I thought the interaction of objects in NetHack was very cool and well-developed, but nonetheless, I think it could be taken one step further. Basically, all of the interactions are a bunch of IF statements hard-coded into the game. You don't discover anything other than what a dev thought was cool,and coded in. It's very cool and elaborate at this point, but ultimately limited.
It would be theoretically possible to create a game where you can have true unexpected interactions of objects. You would create a set of simple properties, and then more complex interaction emerge from the interactions of simple properties. Like legos, you keep combining and combining, coming up with new and creative combination, suprising yourself with things no one could have predicted. It's like language or music; you can never exhaust the possibilities. They're endless. It's literally and endless set. It's called a discrete combinatorial system.
The plan was to create a giant database of *everyone*, including every bit of electronic data available about them. Think of it as a FaceBook that includes everyone in the nation, with all your medical records, financial records, credit card records, phone calls, and emails. It was called "Total Information Awareness", and the Latin Phrase on its logo was Scientia est Potentia -- "Knowledge is Power". Therefore, Total Information Awareness means absolute power.
The wikipedia article seems to indicate that the project was simply broken up into smaller pieces, not actually ended, after public outcry.
I had a spell of nethack addiction a few years back. One of it's great features is the interaction of all the various elements. Potions, monsters, items, etc.
But I got the feeling it was all coded as a bunch of IF statements. IF you got a pie in your face, and IF you wiped it with a towel, then it would unblind you. Very cool, and on a level much more complex than most other games. However, it was all still pre-planned. Any cool interaction of things in nethack you discovered as coded into the game by a dev. You were discovering someone else's cool tricks. I thought it would be cool if a game could have true creative interaction of objects -- a sort of emergence of events, not just a list or pre-planned events. I think you would have to do it with a discrete combinatorial system, so that you have just a bunch of simple parts. Like legos, they dont do anything by themselves, but the way in which you combine them in new and creative ways leads to things no one could have predicted, much less plan and code into IF statements.
I was thinking the same thing about his mastery of visual symbolism. However, in what sense are ancient greek and roman buildings dense with symbolism? Are you talking about the sculpture on them?
I took a class on Sacred Architecture, and basically, the Greek buildings are loaded to the hilt with meanings. Well, it was all mathematical, though. You can thank the Greek philosophers for first originating the idea of the Matrix. The reality we see with the senses is a shadow of the real world, which is mathematics.
For one, they liked to use the golden ratio wherever they could. Here's a page that has an image of the golden ratio in a Greek temple. Second, look closely at the columns. See who they taper on top? That was done on purpose, so that when you're up close, looking up at them, the appear to rise straight up, instead of bending slightly inwards over you, as Manhattan skyscrapers do. The Greeks understood perspective and corrected for it with an optical illusion.
There are a lot of other things, which I've forgotten from the class, but it's utterly fascinating. If you have a chance to do a little reading, you'll be greatly rewarded!:)
This coin being loaded with dense symbolism and being about architecture, I hope there's something masonic hidden on it somewhere. I assume the masons were active in The Netherlands?
Are they? Are they ever!
Why, just look at the way the guy is holding his hand in the photo at the bottom of this page! Can you believe it!? It's right out in front of everyone, there on this web page! I would think they would be more subtle about it.
So in that sense, I think conservatives would support taxpayer funding for a "right to live" limited to food, clothing, very basic medical care, and shelter; provided that the person is doing their best to improve their own situation.
No, no they wouldn't. Just listen to any conversative talk show, any conservative think-tank representative, or any conservative guest on a liberal talk show. I've heard Rush say on his program "Where does the constitution guarantee a right to food? Where? Just tell me where?"
They think that the *only* thing that motivates able-bodied people to work is fear of starvation, homelessness, etc. If people had free food, water shelter, and medical care, they just wouldn't work, simple as that. There's no objective way to measure if someone is really unable to work ( do those migraines *really* hurt that badly? ), or just faking it, so we have to make sure that life has the proper system of rewards and punishments. Lazy people die in the ditch of disease and poverty, while hard-working people are rewarded with comfort and family in their old age.
