(Former) Minnesotan with 30+ years living there weighing in here:
Guess you're too young to remember Rudy Perpich?:) I'll let you research that one.
Jesse wasn't the most wise of governors, nor was he perfect (a lot of people where I lived hated him, because of the cuts to state welfare grants to the area I was in; not that his replacement did better, and not that the cuts weren't justified)
What I found refreshing was a governor who DID speak his mind; who would tell the press to go to hell when they were heckling; who didn't hesitate to let people know what he was thinking instead of relying on professional spin advisors.
I'm just guessing wrt to my first comment, but you *have* to be young. Otherwise you wouldn't find a politician who is publicly honest about his opinions, despite the consequences, to be anything other than refreshing. Remember Paul Wellstone and his campaign by any chance - and what happened after he was elected?
I for one would trade a lot wrt to competence just to have a politician running for national office who is willing to say what he/she thinks, and damn the media and the consequences. I think we need a lot more of that sort of thing in this country, rather than politicians who pander to whomever they need to please today and end up being hypocritical assholes.
Hey, I can dream, can't I? Shit, I've only been watching this circus for a quarter century.
SB
PS Jesse really didn't have much power over the minnesota legislature. Many of the party members on both sides resented his outspokenness and took it as an excuse to ramrod thru conflicting "reforms" which contributed to the resulting chaos.
As to tuition increases, etc - you can blame the federal government, increased bureaucratic influence, and lawsuit scares on tuition increases long before blaming Jesse.
Good luck in your studies, kiddo. Work hard...you'll need to. No offense meant.
You said: Without the Electoral College a few things would happen....The Dakotas...would never see a candidate campaign in their state. They would be completely irrelevant.
Bush had no paid campaign workers in South Dakota, but Republican politicians such as Gov. Bill Janklow and U.S. Rep. John Thune carried the torch on his behalf. The Gore campaign had one paid worker in South Dakota, Democratic officials said.
I actually found Win98SE quite usable, back when I used to run windows. I gave up using IE after Mozilla hit 0.9 and subsequently noticed a huge improvement in overall stability.
Funny about the Via chipsets - I've used Via chipsets since my K6-2 days, and while Windows often had problems on them (particularly 3D games and larger apps) linux has always been uber-stable - my current main box is a Chaintech mobo using a 1200 Duron, Via chipset, and I got so sick of windows not staying up for more than a few days I finally wiped the partition and went entirely to linux. Only time I ever reboot is for a new kernel or hardware change:) so shitty windows drivers are my suspicion rather than shitty hardware. I use this box hard, too.
In the process of building a new box but I'm having to do it piece by piece until my finances recover from my move here last summer. Don't need one all that much - hardly ever play games anymore and this box does all I want it to, but I do want another box built in case this one ever dies (the mobo is several years old and has been up 24/7 for more than a year and a half/three power supplies/two videocards/several cpu fans:)
Heh. I grew up in a podunk farm town in MN. Ag never attracted me - I was always a geek/nerd type. I always had a helluva lot of respect for farmers, and I've known many of them, but I'd never want to be one:)
Now that I'm almost forty, life has settled down for me. I'm an experienced carpenter and good computer tech and can pick and choose the jobs I take. Currently I'm a hardware store rep, I hate retail, but I moved here completely cold - took the first job I was offered and it turned out to be a good one. Great boss, great customers, nice town. Going to go independent later this year, but only after we've found someone to replace me - won't leave the boss in the lurch; may stay on parttime anyway. Meanwhile I get all the hours I want and do work on the side when I want to or need the money. Pretty good life, overall:)
Disabling restore did indeed help IIRC; but getting customers NOT to use Help is difficult.
I saw a few stable WinME boxes (one guy boasted that it crashed only once every couple days or so:); I suspect that hardware drivers and the HAL were the biggest cause of most lockups. On some hardware it was simply more stable. Go figure. ME *does* deserve it's reputation, tho; even Microsoft would like to quietly assign it to the history trash bin.
A living, breathing, functional ME installation? Whoa. Put that thing in a museum, man!:)
tempfiles; yaya; "How come my hard drive is full?" *grin*
Off to work again. "Yea, tho I work on the Day of Rest, my Paychecks be Mighty"
But I distinctly remember, about 10 years ago or so, the Vatican issuing a statement that condoms might be a viable option in preventing STD propogation; I can't find a link to it, now.
Maybe I'm nut, but I don't think so, I remember discussing this with a lot of people on usenet.
Guess I need to play catchup with google; I don't think my memory is faulty, but it's happened before.
Copernicus didn't live in the same era:) The church was a lot more powerful during Galileo's time.
Well, the library would just have to make it clear that there is no support and it's strictly use at your own risk. No different from the risk of being exposed to new ideas every time you read a book!
