Yes, your sig is flamebait, and I see nothing wrong with that. In this case, it seems to have sparked an actual discussion instead of a flame war.
Moving on, let's examine your last question, because its an interesting one. You start with one observation -- a person prays to be healed and afterwards is healed. In this case you have a single corelation. From a scientific standpoint, I would say this qualifies as evidence, but not very strong evidence. I certainly wouldn't draw a conclusion from it, but if I were a researcher, it might interest me. The theory I would build from this would be "prayer cures this illness," and then I would search for more evidence that supports or refutes the theory. If I'm intellectually honest, I have to consider evidence for or against my hypothesis and not try to twist my observations towards one conclusion or the other -- being only human, this may be difficult, which is where peer review is valuable.
Now its my turn to throw out some flamebait. It is my observation that people who try to somehow "prove" their religious beliefs only except evidence that supports their position and ignore, discount, or do not even concieve as possible, evidence against their position.
Finally, I would take issue with your characterization of science. Science does not have a set of beliefs based on what it assumes to be facts. Science has a set of theories based on observations. This is a much weaker claim that, ironically, has led to what is, in my opinion, a much stronger system.
That last definition is so broad as to be useless. Since it can be applied to _any_ activity, it can not be used to distinguish between any two activities. If you chose that last definition for religion in your debate, you reduce your argument to a tautology. You are claiming that science is a religion because all activities can be classified as religions. Not very convincing.
Well, it looks like at least one AC wants to continue the discussion. I don't know if you're the same one, of course, but I'm willing to continue playing. I took a quick look through the site you mentioned, but I did not find any presentation of science as a religion -- a link would be a great help. What I did see on the site was arguments from a religious viewpoint arguing against some of the conclusions of science, but that is not what this discussion was about. We were looking at whether science is a religion, which is a very different question. Of course, since this is all way off topic to begin with, it may be best to continue the debate elsewhere. Any suggestions?
It looks like the AC doesn't want to play anymore, which is a shame considering I'm about to conceed a point. When I stated that *most* religions are based on the acceptance of certain ideas, I qualified the statement because I know of some jewish scholars who define religion as the struggle with the question of god, not the belief or dis-belief in god. So, by their definition of religion, science could be considered a religion if you use it as your means for deciding whether there is a god, the nature of god, etc. But even under this broad definition, science is not a religion when used for something else.
Ok, I'll use your definition of religion if you like. We'll start from the definition that all religions are based on truths. I would then assert that science is not a religion because science is not based on, or even really concerned with, truths. Science is concerned with theories and evidence. All theories and all evidence are always open to question -- infact, they must be testable and repeatable so that they can always be questioned -- so they can not in any sense be considered truths. There is no leap of faith in science because science is not built on faith, it is built on scepticism and pragmatism. We have given up on the idea of absolute truth and proceed with the theories we have because its the best we can do right now, knowing full well that these theories may be discarded later on.
A very optimistic outlook, but things would only work out this well if we were a planet of saints. All it takes is a few assholes to make the world you describe a living hell. Less hypocisy? Try more conformity. To say that removing privacy will remove fear is to confuse the cause with the result.
Actually, pirana do eat each other. Back in highschool, our biology class had three small pirana at the beginning of the year. At the end of the year, we had one large pirana.
Proposing a tax cut is a standard election lie. If a candidate doesn't propose a tax cut, they can forget about getting elected (see Mondale...). Once they get elected, that promise is meaningless (see Bush Sr....).
Sounds like a troll, but I just got back from the dentist, so I'm in a mood to throw some flame. If the factories were sending out thugs to force the weavers to stop weaving, they would have had a right to fight back. If nobody would buy their goods because they could get them cheaper from the factories, too bad. Nobody has a right to make money, only the right to try. If you want to start a business selling nose goblins, (or flawed analogies, wherever your talents lie..) go right ahead. If that way of life brings you status, pride and money, good for you. If not, you can either be poor or find something else to do, but don't bother others with rediculous claims about your right to get paid lots of money providing a service nobody wants.
Actually, a legal approach is the best one in this case. If someone tries to use the law as a club to attack you, your best defense is a better understanding of the law. DC is trying to intimidate people by telling them they are breaking the law when they are not. So, first point out that you are not violating the law, then point out that their threats are against the law. Checkmate.
