Should we all just send letters to the MPAA saying "Make any old crap you want. It really doesn't matter, you don't need us to like it, just to pay to see how much we hate it." [...] Personally, I'm going to sit it out until Ang Lee and James Shamus bring us the Hulk in 2003. If that falls flat, then that about wraps it up for Hollywood as far as I'm concerned.
I was about to post the same thing. I have been running an up-to-date version of Mozilla/Galeon for quite a while, and things seem to be much better now that Mozilla has matured.
Does it not seem more likely then that things are better because, as Mozilla matured, compatibility was added so that IE-specific stuff would render more or less correctly? I use Opera, and I too very rarely come across a site that doesn't work, but I'd be surprised if it was because designers were following standards more frequently. Until Opera 6, I had trouble with a lot of sites that work fine now. Just a thought.
This sounds like the data access "terminals" used in the recent Time Machine movie. They consisted of large slabs of glass attached to bases on the floor, and when you stood in front of them a friendly black AI fellow appeared, apparently completely real, except that if you walked around the slab he wasn't there. Similar thing?
Time doesn't exist, depending on how you look at the situation. I don't know that your interpretation has been proven, though it has some merit. Isn't time technically a fourth dimension, t? The question should really be, is "time" a by-product of movement in space, or is movement in space possible because time already exists?
As you can see, I wasn't expressing any kind of surprise at the fact Eminem is revered. I was merely asking (rhetorically) what kind of fuc^H^H^Hscrewed up society we live in that this is the case. You caught me at a bad time now; I just got home from Tech, where it has become blindingly obvious that not only are the best and brightest future journalists nearly all illiterate, but they also lack any kind of critical thinking capability or even the desire to think about anything that seems vaguely "intellectual". When you see people who are going to be working in the media and possibly in positions of influence struggling with concepts like Marxism, ideology and semiotics, and wondering what is the point of studying them...
I'm deeply depressed at how totally wasted the incredible potential of humanity is. We are capable of such great things, yet probably less than 1% of our entire population is even interested in anything beyond how to be "better" than anyone else through meaningless material wealth and social status. Everyone searches for some way to be happy, following the media in a desperate consumerist belief of more is better; never appearing to realise that happiness will always be deferred and never noticing that their entire lives have been spent searching for something they already have.
People tell me I think too much. I tell them they think too little.
I don't see any evidence in your post that Lucas is a genius. I see evidence that he is a shrewd businessman who happens to have a moderate amount of skill in his chosen industry.
He's not a good writer. He's an average director. As for vision...judging by the large number of "epic" films he's produced that flopped, my observation would be that his vision reaches no further than his bank balance.
They should give William Shatner a beta model out of pure respect...
Why? William Shatner played Captain Kirk. What he do that other Star Trek actors (captains or not) didn't? It's not like Kirk invented the universal translator or something. If he wanted to, Shatner has enough money to buy one of these things anyway.
If DARPA was going to give a beta-model universal translator to anyone it should be awarded posthumously to Star Trek's creator, Gene Roddenberry. His wife, Majel Barret Roddenberry, is still alive.
...I didn't realise Red Hat had much dominance. I'd always thought of it as the "crappy Linux distro" (which I know is unfair). I run Windows 2000 at the moment, and have been looking into which distro would be best for my needs. Essentially, Mandrake and SuSE were the two that seemed most useful. RedHat never featured.
However, when I think about it, perhaps that makes sense; I'm looking to run a desktop (mostly), whereas I'm presuming that when Linux is used in the corporate environment it is basically only on servers.
Is RedHat really such a good distro for corporate needs, or is it merely that it has a big name so everyone buys it? I always think of RedHat as the distro that's been around forever, even though no one seems to use it (here come the RedHat users to set me straight...) Guess I've been talking to the wrong people.
Corporations never did make good friends to talk to though.
Wouldn't anyone who wanted to actually own their cable modem either buy one the company supported, or make sure they knew something about cable modems and PPP etc before buying one? Seems to me that most nerds would want their own modem, and these kinds of people would be able to tell the tech support person everything they needed to know in the event of a problem. Heck, they could probably tell the tech support person how to fix the problem.
