The only reason for this is that the US citizenry has become so arrogant and self-centered that they fully expect to be able to wage war with few or no American casualties, and they are unwilling to engage in war in which many Americans will die (though they have no problem mass-murdering other people, as long as they talk funny).
I have to say, I'm shocked that this sort of blatant flamebait can get an insightful rating from you guys. What has happened to the libertine/. of old, that we can give credence to this sort of immature crap?
Protesters, regardless of what you think of their opinions or rhetoric, are trying to get as much attention as they can for their message. This means doing some disruptive things. Threatening to run them over with your car for that seems pretty low to me.
Actually, civil disobedience refers to the act of deliberately breaking the law in order to express your opinions. The idea is to overload the "justice" system with traffic, a sort of DOS attack of the court system, and of course also to attract media attention.
In order to commit acts of civil disobedience, you have to break the law. The word "civil" in this context doesn't necessarily mean "polite".
To quote George Carlin, "What exactly is a 'civil war' anyway? 'Excuse me, RATATATATATATATATAT! Oh, I'm terribly sorry, did that hurt?'"
Actually, I know several people with really nasty staph, at least one of which has been on antibiotics for more than a year, so it's pretty safe to say that it's resistant. Not to say this shouldn't make this company a lot of money, I think they deserve it if they can make this work. This is a HUGE relief, let me tell you, if you've ever had a severe dermonecrotic staph infection, it's incredibly nasty.
I happen to have one now, and I just spent three hours this morning gouging out my wounds with a razor blade. I think the standard antibiotics are going to work for me, thank God, but if they don't, it's sure nice to know that something better is in the works. Staph is a nightmare.
Depends on how you interpret the second law. In the macroscopic, statistical sense, sorry, but you will never live long enough to see the second law violated, although the laws of probability dictate that it will probably happen some time.
This simply points out the statistical nature of Thermodynamics. Small systems can be expected to violate the laws of Thermo sometimes because they are small, and the laws of Thermo assume that you are dealing with a system with a large number of components. Rigorous derivations of the laws use the Law of Large Numbers, which of course only applies to large numbers for some strange reason.
It's still pretty cool, because dispite the theoretical possiblility of observing violations on the small scale, it's never actually been seen before.
You can't use this to build a perpetual motion machine, because the effects are only of limited duration. It's kind of like in particle physics, where you can violate conservation of energy if you do it fast enough that the rest of the Universe doesn't catch you at it.
4.) Physicists Create a New State of Matter - Sorry, call me short sighted, but I just don't see how this is useful
Actually, that's what everybody said back in '95 when BEC was first achieved. The new discovery is that it can be teased into yet another state, which is even cooler (though not colder). This new patterned state might be used to make quantum computers, in which case it will be very useful.
I lifted this meme from this OP-ED piece by Ted Rall. I don't know where he got it, but it presumably was originally taken from the Artist Formerly Known As the Artist Formerly Known As Prince (no typo;-)).
I like it a lot, because of the reasons you stated and also because God is a terrible word, has all sorts of silly connotations. It's masculine for one thing. Its a name, for another, and any name is a definition, and the Entity is beyond definition, even Entity doesn't work, nor does Tao or any other word. "The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao." -- Lao Tzu
As an AC in a thread above pointed out, It called Itself "I am" (Jehovah) when asked for a name, and I think that's a great name, especially since it points out the whole problem with asking It for a name in the first place.
The Witch Doctor and the Anthropologist
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Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
There is a story I've heard told, though I don't know if it's true or merely a parable. It doesn't matter, because it's mythically true, even if it's not historically accurate. It goes something like this:
There once was an anthropologist who was studying a remote tribe in Africa somewhere. One day, some guy was sitting on the ground in the shade of a grain silo, a building bulit up on stilts to hold grain. The building collapsed, fell on him, and killed him.
The people called in the local witch doctor to figure out why this happened, and the anthropologist came along to see what would ensue. The witch doctor examined the scene and immediately declared that the man had been cursed by a witch, and this was the cause of his terrible misfortune.
The anthropologist looked at the stilts of the building and saw that they clearly had been eaten away by termites. He said to the witch doctor, "That's nonsense. The building collapsed because of termites, a witch had nothing to do with it."
The witch doctor replied, "Ah, yes, that explains why the building collapsed all right. But what it doesn't explain is, why did it collapse on him?"
