also saw another problem. As the number of users of software increases, the number of feature requests increase as well. How do you satisfy all of these customers simultaneously? Eventually, the proprietary software model is unable to address the needs of their customer base as it grows. (Witness that there is no Icelandic Windows available anywhere.) The Free Software solution is to let the users fix it. So, if there is a problem with the software that any one person is willing to spend the time and money on to fix, then it will get fixed for everyone. Since security holes bother at least a few of the users of Free Software, and these users are also ones willing to put in the time and cash to get it fixed, it gets fixed.
Simple capitalism is the reason why Free Software is doing so much better than proprietary software. As a piece of Free Software becomes popular, it increases in security, features, and usability at a faster rate than proprietary because of the economic incentives.
I'm running FC4 which is stable and has a pretty recent KDE.
* If you double click on a text file, it opens a new window (KWrite) which is a much better editor than Notepad. (I personally prefer GViM, and it's not too hard to configure it to use that.)
* I hit the red hat (start menu), clicked and held on an app, and dragged it to my desktop. It asked if I wanted to copy or link to it. Either way, it works.
* I just opened a text file in KWrite (double clicking from konqueror), copied text (CTRL-C), and then closed it. Then I created a new text file (in Konqueror - right click->Create New->Text File), double-clicked it, and I pasted with CTRL-V. It worked.
* Your review is over a year and a half old. You should try out the latest version. A lot happens in a year in the OS world.
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One of the reasons Japan isn't doing so hot is that they can't compete as well as they used to now that their labor wages are so high. I find it amazing that any business leader would think by eliminating all competition in their own country they are going to be more competitive on the world market. Since when has IBM or Sun decided that buying out Intel, AMD, and all the other chip makers is going to make them sell more chips in Asia? No, we in America do precisely the opposite. We stab our own domestic companies in the back unless they can do it for cheaper and better. We would happily see IBM, Sun, Intel, and AMD bite the dust if they bit the dust due to a leaner, more aggressive, and better producer.
What Japan should look at instead of conglomeration is lowering the cost of entrepeneuring, and encouraging young people to start companies. Rather than forcing on the youth the ideal of getting into a good college so you can get hired by a good company, they should push on the youth the concept of rebelling against conventional wisdom and inventing new businesses and technology to slay the dragons. This would keep the existing companies competetive because they would have to compete just to keep their domestic revenue. Instead, they are forming a cartel of sorts that will discourage innovation and competition, and the Japanese people are looking the other way. They don't have a culture of entrepeneurship, and they haven't worked to create one. Now they will get screwed by higher prices and crappier products thanks to an unrestricted monopoly. (Phase 2 of the plan, if it isn't obvious, is tariffs or restrictions on imported electronics.)
Maybe the US system of education is doing well for our country precisely because it is so incredibly broken compared to Japan's. People have a much better chance of succeeding economically by entrepeneurship than education and employment in our country. That's why your local independent plumber and painter are making more money than you are and they haven't even seen the inside of a college campus. And the net result is that people in our country know that the only way to be truly fabulously wealthy is to quit your job and go form your own company.
Up until QM, physicists viewed the world the same way almost all scientists had viewed it up until that point: as a giant machine moving according to some fundamental principles of motion. If you look inside a mechanical clock, you'll see a bunch of gears that each follow simple rules of motion but together produce a clock that behaves as you would expect it.
The QM theory troubled Einstein especially because that way of thinking no longer worked anymore. For the first time, there was something truly, and irreducibly, random. Stuff happens, and it happens one way half the time and the other way the other half of the time, and there is nothing anyone in this universe can do about it. What is amazing is that even within this randomness, the "old" order is preserved.
We should keep asking ourselves, "Why?" Why does the universe behave this way? Is this really the end of the story or are there more fundamental principles of motion to understand? We should explore the standard theories and experiment and see how close they are to reality. We ask this question almost knowing we won't get a good answer. But we discover all sorts of neat things along the way.
On the separation of philosophy and physics, they aren't that separated after all. The difference is that physicists go out and do experiments, while philosophers talk about doing experiments. There is a large group of physicists--the theoretical physicists--that really blur the lines between philosophy and physics. What's really interesting is to listen to philosophers and see what they have to say about QM, at least those that really understand it. Yes, you can take physics and treat it as a tool. "We know X, Y, and Z, and that's it." But I am telling you, that isn't interesting. What is really interesting is asking, "Why is X, Y, and Z X, Y, and Z and not A, B, and C?" That's where new ideas come and ground-breaking experiments are proposed.
