Darwin is an entire operating system distribution with CLI interface. The operating system does not consist of an operating environment suitable for users. The operating system only consists of an operating environment for programs. Operating System and kernel are the same thing.
The same is true of windows. Explorer is an Application and so is the graphical interface. Only the windows kernel is actually part of the operating system.
Maybe they are your customers but my customers earn that classification by giving me some form of payment. Customers are someone you have an obligation to. Nobody has an obligation to these guys except Oracle.
Linux is an operating system. The kernel is the only and only component of the operating system. Everything else is just a library, application, or memory resident application that runs on top of that kernel. You must be confusing an operating system with an operating environment for users, those are called operating system distributions or just distributions.
The confusion in these terms have been inappropriately spread by Microsoft and Apple who refer to their distributions as operating systems because they do not allow competing distributions based upon their operating systems.
'Gold farming is a serious issue that undermines the integrity of the games we invest our time and money in to play.'
Some people have less time and more money. Gold farming helps to balance the game play for them. The first thing that gold farming tell you is that the game has some sort of boring repetitive time sync task that needs to be eliminated. The is true of botting and macroing. Succeeding in a game should be a combination of luck and skill, syncing more time into the game shouldn't give you an edge at all.
Come now. If you aren't a gay male and think having a Mac is sexy then I am going to predict you have lots of females who view you as 'just as friend'.
'XP's underlying NT kernel and merging of the Windows 9x interfaces made it useful.'
Actually Win2000 did that. XP gave the interface a makeover that nobody really liked. Everyone I know of avoided XP (just like they are avoiding Vista) but it spread anyway since it comes on computers and 2000 now receives a reduced level of support.
'Not really, assuming that the hypothetical creator have evolved from single celled life, it is easy to hypothesise that the creation was instansiated by a team of extra dimensional scientists and engineers. Having a multiple of beings working together thus makes the hypothesis more plausable.'
If you were referring to the creation of life on Earth, sure. If you are referring to the creation of the Universe that doesn't seem as plausible. The same is true of aliens.
Thats 1MB of memory you were giving up for absolutely nothing. Using the classic desktop and turning off all the eye candy makes the desktop much more responsive.
There are dozens of things that serve no worthwhile purpose in windows you can turn off to gain 1-5mb of ram. They add up.
Or, like every other religion. It is a tool used to exploit, control, and herd primitive peoples. I just find it depressing that there are still so many primitives that believe it today. I mean seriously, there are bible stories that every bit as ridiculous as the most hokey of Greek mythology. You have spirits, you have Egyptian wizards (who the bible claims had actual powers, moses just had greater powers) you have sea monsters, psychics, giants, talking snakes, flaming bushes, people rising from the dead, walking on water, the sick being healed, etc.
Those make for great stories but where are any of those things today? You have no real psychics, wizards, witches, witchcraft, giants, talking animals, no magic, no blind men being healed by supernatural forces, no prophets, no flaming bushes, Nada, zip, zilch, not one provable miracle in the age of science and information. There is absolutely no credible reason to believe that any of those things ever existed outside of creative imaginations. What is the difference between then and now? Dissemination of information is it. It is difficult to perpetrate a substantial hoax in this age of increased awareness.
Today Jesus would be another David Blane or even the homeless guy carrying a sign in the subway.
'Observations are trivial truths, and such truth only exists for the observing individual. They meaningless until they are incorporated (whether to prove/disprove/develop) into some sort of theory.'
Technically any truth exists only to the individual. Some would say the difference is that other people corroborate your observation or truth but your awareness that others have done so and indeed the existence of the others at all is merely observation.
Individually observations are trivial truths although they are the most substantial truths that exist. And indeed, they are useless (not meaningless, you base theories on the implied meaning of the observations) for anything but the formation of a theory. Then again, theories are both meaningless and useless if they are not based upon those trivial truth observations.
Theories and Observations are both useless without one another. None of that changes that observations are facts, theories exist to coax more repeatable observations and that observations are the only facts that exist.
Multiple beings are a possibility as well. Although that introduces greater complexity yet and is therefore even less likely.
'Personally I wouldn't call you an agnostic, at all.'