Coincidence is the myth of the scientific age.
Re:More than two brands of ethics...
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Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
Beileve me, I used to say exactly this sort of thing. And you're right. You have no reason to believe in God.
I believe in the Entity Formerly Known as God because I have directly experienced Its impact on my life and directly felt Its presence in my heart. I have witnessed bona-fide miracles. I'm a very rational person and a hardcore skeptic, so it's not easy to convince me that something is a miracle, but when I see it whith my own eyes and there is no other explanation, I have to accept the evidence of my own experience.
I don't expect you to share this view, however. You weren't there. I have no direct experience of your Dragon, so I can't say one way or the other.
Hang on to your skepticism, it's a credit to your intelligence. But keep your eyes and your mind open. When the Entity reveals Itself to you, you will see what I mean.
Re:More than two brands of ethics...
on
Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
This is where the important (though arbitrary) distinction I was trying to make in another thread between the religion and the religious institution comes into play.
A religious institution has to compete in the marketplace against other religious institutions, and so they have to have a unique selling proposition, i.e. our religion is the only right one and all the rest of you dirty sinners are going to Hell.
I think therefore you do have to filter religious morality. You have to separate out the actual core of the religion (in the case of Christianity, the teachings of Jesus) from all the crap that's been piled on top of it over the centuries in order to make the religion sell better. If you look at the teachings of Jesus, you won't find a single thing that doesn't sound exactly right, and you know that in your heart. That's (one reason) why I'm a Christian.
But I certainly don't believe all the silly crap that has been said by so-called Christians in the time since Jesus' death.
You definitely have to filter religious teachings. However, use your heart not your head, you get better results.
Re:More than two brands of ethics...
on
Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
Thanks Jimmy... too bad you're not moderating...;-)
Actually I should clarify my position a bit more. I think the Entity Formerly Known as God is beyond logic. Logic is a human invention. Recent evidence suggests that the law of non-contradiction (the basis of logic) doesn't apply in the real world. Perhaps the Entity is Meta-logical, in the sense that It makes more sense than logic itself. But I meant logic in the positive sense, meaning something that is reasonable and sound and all that.
Not sure I'm saying this right... whatever... what I mean is, the Entity is cool, people sometimes screw up but shouldn't be judged for that, and religion and reason are not so opposed as this guy seems to be saying.
Oops, I forgot to explain how I think this applies to the current situation with Google. So here's my two cents:
From what I can understand of the way Google has been acting lately, it seems that they are acting on a maxim like this: "if you don't like someone's content or the content of the sites they link to, you should do everything you can to reduce their online presence."
Does Google want to be held to this maxim? Hell no!
The article talks about how Google was hit with a "PR0 penalty" by China because China disagreed with the content of the sites Google links to. Google didn't like this one bit, and moved quickly to correct the situation. So I think that, at least by the standards of Jesus and Kant, Google isn't doing that great of a job of being moral. They are employing a double standard, one they themselves don't want to be held to.
So how about this for a maxim instead: "you should act in such a way as to help the user find what they are looking for, regardless of whether you happen to disagree with it." I think Google could live with that standard being applied to them, and I think the internet would be a better place if all search engines were held to it, so I think it stands up to Kant's test.
More than two brands of ethics...
on
Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
The "logical morality" you describe here is referred to in philosophy as "utilitarianism", basically, morality is what's good for society. There are other kinds of logical morality. Indeed, I don't think utilitarianism stands up to close logical scrutiny, since it puts the good of the society above the good of the individual and can lead to obviously immoral acts by a well-meaning majority. But there are other alternatives.
For instance, Aristotle based a logically consistant ethics on the idea of, basically, doing what an ideal "good person" would do. Has some problems defining the ideal, but is nonetheless based on logic.
My personal favorite is Kant, who says,
Act on that maxim which you can consistently will become universal law.
Now, Kant is nothing if not logical, one of the most rigorous philosophers ever. However, note the similarity of the above statement to Jesus' golden rule, "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Kant just extends and refines this idea, but doesn't change its essence. So maybe logical and religious morality are not so radically opposed as you make out. Now, if you believe in God (or the Entity Formerly Known as God, as I recently heard someone call Him, I love that, it's perfect), this makes perfect sense, because of course God's logic would have to be perfect, so his morality would have to be perfectly logical.
And yes, I know that religion is notoriously illogical, but that's people being illogical, not God.