Our litigational society is wonderful, neh?:) Give 'em time, give 'em time...they'll find a way. Bastards. Only thing stopping the censorists is public opinion - but the fight alone is putting serious hurt on libraries. (that, and computers - but private industry wrt to public computer koisks is in it's own kind of hurt:( )
Seriously, there will be requests for support for said software wrt to librarians. You and I both know there will be. What I'm saying is that there will be people who could fill that niche - but it'd be damned hard for a lot of people to do so without making it an occupation - ie, charging for it. Volunteerism only goes so far (sigh).
I haven't done any serious coding myself for many, many years; but collect, collect. I for one welcome my book overlords:)
I moved a thousand miles almost a year ago; sold 95% of what I owned; it was a three week+ running garage sale. The funniest thing about it is that the books/manuals/assorted printouts went in the first week, and the three walkin closets full of old but working computer equipment and assorted debris from 6 years+ of carpentry work trickled out.
What does that mean?:)
Librarian in Montana was like that.. I'd come in the door and she'd start waving books at me. She was great!:))) small town librarians... I missed them - where I was living before I moved, well... then I moved here. We're old fashioned, here. Thou knowest what I mean... what a great bunch. I was seeking a old Dave_Barry book recently, not on the computer list - but one local librarian not only had the book in her personal lib, but was willing to loan it to me. Nostalgia == what libs are about!
The only trouble with libraries is, you have to give the books back!
No, that's the great thing about libraries - the bad thing is, they don't have the shelf space to accomodate what you can give them...
Support groups for bookaholics... um, alt.binaries.e-book?:)
Another enabler:) My ebook collection hasn't surpassed my physical one yet, but only because of my guilt factor:)
Someday they're going to band together and take over my house.
*grin*
Montana...
Black Hills, SD bookworm here. Middle of nowhere...we're the center of everywhere!:)
WRT to Galileo, true (to an extent! there were a lot of bishops who wanted Galileo burned), but the church still did not issue a formal apology/acknowledgement of his work until just a few years ago. (don't remember when it was exactly now, but not that long ago).
One might also think on the fact that Galileo's findings - and he was vocal about them, as he should have been - were in direct conflict with the church teachings at the time; so there is no way he could have avoided censure of one kind or another. (A lesson that could also be applied to our times with different subjects and different players, nay?)
I was actually more impressed by the acknowledgement by the Catholic church that condoms were perhaps not a bad idea, after all. Of course if this had come before nasty STDs such as HIV were becoming a really serious and widespread medical problem, it might have been more of an indication of real tolerance rather than forced recognition of reality. But at least they went that far. Shows that someone there is thinking.
I'm not religious, tho raised so; but I'll admit that the Catholic church is one of the more enlightened in matters of science. I personally consider it penance for past transgressions.:)
I'm not saying that *I* would; I'm saying that a lot of the public would. Which is a good argument for Knoppix bootable CDs:)
Book sales: Oy, I know that feeling. I can't build shelving fast enough. I have 9 60 gallon totes full of books and they just, um, breed:) I can't walk away! Help! Visited the local Salvation army a week ago looking for some cheap blankets to use as throways... didn't find them, but walked away with several hundred issues of F&SF magazine from the 80s - be reading them for years, I suspect:)
Meanwhile the local library staff finds much glee in stacking books for me on the counter when I visit. ("Look, I found this, and this, and this..." and my back groans under the weight of carrying them out:) and I just can't say no. How could I? (thank bog I'm not into Harlequin or other useless rag - tho I do have many copies of various print dates of Heinlein:)
The Vatican learned a lot from the lesson of Galileo; even if it did take them until the 20th century to acknowledge so publicly. The Catholic church does seem to be keeping up with the times, however; contraception being one example of sorts...
I don't remember much of what I read about the origins of the Vatican Astronomer, tho; what was the reason for creating the position in the first place?
Christianity has fragmented so much that there are altogether too many whackies. Not really surprising, most authoritarian frames of mind tend to generate offshoots both more and less fanatical.
WinME would reboot if you looked at it crosseyed:)
Can't beat your record - OUCH! but I did once clean 3284 Melissa infected files off of a win98 machine (back in 2001-!). Guy I was working for wanted to reinstall, but he left for the day and it was quiet afterwards, so I took a stab at it. Fixed it, too. (Then the following week the customer was back in with two other virus infections and the first newdot.net infection I'd seen - guess my twenty minute lecture was completely ignored.)
Sigh. Glad I don't do that anymore. I'd seriously rather fix toilets for a living (don't do that either anymore, but I do teach people how to do it themselves:)
Yeah. Danged media. Not a bad article, tho, despite the speculation. But this got me:
Article quote: The way Opportunity's luck has been going, it would not be surprising to learn the rover has detected Martian microbes.
Although it's not equipped to, like the Viking landers were. Opportunity is a geological explorer, not a biological one.
SB
Re:The Cassandra effect and Public discourse (long
on
A New Ice Age?
·
· Score: 1
Wow. Fabulous posts. For a little while there I thought I was back in my Climatology classes:) (long time ago, and I've not kept up; I feel enlightened! Thanks!)
