Take biomedicine. A scientist looks at symptoms and deduce's what is probably going on (at either a cellular, DNA or molecular level), and then develops a drug which will probably treat it.
There is no complete definate, BECAUSE IT'S SCIENCE!
However, the science behind the Montreal Treaty (as with the Kyoto Treaty) is far more indepth and independantly verifiyed than any drug in history (except maybe asprin and alcohol)!
I think its all about 'margin of error'.
Predictions may have a 1%, 5% or even 15% margin of error. The complex nature of ozone layer recovery (like all climate predictions) means the error margin is bigger than say predicting radioactive decay (which has a very small but still definate error margin).
What pisses me off is when idiots (normally with vested interests) take that 10% possible margin of error and try to pretend it means that the theory could have a 100% margin of error. As a very small group of certain 'so called scientists' are still trying to do with global warming.
But God must have created the heliosphere. Otherwise we might have to use lots of difficult mathematics to explain its asymmetry and how annoying would that be?
Also, Occams razor PROVES it, because its much easier to imagine some guy coming along and just plonking the heliosphere there rather than an uncountable number of magnetic particles/waves interacting with one another over billions of years.
Synthetic drugs don't just get made. 95% of the time they are modelled on naturally produced sources, they can then get made artifically once the source process has been well researched.
Your kitchen surface is not likely to produce chemicals useful for drugs either mainly because their not surviving in a niche enviroment. Rainforests for example contain lots of good candidate chemicals because trillions of different types of organisms live in often carefully etched out niche's where funky chemical processes allow them to survive predators. These funky processes are the ones BY FAR most likely to produce "wonder-drugs" if they can be made to do funky stuff in humans aswell....with rainforests gone, wonder-drug's will be A LOT harder to discover. That is my point!
It makes sense really. Since we've cutting all the rainforests down to grow soya, we can no longer draw upon the most widely used source of drug inventions. Over 25% of modern drugs contain chemicals originally discovered in rainforest plants & animals. These discoveries then normally allow synthetic mass-production.
Once the rainforests are gone, discovering these chemicals and constituants will get much tougher and many drugs simply wont be invented. Reefs may help produce some drugs, but the article ignores the fact that the diminishing rainforests and other similar natural sources provide far better places to look for potential drug ingredients!
My response is based on the response of my girlfriend who is a British law student (currently taking a module specifically in electronic crime) who is aware of the bill from her studies and was appalled after I showed her the article in qestion.
Basically, she explained there are two types of possession laws: 1) for totally contraband items (i.e. drugs) and 2) items which have legitimate uses but can be used illegally (e.g. knives, axes, screwdrivers, glass etc.). The law for drugs states basically any possession no matter what is an offense, but for items like knives or screwdrivers it depends on the situation: Owning a knife in the kitchen is fine or a screwdriver in a toolbox, but going around someones house after an arguement holding one in your hand is illegal.
The Computer Misuse Act specifies programs (whether interpreted or compiled) clearly as the 2nd case. Meaning if you are a network admin or computer enthusiast and have perl scripts than there is nothing they can do to you, the law clearly states that both in the part I (and even the article) quoted and elsewhere, although the journalist who wrote the article obviously has no education in basic principles of law.
If what the journalist says throughout the article was correct, everyone owning pretty much any physical item would be guilty under "conspiring to commit an offense" laws.
But to qualify for prosecution under part b), some direct evidence of either: 1) the suspect wishing to commit an offense or 2) the suspect having absolutly no legitimate reason to have possession of such code has to be available.
There is absolutly nothing in the bill which would make Perl scripts illegal due to their vast range of legitimate uses, unless the script in particular has no other purpose but to attack a foreign networks and even then only if the suspect has no legitimate reason to do so (i.e. is not involved in legitimate IT security). A network admin, for example, could own such scripts though and could only be prosecuted if he was seen to be snooping around other people's networks to which he has no legitimate reason to do so (i.e. port sniffing etc.).
People who think NASA is going to replace the Space Shuttle with an entirely new system allowing regular manned trips to space are kidding themselves. US based manned space flight will be a rare thing in the future, there's simply no political will to continue it anymore.
A sad end to a once great US endeavour which was the envy of the world, but hey there's always the war on terror, look how popular that is making us, and at only 20 times the cost!
That would be the case if thats what the bill actually states. Fortunatly, it's not.This is more of the case of an IT journalist who has no idea of the principles of law completely misinterpreting the legislation.
Your analogy is valid, but the law for surgeon's knives as well as hammers, chainsaw etc. already is pretty much identical to the relevant section of this bill and they are not all banned in the UK, so why would pearl scripts be?