Shareholders do watch over the management's shoulder. Smaller shareholders may not pay attention to shareholder meetings, but larger ones do. They elect the board of directors and the directors hire/fire upper management. Management already does everything they can to protect a company's stock price. Just look at the current Firestone/Ford situation -- the CEO of Ford appears in a comercial and you can see the fear in his eyes. If this sort of corporate death penalty were allowed, you can bet that management will take notice.
#1. These criminals are very skilled and have significant resources (they pulled off the DoS job)
While it may have taken some skill, it is not clear that significant resources were required.
#3. Whatever goal the criminals have, the goal is furthered better if we do _not_ know what it is (there is no clue why this happened)
This one assumes that the criminals have some goal beyond the attacks themselves, which is begging the question. And even if this assertion were true, you read too much into it in the following...
That implies that if people knew what the goal was, the goal would not be accomplished. This is a godelian contradiction! (eg. "This sentence is false".) Therefore the goal must deal with affecting public knowledge, if public knowledge would destroy the goal.
The fact that public knowledge of my goal would prevent its accomplishment does not imply that my goal is to affect public knowledge. If my goal were to blow up a bridge, public knowledge of that goal would hinder my efforts, but my goal isn't to affect public knowledge.
Protecting investors from fraud is the SEC's job, but enforcing the GPL isn't. If a linux company violates the GPL (whether LinuxOne has or not I do not know) it is in the best interests of Red Hat and others to do something about it.
And junior programmers who never get their bad coding practices corrected become senior programmers who turn projects into hopeless piles of cruft. Peer review is important at all levels.
One of the nice things about Open Source software is there is no _need_ to make excuses for bugs. There will always be bugs, but when you have the source and things are in the open, they are easier to find and fix. In the MS world, on the other hand, bugs are viewed as something that must be denied, covered up, blamed on someone else, or passed off as a feature until they can be fixed in a "service release".
No, I was not aware that he is an author, porter, etc. That makes what he did that much worse. The important thing is, whatever skills we have, we must choose how to use them. That choice, more than anything else, defines who we are. Someone may be better at perl than I, ( and most are.. ), but if they use that skill to jerk people around, that makes them an asshole, plain and simple. Now, I'm willing him the benefit of the doubt -- maybe he's a good guy who had a moment of immaturity -- it happens to everyone... whatever. What bothers me is that other people see this and think its something to aspire to.
The comment "Always use your power for good, never evil." was made by a prof. of mine in the first lecture of his OS course. Its a bit of hyperbolie (sp?), but makes a point. Learning how to muck with stuff gives a sense of power -- usually exagerated -- and any power can be used for good or evil. Mucking with the democratick of baseball may not be evil in some absolute sense, but it _is_ being a dick.
1. Get the camel book 2. Read other peoples scripts 3. Find something that needs doing 4. Write a script and try it 5. Ask for help 6. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until the script does what you want 7. Repeat steps 2 through 6 often 8. Always use your power for good, never evil
If you do turn to the dark side, at least try not to be as incompetent as this guy was.
> Maybe mags will think twice about publishing this kind of crap then.
Quite the opposite... Metcalfe clearly knew that his first article would cause a blast furnace of flame, which he could then use to write a second. Think about it. Instead of taking the time to do research and write one good article, he expended virtually no effort and got paid for two. And a bunch of immature flames won't bother the publisher either -- they can just show the large number of responses their articles generate to convince advertisers to pay them more money. Insults, ranting, and personal attacks rarely affect the target, but always reflect poorly on the flamer.
> Well, the case is a bit different here. There is no > constitutional right to drink before you're 21:( -- or ever > after 21 for that matter -- so the Feds can force the > state/local governments to make these laws.
The Feds can force state/local governments to make these laws only by using the 16th amendment ( income tax ) to get around the 10th amendment. To continue the drinking age example, the constitution does not authorise the Fed to make a law establishing a drinking age, and it does not prohibit the states from doing so. According to the 10th amendment, this means that a law establishing a drinking age is the states' business. But, the Feds want to stick their noses in the states' business (and anywhere else they can fit them;) ), so they use funds from the income tax which, unlike other direct taxes, they do not have to distribute to the states according to popluation, to bribe the states to pass them.
> However, from the Bill of Rights point of view there is no > difference between the Feds, the states and your friendly > local town hall -- it's all "government"
From the Bill of Rights point of view, there _is_ a difference -- the 10th amendment.