It goes back to the Puritan work ethic. God metes out punishment and reward here on Earth; if you see a sickly person on the street, it's because their morally bad, a sinner. If you see a wealthy person in a big house, they are a good upstanding person. There is no 'chance' or 'bad luck' or 'accident of birth' in this belief system.
I think 1. the constitution places a limit on what the government can do to/with citizens, so this doesn't apply to what two private parties can get from each other in civil court, and 2. punishments are for crimes, and this is a civil matter.
I don't know if the smartcard can be traced back to the voter, but what I bet happens is that the smart card is re-used, which means it is erased with each new voter. It functions as a ballot. There's no way there giving a smart card to each voter.
As an American, I would like to have my electronic ballot on a smart card, which I then turn in to an election official, instead of just trusting that my vote is recorded on the machine... But perhaps it could easily be manipulated into being a simple placebo, me thinking that it has the security of a paper ballot, when really, it doesn't.
This is a question I've thought about. Now before I post this, let me just say that I work hard in the private sector and I hate the idea that people can get away with surfing the web for a living at work.
Modern technology allows us to work less and enjoy the same standard of living. As productivity increases, we will not need to work as much as our ancestors did.
How should society respond, if we really are in a situation where we don't need to work as much as we used to? Lower the hours in the work-week across the board? Create work by blowing up things and people in wars? Create extra hoops, such as advanced, yet irrelevant degrees, for basic jobs? Or have fluff jobs, where people make a good living, 75% of the people don't do much, and the other 25% get the job done?
I always wonder when I hear people talk about how hard they work and that they work just as hard as their ancestors. Isn't the point of technology and progress to work *less*?
Thanks for the well-thought out reply. I have a few more questions; perhaps you can help me out with them.
What precipitated these NINJA ( No Job, No Asset ) loans?
I have a hard time putting this on the backs work working- and middle-class people who bought homes "they couldn't afford". If there's a foreclosure, and the loan officer and Joe Sixpack are staring at each other, saying, "we got both got each in trouble, we didn't know any better" I would blame the banker more. It's the banker's job to know good risks. He's been making loans for years. How many times does a person buy a home in their lifetime? 2 or 3, max? I expect more out of the banker than Joe Sixpack.
It's the job of banks and loan officers to sit around all day and decide who can't and can't pay off a 30-year-loan, and how much a house is worth. Joe Sixpack has a fulltime job and kids to take care of. Yes, he should know whether or not he can afford X amount a month, but if a loan officer is approved, why would Joe thinks he knows more than a loan officer? We don't expect a mortgage bank to act like a shady car dealership. So if he gets approved for a loan, that has to figure into his conception of whether he can afford it. "I'm not sure about this, but if the bank says I can afford it, they must know what they're talking about, since they have all those actuarial tables and mathematicians working on things."
So Joe Sixpack works for a company that doesn't have a retirement fund, he lost a bunch of money in the tech bubble burst and post 9/11. Social Security doesn't look good. His last job got shipped overseas, now he has less benefits. His wife works two jobs. He has kids who needs food, clothing, and college. He can't rely on things that his parents did -- retirement, stock market, social security, etc. What's the last, best thing he can do to prepare for his future? Well, buy a house of course. Why should he throw away money on rent, and have nothing to show for it after 30 years? Buying a house has always been seen as a mature, smart financial move. He's got nothing else as far as retirement, and now a loan officer is telling him he can buy a house. What would a financially prudent person do? Of course you buy that house. And since we were in a bubble, the only house he can buy is an overpriced one.
So, it seems to me that if banks never made NINJA loans, we wouldn't be in this mess this badly. We probably would be in a crappy market, but Lehman Brother's and other banks failing? Government bailouts? I blame the banks. It's their job to know this stuff. Collective Delusion? Joe Sixpack might not know better, but the bank sure had better know, and therefore not make risky loans.
FWIW, I talked several people out of buying homes since 2003. They thought there was no other safe place for their money. Others I talked to still bought houses. They thought I was some end-of-the-world conspiracy nut. Why should they believe the crazy blogs I referenced when a loan officer is ready to loan, and everyone knows a house is a good asset anyway?
