That's why I say it's difficult, expensive, dangerous and time-consuming... which is why most people settle for not thinking about it, and just giving some money to the latest in an unending series of famine-relief programmes, never asking *why* such famines happen.
I disagree - if it's not accompanied by a corresponding political change, simple material aid actually worsens the plight of the country receiving it, because it empowers the existing regime and reduces incentives for the replacement of that regime.
What's best is a combination: political education and change, accompanied by gradually-reduced material relief.
But if you have to have one without the other (sub-optimal but possible), choose education over material relief - because on its own, material relief makes things worse, not better.
Oh yeah... and don't forget to lobby for genuine free trade - i.e. two-way trade without constraint or tariffs, so third-world countries can actually export agricultural products to first-world countries like the U.S.A.
There's only one thing that's going to reduce poverty and suffering in third-world countries: classical liberalism.
If Google (or any philanthropist) wants to really help a poor country, persuading them to depose their theocratic / despotic / fascist / socialist / puppet Governments and replace them with a constitutionally-bound Republic would be a good start.
Of course, that'd involve many people, a deep understanding of the culture of said country, and a long, tiresome struggle to educate the people - not to mention the high likelihood of violent opposition from the existing powermongers.
So most people don't bother, they don't choose to analyse the causes of poverty, and instead buy the people of those countries millions of dollars worth of rice and medicine, thereby adding welfare dependency to their list of problems, and propping up the aforementioned evil Governments.
Sigh.
Hopefully Evolution has a fix for Palm-Synch bug
on
A Look at GNOME 2.14
·
· Score: 1
> what happens to schools that can't be profitable and have to close down?
The same as with any business - their customers go elsewhere, and their assets are sold to cover their debts, which usually allows competitors or startups to obtain the gear they need at very good prices.
> What if you can't afford to send your kids to school?
Then they are educated at home, or by charities (either directly by trusts, Churches etc., or they're funded to attend school).
> What if the only school you can afford offers a poorer education than the current public > schools now do?
You get what you can afford, either through your own efforts, or through charity. Anything else, and you're demanding others pay for what you want for your children.
> I fear that if education was completely privatized we would have a shortage of educational > facilities.
Eh? That doesn't add up... why should education be any different from any other good? I mean, privatisation hasn't led to a shortage of cars, hamburgers, architects, designers, dentists, guns, airplanes, etc. etc. In fact, education is so important, I expect it'd be a growth industry if privatised & deregulated.
> My preference are schools more like the charter schools where the tax dollars still support > them, but they have the autonomy that you refer to.
Granted, that's an improvement, but the compulsory & regulated nature of the schools are still maintained.
Parental choice is increased, but others are still forced to pay for that choice. And you can guarantee the Govt. will still want to control the curricula of those schools... hello political football once more.
Well, what do you expect? This kind of political intrusion into education is an inevitable consequence of a socialised education system. The moment you take something out of private hands and let the Government run it, it's going to become a poorly-funded, poorly-run political football.
The solution is to privatise education completely, and let parents, businesses and charitable trusts run schools - and, more importantly, let parents send children to the best schools they can afford, schools of their own choosing (or, alternatively, homeschool).
.NET isn't just for Windows - nor is the Microsoft implementation the only one available. Check out the Mono, an open source cross platform implementation of the.NET Framework.
Code in C#, using wrappers for GTK, producing an app that runs flawlessly on Windows, Linux and MacOSX? Sure can, with Mono.
The Telcos provide a service, for which they should be able to charge as much, or as little, as they like. Google can either choose to buy their service, and pay accordingly, or choose not to.
... provided I could afford the paycut (mortgage, dogs, etc.) Fortunately every time I've quit for a more interesting job, I've received a pay rise as well. My wife, however, recently took a pay cut in order to move to a (non-IT, Call Centre Analyst) job that's more interesting than her previous team leader role, and will benefit her career in the long term.
