"Actual user of the scientific method and all-around skeptic."
Spencer Tracy as Edison.
OTOH: Jodie Foster is a great actress and Carl Sagan was a genius at communicating the philosophy and findings of science. Try reading his book "A Deamon Haunted World" (if you haven't already).
"two completely different words might sound exactly the same to us"
This is due to the way humans learn language, the human brain learns the sounds that are peculiar to the language spoken, extra sounds are meaningless and the brain actually filters them out so you don't "hear" them in the first place. This is the reason asian speakers consistently get "L" and "R" mixed up (to asians they sound similar!!!). I would guess the same is true for the cat, ie: it just hears the two "intonations" and recognises it as "dinner time".
"to say that it is all instinct and mimicking would be a vast oversimplification. This is a dangerous line of thinking though - a pig is as smart as a cat, but I do love eating pork chop."
The same people who make those sorts of "instinct" statements have difficulty comming to terms with the fact that humans are just another animal wandering around the planet (or perhaps they don't watch animals often enough to recognise what they are doing). Personally I don't think there is any reason to stop eating meat just because pigs/dogs/cats/chickens/cows... have emotional and reasoning abilities. However, it does support the POV that animals should not be subjected to undue cruelty or neglect. BTW: Cows/pigs know what is happening when they see the other animals at the front of the slaughter house line, they often panic or throw up with fear.
I'm an old fart too, during the early 80's I had a mini that had a single large smiley that covered the drivers side door. I bought it from a student to use for parts but it turned out it was better than the one I was trying to repair.
Sadly the smiley turned out to be a powerfull cop magnet.
My doctor says you are a figment of my imagination, he said you can only talk to me through a PC so you are not omnipotent and everyone knows God is omnipotent.
Occam's razor says my doctor has the better theory (and the best drugs). Now you (God) once said "God cannot be wrong" so either, you are not God, or you were God up until you "dissapered in a puff of logic". - (apologies to D.Adams).
"If I do something dumb, I have no problem taking responsibility for it. I'd like to be able to know what my actual risks are before I do something dumb, though."
Yeah, I only smoke cigarettes that "harm others", before I light up I just warn others to stand back.
Hehe, I had an retired guy next door who was the same, after a while I trained him to call me and say "I've pushed the wrong button again" before fiddling. OTOH: The same guy could rebuild a tractor with a pair of knitting needles (ok, slight exageration but you get the idea).
The media is always blowing something out of proportion
It's equally as tragic to ignore what is a very plausable threat to 10-20% of humanity.
...they aren't just going to all of a sudden just break out all over the place...
So your saying it doesn't "suddenly just break out all over the place" every year during "flu season"? Surely that must have been a typo because you fix it up by contradicting yourself...
"When it explodes[emphasis mine], THEN freak out about it,...."
What a good idea, let's organise our institutions like a school of popeyed mullet.
Roche have dragged their heels with licenses for over a year, they finally issued a few licenses after several governments threatened to force a license agreement on them. Regardless of the eventual merits of the drug, Roche's lengthy "license negotiations" are an exercise in pure greed.
It's also the reason we have to put up with the concerted effort to take over your browser, spam your inbox, ect. People actually buy shit from random pop-ups and emails. AOL will happily promise to shield you from all the "hackers" for a fee. From what I can tell, (I'm not from the US), they are basically aimed at people who (for whatever reason) cannot use a browser for more than five minutes without calling a help desk.
If AOL suddenly had a change of heart and tried to educate their users about "the tricks of the trade" they would loose their (sizable) section of the market, it is in their interest to "help" their users and at the same time treat them as mushrooms.
"The average net use cannot figure it out in 15 minutes."
I agree. Whatever your opinion of AOL, there are plenty of people who are willing to pay for someone else to "work it out" for them Many of them don't want educating, they want a device like a preset home theater where they only have a few buttons to remeber to get what they want. Push the wrong buttons (like 'mute' or 'AV3') and they simply call in a TV repairman (or pester a relative) to "fix it".
"People are fucking stupid."
I don't see that behaviour as automatically stupid, sometimes it is just willfull ignorance. All through the 80's I repaired my own cars and bikes, now my car looks like a dishwasher under the hood and tells the mechanic how badly I have neglected it (error codes). I have a good enough idea of how my car works to spot bullshit, but spare me the details, what's it going to cost and how long will it take?