Hey, thanks for responding in a non-inflammatory manner.
So, when did it become possible to sell mortgage-backed securities, and why did it go into overdrive around 2002, 2003?
I've heard and seen plenty of source on the radio and web that lays the blame at Bush's feet. I've heard that deregulation started with Clinton, but later heard ( which corroborated my own memory ) that they basically outlawed redlining, which is simply the refusal to make loans in certain neighborhoods, regardless of income, assets, or credit history -- nothing that would have caused out situation today. What's your story, and can you provide me some links?
Oh get off of it. The reason for the economic meltdown has little to do with Freddie and Fannie. It was deregulation, spearheaded by the Bush administration, which allowed financial institutions to create "mortgage-backed securities". Instead of a bank making a 30-year mortgage to someone who was a good risk, and keeping the mortgage for the life of it, now institutions could buy and trade baskets of mortgages. They could buy and sell it at any time, and therefore had little incentive to see how well any individual could pay of their personal mortgage. As the appetite for mortgage backed securities increased, lenders loosened criteria to give subprime mortgages, eventually taking people with no incomes and no assets. This had little to do with Fannie and Freddie, and much more to do with deregulation. In their greed, lenders gave loans to people who could never pay, simply because they wanted to sell another bundle of loans. If banks held individual mortgages for the life of the loan, and therefore had good lending criteria, none of this would have happened.
Here's a great "This American Life" piece on it. Banks made loans to people with no money. Banks wouldn't "regulate" themselves, the Bush administration rolled back regulation. The small way that Freddie and Fannie are related to this is because investors foolishly thought that the US gov't would prop them up. That's the investor's mistake. That's the long and short of it.
If you accept what the Supreme Court said, then the 2nd amendment is basically about the inalienable right of the people to keep and bear arms.
It's also worth noting that the Constitution, the same document where we learn about the 2nd amendment, also says that the SCOTUS is the final arbiter on what the constitution means. I would think that if you are a 2nd amendment supporter, to be consistent, you must also accept what the SCOTUS rules.
And what you (and many others; you're in good company) keep overlooking is that A COUNTRY FACING ARMED INSURRECTION FROM ITS OWN PEOPLE CANNOT QUIT AND GO HOME.
Have you never heard of the phrase "government in exile" ?
Are you claiming that in a civil war, when the populace takes up arms, they are simply fighting their fellow citizens, instead of the government? If so, I think you are confusing "the country" with the "the government". Usually a civil war is when people take up arms against their government ( not "the country" meaning "the people" ), otherwise it's called ethnic warfare.
How was Ireland able to break away from Great Britain. Hasn't the British Empire shown throughout history the willingness not to pull punches when fighting their own subjects?
Just because New Yorkers were willing to fire on Alabamas 150 years ago doesn't mean that the army is going to fire on "rebelling" citizens in Manhattan.
People ultimately want peace and the ability to raise a family ( even a young 20 year old man comes to this decision, given the passing of time). The more you kill civilians, the less just you are perceived to be, and the more people see the need to fight you to keep from living the rest of their lives under injustice. If we started blowing up villages wholesale in Iraq and Afghanistan, the whole *world* would turn against us. Nobody likes terrorism. It's treated as a crime when weaklings do it; when powerful governments do it, people choose to stand up against tyranny.
And what you (and many others; you're in good company) keep overlooking is that A COUNTRY FACING ARMED INSURRECTION FROM ITS OWN PEOPLE CANNOT QUIT AND GO HOME.
You're right, they simply quit, and they're already home. A treaty is negotiated, and a new government is formed, and people try to rebuild their lives.
I think what he's claiming is that guns can help you fight off invading armies, but they don't safeguard democracy or civil city ( meaning Rule of Law ). It likely means that you'll be ruled by warlords, AKA Rule of Men. Whoever has the most guns and fanatical young men "wins", meaning they are in charge of everything.
A Jewish friend of mine once told me that some rabbi from some thousand years ago or more ruled that a baby is "born" when the head emerges from the woman's body. At that point it's a separate human being; before that, it's part of the mother.
