GNU has produced an operating system. It's nowhere near as advanced in functionality as Linux, but it exists, and GCC one of the largest parts of it.
It's true that Stallman is a self-important man who makes himself look arrogant by delineating that GNU tools are part of the operating system but not making the same claim for a whole slew of other important tools.
But however correct the OP's statement, I agree with the reply made to it that the fact it comes apropos of nothing indicates it's a troll.
While I support the idea behind analogies, they're pretty dead as far as I'm concerned. Crap ones are good enough for most people. Back when we used to measure analogy quality by depth of equivalence, fewer people used to post to Slashdot, and being able to stand up to a proper reading was important. Now that there aren't enough hours in the day to read Slashdot properly, most people are convinced by a superficial similarity in sentence structure. IMO, the window of opportunity for quality metaphor has come and gone, as least as long as Anonymous Coward is the standard Slashdot author.
The fact that Ogg isn't much better than MP3 whereas local restaurants are much better than McDonalds -- and that taste is not an analogous fit for availability of bandwidth/storage -- is a non-issue for most people. They just want to post something pithy and stylish-looking.
"Admittedly, misleading people is antithetical to science, and therefore arguably anti-scientific. But why didn't you just make that the basis of your argument in the first place?!"
Because the case I presented was sufficient for any well informed person to follow my position. You asked for more evidence, so I gave you it.
No, I asked for some evidence, and you gave it to me. At which point I admitted that some of the misinformation presented was arguably anti-scientific, i.e., I agreed with you. You need to learn to read people's posts instead of knee-jerking.
"Thousands of drugs passed safe in animals have been withdrawn or banned due to their effect on human health." This is very often due to human trials (or actual usage) revealing side effects which the animal experiments did not reveal due to small statistics. They have taken an arguement for more animal testing and presented it as one for less.
Not necessarily: there are other reasons that drugs can have different behaviour in humans, as well you know and now it's you that's presenting only one side of the story. Also, if people who perform animal testing can't even ensure they use large enough populations, they really oughtn't to be doing it at all.
"When the producers of thalidomide were taken to court, they were aquitted after numerous experts agreed animal tests could not be relied on for human medicine."
This is a blatent lie. Animal tests have shown that thalidomide causes birth defects. This is again a problem with not enough animal testing.
If that were the case, why was it not shown in court that the testing that the producers of thalidamide did was inadequate?
"At least 450 methods exist with which we can replace animal experiments."
This is a monstrous lie. How exactly are we going to do studies on the anatomy of say the cat basal ganglia without cutting open a cats head?
Nobody is claiming that you can do experiments on the anatomy of the cat basal ganglia without cutting open a cat's head. Show me the bit where someone is saying that, or keep your straw men to yourself.
"Morphine puts humans asleep but excites cats."
Morphine has the same effect in cats as it does in humans at equivilant doses.
I agree with you that this is false, but it is widely-believed based on a misunderstanding of certain experiments that were done on cats which could not have been repeated on humans. In other words, it's perfectly possible that it's a misunderstanding, not a misrepresentation.
They in no way try a reductio ad hitlerum.
Why don't they give that disclaimer a little further up, then, say, next to the picture?
Are you really going to insist for more evidence, or are you finally convinced?
I've told you: I agree that misleading people is anti-scientific, and I agree that there is evidence of this. But perhaps you are misleading as well? You present statements as facts without supporting them. For instance, WRT cats and aspirin: you offer the refutation on the armyths page as proof positive that they did in fact mean aspirin. Yet as you say, the armyths page "is a response to AR propaganda", so what makes you think that the entire aspirin myth is not based on the same misunderstanding?
Let me be clear about this. I'm not saying that they don't intend to present one side of the debate. I'm just saying that you do the same, and you ascribe to malice what can easily be attributed to ignorance.
You are not in the biological sciences if you don't realise this (taken from the SHAC link) is a blatent lie.