Re:How to decide if something is immoral
on
Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
This is similar to, but not quite exactly the same as Kant. A better way to tell is,
Act on that maxim which you can consistently will become universal law. --Kant
Has nothing to do with family relationships, everything to do with what standards you would want others to follow.
BTW, I would have no problem with my kids looking at porn. Why should I?
Strictly for the SEO's
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Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 2, Interesting
You guys better pay attention to this one:
He regards optimizers the way a mother grizzly might regard a hunter jabbing at her cub with a stick.
The slide into corporate prostitution was inevitable, but I think you have to give Google props for at least trying to hold out this long. Think about it. Most businesses their size don't give a fig about morality, and have no problem with saying so. At least Google seems to be trying.
Re:29 years old and ready for grave
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Old Age Simulator
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· Score: 3, Funny
"It's not the years, baby, it's the mileage." -- Indiana Jones
Generally speaking, I agree wholeheartedly, however...
People do it
because they love it.
This may be just a little rose-tinted. Sure, you have to love science to stick with it given all the sh*t you have to put up with and the low pay/work ratio, but that's not all there is to it. I think a lot of scientists are in it for the ego-boost, which is similar to loving it but not exactly the same. This is not necessarily a bad thing, it's just the way it is. In science, reputation is much more important than money (kind of like OSS, eh?). When you're on top of the game, everybody treats you like a king, and that can be pretty addictive.
I totally agree that nobody's in it for the money though. That's a pretty silly idea, given the number of ways you can use the same education to make a lot more money.
Actually, there have been more meteor showers lately. This is obviously the beginning of an attack by the dread meteoric weapons of the planet Zarquon. Of course, now that you've found them out, they'll have to come up with some other ploy...
So you can't be an environmentalist unless you live in a shack, grow your own food, forgo Western medicine, and don't use any technology that you didn't build yourself? That's absurd.
I've actually tried this, to some extent, and let me tell you, it's not easy! You can't expect that of people, you're right, it's absurd. On the other hand, if you're serious about protecting the environment, that's the direction in which we have to move. Problem is, it's a really hard way to live, especially if you're alone. It can only be done with lots of support from other people, and this takes time and energy, and, yes, money to put together.
All of us who have grown up in the system need some decompression time before we're ready to "go back to nature." I think we should all applaud the efforts of anyone who is even vaguely moving in the right direction, instead of criticizing them for not going far enough. Give it time!
Well, you can gripe about hypocricy and all that all you like, I think this is a wonderful thing and everyone involved deserves mad props for it. This sort of thing takes real gumption, and I consider Remedy a heroine.
Anyone out there who agrees with me on this who has a website, link to her so that she gets more publicity! Tree-sitting in itself doesn't do much good, it's the publicity for the cause that counts.
in the jungle. I can tell you that. I live in the jungle and I work with electronics, and the humidity is hell on them, it's no surprise the new synth didn't work out very well.
Trying to use computers here is a joke, they break amazingly fast. The trick is to use it all the time, so the circuits stay warm.
Seems like being the one true OS which dominates the world would be counter to the principles behind Linux, so if this is the definition of winning then Linux cannot possibly win by definition. However, the triumph of the principles would count as "winning" IMHO.
Slashdot Mirror
The only reason for this is that the US citizenry has become so arrogant and self-centered that they fully expect to be able to wage war with few or no American casualties, and they are unwilling to engage in war in which many Americans will die (though they have no problem mass-murdering other people, as long as they talk funny).
I have to say, I'm shocked that this sort of blatant flamebait can get an insightful rating from you guys. What has happened to the libertine /. of old, that we can give credence to this sort of immature crap?
Protesters, regardless of what you think of their opinions or rhetoric, are trying to get as much attention as they can for their message. This means doing some disruptive things. Threatening to run them over with your car for that seems pretty low to me.
Actually, civil disobedience refers to the act of deliberately breaking the law in order to express your opinions. The idea is to overload the "justice" system with traffic, a sort of DOS attack of the court system, and of course also to attract media attention.
In order to commit acts of civil disobedience, you have to break the law. The word "civil" in this context doesn't necessarily mean "polite".
To quote George Carlin, "What exactly is a 'civil war' anyway? 'Excuse me, RATATATATATATATATAT! Oh, I'm terribly sorry, did that hurt?'"
