How about making the advertised company the default responsible party for illegal spam unless they can point at a third party or fraud, isn't it the same thing as fining car owners with traffic cameras? Much of the spam is advertising US companies, US law would be best applied to cut off the source of the $$$$.
"If you think you can have [?] liberty without [?] safety, you don't understand what the word liberty means."
Essential liberty, eg: The liberty to carry nukes is curtailed because it is not essential.
Temporary safety, eg: The snooping program may have provided temporary safety for the Brooklyn bridge.
If you think you can buy safety or liberty with secret laws enforced by lawless secret police then you don't understand what the word safety or treason means.
"If you're not doing anything wrong, what do you care if somebody knows about it."
If "wrong" had an immutable definition, I wouldn't. However it doesn't, so I do.
"Yes...it's good for them to keep some secrets from us. THEY'RE IN CHARGE! Parents keep secrets from children because that's better for them."
You want the govt to act like YOUR parents and citizens to act like good children. What happens when we inadvertently elect abusive parents? You know, the rock spiders and the sadists who pass their habits down through the generations.....hang on....maybe that is why we are still fighting wars and watching people starve, all live on TV????
"Of course you idiot liberals think and act like children"
Kind of ambigous given what you just said about the parent/child model of government. Do you mean: "Idiot liberals are good citizens" or "Idiot liberals are bad children", maybe "All citizens who don't act like good children are bad"????
Nuclear fission bombs are currently the only way to detonate much higher yeild FUSION (H) bombs. France is a good choice for the new wepon (err, reactor), we could give the operation a catchy name, how about "Pacific Payback".
"But perhaps you could be a little clearer in your assertions?"
I do agree writing is a skill that can always be improved but so is comprehension. My original post had two sentences and an attempt a humour, the second one said: "This behaviour is what I would call violence as opposed to survival.".
"Perhaps war is lion behaviour with intelligence."
I think both are essential ingredients but war also needs alturism (fighting for others) otherwise it would not be war, it would be "every lion for himself" type anarchy.
"It's a rather bright flash, though, isn't it?"
Yes it is, I think an alien biologist would find humans the most interesting species on the planet, however I also realise my humanity makes that statement biased.
"Whilst we've only been around for a brief time, we've done considerably more to secure our continuing survival in that time, than octopuses have in theirs."
To me the jury is still out. Certainly the bulk of individuals are better off, due to technology, individuals tend to survive twice as long as their ancestors did. That does not convince me that the industrial revolution has done anything to ensure our survival as a species, it could quite easily become our downfall.
"Ants possess a degree of collective intelligence, yes, but it's an extremely limited intelligence, due to its distributed nature."
I could accept some of that paragraph iff you find me an example where intelligence does NOT emerge from lower level(s) of co-operating "automota". The analogy between ants and neurons was to show a human mind and the "mind" of an ants nest are both "distributed in nature". They are the "same" yet very different. All species of ant's nest have found close to the most effecient scavenging strategy possible. Sure it was achived by an evolutionary random walk thru the problem space over tens of millions of years. Assuming there are no mind/soul implants by divine beings, wasn't the human mind created the same way? For the same "purpose" of surviving in a particular "problem space"?
"And whilst we're talking about collective intelligence, what about the collective intelligence of humanity itself?"
Collectively I don't think we are that smart. I am not trying to downplay our achivements, they are indistingushable from magic. My best hope is to seek refuge in yet another quote from Dawkins....
"Be warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature. Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have a chance to upset their designs, something that no other species has ever aspired to do."
I try to heed that warning for my own selfish reasons. I think it will lead my grandchildren to a more profound understanding of "free will".
"don't jump on here calling other people's quite valid interpretations down because "you think" you know better ".
Well excuse me for fucking breathing, who or what did I "call down"? Where does my comment even suggest "I know better"? Is your parinoid and insecure personality showing today?
"get some facts, then make a contribution that's actually worthwhile to read--just like this new system on the Wikipedia is Hoping to encourage."
Put down the crack pipe. I made the comment because I have edited on Wikipedia once or twice in the past and have also come across badly vandalised pages. Consider it a suggestion by an interested user, not a thesis on TFA.
"Here, you ass-hats get away with it, cuz slashdot is all about anyone's opinion"
In case you hadn't noticed this is a slashdot discussion, the whole fucking thing is based on OPINION. If you want a "fact" then how about the fact that your post does not contain any facts. In FACT your post is just another aggressive bile spewing opinion from a dickhead who does not "get it".
"Pull yer head out yer ass..."
You arrogant, unimaginitive little turd, how about you go first!
Didn't read TFA but that never stops me. I think they could restrict the size of the edit based on article metrics such as age, size, rate of change, rate of rollbacks, ect. Otherwise stable articles that are prone to vandalisim should have a unique pattern. Articles identified this way could have proposed edits submitted for user review, other users would have a time period to object.