It's not a blatant lie. It's misleading. There's a difference. Admittedly, misleading people is antithetical to science, and therefore arguably anti-scientific. But why didn't you just make that the basis of your argument in the first place?!
This is simply false. Aspirin is fatal to cats only it crazy doses and would pass animal tests no problem.
Perhaps they were thinking of ibuprofen which, as I'm sure you know, is considerably more toxic to cats than to humans?
You're right that it's a propaganda piece, but then, what's that big picture of Goering doing in the middle of that armyths web site?
I also don't believe that you picked a few at random, I think you cherry-picked a few that you knew you could refute. As such, your comment is also a propaganda piece:)
So what I'm saying is, if whatever you're afraid of has access to the physical server (i.e. government spooks with a warrant), they'd most likely also have the compliance of the people running the datacenter
Um, he did mention that the front-end and the back-end were in different countries.
I do agree that the SPEAKS page contains some misprepresentation, e.g., implying that "Dogs, cats, monkeys, rabbits, rats, mice, guinea pigs, sheep, fish, birds, horses, goats. You name it and the vivisectors abuse it." is a refutation to "According to Home Office figures for 2002, rodents accounted for around 84 per cent of animals used for research in the UK."
As for whether they are lies, well, why don't you point to specific items and provide refutations? You'd probably better stick to the ALF and SHAC pages, though, since those are the organisations about which you made your claim, and we wouldn't want to confuse the issue, would we?
I don't credit everyone with the benefit of the doubt. I don't defend the actions of these people. I merely ask you to provide evidence for your baseless assertions. If your claim is now that they are anti-science because they are lying about facts and figures, you'll have to prove that they are lying about those facts and figures, rather than, for example, simply mistaken, or in fact telling the truth.
If your only response is a combination of comparing me to the ALF and liberal arts graduates we aren't going to make progress here.
P.S. That's not my only response, as you well know. If you continue to fail to address my points about the scientific method, we aren't going to make progress.
I agreed with you that additional evidence can change the outcome of an experiment. But so far you have presented "they attack scientists" as the entirety of your evidence in favour of the hypothesis "they are anti-science". In combination with the evidence "they attack non-scientists", the available evidence does not support your hypothesis.
Then you provide me with a few links to sites which, in fact, provide more evidence that these people are not anti-science:
http://www.speakcampaigns.org/faq.php/ -- again, there is a (not particularly rigorous, but nonetheless laudable) attempt to meet scientists with evidence-based reasoning.
No, you're not, you just call yourself one. Unless you adhere to the scientific method, you're no more a scientist than an ALF member dressed in a white coat is a scientist.
The obvious logical flaw in your reasoning is to assume that a person can be anti science and not anti other things as well, you presented a false dichotomy.
Not at all. I tested your assertion that they are anti-science, and found it to be false. I would in fact assume that they are anti other things too, but that has no bearing whatsoever on your assertion. "Control your variables", as my physics teacher used to say.
Your experiment is ill conceived because it only tests if these terrorists are also prepared to attack other targets in addition to scientists. I did not in any way state that these people were not motivated by other factors.
Good, then we are agreed. Since they attack scientists and non-scientists, you'll have to provide additional evidence if you want to prove that they are anti-science. So far, you have provided no such evidence.
Let me designed a better experiment for you. Examine their rhetoric to see how the characterise the scientists conducting these experiments. If they do not conform to standard stereotyping of scientists I'm wrong.
"Examine their rhetoric?!?!" WTF kind of experimental design is that?! You sound like a liberal arts graduate.
Examine if they are prepared to tell bold face lies about the values of animals in research, perverting the results of science for propaganda purposes. Someone who was interested in protecting those who conduct science and the value of it's results wouldn't pervert it for their own ends.
Again, this fits with the hypothesis that they are anti animal testing.
Here is why your experiment is flaws. Say a group bombs synagogue, but also bombs mosques and churches. Then you look on their website and find language describing how they are completing "the final solution to the Jewish question" and describe Jews as "evil" and "money grubbing". You can safely conclude that while this group is clearly anti religion in general, it is not their motivation for harming Jews.