Actually, I know several people with really nasty staph, at least one of which has been on antibiotics for more than a year, so it's pretty safe to say that it's resistant. Not to say this shouldn't make this company a lot of money, I think they deserve it if they can make this work. This is a HUGE relief, let me tell you, if you've ever had a severe dermonecrotic staph infection, it's incredibly nasty.
I happen to have one now, and I just spent three hours this morning gouging out my wounds with a razor blade. I think the standard antibiotics are going to work for me, thank God, but if they don't, it's sure nice to know that something better is in the works. Staph is a nightmare.
Depends on how you interpret the second law. In the macroscopic, statistical sense, sorry, but you will never live long enough to see the second law violated, although the laws of probability dictate that it will probably happen some time.
This simply points out the statistical nature of Thermodynamics. Small systems can be expected to violate the laws of Thermo sometimes because they are small, and the laws of Thermo assume that you are dealing with a system with a large number of components. Rigorous derivations of the laws use the Law of Large Numbers, which of course only applies to large numbers for some strange reason.
It's still pretty cool, because dispite the theoretical possiblility of observing violations on the small scale, it's never actually been seen before.
You can't use this to build a perpetual motion machine, because the effects are only of limited duration. It's kind of like in particle physics, where you can violate conservation of energy if you do it fast enough that the rest of the Universe doesn't catch you at it.
Actually, that's what everybody said back in '95 when BEC was first achieved. The new discovery is that it can be teased into yet another state, which is even cooler (though not colder). This new patterned state might be used to make quantum computers, in which case it will be very useful.
Could finally be time to bring on the heavy graphics!
I like it a lot, because of the reasons you stated and also because God is a terrible word, has all sorts of silly connotations. It's masculine for one thing. Its a name, for another, and any name is a definition, and the Entity is beyond definition, even Entity doesn't work, nor does Tao or any other word. "The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao." -- Lao Tzu
As an AC in a thread above pointed out, It called Itself "I am" (Jehovah) when asked for a name, and I think that's a great name, especially since it points out the whole problem with asking It for a name in the first place.
There once was an anthropologist who was studying a remote tribe in Africa somewhere. One day, some guy was sitting on the ground in the shade of a grain silo, a building bulit up on stilts to hold grain. The building collapsed, fell on him, and killed him.
The people called in the local witch doctor to figure out why this happened, and the anthropologist came along to see what would ensue. The witch doctor examined the scene and immediately declared that the man had been cursed by a witch, and this was the cause of his terrible misfortune.
The anthropologist looked at the stilts of the building and saw that they clearly had been eaten away by termites. He said to the witch doctor, "That's nonsense. The building collapsed because of termites, a witch had nothing to do with it."
The witch doctor replied, "Ah, yes, that explains why the building collapsed all right. But what it doesn't explain is, why did it collapse on him?"
Coincidence is the myth of the scientific age.
I believe in the Entity Formerly Known as God because I have directly experienced Its impact on my life and directly felt Its presence in my heart. I have witnessed bona-fide miracles. I'm a very rational person and a hardcore skeptic, so it's not easy to convince me that something is a miracle, but when I see it whith my own eyes and there is no other explanation, I have to accept the evidence of my own experience.
I don't expect you to share this view, however. You weren't there. I have no direct experience of your Dragon, so I can't say one way or the other.
Hang on to your skepticism, it's a credit to your intelligence. But keep your eyes and your mind open. When the Entity reveals Itself to you, you will see what I mean.
A religious institution has to compete in the marketplace against other religious institutions, and so they have to have a unique selling proposition, i.e. our religion is the only right one and all the rest of you dirty sinners are going to Hell.
I think therefore you do have to filter religious morality. You have to separate out the actual core of the religion (in the case of Christianity, the teachings of Jesus) from all the crap that's been piled on top of it over the centuries in order to make the religion sell better. If you look at the teachings of Jesus, you won't find a single thing that doesn't sound exactly right, and you know that in your heart. That's (one reason) why I'm a Christian.
But I certainly don't believe all the silly crap that has been said by so-called Christians in the time since Jesus' death.
You definitely have to filter religious teachings. However, use your heart not your head, you get better results.
Actually I should clarify my position a bit more. I think the Entity Formerly Known as God is beyond logic. Logic is a human invention. Recent evidence suggests that the law of non-contradiction (the basis of logic) doesn't apply in the real world. Perhaps the Entity is Meta-logical, in the sense that It makes more sense than logic itself. But I meant logic in the positive sense, meaning something that is reasonable and sound and all that.