> and government's ability to trample/ignore/go around the > Bill of Rights is quite limited (subject, of course, to the > whims of the Supreme Court).
The Feds routinely use the taxation powers given by the 16th amendment to go around the 10th.
Slashdot Mirror
The Democrats are not unique in that regard...
You are using definitions 3 & 4 given above, not just 4.
Yes, your sig is flamebait, and I see nothing wrong with that. In this case, it seems to have sparked an actual discussion instead of a flame war.
Moving on, let's examine your last question, because its an interesting one. You start with one observation -- a person prays to be healed and afterwards is healed. In this case you have a single corelation. From a scientific standpoint, I would say this qualifies as evidence, but not very strong evidence. I certainly wouldn't draw a conclusion from it, but if I were a researcher, it might interest me. The theory I would build from this would be "prayer cures this illness," and then I would search for more evidence that supports or refutes the theory. If I'm intellectually honest, I have to consider evidence for or against my hypothesis and not try to twist my observations towards one conclusion or the other -- being only human, this may be difficult, which is where peer review is valuable.
Now its my turn to throw out some flamebait. It is my observation that people who try to somehow "prove" their religious beliefs only except evidence that supports their position and ignore, discount, or do not even concieve as possible, evidence against their position.
Finally, I would take issue with your characterization of science. Science does not have a set of beliefs based on what it assumes to be facts. Science has a set of theories based on observations. This is a much weaker claim that, ironically, has led to what is, in my opinion, a much stronger system.
That last definition is so broad as to be useless. Since it can be applied to _any_ activity, it can not be used to distinguish between any two activities. If you chose that last definition for religion in your debate, you reduce your argument to a tautology. You are claiming that science is a religion because all activities can be classified as religions. Not very convincing.
Well, it looks like at least one AC wants to continue the discussion. I don't know if you're the same one, of course, but I'm willing to continue playing. I took a quick look through the site you mentioned, but I did not find any presentation of science as a religion -- a link would be a great help. What I did see on the site was arguments from a religious viewpoint arguing against some of the conclusions of science, but that is not what this discussion was about. We were looking at whether science is a religion, which is a very different question. Of course, since this is all way off topic to begin with, it may be best to continue the debate elsewhere. Any suggestions?
It looks like the AC doesn't want to play anymore, which is a shame considering I'm about to conceed a point. When I stated that *most* religions are based on the acceptance of certain ideas, I qualified the statement because I know of some jewish scholars who define religion as the struggle with the question of god, not the belief or dis-belief in god. So, by their definition of religion, science could be considered a religion if you use it as your means for deciding whether there is a god, the nature of god, etc. But even under this broad definition, science is not a religion when used for something else.
Ok, I'll use your definition of religion if you like. We'll start from the definition that all religions are based on truths. I would then assert that science is not a religion because science is not based on, or even really concerned with, truths. Science is concerned with theories and evidence. All theories and all evidence are always open to question -- infact, they must be testable and repeatable so that they can always be questioned -- so they can not in any sense be considered truths. There is no leap of faith in science because science is not built on faith, it is built on scepticism and pragmatism. We have given up on the idea of absolute truth and proceed with the theories we have because its the best we can do right now, knowing full well that these theories may be discarded later on.
And, as an added bonus, Vim has also been ported to Windows, so you don't have to learn a new text editor for both environments. :)
A very optimistic outlook, but things would only work out this well if we were a planet of saints. All it takes is a few assholes to make the world you describe a living hell. Less hypocisy? Try more conformity. To say that removing privacy will remove fear is to confuse the cause with the result.
Actually, pirana do eat each other. Back in highschool, our biology class had three small pirana at the beginning of the year. At the end of the year, we had one large pirana.
To which Supreme Court decision are you refering? (seriously, this isn't a flame or anything, I'm just curious)
Proposing a tax cut is a standard election lie. If a candidate doesn't propose a tax cut, they can forget about getting elected (see Mondale...). Once they get elected, that promise is meaningless (see Bush Sr. ...).
Sounds like a troll, but I just got back from the dentist, so I'm in a mood to throw some flame. If the factories were sending out thugs to force the weavers to stop weaving, they would have had a right to fight back. If nobody would buy their goods because they could get them cheaper from the factories, too bad. Nobody has a right to make money, only the right to try. If you want to start a business selling nose goblins, (or flawed analogies, wherever your talents lie..) go right ahead. If that way of life brings you status, pride and money, good for you. If not, you can either be poor or find something else to do, but don't bother others with rediculous claims about your right to get paid lots of money providing a service nobody wants.
