Of course, there is also the problem of developed nations evilly usurping pieces of the magic pie.
Did you even read the post to which you just replied? If so, yo missed the point: There is no magic pie!
The whole game of cat and mouse with subsidies and tarriffs, etc. is used to keep rich industrial giants rich at the expense of people in other countries that can perform that same work cheaper
Yep big conspiracy to keep the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. It's always been that way. Wonder why the US managed to get so far ahead from such a crummy start? It can't have had anything to do with an environment that fosters and rewards success and ingenuity. It must be a conspiracy. Right. We couldn't have possibly pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and gone from refugees with next-to-nothing to being the world superpower in a few hundred years by our own means, because that would imply that anyone could do it, which can't be true because then we'd have to stop listening to people like you who insist everything the US does is unfair, and that the US should foot the bill to fix everyone's everything, because it's the US's fault, somehow.
Kyoto wasn't drafted with attacking US interests in mind.
That's irrelevant. Attacking (primarily) US interests is what it does. The road to hell is paved with good intentions -- feel free to add a brick inscribed with the Kyoto treaty. It'll fit right in.
You think it is good. Not everyone agrees. Stop stating your (relatively uninformed) opinions as facts; it's tiresome, and it makes me not want to listen to anything you say.
it's all about widening access and closing the digital divide that is a *big* problem in all nations
If I understand correctly, "digital divide" is the buzzword used to refer to the fact that some people do not have internet access, right?
How, exactly, is this really a problem? I mean, in any county? See, for a long time there wasn't an internet at all, and somehow life went on. Then just a relatively few people used the internet and, again, life went on. Now that a (relatively) large number of people use it, it's somehow a "big problem" that not everyone does/can?
How? Why? I'm serious. I don't see how an Ugandan dirt farmer needs the internet at all, much less how it is a "big problem" if he doesn't have it. For that matter, I can't see how anyone lacking netness can be a "big problem". We're not talking about food, water, shelter here. Unless you mean slashdotters, of course:)
Serously, back off of the crisis button a bit. Your hyperbole dilutes everything else you say.
Kyoto would not exempt developing nations for the purpose of moving the polluting industries to these developing countries;
....yet...
The exemption is made because of a) the costs of reducing pollution; developing nations simply can't afford it as long as they're in their developing stages; and b) fairness; the polluters should pay to get their mess cleaned up.
It doesn't matter why the exemptions were made, the fact remains that they were, and some people think that makes it stupid and decidedly unfair, despite your claim that it is in the interest of fairness.
So since when is (offensively) invading a sovereign nation defence?
Since September 11, 2001. Welcome to the next phase. The sleeping giant was awakened again, and as the former emperor of Japan said (I'm paraphrasing): "Are you nuts!? Boy are you in biiiig trouble now..."
Now if you would show some initiative and try to find out for yourself what the UN does (like the WHO for example), that would impress me.
Oh, oooh! I know this one: the WHO is the World Health Organization. They're the ones who tell the US how many billions it is supposed to spend to solve the self-perpetuated AIDS "crisis" in Africa.
Because, er, well, because it's a crisis, and since the US has the most money, it should be the first to pony up the most! Right? Yay, I get a gold start.
Sorry, but am I the only one who identifies this as flaimbait?
Yes.
What gives occidental countries a greater right to speech over other cultures?
Right is right -- who said this? I don't see it in this thread, even in implied form.
The West may have the power to impose their views upon others, but does this power legitimize imposing their views?
What the fuck is "imposing a view?" -- if we think something is right (such as the UN keeping the hell away from the net), should we just shut up and let others decide our fate because we don't have a "right to impose" our views? Take that to its logical extension and nothing ever happens, no one ever has an opinion (or at least they can't express it), no one ever takes a stand, praises good, condemns bad -- we all just sit around and argue forever until we reach unattainable universal unanimity?
Western ideas of "intellectual property" are forced upon African and Asian countries, meaning they cannot produce medications for their own people, but have to buy medication from Western corporations at artificially-inflated prices.
You need a tourniquet for that heart of yours? I can hardly believe what I just read. Would you rather the West hadn't developed the medications at all and left it to these African and Asian countries to do it? Great, then they'd be dying and even money wouldn't buy them he treatment they need, because it wouldn't exist.
I mean, give me a break here -- we spend gazilions researching and developing effective drugs, but then we should let the "smaller nations" (i.e., those who didn't spend the time or money to invent them) produce them without recoouping R&D expenses? You realize that it's impossible to continue that sort of inanity for long, right? We work, they don't but still benefit, we spend, they don't but still benefit. Great long-term plan.
Had these smaller nations not been strong-armed into signing agreements on intellectual property, they would have been able to afford medication for their people.
Er, sure. I'm so afraid you really believe that. Really. I guess we should just give them everything, efter all, we've reached our superior status via unfair and exploitative means, therefore we should surrender any and all things of value to those who were not clever or lucky enough to achieve superior status via unfair and exploitative means.