I think a more modern version would be when the umbilical cord is cut. Before then, the baby depends completely on the mothers' bloodstream for oxygen and nutrients. It makes its living just like any other organ in her body. However, after the umbilical cord is cut, it has to breath and eat on its own*. It doesn't ingest nutrients and oxygen directly from the mother's blood anymore.
* Yes, the mother and other people help the baby eat. But the baby has to actually do the suckling and eating. It's doing its part at that point.
When a person's basic needs aren't being meet nothing else really matters.
Bullshit. Ever heard of a starving artist? Ever have a buddy who was a drug addict, couldn't really care for themselves, but was somehow managing to write amazing songs or create wondrous paintings? Renoir used to bring bread to Monet when they got together and painted. They made amazing paintings when they were starving.
In a depression, there's no money coming in. It doesn't matter how much blogging or coding you keep yourself from doing; that's not stopping the flow of money at your doorstep. In a depression, there's no paid work. It's as simple as that. You've got all the time in the world; you can spend months looking for work that isn't there, or you can actually do something that's constructive for society and feel rewarded doing it.
I predict the economic downturn will be a boon/m for open source, once people get over the psychological trauma of not having any money or work.
You can argue that this is also a possibility with commercial software, which is true. But with commercial software, the owner of the infringed code will go after the creator of the software. Better yet, we too get to sue his pants off. In the case of open source, they are likely to sue not the creators or distributors of the software, but the people using it. That means us, and the legal eagles don't like that, oh no. Remember the old maxim "No one has ever been fired for buying IBM"... that goes doubly for OSS. OSS exposes you to lawsuits, and when the stuff does hit the fan, the buck stops with you.
Has this actually happened with an OSS package? Where it had a piece of misappropriated proprietary code, and the *users* were sued, and not the distributors?
Slashdot Mirror
I thought the interaction of objects in NetHack was very cool and well-developed, but nonetheless, I think it could be taken one step further. Basically, all of the interactions are a bunch of IF statements hard-coded into the game. You don't discover anything other than what a dev thought was cool,and coded in. It's very cool and elaborate at this point, but ultimately limited.
It would be theoretically possible to create a game where you can have true unexpected interactions of objects. You would create a set of simple properties, and then more complex interaction emerge from the interactions of simple properties. Like legos, you keep combining and combining, coming up with new and creative combination, suprising yourself with things no one could have predicted. It's like language or music; you can never exhaust the possibilities. They're endless. It's literally and endless set. It's called a discrete combinatorial system.
Sir, you are much too naive.
The plan was to create a giant database of *everyone*, including every bit of electronic data available about them. Think of it as a FaceBook that includes everyone in the nation, with all your medical records, financial records, credit card records, phone calls, and emails. It was called "Total Information Awareness", and the Latin Phrase on its logo was Scientia est Potentia -- "Knowledge is Power". Therefore, Total Information Awareness means absolute power.
The wikipedia article seems to indicate that the project was simply broken up into smaller pieces, not actually ended, after public outcry.
I had a spell of nethack addiction a few years back. One of it's great features is the interaction of all the various elements. Potions, monsters, items, etc.
But I got the feeling it was all coded as a bunch of IF statements. IF you got a pie in your face, and IF you wiped it with a towel, then it would unblind you. Very cool, and on a level much more complex than most other games. However, it was all still pre-planned. Any cool interaction of things in nethack you discovered as coded into the game by a dev. You were discovering someone else's cool tricks.
I thought it would be cool if a game could have true creative interaction of objects -- a sort of emergence of events, not just a list or pre-planned events. I think you would have to do it with a discrete combinatorial system, so that you have just a bunch of simple parts. Like legos, they dont do anything by themselves, but the way in which you combine them in new and creative ways leads to things no one could have predicted, much less plan and code into IF statements.
I was thinking the same thing about his mastery of visual symbolism. However, in what sense are ancient greek and roman buildings dense with symbolism? Are you talking about the sculpture on them?
