I didn't see anything that said the machines failed to function properly. If one is too stupid to grasp the concept of electronic menus then one isn't bright enough to making decisions about how the nation should be run.
I would not be at all surprised to find out that most of those 4 out of 7 people over the age of 65 have felt the effects of old age upon their minds. Sorry grey panthers. The elderly deserve respect for their time and we should all do our best to see to it that those in the golden years live comfortably. As a society we owe that to those who built the world we live in today as the following generations will owe it to us for our contributions to the world. That said, the right to make decisions in how society is run should be lost when retirement age comes.
I also think that drivers/pilots licenses should have to be renewed each year in person once retirement age is reached and that the renewal should require passing both vision tests and tests to measure reaction times. Every 5 years a driven test should probably have to be passed as well. The elderly are rarely in traffic accidents but it is not uncommon to find an elderly individual blissfully moving on after causing an accident behind them when they ran a stop sign or red light.
It doesn't break if that is what you are getting at. It just doesn't run at anything approaching speed. I've used a system with specs similar to what you are referring to and there was a noticable delay just opening a menu. You'd open the menu and then have to wait for the icons to fill in. When you open even a text editor you have to wait and wait some more before it finally appears and a attempting a search and replace operation in a medium sized text file is less than immediate.
You can work that way. Most windows based home pcs perform that way. If they didn't out of the box (usually they preload enough crap to make sure they do) they will from the spyware after a couple weeks.
Aside from mom's and grandmas, I don't know many who would be willing to cope with that kind of performance.
That seems reasonable enough. Unless you are buying the absolute fastest chip on the shelf with a massive premium you want to know which chip offers a superior architecture. Comparing the performance of two chips at the same clock tells you that. Especially since AMD chips are much lower in price than Intel chips. Assuming you don't have a limitless budget you can definately get a rock solid AMD chip that outperforms the equally priced Intel chip at any price point but the very top. Even most of the gaming crowd will be spending $1000 on their system, not on their processor.
'they may start argueing that we should only be allowed to compare Intel's old 65nm products (not the 45nm) to 65nm Barcelona, too.'
I doubt it but it is definately something to keep in mind. AMD runs neck and neck with Intel on performance. AMD always has that card to play, simply but upgrading their fabs the same design that competes with Intel while using an inferior fab process will suddenly blow Intel away. I find it very interesting that AMD's design is so far superior to Intels that their technology can compete with such a huge fab disadvantage. The newer fabs are probably why intel chips are so expensive. AMD probably makes more per chip while selling at a lower price.
'And Intel will ship Penryn processors IN VOLUME, so they'll be something you can buy, not just read about on test reviews designed to give the rest of AMDs product line a halo effect from one excellent part.'
Okay, APPLE might have a problem getting enough chips. Dell might have a problem. HP could have a problem. I've never heard of an individual being unable to get a currently manufactured AMD processor. You can probably buy all the currently manufactured chips from newegg right this second.
'Open source means free. Everything else is just a motivation to get people to work without being paid while the work itself is systematically devalued.'
Open source does not mean free as in beer. Its about freedom to use, modify, and distribute.
Lightweight indeed and just fine for me or you. But XFCE isn't or no gui is not really a fair comparison to a full featured UI like that in XP or Vista.
'As an employer, I should be able to rely on a recent graduate's grades to predict the ability to perform.'
But the purpose of school or any EDUCATIONAL facility is to educate, not to gauge ability for third parties or to prepare one for the workforce. You might hope that having knowledge will help you get a better job but universities exist for the benefit of the educated, not their future employer. Grades are a way of determining whether or not someone has learned the material well enough to advance, not to convey information to employers or anyone else.
You could make an argument that a trade school could be bent to fit your ideas. Professional certifications and courses from them are also designed to send a message to employers.
University diplomas and the grades that go along with them are simply being misused. Schools exist to better oneself and to convey knowledge. If having knowledge makes you employable its a side-effect. This would be true even if every student chose to better themselves as a means of employment/higher pay whoring. In fact, almost every student goes for that reason and its sad.
To be fair to vista, linux is a hell of a ram hog too. Although it outperforms Vista in most every way on the same hardware. Linux needs at least 512mb to perform well and because it does no swapping unless it needs it you will see huge performance increases if you give it a couple gigs. It'll just run everything from memory and for the rare occasion you need more ram than that, it turns on swap.
Hell, you can give XP 2gigs of RAM and turn off swapping but be prepared for the system to crash the minute you try to run photoshop and office at the same time.
'Why do people keep perpetuating this misnomer?? If you don't use Aero and instead switch to Windows Classic Appearance, Vista works great on a wide variety of machines.'
A variety of machines with really fast processors and boatloads of ram.
'Grades should evaluate the ability to *use* the material of a course.'
I disagree. That falls back to a measure of the intellect of the individual. That will play a role after school but you don't go to school to demonstrate your abilities or use material, you go to learn material.
'An A-level student is one who grasps the course material so well that he builds on it to produce other conclusions.'