If this conference forces powerful nations to listen to the viewpoints of the rest of the world, some good may come of it.
Yeah, sure, listen to the losers. They always have all the answers, and oddly enough, it always sounds like this "help the losers at the expense of the winners".
Of course if you are so uneducated as to not know that treaties like Kyoto and the ICC, whilst not obviously in America's short term interests, are in fact in America's long term interests, you might say something so daft in the context of Kyoto and the ICC.
You say that with such confidence that, if I didn't know better, I might actually buy it. Care to back up your claim that Kyoto and ICC "are in America's long term interests"? Or are you just trying to convince via confidence and namecalling?
I, for one, don't buy it, especially regarding Kyoto -- that POS was exactly counter to America's short- and long-term interests, IMHO. Of course, that's my opinion, and I stated it as such. But since you're so sure that I'm wrong, I'm excited to learn of the basis for your matter-of-fact assertion.
A light jet for under $1 million new? Still yet to be done. Granted, it is a kit plane--that brings the price down quite a bit. You sacrifice reliability to get an uncertified aircraft that you get to assemble yourself. No guarantees. Hope you didn't forget that last screw.
Worse, the $400k price is assuming a refurbished engine (read the specs page carefully).
It not only makes sure they're driving around, it also knows when the plow is up or down. If they are driving, and they plow is down, they are doing the work.
You're being silly. How, exactly, is an automatic GPS tracker more complicated (from a user standpoint) than writing down every street plowed and recording mileage?
Indeed, it may be about paying them less to get more work done, but only because the plowers currently lie (or make mistakes) about what they plowed when. It's an empirical fact -- they bust at least a few every year during the winters here near Boston. This isn't "nitpicking", it's stopping corrupt, illegal activity.
The bottom line is, the plowers agreed to the existing pay scale, knowing that they could pad their mileage to make it a sweeter deal. They began to count on this. Now, there's a cost-effective way to verify their work very accurately, and simultaneously remove the need to have the plowers spend any time at all recording and documenting. They aren't hapopy because thier pay will now revert to the original, agreed rate and they will indeed have to do all of the work that they claim they do to get paid.
This is the sort of trouble one gets into when one is dishonest. They should have negotiated for better pay, and then honestly reported their work. Instead, they assumed that technology would never create a speed bump for their gravy train. They were wrong.
Nice try, but poor results. No one said employers can do whatever they want, but they can certainly do anything legal that they want. Sexual harassment is a crime, as it well should be. Watching an employee to make sure he or she does his or her job is not a crime, nor should it be.
In the "environmentalism" episode of Penn & Teller's Bullshit! TV series on Showtime, they get hundreds of green activists at a rally to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen oxide by explaining to each (individually) that this evil H2O "gets into the rivers and streams because of runoff from populated areas" and similar drivel.
Even the main organizer of the (big) rally signed, and seemed confused when it was finally explained to her what she had signed.
Great fun to watch. The whole first season of this awesome series is floating on the torrents out there somewhere; I highly recommend it.
Not if the service sucks, I'm not. That's the beauty of the seperate tipping concept -- it's optional, and the server knows it.
Tipping in the US is defnitely far from a formality, in any case. When I hit may favorite places the servers all know me and treat me like a king, and they get 20-40% tips for it. When they're busier and can't cater as much, they get less. They expect and understand this. It all balances out -- when they have lots of tables they get lots of smaller tips. When they have fewer tables, they get fewer larger tips. They spend about the same effort and get paid about the same. If they want to slack off one day because they're not feeling well, the can, and they make a little lett per hour. Great deal, if you ask me. Flexibility is nice.
OK, it does now seem that you're not trolling -- sorry for the accusation there.
As for most historical examples, I'm not supporting enslavement of people, as happened in many cases in history (feudalist Europe as an example).
Right! Slavery (or hardcore explotation, at least) usually (always?) results when either (1) a society has an inadequate set of laws to prevent tyrrany (checks & balances on the gummint) or (2) insufficient ability to enfore those against laws domestic and foreign threats. Examples of these "enforcers" include the military, police, schools that inculcate and teach right and wrong (cheaper than jailing and feeding them laterm, right?), welfare programs that help avoid turning relatively small, short-term problems into major family catastrophes without encouraging laziness or leeching. Now, I know that the image I painted above is ideally speaking and is not the case in the US today (or anywhere, ever). But, as much as the rampant corruption and exploitation in America's current entitlement programs piss me off, this system is as close to ideal as I know of, and it seems better to err on the side we are erring now.
Here's a funny statement: "...a strong state is needed to prevent rise of an excessively strong (tyrranical) state."
Huh?
See above. If the government does not have rules to prevent tyrants and the muscle to enforce the rules, a tyrant will almost always arise from the teeming millions. Or, said differently: people suck.
Excessive government is usually the problem in the "historical evidence" you refer to.