I took a class on Sacred Architecture, and basically, the Greek buildings are loaded to the hilt with meanings. Well, it was all mathematical, though. You can thank the Greek philosophers for first originating the idea of the Matrix. The reality we see with the senses is a shadow of the real world, which is mathematics.
:)
For one, they liked to use the golden ratio wherever they could. Here's a page that has an image of the golden ratio in a Greek temple. Second, look closely at the columns. See who they taper on top? That was done on purpose, so that when you're up close, looking up at them, the appear to rise straight up, instead of bending slightly inwards over you, as Manhattan skyscrapers do. The Greeks understood perspective and corrected for it with an optical illusion.
There are a lot of other things, which I've forgotten from the class, but it's utterly fascinating. If you have a chance to do a little reading, you'll be greatly rewarded!
This coin being loaded with dense symbolism and being about architecture, I hope there's something masonic hidden on it somewhere. I assume the masons were active in The Netherlands?
Are they? Are they ever!
Why, just look at the way the guy is holding his hand in the photo at the bottom of this page! Can you believe it!? It's right out in front of everyone, there on this web page! I would think they would be more subtle about it.
Photo in question
Who wants to take bets on how paper votes align with exit polls, while the exit polls somehow turnout wrong where voting machines are used?
So in that sense, I think conservatives would support taxpayer funding for a "right to live" limited to food, clothing, very basic medical care, and shelter; provided that the person is doing their best to improve their own situation.
No, no they wouldn't. Just listen to any conversative talk show, any conservative think-tank representative, or any conservative guest on a liberal talk show. I've heard Rush say on his program "Where does the constitution guarantee a right to food? Where? Just tell me where?"
They think that the *only* thing that motivates able-bodied people to work is fear of starvation, homelessness, etc. If people had free food, water shelter, and medical care, they just wouldn't work, simple as that. There's no objective way to measure if someone is really unable to work ( do those migraines *really* hurt that badly? ), or just faking it, so we have to make sure that life has the proper system of rewards and punishments. Lazy people die in the ditch of disease and poverty, while hard-working people are rewarded with comfort and family in their old age.
It goes back to the Puritan work ethic. God metes out punishment and reward here on Earth; if you see a sickly person on the street, it's because their morally bad, a sinner. If you see a wealthy person in a big house, they are a good upstanding person. There is no 'chance' or 'bad luck' or 'accident of birth' in this belief system.
I think 1. the constitution places a limit on what the government can do to/with citizens, so this doesn't apply to what two private parties can get from each other in civil court, and 2. punishments are for crimes, and this is a civil matter.
I don't know if the smartcard can be traced back to the voter, but what I bet happens is that the smart card is re-used, which means it is erased with each new voter. It functions as a ballot. There's no way there giving a smart card to each voter.
As an American, I would like to have my electronic ballot on a smart card, which I then turn in to an election official, instead of just trusting that my vote is recorded on the machine... But perhaps it could easily be manipulated into being a simple placebo, me thinking that it has the security of a paper ballot, when really, it doesn't.
There *has* to be a better way to do this.
This is a question I've thought about. Now before I post this, let me just say that I work hard in the private sector and I hate the idea that people can get away with surfing the web for a living at work.
Modern technology allows us to work less and enjoy the same standard of living. As productivity increases, we will not need to work as much as our ancestors did.
How should society respond, if we really are in a situation where we don't need to work as much as we used to? Lower the hours in the work-week across the board? Create work by blowing up things and people in wars? Create extra hoops, such as advanced, yet irrelevant degrees, for basic jobs? Or have fluff jobs, where people make a good living, 75% of the people don't do much, and the other 25% get the job done?
I always wonder when I hear people talk about how hard they work and that they work just as hard as their ancestors. Isn't the point of technology and progress to work *less*?
I think you have him confused with the good Professor Neeson, you karma whore!
Thanks for the well-thought out reply. I have a few more questions; perhaps you can help me out with them.
What precipitated these NINJA ( No Job, No Asset ) loans?