Yes, and as soon as you present me with the equivalent additional evidence, we can test that.
Wait, your assertion is that a group that attacks companies and Universities engaged in scientific research precisely because they are engaged in scientific research is not anti science.
No, it's not. My assertion is not they attack those targets "precisely because they are engaged in scientific research", but rather that they attack those targets because they are involved in animal testing.
I really have no idea how I'm supposed to answer that.
Of course you don't, because you're not a scientist. Let me show you what it means to be pro-science:
1) Observe the evidence (ALF/SHAC attack scientists involved in animal testing). 2) Form a hypothesis (the ALF/SHAC are anti-science). 3) Design an experiment to falsify the hypothesis (test to see if the ALF/SHAC also attack non-scientists). 4) Perform the experiment (observe whether the ALF/SHAC also target non-scientists). 5) Determine the conclusion (given that the ALF/SHAC also target non-scientists, the hypothesis has been falsified) 6) Come up with a better hypothesis (that the ALF/SHAC are anti-animal testing). 7) Design an experiment to falsify the hypothesis (test to see if the ALF/SHAC also attack people not involved in animal testing). 8) Perform the experiment (observe whether the ALF/SHAC also target people not involved in animal testing). 9) Determine the conclusion (given that the ALF/SHAC do not target people not involved in animal testing, the hypothesis has not been falsified).
At this stage, the hypothesis that the ALF/SHAC are anti-animal testing is your best hypothesis. Feel free to come up with tighter hypotheses that incorporate scientists if you want, but remember to test them properly, according to the scientific method.
I'm fairly certain that someone who bombs synagogues is antisemitic.
Not if they also bomb churches and mosques. You're only looking at the part of the picture that supports your hypothesis. That's the cardinal sin in science. You really should learn about it sometime.
If the group you protested with were engaged in terrorist actions then you are.
No, engaging with a terrorist group would make me a terrorist. It would only make me anti-science if that group is anti-science which, so far, you have spectacularly failed to demonstrate.
The ALF attack one subset of people (both scientists and non-scientists). The ELF attack a different subset. What is your basis for saying they are all anti-science?
I am a scientist based in the UK. In the nineties I attended public rallies again farm-scale trials of certain GM crops on the basis that there had been an observable correlation in the US between open-air production of GM crops and a decline in the local bee population, which I felt meant that further lab testing was required before trials were done in the open. Yet you would say that I am anti-science. For someone who claims to be pro-science, you're pretty bad at applying the scientific method.
SHAC/ALF have target people only tangentially related HLS.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
They target vivisection while ignoring appalling conditions in slaughter houses.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
They have a history of indiscriminate violence and intimidation targetting skilled people.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
Either they are being disingenuous and targeting research because they know that their wider agenda of banning meat products would cause the general public to go into a frenzy against them, or they are targeting research because they truly hate scientists.
False dichotomy.
Look, I'm well aware of the hypocrisy of animal activists. You don't even have to look as far as the meat industry for that.
But unless you can demonstrate that they attack scientists/engineers unrelated to animal testing, your accusations of them being "anti-science" are baseless. Indeed, the very fact that they attack NON-scientists tangentially related to HLS is an indication that what they're anti is animal testing, not science.
By the way I think you'll find that a lot of the members of SHAC/ALF do in fact also campaign against the meat industry. People can belong to more than one organisation, you know.
These terrorists want to commit acts of violence. They couldn't care less who they commit them against. They consciously rationalise their decision by proclaiming the issue to be animal rights.
Another completely baseless assertion. You make a lot of those, and in doing so come across as a bit of a nutter. WRT the actions of these guys I'm basically on the same side of this debate as you are, but rants like yours do our cause no good whatsoever.
The truth is that scientists just form a soft target, one which they happen to dispise. In the context of a slashdot post that is what really matters.