Just one comment (ok, couple):
In the simple chaotic dynamics view, weather is the state of the system (the wandering dot), and climate is the shape of the set of permissible trajectories (the whole phase diagram). Things aren't necessarily that simple in fact, but we don't have a better way of addressing the issue. Ultimately, we aren't trying to prove theorems, we're trying to elucidate complex physics, and this view appears to be both necessary and sufficient for most of our purposes.
When I read that, I was reminded of quantum uncertainty as it pertains to electrons; one can observe either the position or velocity vector, but not both simultaneously, and hence you have a mathematical range of uncertaintity for either, and a wider range of possibility when extrapolating past and future. Is that a legit way of visualizing it?
The global-warming-causes-an-ice-age-in-Eurpose scenario is basewd on this particular, not fully understood instability, recurring. This would be a brief and short cold perturbation in geophysical terms (a few hundred years) but it could still be a big deal on the ground. This is pretty speculative, and is probably better thought of as an example of the sort of risks we are taking than as a prediction.
I thought that Atlantic conveyer shutdown as a cooling mechanism was pretty well understood and had evidence to back it up. So essentially what you're saying is that we don't know how long term the effects - or the shutdown - could last. Am I missing something here? (probably)
WRT to sci.environment: It's just a side effect of the continuing destruction of Usenet as a viable forum. Scoring and killfiles simply can't keep up anymore. Sad, but I suspect a lot of serious people have left for the same reasons. Usenet was once (80s) a good forum for discussion; not anymore. Private forums are taking over, but they are harder to find if you're not directly invited. Sigh.
It's pretty discouraging to see what gets moderated to 5, insightful or informative.
Such was my thought also...
I've been watching the online discussion of climate change over the past decade. The evidence has gotten stronger and the public discourse has gotten more confused. This is not good.
and given that public discourse, media opinion, and polls have a large effects on political opinion and decision....well:( we're seeing the effects of that; and they're not good...
I think the blame falls largely on us baby boomers, with our motto of Question Authority. This particular idea has infected all sides of debate, and it's a very bad idea unless it is qualified. I suggest Question Authority, but Listen to the Answer.
Maybe. I'm not so sure. I think that the massive increase in the ease of public discourse and input into the media provided by better communications - particularly the internet - has had a much larger effect. Not that I'm dismissing what you've said, it's certainly a factor. The tumult of the 60s and early 70s certainly left it's mark on this country. Perhaps it's both; the earlier magnified by the later.
Your first paragraph is exactly what I thought while I was reading the article. Despite the obvious bias of the article* they did point out that phytoplankton blooms were apparently a effect, rather than a cause. Triggered blooms could have totally unpredictable effects on local ecologies (and distant ones).
The real kicker, tho, is that there is nothing that we *could* do. There is no way there would ever be any consensus and global action - whatever it is we would try - because there is not enough global unity to make a real dent in any effects we may be causing. More research is needed - but even if the possible climate changes do become severe, I think it's highly unlikely we could really change things enough to make a difference. (Think the inhabitants of Siberia saying "No, don't you go trying to alter global warming, we like it warmer!":)
So, I think we're pretty safe from deliberate action to change the global climate, anyway:)
* ("one reason scientists find the ice age scenario" - they should have said "a few scientists", as those were the only ones they could quote)
Good points, all. Let's leave aside the problem of downloading/burning CDs for now (see below)
What I see as the biggest problem is answering the questions that patrons might have - IOW, support. The whole idea would die if the patrons couldn't get support and tutoring in using what they had borrowed - and could freely copy.
The only viable solution WRT to support that I can see is LUGs - but that might get to be debilitating for a lot of local LUGs in terms of time spent. Most LUG members are already busy as hell.
It's a horrid catch22. I donate to my local library, and spend a lot of time there, and they know me really well. I'd be perfectly willing to keep linux CDs up to date for them - I already do it for anyone who wants a copy of linux dists, I have a 20 GB HD dedicated to linux ISOs - I have a very high bw connection and fast burner and they've expressed interest but I had to tell them - I don't have time to support patrons (hell, I'm turning down paying requests to fix machines now, as it is;( and am already working overtime at the job I have + doing this)
Argh! Such a great idea (I read the Dec article too) yet there is no real answer to it that doesn't involve the patrons ultimately paying for support/tutoring in one fashion or another.
Perhaps a partial answer might be dedicated LUGs giving classes at local libraries for interested parties, volunteer. I don't know whether that would work. I honestly don't know what would work! but I do know that having FOSS CDs available at a local library is a damned good idea, and right in line with what libraries are for. (Our local LUG is dead; I 'm trying to revive/restart one, but so far no success)
One of the people I work with is a city councilwoman; I've brought the idea up to her wrt to funding; she doesn't know that she can ram anything thru, but she's said she's going to try. Sounds like I may be able to present at a meeting this summer. Hope I can achieve coherence:)
There has to be an answer somewhere. I hope so, anyway.