Wiki vandalisim should be treated like a virus and identified automagically. The hard part is where do you draw the line between repairing vandalisim and group-think censorship?
If all your skills are in programming why should I pay a premium just because you are old. If you have matured and are also adept at avoiding finacial, political and technical potholes then it might be a different story. Not all programmers mature into developers, not everyone wants too, many get some cash and go and do something different in their thirties and fourties (eg:get so pissed off they start their own company).
There are places for old developers (as opposed to old programmers). I am 46 and the second youngest on a team of ~10 developers.
If an employer wants "yes men" then they can get plenty at the $2 shop but as a business strategy it is unsustainable. Where I work we tell each other "where to get off" often (mostly it's polite). All of us argue like a bunch of kids organising the rules and positions for a game of street footy. The difference between this group and a group of kids is we are all mature enough to know how to keep it a healthy rather than destructive influence.
As for "yes men", thousands of small and medium software houses make their money developing and supporting custom systems for one or two large customers. Someone who instintively says "yes" to authority, should be hidden from powerful customers.
I think you only have a vauge clue what you are talking about, let alone understand what I have been saying.
You appear to be arguing that humans and chimps are significantly more violent and cruel than other animals, and hold up the concept of war as evidence of your claim.
Bzzzzt, I'm sorry, I am arguing that humans and chimps evolved a survival strategy that we call war. This strategy is significantly different to other animals and is what I called "violence". Perhaps I confused you when I defined war as "violence" to distigush the behaviour from the background gnash of tooth and claw? What really pisses me off is you have managed to take your confusion, mix it with some personal baggage and project a whole heap of words and thoughts on to me that are simply not there. Did I say anything about cruelty? Did I bring up lions and cartoon characters? Where did I make any type of moral judgement or quantitative comaprison on any species (including humans)?
War has always been a part of us and I belive it is an evelotionary trait unique to great apes. War is not just lion behaviour with more technology. I also happen to agree with the other poster who said something like we also have an "equally great capacity for peace". This does not deny the "selfish gene" theory, what it says is that for most species, when it comes to killing their own kind, it is a "selfish and lazy gene" at work.
Personally I think the selfish gene theory is often used by arseholes to justify being an arsehole, it's a peversion of a great theory, like eugenics is a peversion of genetics. They (unlike Dawkins) say nothing about co-operation. eg: The mitochondrial symbiosis at the heart of all multi-cellular life. The mitochondria genes are being selfish, co-operative and are certainly succesfull?
Compared to humans, the their [octopi] intellect is a flickering candleflame compared to the nuclear brightness of humanity. Even the most moronic human far outstrips the capabilities of an octopus.
When working on human problems I would have to agree (except for independently discovering how to open a screw top jar). But when applied to survival problems humans look more like a flash in the pan. Ant colonies with millions of individuals can rebuild an "ant city" in under a week. Does this mean our species is smarter or dumber or does it simply mean humans define intelligence so that our species is at the pinicale of evolution. When you think about how other organisims, (particularly something as alien as an octopus), might percive the world you might realise that it does not make much sense to compare human and octopi IQ results.
"Internet routers, like ants, are unintelligent and follow a set of mindless rules."
"The argument of this book is that we, and all other animals, are machines created by our genes." - Chapt 1, The selfish gene.
Argue with that book and then we can talk about cognition as an emergent behaviour of simple physical rules. In the meantime stop putting words in my mouth, I did not say ants are intelligent ( to start with, they physically do not have a brain). Human brains are an intricately woven blob of neurons that individually follow a set of mindless rules. Both the ant and the neuron have evolved to co-operate, co-operation on the "mindless" level emerges as intelligent behavior on the "mindfull" level. Given that you have a hard time understanding me, what hope has a human got of seeing the world through the eye of an octupus.
But just because these rules are effective, doesn't mean intelligence is at play.
Slashdot Mirror
How about making the advertised company the default responsible party for illegal spam unless they can point at a third party or fraud, isn't it the same thing as fining car owners with traffic cameras? Much of the spam is advertising US companies, US law would be best applied to cut off the source of the $$$$.
"If you think you can have [?] liberty without [?] safety, you don't understand what the word liberty means."
Essential liberty, eg: The liberty to carry nukes is curtailed because it is not essential.
Temporary safety, eg: The snooping program may have provided temporary safety for the Brooklyn bridge.
If you think you can buy safety or liberty with secret laws enforced by lawless secret police then you don't understand what the word safety or treason means.
That sig would make a great bumper sticker!
"If you're not doing anything wrong, what do you care if somebody knows about it."
If "wrong" had an immutable definition, I wouldn't. However it doesn't, so I do.
"Yes...it's good for them to keep some secrets from us. THEY'RE IN CHARGE! Parents keep secrets from children because that's better for them."