Whoever put my shit on the Internet, I want to meet that motherfucker and beat the shit out of him... - Eminem
Do these sound like the words of an intelligent or balanced individual? I don't understand why this guy is so popular when he is apparently:
arrogant
conceited
rude
disrespectful
racist
homophobic
If anything, he reminds me of a Slashdot troll. What does it say about our society that people who exhibit these qualities, and must use three expletives in single sentence, are held up as some kind of idols? And what does it say about the intelligence levels of people who find his lyrics appealing?
Perhaps it is his lyrics that are what cause so much negative bias against him? I know nothing of hip-hop and would not even consider it music by my own definition, but I certainly hold nothing against hip-hop artists. Eminem, however, I dislike intensely; I have not heard much of his music, but I have heard some. I have also had conversations with people who have heard much more. The general consensus appears to be that he is an advocate of homophobia, racism and violence.
Now, he's quite entitled to his views, and I won't stop him trying to voice them, but it's hard to like someone with that image, you know? I try to see him as a social dissident or something, rebelling against political correctness, but it just isn't happening. People like that don't generally appear to have vastly inflated egos, extreme views or the need to appear cool. Which is how, frankly, Eminem comes across.
Obviously I am no expert on the topic, and this isn't meant as a flame. I know that his image is probably based primarily in hip-hop; a culture I know little about. But he's not a difficult person to dislike, especially if you just catch an ad on TV for his album.
...that the prices of CDs are disproportionately high, but when one is remembering buying stuff cheaply, one must take into account that nasty price-hiking bastard: Inflation.
Now, I have no doubt that inflation has accounted for only a smallish percentage of the total rise in cost, but it's something that should be kept in mind. On the other hand though, I suppose it's likely that manufacturing costs have gone down, which should have balanced the system out.
So yeah, you're right, the music industry is bloated, money-hungry and mostly produces music not worth the CDs its printed on.
...but if you guys are really that dead set on not adopting the metric system, couldn't you at least present your measurements with metric units in brackets, for...I dunno...the other few billion people who might be interested?
I don't believe I have ever indicated anger at your statements. I merely find you frustrating. You seem incapable of rebutting the arguments I make against you, yet you act like this is irrelevant to the validity of your ideas. You are unable to to reply to me with anything but insults, yet choose to do this over admitting that you may be wrong.
It is you who consistently reply with intellectually vacuous posts written in anger.
I believe you'll note, regarding Amalek, that I said I was making an assumption based on your sig. Since I stated I had to look up what it meant, and only gave one reference, it was (though apparently not to you) obviously not supposed to be anything more than a theory that meshed with what you have shown of your personality. Having researched the issue at greater length, and had the term "blot the remembrance" (RSV) explained by you (thus resolving the apparent contradiction in the Bible itself), I am happy to admit that my theory was born of ignorance and was entirely wrong.
Nonetheless, my question over your belief in equality must stand. It is interesting that although you continue to find it acceptable to insult me at great length, this barb of my own brought down upon me an entire post of righteous fury dedicated to demonstrating your superior knowledge of the Bible. In retrospect, it was a telling experiment since it indicates that, while your attitude leaves a great deal to be desired (intelligent people don't resort to enraged flaming), you actually are capable of forming coherent arguments when you have a case.
I'm curious though. If you are a fan of the Bible, how is it that the values it teaches have completely passed you by? I'm forced to ask: in your position, what would Jesus do? The only occasion I can recall offhand where Jesus even got angry was when he kicked all those traders etc out of the temple. Certainly he never seemed to hold anyone in contempt or believe he was better than them, as you do. Though, since the Bible itself is chockablock with contradictions, perhaps you believe they're an acceptable way of justifying anything. Who knows.