Respect,
SB
Frequenting and supporting his local librar(ies) for 25yrs+
Ah, grasshopper, but IBM was fighting bigger battles than this when Gates & Co were still struggling to buy themselves a startup.
IBM knows how these battles are fought. Don't forget, they *won* against the DOJ; Microsoft lost, and got lucky that the new admin trumped the DOJ.
IBM vs. Microsoft: I'd be buying IBM stock. It'd be a long battle, but IBM would crush Microsoft. Why do you think that Microsoft isn't attacking open source directly? Because they know that they'd end up fighting IBM; and they know goddamned well that they'd lose.
I tried the same with the Traveller rules (in Turbo Pascal) back in about '85. IIRC it was an ugly mess because there wasn't enough mathematical consistency within the rules; but it's been a very long time, and I no longer have any of my notes and remember very little of my thinking at the time.
I'd be curious to know what the specific issues you faced were; after I quit trying I went to college and never looked back, and haven't really thought about it since.
No other reason than just genuine curiousity, BTW.:)
I do remember thinking about halfway thru the project that the only usefulness it would have at the time would be as a GM tool; and considering it was too large, at the time, to run on anything other than an IBM PC (and maybe two people I played with had one, including me:) that it was a waste of time. Boy, did I miss the boat!
Sadly, I don't have the source anymore. A few much more brilliant people than me contributed excellent ideas. Sigh. Damn... now I'm feeling old:)
Caretaking is basically the deal on this farmhouse; I live there for a year payment free as long as I make improvements to the place and keep the orchards up; then at end of year I get C4D, low payments and title, maybe, my credit rating is a smoking crater from taking too many years to pay off student loans. House needs a lot of work tho and I'm not sure I can afford it right now, overtime or not, sigh. Hate to pass it up tho, owner is a customer and great guy and he really needs someone trustworthy out there so he's not running back and forth hundreds of miles each week. Tradeoffs.
You're probably right about the real estate bubble, but I doubt it'll affect things around here much; lots of construction and area is expanding rapidly because it's a great place to live, super climate, jobs and nice people and good schools. Property within the Hills is hellishly expensive; go 15 miles out and it gets cheap, but not as nice place to live. Hurk. That and we get a million+ people out here for Sturgis every year - it's money week - missed my chance last year, but this year, muhahahaha;)
Steady income is no prob; more work than I can handle and I practically pray for days off.
I don't play stock market or investment games; too dangerous and I've never taken the time to learn how (and don't want to). Prefer to put my money into tools, books and (hopefully soon) land.
Tangible stuff:)
I'll check out some of those links/shows, if/when I get a chance. Printed out your post and stuck it on the wall (next to ten million other things:)
If you ever do take a break, come out and visit. The Hills are a great place. I agree about moving - moved a thousand miles last May, totally blind wrt to new place and it wiped my savings out. Was worth it tho - work was drying up where I was and the winters really sucked. I sure hear you about gear - I sold/gave away/junked 95% of what I owned and still piled a truck bed 6 feet high. Danged packrat, that's me:)
Never been to Georgia - probably never will, but it sounds nice. I've heard there's lot of cheap land there if you don't mind being way the hell beyond the sidewalks. I can't take heat+humidity anymore tho, part of the reason I moved out here.
Darnit, stuck inside today, weather bit me - it's snowing. 80 degrees last week, supposed to be 70 by Tuesday, snowing today - that's 'Hills' weather:) Love it, and we need the moisture. But the cabin fever is creeping in...
Sounds like you've got a nice place going there. I miss having the room ; it's been some years since I could garden and it's left a big hole in my heart. Raised beds mulched and turned over winter worked really well for me - lots of sweat but the results are worth it. Out here is going to be different from where I was - too much water there, not enough here, and lots of clay/lime soil. Should be ideal for peppers tho *grin*
Anyway, if you'd like to chat more (I would, I love this stuff) shoot an email tonite off to shadowbearer at yahoo com (obfuscated of course)
Anyone that's a good programmer would much rather be coding than auditing.:)
Not necessarily (was that why the smiley?:) - inventing code to solve a problem is whole different problem than going thru it looking for vulnerabilities is - testing for vulns is easier than avoiding them in the first place.
Slashdot Mirror
Hee! Well done. That's the best takeoff on grave spinning I've ever seen!
I have to go clean the snorted beer off my monitor now...
SB
Such was my first thought, also.
It would *have to* distribute the kinetic energy of impact - there's nowhere else for it to go, after all.
One would probably end up bruised over a larger area, but it would reduce point impact damage considerably.
Shit, I wish this stuff had been available for leathers 13 years ago - would have saved me a lot of pain.
Another application that excites me is clothing for construction workers - sharp impacts and trauma are a large cause of most injuries.
Wow.
SB
Is there some way to have a machine reboot on kernel error into a known good config automagically even if it's been up for a long time?
