If things are as you say however, how come no one did anything about Abu Ghraib when it was actually happening?
I don't know. After reading the accounts, I didn't have a clear picture of where the mysterious instructions came from, or why the commanders didn't intervene.
How come Guantanamo persists? Why aren't these trained soldiers refusing these orders today?
Are you saying the guards should just refuse to guard? It doesn't work, though. Refusing orders can prevent the worst excesses and prevent individual acts of sadism. But even in the worst Nazi or Soviet concentration camps, what killed the most people was the combination of backbreaking work, inadequate food, lousy hygiene and no medical care. None of those things can be prevented by refusing orders.
And lets say there was a military coup or some other reason for platoons to be wandering around on American soil? How many platoons do you think it would take to cover America?
I'm not saying that armor would be used to patrol the entire country. I have no idea how martial law would be imposed. I was merely remarking on the fact that it's not easy to attack armor.
You know, those that get upset about free speech rights but think that guns should be outlawed.
But they only get upset about free speech when it's artistic or if they feel that someone is promoting Christianity. Most lefties are perfectly happy with campaign finance reform, speech codes in universities and other limits on political speech.
I mean, it was the left that invented "political correctness." Their support of the 1A is purely in support of a lifestyle. It has nothing to do with protecting individual political autonomy.
Firearms are a problem in major urban centers but not a big problem in rural states. Each state crafts its own rules.
There simply is no such thing as an urban or rural state, Washington DC being the exception that proves the rule. Every state has urban centers and rural areas so you'd have to push firearms laws down to the county level. This would result in an impossible patchwork of laws.
Also, from a moral perspective, such a law would ensure that those least able to move would be stuck in areas where they would be prohibited from defending themselves.
Hopefully, a large portion of them would either refuse or even defend the civilian population.
Yea, good luck with that.
Given that the combat arms branches (in which I'm serving) of the US military is equal parts Southerners who are convinced that the Civil War ended wrong and small-government conservatives, the Pentagon would have to make do with the least combat-capable branches. They'd pretty much be stuck trying to impose martial law and control insurrection with MPs.
What is the likelihood of a significant portion of the military defecting after watching their friend get his head blown off by their commander, with the gun is now pointed directly at them?
If I did get stuck working for that one commander, I can guarantee you that every NCO, warrant officer and commissioned officer I've ever served with would have zip-cuffed him long before it got to that point. I may only have 3 years service, but it's long enough to have gotten to know quite a few leaders.
Oh, and, yes, we are instructed to disobey illegal and immoral orders, repeatedly. My squad leader mentioned it *again* last week when we were in the field doing machine gun live fires, when we were going over fire command drills. (His words, roughly: "if you get a sector of fire that has civilians, you request confirmation. If you are ordered, you must say negative and refuse to comply.") And I was in basic when Abu Ghraib happened; the troop commander stopped training for the afternoon to talk about it in an open forum.
Best case, they defect with what they happen to have on them now, and become "enemy combatants". Great! We got a dozen guys and a handful of pea shooters and grenades. Too bad there's a "daisy cutter" on its way to whatever building you rebels are holed up in.
I'm in an "OPFOR" unit, meaning that we portray an opposing force in wargames type training exercises. We go against BLUFOR using small arms, mortars and RPGs vs 5 times as many troops, tracks and aircraft. And BLUFOR does destroy buildings we're hiding in. We typically kill 10 of them for each one of us. So, yes, a group of determined turncoats can wreak havoc on a standing army.
About the only man-portable weapon that can take out a main battle tank is an anti-tank missile like the Javelin. Sustained small-arms fire can be debilitating by damaging optics and disorienting the crew but it won't destroy or even disable an MBT.
And all of this ignores the fact that MBTs move in platoons with dismount, indirect and air support. It's not like in the movies where one tank is wandering around for no particular reason, so if you even if you score a kill in one hit his wingman will get you or call in artillery on you.
I'm kind of surprised the grandparent didn't mention Windows. Anyone remember Windows 1?