Are you saying that because we're discussing this on Slashdot, proof by assertion, false dichotomy and ad hominem do not qualify as fallacies?
These barsteds hate people like you and I and would revel in slowing killing us if they had the chance.
It would seem that you are as paranoid and bitter as the worst of them.
They seized a *mirror* of the main server (the main site is still up a running just fine), in order to try to trace the original poster.
Yet the original poster can not be retrieved from the "mirror" (or from the main site for that matter).
Thanks to your insight, I have developed a foolproof method for the Perfect Crime:
1) Commit crime 2) When the police ask you whether or not anything in your possession implicates you in said crime... (and here is the genius bit): tell them "NO!" 3) !!!! 4) Profit!
SHAC/ALF are not a group protesting animal cruelty. They are a bunch of anti science luddites hell bent on hurting scientists and engineers.
I don't understand why you keep saying this. Do you have any proof that these people target scientists and engineers outside of fields that involve animal testing?
P.S. Read up about the Luddites sometime. They weren't anti-technology for its own sake, but rather because it took away people's livelihood.
Slashdot Mirror
There are two stories here:
1) 25th anniversary of GNU OS project
2) GCC plugin approach agreed
They coincide, and both relate to the FSF, so why shouldn't they be brought together in a single article?
GNU has produced an operating system. It's nowhere near as advanced in functionality as Linux, but it exists, and GCC one of the largest parts of it.
It's true that Stallman is a self-important man who makes himself look arrogant by delineating that GNU tools are part of the operating system but not making the same claim for a whole slew of other important tools.
But however correct the OP's statement, I agree with the reply made to it that the fact it comes apropos of nothing indicates it's a troll.
Vim, eh? You spoiling for a fight? ;)
While I support the idea behind analogies, they're pretty dead as far as I'm concerned. Crap ones are good enough for most people. Back when we used to measure analogy quality by depth of equivalence, fewer people used to post to Slashdot, and being able to stand up to a proper reading was important. Now that there aren't enough hours in the day to read Slashdot properly, most people are convinced by a superficial similarity in sentence structure. IMO, the window of opportunity for quality metaphor has come and gone, as least as long as Anonymous Coward is the standard Slashdot author.
The fact that Ogg isn't much better than MP3 whereas local restaurants are much better than McDonalds -- and that taste is not an analogous fit for availability of bandwidth/storage -- is a non-issue for most people. They just want to post something pithy and stylish-looking.
I have two questions that I don't believe are covered by the summary:
1) Is this the end of the line for the Geode?
2) Is the Geode used in the OLPC XO laptops?
They can tell if you have THC in your body but you could have ingested marijuana in some form or another weeks ago.
So make a better test, or make it illegal to have THC in your body and drive.
Because it has not been proven to be more effective than other, signficantly safer drugs.
In addition THC IS legal for some diseases
In that case, since the context is recreational usage, you must be talking about alcohol?
Would you care to provide some supporting evidence that alcohol is safer than weed?
s/hippies/supposed mexican rapists/
s/risk/fun/
Make it freely available
It already is freely available. Much more freely available than booze to many people under 21 in the US.
Ah, young 'uns modding me offtopic. Don't worry -- I too have karma to burn ;)
"Admittedly, misleading people is antithetical to science, and therefore arguably anti-scientific. But why didn't you just make that the basis of your argument in the first place?!"
Because the case I presented was sufficient for any well informed person to follow my position. You asked for more evidence, so I gave you it.
No, I asked for some evidence, and you gave it to me. At which point I admitted that some of the misinformation presented was arguably anti-scientific, i.e., I agreed with you. You need to learn to read people's posts instead of knee-jerking.
"Thousands of drugs passed safe in animals have been withdrawn or banned due to their effect on human health." This is very often due to human trials (or actual usage) revealing side effects which the animal experiments did not reveal due to small statistics. They have taken an arguement for more animal testing and presented it as one for less.