SB
(Former) Minnesotan with 30+ years living there weighing in here:
:) I'll let you research that one.
Guess you're too young to remember Rudy Perpich?
Jesse wasn't the most wise of governors, nor was he perfect (a lot of people where I lived hated him, because of the cuts to state welfare grants to the area I was in; not that his replacement did better, and not that the cuts weren't justified)
What I found refreshing was a governor who DID speak his mind; who would tell the press to go to hell when they were heckling; who didn't hesitate to let people know what he was thinking instead of relying on professional spin advisors.
I'm just guessing wrt to my first comment, but you *have* to be young. Otherwise you wouldn't find a politician who is publicly honest about his opinions, despite the consequences, to be anything other than refreshing. Remember Paul Wellstone and his campaign by any chance - and what happened after he was elected?
I for one would trade a lot wrt to competence just to have a politician running for national office who is willing to say what he/she thinks, and damn the media and the consequences. I think we need a lot more of that sort of thing in this country, rather than politicians who pander to whomever they need to please today and end up being hypocritical assholes.
Hey, I can dream, can't I? Shit, I've only been watching this circus for a quarter century.
SB
PS Jesse really didn't have much power over the minnesota legislature. Many of the party members on both sides resented his outspokenness and took it as an excuse to ramrod thru conflicting "reforms" which contributed to the resulting chaos.
As to tuition increases, etc - you can blame the federal government, increased bureaucratic influence, and lawsuit scares on tuition increases long before blaming Jesse.
Good luck in your studies, kiddo. Work hard...you'll need to. No offense meant.
SB
You said: Without the Electoral College a few things would happen....The Dakotas...would never see a candidate campaign in their state. They would be completely irrelevant.
Well;
The two candidates instead put their time, energy and money into major battleground states this year, and South Dakota was not among them. After all, the state has only three electoral votes.
Bush had no paid campaign workers in South Dakota, but Republican politicians such as Gov. Bill Janklow and U.S. Rep. John Thune carried the torch on his behalf.
The Gore campaign had one paid worker in South Dakota, Democratic officials said.
Whatever.
SB
I actually found Win98SE quite usable, back when I used to run windows. I gave up using IE after Mozilla hit 0.9 and subsequently noticed a huge improvement in overall stability.
Funny about the Via chipsets - I've used Via chipsets since my K6-2 days, and while Windows often had problems on them (particularly 3D games and larger apps) linux has always been uber-stable - my current main box is a Chaintech mobo using a 1200 Duron, Via chipset, and I got so sick of windows not staying up for more than a few days I finally wiped the partition and went entirely to linux. Only time I ever reboot is for a new kernel or hardware change
In the process of building a new box but I'm having to do it piece by piece until my finances recover from my move here last summer. Don't need one all that much - hardly ever play games anymore and this box does all I want it to, but I do want another box built in case this one ever dies (the mobo is several years old and has been up 24/7 for more than a year and a half/three power supplies/two videocards/several cpu fans
Heh. I grew up in a podunk farm town in MN. Ag never attracted me - I was always a geek/nerd type. I always had a helluva lot of respect for farmers, and I've known many of them, but I'd never want to be one
Now that I'm almost forty, life has settled down for me. I'm an experienced carpenter and good computer tech and can pick and choose the jobs I take. Currently I'm a hardware store rep, I hate retail, but I moved here completely cold - took the first job I was offered and it turned out to be a good one. Great boss, great customers, nice town. Going to go independent later this year, but only after we've found someone to replace me - won't leave the boss in the lurch; may stay on parttime anyway. Meanwhile I get all the hours I want and do work on the side when I want to or need the money. Pretty good life, overall
Cheers
SB
Disabling restore did indeed help IIRC; but getting customers NOT to use Help is difficult.
:); I suspect that hardware drivers and the HAL were the biggest cause of most lockups. On some hardware it was simply more stable. Go figure. ME *does* deserve it's reputation, tho; even Microsoft would like to quietly assign it to the history trash bin.
:)
I saw a few stable WinME boxes (one guy boasted that it crashed only once every couple days or so
A living, breathing, functional ME installation? Whoa. Put that thing in a museum, man!
tempfiles; yaya; "How come my hard drive is full?" *grin*
Off to work again. "Yea, tho I work on the Day of Rest, my Paychecks be Mighty"
SB
No, I don't.
But I distinctly remember, about 10 years ago or so, the Vatican issuing a statement that condoms might be a viable option in preventing STD propogation; I can't find a link to it, now.
Maybe I'm nut, but I don't think so, I remember discussing this with a lot of people on usenet.
Guess I need to play catchup with google; I don't think my memory is faulty, but it's happened before.
Copernicus didn't live in the same era
Cheers!
'nite
SB
Well, the library would just have to make it clear that there is no support and it's strictly use at your own risk. No different from the risk of being exposed to new ideas every time you read a book!