Of course. But it's a matter of degree. That's why I said we need a not-excessive gummint to help enforce rules and laws that will help prevent the rise of these problems.
Further more, yes, I believe social programs perpetuate the very problems they claim to solve.
I agree. But not always. And I think we can make the system better rather than throw it out completely.
How did people ever get a long before social security for example? It hasn't really been around that long...less than 100 hundred years.
They didn't get along; they died much earlier (before retuirement age) because of a lack of adequate social medicine, education, sanitation, and health regulations.
1) The lazy get lazier. As I've said before, there is nothing wrong with not wanting to work. However, subsidizing this behavior leads to more of the same behavior, not less. (...)
I totally agree. I think unemployment, as implemented and administered in the US today, sucks. It should be much harder to get, and you should have to work at any job available (at least part-time) while executing a well-documented and verified job search. The well-intentioned system is inefficient and broken; it needs to be fixed, not eliminated.
2) People become less involved. Why actually spend some of your time mentoring a young poor black kid, when you can sleep comfortably at night knowing that you paid your taxes, and argued with some idiot like me who would do away with public libraries? (...)
Again I must vehemently agree. There needs to be much less money spent on entitlements, and it needs to be distributed much more efficiently and intelligently. But not zero as (I believe) you originally posited.
Here's a thought. Instead of being so wound up about our precious "social programs", why don't we just start actually caring about our fellow man? (...) To act as if you are doing some great social justice by providing public libraries, left to be managed by the completly inept governments of this country, is simply absurd. If you want to help people, then do so. But stop robbing those around you so that you can feel good at the end of the day.
my whole point was that we should be paying for neither wefare, nor public education. You are trying to continue a debate on a premise that isn't agreed upon. The thing I would like to know is, how much would we be paying if neither of the above conditions existed. Also, I suspect their would be far (like something in the 90% range) few people unable to feed themselves if things like welfare didn't exist...but I'm certain we will never know.
The good news is I finally I've started to understand your point (I think)).
The bad news is you're not trolling; you really believe this stuff, it seems.
If I may: You think some social programs are OK or even good, but that there are too many of them and they often create (or at least perpetuate) the problems they purport to solve. So, you want to know how society would work out without them -- with all of them gone, how would things shake out?
Am I right?
If so, the answer is closer than you think: grab a history book. Check out the awesome accounts of life under rule by the strongest under, say feudalism, for example. There is plenty of historical evidence that shows that a strong state is needed to prevent rise of an excessively strong (tyrranical) state. Anarchy breeds tyrrany. I think you know this, and are probably well-educated enough (thanks to everyone elses tax dollars:) ) to know of several examples but are just trying to be difficult.
Well, golly. sbeast702 doesn't think it's a gigapixel image, and he's so clever that he (and only he) knows the subtle ways in which using photoshop magically transforms an image with one billion pixels into something else besides a gigapixel image. Oh, how I wish I could understand such esoteric things. Ah to be the sbeast702 . . .
But wait, what's that?! sbeast702, in his haste to get a FP, failed to read any of the article at all. For had he, he would have noted the author's lament that he could not use photoshop at all because his version limits the canvas to 30k pixels in any dimension, which is far too small for this image with 1 billion pixels which, somehow, is not a gigapixel image because sbeast702 says so.
Can you give me a reasonable explanation beyond "they've got dark skins"?
Sure! Because there were a lot fewer unemployed in the IT (and other) industry in the 80's and early 90's. And who has heard of any outsourcing to Russia or Israel? I haven't . . .
See, when we have plenty of work, we don't mind sharing some of it. On the other hand, when work is scarce, people get upset when it is sent out of the country without really good reasons.
How's that? Or would you just prefer to think everything is racially motivated? It is all the rage these days . . .
OK, now I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but I'll bite anyway.
Assuming I never drive a car, but buy lots of products, it's not likely I'm paying much for roads, since a large portion of the cost of roads comes from gasoline tax. So, this is sort of an inverse example. Of course it benefits me to gain benefit from something I never pay for.
I have no idea what portion of road funding comes from gas taxes, and neither do you. The point stands, however; whether or not you directly use something should not necessarily be the deciding factor in whether or not you pay a share for it.
First, even though I do pay for public schools, there are still lots of uneducated (or just stupid?) people around. So it seems my money is just being wasted. Second, the whole "you might otherwise be contributing more tax dollars for..." arguments is kind of silly. I question having to subsidize the activities of others, and you respond with "well, you would still have to do it anyway". The point is, if someone wants to be educated, they should have to pay for it. If they choose not to be educated (i.e. qualify for welfare, etc.) they should have to pay for that too (where in this case, "paying for it" means simply living with the consequences).
Yeah, great logic! Since there is still crime, why don't we get rid of the police, too? Seems the money is just being wasted and all, just like schools and dumb people, right? Wrong. Your ideology is confusing your economics. And you called my argument silly? Ha ha.