Because this "discussion" is getting disproportionately long and you still haven't addressed my initial arguments, I'm going to have to ask you to actually read and reply to these points, instead of sidetracking the conversation yet again.
do you, or do you not, believe in moral and/or semantic relativism? Ie, do you deny the existence of any kind of authority on any topic?
if you do, why are you quoting from the Bible? Why do you believe that you are an authority on the meaning of the word "terrorist"? If you don't, why do you consider the dictionary sources I cite to be invalid? In the latter instance you'll also have to demonstrate why your own opinion is more valid than four dictionaries, or otherwise provide externally referenced evidence to support your viewpoint
please cite at least five instances (one for each of my posts) where I have made an "absurd statement", and demonstrate why these statements are absurd
If, when you reply, you do not address these three questions (which cover what this discussion is supposed to be about), I will not bother to reply. I am persistent and long-suffering, but even I can recognise when a debate becomes a lost cause due to the inability of one party to either rebut or declare defeat.
Every time you respond, you seem to have less of relevance to say. As I rebut each argument you make, you are left with a smaller and smaller set of material to reply to without confronting the fact that not only are you are wrong, but you're being shown up as a fool to anyone reading this.
For example, in your most recent post you completely ignore all the points that demonstrate the flaws in your ideas; apparently because you can think of no way to respond without admitting that your statements are hopelessly contradictory. Instead, you choose to blind yourself to this inconvenient fact by seeking refuge in that last resort of the desperate: insult.
If you still had a case you would have demonstrated the strength of your position with actual logic by now. Instead, you attempt to invalidate my arguments by trying to diminish my own worth (as a human being, no less). Firstly you twist my words to suggest that I am devoid of common sense, logic or sanity. You draw from somewhere the false assertion that I believe English professors hold the key to gnosis (while apparently holding the same belief of yourself); something I already rebutted and explained in a previous post when you made a similar, though less extreme claim. Secondly, you suggest that journalists are a lower form of life to people like you, applying an unqualified and mass generalisation based entirely in opinion. Incidentally, generalisation is recognised as a key logical fallacy. You also somehow draw the incorrect conclusion that I even am a journalist--something I never claimed. Then, finally, you go on to allege that I am a member of some kind of proletariat, lacking even in the mental ability to make the arguments I have, paradoxically, already made.
Clearly I don't even need to respond to these misrepresentations, generalisations and blatantly superior, unqualified opinions. The only person you are fooling is yourself.
Apparently, you believe someone's ideas are only meaningful if you personally happen to like that individual. This is remarkably convenient for you, since you're unlikely to hold in esteem anyone with ideas that differ much from your own. Subsequently you'll never need to question your beliefs; faulty as they may be. How anyone can have a mindset like this is something I don't pretend to understand, for it contradicts the very idea of equality; it is, having looked up the meaning of your sig, nonetheless what I would expect of you. Since Amalek was a society of racism and intolerance which God reputedly commanded be erased from memory forever (ie, nothing like Amalek must ever be recreated), I am forced to assume your sig is intended to oppose this idea. Since you are apparently therefore a proponent of racism and inequality, which are both ideas requiring irrational and contradictory thought processes to justify, your responses to my own arguments are unsurprising.
I would suggest that you go away and carefully examine your views, applying reasoning and logic to them instead of simply assuming they're somehow superior to everyone else's because they belong to you. This is a hard thing for a weak- and lazy-minded person to do, especially since it is a never-ending process, but ultimately you would find it productive--you would make real friends, learn to respect people and their opinions, and probably even develop the ability to recognise and admit when you're wrong.
If, on the other hand, you truly do believe you are better than me and everyone or anyone else, please do us both a favour by not responding with any more self-inflated arrogance.
Feminists, in my experience, are generally as chauvanistic toward men as they accuse men of being towards women.
Besides that, anyone who can get misogynism out of Star Trek has gotta be a bit screwed in the head. Now, I doubt the parent is a feminist as much as a troll, but nonetheless I've seen feminists come out with some weird shit; all of it easily refutable until it enters their warped minds.
Note that I'm particularly fond of females, and believe in equity, Dr Biscuit.
