That can't be accurate for all metals. For instance, about 3 months ago I purchased a bar of silver. The last time I checked the silver was worth about 20% more than what I paid, not bad because I am using the commodity price and I paid a premium over that price plus shipping when I bought it. Real inflation is bad and certainly is higher than the so called 'rate of inflation' numbers, but the dollar did not lose 20-25% of its value in the past 4 months!
On one hand, look at what Linus has done for the community. On the other hand, I can't think of any cases where Linus has taken a stance that favors the community lately when community versus corporate interests collide.
"Funny, Last time I checked slashdot had a fairly global user base."
No doubt, there are people on slashdot from all over the place and we are happy to converse with them on our forum. But it is a US forum with foreign participants, not an international forum. The appropriate language for the forum is American English, speech in foreign tongues is inappropriate, almost all stories are US Centric, and so forth.
"From where I'm sitting there doesn't seem to be all that much US control over the company's that provide the jobs and bring in the wealth to the area I'm in, its 70% Local, 20% European (mostly German to be fair) and 10% US at best, and even then its UK based organisations with US parents - (The European companies seem to find it easier than the US ones to operate here directly), or majority US shareholding."
I could make up number for your locality with the same accuracy as yours but I won't. I'm not sure what kind of hardware you were referring to but if you mean computer hardware I am pressed to think of any large deployment hardware that has been European since the Amiga was popular. Most has an Asian or US Label and in almost every case US companies or Shareholders own the Asian ones.
But the real question isn't how much of what your locality uses or local employment is with US firms or US owned firms. The US has a massive trade deficit and yet controls 30-60% of the total global economy. That means that the US is probably buying most of the things produced by your nation, or if you produce raw materials then it is probably ultimately consuming the product made with those materials. So, whether the cotten factory is owned by USians or not, the mittens made with the cotten are being bought by USians and the employees of that factory owe their jobs to USians.
Even if we went with your made up numbers, do you have any idea how significant it is for 10% of the local economy to come from a single source? What is the population? 50,000,000? That is 5 million people out of work overnight.
That said, lets focus on your real point. Most of the big commercial players that are working on Linux are US based. Even if you don't use a US commercial distro your distro is probably benefiting more from the commercial support of those projects than it is contributing in its own right. Impacting the US would be a serious issue. But when I think of the biggest companies working on this, it occurs to me that they have patent portfolios that they could bring to retaliate if they needed to.
Your looking at the direct result. What you forget is that the people who will be hurt by this deal are the ones who actually make the products Novell is selling.
Novell is actually going to be in a great deal of trouble when they start releasing GPL'd software that includes patent encumberance from Microsoft. The GPL doesn't allow it and they may quickly find themselves in court.
Last I checked this is a USian site, for USians. We are all in the US. Ignoring that fact for a brief moment, the US alone controls most of the global economy. In economic terms, how something impacts the US is the first and almost only consideration; not a side note.
Last I checked every project defines its own numbering scheme. The VLC project defines its numbering scheme and determines what the valid criteria are for incrementing it. The ranted criteria defined by ACs on Slashdot are by definition incorrect if they dont match that of the project.
The kernel uses a major and minor revision scheme, some projects only increment the version numbers for major releases. Neither is incorrect.
When WMP gets a hotfix or iTunes releases a minor version, they definitely do not make the news anywhere. That's the equivalent. I like VLC as much as the next guy, but I also like iTunes, and neither deserves a frontpage article for minor updates. You assume that because they don't artificially inflate the version number that this is a minor update?
This patent is basically for a trigger on a game controller. The first I am aware of was the light gun for the original NES. I believe that would be prior art and Nintendo's own creation to boot.
I don't recall taking a position on any of the above issues, only the bias surrounding them. A bias that you yourself have just demonstrated with your emotional reactionary response.
Care to respond in a manner that actually has substance?
"Oh, so cold fusion works and it's just that nobody bothered to check? What next the oil company bought the patent,"
Who knows? I certainly don't. Do you? Last I checked those possibilities are as plausible as any others. Is there an actual reason that you discount possibilities that are consistant with known evidence and human nature or is it the simple prejudice you have against those possibilities?
There are circles where people laugh at possibilities that run contrary to 'scientific fact' (a TRUE proponent of the scientific method will tell you that no amount of evidence that fails to disprove a theory makes it any more factual than the day it was proposed and found consistant with the evidence to that point). There are circles where people look to the credentials of the one proposing an idea rather than the idea; circles where people discount anything that requires a conspiracy and circles where people discount anything proposed by people labeled as crackpots. Intelligent and free thinking individuals belong to none of those circles.