If it's cheaper to fund schools than pay welfare for 50% of the population, then it's a better deal for everyone if we collectively fund schools instead of increased welfare.
I couldn't pay my own way through college -- I had to get grants and loans (mostly grants) from Uncle Sam (read: from tax money). So, your taxes paid my way through school. Bad deal? No, because now I pay lots of taxes (much, much more than I would had I remained uneducated with low pay). And now we both benefit.
I'm afraid you're one of those "uneducated (or just stupid?)" people if you really think this way (and again, I doubt it -- you are trolling for sure with this contrived nonsense).
I certainly don't think I should have to pay for something I never use.
That's one of those sorts of statements that sound reasonable at first reading, but fall apart after further contemplation:
Even if you never drive a car, the publicly-funded roads benefit you by helping to reduce shipping costs for the products you buy.
Even if you never have kids, the publicly-funded school systems benefit you by helping to improve the education of those with whom you share a society (and to whom you might otherwise be contributing more tax dollars for welfare/entitlement programs).
I'd say libraries similarly benefit you even if you never visit one.
It is a good idea. So good, in fact, that I'm personally a little disappointed that the libraries are figuring it out so soon.
See, a few years ago I started using amazon.com to sell some of my old books. Amazed that crap I'd give away garnered $10, $20, and in some cases $30 or more, I started keeping a database of the list (and in my cases, sale) prices of used books on amazon. Then I started seeking out the top sellers at local used bookstores, garage sales, whatever. Whenever I found a big stack of cheap books, I'd often buy them all (or most) and then list them on amazon (which is free to do, in contrast with ebay). If they sell, great (70-80% do). If not, nothing lost other than a few minutes time typing in the ISDN number and setting a price.
Especially when I enabled my amazon "will ship internationally" seller option, I found amazing demand (often from overseas) for books that I could get for free or cheap (such as old editions of Dietel's C How to Program which sell quite well in India).
I suppose it's good that the libraries are getting a clue and taking advantage of this -- I just wish I had a little more time to make some more profits first:)
I thought the AC's comments were right on. Not so much funny as accurate.
Your misunderstanding of electronics and physics is remarkable. Some mods, apparently, are as credulous as you are clueless on his subject. In defense of the mods, however, you were amazingly confident in your presentation of completely false claims.
The issue I was talking about was one of interference. As the "tracks", if you will, get smaller they do need a greater rate of flow to get those transistors functioning properly
As wires get smaller, they can carry less current before suffering from electromigration, so this statement makes no sense right off the bat. Moreover, in modern semiconductor processes the signal wires (those containing the logical 1 and 0 values) are getting smaller and smaller, which increases the wire resistance somewhat, and we're driving them with lower and lower voltage transistors so according to Ohm's law (V=I*R), we're using less current on signal wires, not more.
The power wires which supply the operating current to the transistors are not shrinking so fast, since we need to provide more total current to the densely-packed transistors on the die, and prevent electromigration and IR volage drop. Maybe you are thinking of the power supply wires?
(since the number of electrons moving through the gate at any particular time are far smaller due to the diminished size of that gate).
OK, I see -- you seem to have the mistaken impression that electrons passing through the gate somehow provide power to the transistor. They do not. Static DC Power (and ground) is provided to other terminals of the transistors at all times (but not the gate!), whether the gate is open or closed or in the process of switching. The electrons passing through the gate are not used to power the transistor. They simply pass through. In fact, when the gate is closed (off), very few electrons pass through (only leakage current); way to few to power anything using your confused theory. These electrons are simply the messengers -- their presence or not is used to differentiate logical on from off. Dynamic power is consumed as the transisors charge or discharge (source or sink current to) parasitic capacitors -- this power is provided to the transistors via special (wide) power wires. It is not in any way supplied by signal wires.
As the transistors get smaller and more crammed together, the currents, now in extremely close proximity, DO begin to experience interference from each other, which really CAN cause errors as you get standing waves (which would of course create a dam-like effect, preventing a transistor from switching at the appropriate time).
Yes, a wire carrying moving current generates a magnetic field that can affect the current flow in nearby wires. This is called crosstalk, or cross-capacitance. We reduce or avoid this by maintaining a reasonable wire pitch (distance between adjacent wires) and checking switching windows of strong and weak drivers with nets near each other to make sure they don't switch at the same time. Crosstalk can speed up or slow down switching on adjacent nets, or even cause a noise glitch, but it has nothing to do with standing waves. Crosstalk cannot create "a dam-like effect, preventing a transistor from switching at the appropriate time." I believe you're thinking of circuit-board design where reflection, standing-waves, and resonance can be signal integrity problems. These are not issues for wires on semiconductors.
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Of course, there is also the problem of developed nations evilly usurping pieces of the magic pie.
Did you even read the post to which you just replied? If so, yo missed the point: There is no magic pie !