If you'd like to actually turn this into a debate, Dr Troll Biscuit, I'd be happy to oblige. First let me outline my points:
the highest-ranking female seen to date in Star Trek is Captain Kathryn Janeway, the lead character in Star Trek: Voyager
if you'd like to complain about "servitude", you should note that everyone is in a position of servitude to the captain
"captain" is only a sexually-charged word if you choose to make it so for your own disingenuous purposes; it has been a rank since at least the 1700s
Riker is never portrayed as predatory in my recollection. Women on the "new" show you refer to, Star Trek: The Next Generation which began airing in 1988 (from memory; I could be a year or two off), are presented in positions of authority and importance: Dr Beverly Crusher, the ship's chief medical officer; Lt Tasha Yar (since deceased on the show), the chief security officer for the first season or so; and Deanna Troi, the ship's counsellor who is always on the bridge
techies comprise only a small percentage of Star Trek's total viewership and fan base
you should indeed be modded down, for you are a troll. However, since other people less informed than myself may believe you (and obviously have, since you've been modded insightful (good troll btw)), I am replying to set the facts straight.
I'd be glad to discuss in greater depth any or all of the Star Trek programs, should you choose to rise to the bait.
Who'd want to have sex with a Ferengi female? Sick man, have you seen their teeth? Not to mention that the lobes alone are enough to put a guy off any kind of enjoyment.
Give me a Vulcan any day. Superior strength, stamina and physiological control. The sexy pointed ears are just the creme^H^Ham on the pudding baby.
Slashdot Mirror
- Should we all just send letters to the MPAA saying "Make any old crap you want. It really doesn't matter, you don't need us to like it, just to pay to see how much we hate it." [...] Personally, I'm going to sit it out until Ang Lee and James Shamus bring us the Hulk in 2003. If that falls flat, then that about wraps it up for Hollywood as far as I'm concerned.
People still pay for Hollywood movies?- I was about to post the same thing. I have been running an up-to-date version of Mozilla/Galeon for quite a while, and things seem to be much better now that Mozilla has matured.
Does it not seem more likely then that things are better because, as Mozilla matured, compatibility was added so that IE-specific stuff would render more or less correctly? I use Opera, and I too very rarely come across a site that doesn't work, but I'd be surprised if it was because designers were following standards more frequently. Until Opera 6, I had trouble with a lot of sites that work fine now. Just a thought.Lawyer.
And in other recent news, Chicken Licken has announced that the sky is falling.
That was coo...
Another person confusing "legal" with "right".
Time doesn't exist, depending on how you look at the situation. I don't know that your interpretation has been proven, though it has some merit. Isn't time technically a fourth dimension, t ? The question should really be, is "time" a by-product of movement in space, or is movement in space possible because time already exists?
Anyone who's seen Dark Angel will know they produce some damn nice hardware
Wishful enough? Yes.
As you can see, I wasn't expressing any kind of surprise at the fact Eminem is revered. I was merely asking (rhetorically) what kind of fuc^H^H^Hscrewed up society we live in that this is the case. You caught me at a bad time now; I just got home from Tech, where it has become blindingly obvious that not only are the best and brightest future journalists nearly all illiterate, but they also lack any kind of critical thinking capability or even the desire to think about anything that seems vaguely "intellectual". When you see people who are going to be working in the media and possibly in positions of influence struggling with concepts like Marxism, ideology and semiotics, and wondering what is the point of studying them...
I'm deeply depressed at how totally wasted the incredible potential of humanity is. We are capable of such great things, yet probably less than 1% of our entire population is even interested in anything beyond how to be "better" than anyone else through meaningless material wealth and social status. Everyone searches for some way to be happy, following the media in a desperate consumerist belief of more is better; never appearing to realise that happiness will always be deferred and never noticing that their entire lives have been spent searching for something they already have.
People tell me I think too much. I tell them they think too little.
He's not a good writer. He's an average director. As for vision...judging by the large number of "epic" films he's produced that flopped, my observation would be that his vision reaches no further than his bank balance.
Why? William Shatner played Captain Kirk. What he do that other Star Trek actors (captains or not) didn't? It's not like Kirk invented the universal translator or something. If he wanted to, Shatner has enough money to buy one of these things anyway.
If DARPA was going to give a beta-model universal translator to anyone it should be awarded posthumously to Star Trek's creator, Gene Roddenberry. His wife, Majel Barret Roddenberry, is still alive.
[...]
Mod Me down Please
So, you worked out that asking to be modded down has a magical modding-up effect humm?
Mod me down please.