:) Give 'em time, give 'em time...they'll find a way. Bastards. Only thing stopping the censorists is public opinion - but the fight alone is putting serious hurt on libraries. (that, and computers - but private industry wrt to public computer koisks is in it's own kind of hurt :( )
:)
:)
:))) small town librarians... I missed them - where I was living before I moved, well... then I moved here. We're old fashioned, here. Thou knowest what I mean... what a great bunch. I was seeking a old Dave_Barry book recently, not on the computer list - but one local librarian not only had the book in her personal lib, but was willing to loan it to me. Nostalgia == what libs are about!
:)
:) My ebook collection hasn't surpassed my physical one yet, but only because of my guilt factor :)
:)
Our litigational society is wonderful, neh?
Seriously, there will be requests for support for said software wrt to librarians. You and I both know there will be. What I'm saying is that there will be people who could fill that niche - but it'd be damned hard for a lot of people to do so without making it an occupation - ie, charging for it. Volunteerism only goes so far (sigh).
I haven't done any serious coding myself for many, many years; but collect, collect. I for one welcome my book overlords
I moved a thousand miles almost a year ago; sold 95% of what I owned; it was a three week+ running garage sale. The funniest thing about it is that the books/manuals/assorted printouts went in the first week, and the three walkin closets full of old but working computer equipment and assorted debris from 6 years+ of carpentry work trickled out.
What does that mean?
Librarian in Montana was like that.. I'd come in the door and she'd start waving books at me. She was great!
The only trouble with libraries is, you have to give the books back!
No, that's the great thing about libraries - the bad thing is, they don't have the shelf space to accomodate what you can give them...
Support groups for bookaholics... um, alt.binaries.e-book?
Another enabler
Someday they're going to band together and take over my house.
*grin*
Montana...
Black Hills, SD bookworm here. Middle of nowhere...we're the center of everywhere!
Cheers, oh bookworm!
SB
WRT to Galileo, true (to an extent! there were a lot of bishops who wanted Galileo burned), but the church still did not issue a formal apology/acknowledgement of his work until just a few years ago. (don't remember when it was exactly now, but not that long ago).
:)
One might also think on the fact that Galileo's findings - and he was vocal about them, as he should have been - were in direct conflict with the church teachings at the time; so there is no way he could have avoided censure of one kind or another. (A lesson that could also be applied to our times with different subjects and different players, nay?)
I was actually more impressed by the acknowledgement by the Catholic church that condoms were perhaps not a bad idea, after all. Of course if this had come before nasty STDs such as HIV were becoming a really serious and widespread medical problem, it might have been more of an indication of real tolerance rather than forced recognition of reality. But at least they went that far. Shows that someone there is thinking.
I'm not religious, tho raised so; but I'll admit that the Catholic church is one of the more enlightened in matters of science. I personally consider it penance for past transgressions.
SB
I'm not saying that *I* would; I'm saying that a lot of the public would. Which is a good argument for Knoppix bootable CDs :)
:) I can't walk away! Help! Visited the local Salvation army a week ago looking for some cheap blankets to use as throways... didn't find them, but walked away with several hundred issues of F&SF magazine from the 80s - be reading them for years, I suspect :)
:) and I just can't say no. How could I? (thank bog I'm not into Harlequin or other useless rag - tho I do have many copies of various print dates of Heinlein :)
Book sales: Oy, I know that feeling. I can't build shelving fast enough. I have 9 60 gallon totes full of books and they just, um, breed
Meanwhile the local library staff finds much glee in stacking books for me on the counter when I visit. ("Look, I found this, and this, and this..." and my back groans under the weight of carrying them out
Know of a good support group for book packrats?
Cheers!
SB
The Vatican learned a lot from the lesson of Galileo; even if it did take them until the 20th century to acknowledge so publicly. The Catholic church does seem to be keeping up with the times, however; contraception being one example of sorts...
I don't remember much of what I read about the origins of the Vatican Astronomer, tho; what was the reason for creating the position in the first place?
Christianity has fragmented so much that there are altogether too many whackies. Not really surprising, most authoritarian frames of mind tend to generate offshoots both more and less fanatical.
SB
WinME would reboot if you looked at it crosseyed
Can't beat your record - OUCH! but I did once clean 3284 Melissa infected files off of a win98 machine (back in 2001-!). Guy I was working for wanted to reinstall, but he left for the day and it was quiet afterwards, so I took a stab at it. Fixed it, too. (Then the following week the customer was back in with two other virus infections and the first newdot.net infection I'd seen - guess my twenty minute lecture was completely ignored.)
Sigh. Glad I don't do that anymore. I'd seriously rather fix toilets for a living (don't do that either anymore, but I do teach people how to do it themselves
SB
Yeah. Danged media. Not a bad article, tho, despite the speculation. But this got me:
Article quote: The way Opportunity's luck has been going, it would not be surprising to learn the rover has detected Martian microbes.
Although it's not equipped to, like the Viking landers were. Opportunity is a geological explorer, not a biological one.