You want the govt to act like YOUR parents and citizens to act like good children. What happens when we inadvertently elect abusive parents? You know, the rock spiders and the sadists who pass their habits down through the generations.....hang on....maybe that is why we are still fighting wars and watching people starve, all live on TV????
"Of course you idiot liberals think and act like children"
Kind of ambigous given what you just said about the parent/child model of government. Do you mean: "Idiot liberals are good citizens" or "Idiot liberals are bad children", maybe "All citizens who don't act like good children are bad"????
It was an attempt at black humour.
Nuclear fission bombs are currently the only way to detonate much higher yeild FUSION (H) bombs. France is a good choice for the new wepon (err, reactor), we could give the operation a catchy name, how about "Pacific Payback".
No, I'm not anti-France, just anti-destruction.
"But perhaps you could be a little clearer in your assertions?"
I do agree writing is a skill that can always be improved but so is comprehension. My original post had two sentences and an attempt a humour, the second one said: "This behaviour is what I would call violence as opposed to survival.".
"Perhaps war is lion behaviour with intelligence."
I think both are essential ingredients but war also needs alturism (fighting for others) otherwise it would not be war, it would be "every lion for himself" type anarchy.
"It's a rather bright flash, though, isn't it?"
Yes it is, I think an alien biologist would find humans the most interesting species on the planet, however I also realise my humanity makes that statement biased.
"Whilst we've only been around for a brief time, we've done considerably more to secure our continuing survival in that time, than octopuses have in theirs."
To me the jury is still out. Certainly the bulk of individuals are better off, due to technology, individuals tend to survive twice as long as their ancestors did. That does not convince me that the industrial revolution has done anything to ensure our survival as a species, it could quite easily become our downfall.
"Ants possess a degree of collective intelligence, yes, but it's an extremely limited intelligence, due to its distributed nature."
I could accept some of that paragraph iff you find me an example where intelligence does NOT emerge from lower level(s) of co-operating "automota". The analogy between ants and neurons was to show a human mind and the "mind" of an ants nest are both "distributed in nature". They are the "same" yet very different. All species of ant's nest have found close to the most effecient scavenging strategy possible. Sure it was achived by an evolutionary random walk thru the problem space over tens of millions of years. Assuming there are no mind/soul implants by divine beings, wasn't the human mind created the same way? For the same "purpose" of surviving in a particular "problem space"?
"And whilst we're talking about collective intelligence, what about the collective intelligence of humanity itself?"
Collectively I don't think we are that smart. I am not trying to downplay our achivements, they are indistingushable from magic. My best hope is to seek refuge in yet another quote from Dawkins....
"Be warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature. Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have a chance to upset their designs, something that no other species has ever aspired to do."
I try to heed that warning for my own selfish reasons. I think it will lead my grandchildren to a more profound understanding of "free will".
"A couple fans told me that my last journal entry was mint; give it a shot. Hope you like."
I read the whole tedious thing, all I can say is: "Self praise is worthless". You should hire a lumberjack to remove the chip on your shoulder.
Not to mention he was in Stalingrad fighting the "wrong war" in the first place!
Yes, I was thinking of the obvious vandalisim. I have no idea how they could handle the subtle stuff that is hard for a human to find.
"don't jump on here calling other people's quite valid interpretations down because "you think" you know better ".
Well excuse me for fucking breathing, who or what did I "call down"? Where does my comment even suggest "I know better"? Is your parinoid and insecure personality showing today?
"get some facts, then make a contribution that's actually worthwhile to read--just like this new system on the Wikipedia is Hoping to encourage."
Put down the crack pipe. I made the comment because I have edited on Wikipedia once or twice in the past and have also come across badly vandalised pages. Consider it a suggestion by an interested user, not a thesis on TFA.
"Here, you ass-hats get away with it, cuz slashdot is all about anyone's opinion"
In case you hadn't noticed this is a slashdot discussion, the whole fucking thing is based on OPINION. If you want a "fact" then how about the fact that your post does not contain any facts. In FACT your post is just another aggressive bile spewing opinion from a dickhead who does not "get it".
"Pull yer head out yer ass..."
You arrogant, unimaginitive little turd, how about you go first!
It's considered a waste of court time if the lawyer does not write a polite (threatening) letter to ask you to C&D before they sue you.
Didn't read TFA but that never stops me. I think they could restrict the size of the edit based on article metrics such as age, size, rate of change, rate of rollbacks, ect. Otherwise stable articles that are prone to vandalisim should have a unique pattern. Articles identified this way could have proposed edits submitted for user review, other users would have a time period to object.
Wiki vandalisim should be treated like a virus and identified automagically. The hard part is where do you draw the line between repairing vandalisim and group-think censorship?
I thought that, but I live in Australia, it's so like the 1950's here we made Mr P. Head our prime minister.