Thanks very much to all you guys who responded, especially FreeUser. You've been really helpful :)
However, when I think about it, perhaps that makes sense; I'm looking to run a desktop (mostly), whereas I'm presuming that when Linux is used in the corporate environment it is basically only on servers.
Is RedHat really such a good distro for corporate needs, or is it merely that it has a big name so everyone buys it? I always think of RedHat as the distro that's been around forever, even though no one seems to use it (here come the RedHat users to set me straight...) Guess I've been talking to the wrong people.
Corporations never did make good friends to talk to though.
Wouldn't anyone who wanted to actually own their cable modem either buy one the company supported, or make sure they knew something about cable modems and PPP etc before buying one? Seems to me that most nerds would want their own modem, and these kinds of people would be able to tell the tech support person everything they needed to know in the event of a problem. Heck, they could probably tell the tech support person how to fix the problem.
- Whoever put my shit on the Internet, I want to meet that motherfucker and beat the shit out of him... - Eminem
Do these sound like the words of an intelligent or balanced individual? I don't understand why this guy is so popular when he is apparently:- arrogant
- conceited
- rude
- disrespectful
- racist
- homophobic
If anything, he reminds me of a Slashdot troll. What does it say about our society that people who exhibit these qualities, and must use three expletives in single sentence, are held up as some kind of idols? And what does it say about the intelligence levels of people who find his lyrics appealing?Now, he's quite entitled to his views, and I won't stop him trying to voice them, but it's hard to like someone with that image, you know? I try to see him as a social dissident or something, rebelling against political correctness, but it just isn't happening. People like that don't generally appear to have vastly inflated egos, extreme views or the need to appear cool. Which is how, frankly, Eminem comes across.
Obviously I am no expert on the topic, and this isn't meant as a flame. I know that his image is probably based primarily in hip-hop; a culture I know little about. But he's not a difficult person to dislike, especially if you just catch an ad on TV for his album.
Now, I have no doubt that inflation has accounted for only a smallish percentage of the total rise in cost, but it's something that should be kept in mind. On the other hand though, I suppose it's likely that manufacturing costs have gone down, which should have balanced the system out.
So yeah, you're right, the music industry is bloated, money-hungry and mostly produces music not worth the CDs its printed on.
What was my point again..?
Just a thought...
It is you who consistently reply with intellectually vacuous posts written in anger.
I believe you'll note, regarding Amalek, that I said I was making an assumption based on your sig. Since I stated I had to look up what it meant, and only gave one reference, it was (though apparently not to you) obviously not supposed to be anything more than a theory that meshed with what you have shown of your personality. Having researched the issue at greater length, and had the term "blot the remembrance" (RSV) explained by you (thus resolving the apparent contradiction in the Bible itself), I am happy to admit that my theory was born of ignorance and was entirely wrong.
Nonetheless, my question over your belief in equality must stand. It is interesting that although you continue to find it acceptable to insult me at great length, this barb of my own brought down upon me an entire post of righteous fury dedicated to demonstrating your superior knowledge of the Bible. In retrospect, it was a telling experiment since it indicates that, while your attitude leaves a great deal to be desired (intelligent people don't resort to enraged flaming), you actually are capable of forming coherent arguments when you have a case.
I'm curious though. If you are a fan of the Bible, how is it that the values it teaches have completely passed you by? I'm forced to ask: in your position, what would Jesus do? The only occasion I can recall offhand where Jesus even got angry was when he kicked all those traders etc out of the temple. Certainly he never seemed to hold anyone in contempt or believe he was better than them, as you do. Though, since the Bible itself is chockablock with contradictions, perhaps you believe they're an acceptable way of justifying anything. Who knows.
Because this "discussion" is getting disproportionately long and you still haven't addressed my initial arguments, I'm going to have to ask you to actually read and reply to these points, instead of sidetracking the conversation yet again.
If, when you reply, you do not address these three questions (which cover what this discussion is supposed to be about), I will not bother to reply. I am persistent and long-suffering, but even I can recognise when a debate becomes a lost cause due to the inability of one party to either rebut or declare defeat.