Xbox: Anytime a company is willing to take billions in losses to get marketshare, the product should be able to place better than 2nd place to the PS2.
But how is it doing compared to the PS3?
IIS: Even though it is bundled with Windows Server, it still is second place to Apache.
IIS wasn't a good comparison. It's server software, we're talking about iPods and consumer stuff.
IE: Ahem, didn't they get sued by leveraging their monopoly on this one?
Nevertheless, the Netscape we knew is gone and IE is still with us.
I'm not all that great on the history of dead and buried software companies, but MS has outlasted quite a few of them. Fire up Word or Excel and see all the importers for apps no one uses any more.
The real pattern isn't that MS pulls dirty tricks or makes a truly brilliant product, rather, the other company gets lazy or screws up and MS doesn't. (Obviously there are exceptions, like the shenanigans with DR-DOS, and Word 5 really was a good word processor.)
I don't know if I'm making this any clearer - I'm just uncomfortable with society appropriating my property when "it" feels I've had it long enough. Take it when I'm dead if you want, but as long as I'm alive, it should be mine.
If you don't want to have to give it up, don't publish it. Copyright grants you a freedom, the freedom to publish your work without being copied. Once you've enjoyed that freedom, it's gone.
The whole point of having a freedom is that it's expendable. I have a right to speak my mind. But if I go and tell everyone I'm a Republican, I've just expended my freedom to tell everyone I'm a Democrat. (Assuming credibility is important.)
On the bright side, while the freedom to copyright your creative works is expendable, you're really only limited by your imagination.
start off with the idea that a planet must be orbiting a star
So if you knock it out of orbit (somehow...) it changes into "not a planet"?
A sibling post raised a similar point, so we're both arguing that where it happens to be shouldn't affect the definition. It defies our (well, my at least) intuitive understanding of the word to determine a body's identity by where it happens to be.
But you're on the right track, I think. What if we determined it based on something more essential, like how it was formed? So if a body formed during the star's early formation and absorbed some significant portion of proto-stellar (if that's a word) material, *then* it's a planet.
In essence, we'd call it a planet because it grew up a planet.
After that just define the mass need to be called a planet and be done with it.
Mass is one thing, but planets are so huge that the number doesn't mean much to most people. I'd probably draw the line at "does it have weather?" (And I'd have no problem calling Jupiter's moons planets.)
We need a more general form for posts like that, something like:
Your post presents
(x) vague reformist sentiment for ( ) a hyperbolic reaction to ( ) smug moralizing about ( ) snide cynicism towards
a problem with society. However, you present no actual details as to how things could be better because
(x) you're unable to form a coherent idea. ( ) you're too busy furiously masturbating to your own brilliance. ( ) the little people will work out the hard parts.
We as, a society, would be better off if you
( ) were beaten thoroughly with a cluebat. ( ) stopped stealing our oxygen. (x) got outside a little, and played in traffic.
Look at someone just learning a computer. They're *terrified.* I mean, if you've ever learned how to shoot and watched people learn how to shoot it makes sense that someone would be scared of a gun. But I think people are just as scared learning how to use computers.
But as strong as the fear may be, people have a social and financial need to become computer literate.
When a GUI app like Word delivers instantaneous feedback, showing you exactly what will appear on paper as you type, you get a sense of control that you simply don't get with a CLI or with logical systems. You would have to learn to trust yourself to be able to organize your actions in such a way that you could perform a task without instantaneous feedback.
And even if you did, you're already computer literate so you're not opening up any new social or financial opportunities.
I've found a way of stemming inane computer questions: If a person says something about USB or XML, you shift the discussion towards LISP and that kills it pretty quickly.
I can understand IM speak if you never learned to type, but if you're IMing people all day, how is it you don't learn to type from that?
And T9's been out a while. With it, there's no advantage with the most common abbreviations like "u" or "4." So unless kids are using really old phones or can't figure out T9, why do they do it?