I agree with that. Someone who has a fully grasp of the material understands it well. As I said, the grade should reflect understanding of the material that you took the course to learn. It should not reflect intellect (beyond that required to understand said material), creativity, etc.
'If you lack skills needed to compound your understanding of the material, tough luck. A B is not a poor grade...'
I never said a student with a more thorough understanding of the material shouldn't get an A. I said the A shouldn't be reserved for the quick thinking creative writer who can make up nonsense on the spot for a test question. The slow methodical student may have greater insight into the material but be less creative.
This is the same faulty logic that leads to essays and papers as a measure of understanding. Papers do demonstrate understanding but they aren't the best tool to do so. If papers are primary method used to measure understanding then you aren't ultimately measuring comprehension of the material, you are measuring writing ability.
'Coming up with an idea (even if totally made up) and the backing it up with arguments is much harder than memorization and regurgitation and actually backing it up with things having to do with that class shows you have learned something, or at least know about the concepts discussed in the class.'
Sure. It demonstrates that you've learned something and that you are a quick thinking and creative person. Your writing ability also plays a major role.
Unfortunately, you could learn the material without being creative, quick thinking, or a good writer. If you are this unfortunate sole you just got a lower grade. Grades are supposed to demonstrate understanding of the course material, not how bright you are.
For several years now AMD has had the lower price AND the superior product. They have always been the underdog but being both fast and cheap is a winning combination and has gained them market share. Now all the sudden Intel has turned the tides and now has the faster chip.
All those geeks who recommended and purchased AMD have turned around and begun buying intel because intel tops the benchmarks for once. I think AMD's price cuts are an excellent move, AMD had begun to be priced like Intel and this makes them more competative. If I have $200 to spend on a processor, I want the fastest processor I can get for $200, not the fastest series processor. Intel still has the fastest processor but I can get a faster AMD chip for $200.
'However, since you do not acknowledge that you live in a social world and hence none of the benefits of being white or male even exist,'
Living in a social world and believing that race gives one white males a benefit are not mutually inclusive. There are clear benefits to NOT being a white male. Those benefits are coded into law and regulations. I can honestly say that being a white male has never been of any benefit to me. Perhaps it could be helpful at a KKK rally (do they even still exist in substantial numbers? I would be surpised if there were more than 20,000 KKK'ers and neo-nazi's in a nation of 200,000,000) but there are no shortage of gang gatherings and neighborhoods where being of another 'race' would carry an equal benefit.
'to see people refer to it.'
Nobody could dispute that there are many idiots who believe in the concept of race and therefore that there are many idiots who refer to race, write papers about race, discuss the qualities of races, etc. That does not make racial lines objective and valid constructs or mean that white males have an advantage in life.
'One of the key aspects of sexism or racism is to discriminate,'
You are discriminating when you assume someone shares a characteristic because you have grouped them based upon race. Races aren't real, they are arbitrary collections of non-functional genetic characteristics. You could randomize the characteristics and switch them around and the result would be no more consistent or meaningful.
It is racist to believe someone is probably good at sports due to blackness (and contrary to popular belief, your just as racist if you are a black man coming to that conclusion). It is no more racist to believe a black man is lazy due to blackness.
'Women, it seems, tend to be more emotional creatures. While men, it seems, tend to focus more logic based creatures.'
I wouldn't mention that belief to a logical woman. She will probably get quite emotional.
'I'm of the opinion that we should celebrate and embrace our differences.'
I agree. So long as we don't group ourselves and develop culture based upon non-functional physical traits like skin-color and eye-color.
'Sorry, white males have insisted for centuries that they lived in a merit-based society that justified their disproportionate social and economic power.'
No. PEOPLE did bad things. White male is not a valid classification, the color and gender of those people is not relevent. The people who did those things were individuals and individually responsible for their actions. I am not one of those individuals and am neither responsible or liable for their actions.
'It's racist to assume that while ISN'T a race, that whiteness does NOT immediately provide privilege.'
It's never racist to not think in terms of race. It is always racist to think in terms of race.
'I was broke too once. But I do not blame the black or female students just out of college for it, because unlike them I've still got more access to better-paying jobs than they do.'
I don't blame black or female students for my economic status. I don't even blame the laws that give them an advantage simply because they were lucky enough to be born with the right color skin. I take responsibility for my own financial status as you should. I don't have access to better paying jobs than a female black student. I do however protest the laws because they give unfair advantage based upon criteria that is utterly ridiculous.
'Anecdote'
Absolutely meaningless. That is not a white guy and a black guy. That is two individuals. A black man can fit in with the culture of his company just as easily as a white man. It doesn't matter what color you are, you have to fit in, conform, and kiss ass to get ahead.
First, it wouldn't matter if your conclusions were correct since there are just as many incidents that go the other way. Here in Miami it is not at all uncommon for Hispanic businesses and clients to chose Hispanic service providers over anyone else.