"grow up and join the real world."
You fail to provide any support for your claim that I am being unrealistic. I on the other hand have brought ample examples of corrupt and bias manner of things in the real world. You seem to deny those things, again, without providing a reason. I am forced to conclude that it is you who are exhibiting childlike naitivity and ignoring the real nature of a harsh unfair world.
Does anyone else think it is just a little interesting that PRO Microsoft kiddy PR came out just in time to counteract PRO Linux PR from the Indiana 22,000 pc school rollouts.
Attack the status quo in science? Surely you jest. Those who attack the status quo and research in areas that are contrary to 'scientific law' (the idea of a theory being considered concrete simply because it has survived without being dis-proven is contrary to everything science is supposed to be about) are labeled as crackpots despite valid credentials.
"So yes, there is an "institutional bias" toward hiring people who at least seem to know what "it" is they are supposed to attack."
Yes, because if they attack the wrong and big conventional wisdoms they are labeled crackpots. Instead they have to attack the little ones around the edges and amend big ones instead. They must have scotch with the right individuals who control hiring and purse strings and network. With a nice safe topic that is consistent with popular views and the right connections one can get published every time.
If I had a working tabletop cold fusion-like reactor in my garage this very moment nobody would ever read my papers, no journal would publish me, and nobody would ever come look at it. Why? For no other reason than group think that says cold fusion doesn't work and is a joke. If I kidnapped a researcher at gunpoint and showed it to him, he would believe it was a scam. If I paid to be published somewhere, peers would respond with scoff that I was a crackpot, lacked the proper credentials in the field, had not been published and should have used a peer reviewed journal, and didn't have the proper instrumentation in my basement to test properly. Of course, since the very idea of cold fusion is laughable nobody who DOES have the proper instrumentation will take a closer look.
Areas where science blatantly discourages investigation. Cold Fusion, Evolution, Global Warming, and anything that runs counter to Relativity just to name a few big ones. At best a higher burden of proof is being laid upon discoveries if they run counter to accepted beliefs on these topics and at worst anyone who even attempts to publish a finding counter to these will be outcast, laughed at, cut from funding, labeled a crackpot, and never be published in a credible journal again.
Fair enough. I would like to point out that I would like to point out that it was a poster several steps posts before me that implied liberal arts were biased.
Quite frankly I find that any collective of human beings of 2 or more will develop a status quo and therefore a bias. This is due to the innate group dynamics of the interaction of the human animal.
After all, if one weren't trying to cater to the group or group ideals to some extent, one would be conducting self discovery in a secluded area without letting anyone know that one was going to do so.
Although I tend to lean toward the evidence for global warming I do believe a certain level of wrong is being committed in this thread.
First, both the scientific and academic communities are biased. There are several ways in which ANY large community or group becomes corrupted. One example relevant to these groups is the bias toward consideration of the formal credentials and reputation of the individual presenting a claim over the merits of the claim itself. Many think this is essential because time is limited and everything cannot be investigated. It may or may not be a practical necessity, but that does not make it any less a bias. To borrow someone else's example; in today's world no patent clerk would be allowed to propose Relativity because he lacked credentials. Even in Einstein's world, if Einstein had been an auto-mechanic without ANY formal education, none would have bothered to read his paper in the first place.
With that said, here is what I see:
"Person 1: Scientists are generally unbiased. Example: Hawking supporting those who prove his theories wrong. Ergo, climate scientists won't have the same kind of institutional bias that, say, liberal arts types will."
Agreed
"You: OMG, Hawking is atypical, newb."
False. It went like this.
Hawking is atypical. This is due to the fact that Hawking is at the top of the food chain within the institution and no longer needs to win a popularity contest of peer review. An example of something the scientific community has suppressed via institutional bias and the status quo is the possibility of stomach ulcers being caused by bacteria.
"Me: Prove it."
I saw. You: Luser, the GP gave an example but you didn't so he rox. Your an AC so you suck. Give some proof.
Of course, this failed to recognize that the AC supported his case just as strongly as the parent. Both had supported their arguments adequately for informal discussion in my opinion.
"You: OMG, this isn't a peer reviewed journal!"