Not necessarily: there are other reasons that drugs can have different behaviour in humans, as well you know and now it's you that's presenting only one side of the story. Also, if people who perform animal testing can't even ensure they use large enough populations, they really oughtn't to be doing it at all.
"When the producers of thalidomide were taken to court, they were aquitted after numerous experts agreed animal tests could not be relied on for human medicine."
This is a blatent lie. Animal tests have shown that thalidomide causes birth defects. This is again a problem with not enough animal testing.
If that were the case, why was it not shown in court that the testing that the producers of thalidamide did was inadequate?
"At least 450 methods exist with which we can replace animal experiments."
This is a monstrous lie. How exactly are we going to do studies on the anatomy of say the cat basal ganglia without cutting open a cats head?
Nobody is claiming that you can do experiments on the anatomy of the cat basal ganglia without cutting open a cat's head. Show me the bit where someone is saying that, or keep your straw men to yourself.
"Morphine puts humans asleep but excites cats."
Morphine has the same effect in cats as it does in humans at equivilant doses.
I agree with you that this is false, but it is widely-believed based on a misunderstanding of certain experiments that were done on cats which could not have been repeated on humans. In other words, it's perfectly possible that it's a misunderstanding, not a misrepresentation.
They in no way try a reductio ad hitlerum.
Why don't they give that disclaimer a little further up, then, say, next to the picture?
Are you really going to insist for more evidence, or are you finally convinced?
I've told you: I agree that misleading people is anti-scientific, and I agree that there is evidence of this. But perhaps you are misleading as well? You present statements as facts without supporting them. For instance, WRT cats and aspirin: you offer the refutation on the armyths page as proof positive that they did in fact mean aspirin. Yet as you say, the armyths page "is a response to AR propaganda", so what makes you think that the entire aspirin myth is not based on the same misunderstanding?
Let me be clear about this. I'm not saying that they don't intend to present one side of the debate. I'm just saying that you do the same, and you ascribe to malice what can easily be attributed to ignorance.
You are not in the biological sciences if you don't realise this (taken from the SHAC link) is a blatent lie.
It's not a blatant lie. It's misleading. There's a difference. Admittedly, misleading people is antithetical to science, and therefore arguably anti-scientific. But why didn't you just make that the basis of your argument in the first place?!
This is simply false. Aspirin is fatal to cats only it crazy doses and would pass animal tests no problem.
Perhaps they were thinking of ibuprofen which, as I'm sure you know, is considerably more toxic to cats than to humans?
You're right that it's a propaganda piece, but then, what's that big picture of Goering doing in the middle of that armyths web site?
I also don't believe that you picked a few at random, I think you cherry-picked a few that you knew you could refute. As such, your comment is also a propaganda piece :)
So what I'm saying is, if whatever you're afraid of has access to the physical server (i.e. government spooks with a warrant), they'd most likely also have the compliance of the people running the datacenter
Um, he did mention that the front-end and the back-end were in different countries.
I do agree that the SPEAKS page contains some misprepresentation, e.g., implying that "Dogs, cats, monkeys, rabbits, rats, mice, guinea pigs, sheep, fish, birds, horses, goats. You name it and the vivisectors abuse it." is a refutation to "According to Home Office figures for 2002, rodents accounted for around 84 per cent of animals used for research in the UK."
As for whether they are lies, well, why don't you point to specific items and provide refutations? You'd probably better stick to the ALF and SHAC pages, though, since those are the organisations about which you made your claim, and we wouldn't want to confuse the issue, would we?
I don't credit everyone with the benefit of the doubt. I don't defend the actions of these people. I merely ask you to provide evidence for your baseless assertions. If your claim is now that they are anti-science because they are lying about facts and figures, you'll have to prove that they are lying about those facts and figures, rather than, for example, simply mistaken, or in fact telling the truth.
If your only response is a combination of comparing me to the ALF and liberal arts graduates we aren't going to make progress here.
P.S. That's not my only response, as you well know. If you continue to fail to address my points about the scientific method, we aren't going to make progress.