If there were no public education (conceived in Prussia during the late 1800s as an indoctrination system), this would be a non-issue. It's only a problem because the Government has it's tendrils all the way through education, at all levels.
If education were entirely private & unregulated, parents could simply send their children to schools of their own choice, which taught curricula to their liking. End of problem.
What a surprise - Company X fails to bring a new technology to market because its competitors lower their prices in unison, so they sulk, and file lawsuits.
If you can't win by offering consumers better stuff and / or better prices, I suppose you can always 'win' with a crowd of fork-tongued lawyers.
Because I don't agree with anti-trust laws; I think they're immoral, in that they punish companies for their success.
However, I think Microsoft has played fast & loose with other laws in the past (especially surrounding intellectual property), & appear to have escaped unscathed.
I think they deserve support against anti-trust laws (as does every company or individual), but they shouldn't be held up as a shining example of capitalism the way many Libertarians & Objectivists do.
... at least the U.N. workers responsible for Internet administration wouldn't get as many opportunites to rape children as they would if they were working in the field.
Indeed - but I decided to go with the SOHO distro and trim it down, rather than the standard and bulk it up, having had a few issues with the standard release of 4.3. See the updated post for details.
Depends if you're talking about SOHO or not - the *default* setup for SOHO is aimed at higher-end machines than mine. As I tried to make clear, it's easy enough to trim down to size, and my preference is to trim a large install as opposed to adding to a minimal install.
Well I'll be damned - that I didn't know. I don't know it'll be too much of a problem though, as those familiar with the Cray would be unlikely to confuse the issue:-)
Slashdot Mirror
That's why I say it's difficult, expensive, dangerous and time-consuming ... which is why most people settle for not thinking about it, and just giving some money to the latest in an unending series of famine-relief programmes, never asking *why* such famines happen.
I disagree - if it's not accompanied by a corresponding political change, simple material aid actually worsens the plight of the country receiving it, because it empowers the existing regime and reduces incentives for the replacement of that regime.
What's best is a combination: political education and change, accompanied by gradually-reduced material relief.
But if you have to have one without the other (sub-optimal but possible), choose education over material relief - because on its own, material relief makes things worse, not better.
Oh yeah ... and don't forget to lobby for genuine free trade - i.e. two-way trade without constraint or tariffs, so third-world countries can actually export agricultural products to first-world countries like the U.S.A.
There's only one thing that's going to reduce poverty and suffering in third-world countries: classical liberalism.
If Google (or any philanthropist) wants to really help a poor country, persuading them to depose their theocratic / despotic / fascist / socialist / puppet Governments and replace them with a constitutionally-bound Republic would be a good start.
Of course, that'd involve many people, a deep understanding of the culture of said country, and a long, tiresome struggle to educate the people - not to mention the high likelihood of violent opposition from the existing powermongers.
So most people don't bother, they don't choose to analyse the causes of poverty, and instead buy the people of those countries millions of dollars worth of rice and medicine, thereby adding welfare dependency to their list of problems, and propping up the aforementioned evil Governments.
Sigh.
I'm running Mandriva 2005, and although I've found the PalmPilot integration to be quite functional, Evolution is only hot-synching one of my task categories, which is a known bug.
> what happens to schools that can't be profitable and have to close down?
... why should education be any different from any other good? I mean, privatisation hasn't led to a shortage of cars, hamburgers, architects, designers, dentists, guns, airplanes, etc. etc. In fact, education is so important, I expect it'd be a growth industry if privatised & deregulated.
... hello political football once more.
The same as with any business - their customers go elsewhere, and their assets are sold to cover their debts, which usually allows competitors or startups to obtain the gear they need at very good prices.
> What if you can't afford to send your kids to school?
Then they are educated at home, or by charities (either directly by trusts, Churches etc., or they're funded to attend school).
> What if the only school you can afford offers a poorer education than the current public
> schools now do?