This seemed a fairly appropriate response. After all, this is an informal discussion and those who are not already familiar with the topics being discussed are free to Google them without being hand fed by the poster with citations. Hell, if you had asked clarification on his example or argument he might have given a more substantial response; at this point nobody has actually challenged any point he made.
And of course, there is the the post I am responding to. The post is nothing but a rhetorical device. You misrepresent earlier statements in order to make them easier to tear down. You are doing this for the sole purpose of attacking the poster rather than attacking his argument (something that would require you to properly represent his argument).
"So, I say again, show me why he was wrong. You don't need to write a paper for that. Show me why Hawking is an invalid example,"
He already supported his claim that Hawking was not subject to typical institutional pressures because his career is such that he has already risen above the herd. I see an argument and a premise that appears to successfully support it.
" and why climate science is different from physics."
Here on the other hand you make arguments without support. The foremost is that if Hawking is not biased no other physicist is biased. You provide no support for this idea. It is not a safe assumption that because a superstar physicist like Hawking who acts as a spokesman for his profession would act in the same manner as a community college physics professor who represents a typical physicist.
"Oh right, you don't have to show anything, because this is slashdot. You can just claim he was wrong, and claim that your statements don't need backing up. Riiight..."
He didn't claim his statements didn't need backing up. He claimed that this was not an academic paper and as a result he was not going to give citations and references to back up common knowledge (that bacteria causing stomach ulcers was an example of something that was repressed by the status quo of opinion).
Indeed and the bar undoubtedly keeps getting harder to surmount. When someone comes along with a model that works better than Einstein's model it will be back to 'extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence'.
"cannot recall one proven historical event where people were 'sacrificed' for a cause in such a way"
It is so common among that Japanese they actually have a title for those they do it to. Kamikaze. Terrorists were sacrificed in a similar manner if you believe the official 911 story and while I am too lazy to open a new tab for Google I am sure you will find dozens of similar incidents.
The idea that nobody has been sacrificed (voluntarily or otherwise) for a political agenda in the course of history for a political agenda isn't a very strong pillar to rest your opinion on. In fact, all the proven and documented examples one could find of this occurring are just roaches. For each of those you can be certain there are dozens or even hundreds that are classified, hidden, predate accurate records, or otherwise can't be proven to date.
Sorry I am with the parent, I have never seen a Kroger that wasn't a dedicated grocery store (well they have a small liquor section but so do many grocery chains). Not an east coaster here though, midwest.
"It is interesting to note, a lot of inventions in the past were often invented in parallel by scientists working independently often in different countries using the same 'body of knowledge' and the patent bit, has literally been a 'first to the post' race. In essence progress has mostly been taking the next obvious step, (obvious to someone slaving away in that particular field of expertise)"
My point exactly. When the sort of race you mentioned occurs then a patent is detrimental and not beneficial. People seem to lose sight of the purpose for patents. Since patents have been around for our entire lives and are given so carelessly people have begun to think they are to protect some imagined right of the inventor. Patents are not for the inventor, they are to extract the secrets of the inventor and bring them into the public light. If not granting the patent brings about this result sooner than granting it, then the patent should not be granted.
"As noted in another post, the first NTP patent was filed in 1991 -- was a portable device for email "bloody fucking obvious" in 1991?"
The turing machine was a non-obvious advance. Digital Electronics were a non-obvious advance. A portable turning machine was an obvious advance. There is no reason that patents should be granted on a regular basis instead of being reserved for the truely innovative. Especially since the idea that patents advance progress is still a question of debate. Without patents innovation would occur because people desire the products of the innovation and where there is a demand there is money to be made. The flip side patents is sharing the 'secret' with the public, this may have been an issue when patents were first created (not that long ago) but I think you will agree that nothing patented in the last 10 years was actually unique enough that it couldn't be reverse engineered long before the patent expires.
"Just curious, why do you believe 99% of of patents should not be valid?
How do you propose to perform your test? If others "skilled in the art" already know that there is a solution, then you are injecting hindsight into the equation, and EVERYTHING is obvious once you have hindsight."
99% is a made up number that any reasonably thinking individual can assume means "nearly every patent" when used in that context. However, you have established where he got the idea with the second paragraph. I trust that nobody is foolish enough to think that there are no exceptions where something is NOT obvious in hindsight, so you yourself surely must have meant 'almost everything'.