OTOH: Browse at -1 to see the stupidity of people on the net. While doing so remeber the 'netizens' who created the often nonsensical, bottom-dwelling posts were at least smart enough to work out how to post them.
"A market that is supposed to operate efficiently needs government regulation."
I don't have mod points so I will offer a supporting rant.
It could be argued that "regulating the market" is the main reason we have modern democracy. The Magna Carta took absolute power from the king and handed it to a group of merchants and bankers calling themselves "parliment", they claimed to be representative of "freemen" since members of parliment would be selected by a vote. They were able to take this power because together they financed the kingdom, without parliment the king would go broke and a more plyable king would be installed by force. The king did not dare take their money by force, the cream of merchants and bankers spread their risk by operating in competing kingdoms as they do to this day. Any king that took them on as a group was doomed to have waves of well financed invasions launced against him.
Not everybody got a vote, it was only for "freemen" (basically white-male landowners), but it was an improvement over an omnipotent king since power devolved from one weathy family to many wealthy individuals. Parliment made up rules that kept it's members reasonably peacefull with each other, everyone else was fair game and many rules were made by parliment to maintain the power/social divide between freemen and "others" who worked their land for food and and a place to sleep (ie:"others" = economic and traditional style slaves).
Other documents since the Magna Carta have attempted to devolve power to "the people", the US constitution is the best known example. Over the years power has devolved so that most of the population now gets an opportunity to vote. Problem is, we are still voting for "merchants and bankers" and (mostly) they still make rules that benifit themselves at the expense of everyone else.
I think it is admirable to be skeptical of government regulations, but to reject any and all regulation as "interference" is so stupid it has a name, anarchy. This particular rule appears to be an example of "the people" setting a rule that can be shown to benifit all. In this case the "benifit to all" is the attempt to maintain the status-quo of a global infrastruture against an artificial toll that benifits members of a key cartel at the expense of all other parties. If that is not "what government is about", then now is a good time to grab a pitchfork and change it.
The only exceptions I can think of for not making "rules that benifit all" are: rules that create "victims" where none existed (eg: adult drug use) and rules that are inherently uneforcable (eg: adult drug use).
Having said all that, anyone who belives a non-trivial set of rules can be made consistent must first answer to Godel.
I agree, someone will probably throw a brick at me for mentioning MSVC/C++ but it libraries all come in thread safe versions and it is common practice in Windows to start a thread to efficently handle messages from such things as the service manager. Also casting off a thread for a lengthy operation resulting from an MFC button press ensures you dialog does not stop responding while it backs up the hard drive.
I see alot of screwed up code because the coder did not understand the basics (granted the old/new API thing can be confusing). None of these "everyday" threading techniques seems to rate a mention in this disscussion (probably since they don't run on a cluster in the basement).
When the bubble burst, telco stocks were also thrown out the window and in many cases still haven't made up the lost ground. Capital losses on those stocks would have easily topped the $1B mark.
BTW: I know stocks prices are not the same as cash but accountants and bankers think a bit differently.
"In short, the ability to pass a practical skills test trumps any and all pieces of paper"
That automatically assumes the employer knows how to conduct such a test. I did my degree in the 80's, 160 people started the course with me and 12 stayed all the way through to the end. If you can't handle "deadweight partners" at university how the hell do you cope with the PHB's, slackers and wannabe's that permeate the corporate world.
Slashdot Mirror
Seems fitting that a coward would excuse evil intent.
"Actual user of the scientific method and all-around skeptic."
Spencer Tracy as Edison.
OTOH: Jodie Foster is a great actress and Carl Sagan was a genius at communicating the philosophy and findings of science. Try reading his book "A Deamon Haunted World" (if you haven't already).
Yahoo Serious in Young Einstein:
YE: "Dad, I don't want to stay on the farm and grow apples, I want to be a physicist!"
YE's Dad: "What do they grow son?".