The whole game of cat and mouse with subsidies and tarriffs, etc. is used to keep rich industrial giants rich at the expense of people in other countries that can perform that same work cheaper
Yep big conspiracy to keep the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. It's always been that way. Wonder why the US managed to get so far ahead from such a crummy start? It can't have had anything to do with an environment that fosters and rewards success and ingenuity. It must be a conspiracy. Right. We couldn't have possibly pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and gone from refugees with next-to-nothing to being the world superpower in a few hundred years by our own means, because that would imply that anyone could do it, which can't be true because then we'd have to stop listening to people like you who insist everything the US does is unfair, and that the US should foot the bill to fix everyone's everything, because it's the US's fault, somehow.
Kyoto wasn't drafted with attacking US interests in mind.
That's irrelevant. Attacking (primarily) US interests is what it does. The road to hell is paved with good intentions -- feel free to add a brick inscribed with the Kyoto treaty. It'll fit right in.
You think it is good. Not everyone agrees. Stop stating your (relatively uninformed) opinions as facts; it's tiresome, and it makes me not want to listen to anything you say.
it's all about widening access and closing the digital divide that is a *big* problem in all nations
:)
If I understand correctly, "digital divide" is the buzzword used to refer to the fact that some people do not have internet access, right?
How, exactly, is this really a problem? I mean, in any county? See, for a long time there wasn't an internet at all, and somehow life went on. Then just a relatively few people used the internet and, again, life went on. Now that a (relatively) large number of people use it, it's somehow a "big problem" that not everyone does/can?
How? Why? I'm serious. I don't see how an Ugandan dirt farmer needs the internet at all, much less how it is a "big problem" if he doesn't have it. For that matter, I can't see how anyone lacking netness can be a "big problem". We're not talking about food, water, shelter here. Unless you mean slashdotters, of course
Serously, back off of the crisis button a bit. Your hyperbole dilutes everything else you say.
Kyoto would not exempt developing nations for the purpose of moving the polluting industries to these developing countries;
....yet...
..."
The exemption is made because of a) the costs of reducing pollution; developing nations simply can't afford it as long as they're in their developing stages; and b) fairness; the polluters should pay to get their mess cleaned up.
It doesn't matter why the exemptions were made, the fact remains that they were, and some people think that makes it stupid and decidedly unfair, despite your claim that it is in the interest of fairness.
So since when is (offensively) invading a sovereign nation defence?
Since September 11, 2001. Welcome to the next phase. The sleeping giant was awakened again, and as the former emperor of Japan said (I'm paraphrasing): "Are you nuts!? Boy are you in biiiig trouble now
Now if you would show some initiative and try to find out for yourself what the UN does (like the WHO for example), that would impress me.
Oh, oooh! I know this one: the WHO is the World Health Organization. They're the ones who tell the US how many billions it is supposed to spend to solve the self-perpetuated AIDS "crisis" in Africa.
Because, er, well, because it's a crisis, and since the US has the most money, it should be the first to pony up the most! Right? Yay, I get a gold start.
Sorry, but am I the only one who identifies this as flaimbait?
Yes.
What gives occidental countries a greater right to speech over other cultures?
Right is right -- who said this? I don't see it in this thread, even in implied form.
The West may have the power to impose their views upon others, but does this power legitimize imposing their views?
What the fuck is "imposing a view?" -- if we think something is right (such as the UN keeping the hell away from the net), should we just shut up and let others decide our fate because we don't have a "right to impose" our views? Take that to its logical extension and nothing ever happens, no one ever has an opinion (or at least they can't express it), no one ever takes a stand, praises good, condemns bad -- we all just sit around and argue forever until we reach unattainable universal unanimity?
Western ideas of "intellectual property" are forced upon African and Asian countries, meaning they cannot produce medications for their own people, but have to buy medication from Western corporations at artificially-inflated prices.
You need a tourniquet for that heart of yours? I can hardly believe what I just read. Would you rather the West hadn't developed the medications at all and left it to these African and Asian countries to do it? Great, then they'd be dying and even money wouldn't buy them he treatment they need, because it wouldn't exist.
I mean, give me a break here -- we spend gazilions researching and developing effective drugs, but then we should let the "smaller nations" (i.e., those who didn't spend the time or money to invent them) produce them without recoouping R&D expenses? You realize that it's impossible to continue that sort of inanity for long, right? We work, they don't but still benefit, we spend, they don't but still benefit. Great long-term plan.
Had these smaller nations not been strong-armed into signing agreements on intellectual property, they would have been able to afford medication for their people.
Er, sure. I'm so afraid you really believe that. Really. I guess we should just give them everything, efter all, we've reached our superior status via unfair and exploitative means, therefore we should surrender any and all things of value to those who were not clever or lucky enough to achieve superior status via unfair and exploitative means.
If this conference forces powerful nations to listen to the viewpoints of the rest of the world, some good may come of it.
Yeah, sure, listen to the losers. They always have all the answers, and oddly enough, it always sounds like this "help the losers at the expense of the winners".
Socialist.
