Yet another person who doesn't know how to use interlibrary loans.
Your library can very likely get you almost any book or scientific paper held in any library in your country (and perhaps beyond). When I was in high school years ago in a tiny town my local library (which didn't even have a computer) got me an obscure book I needed for a science project from a defense library on the other side of the country.
Some parts of the third world have less access to all kinds of things. That has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that much of the world, possibly the majority of people, have access to free education and don't use it. You included, evidently, since you think libraries are nothing but romance novels.
Even rural places usually have a library not that far away (my home town in northern Canada of 800 people has a library). Libraries in very rural locations may also have a system for mailing books to individuals or the nearest general store.
Yes, people in the third world have less access to free education. They also have less access to food, water, shelter and not getting killed by warlords.
Interested in education. Not desperate for it. There's a difference.
Everyone in the first world ALREADY has access to all the education they want, free. They're called libraries. Learning that way is a bit difficult so there are various ways you can get someone else to do some of the hard work of teaching, frequently by paying some money.
Free online courses are a great idea, but they're not a replacement for schools, they're a supplement to books. I strongly disagree that we should make universities free to anyone who wants to go. That results in resources that are diluted and strained just to try to teach large numbers of people who aren't really interested in putting much effort into learning.
Re:It's not about education, it's about credential
on
The Rage For MOOCs
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· Score: 1
Most people don't want to learn, they want to be taught. Thus the hype about interactive textbooks (the ones with actual stuff you have to read are too boring) and online videos (because reading is hard and listening is just as bad).
There's this idea that if you just hit on the magic teaching method you'll be able to pour knowledge into people's heads and they can just sit in their lazyboy watching TV, I mean, the computer, and absorb it.
People see things like this as a good alternative to regular classrooms. There's no problem with online courses and I think things like iTunes U is a great resource. It's when people start talking about making all education online and massive that there's a problem.
One of the biggest complaints about education is class size, whether it's a kindergarten teacher trying to deal with 30 four year olds or an undergrad professor lecturing to 600 teenagers. Having the professor instead lecture to 100,000 anonymous Internetters isn't a good solution.
No, it's an indication of how many people are interested in what they see as quick and easy education. Hey, that course looks cool! It's free! Okay, I'll sign up!
Then they get into the course (or even before it starts), realize learning takes some work, and either drop out or fail. That's why completion rates for correspondence and other distance learning courses, particularly cheap or free ones, are astronomically low.
Or recalculation, or automatic advance. The old maps app didn't really do anymore turn by turn navigation than a desktop with map quest and a printer did.
In my experience, car nav systems ARE badly flawed at the level of the errors Apple is being criticised for. But TomTom gets compared to Garmin, not to Google. Google has had the benefit of years of massive usage and millions of people contributing corrections. Apple will catch up, but not without getting that user participation.
Google still makes mistakes too. The other day I was trying to find an address and Apple maps sent me eight blocks in the wrong direction, apparently because it didn't know about addresses that have an "east" or "west" in them. Google sent me several blocks in the wrong direction the OTHER way, for no apparent reason.
"Developers on Windows can target a wide range of systems. On OSX they can't."
That's ridiculous. Apple AND virtually all developers support at least one major revision back, usually several. That's a period of years. Meanwhile OS X users upgrade in large numbers in a period of days to months. Most well before new major software releases for the new OS and many before the major software developers even release patches to make sure their software works properly with the new OS.
Let's examine this assertion of yours that developers maintain backwards compatibility longer (in terms of major OS releases) with Windows though. Take Adobe CS for example. CS 6 for Mac: Requires 10.6 or 10.7 (presumably works on 10.8 as well). That's two major (paid) OS versions back. For Windows? XP (SP3), Vista, 7 (and hopefully 8). Three major (paid) OS versions back. The latest version of Office: 10.5 or later on the Mac (three versions back), Office 2010 for Windows requires XP SP3 (three versions), office 2012 will require at least Windows 7 (one version back).
Your assertion doesn't hold up.
And before you say that 10.6 was only two and a bit years ago while XP SP3 was released four years ago, that makes the difference even bigger - somehow Apple convinces most of their users to get excited about their new OS and upgrade not only quicker for a given release, but with more frequent releases!
You should probably know that there's a difference between a girl (or a guy) who has had a glass of wine or two and one who's passed out on the couch. Hint: if she's drooling, you probably shouldn't have sex with her.
Scientology is young. As I said, when Mormonism was the same age they were practicing human sacrifice in their own theocracy. Scientologists are a bunch of amateurs when it comes to religious extremism. Modern Mormons are mostly (mostly, there are still quite a few crazy, polygamous, child abusing ones with guns that ALSO make Scientologists look cute) pretty mainstream people but it took years, violence and some artillery to encourage them to be that way.