For example, in your most recent post you completely ignore all the points that demonstrate the flaws in your ideas; apparently because you can think of no way to respond without admitting that your statements are hopelessly contradictory. Instead, you choose to blind yourself to this inconvenient fact by seeking refuge in that last resort of the desperate: insult.
If you still had a case you would have demonstrated the strength of your position with actual logic by now. Instead, you attempt to invalidate my arguments by trying to diminish my own worth (as a human being, no less). Firstly you twist my words to suggest that I am devoid of common sense, logic or sanity. You draw from somewhere the false assertion that I believe English professors hold the key to gnosis (while apparently holding the same belief of yourself); something I already rebutted and explained in a previous post when you made a similar, though less extreme claim. Secondly, you suggest that journalists are a lower form of life to people like you, applying an unqualified and mass generalisation based entirely in opinion. Incidentally, generalisation is recognised as a key logical fallacy. You also somehow draw the incorrect conclusion that I even am a journalist--something I never claimed. Then, finally, you go on to allege that I am a member of some kind of proletariat, lacking even in the mental ability to make the arguments I have, paradoxically, already made.
Clearly I don't even need to respond to these misrepresentations, generalisations and blatantly superior, unqualified opinions. The only person you are fooling is yourself.
Apparently, you believe someone's ideas are only meaningful if you personally happen to like that individual. This is remarkably convenient for you, since you're unlikely to hold in esteem anyone with ideas that differ much from your own. Subsequently you'll never need to question your beliefs; faulty as they may be. How anyone can have a mindset like this is something I don't pretend to understand, for it contradicts the very idea of equality; it is, having looked up the meaning of your sig, nonetheless what I would expect of you. Since Amalek was a society of racism and intolerance which God reputedly commanded be erased from memory forever (ie, nothing like Amalek must ever be recreated), I am forced to assume your sig is intended to oppose this idea. Since you are apparently therefore a proponent of racism and inequality, which are both ideas requiring irrational and contradictory thought processes to justify, your responses to my own arguments are unsurprising.
I would suggest that you go away and carefully examine your views, applying reasoning and logic to them instead of simply assuming they're somehow superior to everyone else's because they belong to you. This is a hard thing for a weak- and lazy-minded person to do, especially since it is a never-ending process, but ultimately you would find it productive--you would make real friends, learn to respect people and their opinions, and probably even develop the ability to recognise and admit when you're wrong.
If, on the other hand, you truly do believe you are better than me and everyone or anyone else, please do us both a favour by not responding with any more self-inflated arrogance.
Besides that, anyone who can get misogynism out of Star Trek has gotta be a bit screwed in the head. Now, I doubt the parent is a feminist as much as a troll, but nonetheless I've seen feminists come out with some weird shit; all of it easily refutable until it enters their warped minds.
Note that I'm particularly fond of females, and believe in equity, Dr Biscuit.
- the highest-ranking female seen to date in Star Trek is Captain Kathryn Janeway, the lead character in Star Trek: Voyager
- if you'd like to complain about "servitude", you should note that everyone is in a position of servitude to the captain
- "captain" is only a sexually-charged word if you choose to make it so for your own disingenuous purposes; it has been a rank since at least the 1700s
- Riker is never portrayed as predatory in my recollection. Women on the "new" show you refer to, Star Trek: The Next Generation which began airing in 1988 (from memory; I could be a year or two off), are presented in positions of authority and importance: Dr Beverly Crusher, the ship's chief medical officer; Lt Tasha Yar (since deceased on the show), the chief security officer for the first season or so; and Deanna Troi, the ship's counsellor who is always on the bridge
- techies comprise only a small percentage of Star Trek's total viewership and fan base
- you should indeed be modded down, for you are a troll. However, since other people less informed than myself may believe you (and obviously have, since you've been modded insightful (good troll btw)), I am replying to set the facts straight.
I'd be glad to discuss in greater depth any or all of the Star Trek programs, should you choose to rise to the bait.- In fact, all leadership roles on Star Trek, old and new, are white males.
Except for the black Captain Benjamin Sisko in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and the female Captain Kathryn Janeway in Star Trek: Voyager...Give me a Vulcan any day. Superior strength, stamina and physiological control. The sexy pointed ears are just the creme^H^Ham on the pudding baby.