SB
Wow. Fabulous posts. For a little while there I thought I was back in my Climatology classes :) (long time ago, and I've not kept up; I feel enlightened! Thanks!)
:( we're seeing the effects of that; and they're not good...
Just one comment (ok, couple):
In the simple chaotic dynamics view, weather is the state of the system (the wandering dot), and climate is the shape of the set of permissible trajectories (the whole phase diagram). Things aren't necessarily that simple in fact, but we don't have a better way of addressing the issue. Ultimately, we aren't trying to prove theorems, we're trying to elucidate complex physics, and this view appears to be both necessary and sufficient for most of our purposes.
When I read that, I was reminded of quantum uncertainty as it pertains to electrons; one can observe either the position or velocity vector, but not both simultaneously, and hence you have a mathematical range of uncertaintity for either, and a wider range of possibility when extrapolating past and future. Is that a legit way of visualizing it?
The global-warming-causes-an-ice-age-in-Eurpose scenario is basewd on this particular, not fully understood instability, recurring. This would be a brief and short cold perturbation in geophysical terms (a few hundred years) but it could still be a big deal on the ground. This is pretty speculative, and is probably better thought of as an example of the sort of risks we are taking than as a prediction.
I thought that Atlantic conveyer shutdown as a cooling mechanism was pretty well understood and had evidence to back it up. So essentially what you're saying is that we don't know how long term the effects - or the shutdown - could last. Am I missing something here? (probably)
WRT to sci.environment: It's just a side effect of the continuing destruction of Usenet as a viable forum. Scoring and killfiles simply can't keep up anymore. Sad, but I suspect a lot of serious people have left for the same reasons. Usenet was once (80s) a good forum for discussion; not anymore. Private forums are taking over, but they are harder to find if you're not directly invited. Sigh.
It's pretty discouraging to see what gets moderated to 5, insightful or informative.
Such was my thought also...
I've been watching the online discussion of climate change over the past decade. The evidence has gotten stronger and the public discourse has gotten more confused. This is not good.
and given that public discourse, media opinion, and polls have a large effects on political opinion and decision....well
I think the blame falls largely on us baby boomers, with our motto of Question Authority. This particular idea has infected all sides of debate, and it's a very bad idea unless it is qualified. I suggest Question Authority, but Listen to the Answer.
Maybe. I'm not so sure. I think that the massive increase in the ease of public discourse and input into the media provided by better communications - particularly the internet - has had a much larger effect. Not that I'm dismissing what you've said, it's certainly a factor. The tumult of the 60s and early 70s certainly left it's mark on this country. Perhaps it's both; the earlier magnified by the later.
Cheers!!!
SB
Your first paragraph is exactly what I thought while I was reading the article. Despite the obvious bias of the article* they did point out that phytoplankton blooms were apparently a effect, rather than a cause. Triggered blooms could have totally unpredictable effects on local ecologies (and distant ones).
:)
:)
The real kicker, tho, is that there is nothing that we *could* do. There is no way there would ever be any consensus and global action - whatever it is we would try - because there is not enough global unity to make a real dent in any effects we may be causing. More research is needed - but even if the possible climate changes do become severe, I think it's highly unlikely we could really change things enough to make a difference. (Think the inhabitants of Siberia saying "No, don't you go trying to alter global warming, we like it warmer!"
So, I think we're pretty safe from deliberate action to change the global climate, anyway
* ("one reason scientists find the ice age scenario" - they should have said "a few scientists", as those were the only ones they could quote)
Cheers!
SB
Well, books and software are different; nobody expects support for a book, but they do expect it with software. Hence LUGs.
I do like your other ideas (particularly media fees).
SB
(Who spent over fifty bucks at the last library book sale
If that was a slashdot rule, there might be three slashdot posters left by the time it was perfected.
Or maybe two.
SB
Good points, all. Let's leave aside the problem of downloading/burning CDs for now (see below)
;( and am already working overtime at the job I have + doing this)
:)
What I see as the biggest problem is answering the questions that patrons might have - IOW, support. The whole idea would die if the patrons couldn't get support and tutoring in using what they had borrowed - and could freely copy.
The only viable solution WRT to support that I can see is LUGs - but that might get to be debilitating for a lot of local LUGs in terms of time spent. Most LUG members are already busy as hell.
It's a horrid catch22. I donate to my local library, and spend a lot of time there, and they know me really well. I'd be perfectly willing to keep linux CDs up to date for them - I already do it for anyone who wants a copy of linux dists, I have a 20 GB HD dedicated to linux ISOs - I have a very high bw connection and fast burner and they've expressed interest but I had to tell them - I don't have time to support patrons (hell, I'm turning down paying requests to fix machines now, as it is
Argh! Such a great idea (I read the Dec article too) yet there is no real answer to it that doesn't involve the patrons ultimately paying for support/tutoring in one fashion or another.