Not that even modern, mainstream Mormons are entirely cuddly. They still do obnoxious things like baptizing people against their will and barring families from participating in or even watching weddings if they're not Mormon.
We're talking about one major release to another. Apple fully supports everything going back at least a full major release, and most stuff two or three. If anything breaking backwards compatibility (such as the new OS not running on old hardware) means FEWER people should (or can) upgrade.
You've completely ignored Linux.
I think the real problem is that Microsoft has a habit of not putting anything compelling in their new releases and most upgrades are through attrition.
I will freely stipulate that believing the word of a magic rock is not any more crazy than believing in an omnipotent god, or believing that god chose to communicate through the writings of a number of Jewish misfits, kings and other personalities, heavily edited and selected by (very human) committee.
Although, since only John Smith was allowed to hear the rock talk, some people might consider it a little more fallible (although I'm not sure why). Those suspicions might be reinforced when they discover that John Smith's published (revelatory) translations of certain Egyptian hieroglyphic documents, produced before anyone knew how to read hieroglyphics, are inconsistent with the rosetta stone, everything else that's known about hieroglyphics, and are complete fabrications in the expert opinions of modern egyptologists.
Fortunately girls are better at this social stuff than guys are. They're usually the first ones to tell you to put down the fricking phone and say talk to them.
I've also noticed that as soon as the alcohol starts flowing, the phone, if it doesn't get abandoned somewhere, gets used for showing bad music videos, a process that usually involves getting fairly close together so you can both see the screen.
"Buying a new PC is the only time most of us buy an operating system."
That suggests it's something Microsoft is doing. Mac users tend to upgrade fairly quickly when new versions are released, as do Linux users. Perhaps it's because Microsoft charges (or certainly did in the past) so much and most new versions seem not to offer much.
Funny, because that's exactly the same charge that's levelled at the Mormon church by a lot of Mormons who have quit.
Yes, I'm not using the same language as Mormons (new or old) do, but I think it's an accurate, if succinct, translation. If you'd like to debate something in particular please go ahead and mention it, along with your interpretation. Your vague objections don't really amount to much so far.
The one that helped John Smith with his "translations." I suppose I should say Mormons let the words of a magic rock dictate their beliefs. Is that better?
A modern Mormon maybe. When Mormonism was the same age as Scientology it was pretty extreme. They used to practice human sacrifice for major crimes, and Utah was essentially a theocracy. Scientologists will just sue you into oblivion.
Polygamy isn't the batshit insane part, although it is the bit that gets most Christians bent out of shape. Widespread polygamy doesn't work in stable societies that aren't frequently at war though - if one guy has more than one wife then someone else doesn't get any, and he's likely to be unhappy unless he's conveniently killed fighting somewhere.
It sounds like you're the one who doesn't know much about Mormonism, particularly the history of it.
Joseph Smith, the founder of the religion, dictated the book of Mormon to his wife, apparently dictated to him (or translated) by a magic rock. The religion did indeed include such gems as polygamous marriage.
Mormon fundamentalists (those fringe cultists that bonk 12 year old girls) disagree with modern mainstream Mormons, mostly belonging to the Church of Latter Day Saints, about several things that the LDS church dropped for political expediency including:
polygamy (abandoned in the early 20th century, IIRC as a condition of Utah's statehood, and there may have been an army and some artillery involved to hasten the decision)
Adam and Eve as aliens (Adam later became God, abandoned in the mid 20th century)
human sacrifice as punishment for serious crimes (blood atonement, supposedly no longer in force by 1978, but still occasionally coming up in Utah death penalty trials)
and banning black men from the priesthood (1978).
Make no mistake though, the 12 year old bonking fundamentalists are the real Mormons, the ones who have kept the original beliefs of Mormonism. The ones you like so much are the watered down variety who exchanged their unpopular beliefs for more mainstream acceptance (not that trading crazy beliefs for not getting shot at is a bad thing).
Now, worshipping the words of a magic rock and Adam and Eve as alien colonists doesn't seem that much more batshit insane to me than worshipping a magic man in the sky who once decided he'd like to knock up some poor human sap's girlfriend. I know some Mormons, and most of them are nice enough, just like most of the Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and atheists I know. I even knew some Jehovah's Witnesses who I liked well enough once, even if they were a little too quick to criticize other people's Christmas trees and one of them absconded owing me for three months rent and a hefty phone bill.
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Yet another person who doesn't know how to use interlibrary loans.