Of course if you are so uneducated as to not know that treaties like Kyoto and the ICC, whilst not obviously in America's short term interests, are in fact in America's long term interests, you might say something so daft in the context of Kyoto and the ICC.
You say that with such confidence that, if I didn't know better, I might actually buy it. Care to back up your claim that Kyoto and ICC "are in America's long term interests"? Or are you just trying to convince via confidence and namecalling?
I, for one, don't buy it, especially regarding Kyoto -- that POS was exactly counter to America's short- and long-term interests, IMHO. Of course, that's my opinion, and I stated it as such. But since you're so sure that I'm wrong, I'm excited to learn of the basis for your matter-of-fact assertion.
A light jet for under $1 million new? Still yet to be done. Granted, it is a kit plane--that brings the price down quite a bit. You sacrifice reliability to get an uncertified aircraft that you get to assemble yourself. No guarantees. Hope you didn't forget that last screw.
Worse, the $400k price is assuming a refurbished engine (read the specs page carefully).
It not only makes sure they're driving around, it also knows when the plow is up or down. If they are driving, and they plow is down, they are doing the work.
You're being silly. How, exactly, is an automatic GPS tracker more complicated (from a user standpoint) than writing down every street plowed and recording mileage?
Indeed, it may be about paying them less to get more work done, but only because the plowers currently lie (or make mistakes) about what they plowed when. It's an empirical fact -- they bust at least a few every year during the winters here near Boston. This isn't "nitpicking", it's stopping corrupt, illegal activity.
The bottom line is, the plowers agreed to the existing pay scale, knowing that they could pad their mileage to make it a sweeter deal. They began to count on this. Now, there's a cost-effective way to verify their work very accurately, and simultaneously remove the need to have the plowers spend any time at all recording and documenting. They aren't hapopy because thier pay will now revert to the original, agreed rate and they will indeed have to do all of the work that they claim they do to get paid.
This is the sort of trouble one gets into when one is dishonest. They should have negotiated for better pay, and then honestly reported their work. Instead, they assumed that technology would never create a speed bump for their gravy train. They were wrong.
Nice try, but poor results. No one said employers can do whatever they want, but they can certainly do anything legal that they want. Sexual harassment is a crime, as it well should be. Watching an employee to make sure he or she does his or her job is not a crime, nor should it be.
In the "environmentalism" episode of Penn & Teller's Bullshit! TV series on Showtime, they get hundreds of green activists at a rally to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen oxide by explaining to each (individually) that this evil H2O "gets into the rivers and streams because of runoff from populated areas" and similar drivel.
Even the main organizer of the (big) rally signed, and seemed confused when it was finally explained to her what she had signed.
Great fun to watch. The whole first season of this awesome series is floating on the torrents out there somewhere; I highly recommend it.
in the US, you're going to tip 15-18% anyway
I am?
Not if the service sucks, I'm not. That's the beauty of the seperate tipping concept -- it's optional , and the server knows it.
Tipping in the US is defnitely far from a formality, in any case. When I hit may favorite places the servers all know me and treat me like a king, and they get 20-40% tips for it. When they're busier and can't cater as much, they get less. They expect and understand this. It all balances out -- when they have lots of tables they get lots of smaller tips. When they have fewer tables, they get fewer larger tips. They spend about the same effort and get paid about the same. If they want to slack off one day because they're not feeling well, the can, and they make a little lett per hour. Great deal, if you ask me. Flexibility is nice.
It aint broke. Don't fix it.
Hmm, seems to have only worked on you.
Not trolling.
OK, it does now seem that you're not trolling -- sorry for the accusation there.
As for most historical examples, I'm not supporting enslavement of people, as happened in many cases in history (feudalist Europe as an example).
Right! Slavery (or hardcore explotation, at least) usually (always?) results when either (1) a society has an inadequate set of laws to prevent tyrrany (checks & balances on the gummint) or (2) insufficient ability to enfore those against laws domestic and foreign threats. Examples of these "enforcers" include the military, police, schools that inculcate and teach right and wrong (cheaper than jailing and feeding them laterm, right?), welfare programs that help avoid turning relatively small, short-term problems into major family catastrophes without encouraging laziness or leeching. Now, I know that the image I painted above is ideally speaking and is not the case in the US today (or anywhere, ever). But, as much as the rampant corruption and exploitation in America's current entitlement programs piss me off, this system is as close to ideal as I know of, and it seems better to err on the side we are erring now.
Here's a funny statement: "...a strong state is needed to prevent rise of an excessively strong (tyrranical) state."
Huh?
See above. If the government does not have rules to prevent tyrants and the muscle to enforce the rules, a tyrant will almost always arise from the teeming millions. Or, said differently: people suck.
Excessive government is usually the problem in the "historical evidence" you refer to.
Of course. But it's a matter of degree. That's why I said we need a not-excessive gummint to help enforce rules and laws that will help prevent the rise of these problems.