For anyone who received a C&D letter, this isn't legal nit-picking, its a legal defense.
Actually, a legal approach is the best one in this case. If someone tries to use the law as a club to attack you, your best defense is a better understanding of the law. DC is trying to intimidate people by telling them they are breaking the law when they are not. So, first point out that you are not violating the law, then point out that their threats are against the law. Checkmate.
Shareholders do watch over the management's shoulder. Smaller shareholders may not pay attention to shareholder meetings, but larger ones do. They elect the board of directors and the directors hire/fire upper management. Management already does everything they can to protect a company's stock price. Just look at the current Firestone/Ford situation -- the CEO of Ford appears in a comercial and you can see the fear in his eyes. If this sort of corporate death penalty were allowed, you can bet that management will take notice.
Protecting investors from fraud is the SEC's job, but enforcing the GPL isn't. If a linux company violates the GPL (whether LinuxOne has or not I do not know) it is in the best interests of Red Hat and others to do something about it.
And junior programmers who never get their bad coding practices corrected become senior programmers who turn projects into hopeless piles of cruft. Peer review is important at all levels.
One of the nice things about Open Source software is there is no _need_ to make excuses for bugs. There will always be bugs, but when you have the source and things are in the open, they are easier to find and fix. In the MS world, on the other hand, bugs are viewed as something that must be denied, covered up, blamed on someone else, or passed off as a feature until they can be fixed in a "service release".
No, I was not aware that he is an author, porter, etc. That makes what he did that much worse. The important thing is, whatever skills we have, we must choose how to use them. That choice, more than anything else, defines who we are. Someone may be better at perl than I, ( and most are.. ), but if they use that skill to jerk people around, that makes them an asshole, plain and simple. Now, I'm willing him the benefit of the doubt -- maybe he's a good guy who had a moment of immaturity -- it happens to everyone... whatever. What bothers me is that other people see this and think its something to aspire to.
The comment "Always use your power for good, never evil." was made by a prof. of mine in the first lecture of his OS course. Its a bit of hyperbolie (sp?), but makes a point. Learning how to muck with stuff gives a sense of power -- usually exagerated -- and any power can be used for good or evil. Mucking with the democratick of baseball may not be evil in some absolute sense, but it _is_ being a dick.
A script kiddie is born...
If you want to become a perl hacker:
1. Get the camel book
2. Read other peoples scripts
3. Find something that needs doing
4. Write a script and try it
5. Ask for help
6. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until the script does what you want
7. Repeat steps 2 through 6 often
8. Always use your power for good, never evil
If you do turn to the dark side, at least try not to be as incompetent as this guy was.
> Maybe mags will think twice about publishing this kind of crap then.
Quite the opposite... Metcalfe clearly knew that his first article would cause a blast furnace of flame, which he could then use to write a second. Think about it. Instead of taking the time to do research and write one good article, he expended virtually no effort and got paid for two. And a bunch of immature flames won't bother the publisher either -- they can just show the large number of responses their articles generate to convince advertisers to pay them more money. Insults, ranting, and personal attacks rarely affect the target, but always reflect poorly on the flamer.
> Well, the case is a bit different here. There is no :( -- or ever
;) ), so they use funds from the income tax which, unlike other direct taxes, they do not have to distribute to the states according to popluation, to bribe the states to pass them.
> constitutional right to drink before you're 21
> after 21 for that matter -- so the Feds can force the
> state/local governments to make these laws.
The Feds can force state/local governments to make these laws only by using the 16th amendment ( income tax ) to get around the 10th amendment. To continue the drinking age example, the constitution does not authorise the Fed to make a law establishing a drinking age, and it does not prohibit the states from doing so. According to the 10th amendment, this means that a law establishing a drinking age is the states' business. But, the Feds want to stick their noses in the states' business (and anywhere else they can fit them
> However, from the Bill of Rights point of view there is no
> difference between the Feds, the states and your friendly
> local town hall -- it's all "government"
From the Bill of Rights point of view, there _is_ a difference -- the 10th amendment.
> and government's ability to trample/ignore/go around the
> Bill of Rights is quite limited (subject, of course, to the
> whims of the Supreme Court).
The Feds routinely use the taxation powers given by the 16th amendment to go around the 10th.