Your library can very likely get you almost any book or scientific paper held in any library in your country (and perhaps beyond). When I was in high school years ago in a tiny town my local library (which didn't even have a computer) got me an obscure book I needed for a science project from a defense library on the other side of the country.
Some parts of the third world have less access to all kinds of things. That has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that much of the world, possibly the majority of people, have access to free education and don't use it. You included, evidently, since you think libraries are nothing but romance novels.
Even rural places usually have a library not that far away (my home town in northern Canada of 800 people has a library). Libraries in very rural locations may also have a system for mailing books to individuals or the nearest general store.
Yes, people in the third world have less access to free education. They also have less access to food, water, shelter and not getting killed by warlords.
Interested in education. Not desperate for it. There's a difference.
Everyone in the first world ALREADY has access to all the education they want, free. They're called libraries. Learning that way is a bit difficult so there are various ways you can get someone else to do some of the hard work of teaching, frequently by paying some money.
Free online courses are a great idea, but they're not a replacement for schools, they're a supplement to books. I strongly disagree that we should make universities free to anyone who wants to go. That results in resources that are diluted and strained just to try to teach large numbers of people who aren't really interested in putting much effort into learning.
Most people don't want to learn, they want to be taught. Thus the hype about interactive textbooks (the ones with actual stuff you have to read are too boring) and online videos (because reading is hard and listening is just as bad).
There's this idea that if you just hit on the magic teaching method you'll be able to pour knowledge into people's heads and they can just sit in their lazyboy watching TV, I mean, the computer, and absorb it.
People see things like this as a good alternative to regular classrooms. There's no problem with online courses and I think things like iTunes U is a great resource. It's when people start talking about making all education online and massive that there's a problem.
One of the biggest complaints about education is class size, whether it's a kindergarten teacher trying to deal with 30 four year olds or an undergrad professor lecturing to 600 teenagers. Having the professor instead lecture to 100,000 anonymous Internetters isn't a good solution.
No, it's an indication of how many people are interested in what they see as quick and easy education. Hey, that course looks cool! It's free! Okay, I'll sign up!
Then they get into the course (or even before it starts), realize learning takes some work, and either drop out or fail. That's why completion rates for correspondence and other distance learning courses, particularly cheap or free ones, are astronomically low.
Or recalculation, or automatic advance. The old maps app didn't really do anymore turn by turn navigation than a desktop with map quest and a printer did.
In my experience, car nav systems ARE badly flawed at the level of the errors Apple is being criticised for. But TomTom gets compared to Garmin, not to Google. Google has had the benefit of years of massive usage and millions of people contributing corrections. Apple will catch up, but not without getting that user participation.
Google still makes mistakes too. The other day I was trying to find an address and Apple maps sent me eight blocks in the wrong direction, apparently because it didn't know about addresses that have an "east" or "west" in them. Google sent me several blocks in the wrong direction the OTHER way, for no apparent reason.
They licensed TomTom data. Making fun of the apple maps database is actually making fun of TomTom.
Hm... I didn't think of tattling on her to the temple. She'd moved to a new city though... Can they track people anywhere?
Okay, why only two of them?
I think you're misunderstanding what I wrote.
"Developers on Windows can target a wide range of systems. On OSX they can't."
That's ridiculous. Apple AND virtually all developers support at least one major revision back, usually several. That's a period of years. Meanwhile OS X users upgrade in large numbers in a period of days to months. Most well before new major software releases for the new OS and many before the major software developers even release patches to make sure their software works properly with the new OS.
Let's examine this assertion of yours that developers maintain backwards compatibility longer (in terms of major OS releases) with Windows though. Take Adobe CS for example. CS 6 for Mac: Requires 10.6 or 10.7 (presumably works on 10.8 as well). That's two major (paid) OS versions back. For Windows? XP (SP3), Vista, 7 (and hopefully 8). Three major (paid) OS versions back. The latest version of Office: 10.5 or later on the Mac (three versions back), Office 2010 for Windows requires XP SP3 (three versions), office 2012 will require at least Windows 7 (one version back).
Your assertion doesn't hold up.
And before you say that 10.6 was only two and a bit years ago while XP SP3 was released four years ago, that makes the difference even bigger - somehow Apple convinces most of their users to get excited about their new OS and upgrade not only quicker for a given release, but with more frequent releases!
You should probably know that there's a difference between a girl (or a guy) who has had a glass of wine or two and one who's passed out on the couch. Hint: if she's drooling, you probably shouldn't have sex with her.
Scientology is young. As I said, when Mormonism was the same age they were practicing human sacrifice in their own theocracy. Scientologists are a bunch of amateurs when it comes to religious extremism. Modern Mormons are mostly (mostly, there are still quite a few crazy, polygamous, child abusing ones with guns that ALSO make Scientologists look cute) pretty mainstream people but it took years, violence and some artillery to encourage them to be that way.