I have a hard time putting this on the backs work working- and middle-class people who bought homes "they couldn't afford". If there's a foreclosure, and the loan officer and Joe Sixpack are staring at each other, saying, "we got both got each in trouble, we didn't know any better" I would blame the banker more. It's the banker's job to know good risks. He's been making loans for years. How many times does a person buy a home in their lifetime? 2 or 3, max? I expect more out of the banker than Joe Sixpack.
It's the job of banks and loan officers to sit around all day and decide who can't and can't pay off a 30-year-loan, and how much a house is worth. Joe Sixpack has a fulltime job and kids to take care of. Yes, he should know whether or not he can afford X amount a month, but if a loan officer is approved, why would Joe thinks he knows more than a loan officer? We don't expect a mortgage bank to act like a shady car dealership. So if he gets approved for a loan, that has to figure into his conception of whether he can afford it. "I'm not sure about this, but if the bank says I can afford it, they must know what they're talking about, since they have all those actuarial tables and mathematicians working on things."
So Joe Sixpack works for a company that doesn't have a retirement fund, he lost a bunch of money in the tech bubble burst and post 9/11. Social Security doesn't look good. His last job got shipped overseas, now he has less benefits. His wife works two jobs. He has kids who needs food, clothing, and college. He can't rely on things that his parents did -- retirement, stock market, social security, etc. What's the last, best thing he can do to prepare for his future? Well, buy a house of course. Why should he throw away money on rent, and have nothing to show for it after 30 years? Buying a house has always been seen as a mature, smart financial move. He's got nothing else as far as retirement, and now a loan officer is telling him he can buy a house. What would a financially prudent person do? Of course you buy that house. And since we were in a bubble, the only house he can buy is an overpriced one.
So, it seems to me that if banks never made NINJA loans, we wouldn't be in this mess this badly. We probably would be in a crappy market, but Lehman Brother's and other banks failing? Government bailouts? I blame the banks. It's their job to know this stuff. Collective Delusion? Joe Sixpack might not know better, but the bank sure had better know, and therefore not make risky loans.
FWIW, I talked several people out of buying homes since 2003. They thought there was no other safe place for their money. Others I talked to still bought houses. They thought I was some end-of-the-world conspiracy nut. Why should they believe the crazy blogs I referenced when a loan officer is ready to loan, and everyone knows a house is a good asset anyway?
Can you provide me some link, and also, if this goes back to Carter, how come it they weren't very popular until 2002/2003?
Hey, thanks for responding in a non-inflammatory manner.
So, when did it become possible to sell mortgage-backed securities, and why did it go into overdrive around 2002, 2003?
I've heard and seen plenty of source on the radio and web that lays the blame at Bush's feet. I've heard that deregulation started with Clinton, but later heard ( which corroborated my own memory ) that they basically outlawed redlining, which is simply the refusal to make loans in certain neighborhoods, regardless of income, assets, or credit history -- nothing that would have caused out situation today. What's your story, and can you provide me some links?
Oh get off of it. The reason for the economic meltdown has little to do with Freddie and Fannie. It was deregulation, spearheaded by the Bush administration, which allowed financial institutions to create "mortgage-backed securities". Instead of a bank making a 30-year mortgage to someone who was a good risk, and keeping the mortgage for the life of it, now institutions could buy and trade baskets of mortgages. They could buy and sell it at any time, and therefore had little incentive to see how well any individual could pay of their personal mortgage. As the appetite for mortgage backed securities increased, lenders loosened criteria to give subprime mortgages, eventually taking people with no incomes and no assets. This had little to do with Fannie and Freddie, and much more to do with deregulation. In their greed, lenders gave loans to people who could never pay, simply because they wanted to sell another bundle of loans. If banks held individual mortgages for the life of the loan, and therefore had good lending criteria, none of this would have happened.
Here's a great "This American Life" piece on it. Banks made loans to people with no money. Banks wouldn't "regulate" themselves, the Bush administration rolled back regulation. The small way that Freddie and Fannie are related to this is because investors foolishly thought that the US gov't would prop them up. That's the investor's mistake. That's the long and short of it.
If you accept what the Supreme Court said, then the 2nd amendment is basically about the inalienable right of the people to keep and bear arms.