So... do you know, for certain, that everyone you know, or have exchanged files with or phone messages or mail or time with, is *not* or *will not in the future* be considered a criminal or a terrorist?
Umm... you investigate them? And if you find likely evidence, you arrest and try them.
No, it doesn't always work and, yes, I'd hate it if it happened to me.
But I have to balance that against how much I dislike getting blown up by terrorists. So far, have the police done anything unreasonable?
I think the most terrifying aspect of this whole thing is that she was arrested not because of anything she did, but rather because of her association with others the government doesn't like.
By "doesn't like" you mean "are suspected of plotting to kill and maim innocent people."
So, let's see. First, we had computers that were on all the time.
So our first investment was to have them go to standby automatically. And we got huge savings from that.
Now, *maybe* we can eke out some more savings. But it's a hard technical problem because, quite simply, standby is both cost effective and highly convenient.
The next investment shouldn't be in better power supplies for desktops. Rather, operating systems and applications should be designed so that if you pull the plug and then power on again, the system is right where you left it. Any solution short of that is not good enough.
The best compromise we probably have is "hibernate," but I find that pretty slow on all the machines I've used. People aren't patient, and they have good reasons not to be so if you're taking this seriously as an engineering problem and not as an ideological issue, you have to take that into account.
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If things are as you say however, how come no one did anything about Abu Ghraib when it was actually happening?
I don't know. After reading the accounts, I didn't have a clear picture of where the mysterious instructions came from, or why the commanders didn't intervene.
How come Guantanamo persists? Why aren't these trained soldiers refusing these orders today?
Are you saying the guards should just refuse to guard? It doesn't work, though. Refusing orders can prevent the worst excesses and prevent individual acts of sadism. But even in the worst Nazi or Soviet concentration camps, what killed the most people was the combination of backbreaking work, inadequate food, lousy hygiene and no medical care. None of those things can be prevented by refusing orders.
Everyone, pool your mod points and give 'em to this guy.
It just takes 3 people to mod someone up to 5... If you think about it, that's why there are so many lame 5 point posts.
And lets say there was a military coup or some other reason for platoons to be wandering around on American soil? How many platoons do you think it would take to cover America?
I'm not saying that armor would be used to patrol the entire country. I have no idea how martial law would be imposed. I was merely remarking on the fact that it's not easy to attack armor.
You know, those that get upset about free speech rights but think that guns should be outlawed.
But they only get upset about free speech when it's artistic or if they feel that someone is promoting Christianity. Most lefties are perfectly happy with campaign finance reform, speech codes in universities and other limits on political speech.
I mean, it was the left that invented "political correctness." Their support of the 1A is purely in support of a lifestyle. It has nothing to do with protecting individual political autonomy.
Firearms are a problem in major urban centers but not a big problem in rural states. Each state crafts its own rules.
There simply is no such thing as an urban or rural state, Washington DC being the exception that proves the rule. Every state has urban centers and rural areas so you'd have to push firearms laws down to the county level. This would result in an impossible patchwork of laws.
Also, from a moral perspective, such a law would ensure that those least able to move would be stuck in areas where they would be prohibited from defending themselves.
Hopefully, a large portion of them would either refuse or even defend the civilian population.
Yea, good luck with that.
Given that the combat arms branches (in which I'm serving) of the US military is equal parts Southerners who are convinced that the Civil War ended wrong and small-government conservatives, the Pentagon would have to make do with the least combat-capable branches. They'd pretty much be stuck trying to impose martial law and control insurrection with MPs.
What is the likelihood of a significant portion of the military defecting after watching their friend get his head blown off by their commander, with the gun is now pointed directly at them?
If I did get stuck working for that one commander, I can guarantee you that every NCO, warrant officer and commissioned officer I've ever served with would have zip-cuffed him long before it got to that point. I may only have 3 years service, but it's long enough to have gotten to know quite a few leaders.