Not that even modern, mainstream Mormons are entirely cuddly. They still do obnoxious things like baptizing people against their will and barring families from participating in or even watching weddings if they're not Mormon.
We're talking about one major release to another. Apple fully supports everything going back at least a full major release, and most stuff two or three. If anything breaking backwards compatibility (such as the new OS not running on old hardware) means FEWER people should (or can) upgrade.
You've completely ignored Linux.
I think the real problem is that Microsoft has a habit of not putting anything compelling in their new releases and most upgrades are through attrition.
I will freely stipulate that believing the word of a magic rock is not any more crazy than believing in an omnipotent god, or believing that god chose to communicate through the writings of a number of Jewish misfits, kings and other personalities, heavily edited and selected by (very human) committee.
Although, since only John Smith was allowed to hear the rock talk, some people might consider it a little more fallible (although I'm not sure why). Those suspicions might be reinforced when they discover that John Smith's published (revelatory) translations of certain Egyptian hieroglyphic documents, produced before anyone knew how to read hieroglyphics, are inconsistent with the rosetta stone, everything else that's known about hieroglyphics, and are complete fabrications in the expert opinions of modern egyptologists.
Fortunately girls are better at this social stuff than guys are. They're usually the first ones to tell you to put down the fricking phone and say talk to them.
I've also noticed that as soon as the alcohol starts flowing, the phone, if it doesn't get abandoned somewhere, gets used for showing bad music videos, a process that usually involves getting fairly close together so you can both see the screen.
"Buying a new PC is the only time most of us buy an operating system."
That suggests it's something Microsoft is doing. Mac users tend to upgrade fairly quickly when new versions are released, as do Linux users. Perhaps it's because Microsoft charges (or certainly did in the past) so much and most new versions seem not to offer much.
This way it gets installed on all the computers people are going to buy for Christmas. Microsoft doesn't really care if it people don't like it.
Funny, because that's exactly the same charge that's levelled at the Mormon church by a lot of Mormons who have quit.
Yes, I'm not using the same language as Mormons (new or old) do, but I think it's an accurate, if succinct, translation. If you'd like to debate something in particular please go ahead and mention it, along with your interpretation. Your vague objections don't really amount to much so far.
The one that helped John Smith with his "translations." I suppose I should say Mormons let the words of a magic rock dictate their beliefs. Is that better?
A modern Mormon maybe. When Mormonism was the same age as Scientology it was pretty extreme. They used to practice human sacrifice for major crimes, and Utah was essentially a theocracy. Scientologists will just sue you into oblivion.
Polygamy isn't the batshit insane part, although it is the bit that gets most Christians bent out of shape. Widespread polygamy doesn't work in stable societies that aren't frequently at war though - if one guy has more than one wife then someone else doesn't get any, and he's likely to be unhappy unless he's conveniently killed fighting somewhere.
It sounds like you're the one who doesn't know much about Mormonism, particularly the history of it.
Joseph Smith, the founder of the religion, dictated the book of Mormon to his wife, apparently dictated to him (or translated) by a magic rock. The religion did indeed include such gems as polygamous marriage.
Mormon fundamentalists (those fringe cultists that bonk 12 year old girls) disagree with modern mainstream Mormons, mostly belonging to the Church of Latter Day Saints, about several things that the LDS church dropped for political expediency including:
polygamy (abandoned in the early 20th century, IIRC as a condition of Utah's statehood, and there may have been an army and some artillery involved to hasten the decision)
Adam and Eve as aliens (Adam later became God, abandoned in the mid 20th century)
human sacrifice as punishment for serious crimes (blood atonement, supposedly no longer in force by 1978, but still occasionally coming up in Utah death penalty trials)
and banning black men from the priesthood (1978).
Make no mistake though, the 12 year old bonking fundamentalists are the real Mormons, the ones who have kept the original beliefs of Mormonism. The ones you like so much are the watered down variety who exchanged their unpopular beliefs for more mainstream acceptance (not that trading crazy beliefs for not getting shot at is a bad thing).
Now, worshipping the words of a magic rock and Adam and Eve as alien colonists doesn't seem that much more batshit insane to me than worshipping a magic man in the sky who once decided he'd like to knock up some poor human sap's girlfriend. I know some Mormons, and most of them are nice enough, just like most of the Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and atheists I know. I even knew some Jehovah's Witnesses who I liked well enough once, even if they were a little too quick to criticize other people's Christmas trees and one of them absconded owing me for three months rent and a hefty phone bill.