You get what you can afford, either through your own efforts, or through charity. Anything else, and you're demanding others pay for what you want for your children.
> I fear that if education was completely privatized we would have a shortage of educational
> facilities.
Eh? That doesn't add up
> My preference are schools more like the charter schools where the tax dollars still support
> them, but they have the autonomy that you refer to.
Granted, that's an improvement, but the compulsory & regulated nature of the schools are still maintained.
Parental choice is increased, but others are still forced to pay for that choice. And you can guarantee the Govt. will still want to control the curricula of those schools
Funding is only one half of the equation.
Well, what do you expect? This kind of political intrusion into education is an inevitable consequence of a socialised education system. The moment you take something out of private hands and let the Government run it, it's going to become a poorly-funded, poorly-run political football.
The solution is to privatise education completely, and let parents, businesses and charitable trusts run schools - and, more importantly, let parents send children to the best schools they can afford, schools of their own choosing (or, alternatively, homeschool).
.NET isn't just for Windows - nor is the Microsoft implementation the only one available. Check out the Mono, an open source cross platform implementation of the .NET Framework.
Code in C#, using wrappers for GTK, producing an app that runs flawlessly on Windows, Linux and MacOSX? Sure can, with Mono.
The Telcos provide a service, for which they should be able to charge as much, or as little, as they like. Google can either choose to buy their service, and pay accordingly, or choose not to.
Why is this such an issue?
... provided I could afford the paycut (mortgage, dogs, etc.) Fortunately every time I've quit for a more interesting job, I've received a pay rise as well. My wife, however, recently took a pay cut in order to move to a (non-IT, Call Centre Analyst) job that's more interesting than her previous team leader role, and will benefit her career in the long term.
If there were no public education (conceived in Prussia during the late 1800s as an indoctrination system), this would be a non-issue. It's only a problem because the Government has it's tendrils all the way through education, at all levels.
If education were entirely private & unregulated, parents could simply send their children to schools of their own choice, which taught curricula to their liking. End of problem.
Okay, I'll bite ... WTF is a "government class"? That sounds like something out of North Korea :-)
What a surprise - Company X fails to bring a new technology to market because its competitors lower their prices in unison, so they sulk, and file lawsuits.
If you can't win by offering consumers better stuff and / or better prices, I suppose you can always 'win' with a crowd of fork-tongued lawyers.
Sometimes, SlashDot articles read as though the posters are actually embarassed to be American.
Because I don't agree with anti-trust laws; I think they're immoral, in that they punish companies for their success.
However, I think Microsoft has played fast & loose with other laws in the past (especially surrounding intellectual property), & appear to have escaped unscathed.
I think they deserve support against anti-trust laws (as does every company or individual), but they shouldn't be held up as a shining example of capitalism the way many Libertarians & Objectivists do.
Heh. I guess you haven't read my article Microsoft - Undeserving of Libertarian Praise then.
:-)
I guess it's just easier to pigeonhole people
... check out The Center for the Advancement of Capitalism - Anti-Trust Resources.
I think he was refering to teTeX and lyx, which aren't exactly mainstream (except in particular fields, where they appear to be the default choice).
Indeed - but I decided to go with the SOHO distro and trim it down, rather than the standard and bulk it up, having had a few issues with the standard release of 4.3. See the updated post for details.
I've added an Update section to the original post to address some of the issues you guys have raised. Thanks for the feedback! :-)
Depends if you're talking about SOHO or not - the *default* setup for SOHO is aimed at higher-end machines than mine. As I tried to make clear, it's easy enough to trim down to size, and my preference is to trim a large install as opposed to adding to a minimal install.
Well I'll be damned - that I didn't know. I don't know it'll be too much of a problem though, as those familiar with the Cray would be unlikely to confuse the issue :-)
... we can trust them, can't we?
Libertarians like myself are always looking for ways to fund Government, other than compulsory taxation. Perhaps this is one such way?