Oh, and, yes, we are instructed to disobey illegal and immoral orders, repeatedly. My squad leader mentioned it *again* last week when we were in the field doing machine gun live fires, when we were going over fire command drills. (His words, roughly: "if you get a sector of fire that has civilians, you request confirmation. If you are ordered, you must say negative and refuse to comply.") And I was in basic when Abu Ghraib happened; the troop commander stopped training for the afternoon to talk about it in an open forum.
Best case, they defect with what they happen to have on them now, and become "enemy combatants". Great! We got a dozen guys and a handful of pea shooters and grenades. Too bad there's a "daisy cutter" on its way to whatever building you rebels are holed up in.
I'm in an "OPFOR" unit, meaning that we portray an opposing force in wargames type training exercises. We go against BLUFOR using small arms, mortars and RPGs vs 5 times as many troops, tracks and aircraft. And BLUFOR does destroy buildings we're hiding in. We typically kill 10 of them for each one of us. So, yes, a group of determined turncoats can wreak havoc on a standing army.
Infantry can take out tanks with a rifle.
About the only man-portable weapon that can take out a main battle tank is an anti-tank missile like the Javelin. Sustained small-arms fire can be debilitating by damaging optics and disorienting the crew but it won't destroy or even disable an MBT.
And all of this ignores the fact that MBTs move in platoons with dismount, indirect and air support. It's not like in the movies where one tank is wandering around for no particular reason, so if you even if you score a kill in one hit his wingman will get you or call in artillery on you.
Are you saying that it's really religion, specifically Christianity , wrapped in deceptive packaging?
I'm pretty sure that if you ask an imam you'll find that Christians aren't the only creationists. And that hair gel is permissible.
The only thing I haven't figured out is the whole bathroom thing.
I'm sure a good plumber could work it for you. You'll probably have to forgo pants.
I'm kind of surprised the grandparent didn't mention Windows. Anyone remember Windows 1?
Xbox: Anytime a company is willing to take billions in losses to get marketshare, the product should be able to place better than 2nd place to the PS2.
But how is it doing compared to the PS3?
IIS: Even though it is bundled with Windows Server, it still is second place to Apache.
IIS wasn't a good comparison. It's server software, we're talking about iPods and consumer stuff.
IE: Ahem, didn't they get sued by leveraging their monopoly on this one?
Nevertheless, the Netscape we knew is gone and IE is still with us.
I'm not all that great on the history of dead and buried software companies, but MS has outlasted quite a few of them. Fire up Word or Excel and see all the importers for apps no one uses any more.
The real pattern isn't that MS pulls dirty tricks or makes a truly brilliant product, rather, the other company gets lazy or screws up and MS doesn't. (Obviously there are exceptions, like the shenanigans with DR-DOS, and Word 5 really was a good word processor.)
I don't know if I'm making this any clearer - I'm just uncomfortable with society appropriating my property when "it" feels I've had it long enough. Take it when I'm dead if you want, but as long as I'm alive, it should be mine.
If you don't want to have to give it up, don't publish it. Copyright grants you a freedom, the freedom to publish your work without being copied. Once you've enjoyed that freedom, it's gone.
The whole point of having a freedom is that it's expendable. I have a right to speak my mind. But if I go and tell everyone I'm a Republican, I've just expended my freedom to tell everyone I'm a Democrat. (Assuming credibility is important.)
On the bright side, while the freedom to copyright your creative works is expendable, you're really only limited by your imagination.
No one I know is buying a PS3 -- everyone wants a Wii and has or wants an Xbox 360.
You missed the stories about people trampling each other to get PS3s?
If you would disregard all the evidence, you might as well believe the world was created 5 minutes ago by a spaghetti monster.
If it wasn't, then why am I still covered in fresh sauce?
(It's quite delicious!)
start off with the idea that a planet must be orbiting a star
So if you knock it out of orbit (somehow...) it changes into "not a planet"?
A sibling post raised a similar point, so we're both arguing that where it happens to be shouldn't affect the definition. It defies our (well, my at least) intuitive understanding of the word to determine a body's identity by where it happens to be.