Either the journalist who wrote the article is extremely ignorant of basic law principles or he just needed a good story so decided to disregard some basic facts.
If you follow that logic then we are all guilty under pretty much every country's attempted murder laws. In the Common Law system at least (the system of law in use in the UK as well as most British settled countries e.g. Canada, USA, Australia etc.) then in any there has to be a specific victim you are suspected of attempting to murder or attempt to hack into.
Even having obviously dodgy scripts on your computer doesn't qualify for prosecution under the part b) you quote unless there is direct evidence of you planning (or supplying to someone who you know is planning) to launch a specific attack against a specific target.
Without the specific target a judge would simply laugh the case out of court as this is an extremely fundamental principle which the journalist who wrote the article fails/chooses not to identify.
...Only when he starts sniffing around other people's networks.
Laws governing knifes and such items have the exact same clause. Just having a knife in your kitchen doesn't mean anything, it's when you start going around other people's houses with it in your hand that your likely to get busted. The same is being applied here to pearl scripts.
Personally I think thats about the exact the level cybercrime laws should be at. What possibly valid reason could someone have for running port sniffers and other such scripts on a network which they no legitimate reason to access??
Even if you have dodgy pearl scripts on your computer a judge would through the case out as there is no direct evidence the script is "likely to be so used".
This story is ridiculous! It is implying something totally different from what the law actually states in order to attract horrified readers. I bet the website is getting massive amounts of hits at the moment, but lets look at what the bill actually says:
"A person is guilty of an offence if he makes, adapts, supplies or offers to supply any article -- (a) intending it to be used to commit, or to assist in the commission of, an offence under section 1 or 3 [of the Computer Misuse Act]; or (b) believing that it is likely to be so used."
This is a common-sense sense law which recognises software for what it is: a tool. It looks almost identical to the law which applies to other tools capable of being used to commit offences, i.e. knifes, hammers, axes, pieces of wood etc.. You don't see the police arresting people who use these, unless they use them to commit (or attempt to commit) a crime, so why would they suddenly arrest anyone who writes a pearl script?
I think it is good to see a government finally recognising software like the useful tool it is, but one which (like most tools) can be intentially misused to cause harm.
"It's just not codified in one document."...which is what a consitution is and what the UK people have time and time again said they do not want. Only an idiot would believe a written constitution means anything at all anyway, as they can just be rewritten whenever a government wants to.
I started using one of the earlier Bon Echo Firefox 2.0 builds just to try it out. I soon had to delete it and reinstall version 1.5 simply because of this ridiculous close-tab button change and how frustrating it makes trying to close multiple tabs quickly.
I fear the Firefox guys are making a huge mistake by changing a feature which the vast majority of users are completely happy with. History is littered with instances of large-scale user frustration resulting from unnecessary UI changes. Personally, if the update and this feature were made mandatory (I mean hypothetically), then I would switch to another browser!
Indeed, this seems to be the mistake most people make regarding nearly all renewable energy generation techniques (which apart from hydro-electric, only make up a tiny fraction of power generation). Most of the plants built up until today have been little more than feasibility projects.
But - as is starting to be seen in some European countries - significant cheap energy contributions can be made when the technology begins to mature and get the sort of level of massive investment traditional energy generation techniques receive. The companies (and the therefore the countries) spearheading the investment also stand to make a lot of money when the technology starts to be installed worldwide.
As for why I'm here: Slashdot is the latest hip place for deities and their buddies to hang out at. Its the only place us all-knowing gods can be surrounded by thousands of other know-it-alls who also think of themselves as gods. Me, Buddha and that freaky Hindu goddess with lots of arms come here all the time.
But in this instance I am referring to the preferable use of a news source which actually cares about the facts of the study over a news source which is simply using the research as a launching point for the journalist to present stereotyped opinions on male and female attraction.
I am an all-powerful and omnipotent being, and I therefor obviously know exactly where the prepostion should be. But, purely as a test, do you mind telling me where you would put it?
Customs are completly within their rights to open any baggage they want to, thats their job. Technically they don't even need "probable cause", it could just be a "check". Also, an individuals right to make a purely personal back-up copy has yet to be specifically tested in the courts.
Slashdot Mirror
Uhhh, thats exactly what science is.
Take biomedicine. A scientist looks at symptoms and deduce's what is probably going on (at either a cellular, DNA or molecular level), and then develops a drug which will probably treat it.
There is no complete definate, BECAUSE IT'S SCIENCE!
However, the science behind the Montreal Treaty (as with the Kyoto Treaty) is far more indepth and independantly verifiyed than any drug in history (except maybe asprin and alcohol)!