If something is obvious in hindsight then it is just a progressive step built upon the existing state of invention. Progressive steps are not truely innovative things that are worthy of patents. The reason is that sooner or later someone else would have made that step. Granting patents on things that would be discovered and become available to the industry without patents hinders forward progress rather than helping.
The standard for a patent should not be whether or not effort went into coming up with a solution. The standard for a patent should be whether or not any other human being would have ever come up with that solution withen the length of the patent. Patents are a government granted monopoly and should not be granted on a daily basis!
There are probably only a couple dozen patents that should have been granted this century.
"And Linux, when administered by someone who does NOT know what he's doing is no more stable than Windows. But Windows can be as stable as Linux when you have a competent administrator. In your scenario, the company would be paying for Linux experts AND Windows experts. Why? Why not just spend the money and get competent Windows administraters?"
Lets not take playing nice with the windows droids too far. Linux when administered by a novice may not be secure, but it is stable upon install with all the typical services you would find on even a desktop distribution running. Windows only becomes stable when you turn everything off but a single stable function.
"www.vmware.com
It's even free (as in beer) now. And you don't have to tweak the guest OS. It runs clean. We use it all the time."
But its slow. Microsoft bought a virtualization software that is tuned to windows rather than a full hardware emulator. It brings dramatic performance gains to the table.
"Also you haven't stated which platform are you reffering to - Linux? Windows? OSX?"
I am a computer technician who performs commercial and residential onsite service. I service hundreds of computers and almost all of them have different hardware configurations. Most systems are windows but since I am something of a linux geek there are no shortage of linux configurations either. I have never seen a system that did not have the previously discussed locking issue. Perhaps if you click on a link and a page is loading an embedded mpeg video you expect the browser to become unresponsive while the content loads? Or perhaps you do not heavily multi-task? I usually have a dozen or so tabs open and while that video says 'loading' or still has the grey box sitting there before it even says loading, I need the browser itself to be responsive.
P.S. The problem occurs with flash content as well. I doubt it is a problem that all these services happen to have in common. It is certainly a FF issue. I suspect the code is blocking somewhere that it shouldn't and everything else is halted while waiting for a timeout or response.
"Your comment is arrogant and typical of a lot of programmers that don't feel someone has worth unless they can code."
True, although coding is the most obvious way to contribute to the project there are other ways. Of course, if you are contributing in any of those ways then I am sure the developers will recognize it and be more considerate of your concerns. If you aren't, then you are just another freeloader and from the perspective of the open source community you truely are worthless, right?
Non-developers can also pay developers to fix things for them; paying a developer for a few hours of his time will get your concerns focused on right away. If you aren't sure how to go about this then search for open source bounty on google and you will find sites that let you post bounties. Even if you have little money and no skills you could start a grassroots advertising campaign.
Simply because you are not a developer doesn't mean you are worthless, but if you aren't worthless from the perspective of (insert any open source project here) then you are contributing and will be able to get developer focus.
I have experienced the same browser locks with FireFox for as long as I can remember (definitely goes back beyond the 1.0 mark). Usually what occurs is that the entire browser locks while the content is loading (be it a video, or pdf, or whatever) and you are unable to switch tabs. Sometimes the browser simply stays unresponsive.
For me, this is the only severe issue I encounter with FireFox on a regular basis. If I am loading a video, pdf, or sometimes even a web page that is slow to respond or is unable to contact the server/resolve dns; I need to be able to open a new tab or switch to an already open tab and view something else while I wait.
At this point in the discussion I believe our differing views really boil down to semantics. You are really saying that a word's meaning can be offensive and do not see the word and the meaning as separate things because the purpose of a word is to express meaning. I being more utilitarian believe that a word as a separate entity from the meaning because it is separate from a technical view (a word is a grouping of sounds and need not have a fixed meaning or even be coherent) and because it is a more flexible stance.
If I am speaking to a friend and an elderly woman overhears me say "Fuck man, I don't think we should go to that piece of shit assembly anyway."; she might then choose to be offended and will have made a choice that is not valid from the view of logic. She might even take an action, complaining to the storekeeper or slapping me. I can review the history of language and discover roots that have led to her emotional response. Her offense can in that way be understood. But simply because something can be understood does not make it logical and taking action due solely to an emotional response is always illogical.