Not sure I'm saying this right... whatever... what I mean is, the Entity is cool, people sometimes screw up but shouldn't be judged for that, and religion and reason are not so opposed as this guy seems to be saying.
From what I can understand of the way Google has been acting lately, it seems that they are acting on a maxim like this: "if you don't like someone's content or the content of the sites they link to, you should do everything you can to reduce their online presence."
Does Google want to be held to this maxim? Hell no!
The article talks about how Google was hit with a "PR0 penalty" by China because China disagreed with the content of the sites Google links to. Google didn't like this one bit, and moved quickly to correct the situation. So I think that, at least by the standards of Jesus and Kant, Google isn't doing that great of a job of being moral. They are employing a double standard, one they themselves don't want to be held to.
So how about this for a maxim instead: "you should act in such a way as to help the user find what they are looking for, regardless of whether you happen to disagree with it." I think Google could live with that standard being applied to them, and I think the internet would be a better place if all search engines were held to it, so I think it stands up to Kant's test.
For instance, Aristotle based a logically consistant ethics on the idea of, basically, doing what an ideal "good person" would do. Has some problems defining the ideal, but is nonetheless based on logic.
My personal favorite is Kant, who says,
Act on that maxim which you can consistently will become universal law.
Now, Kant is nothing if not logical, one of the most rigorous philosophers ever. However, note the similarity of the above statement to Jesus' golden rule, "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Kant just extends and refines this idea, but doesn't change its essence. So maybe logical and religious morality are not so radically opposed as you make out. Now, if you believe in God (or the Entity Formerly Known as God, as I recently heard someone call Him, I love that, it's perfect), this makes perfect sense, because of course God's logic would have to be perfect, so his morality would have to be perfectly logical.
And yes, I know that religion is notoriously illogical, but that's people being illogical, not God.
Act on that maxim which you can consistently will become universal law. --Kant
Has nothing to do with family relationships, everything to do with what standards you would want others to follow.
BTW, I would have no problem with my kids looking at porn. Why should I?
He regards optimizers the way a mother grizzly might regard a hunter jabbing at her cub with a stick.
He sounds like he means it!
The slide into corporate prostitution was inevitable, but I think you have to give Google props for at least trying to hold out this long. Think about it. Most businesses their size don't give a fig about morality, and have no problem with saying so. At least Google seems to be trying.
"It's not the years, baby, it's the mileage." -- Indiana Jones
People do it because they love it.
This may be just a little rose-tinted. Sure, you have to love science to stick with it given all the sh*t you have to put up with and the low pay/work ratio, but that's not all there is to it. I think a lot of scientists are in it for the ego-boost, which is similar to loving it but not exactly the same. This is not necessarily a bad thing, it's just the way it is. In science, reputation is much more important than money (kind of like OSS, eh?). When you're on top of the game, everybody treats you like a king, and that can be pretty addictive.
I totally agree that nobody's in it for the money though. That's a pretty silly idea, given the number of ways you can use the same education to make a lot more money.
No dice. Already been tried dozens of times. Never works, sorry, you'll have to come up with something else.
Actually, there have been more meteor showers lately. This is obviously the beginning of an attack by the dread meteoric weapons of the planet Zarquon. Of course, now that you've found them out, they'll have to come up with some other ploy...
I've actually tried this, to some extent, and let me tell you, it's not easy! You can't expect that of people, you're right, it's absurd. On the other hand, if you're serious about protecting the environment, that's the direction in which we have to move. Problem is, it's a really hard way to live, especially if you're alone. It can only be done with lots of support from other people, and this takes time and energy, and, yes, money to put together.
All of us who have grown up in the system need some decompression time before we're ready to "go back to nature." I think we should all applaud the efforts of anyone who is even vaguely moving in the right direction, instead of criticizing them for not going far enough. Give it time!
Anyone out there who agrees with me on this who has a website, link to her so that she gets more publicity! Tree-sitting in itself doesn't do much good, it's the publicity for the cause that counts.
Trying to use computers here is a joke, they break amazingly fast. The trick is to use it all the time, so the circuits stay warm.
Seems like being the one true OS which dominates the world would be counter to the principles behind Linux, so if this is the definition of winning then Linux cannot possibly win by definition. However, the triumph of the principles would count as "winning" IMHO.