I sat through a class on particle quantum physics, and I watched as the professor pulled out charts from experiments he personally ran. "This is the predicted behavior. As you can see, it matches up pretty well, within the margins of error. It's always exciting when you get something so right. Except for these completely unexpected spikes here, here, and here. What causes these spikes? We don't know. But whatever it is, it is interesting, and we are spending a great deal of time and effort trying to understand these spikes. I have some ideas, my colleagues have others, and I am sure some of you have your own. I can't predict which ideas are correct and anyone who says they can is a fool. We have to look more and figure things out before we can say for sure what causes these spikes."
We have made significant progress since Aristotle first started writing things down and being methodical about his observations. But we are nowhere near the goal of understanding the universe. And what we do know seems to say we can't ever know what makes up the universe.
You seem to misunderstand Occam's Razor completely. If two alternate theories fit the facts observed, then they are both equally valid, regardless of which one is more complicated. If someone were to discover an alternate theory that is different from QM or NM and that theory fits with observed phenonema equally well, then it would be just as valid as today's theories on mechanics. Occam's Razor says nothing about which theory is more correct or less correct. It only says to cut the fat from your theories and reduce it down to the bar minimum.
BTW, string theory doesn't fit the facts as well as other theories. It is pure speculation and an exercise in mathematics. Yes, the 10 dimensional thing is interesting, but it doesn't explain very much and it is incorrect on several fundamental points. You should know that at any one time in the physics world there are several GUT (Grand Unification Theories) being passed around. Each of them are equally valid until evidence supporting one and discrediting another are found. So, yes, there are several competing theories, each of them different. Note also that Newtonian Mechanics doesn't even explain all phenonema observed in the macro world; and in QM, we know for a fact that there is behavior observed that outright contradicts it. However, it is the best we got, and until someone finds something equally good or better, it's what we're using.
IF water is found on Mars, and IF chemicals that we attribute to biological processes are discovered on Mars, then it is very likely that there was life on Mars, or is life now. Since we can't say one way or the other, we should be looking at both and pretending in one instance that there is no life, and in another that there is. This isn't jumping the gun. Jumping the gun is saying "There is no life on Mars" when we can't tell for sure one way or the other. This is just like physicists saying, "If we find gravity waves, then..." or "If we can observe the Higgs Boson, then..." and then going so far as to teach the theories and explanations in class. Of course, physicists are much more careful in stating facts than biologists and archeaologists. "Yes, running this high-energy experiment could create miniature black holes according to some theories that are somewhat valid. And yes, according to some theories that are somewhat valid this black hole could accumulate mass and destroy the earth. However, there are other theories that say a small black hole would evaporate or that black holes don't even exist and cannot be created."
Are Christians allowed to fight in a war?
There are a few Christian denominations that say "no". However, most permit it under specific circumstances.
It is clear that Christians are expected to be subordinate to their government. If that means they are drafted to war, they are expected to fight that war.
It is clear that God himself ordered genocide in Old Testament times. So, if God is just, then in certain circumstances, warfare, and even genocide are just. If you believe God somehow changed between BC and AD, then you have to explain how the definition and meaning of justice can change from one period of time or another, or explain how God can be both just and unjust.
"Thou shalt not kill". But a better translation is "Though shalt not shed innocent blood." In fact, God commanded men to kill people in certain circumstances as mentioned above.
Should Christians defend themselves? "Turn the other cheek" and "give him your cloak also" implies a limit to the number of cheeks to turn and cloaks to give. Jesus commanded his followers to walk an extra mile, not two or three, and certainly not until you work yourself to death. Jesus' commandment to forgive 70x7 could be interpreted to mean forgive those who truly repent 70x7.
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" "By your fruits ye shall know them". I look at our military objectively. I see a group of men who live sacrificing themselves for their friends. From the day they show up to the recruiters office until the day the stop, every moment is spent living as a servant by choice not force. If you want to know how a Christian can reconcile their conscience with bloody hands, ask one of them and listen closely. When you put on that uniform, you might as well paint a great big red circle. According to the Geneva convention, people who wear our country's uniform are valid targets to be slaughtered mercilessly until they surrender. They are literally laying their life down so that we can live in peace and without threat. I think our military is truly the organization that has the best people in our country.