Second, there are numerous other factors you ignore. Simply because one is black and one white does not mean that being black or white has anything to do with the result. The result could have been because of job performance. The black individual could have insisted on maintaining his 'blackness' by adhering to street culture. Sorry, the rest of us have to give up our fun pet cultures and music when we stop being teens and grow up. Or, the most likely of all, the white guy was in the right place at the right time and/or knew the right people.
I am confident that in addition to these two people you could probably name lots of white guys who didn't get this once in a lifetime opportunity as well. Perhaps you'd like to give an anecdote where you mention this lucky guy and this other white college who didn't get the opportunity so that you could demonstrate... what excuse for the result would you give there?
'Most localities in the US require this because as a society we value women having babies (even if she was drunk) more than we value men having drunken ski parties. How else are we, as a society, going to stave off those hoards of immigrants?'
That's great for society but society should keep its business practices for use in its own businesses and leave everyone else to run their businesses as they see fit.
'and you should want them to not be in conflicts over work and home'
Hence the reason you would hire the employee who doesn't have family concerns and can work the hours needed.
'Sometimes its inevitable, but as a manager you should be trying to prevent it when possible, not encourage a work culture around sacrificing everything for the company.'
Again, the best way to do this is to not hire people who have those conflicts in the first place.
'Maybe in the short term. But in the long term, having a business full of people who are happy with their work and home lives has much greater benefits.'
If you are hiring for positions that need someone on call 24/7 and you hire people who have personal commitments that make them unable to live up to that obligation then there won't be a long term for your business.
'Umm...black isn't a race, or an ethnicity, it's simply a categorization racists use to put "them" in another group from "us".'
Perhaps you are behind the times, black is the current politically correct term. African-American is out.
As far as categorizations go, race IS an arbitrary categorization. There really is no such thing as a race so the definitions for races are moving lines. Lets see, let me make one up. Okay, how about fair-skinned, red-heads with freckles. We will call them 'reds' or Irish-Americans since some of them know they have Irish ancestors. Lets give them a culture too, they feel they were oppressed because everyone called their ancestors potatoheads when they came over after the potato famine. We shall forget that half the reds migrated after the potato famine because they choose to join in with the other reds.
Of course, now we need to see how many colleges admit reds in relation to 'others'. If a college admitted significantly more 'others' it couldn't merely be chance or unrelated factors, the school is clearly prejudiced against reds. What if there are fewer executive reds? What if those executive reds on average make less money than 'others'? What if these statistics don't show anything at all because there is no valid reason to single out reds in the first place and no particular reason to think that a random sample of people would perform comparably to the rest of the population?
Races do not exist, there is no such thing. Therefore, there is no correct or incorrect definition of a race, there is no racist or non-racist definition. If you want to get technical, anyone who has ever referred to race is a racist since races are not valid groupings to begin with.
'And unless you spent today applying for jobs, stop complaining about economic advantages for hiring.'
Why shouldn't I (and everyone else classified the same way as me) complain about being selected based upon meaningless physical traits to be singled out and given a disadvantage when it comes time to go to college, get a job, receive funding to start a business, receive grants to go to school, receive government funding for... anything?
'Maybe because a woman who has to care for a child shouldn't be required to justify the circumstances of the conception. Dumbass.'
The circumstances don't matter. A man who had a skiing accident sober isn't guaranteed a job when he returns either. It doesn't matter why or how it happened, what matters is that the employer isn't responsible for it and the employer shouldn't have to suffer for it.
Stop thinking of mega corporation X where the money just magically appears and anything that isn't being spent is because corporation x is too cheap. Start thinking of the 4 man office owned by an employer who isn't taking home any more than the employees. The 4 men isn't an arbitrary number, its the minimum number of people who can handle the work load and the maximum number the company can afford to split up the profits between. Now, imagine one of those men has a skiing accident and is going to be out of commission for 4 months. Do you really think that company can afford to go without the 4th guy until he returns? Of course not, they have to fill that position. And they can't afford 5, so that is that. It doesn't matter why the 4th employee will be out of the office for 4 months, whether it is justified or not justified. The business can not survive without that employee and that is why the employee has a job.
'Well, by you logic, if your a gay guy. you probably think on an emotional level too and are inferior, so you shouldn't be in IT either.'
If that were the case then he would be saying those who think on an emotional rather than cold logical level are inferior. And he's right. He's also sexist, not all women (or gay men) think on an emotional level. The ones who do are inferior along with all the straight men who do so.
If you don't think you will find equal proportions of cold logic and warm emotion among straight men, gay men, and women then YOU must be the sexist... or maybe, just maybe, there can both be exceptions AND stereotypes can sometimes coincide with mean averages.
Now for the next great mystery that plagues mankind. Why is it that a black man will laugh with you if you make a crack about him liking KFC when not all black men like KFC? Why will that same black man get angry if you say that blacks have nappy hair when the lack of oil and frizziness it is a genetic trait that is an undisputed part of the definition of the black race?