Perhaps a partial answer might be dedicated LUGs giving classes at local libraries for interested parties, volunteer. I don't know whether that would work. I honestly don't know what would work! but I do know that having FOSS CDs available at a local library is a damned good idea, and right in line with what libraries are for. (Our local LUG is dead; I 'm trying to revive/restart one, but so far no success)
One of the people I work with is a city councilwoman; I've brought the idea up to her wrt to funding; she doesn't know that she can ram anything thru, but she's said she's going to try. Sounds like I may be able to present at a meeting this summer. Hope I can achieve coherence
There has to be an answer somewhere. I hope so, anyway.
Respect,
SB
Frequenting and supporting his local librar(ies) for 25yrs+
Ah, grasshopper, but IBM was fighting bigger battles than this when Gates & Co were still struggling to buy themselves a startup.
IBM knows how these battles are fought. Don't forget, they *won* against the DOJ; Microsoft lost, and got lucky that the new admin trumped the DOJ.
IBM vs. Microsoft: I'd be buying IBM stock. It'd be a long battle, but IBM would crush Microsoft. Why do you think that Microsoft isn't attacking open source directly? Because they know that they'd end up fighting IBM; and they know goddamned well that they'd lose.
SB
I tried the same with the Traveller rules (in Turbo Pascal) back in about '85. IIRC it was an ugly mess because there wasn't enough mathematical consistency within the rules; but it's been a very long time, and I no longer have any of my notes and remember very little of my thinking at the time.
:)
:) that it was a waste of time. Boy, did I miss the boat!
:)
I'd be curious to know what the specific issues you faced were; after I quit trying I went to college and never looked back, and haven't really thought about it since.
No other reason than just genuine curiousity, BTW.
I do remember thinking about halfway thru the project that the only usefulness it would have at the time would be as a GM tool; and considering it was too large, at the time, to run on anything other than an IBM PC (and maybe two people I played with had one, including me
Sadly, I don't have the source anymore. A few much more brilliant people than me contributed excellent ideas. Sigh. Damn... now I'm feeling old
Cheers!
SB
but what about the pure fans who have taken their fandom and raised their obsession to the level of analysis and creation?
I believe one could call them writers (successful or not, text, scripts or music, or artwork)
Cheers. Great posts.
SB
Bill would hate that.
SB
Caretaking is basically the deal on this farmhouse; I live there for a year payment free as long as I make improvements to the place and keep the orchards up; then at end of year I get C4D, low payments and title, maybe, my credit rating is a smoking crater from taking too many years to pay off student loans. House needs a lot of work tho and I'm not sure I can afford it right now, overtime or not, sigh. Hate to pass it up tho, owner is a customer and great guy and he really needs someone trustworthy out there so he's not running back and forth hundreds of miles each week. Tradeoffs.
;)
:)
:)
:)
:) Love it, and we need the moisture. But the cabin fever is creeping in...
You're probably right about the real estate bubble, but I doubt it'll affect things around here much; lots of construction and area is expanding rapidly because it's a great place to live, super climate, jobs and nice people and good schools. Property within the Hills is hellishly expensive; go 15 miles out and it gets cheap, but not as nice place to live. Hurk. That and we get a million+ people out here for Sturgis every year - it's money week - missed my chance last year, but this year, muhahahaha
Steady income is no prob; more work than I can handle and I practically pray for days off.
I don't play stock market or investment games; too dangerous and I've never taken the time to learn how (and don't want to). Prefer to put my money into tools, books and (hopefully soon) land.
Tangible stuff
I'll check out some of those links/shows, if/when I get a chance. Printed out your post and stuck it on the wall (next to ten million other things
If you ever do take a break, come out and visit. The Hills are a great place. I agree about moving - moved a thousand miles last May, totally blind wrt to new place and it wiped my savings out. Was worth it tho - work was drying up where I was and the winters really sucked. I sure hear you about gear - I sold/gave away/junked 95% of what I owned and still piled a truck bed 6 feet high. Danged packrat, that's me
Never been to Georgia - probably never will, but it sounds nice. I've heard there's lot of cheap land there if you don't mind being way the hell beyond the sidewalks. I can't take heat+humidity anymore tho, part of the reason I moved out here.
Darnit, stuck inside today, weather bit me - it's snowing. 80 degrees last week, supposed to be 70 by Tuesday, snowing today - that's 'Hills' weather
Sounds like you've got a nice place going there. I miss having the room ; it's been some years since I could garden and it's left a big hole in my heart. Raised beds mulched and turned over winter worked really well for me - lots of sweat but the results are worth it. Out here is going to be different from where I was - too much water there, not enough here, and lots of clay/lime soil. Should be ideal for peppers tho *grin*
Anyway, if you'd like to chat more (I would, I love this stuff) shoot an email tonite off to shadowbearer at yahoo com (obfuscated of course)
Cheers!
SB
legal accountability
Pardon me while I puke up a few EULAs
Anyone that's a good programmer would much rather be coding than auditing.
Not necessarily (was that why the smiley?
cheers!
SB