Jesus drove the merchants out of the temple with force. Does that imply Christians are allowed to use force betimes? Jesus once declared that he didn't come to the earth to bring peace, but the sword. Does that mean that Christians are to bring peace to the earth, or the sword? Jesus prophesied of wars and rumors of wars. he prophesied of calamities. Are Christians spectators or will they have to participate?
I would dearly like to have peace with the terrorist world. I intend them no harm, why do they threaten me? Why are they demanding I convert to their perverted version of Islam and abandon my country's ideals? It is suicide to sacrifice one's self, one's family, and one's neighbor on the altar of pointless exercises in futility. It is apparent that by sacrificing ourselves we will not change the minds of the terrorists and convince them to change their ways. In fact, they see forgiveness as a weakness, and their hearts are unmoved. Note that I am talking about the hardened terrorists---not the muslim world. The muslim world we can live peacably with, and largely have, for quite some time.
Looking at the internet, it seems I was wrong. The movie "Swordfish" has one of its characters claiming this event, but it is probably not factual.
You are correct that the Moslems and other religions have built pretty good societies. Yes, we owe the Rennaisance to the preserving efforts of Moslem scholars. However, look at the successful societies today. If you walk around Japan, you will notice that while they have still preserved some of their traditions and religion, it is mostly gone today. It is replaced with the Western culture, which is largely influenced by Christian philosophy. The same holds true for every other good society today, from South Africe to Australia to Asia and South America. And look at the European societies. How did such a small bit of land dominate the world so powerfully for such a long time? Why did Spain, France, England, and even the Netherlanders carve up empires so much greater than anything the Romans could hope for? How could they turn around so quickly from being impoverished serfs to an international power?
The secret was that these societies were reborn, in a large way, by their rediscover of classical Christianity. I think the results were most marked in England, were the Bible was freely published and distributed. Even the poorest could cite key scriptures and the middle class owned their own copy of it and referred to it frequently.
Let's talk about WHY the countries signed on to the concept of the Geneva convention in the first place. If you read a little history, you'll note that the European powers didn't mind the frequent wars. It was the people who clamored to stop them. They would rather live in peace that see so much bloodshed. It was a religious person who founded the Red Cross, and religious people who began a drive towards world peace by abolishing or limiting warfare. I think if you look at the founding of the League of Nations, you will find the people behind it were very religious Christians who wanted nothing more than to usher in the millenium through peaceful negotiations rather than pointless warfare. It was the relentless efforts of these peace-mongers that convinced the nations as a whole to accept the concepts and to actually agree to it. As it was at the time, none of the heads of state would've liked to see and end to war or at least the worst parts of it.
I think it is a mistake to include Adam Smith in your discussion of non-religious economists. His "Invisible Hand" was an obvious parallel to Nature or God. Regardless, where did this philosophy of "leave others alone so they'll leave you alone" come from? Why didn't Rome have libertarians back in the day? Why, it comes from Christ's teaching of "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". What about the separation of church and state? That came from Jesus' saying, "Render that which is Ceasars to ceasar". He showed that you can be religious and live in a state that was irreligious quite capably. In fact, he proved that it is not the state's job to make people religious or ensure morals are being met. In fact, he probably did more to teach about chastity by forgiving the adultress caught in the act than her execution would've taught.
You missed my point entirely. I wasn't arguing the merits of the possibilities. I was merely pointing them out.
Our sampling of the universe (we only have a good look at one planet in this universe, and very little information on 8 others) means that we don't know enough to say definitively any way. When we start to build up a larger sampling, with a good understanding of extra-solar planets, then we can start saying for sure where exactly life started and whether or not it is confined to our planet or solar system alone. Until then, we are ignorant on the subject, and anyone who supposes otherwise is trusting their guesses more than observation plus logic. On the origins of life, scientists say, "We don't know for sure, but here's our best guess that is subject to change pending more observation." At least the scientists that truly understand the body of evidence we have today.
I find it interesting that you incorrectly use Occam's Razor as a way to reinforce the first notion. Occam's Razor says leave the irrelevant stuff out when explaining something. It doesn't say throw out the more complicated but different explanations. Often the simplest explanation is wrong. Newtonian Mechanics and even Quantum Mechanics is not the complete story of particle motion. Hence the excitement over string theory. Occam's Razor, if it is what you think it is, would state that the classical physics model (pre-Newton: IE, things move, but then they tend to stop after a while) was more correct because it was simpler to explain than Newton's three laws.