I think its all about 'margin of error'. Predictions may have a 1%, 5% or even 15% margin of error. The complex nature of ozone layer recovery (like all climate predictions) means the error margin is bigger than say predicting radioactive decay (which has a very small but still definate error margin). What pisses me off is when idiots (normally with vested interests) take that 10% possible margin of error and try to pretend it means that the theory could have a 100% margin of error. As a very small group of certain 'so called scientists' are still trying to do with global warming.
But God must have created the heliosphere. Otherwise we might have to use lots of difficult mathematics to explain its asymmetry and how annoying would that be?
Also, Occams razor PROVES it, because its much easier to imagine some guy coming along and just plonking the heliosphere there rather than an uncountable number of magnetic particles/waves interacting with one another over billions of years.
Synthetic drugs don't just get made. 95% of the time they are modelled on naturally produced sources, they can then get made artifically once the source process has been well researched.
...with rainforests gone, wonder-drug's will be A LOT harder to discover. That is my point!
Your kitchen surface is not likely to produce chemicals useful for drugs either mainly because their not surviving in a niche enviroment. Rainforests for example contain lots of good candidate chemicals because trillions of different types of organisms live in often carefully etched out niche's where funky chemical processes allow them to survive predators. These funky processes are the ones BY FAR most likely to produce "wonder-drugs" if they can be made to do funky stuff in humans aswell.
It makes sense really. Since we've cutting all the rainforests down to grow soya, we can no longer draw upon the most widely used source of drug inventions. Over 25% of modern drugs contain chemicals originally discovered in rainforest plants & animals. These discoveries then normally allow synthetic mass-production.
Once the rainforests are gone, discovering these chemicals and constituants will get much tougher and many drugs simply wont be invented. Reefs may help produce some drugs, but the article ignores the fact that the diminishing rainforests and other similar natural sources provide far better places to look for potential drug ingredients!
My response is based on the response of my girlfriend who is a British law student (currently taking a module specifically in electronic crime) who is aware of the bill from her studies and was appalled after I showed her the article in qestion.
Basically, she explained there are two types of possession laws: 1) for totally contraband items (i.e. drugs) and 2) items which have legitimate uses but can be used illegally (e.g. knives, axes, screwdrivers, glass etc.). The law for drugs states basically any possession no matter what is an offense, but for items like knives or screwdrivers it depends on the situation: Owning a knife in the kitchen is fine or a screwdriver in a toolbox, but going around someones house after an arguement holding one in your hand is illegal.
The Computer Misuse Act specifies programs (whether interpreted or compiled) clearly as the 2nd case. Meaning if you are a network admin or computer enthusiast and have perl scripts than there is nothing they can do to you, the law clearly states that both in the part I (and even the article) quoted and elsewhere, although the journalist who wrote the article obviously has no education in basic principles of law.
If what the journalist says throughout the article was correct, everyone owning pretty much any physical item would be guilty under "conspiring to commit an offense" laws.
But to qualify for prosecution under part b), some direct evidence of either: 1) the suspect wishing to commit an offense or 2) the suspect having absolutly no legitimate reason to have possession of such code has to be available.
There is absolutly nothing in the bill which would make Perl scripts illegal due to their vast range of legitimate uses, unless the script in particular has no other purpose but to attack a foreign networks and even then only if the suspect has no legitimate reason to do so (i.e. is not involved in legitimate IT security). A network admin, for example, could own such scripts though and could only be prosecuted if he was seen to be snooping around other people's networks to which he has no legitimate reason to do so (i.e. port sniffing etc.).
People who think NASA is going to replace the Space Shuttle with an entirely new system allowing regular manned trips to space are kidding themselves. US based manned space flight will be a rare thing in the future, there's simply no political will to continue it anymore.
A sad end to a once great US endeavour which was the envy of the world, but hey there's always the war on terror, look how popular that is making us, and at only 20 times the cost!
That would be the case if thats what the bill actually states. Fortunatly, it's not.This is more of the case of an IT journalist who has no idea of the principles of law completely misinterpreting the legislation.
Your analogy is valid, but the law for surgeon's knives as well as hammers, chainsaw etc. already is pretty much identical to the relevant section of this bill and they are not all banned in the UK, so why would pearl scripts be?
Either the journalist who wrote the article is extremely ignorant of basic law principles or he just needed a good story so decided to disregard some basic facts.
If you follow that logic then we are all guilty under pretty much every country's attempted murder laws. In the Common Law system at least (the system of law in use in the UK as well as most British settled countries e.g. Canada, USA, Australia etc.) then in any there has to be a specific victim you are suspected of attempting to murder or attempt to hack into.
Even having obviously dodgy scripts on your computer doesn't qualify for prosecution under the part b) you quote unless there is direct evidence of you planning (or supplying to someone who you know is planning) to launch a specific attack against a specific target.