For the record I am a young white male with a solid heinz 57 of European ancestry. That means I am a minority. I am the only race/gender/background combination that isn't allowed to talk about ANYONE. Its even racist if I refer to MY OWN RACE/GENDER. Yet somehow, all other races/genders are allowed to make fun of my race/gender all day long. I'm also broke, I want all that economic advantage they use to justify hiring a minority (which consists of EVERY other group/gender) over me.
'Think of it this way... What if an IT department didn't have women's bathrooms, because it was designed back when only men held IT jobs. So the job "requires" women to go to a different building to use the bathroom. If a women quits because she finds that annoying, it is literally correct to say that she isn't willing to accept the conditions of the job. But obviously no one would defend that situation.'
I fail to see how that scenario has any relation to the current question.
'That's putting an end to arbitrary conditions that create, in effect, special treatment for young, single men.'
False. That's putting an end to work demands that create, in effect, special treatment for anyone who is not the primary caregiver for kids. It has nothing to do with gender. Further the company didn't give people without children special treatment. You could claim they gave themselves that advantage by choosing not to have children or you could pass it off on fate if you have trouble owning responsibility for your actions.
It is illegal to discriminate based upon age, gender, race, or religion. It is neither or illegal or wrong to discriminate based upon dedication. Employees who sacrifice work performance and/or availability for things that are more important to them (doesn't really matter if it's children, family, or something else) are less dedicated to the job than those who do not. You might be justified in that choice, it might be the right choice. Maybe you should put your children and family before your job. But as an employer I'm making a bad business decision if I let understanding and sympathy interfere with choosing a candidate with greater dedication and availability.
It's really no different than refusing to hire an employee who has a second job because you don't want to schedule around it. The same is really true of daycare and maternity. It makes no more sense for employers to accommodate pregnant women or women who leave for maternity than it makes to accommodate anyone else who was injured outside of work. If a man has a little too much to drink and gets in a skiing accident that will make him unable to work for 3 months there isn't even a guarantee of a job when he returns. Why should a woman who has a little too much to drink gets knocked up be treated any differently?
Please understand, I am not saying that no companies should have jobs waiting for employees after pregnancy or accidents or accommodate injured employees. I am not saying that employers shouldn't consider providing daycare or work from home options. But it is a choice the company makes and they make those choices for business reasons. They might attract better employees that perform better or be able to pay employees lower salaries (something has to PAY for those accommodations after all). But there is no just reason to force them to provide those things.
'Umm... This is really an odd statement, here. What do you care that someone can convincingly file any sort of transaction under your name (SSN and Mother's Maiden Name). What do you care that someone could borrow $150,000, and put up your house as security.'
These are all problems for someone with good credit and/or assets or maybe even money. For the majority of the population this is not the case. Most of us don't own a home or even a decent car. Most of us have no credit worth mentioning and probably bad credit besides. What difference does it make if the number you owe on paper grows? It isn't like you could have paid what was there anyway. A few more collectors harassing you? That is why you got a machine years ago. Time in court? Please, you can't afford to file bankruptcy, especially if the only purpose it serves to erase an imaginary debt (I say imaginary because the only chance it has of being paid or collected is in the imagination).
'What do you care that someone could use your info to launder money, with a trail leading right to you when the feds look into it and an onus on you to prove it wasn't you?'
The burden is on the feds, not on you. Someone must have gained access to your information, you never went to those places and conducted business. The guy on the bank security cameras wasn't you. The information and picture on the ID the bank photocopied doesn't match yours. How about proof of address? What did they use for that? If they used your address then you would have been sent paperwork before that became an issue. And even without any of that, a claim that someone else used your information is easily within the realm of reasonable doubt. The feds would have to prove not only that my information was used but that it was me who used it. That is of course assuming that you can manage to force your public defender to go to trial instead of plea bargaining. Typically they have enourmous case loads and often are regular attorneys who don't want to waste time on the freebie case.
That is a problem as well. In the world of computer databases it has become far too difficult to be anonymous disappear or even stay private via a crowd.
If the bank wants to assign me a unique number so they can distinguish between me and other customers then that is great. I don't see any reason there needs to be a global fixed number that some other bank can refer to in order to find out information that is unrelated to my history with them.
The world functioned before we had social security numbers and credit reporting agencies. Bad guys were caught, terrorists sometimes stopped, sometimes not. Much like now.
Google. That is the only tool you really need. Proficient googling will give you the appropriate result, whether it is contained in tldp (almost never), a wiki, a forum, some ascii file attached to a source bundle, whatever. Google indexes all those things.
Actually looking at the project page, wiki, or forum manually is a desperate and last resort and rarely yields an answer if google didnt (probably because those are all in the google index).
'which generally have a horrible search, a limited search, or NO search'
Google is the only search. It indexes that posts in that forum along with everything else. Google is the best documentation and helpdesk I have ever found.
Slashdot Mirror
I didn't see anything that said the machines failed to function properly. If one is too stupid to grasp the concept of electronic menus then one isn't bright enough to making decisions about how the nation should be run.
