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User: protolith

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Comments · 153

  1. Re:Oh great, here comes the scapegoat.. on Beating the College Bubble · · Score: 2, Insightful

    a bigoted turn of phrase is at its most derogatory when the people using it accept it as just part of the vernacular and don't question it at all because that means their society has so completely accepted the bigotry to the point where they don't even notice it as being abnormal.

    I think the exact opposite is true. A phrase is at its least derogatory when it is so ubiquitous that even those that were once being degraded are no longer aware they should be offended.
    That is the point when the word or phrase has reached cultural neutrality.

    A word is at its most derogatory when it is used with full malice and prejudice.

    It is an unfortunate circumstance when ignorance of the original meaning of a word or phrase allows its use to become commonplace in an alternative vernacular.

  2. Re:Duh. on Press Favored Obama Throughout Campaign · · Score: 1

    You have it wrong yourself.
    If you plot the political spectrum on a Cartesian plane with conservatism toward the right end of the x axis and liberalism toward the left end, the y-axis would have libertarianism toward the top and authoritarianism toward the bottom.

    Extreme libertarianism is called anarchism
    Extreme left leaning authoritarianism is called communism
    Extreme left leaning authoritarianism is called fascism
    Socialism is left leaning and toward libertarianism
    The Nazis while called the national socialist party are generally considered to be fascists or conservative authoritarians.
    Ultraconservatives tend to be more fascist than anything else.

  3. Re:Hmm on Where Has All My Spam Gone? · · Score: 4, Funny

    is also getting far less spam now for a couple weeks

    I think that's about to change.

  4. Re:pedantry on Your Computer and Cell Phone Are Lying To You · · Score: 1

    Set slashdot to only show posts rated :

    Hilarious
    Funny
    Meh
    Stuffy
    "Get off My Lawn!"

  5. Re:MOD THIS UP! on A DIYer's Quick Guide To Cheap Wireless Extension · · Score: 1

    "you may be able to trawl through logs and find the MAC associated with the illegal download and hunt down the right person"

    Or trawl through logs to show that the MAC associated with the illegal download does not belong to any user in the household.

    If a murder suspect leaves footprints to your doorstep, it might make you look like a suspect, if upon inspection there is no match to shoe size or brand of shoe in your home, then you are ruled out as a suspect.

  6. Re:men and women have different interests on The Push For Quotas For Women In Science · · Score: 4, Interesting

    How about

    "men and women hold different interests because there is gender-based social conditioning."

    So what, it's true, The issue here is that gender based enrolment quotas aren't the answer.

    Ever hear "Ladies drink free" or "No cover charge for ladies" or "every night is ladies night" these are all ploys to keep meat market clubs from turning into sausage fests. And the sciences are generally a sausage fest. I've never heard of a bouncer saying "Dude you can't go in there, there aren't enough women, you will gave to wait until more show up."

    Want more women in the hard sciences, look to the night clubs for your answer. "ladies get math tuition free" Try that a few semesters, and you will see it will still be a sausage fest, but you might get a few women interested enough to stick with it.

    Not fair you might say, well at least an incentive program hasn't told any paying customers that too many cocks already applied.

  7. Re:Use? on Dell Colludes With RIAA, Disables Stereo Mix · · Score: 2, Insightful

    "So if Ford Crown Victorias explode when hit in the rear, it's OK for Chevy to make exploding cars? Your logic is quite faulty there."

    I think the point flew past you faster than an exploding Ford... I read that statement as Dell is not the only one pulling this shit, its a bigger problem than just with Dell.

    Or to recycle your car analogy, If Ford makes exploding cars and Chevy also makes exploding cars, it's not used as justification, but as a statement that Automakers make exploding cars.

    It illustrated the extent of an issue.

  8. Re:It flew under the radar on Best Buy Is Selling Ubuntu · · Score: 1

    Your friend has a pet monkey that runs on Ubuntu?

    I know the "yea, but does it run Linux?" joke is tired but an Ubuntu Monkey - pretty cool.

  9. LOL on ICANN to Add Anti Front Running Charge? · · Score: 5, Funny

    ICANN has domane tastin fee?

  10. Re:Not a thief on Confessions of a Wi-Fi Thief · · Score: 1

    Interesting analogy but that's not really the same.

    A closer analogy would involve fruit growing on a tree. If you defeat a locked gate and enter past a no trespassing sign to pick a piece of fruit from a tree in the garden, that's B&E and theft of property, even if the fruit was not going to be used by the owner.

    Most unauthorized use of Wifi is more like picking a piece of fruit from the branches of a tree hanging over the property line, like over a public sidewalk. Unless a security measure has been emplaced (like a big net) to prevent me access to the fruit, I really don't see how its stealing something that is being allowed by its owner into public.

  11. Re:Culture --weird on Geohashing Meets an Angry Rancher With Firearms · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "I dunno why people always think a fear of firearms is irrational"

    Because it is irrational to fear guns. If your fear is based on ignorance then it is a rational fear, and can be corrected.
    Your post attempts to rationalize your fear with the injection of a form of understanding. If you Fear an inanimate object simply based on its designed or perceived designed purpose then it is an irrational fear.

    Hoplophobia along with Agoraphobia, Arachnophobia, and any of the other host of phobias are all defined as irrational fears.

    If in fact your fear is based to a degree on ignorance (unfamiliarity with the workings of firearms), I suggest you spend some time taking lessons at a local shooting range.