While I agree with you that scientists should not have a problem questioning common thinking, unfortunately, history demonstrates otherwise. Even in our enlightened times, people would rather stick with prevailing theories than examine alternate explanations in the face of new evidence. It's almost the same as it was back in Galileo's day, except we are much better at not killing each other based on our beliefs.
You must not know anything about economics. Printing money to pay off billions of dollars of debt would completely destroy the economy. Investors have faith that the US isn't short-sighted enough to cut off their nose to spite their face.
We do print billions of dollars every year, unsecured! We have this group of bankers who decide how much money they're going to print out of thin air every year. We call them the Federal Reserve. Even when they played with our economy by bringing the interest rate way up (thus printing untold trillions in fresh currency, unsecured), we still recovered quite well.
Companies go under, the US does not. You have a huge ammount[sic] of risk if you invest in stocks, and the return can be huge, or a complete loss. The entire country was up in arms when Enron went under because Enron stock was a big part of their retirement fund. IMHO, you have to be stupid to invest money you DEPEND ON in stocks.
Companies ARE the US! Individual companies MAY go under, but in the long run, in average, they do remarkably well. Yes, Enron went down. But I can name you thousands and thousands of companies that didn't. A very large number of them did incredibly well. Look at the stock charts. Take the Dow Jones, for instance. It goes up exponentially over time, at about 20% per year! In my mind, you have to be stupid to not invest free capital in the stock market. I mean, if I told you I can guaranteed give you 20% per year on your money, and I consistently delivered for the past 100 years, why would you put it anywhere else?
Besides, if the stock market really failed, I mean, failed in a way that made the stocks irrecoverable, it would have to be because we were hit with a crippling nuclear attack and no one can rebuild anything. In that scenario, even gold won't be worth much, because there will be nothing to buy.
US bonds generally give you better interest than a bank, and you can get big tax breaks from them, which make them rather more valuable.
I don't see why Japan and China would think getting tax breaks by buying bonds would make them more attractive. They pay 0 in taxes to the US government anyway.
But think of this! Look at the Dow Jones average over the past 100 years. A far safer bet would've been to sink those trillions of dollars into American companies. Instead, the Japanese and Chinese are buying some of the worst investments in America! You can't find a serious trader whose principal strategy is to buy American debt.
YES, we will repay the debt. But guess what? On average, an American company will succeed fantastically! Why they trust the taxpayers and not our business leaders is a mystery to me.
Bottom line is, if the Japanese invested like Warren Buffet, they wouldn't have any national debt and would have money coming out of their ears they wouldn't know what to do with like Warren Buffet. They would have all this cash and capital and wonder, "What in the world can I do with this?"
In the vast realm of possibilities that all agree with the current theories of evolution, these are some of the interesting ones I've heard of or thought of. These are all possibilities. Nobody can say what the likelihood of each are, except that they are all really, really improbable.
(1) Life was generated on earth, evolved on earth, and stayed on earth. No interplanetary travel of life. To discover life on Mars would suggest that life tends to develop on most planets with earth-like mass and orbits. Thus, the earth is not unique, where are the intelligent aliens?
(2) Life was not generated on earth, but somewhere else, and was transplanted to earth, where it further evolved. The mechanics of the actual transport can range from a stray meteor causing bacteria or fungus to be ejected into the upper atmosphere and beyond, to some intelligent species actually transplanting life intentionally or not.
(3) Life was generated on earth, and from earth it spread. Again, the mechanics could be a stray meteor to the actions of intelligent life.
Stretch your mind and think of the possibilities. Are we really alone in this cold, dark universe, or have other species evolved over time? Are we the most advanced that Homo Sapiens has ever been (IE, is Atlantis more than a myth?) Have there been other intelligent species before Homo Sapiens that could have been space-faring? With the understanding that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, there can be a whole lot going on around us that we are totally ignorant of.
Now, common thinking is that earth is a unique thing, life started here and evolved here, and we 21st century animals are the pinnacle of our race and indeed any race that has ever lived on this planet. But why is this common thinking? If we discover evidence that even hints at any one of these assumptions being wrong, do we dare question common thinking? Any sane scientist would have to answer, "Yes!"