"two completely different words might sound exactly the same to us"
This is due to the way humans learn language, the human brain learns the sounds that are peculiar to the language spoken, extra sounds are meaningless and the brain actually filters them out so you don't "hear" them in the first place. This is the reason asian speakers consistently get "L" and "R" mixed up (to asians they sound similar!!!). I would guess the same is true for the cat, ie: it just hears the two "intonations" and recognises it as "dinner time".
"to say that it is all instinct and mimicking would be a vast oversimplification. This is a dangerous line of thinking though - a pig is as smart as a cat, but I do love eating pork chop."
The same people who make those sorts of "instinct" statements have difficulty comming to terms with the fact that humans are just another animal wandering around the planet (or perhaps they don't watch animals often enough to recognise what they are doing). Personally I don't think there is any reason to stop eating meat just because pigs/dogs/cats/chickens/cows... have emotional and reasoning abilities. However, it does support the POV that animals should not be subjected to undue cruelty or neglect. BTW: Cows/pigs know what is happening when they see the other animals at the front of the slaughter house line, they often panic or throw up with fear.
I'm an old fart too, during the early 80's I had a mini that had a single large smiley that covered the drivers side door. I bought it from a student to use for parts but it turned out it was better than the one I was trying to repair.
Sadly the smiley turned out to be a powerfull cop magnet.
"I am God ...try prove otherwise."
My doctor says you are a figment of my imagination, he said you can only talk to me through a PC so you are not omnipotent and everyone knows God is omnipotent.
Occam's razor says my doctor has the better theory (and the best drugs). Now you (God) once said "God cannot be wrong" so either, you are not God, or you were God up until you "dissapered in a puff of logic". - (apologies to D.Adams).
He's waxin' his modem, tryin' to make it go faster. - Wierd Al.
""The VNC viewer has colors spelled/spelt as colours, which is wrong "
/sarcasm
It is spelt as "colour" in English, "color" is the perverted American form.
"If I do something dumb, I have no problem taking responsibility for it. I'd like to be able to know what my actual risks are before I do something dumb, though."
Yeah, I only smoke cigarettes that "harm others", before I light up I just warn others to stand back.
Hehe, I had an retired guy next door who was the same, after a while I trained him to call me and say "I've pushed the wrong button again" before fiddling. OTOH: The same guy could rebuild a tractor with a pair of knitting needles (ok, slight exageration but you get the idea).
Thanks, that's the word I was looking for. :)
"It's not my fault that life sucks so much."
....I'm a grammar nazi in denial.
I know, I know, don't tell me.....
The media is always blowing something out of proportion
...they aren't just going to all of a sudden just break out all over the place...
...."
It's equally as tragic to ignore what is a very plausable threat to 10-20% of humanity.
So your saying it doesn't "suddenly just break out all over the place" every year during "flu season"? Surely that must have been a typo because you fix it up by contradicting yourself...
"When it explodes[emphasis mine], THEN freak out about it,
What a good idea, let's organise our institutions like a school of popeyed mullet.
"...but until then enjoy life."
Sane advice.
Roche have dragged their heels with licenses for over a year, they finally issued a few licenses after several governments threatened to force a license agreement on them. Regardless of the eventual merits of the drug, Roche's lengthy "license negotiations" are an exercise in pure greed.
That is why AOL has succeeded thusfar..
It's also the reason we have to put up with the concerted effort to take over your browser, spam your inbox, ect. People actually buy shit from random pop-ups and emails. AOL will happily promise to shield you from all the "hackers" for a fee. From what I can tell, (I'm not from the US), they are basically aimed at people who (for whatever reason) cannot use a browser for more than five minutes without calling a help desk.
If AOL suddenly had a change of heart and tried to educate their users about "the tricks of the trade" they would loose their (sizable) section of the market, it is in their interest to "help" their users and at the same time treat them as mushrooms.
"The average net use cannot figure it out in 15 minutes."
I agree. Whatever your opinion of AOL, there are plenty of people who are willing to pay for someone else to "work it out" for them Many of them don't want educating, they want a device like a preset home theater where they only have a few buttons to remeber to get what they want. Push the wrong buttons (like 'mute' or 'AV3') and they simply call in a TV repairman (or pester a relative) to "fix it".
"People are fucking stupid."