I can understand various popular religions and why people believe in them. If someone makes a statement that fails to give them reverence it evokes strong emotion. That doesn't mean it is not illogical to take on religious views without first following a chain of solid logic and evidence that concludes in that belief. Understanding and empathy do not change that it is illogical to speak or act based solely upon emotion or based upon a line of thinking that at any point uses the word 'feel' in an emotional sense. 'I did 'x' because after speaking with him he seemed honest enough' would be an example we can all relate to and yet is something that clearly illustrates an example of an illogical course of action and thought.
Slashdot Mirror
That can't be accurate for all metals. For instance, about 3 months ago I purchased a bar of silver. The last time I checked the silver was worth about 20% more than what I paid, not bad because I am using the commodity price and I paid a premium over that price plus shipping when I bought it. Real inflation is bad and certainly is higher than the so called 'rate of inflation' numbers, but the dollar did not lose 20-25% of its value in the past 4 months!
On one hand, look at what Linus has done for the community. On the other hand, I can't think of any cases where Linus has taken a stance that favors the community lately when community versus corporate interests collide.
"Funny, Last time I checked slashdot had a fairly global user base."
No doubt, there are people on slashdot from all over the place and we are happy to converse with them on our forum. But it is a US forum with foreign participants, not an international forum. The appropriate language for the forum is American English, speech in foreign tongues is inappropriate, almost all stories are US Centric, and so forth.
"From where I'm sitting there doesn't seem to be all that much US control over the company's that provide the jobs and bring in the wealth to the area I'm in, its 70% Local, 20% European (mostly German to be fair) and 10% US at best, and even then its UK based organisations with US parents - (The European companies seem to find it easier than the US ones to operate here directly), or majority US shareholding."
I could make up number for your locality with the same accuracy as yours but I won't. I'm not sure what kind of hardware you were referring to but if you mean computer hardware I am pressed to think of any large deployment hardware that has been European since the Amiga was popular. Most has an Asian or US Label and in almost every case US companies or Shareholders own the Asian ones.
But the real question isn't how much of what your locality uses or local employment is with US firms or US owned firms. The US has a massive trade deficit and yet controls 30-60% of the total global economy. That means that the US is probably buying most of the things produced by your nation, or if you produce raw materials then it is probably ultimately consuming the product made with those materials. So, whether the cotten factory is owned by USians or not, the mittens made with the cotten are being bought by USians and the employees of that factory owe their jobs to USians.
Even if we went with your made up numbers, do you have any idea how significant it is for 10% of the local economy to come from a single source? What is the population? 50,000,000? That is 5 million people out of work overnight.
That said, lets focus on your real point. Most of the big commercial players that are working on Linux are US based. Even if you don't use a US commercial distro your distro is probably benefiting more from the commercial support of those projects than it is contributing in its own right. Impacting the US would be a serious issue. But when I think of the biggest companies working on this, it occurs to me that they have patent portfolios that they could bring to retaliate if they needed to.
Your looking at the direct result. What you forget is that the people who will be hurt by this deal are the ones who actually make the products Novell is selling.
Novell is actually going to be in a great deal of trouble when they start releasing GPL'd software that includes patent encumberance from Microsoft. The GPL doesn't allow it and they may quickly find themselves in court.
"Different story if you are in the US I guess"
Last I checked this is a USian site, for USians. We are all in the US. Ignoring that fact for a brief moment, the US alone controls most of the global economy. In economic terms, how something impacts the US is the first and almost only consideration; not a side note.
Last I checked every project defines its own numbering scheme. The VLC project defines its numbering scheme and determines what the valid criteria are for incrementing it. The ranted criteria defined by ACs on Slashdot are by definition incorrect if they dont match that of the project.
The kernel uses a major and minor revision scheme, some projects only increment the version numbers for major releases. Neither is incorrect.
aye, and even without the prior art the idea of putting a trigger on a game controller doesn't strike me as novel enough to warrant a patent.
This patent is basically for a trigger on a game controller. The first I am aware of was the light gun for the original NES. I believe that would be prior art and Nintendo's own creation to boot.
I don't recall taking a position on any of the above issues, only the bias surrounding them. A bias that you yourself have just demonstrated with your emotional reactionary response.
Care to respond in a manner that actually has substance?
"Oh, so cold fusion works and it's just that nobody bothered to check? What next the oil company bought the patent,"
Who knows? I certainly don't. Do you? Last I checked those possibilities are as plausible as any others. Is there an actual reason that you discount possibilities that are consistant with known evidence and human nature or is it the simple prejudice you have against those possibilities?