Further more, yes, I believe social programs perpetuate the very problems they claim to solve.
I agree. But not always. And I think we can make the system better rather than throw it out completely.
How did people ever get a long before social security for example? It hasn't really been around that long...less than 100 hundred years.
They didn't get along; they died much earlier (before retuirement age) because of a lack of adequate social medicine, education, sanitation, and health regulations.
1) The lazy get lazier. As I've said before, there is nothing wrong with not wanting to work. However, subsidizing this behavior leads to more of the same behavior, not less. (...)
I totally agree. I think unemployment, as implemented and administered in the US today, sucks. It should be much harder to get, and you should have to work at any job available (at least part-time) while executing a well-documented and verified job search. The well-intentioned system is inefficient and broken; it needs to be fixed, not eliminated.
2) People become less involved. Why actually spend some of your time mentoring a young poor black kid, when you can sleep comfortably at night knowing that you paid your taxes, and argued with some idiot like me who would do away with public libraries? (...)
Again I must vehemently agree. There needs to be much less money spent on entitlements, and it needs to be distributed much more efficiently and intelligently. But not zero as (I believe) you originally posited.
Here's a thought. Instead of being so wound up about our precious "social programs", why don't we just start actually caring about our fellow man? (...) To act as if you are doing some great social justice by providing public libraries, left to be managed by the completly inept governments of this country, is simply absurd. If you want to help people, then do so. But stop robbing those around you so that you can feel good at the end of the day.
Holy cow, I still
my whole point was that we should be paying for neither wefare, nor public education. You are trying to continue a debate on a premise that isn't agreed upon. The thing I would like to know is, how much would we be paying if neither of the above conditions existed. Also, I suspect their would be far (like something in the 90% range) few people unable to feed themselves if things like welfare didn't exist...but I'm certain we will never know.
:) ) to know of several examples but are just trying to be difficult.
;)
The good news is I finally I've started to understand your point (I think)).
The bad news is you're not trolling; you really believe this stuff, it seems.
If I may: You think some social programs are OK or even good, but that there are too many of them and they often create (or at least perpetuate) the problems they purport to solve. So, you want to know how society would work out without them -- with all of them gone, how would things shake out?
Am I right?
If so, the answer is closer than you think: grab a history book. Check out the awesome accounts of life under rule by the strongest under, say feudalism, for example. There is plenty of historical evidence that shows that a strong state is needed to prevent rise of an excessively strong (tyrranical) state. Anarchy breeds tyrrany. I think you know this, and are probably well-educated enough (thanks to everyone elses tax dollars
If not, I'm confused -- maybe you are trolling!
No, I haven't, yet I feel awake.
Anyway, how much is "a lot"?
lighten up mods, you know that was funny!
No, but you should have posted as AC instead of karma whoring article text for a server that is holding up fine and did not need your mirror.
:)
Of course, you do need the karma, so I understand. Can't troll without karma, now can you?
Well, golly. sbeast702 doesn't think it's a gigapixel image, and he's so clever that he (and only he) knows the subtle ways in which using photoshop magically transforms an image with one billion pixels into something else besides a gigapixel image. Oh, how I wish I could understand such esoteric things. Ah to be the sbeast702 . . .
But wait, what's that?! sbeast702, in his haste to get a FP, failed to read any of the article at all. For had he, he would have noted the author's lament that he could not use photoshop at all because his version limits the canvas to 30k pixels in any dimension, which is far too small for this image with 1 billion pixels which, somehow, is not a gigapixel image because sbeast702 says so.
STFU karma whore.
Can you give me a reasonable explanation beyond "they've got dark skins"?
Sure! Because there were a lot fewer unemployed in the IT (and other) industry in the 80's and early 90's. And who has heard of any outsourcing to Russia or Israel? I haven't . . .
See, when we have plenty of work, we don't mind sharing some of it. On the other hand, when work is scarce, people get upset when it is sent out of the country without really good reasons.
How's that? Or would you just prefer to think everything is racially motivated? It is all the rage these days . . .
OK, now I'm pretty sure you're trolling, but I'll bite anyway.
Assuming I never drive a car, but buy lots of products, it's not likely I'm paying much for roads, since a large portion of the cost of roads comes from gasoline tax. So, this is sort of an inverse example. Of course it benefits me to gain benefit from something I never pay for.
I have no idea what portion of road funding comes from gas taxes, and neither do you. The point stands, however; whether or not you directly use something should not necessarily be the deciding factor in whether or not you pay a share for it.
First, even though I do pay for public schools, there are still lots of uneducated (or just stupid?) people around. So it seems my money is just being wasted. Second, the whole "you might otherwise be contributing more tax dollars for..." arguments is kind of silly. I question having to subsidize the activities of others, and you respond with "well, you would still have to do it anyway". The point is, if someone wants to be educated, they should have to pay for it. If they choose not to be educated (i.e. qualify for welfare, etc.) they should have to pay for that too (where in this case, "paying for it" means simply living with the consequences).