I don't see that behaviour as automatically stupid, sometimes it is just willfull ignorance. All through the 80's I repaired my own cars and bikes, now my car looks like a dishwasher under the hood and tells the mechanic how badly I have neglected it (error codes). I have a good enough idea of how my car works to spot bullshit, but spare me the details, what's it going to cost and how long will it take?
OTOH: Browse at -1 to see the stupidity of people on the net. While doing so remeber the 'netizens' who created the often nonsensical, bottom-dwelling posts were at least smart enough to work out how to post them.
Considering the content an OT mod for the post would be quite humourous, "troll" is a wee bit too harsh in my book.
"A market that is supposed to operate efficiently needs government regulation."
I don't have mod points so I will offer a supporting rant.
It could be argued that "regulating the market" is the main reason we have modern democracy. The Magna Carta took absolute power from the king and handed it to a group of merchants and bankers calling themselves "parliment", they claimed to be representative of "freemen" since members of parliment would be selected by a vote. They were able to take this power because together they financed the kingdom, without parliment the king would go broke and a more plyable king would be installed by force. The king did not dare take their money by force, the cream of merchants and bankers spread their risk by operating in competing kingdoms as they do to this day. Any king that took them on as a group was doomed to have waves of well financed invasions launced against him.
Not everybody got a vote, it was only for "freemen" (basically white-male landowners), but it was an improvement over an omnipotent king since power devolved from one weathy family to many wealthy individuals. Parliment made up rules that kept it's members reasonably peacefull with each other, everyone else was fair game and many rules were made by parliment to maintain the power/social divide between freemen and "others" who worked their land for food and and a place to sleep (ie:"others" = economic and traditional style slaves).
Other documents since the Magna Carta have attempted to devolve power to "the people", the US constitution is the best known example. Over the years power has devolved so that most of the population now gets an opportunity to vote. Problem is, we are still voting for "merchants and bankers" and (mostly) they still make rules that benifit themselves at the expense of everyone else.
I think it is admirable to be skeptical of government regulations, but to reject any and all regulation as "interference" is so stupid it has a name, anarchy. This particular rule appears to be an example of "the people" setting a rule that can be shown to benifit all. In this case the "benifit to all" is the attempt to maintain the status-quo of a global infrastruture against an artificial toll that benifits members of a key cartel at the expense of all other parties. If that is not "what government is about", then now is a good time to grab a pitchfork and change it.
The only exceptions I can think of for not making "rules that benifit all" are: rules that create "victims" where none existed (eg: adult drug use) and rules that are inherently uneforcable (eg: adult drug use).
Having said all that, anyone who belives a non-trivial set of rules can be made consistent must first answer to Godel.
"...since when did government become the solution to all problems?"
The same day they formed an army.
I agree, someone will probably throw a brick at me for mentioning MSVC/C++ but it libraries all come in thread safe versions and it is common practice in Windows to start a thread to efficently handle messages from such things as the service manager. Also casting off a thread for a lengthy operation resulting from an MFC button press ensures you dialog does not stop responding while it backs up the hard drive.
I see alot of screwed up code because the coder did not understand the basics (granted the old/new API thing can be confusing). None of these "everyday" threading techniques seems to rate a mention in this disscussion (probably since they don't run on a cluster in the basement).
"I worked for Sprockets.com for a couple months as technical support..."
How is Mr Spacely and what's George up to these days...
"The iloo was a joke..."
And yet somehow the internet fridge survived. "Evolving markets", go figure!
When the bubble burst, telco stocks were also thrown out the window and in many cases still haven't made up the lost ground. Capital losses on those stocks would have easily topped the $1B mark.
BTW: I know stocks prices are not the same as cash but accountants and bankers think a bit differently.
"I'm talking about the anchor "personalities" who read corporate propaganda from a teleprompter"
Doh, I thought those people were actors not journalists.
"No offense meant, but that's Robert Fisk"
None taken, thanks for the correction.
"In short, the ability to pass a practical skills test trumps any and all pieces of paper"
That automatically assumes the employer knows how to conduct such a test. I did my degree in the 80's, 160 people started the course with me and 12 stayed all the way through to the end. If you can't handle "deadweight partners" at university how the hell do you cope with the PHB's, slackers and wannabe's that permeate the corporate world.