There are circles where people laugh at possibilities that run contrary to 'scientific fact' (a TRUE proponent of the scientific method will tell you that no amount of evidence that fails to disprove a theory makes it any more factual than the day it was proposed and found consistant with the evidence to that point). There are circles where people look to the credentials of the one proposing an idea rather than the idea; circles where people discount anything that requires a conspiracy and circles where people discount anything proposed by people labeled as crackpots. Intelligent and free thinking individuals belong to none of those circles.
"grow up and join the real world."
You fail to provide any support for your claim that I am being unrealistic. I on the other hand have brought ample examples of corrupt and bias manner of things in the real world. You seem to deny those things, again, without providing a reason. I am forced to conclude that it is you who are exhibiting childlike naitivity and ignoring the real nature of a harsh unfair world.
Does anyone else think it is just a little interesting that PRO Microsoft kiddy PR came out just in time to counteract PRO Linux PR from the Indiana 22,000 pc school rollouts.
Attack the status quo in science? Surely you jest. Those who attack the status quo and research in areas that are contrary to 'scientific law' (the idea of a theory being considered concrete simply because it has survived without being dis-proven is contrary to everything science is supposed to be about) are labeled as crackpots despite valid credentials.
"So yes, there is an "institutional bias" toward hiring people who at least seem to know what "it" is they are supposed to attack."
Yes, because if they attack the wrong and big conventional wisdoms they are labeled crackpots. Instead they have to attack the little ones around the edges and amend big ones instead. They must have scotch with the right individuals who control hiring and purse strings and network. With a nice safe topic that is consistent with popular views and the right connections one can get published every time.
If I had a working tabletop cold fusion-like reactor in my garage this very moment nobody would ever read my papers, no journal would publish me, and nobody would ever come look at it. Why? For no other reason than group think that says cold fusion doesn't work and is a joke. If I kidnapped a researcher at gunpoint and showed it to him, he would believe it was a scam. If I paid to be published somewhere, peers would respond with scoff that I was a crackpot, lacked the proper credentials in the field, had not been published and should have used a peer reviewed journal, and didn't have the proper instrumentation in my basement to test properly. Of course, since the very idea of cold fusion is laughable nobody who DOES have the proper instrumentation will take a closer look.
Areas where science blatantly discourages investigation. Cold Fusion, Evolution, Global Warming, and anything that runs counter to Relativity just to name a few big ones. At best a higher burden of proof is being laid upon discoveries if they run counter to accepted beliefs on these topics and at worst anyone who even attempts to publish a finding counter to these will be outcast, laughed at, cut from funding, labeled a crackpot, and never be published in a credible journal again.
Fair enough. I would like to point out that I would like to point out that it was a poster several steps posts before me that implied liberal arts were biased.
Quite frankly I find that any collective of human beings of 2 or more will develop a status quo and therefore a bias. This is due to the innate group dynamics of the interaction of the human animal.
After all, if one weren't trying to cater to the group or group ideals to some extent, one would be conducting self discovery in a secluded area without letting anyone know that one was going to do so.
Although I tend to lean toward the evidence for global warming I do believe a certain level of wrong is being committed in this thread.
First, both the scientific and academic communities are biased. There are several ways in which ANY large community or group becomes corrupted. One example relevant to these groups is the bias toward consideration of the formal credentials and reputation of the individual presenting a claim over the merits of the claim itself. Many think this is essential because time is limited and everything cannot be investigated. It may or may not be a practical necessity, but that does not make it any less a bias. To borrow someone else's example; in today's world no patent clerk would be allowed to propose Relativity because he lacked credentials. Even in Einstein's world, if Einstein had been an auto-mechanic without ANY formal education, none would have bothered to read his paper in the first place.
With that said, here is what I see:
"Person 1: Scientists are generally unbiased. Example: Hawking supporting those who prove his theories wrong. Ergo, climate scientists won't have the same kind of institutional bias that, say, liberal arts types will."
Agreed
"You: OMG, Hawking is atypical, newb."
False. It went like this.
Hawking is atypical. This is due to the fact that Hawking is at the top of the food chain within the institution and no longer needs to win a popularity contest of peer review. An example of something the scientific community has suppressed via institutional bias and the status quo is the possibility of stomach ulcers being caused by bacteria.
"Me: Prove it."
I saw.
You: Luser, the GP gave an example but you didn't so he rox. Your an AC so you suck. Give some proof.