Thirty years ago the idea of finding life ANYWHERE but here was equally preposterous. We thought our solar system was one in a billion because it had a rock large enough to sustain life around it. But we started studying the stars and guess what? The number of stars out there with planets that are roughly earth's mass and earth's distance from the sun is surprisingly large. Even binary stars have planets around them, which people thought was impossible!
I'm just saying that even though nobody actually believes we will find any type of intelligent life on Mars, let alone HUMAN life, it is in the realm of possibilities (however infinitessimally small!)
I've been using KMail for quite a while now. I don't clearly remember why I chose it above the alternatives. However, I believe it was a combination of the following things.
(1) KMail is mature. It can handle a variety of mail delivery systems properly. In particular, it handles my setup extremely well. (The others do equally well, however.)
(2) KMail integrates well into the KDE platform. If you're using KDE, you'll probably like KMail. If you're not, then it probably won't work for you.
(3) KMail seems to be snappier and less memory hungry than Evolution and Thunderbird. (I haven't used recent versions of Thunderbird, so this may not be true.)
(4) KMail handles HTML and Outlook mail reasonably well. It doesn't try to pressure me to use HTML format, but it does pretty well with it anyway.
(5) I tried for a while to use the command line MUAs. Mutt was my best fit, but it had weaknesses where KMail had strengths. I think KMail does a reasonable job of keeping the UNIX philosophy in that it doesn't try to do everything, just reading and delivering mail.
(6) KMail seems more intuitive. The keyboard settings seemed to fit my style, whereas the others don't quite match well.
(7) KMail has reasonable support for mailing lists. The others may have good support to, it's just that I haven't been able to get them to work together too well.
Ultimately, it comes down to choice. I don't expect many people to have similar experiences to mine.
Sorry to rain on everyone's parades here, but to find any signs of life on Mars would really damage the current theory of how life got to be here.
See, the chances of life spontaneously being created on a planet is so astronomically small as to be almost impossible. The universe is vast, and finding a handful of other planets in different galaxies that also bore life at one point in their histories would corroborate this. In fact, finding no planets with any signs of life corroborates it even better.
However, if we find life on our next door neighbor, we have some explaining to do. How did life get there? Was it transplanted from earth? Or was earth life transplanted from Mars? If life can propogate across the void of space between earth and Mars, what's to stop it from propogating across solar systems and perhaps even galaxies in astronomical time scales? How old is life anyway, and where did it really come from?
All of a sudden, earth won't seem so unique anymore. And we'll start wondering why SETI hasn't turned anything up yet.
Now, if we found HUMAN life on Mars, that would really destroy all of the ongoing theories of the origins of life on earth. Either we are a spacefaring species and thus earth is not our home, or somehow, despite all odds, humanity has evolved on two separate planets that just happen to be right next to each other.
I can't predict reliably one way or the other, but my guesses are that Mars is a dead as the moon. As with anything in science, it's the surprises that are interesting here.
This is why MySQL is bad. Rather than actually approach ACID compliance, they kind of gloss over it as if it's not important. Within a single transaction there is exactly one version of the table any process should see. It's that way with any real database. Why should it be any different for MySQL?
I know that Oracle handles this with rollback segments. It keeps around the old rows that were deleted or modified and resurrects them for old processes that shouldn't see the recent stuff. PostgreSQL just adds new rows to the tables and keeps a record of which transactions should see which rows. I'm not sure how DB2 does it but I am certain it is something like the above two. And if MS-SQL doesn't do this, I would be very surprised.
Until MySQL does transactions right, or even attempts to, it's a toy database. They aren't going to find a magical way to get around this. They should listen to the academics on databases because it is a well-understood problem and has withstood the test of time.
They are in the prisons where they belong, being interrogated to find more terrorists like them.
You have got to admit, there hasn't been a terrorist attack on our soil since 9/11 for a reason. President Bush has been using his power wisely.
Let's assume that the headline is true. "Bush spied on Americans". Yeah, the problem is.... what exactly? Why is it wrong to spy on Americans, especially when we feel that those so-called "Americans" are collaborating with an enemy whose MO is to infiltrate a nation to attack it from within?
Tell me, exactly, how Bush is supposed to catch and kill domestic terrorists without spying on Americans?