    As for the guns are designed to kill thing.... Well yes, most guns are deigned to, or are based off of guns designed to kill. But the truth about that is, some things need killing. Animals don't sacrifice themselves to be food on a table. If its made of meat it was killed to be put on your plate. If its made of red meat, then it was killed with a gun (firearm or captive bolt) to become food. As for killing people, "couple that with the general fact that people are idiots" you summed up why some people need killing, because some idiots will take your life for their personal or political gain.

  12. Re:Simple solution? on Hard Evidence of Voting Machine Addition Errors · · Score: 1

    Some good ideas presented, one problem with printing barcodes, The machine could be hacked to print the wrong barcode next to some of the votes cast. "It looked like the right vote when the machine ran the tape by"

    It's easy to make printers print in machine readable characters and use an open OCR platform to count the printed votes for comparison to the electronically cast votes.

    Otherwise, if you can make a machine switch votes electronicaly, it can be made to print the corresponding bar code to make the resultant numbers match and the fraud would be invisible.

  13. Re:Way to go to make me feel like a goldfish on GPS Used To Find Graves In Eco-Burial Sites · · Score: 1

    Better a cardboard box than a giant toilet.

    "gather the bereaved around to say good by"... Flush

  14. Re:You must be a cdesign proponentsist on Ben Stein's 'Expelled' - Evolution, Academia and Conformity · · Score: 1

    I will take your ID vs Evolution Pepsi challenge any day, The book you cite turns the Pepsi challenge into a comparison between an icy cold Pepsi and a warm cup of piss.

    "He intentionally only uses studies by evolutionists so that he cannot be accused of cooking up the results"

    In other words, "we fed Coca cola to a dog and this warm cup of piss came out came out, it's made of the same stuff, see it came from Coke, how can you not compare the two?"

  15. Re:You must be a cdesign proponentsist on Ben Stein's 'Expelled' - Evolution, Academia and Conformity · · Score: 1

    ID is not a scientific theory.

    In scientific terms ID is at best and idea, a weak hypothesis, almost a model, but not a scientific theory.

    you presented an idea:
    ""natural selection" and deviations were guided by the hand of God"
    If you can present a scientific test of this hypothesis you presented, then you can begin to justify the mention of ID long with evolution as a competing scientific idea.

    Otherwise you are just doing the equivalent of saying "some people believe the earth is flat, and that's a theory, so they should be represented in geology books to rectify their beliefs with common scientific knowledge".

  16. "Latest and Greatest" GIS Community Influence on Google Earth 4.3 Offers a Number of New Features · · Score: 1

    The decrease in resolution is the failure of a common GIS mentality - The term "Latest and Greatest" is used to the point of being a beaten dead horse cliche. The failure of this mentality is that it assumes that the newest version of data is Always the best version to use.

  17. Re:A real danger on FBI Lied To Support Need For PATRIOT Act Expansion · · Score: 1

    Straw man, Perhaps, not passionately caring about the work being done, Fine with me...

    Doing the work w/o caring, just to get reelected = whore.

    Doing the work because you know it needs to be done whether or not you passionately care about it = being grown up. There is a difference.

  18. Re:A real danger on FBI Lied To Support Need For PATRIOT Act Expansion · · Score: 1

    If good work is being done to fix an issue I don't care if the person who got the ball rolling did not personally care about it.
    So in other words, if your mother was a whore, you wouldn't care as long as there was food on the table and your clothes were clean?
  19. Brilliant, Randomness!! on Software to Randomize Police Operations at LAX · · Score: 5, Funny

    Are they going to have truly random responses?

    Thursday, Red panties are prohibited from carry on Luggage.
    Friday, the X-ray conveyor machine will distribute Salisbury steak.

    Periodically travelers will be pulled from the security line,
    some will be sent directly to their planes, some will be beaten with sticks.

    Saturday, the first 100 customers get a hand grenade!
    Sunday, 100 random travelers will be conscripted to run security for the rest of the day.

  20. Re:Now I'm completly lost on The Milky Way's Black Hole Is Not So Quiescent · · Score: 5, Funny

    The term black is offensive to some, We say African American Holes

  21. Re:Red Shift on Cities Tampering With Traffic Lights To Generate Revenue · · Score: 2, Informative

    I was using "Red Shift" as more of the generic and popular term to refer to the doppler effect on light.

    Blue shift (while more correct) sounds like something involving the police, and attempting to drive my car at speeds approaching C on public roads.

  22. Red Shift on Cities Tampering With Traffic Lights To Generate Revenue · · Score: 2, Funny

    Then I will have to travel fast enough that the red shift causes the reflection of the yellow light off my windshield to appear green.

    Should screw up the radar too.

  23. Bastards on Cities Tampering With Traffic Lights To Generate Revenue · · Score: 5, Funny

    I guess I will have to drive faster to make those yellow lights, You know, lights timed for 35 mph are also timed for 70 mph.

  24. Easy to Block on GPS Trackers Find Novel Applications · · Score: 1

    Just put yer tin foil hat on it.

  25. Re:Le Sigh... on The DIY Tank · · Score: 1

    Not a suprise such a pusilanimous view came from an "Anonymous Coward".

    You should pay homage to the great weapons of war as the engineering marvels they are. Most of civilizations advancements came from developments associated with war. Don't try to deny that a fundamental of human nature is the ingrained desire to fuck up someone elses shit.

    Instead of trying to pretend humans aren't advanced apes with a history of violence, remember that if you are standing with your head in the clouds thinking about "researching sustainable, peaceful communities", your feet are still on the backs of people that were beaten down.