I would not be at all surprised to find out that most of those 4 out of 7 people over the age of 65 have felt the effects of old age upon their minds. Sorry grey panthers. The elderly deserve respect for their time and we should all do our best to see to it that those in the golden years live comfortably. As a society we owe that to those who built the world we live in today as the following generations will owe it to us for our contributions to the world. That said, the right to make decisions in how society is run should be lost when retirement age comes.
I also think that drivers/pilots licenses should have to be renewed each year in person once retirement age is reached and that the renewal should require passing both vision tests and tests to measure reaction times. Every 5 years a driven test should probably have to be passed as well. The elderly are rarely in traffic accidents but it is not uncommon to find an elderly individual blissfully moving on after causing an accident behind them when they ran a stop sign or red light.
It doesn't break if that is what you are getting at. It just doesn't run at anything approaching speed. I've used a system with specs similar to what you are referring to and there was a noticable delay just opening a menu. You'd open the menu and then have to wait for the icons to fill in. When you open even a text editor you have to wait and wait some more before it finally appears and a attempting a search and replace operation in a medium sized text file is less than immediate.
You can work that way. Most windows based home pcs perform that way. If they didn't out of the box (usually they preload enough crap to make sure they do) they will from the spyware after a couple weeks.
Aside from mom's and grandmas, I don't know many who would be willing to cope with that kind of performance.
'AMD only wants to compare same-clock chips'
That seems reasonable enough. Unless you are buying the absolute fastest chip on the shelf with a massive premium you want to know which chip offers a superior architecture. Comparing the performance of two chips at the same clock tells you that. Especially since AMD chips are much lower in price than Intel chips. Assuming you don't have a limitless budget you can definately get a rock solid AMD chip that outperforms the equally priced Intel chip at any price point but the very top. Even most of the gaming crowd will be spending $1000 on their system, not on their processor.
'they may start argueing that we should only be allowed to compare Intel's old 65nm products (not the 45nm) to 65nm Barcelona, too.'
I doubt it but it is definately something to keep in mind. AMD runs neck and neck with Intel on performance. AMD always has that card to play, simply but upgrading their fabs the same design that competes with Intel while using an inferior fab process will suddenly blow Intel away. I find it very interesting that AMD's design is so far superior to Intels that their technology can compete with such a huge fab disadvantage. The newer fabs are probably why intel chips are so expensive. AMD probably makes more per chip while selling at a lower price.
'And Intel will ship Penryn processors IN VOLUME, so they'll be something you can buy, not just read about on test reviews designed to give the rest of AMDs product line a halo effect from one excellent part.'
Okay, APPLE might have a problem getting enough chips. Dell might have a problem. HP could have a problem. I've never heard of an individual being unable to get a currently manufactured AMD processor. You can probably buy all the currently manufactured chips from newegg right this second.
'Open source means free. Everything else is just a motivation to get people to work without being paid while the work itself is systematically devalued.'
Open source does not mean free as in beer. Its about freedom to use, modify, and distribute.
Language is defined by usage, not by reference. Open source has been used as a verb longer than google and Oxford has already recognized google.
'but Xubuntu (XFCE, pretty lightweight)'
Lightweight indeed and just fine for me or you. But XFCE isn't or no gui is not really a fair comparison to a full featured UI like that in XP or Vista.
'And herein lies our disagreement.'
Indeed.
'As an employer, I should be able to rely on a recent graduate's grades to predict the ability to perform.'
But the purpose of school or any EDUCATIONAL facility is to educate, not to gauge ability for third parties or to prepare one for the workforce. You might hope that having knowledge will help you get a better job but universities exist for the benefit of the educated, not their future employer. Grades are a way of determining whether or not someone has learned the material well enough to advance, not to convey information to employers or anyone else.
You could make an argument that a trade school could be bent to fit your ideas. Professional certifications and courses from them are also designed to send a message to employers.
University diplomas and the grades that go along with them are simply being misused. Schools exist to better oneself and to convey knowledge. If having knowledge makes you employable its a side-effect. This would be true even if every student chose to better themselves as a means of employment/higher pay whoring. In fact, almost every student goes for that reason and its sad.
To be fair to vista, linux is a hell of a ram hog too. Although it outperforms Vista in most every way on the same hardware. Linux needs at least 512mb to perform well and because it does no swapping unless it needs it you will see huge performance increases if you give it a couple gigs. It'll just run everything from memory and for the rare occasion you need more ram than that, it turns on swap.
Hell, you can give XP 2gigs of RAM and turn off swapping but be prepared for the system to crash the minute you try to run photoshop and office at the same time.
'Why do people keep perpetuating this misnomer?? If you don't use Aero and instead switch to Windows Classic Appearance, Vista works great on a wide variety of machines.'
A variety of machines with really fast processors and boatloads of ram.
'Is Beryl (not required for Ubuntu) as bad as this guy makes it out to be?'
It just so happens that I am running both. I have had no problems with Beryl so far.
'Is Feisty (required for Ubuntu 7.04) as bad as this guy makes it out to be?'
The only hiccup I have had is that my sound card was incorrectly detected and this card works with previous Ubuntu releases.