I prefer to stick with the dictionary myself. I also don't think one has to ignore the fact that the introduction of a creator makes for greater complexity in determining the origins of the universe and the more creators the more complexity therefore the less likely. Unlikely is not impossible. Unlike some I am satisfied to be aware of those facts without feeling some compelling need to arrive at an opinion or to choose a side.
'No one got it right'
Of course no one got it right. The odds of a man making up a creation myth that happens to match the truth out of the billions of possibilities are phenomenally poor. I am less sure of previous observances of gravity reoccurring upon the next experiment than I am of that one.
This is my typical recommendation for clients. Power management functions in windows are highly unstable. The PC doesn't wake half the time if you use any power management beyond having the monitor go on low power mode. The monitor uses less power when off then on low power mode.
The advice is simple. Turn off all power management. If you walk away for a second your system will be ready and responsive. If you walk away for 15+min turn off your monitor. If you leave for 8hr+ turn off your PC.
'With win2000 the interface still sucked. XP made big strides in making the interface less sucky.'
Less sucky in what way? Anyone who knows how uses the classic start menu and control panel. The only thing that really leaves is the theme and anyone who is at all concerned about performance uses the windows classic theme.
'Science is meaningful and helpful, and it would be a real shame if its pursuit were to be abandoned, but calling science truth is just as bad as calling it a lie.'
Not at all, there are two facets to science. The first is the one everyone focuses on. The formation of theories. The part everyone ignores is the observation phase. While the formation of theories to explain observations is the process of creating models and not to be confused with truth (it isn't even supposed to be truth); I view the theories as a means to gather more observations. The primary function of science is to collect observations and establish new observations by postulating behaviors and then subsequently observing those behaviors. Observations are fact, and fact is also truth.
'the question evolution fails to answer and which makes it counterintuitive is "Where/How/When did it all start"'
Evolution makes no claims about the origin of life. It could have been done by the Christian god when he created life. He might have done it via evolution. Contrary to what preachers would tell the ignorant followers who don't read and interpret the bible for themselves there is no conflict between evolution and creation.
'Thats natural selection, Creationists do not dispute that fit creatures(created things) survive and unfit creatures don't.'
Maybe you do. Most have already decided they don't believe in evolution so when you break it into the pieces they are forced to admit, like natural selection they refuse logical debate. Natural selection is 99% of evolution. The other 1% is how new genes (and therefore traits) come into being. That is the part that is debated by scientists. Scientists have no doubt that Evolution occurs the only question is how the new traits come into being. If people evolve to have purple eyes where did the purple eye gene come from? I believe that things aren't that simple, there are multiple answers. One obvious answer is that new changes in genes are called mutations and those mutations occur under radiation. Since those mutations are random most mutations are worthless, natural selection then takes over to determine if they will be passed on.
Its really hard to dispute this when humans share common ancestral genetic code with rats. In the same way we can use DNA to determine if you are related to someone, we have used DNA to show that all humans are related to rats (and many other diverse lifeforms). That means we all evolved from a common ancestor.
'First: you're completely wrong. If 1% of scientists actively reject evolution as absolutely the best answer for the origin and evolution of life on this planet, I'd be utterly stunned..01% would still be pretty damn surprising.'
He skewed his statistic to cook the numbers. He didn't refer to how many scientists believe in evolution, he referred to how many scientists believe in Darwinian evolution. The general concept of evolution is pretty much accepted as fact, whether Darwin had the right of it is what is debated.
'Only 51% of physical scientists believe in any form of Darwinian evolution.'
Great. Thats a fine useless number. Now how many believe in more modern views of evolution? 99% or so I would suppose and rest are a few fundementalist crackpots.
Slashdot Mirror
'So what's a kernel ?'
That is answered in the statement you quoted.
'everyone except hardcore academics and pedantic wankers'
I see, everyone who doesn't agree with your point of view is a 'insert misc insulting noun here'. Got it. Now, begone troll.
Darwin is an entire operating system distribution with CLI interface. The operating system does not consist of an operating environment suitable for users. The operating system only consists of an operating environment for programs. Operating System and kernel are the same thing.
The same is true of windows. Explorer is an Application and so is the graphical interface. Only the windows kernel is actually part of the operating system.
'who are really our customers'
Maybe they are your customers but my customers earn that classification by giving me some form of payment. Customers are someone you have an obligation to. Nobody has an obligation to these guys except Oracle.