In my mind, security trumps liberty. Are we handing over our liberty for security's sake? No. But when you are a threat to our security, you have no liberties. If you donate 1 shiny red cent to any organization tied to any terrorist organization, if you speak oiut encouraging people to attack America or its interests, you are no longer entitled to your liberties. You are an enemy of the state and the people of the US, and should be spied on day and night without excuse.
Jefferson shot someone on the White House lawn. He accused him of being a traitor and *BANG*! Case closed.
Would you rather have a president like that?
You'd be surprised what a President can get away with in times of way. Hint: We don't call him Commander in Chief because it sounds pretty.
Europe, it's time to defend yourselves.
Ask yourself, "By what reason does my government consider it necessary to collect this information?" The reason is clear: terrorism. Yes, it is a real threat, and no, it is not going away anytime soon.
It's time you told the government that the people are quite capable of defeating domestic terrorists without the invasion of privacy. I suggest you start learn Arabic and start gathering information for the government. Turn in those you suspect of terrorism along with the evidence you, a private citizen, collected. That way, it won't be the government that has to take away your rights, it will be you doing it to each other. But whom do you trust more? The guy down the street or the guy who calls himself PM?
Bottom line is, in America we take responsibility for our safety. We buy guns and learn how to use them. We report suspicious activity. When someone is being hurt, we don't hurry by. We are invasive to each other and we don't respect other's right to privacy. Privacy to do what? Blow us up? Heck no.
That's why we've been able to keep terrorism in check here at home. We as a people are largely vigilant, making the government's job easy.
The trouble comes when you tell your government: Give me the blessings of security but I don't want to lift a finger. Then the government does what it has to: invades your liberty to give you a bit of security.
Europe, if you want to know why we elected a cowboy for president, go watch some old Westerns in black and white. Imagine yourself as one of the townswomen, afraid to go out at night. Imagine yourself as the banker living in fear of the gang coming down and greeting you with a stick of dynamite. You'll see why we like our cowboys, and why we encourage our young men to pick up guns and kill the bad guys.
It fascinates me to no end how people familiar with Christianity can ever blame the religion for the failings of its followers.
Jesus built his entire ministry on the fallacy of hypocrisy. No hypocrite could be considered a Christian! And yet hypocrisy is somehow a Christian attribute?
Look around at modern philosophy, where modern is anything after the 1300s. Name ONE significant contribution to modern society that allowed the creation of super societies the planet couldn't even imagine that isn't contributed by Christianity. The bottom line, the internet wouldn't exist had it not been for Christ's humble teachings 2,000 years ago.
Modern governments are the implementation of a Christian ideal. We've been working on the idea of how to run a country the way Christ would ever since Rome became the Holy Roman Empire. Economics is fundamentally a Christian philosophy that teaches us to not meddle in each other's affairs. War in the modern world is waged according to Christian ideals. That's why we can't abuse prisoners with Abu Ghraib and shrug it off easily, and that's why everybody in the US does some serious introspection before waging it. (Abraham Lincoln retorted to someone who hoped that God was on their side that it would be better if we were on God's side.) The Marshall Plan is the practice of the Christian ideal of "Love thy enemy".
There is a reason that the Moslems and Buddhists and Shintoists and Hindus have never built the kind of society that we are enjoying now today. The best that these religions have born is a third-world shadow of the Christian society we have today. Why? It is simply because they are ultimately incorrect. Only Christianity has the right combination of justice and mercy and plays out in the end valuing the follower over the preacher. Christians don't go around killing people of other faiths because they are of a different faith. They don't long for transcending this world, but rather conquering it through righteousness. They don't believe in fairy tales and they don't worship dead pieces of rock and wood. And they don't go around telling people that they are poor because God said so and there's nothing they can ever do about it. And as we learn how to be better Christians, our society is improving. Remember, even as late as the 60's and the Civil Rights Movement, it was a Christian political issue, with Martin Luther King himself being a preacher by trade.
There is only one hope for mankind, and it is Christianity. Rather than fighting the religion, or the establishments of religion, which Jesus himself never did, fight to make yourself a better Christian, and fight to make others better by perfect love. Sacrifice yourself, your time, your money, your talents, and anything else you have to serve those around you. That is the ultimate ideal, and the only path to happiness.
The sad and funny thing about macro-economics is that they ignore where wealth is actually created.
I've studied long and hard about the so-called problems of trade imbalance. All I can see is a bunch of people asserting things without backing them up. I've looked at historical examples of trade imbalances. I can't see how it is a bad thing, even in the long run.