I agreed with you that additional evidence can change the outcome of an experiment. But so far you have presented "they attack scientists" as the entirety of your evidence in favour of the hypothesis "they are anti-science". In combination with the evidence "they attack non-scientists", the available evidence does not support your hypothesis.
Then you provide me with a few links to sites which, in fact, provide more evidence that these people are not anti-science:
http://www.shac.net/science/facts.html -- why would SHAC appeal to "scientific facts" [sic] if they rejected science?
http://www.speakcampaigns.org/faq.php/ -- again, there is a (not particularly rigorous, but nonetheless laudable) attempt to meet scientists with evidence-based reasoning.
http://www.animalliberationfront.com/Philosophy/Morality/ScienceandMorality.htm -- which seeks to separate the moral argument from the scientific argument, and rejects animal testing on the former rather than the latter.
Feel free to point me to specific pages which you feel demonstrate evidence of an anti-scientific standpoint.
I'm a professional scientist
No, you're not, you just call yourself one. Unless you adhere to the scientific method, you're no more a scientist than an ALF member dressed in a white coat is a scientist.
The obvious logical flaw in your reasoning is to assume that a person can be anti science and not anti other things as well, you presented a false dichotomy.
Not at all. I tested your assertion that they are anti-science, and found it to be false. I would in fact assume that they are anti other things too, but that has no bearing whatsoever on your assertion. "Control your variables", as my physics teacher used to say.
Your experiment is ill conceived because it only tests if these terrorists are also prepared to attack other targets in addition to scientists. I did not in any way state that these people were not motivated by other factors.
Good, then we are agreed. Since they attack scientists and non-scientists, you'll have to provide additional evidence if you want to prove that they are anti-science. So far, you have provided no such evidence.
Let me designed a better experiment for you. Examine their rhetoric to see how the characterise the scientists conducting these experiments. If they do not conform to standard stereotyping of scientists I'm wrong.
"Examine their rhetoric?!?!" WTF kind of experimental design is that?! You sound like a liberal arts graduate.
Examine if they are prepared to tell bold face lies about the values of animals in research, perverting the results of science for propaganda purposes. Someone who was interested in protecting those who conduct science and the value of it's results wouldn't pervert it for their own ends.
Again, this fits with the hypothesis that they are anti animal testing.
Here is why your experiment is flaws. Say a group bombs synagogue, but also bombs mosques and churches. Then you look on their website and find language describing how they are completing "the final solution to the Jewish question" and describe Jews as "evil" and "money grubbing". You can safely conclude that while this group is clearly anti religion in general, it is not their motivation for harming Jews.
Yes, and as soon as you present me with the equivalent additional evidence, we can test that.
Wait, your assertion is that a group that attacks companies and Universities engaged in scientific research precisely because they are engaged in scientific research is not anti science.
No, it's not. My assertion is not they attack those targets "precisely because they are engaged in scientific research", but rather that they attack those targets because they are involved in animal testing.
I really have no idea how I'm supposed to answer that.
Of course you don't, because you're not a scientist. Let me show you what it means to be pro-science:
1) Observe the evidence (ALF/SHAC attack scientists involved in animal testing).
2) Form a hypothesis (the ALF/SHAC are anti-science).
3) Design an experiment to falsify the hypothesis (test to see if the ALF/SHAC also attack non-scientists).
4) Perform the experiment (observe whether the ALF/SHAC also target non-scientists).
5) Determine the conclusion (given that the ALF/SHAC also target non-scientists, the hypothesis has been falsified)
6) Come up with a better hypothesis (that the ALF/SHAC are anti-animal testing).
7) Design an experiment to falsify the hypothesis (test to see if the ALF/SHAC also attack people not involved in animal testing).
8) Perform the experiment (observe whether the ALF/SHAC also target people not involved in animal testing).
9) Determine the conclusion (given that the ALF/SHAC do not target people not involved in animal testing, the hypothesis has not been falsified).