But you're on the right track, I think. What if we determined it based on something more essential, like how it was formed? So if a body formed during the star's early formation and absorbed some significant portion of proto-stellar (if that's a word) material, *then* it's a planet.
In essence, we'd call it a planet because it grew up a planet.
After that just define the mass need to be called a planet and be done with it.
Mass is one thing, but planets are so huge that the number doesn't mean much to most people. I'd probably draw the line at "does it have weather?" (And I'd have no problem calling Jupiter's moons planets.)
If you use adblock, he still pays for bandwidth for the videos and gets no ad revenue.
"Those who do not understand UNIX are condemned to reinvent it, poorly." -Henry Spencer
And those who understand Unix wrote the Unix Hater's Handbook...
We need a more general form for posts like that, something like:
Your post presents
(x) vague reformist sentiment for
( ) a hyperbolic reaction to
( ) smug moralizing about
( ) snide cynicism towards
a problem with society. However, you present no actual details as to how things could be better because
(x) you're unable to form a coherent idea.
( ) you're too busy furiously masturbating to your own brilliance.
( ) the little people will work out the hard parts.
We as, a society, would be better off if you
( ) were beaten thoroughly with a cluebat.
( ) stopped stealing our oxygen.
(x) got outside a little, and played in traffic.
We're too visual
I'm not so sure that's the case.
Look at someone just learning a computer. They're *terrified.* I mean, if you've ever learned how to shoot and watched people learn how to shoot it makes sense that someone would be scared of a gun. But I think people are just as scared learning how to use computers.
But as strong as the fear may be, people have a social and financial need to become computer literate.
When a GUI app like Word delivers instantaneous feedback, showing you exactly what will appear on paper as you type, you get a sense of control that you simply don't get with a CLI or with logical systems. You would have to learn to trust yourself to be able to organize your actions in such a way that you could perform a task without instantaneous feedback.
And even if you did, you're already computer literate so you're not opening up any new social or financial opportunities.
I've found a way of stemming inane computer questions: If a person says something about USB or XML, you shift the discussion towards LISP and that kills it pretty quickly.
My personal longstanding theory is that the total global I.Q. is a constant. It's just split up among an exponentially growing population.
If your longstanding theory is any evidence of your cognitive abilities, you're one of the stupid ones.
It sounds like elevator music.
I can understand IM speak if you never learned to type, but if you're IMing people all day, how is it you don't learn to type from that?
And T9's been out a while. With it, there's no advantage with the most common abbreviations like "u" or "4." So unless kids are using really old phones or can't figure out T9, why do they do it?
So... do you know, for certain, that everyone you know, or have exchanged files with or phone messages or mail or time with, is *not* or *will not in the future* be considered a criminal or a terrorist?
Umm... you investigate them? And if you find likely evidence, you arrest and try them.
No, it doesn't always work and, yes, I'd hate it if it happened to me.
But I have to balance that against how much I dislike getting blown up by terrorists. So far, have the police done anything unreasonable?
Oh, wait, why am I bothering to ask an idiot?
I think the most terrifying aspect of this whole thing is that she was arrested not because of anything she did, but rather because of her association with others the government doesn't like.
By "doesn't like" you mean "are suspected of plotting to kill and maim innocent people."
Look it up.
So, let's see. First, we had computers that were on all the time.
So our first investment was to have them go to standby automatically. And we got huge savings from that.
Now, *maybe* we can eke out some more savings. But it's a hard technical problem because, quite simply, standby is both cost effective and highly convenient.
The next investment shouldn't be in better power supplies for desktops. Rather, operating systems and applications should be designed so that if you pull the plug and then power on again, the system is right where you left it. Any solution short of that is not good enough.
The best compromise we probably have is "hibernate," but I find that pretty slow on all the machines I've used. People aren't patient, and they have good reasons not to be so if you're taking this seriously as an engineering problem and not as an ideological issue, you have to take that into account.