...and everyone of them would sooner or later poke themselves in the eye.
We don't talk about Lego, it killed Meccano. Only the rich kids had Mr. P. Head the rest of us had marbles and hulla hoops.
The other animals saw what happened to the curious cat.
Your living in it now. :)
If all your skills are in programming why should I pay a premium just because you are old. If you have matured and are also adept at avoiding finacial, political and technical potholes then it might be a different story. Not all programmers mature into developers, not everyone wants too, many get some cash and go and do something different in their thirties and fourties (eg:get so pissed off they start their own company).
There are places for old developers (as opposed to old programmers). I am 46 and the second youngest on a team of ~10 developers.
If an employer wants "yes men" then they can get plenty at the $2 shop but as a business strategy it is unsustainable. Where I work we tell each other "where to get off" often (mostly it's polite). All of us argue like a bunch of kids organising the rules and positions for a game of street footy. The difference between this group and a group of kids is we are all mature enough to know how to keep it a healthy rather than destructive influence.
As for "yes men", thousands of small and medium software houses make their money developing and supporting custom systems for one or two large customers. Someone who instintively says "yes" to authority, should be hidden from powerful customers.
I think you only have a vauge clue what you are talking about, let alone understand what I have been saying.
You appear to be arguing that humans and chimps are significantly more violent and cruel than other animals, and hold up the concept of war as evidence of your claim.
Bzzzzt, I'm sorry, I am arguing that humans and chimps evolved a survival strategy that we call war. This strategy is significantly different to other animals and is what I called "violence". Perhaps I confused you when I defined war as "violence" to distigush the behaviour from the background gnash of tooth and claw? What really pisses me off is you have managed to take your confusion, mix it with some personal baggage and project a whole heap of words and thoughts on to me that are simply not there. Did I say anything about cruelty? Did I bring up lions and cartoon characters? Where did I make any type of moral judgement or quantitative comaprison on any species (including humans)?
War has always been a part of us and I belive it is an evelotionary trait unique to great apes. War is not just lion behaviour with more technology. I also happen to agree with the other poster who said something like we also have an "equally great capacity for peace". This does not deny the "selfish gene" theory, what it says is that for most species, when it comes to killing their own kind, it is a "selfish and lazy gene" at work.
Personally I think the selfish gene theory is often used by arseholes to justify being an arsehole, it's a peversion of a great theory, like eugenics is a peversion of genetics. They (unlike Dawkins) say nothing about co-operation. eg: The mitochondrial symbiosis at the heart of all multi-cellular life. The mitochondria genes are being selfish, co-operative and are certainly succesfull?
Compared to humans, the their [octopi] intellect is a flickering candleflame compared to the nuclear brightness of humanity. Even the most moronic human far outstrips the capabilities of an octopus.
When working on human problems I would have to agree (except for independently discovering how to open a screw top jar). But when applied to survival problems humans look more like a flash in the pan. Ant colonies with millions of individuals can rebuild an "ant city" in under a week. Does this mean our species is smarter or dumber or does it simply mean humans define intelligence so that our species is at the pinicale of evolution. When you think about how other organisims, (particularly something as alien as an octopus), might percive the world you might realise that it does not make much sense to compare human and octopi IQ results.
"Internet routers, like ants, are unintelligent and follow a set of mindless rules."
"The argument of this book is that we, and all other animals, are machines created by our genes." - Chapt 1, The selfish gene.
Argue with that book and then we can talk about cognition as an emergent behaviour of simple physical rules. In the meantime stop putting words in my mouth, I did not say ants are intelligent ( to start with, they physically do not have a brain). Human brains are an intricately woven blob of neurons that individually follow a set of mindless rules. Both the ant and the neuron have evolved to co-operate, co-operation on the "mindless" level emerges as intelligent behavior on the "mindfull" level. Given that you have a hard time understanding me, what hope has a human got of seeing the world through the eye of an octupus.
But just because these rules are effective, doesn't mean intelligence is at play.
Yes, you have demonstrated that.
"The Lion King is not a substitute for a basic knowledge of biology. Animals do not try and preserve the environment"
You should take comprehension lessons if you read that in my posts. Like humans, lions behaviour has evolved they did not choose it.
"And what with this whole "non-human-like intelligence" rubbish?"
An ants nest is a nice example, so is an octopus but before we move on to advanced subjects watch the documentary that lion king was based on.
Just poking fun, the links were worth the read :)
"Animals with less intelligence do not war because they lack the capability, not the will to do so."
...Animals with non-human-like intelligence do not war because it is detrimental to THEIR species"...
You accuse me of being naive, I would say say you have a narrow view of intelligence. If you change the above to read
then I think we understand each other.
...I thought that idea ran out of steam decades ago...ba-da-boom!
We must have read different editions or something?