At this stage, the hypothesis that the ALF/SHAC are anti-animal testing is your best hypothesis. Feel free to come up with tighter hypotheses that incorporate scientists if you want, but remember to test them properly, according to the scientific method.
I'm fairly certain that someone who bombs synagogues is antisemitic.
Not if they also bomb churches and mosques. You're only looking at the part of the picture that supports your hypothesis. That's the cardinal sin in science. You really should learn about it sometime.
If the group you protested with were engaged in terrorist actions then you are.
No, engaging with a terrorist group would make me a terrorist. It would only make me anti-science if that group is anti-science which, so far, you have spectacularly failed to demonstrate.
The ALF attack one subset of people (both scientists and non-scientists). The ELF attack a different subset. What is your basis for saying they are all anti-science?
I am a scientist based in the UK. In the nineties I attended public rallies again farm-scale trials of certain GM crops on the basis that there had been an observable correlation in the US between open-air production of GM crops and a decline in the local bee population, which I felt meant that further lab testing was required before trials were done in the open. Yet you would say that I am anti-science. For someone who claims to be pro-science, you're pretty bad at applying the scientific method.
Yes, yes I do.
Let's hear it, then?
SHAC/ALF have target people only tangentially related HLS.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
They target vivisection while ignoring appalling conditions in slaughter houses.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
They have a history of indiscriminate violence and intimidation targetting skilled people.
But have they attacked scientists and engineers unrelated to animal testing?
Either they are being disingenuous and targeting research because they know that their wider agenda of banning meat products would cause the general public to go into a frenzy against them, or they are targeting research because they truly hate scientists.
False dichotomy.
Look, I'm well aware of the hypocrisy of animal activists. You don't even have to look as far as the meat industry for that.
But unless you can demonstrate that they attack scientists/engineers unrelated to animal testing, your accusations of them being "anti-science" are baseless. Indeed, the very fact that they attack NON-scientists tangentially related to HLS is an indication that what they're anti is animal testing, not science.
By the way I think you'll find that a lot of the members of SHAC/ALF do in fact also campaign against the meat industry. People can belong to more than one organisation, you know.
These terrorists want to commit acts of violence. They couldn't care less who they commit them against. They consciously rationalise their decision by proclaiming the issue to be animal rights.
Another completely baseless assertion. You make a lot of those, and in doing so come across as a bit of a nutter. WRT the actions of these guys I'm basically on the same side of this debate as you are, but rants like yours do our cause no good whatsoever.
The truth is that scientists just form a soft target, one which they happen to dispise. In the context of a slashdot post that is what really matters.
Are you saying that because we're discussing this on Slashdot, proof by assertion, false dichotomy and ad hominem do not qualify as fallacies?
These barsteds hate people like you and I and would revel in slowing killing us if they had the chance.
It would seem that you are as paranoid and bitter as the worst of them.
They seized a *mirror* of the main server (the main site is still up a running just fine), in order to try to trace the original poster.
Yet the original poster can not be retrieved from the "mirror" (or from the main site for that matter).
Thanks to your insight, I have developed a foolproof method for the Perfect Crime:
1) Commit crime
2) When the police ask you whether or not anything in your possession implicates you in said crime... (and here is the genius bit): tell them "NO!"
3) !!!!
4) Profit!
SHAC/ALF are not a group protesting animal cruelty. They are a bunch of anti science luddites hell bent on hurting scientists and engineers.
I don't understand why you keep saying this. Do you have any proof that these people target scientists and engineers outside of fields that involve animal testing?
P.S. Read up about the Luddites sometime. They weren't anti-technology for its own sake, but rather because it took away people's livelihood.
The difference is in intent. If a crowded theatre actually is on fire, I doubt it's illegal to yell about it.
I used to remove every one of those stupid warnings when I'd hit an article via google just for spite.
Do us all a favour: next time you get a bug up your ass about something, just learn a bit of greasemonkey.