Without the specific target a judge would simply laugh the case out of court as this is an extremely fundamental principle which the journalist who wrote the article fails/chooses not to identify.
...Only when he starts sniffing around other people's networks.
Laws governing knifes and such items have the exact same clause. Just having a knife in your kitchen doesn't mean anything, it's when you start going around other people's houses with it in your hand that your likely to get busted. The same is being applied here to pearl scripts.
Personally I think thats about the exact the level cybercrime laws should be at. What possibly valid reason could someone have for running port sniffers and other such scripts on a network which they no legitimate reason to access??
Even if you have dodgy pearl scripts on your computer a judge would through the case out as there is no direct evidence the script is "likely to be so used".
This story is ridiculous! It is implying something totally different from what the law actually states in order to attract horrified readers. I bet the website is getting massive amounts of hits at the moment, but lets look at what the bill actually says:
"A person is guilty of an offence if he makes, adapts, supplies or offers to supply any article --
(a) intending it to be used to commit, or to assist in the commission of, an offence under section 1 or 3 [of the Computer Misuse Act]; or
(b) believing that it is likely to be so used."
This is a common-sense sense law which recognises software for what it is: a tool. It looks almost identical to the law which applies to other tools capable of being used to commit offences, i.e. knifes, hammers, axes, pieces of wood etc.. You don't see the police arresting people who use these, unless they use them to commit (or attempt to commit) a crime, so why would they suddenly arrest anyone who writes a pearl script?
I think it is good to see a government finally recognising software like the useful tool it is, but one which (like most tools) can be intentially misused to cause harm.
"It's just not codified in one document." ...which is what a consitution is and what the UK people have time and time again said they do not want. Only an idiot would believe a written constitution means anything at all anyway, as they can just be rewritten whenever a government wants to.
just to let you know, the UK doesn't actually have a constitution.
Because rich Soccer Moms whose kids have Xboxs vote, wheras poor people with no house, don't. Its called democracy.
Couldn't agree more.
I started using one of the earlier Bon Echo Firefox 2.0 builds just to try it out. I soon had to delete it and reinstall version 1.5 simply because of this ridiculous close-tab button change and how frustrating it makes trying to close multiple tabs quickly.
I fear the Firefox guys are making a huge mistake by changing a feature which the vast majority of users are completely happy with. History is littered with instances of large-scale user frustration resulting from unnecessary UI changes. Personally, if the update and this feature were made mandatory (I mean hypothetically), then I would switch to another browser!
If Congress passes their anti blogging and forum posting bill, does this mean Word 2007 would be baned from state libraries and schools?
Maybe this is the news OpenOffice has been waiting for!
The next line of my post reads:
But - as is starting to be seen in some European countries - significant cheap energy contributions can be made
Indeed, this seems to be the mistake most people make regarding nearly all renewable energy generation techniques (which apart from hydro-electric, only make up a tiny fraction of power generation). Most of the plants built up until today have been little more than feasibility projects.
But - as is starting to be seen in some European countries - significant cheap energy contributions can be made when the technology begins to mature and get the sort of level of massive investment traditional energy generation techniques receive. The companies (and the therefore the countries) spearheading the investment also stand to make a lot of money when the technology starts to be installed worldwide.
The current output maybe low, but the plant is a new concept, using new processes and has only just been set-up.
) probably outputed even less petroleum to begin with.
The first refinery (apparently built in 1856 at Ploieti, Romania http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_refinery#History
"Therefor" is a valid word. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/therefor
How dare you imply I made a mistake, I condemn you to hell!
As for why I'm here: Slashdot is the latest hip place for deities and their buddies to hang out at. Its the only place us all-knowing gods can be surrounded by thousands of other know-it-alls who also think of themselves as gods. Me, Buddha and that freaky Hindu goddess with lots of arms come here all the time.
Indeed, the trade-off is often debatable.
But in this instance I am referring to the preferable use of a news source which actually cares about the facts of the study over a news source which is simply using the research as a launching point for the journalist to present stereotyped opinions on male and female attraction.
I am an all-powerful and omnipotent being, and I therefor obviously know exactly where the prepostion should be. But, purely as a test, do you mind telling me where you would put it?
How about using a proper source for this study?
The summary (and the linked articles) are so sensationalised it is ridiculous.
The BBC have a slightly better written article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4751501.stm
Customs are completly within their rights to open any baggage they want to, thats their job. Technically they don't even need "probable cause", it could just be a "check". Also, an individuals right to make a purely personal back-up copy has yet to be specifically tested in the courts.
You should probably start attending your primary school classes and then you won't have to ask such stupid questions.