'Grades should evaluate the ability to *use* the material of a course.'
I disagree. That falls back to a measure of the intellect of the individual. That will play a role after school but you don't go to school to demonstrate your abilities or use material, you go to learn material.
'An A-level student is one who grasps the course material so well that he builds on it to produce other conclusions.'
I agree with that. Someone who has a fully grasp of the material understands it well. As I said, the grade should reflect understanding of the material that you took the course to learn. It should not reflect intellect (beyond that required to understand said material), creativity, etc.
'If you lack skills needed to compound your understanding of the material, tough luck. A B is not a poor grade...'
I never said a student with a more thorough understanding of the material shouldn't get an A. I said the A shouldn't be reserved for the quick thinking creative writer who can make up nonsense on the spot for a test question. The slow methodical student may have greater insight into the material but be less creative.
This is the same faulty logic that leads to essays and papers as a measure of understanding. Papers do demonstrate understanding but they aren't the best tool to do so. If papers are primary method used to measure understanding then you aren't ultimately measuring comprehension of the material, you are measuring writing ability.
'Coming up with an idea (even if totally made up) and the backing it up with arguments is much harder than memorization and regurgitation and actually backing it up with things having to do with that class shows you have learned something, or at least know about the concepts discussed in the class.'
Sure. It demonstrates that you've learned something and that you are a quick thinking and creative person. Your writing ability also plays a major role.
Unfortunately, you could learn the material without being creative, quick thinking, or a good writer. If you are this unfortunate sole you just got a lower grade. Grades are supposed to demonstrate understanding of the course material, not how bright you are.
For several years now AMD has had the lower price AND the superior product. They have always been the underdog but being both fast and cheap is a winning combination and has gained them market share. Now all the sudden Intel has turned the tides and now has the faster chip.
All those geeks who recommended and purchased AMD have turned around and begun buying intel because intel tops the benchmarks for once. I think AMD's price cuts are an excellent move, AMD had begun to be priced like Intel and this makes them more competative. If I have $200 to spend on a processor, I want the fastest processor I can get for $200, not the fastest series processor. Intel still has the fastest processor but I can get a faster AMD chip for $200.
'However, since you do not acknowledge that you live in a social world and hence none of the benefits of being white or male even exist,'
Living in a social world and believing that race gives one white males a benefit are not mutually inclusive. There are clear benefits to NOT being a white male. Those benefits are coded into law and regulations. I can honestly say that being a white male has never been of any benefit to me. Perhaps it could be helpful at a KKK rally (do they even still exist in substantial numbers? I would be surpised if there were more than 20,000 KKK'ers and neo-nazi's in a nation of 200,000,000) but there are no shortage of gang gatherings and neighborhoods where being of another 'race' would carry an equal benefit.
'to see people refer to it.'
Nobody could dispute that there are many idiots who believe in the concept of race and therefore that there are many idiots who refer to race, write papers about race, discuss the qualities of races, etc. That does not make racial lines objective and valid constructs or mean that white males have an advantage in life.
'One of the key aspects of sexism or racism is to discriminate,'
You are discriminating when you assume someone shares a characteristic because you have grouped them based upon race. Races aren't real, they are arbitrary collections of non-functional genetic characteristics. You could randomize the characteristics and switch them around and the result would be no more consistent or meaningful.
It is racist to believe someone is probably good at sports due to blackness (and contrary to popular belief, your just as racist if you are a black man coming to that conclusion). It is no more racist to believe a black man is lazy due to blackness.
'Women, it seems, tend to be more emotional creatures. While men, it seems, tend to focus more logic based creatures.'
I wouldn't mention that belief to a logical woman. She will probably get quite emotional.
'I'm of the opinion that we should celebrate and embrace our differences.'
I agree. So long as we don't group ourselves and develop culture based upon non-functional physical traits like skin-color and eye-color.
'Sorry, white males have insisted for centuries that they lived in a merit-based society that justified their disproportionate social and economic power.'
No. PEOPLE did bad things. White male is not a valid classification, the color and gender of those people is not relevent. The people who did those things were individuals and individually responsible for their actions. I am not one of those individuals and am neither responsible or liable for their actions.
'It's racist to assume that while ISN'T a race, that whiteness does NOT immediately provide privilege.'
It's never racist to not think in terms of race. It is always racist to think in terms of race.
'I was broke too once. But I do not blame the black or female students just out of college for it, because unlike them I've still got more access to better-paying jobs than they do.'
I don't blame black or female students for my economic status. I don't even blame the laws that give them an advantage simply because they were lucky enough to be born with the right color skin. I take responsibility for my own financial status as you should. I don't have access to better paying jobs than a female black student. I do however protest the laws because they give unfair advantage based upon criteria that is utterly ridiculous.
'Anecdote'
Absolutely meaningless. That is not a white guy and a black guy. That is two individuals. A black man can fit in with the culture of his company just as easily as a white man. It doesn't matter what color you are, you have to fit in, conform, and kiss ass to get ahead.