It's also worth noting that the Constitution, the same document where we learn about the 2nd amendment, also says that the SCOTUS is the final arbiter on what the constitution means. I would think that if you are a 2nd amendment supporter, to be consistent, you must also accept what the SCOTUS rules.
And what you (and many others; you're in good company) keep overlooking is that A COUNTRY FACING ARMED INSURRECTION FROM ITS OWN PEOPLE CANNOT QUIT AND GO HOME.
Have you never heard of the phrase "government in exile" ?
Are you claiming that in a civil war, when the populace takes up arms, they are simply fighting their fellow citizens, instead of the government? If so, I think you are confusing "the country" with the "the government". Usually a civil war is when people take up arms against their government ( not "the country" meaning "the people" ), otherwise it's called ethnic warfare.
How was Ireland able to break away from Great Britain. Hasn't the British Empire shown throughout history the willingness not to pull punches when fighting their own subjects?
Just because New Yorkers were willing to fire on Alabamas 150 years ago doesn't mean that the army is going to fire on "rebelling" citizens in Manhattan.
People ultimately want peace and the ability to raise a family ( even a young 20 year old man comes to this decision, given the passing of time). The more you kill civilians, the less just you are perceived to be, and the more people see the need to fight you to keep from living the rest of their lives under injustice. If we started blowing up villages wholesale in Iraq and Afghanistan, the whole *world* would turn against us. Nobody likes terrorism. It's treated as a crime when weaklings do it; when powerful governments do it, people choose to stand up against tyranny.
And what you (and many others; you're in good company) keep overlooking is that A COUNTRY FACING ARMED INSURRECTION FROM ITS OWN PEOPLE CANNOT QUIT AND GO HOME.
You're right, they simply quit, and they're already home. A treaty is negotiated, and a new government is formed, and people try to rebuild their lives.
Sorry, I meant "civil society", not "civil city".
I think what he's claiming is that guns can help you fight off invading armies, but they don't safeguard democracy or civil city ( meaning Rule of Law ). It likely means that you'll be ruled by warlords, AKA Rule of Men. Whoever has the most guns and fanatical young men "wins", meaning they are in charge of everything.
A Jewish friend of mine once told me that some rabbi from some thousand years ago or more ruled that a baby is "born" when the head emerges from the woman's body. At that point it's a separate human being; before that, it's part of the mother.
I think a more modern version would be when the umbilical cord is cut. Before then, the baby depends completely on the mothers' bloodstream for oxygen and nutrients. It makes its living just like any other organ in her body. However, after the umbilical cord is cut, it has to breath and eat on its own*. It doesn't ingest nutrients and oxygen directly from the mother's blood anymore.
* Yes, the mother and other people help the baby eat. But the baby has to actually do the suckling and eating. It's doing its part at that point.
When a person's basic needs aren't being meet nothing else really matters.
Bullshit. Ever heard of a starving artist? Ever have a buddy who was a drug addict, couldn't really care for themselves, but was somehow managing to write amazing songs or create wondrous paintings? Renoir used to bring bread to Monet when they got together and painted. They made amazing paintings when they were starving.
In a depression, there's no money coming in. It doesn't matter how much blogging or coding you keep yourself from doing; that's not stopping the flow of money at your doorstep. In a depression, there's no paid work. It's as simple as that. You've got all the time in the world; you can spend months looking for work that isn't there, or you can actually do something that's constructive for society and feel rewarded doing it.
I predict the economic downturn will be a boon/m for open source, once people get over the psychological trauma of not having any money or work.
You can argue that this is also a possibility with commercial software, which is true. But with commercial software, the owner of the infringed code will go after the creator of the software. Better yet, we too get to sue his pants off. In the case of open source, they are likely to sue not the creators or distributors of the software, but the people using it. That means us, and the legal eagles don't like that, oh no. Remember the old maxim "No one has ever been fired for buying IBM"... that goes doubly for OSS. OSS exposes you to lawsuits, and when the stuff does hit the fan, the buck stops with you.
Has this actually happened with an OSS package? Where it had a piece of misappropriated proprietary code, and the *users* were sued, and not the distributors?