Yeah, great logic! Since there is still crime, why don't we get rid of the police, too? Seems the money is just being wasted and all, just like schools and dumb people, right? Wrong. Your ideology is confusing your economics. And you called my argument silly? Ha ha.
If it's cheaper to fund schools than pay welfare for 50% of the population, then it's a better deal for everyone if we collectively fund schools instead of increased welfare.
I couldn't pay my own way through college -- I had to get grants and loans (mostly grants) from Uncle Sam (read: from tax money). So, your taxes paid my way through school. Bad deal? No, because now I pay lots of taxes (much, much more than I would had I remained uneducated with low pay). And now we both benefit.
I'm afraid you're one of those "uneducated (or just stupid?)" people if you really think this way (and again, I doubt it -- you are trolling for sure with this contrived nonsense).
I certainly don't think I should have to pay for something I never use.
That's one of those sorts of statements that sound reasonable at first reading, but fall apart after further contemplation:
Even if you never drive a car, the publicly-funded roads benefit you by helping to reduce shipping costs for the products you buy.
Even if you never have kids, the publicly-funded school systems benefit you by helping to improve the education of those with whom you share a society (and to whom you might otherwise be contributing more tax dollars for welfare/entitlement programs).
I'd say libraries similarly benefit you even if you never visit one.
It is a good idea. So good, in fact, that I'm personally a little disappointed that the libraries are figuring it out so soon.
:)
See, a few years ago I started using amazon.com to sell some of my old books. Amazed that crap I'd give away garnered $10, $20, and in some cases $30 or more, I started keeping a database of the list (and in my cases, sale) prices of used books on amazon. Then I started seeking out the top sellers at local used bookstores, garage sales, whatever. Whenever I found a big stack of cheap books, I'd often buy them all (or most) and then list them on amazon (which is free to do, in contrast with ebay). If they sell, great (70-80% do). If not, nothing lost other than a few minutes time typing in the ISDN number and setting a price.
Especially when I enabled my amazon "will ship internationally" seller option, I found amazing demand (often from overseas) for books that I could get for free or cheap (such as old editions of Dietel's C How to Program which sell quite well in India).
I suppose it's good that the libraries are getting a clue and taking advantage of this -- I just wish I had a little more time to make some more profits first
I thought the AC's comments were right on. Not so much funny as accurate. Your misunderstanding of electronics and physics is remarkable. Some mods, apparently, are as credulous as you are clueless on his subject. In defense of the mods, however, you were amazingly confident in your presentation of completely false claims.
The issue I was talking about was one of interference. As the "tracks", if you will, get smaller they do need a greater rate of flow to get those transistors functioning properly
As wires get smaller, they can carry less current before suffering from electromigration, so this statement makes no sense right off the bat. Moreover, in modern semiconductor processes the signal wires (those containing the logical 1 and 0 values) are getting smaller and smaller, which increases the wire resistance somewhat, and we're driving them with lower and lower voltage transistors so according to Ohm's law (V=I*R), we're using less current on signal wires, not more. The power wires which supply the operating current to the transistors are not shrinking so fast, since we need to provide more total current to the densely-packed transistors on the die, and prevent electromigration and IR volage drop. Maybe you are thinking of the power supply wires?
(since the number of electrons moving through the gate at any particular time are far smaller due to the diminished size of that gate).
OK, I see -- you seem to have the mistaken impression that electrons passing through the gate somehow provide power to the transistor. They do not. Static DC Power (and ground) is provided to other terminals of the transistors at all times (but not the gate!), whether the gate is open or closed or in the process of switching. The electrons passing through the gate are not used to power the transistor. They simply pass through. In fact, when the gate is closed (off), very few electrons pass through (only leakage current); way to few to power anything using your confused theory. These electrons are simply the messengers -- their presence or not is used to differentiate logical on from off. Dynamic power is consumed as the transisors charge or discharge (source or sink current to) parasitic capacitors -- this power is provided to the transistors via special (wide) power wires. It is not in any way supplied by signal wires.
As the transistors get smaller and more crammed together, the currents, now in extremely close proximity, DO begin to experience interference from each other, which really CAN cause errors as you get standing waves (which would of course create a dam-like effect, preventing a transistor from switching at the appropriate time).
Yes, a wire carrying moving current generates a magnetic field that can affect the current flow in nearby wires. This is called crosstalk, or cross-capacitance. We reduce or avoid this by maintaining a reasonable wire pitch (distance between adjacent wires) and checking switching windows of strong and weak drivers with nets near each other to make sure they don't switch at the same time. Crosstalk can speed up or slow down switching on adjacent nets, or even cause a noise glitch, but it has nothing to do with standing waves. Crosstalk cannot create "a dam-like effect, preventing a transistor from switching at the appropriate time." I believe you're thinking of circuit-board design where reflection, standing-waves, and resonance can be signal integrity problems. These are not issues for wires on semiconductors.