First, it wouldn't matter if your conclusions were correct since there are just as many incidents that go the other way. Here in Miami it is not at all uncommon for Hispanic businesses and clients to chose Hispanic service providers over anyone else.
Second, there are numerous other factors you ignore. Simply because one is black and one white does not mean that being black or white has anything to do with the result. The result could have been because of job performance. The black individual could have insisted on maintaining his 'blackness' by adhering to street culture. Sorry, the rest of us have to give up our fun pet cultures and music when we stop being teens and grow up. Or, the most likely of all, the white guy was in the right place at the right time and/or knew the right people.
I am confident that in addition to these two people you could probably name lots of white guys who didn't get this once in a lifetime opportunity as well. Perhaps you'd like to give an anecdote where you mention this lucky guy and this other white college who didn't get the opportunity so that you could demonstrate... what excuse for the result would you give there?
'Most localities in the US require this because as a society we value women having babies (even if she was drunk) more than we value men having drunken ski parties. How else are we, as a society, going to stave off those hoards of immigrants?'
That's great for society but society should keep its business practices for use in its own businesses and leave everyone else to run their businesses as they see fit.
'and you should want them to not be in conflicts over work and home'
Hence the reason you would hire the employee who doesn't have family concerns and can work the hours needed.
'Sometimes its inevitable, but as a manager you should be trying to prevent it when possible, not encourage a work culture around sacrificing everything for the company.'
Again, the best way to do this is to not hire people who have those conflicts in the first place.
'Maybe in the short term. But in the long term, having a business full of people who are happy with their work and home lives has much greater benefits.'
If you are hiring for positions that need someone on call 24/7 and you hire people who have personal commitments that make them unable to live up to that obligation then there won't be a long term for your business.
'Umm...black isn't a race, or an ethnicity, it's simply a categorization racists use to put "them" in another group from "us".'
Perhaps you are behind the times, black is the current politically correct term. African-American is out.
As far as categorizations go, race IS an arbitrary categorization. There really is no such thing as a race so the definitions for races are moving lines. Lets see, let me make one up. Okay, how about fair-skinned, red-heads with freckles. We will call them 'reds' or Irish-Americans since some of them know they have Irish ancestors. Lets give them a culture too, they feel they were oppressed because everyone called their ancestors potatoheads when they came over after the potato famine. We shall forget that half the reds migrated after the potato famine because they choose to join in with the other reds.
Of course, now we need to see how many colleges admit reds in relation to 'others'. If a college admitted significantly more 'others' it couldn't merely be chance or unrelated factors, the school is clearly prejudiced against reds. What if there are fewer executive reds? What if those executive reds on average make less money than 'others'? What if these statistics don't show anything at all because there is no valid reason to single out reds in the first place and no particular reason to think that a random sample of people would perform comparably to the rest of the population?
Races do not exist, there is no such thing. Therefore, there is no correct or incorrect definition of a race, there is no racist or non-racist definition. If you want to get technical, anyone who has ever referred to race is a racist since races are not valid groupings to begin with.
'And unless you spent today applying for jobs, stop complaining about economic advantages for hiring.'
Why shouldn't I (and everyone else classified the same way as me) complain about being selected based upon meaningless physical traits to be singled out and given a disadvantage when it comes time to go to college, get a job, receive funding to start a business, receive grants to go to school, receive government funding for... anything?
'Maybe because a woman who has to care for a child shouldn't be required to justify the circumstances of the conception. Dumbass.'
The circumstances don't matter. A man who had a skiing accident sober isn't guaranteed a job when he returns either. It doesn't matter why or how it happened, what matters is that the employer isn't responsible for it and the employer shouldn't have to suffer for it.
Stop thinking of mega corporation X where the money just magically appears and anything that isn't being spent is because corporation x is too cheap. Start thinking of the 4 man office owned by an employer who isn't taking home any more than the employees. The 4 men isn't an arbitrary number, its the minimum number of people who can handle the work load and the maximum number the company can afford to split up the profits between. Now, imagine one of those men has a skiing accident and is going to be out of commission for 4 months. Do you really think that company can afford to go without the 4th guy until he returns? Of course not, they have to fill that position. And they can't afford 5, so that is that. It doesn't matter why the 4th employee will be out of the office for 4 months, whether it is justified or not justified. The business can not survive without that employee and that is why the employee has a job.
'Well, by you logic, if your a gay guy. you probably think on an emotional level too and are inferior, so you shouldn't be in IT either.'
If that were the case then he would be saying those who think on an emotional rather than cold logical level are inferior. And he's right. He's also sexist, not all women (or gay men) think on an emotional level. The ones who do are inferior along with all the straight men who do so.
If you don't think you will find equal proportions of cold logic and warm emotion among straight men, gay men, and women then YOU must be the sexist... or maybe, just maybe, there can both be exceptions AND stereotypes can sometimes coincide with mean averages.
Now for the next great mystery that plagues mankind. Why is it that a black man will laugh with you if you make a crack about him liking KFC when not all black men like KFC? Why will that same black man get angry if you say that blacks have nappy hair when the lack of oil and frizziness it is a genetic trait that is an undisputed part of the definition of the black race?