'Linux is an operatings system kernel'
Linux is an operating system. The kernel is the only and only component of the operating system. Everything else is just a library, application, or memory resident application that runs on top of that kernel. You must be confusing an operating system with an operating environment for users, those are called operating system distributions or just distributions.
The confusion in these terms have been inappropriately spread by Microsoft and Apple who refer to their distributions as operating systems because they do not allow competing distributions based upon their operating systems.
'Sounds like evolution to me. I wonder if there are biological instances of a "merger" after branching for a while?'
Remember when that non-slashdoter you knew got a girl who wasn't his sister knocked up? That was a biological merger.
'So......pursuing your argument a little further, should we all just use windows ????'
If you are looking for a one size fits all operating system, it'd be Linux, not windows.
'Gold farming is a serious issue that undermines the integrity of the games we invest our time and money in to play.'
Some people have less time and more money. Gold farming helps to balance the game play for them. The first thing that gold farming tell you is that the game has some sort of boring repetitive time sync task that needs to be eliminated. The is true of botting and macroing. Succeeding in a game should be a combination of luck and skill, syncing more time into the game shouldn't give you an edge at all.
Because Wow and most windows games work perfectly under Cedegra?
'or a Mac for ... looking sexy?'
Come now. If you aren't a gay male and think having a Mac is sexy then I am going to predict you have lots of females who view you as 'just as friend'.
Fair enough, why would you put a crappy dodge Postgres backend on a Ferrari like MySQL?
'I have 2G of ram. I'm not going to lose sleep over 1M here and there.'
That's enough to run Vista if you don't need to do anything fancy.
'XP's underlying NT kernel and merging of the Windows 9x interfaces made it useful.'
Actually Win2000 did that. XP gave the interface a makeover that nobody really liked. Everyone I know of avoided XP (just like they are avoiding Vista) but it spread anyway since it comes on computers and 2000 now receives a reduced level of support.
'Not really, assuming that the hypothetical creator have evolved from single celled life, it is easy to hypothesise that the creation was instansiated by a team of extra dimensional scientists and engineers. Having a multiple of beings working together thus makes the hypothesis more plausable.'
If you were referring to the creation of life on Earth, sure. If you are referring to the creation of the Universe that doesn't seem as plausible. The same is true of aliens.
'Gained about 1MB free memory.'
Thats 1MB of memory you were giving up for absolutely nothing. Using the classic desktop and turning off all the eye candy makes the desktop much more responsive.
There are dozens of things that serve no worthwhile purpose in windows you can turn off to gain 1-5mb of ram. They add up.
Or, like every other religion. It is a tool used to exploit, control, and herd primitive peoples. I just find it depressing that there are still so many primitives that believe it today. I mean seriously, there are bible stories that every bit as ridiculous as the most hokey of Greek mythology. You have spirits, you have Egyptian wizards (who the bible claims had actual powers, moses just had greater powers) you have sea monsters, psychics, giants, talking snakes, flaming bushes, people rising from the dead, walking on water, the sick being healed, etc.
Those make for great stories but where are any of those things today? You have no real psychics, wizards, witches, witchcraft, giants, talking animals, no magic, no blind men being healed by supernatural forces, no prophets, no flaming bushes, Nada, zip, zilch, not one provable miracle in the age of science and information. There is absolutely no credible reason to believe that any of those things ever existed outside of creative imaginations. What is the difference between then and now? Dissemination of information is it. It is difficult to perpetrate a substantial hoax in this age of increased awareness.
Today Jesus would be another David Blane or even the homeless guy carrying a sign in the subway.
'Observations are trivial truths, and such truth only exists for the observing individual.
They meaningless until they are incorporated (whether to prove/disprove/develop) into some sort of theory.'
Technically any truth exists only to the individual. Some would say the difference is that other people corroborate your observation or truth but your awareness that others have done so and indeed the existence of the others at all is merely observation.
Individually observations are trivial truths although they are the most substantial truths that exist. And indeed, they are useless (not meaningless, you base theories on the implied meaning of the observations) for anything but the formation of a theory. Then again, theories are both meaningless and useless if they are not based upon those trivial truth observations.
Theories and Observations are both useless without one another. None of that changes that observations are facts, theories exist to coax more repeatable observations and that observations are the only facts that exist.