In America, wealth is generated with EVERY TRANSACTION in trade. Every little thing you buy in the store, every time you put your money in the bank, or take it out, or buy a stock or sell it, or make a house payment, etc... wealth is generated. Someone gave you something that is worth more to you than it was to them, and in exchange, you gave them something worth more to them than you. If it weren't so, the trade would not have occurred. In fact, even NOT TRADING creates wealth.
Only in America do people understand this at a common-sensical level. We know that by buying groceries, we generate wealth. By staying home and eating leftovers, we generate wealth. Boycotting creates wealth (because well-behaved companies are more valuable to society than ill-behaved ones). Donating to charity creates wealth (because we value charitable acts and are willing to spend money on it). We don't buy into this "buy! buy! buy!" consumerism because we know it is not right. It is only when we take our hard-earned cash and spend it on things MORE valuable to us than cash that we are helping the economy.
No other country in the world has such an economy. All other economies put on limits or they misinform the people about what is needed to generate wealth. The net effect is that people make decisions that actually reduce the wealth in the country.
I find it mildly humorous that the US has been able to get foreign countries to buy our debt when we can print as much of it as we like at any time. Any country that has a long-term strategy of buying American debt is in for a surprise one of these days. Besides, the bonds don't even pay very well! Americans won't buy them because their return is too low. They'd rather buy shares in an American company, because almost any company does better than American bonds.
Add to that that our economy is growing faster than our interest rates, so that our collective debt to GDP ratio today is lower than it was 20 years ago, and you see why Americans are more than willing to borrow as much money as possible from anyone stupid enough to lend it to us rather than invest in their own country. If China and Japan were really smart, they would be buying American companies or even their own companies. They'd get a better return, the money would flow back into their own country, and then find its way back into their own coffers.
In the end, the US wins in any scenario. If the rest of the world should stop trading with us, they'll lose a lot more than we would.
In my experience, as someone with a high IQ, IQ has little or nothing to do with success or even smarts. I've looked around myself and I see people with average IQs perform better than myself and IQ-equivalent peers. Why? Because they work harder.
In the end, it's not what you are given that determines your success. It is what you do with it. And that means work.
You're going to want to separate out your web server if you are going to face any real load. A good mod_perl implementation with a PostgreSQL (or even MySQL) can give you the kind of dynamic speeds you need. Since the AJAX queries usually translate to a single call, you can probably get much more performance than the older style where each page had to make several queries.
To serve up the webpage, I think you should go with a static HTTP server if you can. If you can't I would use a different server because there are different queries and a different load characteristic. For starters, people can wait 2 seconds while a new page loads, but they will get antsy if they have to wait more than 1/2 a second for a trivial AJAX query to complete.
The simple answer is Microsoft has no incentive to provide software that works. They only want to provide software that will get people to dump bucketloads of cash on the Microsoft campus. Until people value software that works (which we know from experience they don't -- except rare customers) this won't change.
The Free Software community identified this problem a long time ago. They also saw another problem. As the number of users of software increases, the number of feature requests increase as well. How do you satisfy all of these customers simultaneously? Eventually, the proprietary software model is unable to address the needs of their customer base as it grows. (Witness that there is no Icelandic Windows available anywhere.) The Free Software solution is to let the users fix it. So, if there is a problem with the software that any one person is willing to spend the time and money on to fix, then it will get fixed for everyone. Since security holes bother at least a few of the users of Free Software, and these users are also ones willing to put in the time and cash to get it fixed, it gets fixed.
Simple capitalism is the reason why Free Software is doing so much better than proprietary software. As a piece of Free Software becomes popular, it increases in security, features, and usability at a faster rate than proprietary because of the economic incentives.
I'm running FC4 which is stable and has a pretty recent KDE.
* If you double click on a text file, it opens a new window (KWrite) which is a much better editor than Notepad. (I personally prefer GViM, and it's not too hard to configure it to use that.)
* I hit the red hat (start menu), clicked and held on an app, and dragged it to my desktop. It asked if I wanted to copy or link to it. Either way, it works.
* I just opened a text file in KWrite (double clicking from konqueror), copied text (CTRL-C), and then closed it. Then I created a new text file (in Konqueror - right click->Create New->Text File), double-clicked it, and I pasted with CTRL-V. It worked.
* Your review is over a year and a half old. You should try out the latest version. A lot happens in a year in the OS world.