For the record I am a young white male with a solid heinz 57 of European ancestry. That means I am a minority. I am the only race/gender/background combination that isn't allowed to talk about ANYONE. Its even racist if I refer to MY OWN RACE/GENDER. Yet somehow, all other races/genders are allowed to make fun of my race/gender all day long. I'm also broke, I want all that economic advantage they use to justify hiring a minority (which consists of EVERY other group/gender) over me.
'Think of it this way... What if an IT department didn't have women's bathrooms, because it was designed back when only men held IT jobs. So the job "requires" women to go to a different building to use the bathroom. If a women quits because she finds that annoying, it is literally correct to say that she isn't willing to accept the conditions of the job. But obviously no one would defend that situation.'
I fail to see how that scenario has any relation to the current question.
'That's putting an end to arbitrary conditions that create, in effect, special treatment for young, single men.'
False. That's putting an end to work demands that create, in effect, special treatment for anyone who is not the primary caregiver for kids. It has nothing to do with gender. Further the company didn't give people without children special treatment. You could claim they gave themselves that advantage by choosing not to have children or you could pass it off on fate if you have trouble owning responsibility for your actions.
It is illegal to discriminate based upon age, gender, race, or religion. It is neither or illegal or wrong to discriminate based upon dedication. Employees who sacrifice work performance and/or availability for things that are more important to them (doesn't really matter if it's children, family, or something else) are less dedicated to the job than those who do not. You might be justified in that choice, it might be the right choice. Maybe you should put your children and family before your job. But as an employer I'm making a bad business decision if I let understanding and sympathy interfere with choosing a candidate with greater dedication and availability.
It's really no different than refusing to hire an employee who has a second job because you don't want to schedule around it. The same is really true of daycare and maternity. It makes no more sense for employers to accommodate pregnant women or women who leave for maternity than it makes to accommodate anyone else who was injured outside of work. If a man has a little too much to drink and gets in a skiing accident that will make him unable to work for 3 months there isn't even a guarantee of a job when he returns. Why should a woman who has a little too much to drink gets knocked up be treated any differently?
Please understand, I am not saying that no companies should have jobs waiting for employees after pregnancy or accidents or accommodate injured employees. I am not saying that employers shouldn't consider providing daycare or work from home options. But it is a choice the company makes and they make those choices for business reasons. They might attract better employees that perform better or be able to pay employees lower salaries (something has to PAY for those accommodations after all). But there is no just reason to force them to provide those things.
'Umm... This is really an odd statement, here. What do you care that someone can convincingly file any sort of transaction under your name (SSN and Mother's Maiden Name). What do you care that someone could borrow $150,000, and put up your house as security.'
These are all problems for someone with good credit and/or assets or maybe even money. For the majority of the population this is not the case. Most of us don't own a home or even a decent car. Most of us have no credit worth mentioning and probably bad credit besides. What difference does it make if the number you owe on paper grows? It isn't like you could have paid what was there anyway. A few more collectors harassing you? That is why you got a machine years ago. Time in court? Please, you can't afford to file bankruptcy, especially if the only purpose it serves to erase an imaginary debt (I say imaginary because the only chance it has of being paid or collected is in the imagination).
'What do you care that someone could use your info to launder money, with a trail leading right to you when the feds look into it and an onus on you to prove it wasn't you?'
The burden is on the feds, not on you. Someone must have gained access to your information, you never went to those places and conducted business. The guy on the bank security cameras wasn't you. The information and picture on the ID the bank photocopied doesn't match yours. How about proof of address? What did they use for that? If they used your address then you would have been sent paperwork before that became an issue. And even without any of that, a claim that someone else used your information is easily within the realm of reasonable doubt. The feds would have to prove not only that my information was used but that it was me who used it. That is of course assuming that you can manage to force your public defender to go to trial instead of plea bargaining. Typically they have enourmous case loads and often are regular attorneys who don't want to waste time on the freebie case.
'The problem is not that it is unique'
That is a problem as well. In the world of computer databases it has become far too difficult to be anonymous disappear or even stay private via a crowd.
If the bank wants to assign me a unique number so they can distinguish between me and other customers then that is great. I don't see any reason there needs to be a global fixed number that some other bank can refer to in order to find out information that is unrelated to my history with them.
The world functioned before we had social security numbers and credit reporting agencies. Bad guys were caught, terrorists sometimes stopped, sometimes not. Much like now.
Google. That is the only tool you really need. Proficient googling will give you the appropriate result, whether it is contained in tldp (almost never), a wiki, a forum, some ascii file attached to a source bundle, whatever. Google indexes all those things.
Actually looking at the project page, wiki, or forum manually is a desperate and last resort and rarely yields an answer if google didnt (probably because those are all in the google index).
'which generally have a horrible search, a limited search, or NO search'
Google is the only search. It indexes that posts in that forum along with everything else. Google is the best documentation and helpdesk I have ever found.