'The theme service takes only a few megs of RAM'
If that were bytes it would be negligible, I need all the megs free that I can get.
'"God is Light" -- the Bible
So, according to it, mutations are caused by God.'
I take it you worship the sun god then?
'only monotheistic views as legit'
Multiple beings are a possibility as well. Although that introduces greater complexity yet and is therefore even less likely.
'Personally I wouldn't call you an agnostic, at all.'
I prefer to stick with the dictionary myself. I also don't think one has to ignore the fact that the introduction of a creator makes for greater complexity in determining the origins of the universe and the more creators the more complexity therefore the less likely. Unlikely is not impossible. Unlike some I am satisfied to be aware of those facts without feeling some compelling need to arrive at an opinion or to choose a side.
'No one got it right'
Of course no one got it right. The odds of a man making up a creation myth that happens to match the truth out of the billions of possibilities are phenomenally poor. I am less sure of previous observances of gravity reoccurring upon the next experiment than I am of that one.
This is my typical recommendation for clients. Power management functions in windows are highly unstable. The PC doesn't wake half the time if you use any power management beyond having the monitor go on low power mode. The monitor uses less power when off then on low power mode.
The advice is simple. Turn off all power management. If you walk away for a second your system will be ready and responsive. If you walk away for 15+min turn off your monitor. If you leave for 8hr+ turn off your PC.
'With win2000 the interface still sucked. XP made big strides in making the interface less sucky.'
Less sucky in what way? Anyone who knows how uses the classic start menu and control panel. The only thing that really leaves is the theme and anyone who is at all concerned about performance uses the windows classic theme.
'Science is meaningful and helpful, and it would be a real shame if its pursuit were to be abandoned, but calling science truth is just as bad as calling it a lie.'
Not at all, there are two facets to science. The first is the one everyone focuses on. The formation of theories. The part everyone ignores is the observation phase. While the formation of theories to explain observations is the process of creating models and not to be confused with truth (it isn't even supposed to be truth); I view the theories as a means to gather more observations. The primary function of science is to collect observations and establish new observations by postulating behaviors and then subsequently observing those behaviors. Observations are fact, and fact is also truth.
'the question evolution fails to answer and which makes it counterintuitive is "Where/How/When did it all start"'
Evolution makes no claims about the origin of life. It could have been done by the Christian god when he created life. He might have done it via evolution. Contrary to what preachers would tell the ignorant followers who don't read and interpret the bible for themselves there is no conflict between evolution and creation.
'Thats natural selection, Creationists do not dispute that fit creatures(created things) survive and unfit creatures don't.'
Maybe you do. Most have already decided they don't believe in evolution so when you break it into the pieces they are forced to admit, like natural selection they refuse logical debate. Natural selection is 99% of evolution. The other 1% is how new genes (and therefore traits) come into being. That is the part that is debated by scientists. Scientists have no doubt that Evolution occurs the only question is how the new traits come into being. If people evolve to have purple eyes where did the purple eye gene come from? I believe that things aren't that simple, there are multiple answers. One obvious answer is that new changes in genes are called mutations and those mutations occur under radiation. Since those mutations are random most mutations are worthless, natural selection then takes over to determine if they will be passed on.
Its really hard to dispute this when humans share common ancestral genetic code with rats. In the same way we can use DNA to determine if you are related to someone, we have used DNA to show that all humans are related to rats (and many other diverse lifeforms). That means we all evolved from a common ancestor.
'First: you're completely wrong. If 1% of scientists actively reject evolution as absolutely the best answer for the origin and evolution of life on this planet, I'd be utterly stunned. .01% would still be pretty damn surprising.'
He skewed his statistic to cook the numbers. He didn't refer to how many scientists believe in evolution, he referred to how many scientists believe in Darwinian evolution. The general concept of evolution is pretty much accepted as fact, whether Darwin had the right of it is what is debated.
'Look, instead of talking about how evolution MUST be true just CREATE LIFE IN THE LAB and that will fix it.'
m l
http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/002541.html
Here is some interesting reading.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolution-fact.ht
'Only 51% of physical scientists believe in any form of Darwinian evolution.'
Great. Thats a fine useless number. Now how many believe in more modern views of evolution? 99% or so I would suppose and rest are a few fundementalist crackpots.