Of course, this failed to recognize that the AC supported his case just as strongly as the parent. Both had supported their arguments adequately for informal discussion in my opinion.
"You: OMG, this isn't a peer reviewed journal!"
This seemed a fairly appropriate response. After all, this is an informal discussion and those who are not already familiar with the topics being discussed are free to Google them without being hand fed by the poster with citations. Hell, if you had asked clarification on his example or argument he might have given a more substantial response; at this point nobody has actually challenged any point he made.
And of course, there is the the post I am responding to. The post is nothing but a rhetorical device. You misrepresent earlier statements in order to make them easier to tear down. You are doing this for the sole purpose of attacking the poster rather than attacking his argument (something that would require you to properly represent his argument).
"So, I say again, show me why he was wrong. You don't need to write a paper for that. Show me why Hawking is an invalid example,"
He already supported his claim that Hawking was not subject to typical institutional pressures because his career is such that he has already risen above the herd. I see an argument and a premise that appears to successfully support it.
" and why climate science is different from physics."
Here on the other hand you make arguments without support. The foremost is that if Hawking is not biased no other physicist is biased. You provide no support for this idea. It is not a safe assumption that because a superstar physicist like Hawking who acts as a spokesman for his profession would act in the same manner as a community college physics professor who represents a typical physicist.
"Oh right, you don't have to show anything, because this is slashdot. You can just claim he was wrong, and claim that your statements don't need backing up. Riiight..."
He didn't claim his statements didn't need backing up. He claimed that this was not an academic paper and as a result he was not going to give citations and references to back up common knowledge (that bacteria causing stomach ulcers was an example of something that was repressed by the status quo of opinion).
Indeed and the bar undoubtedly keeps getting harder to surmount. When someone comes along with a model that works better than Einstein's model it will be back to 'extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence'.
"cannot recall one proven historical event where people were 'sacrificed' for a cause in such a way"
It is so common among that Japanese they actually have a title for those they do it to. Kamikaze. Terrorists were sacrificed in a similar manner if you believe the official 911 story and while I am too lazy to open a new tab for Google I am sure you will find dozens of similar incidents.
The idea that nobody has been sacrificed (voluntarily or otherwise) for a political agenda in the course of history for a political agenda isn't a very strong pillar to rest your opinion on. In fact, all the proven and documented examples one could find of this occurring are just roaches. For each of those you can be certain there are dozens or even hundreds that are classified, hidden, predate accurate records, or otherwise can't be proven to date.
Sorry I am with the parent, I have never seen a Kroger that wasn't a dedicated grocery store (well they have a small liquor section but so do many grocery chains). Not an east coaster here though, midwest.
"It is interesting to note, a lot of inventions in the past were often invented in parallel by scientists working independently often in different countries using the same 'body of knowledge' and the patent bit, has literally been a 'first to the post' race. In essence progress has mostly been taking the next obvious step, (obvious to someone slaving away in that particular field of expertise)"
My point exactly. When the sort of race you mentioned occurs then a patent is detrimental and not beneficial. People seem to lose sight of the purpose for patents. Since patents have been around for our entire lives and are given so carelessly people have begun to think they are to protect some imagined right of the inventor. Patents are not for the inventor, they are to extract the secrets of the inventor and bring them into the public light. If not granting the patent brings about this result sooner than granting it, then the patent should not be granted.
"As noted in another post, the first NTP patent was filed in 1991 -- was a portable device for email "bloody fucking obvious" in 1991?"
The turing machine was a non-obvious advance. Digital Electronics were a non-obvious advance. A portable turning machine was an obvious advance. There is no reason that patents should be granted on a regular basis instead of being reserved for the truely innovative. Especially since the idea that patents advance progress is still a question of debate. Without patents innovation would occur because people desire the products of the innovation and where there is a demand there is money to be made. The flip side patents is sharing the 'secret' with the public, this may have been an issue when patents were first created (not that long ago) but I think you will agree that nothing patented in the last 10 years was actually unique enough that it couldn't be reverse engineered long before the patent expires.
"Just curious, why do you believe 99% of of patents should not be valid?
How do you propose to perform your test? If others "skilled in the art" already know that there is a solution, then you are injecting hindsight into the equation, and EVERYTHING is obvious once you have hindsight."
99% is a made up number that any reasonably thinking individual can assume means "nearly every patent" when used in that context. However, you have established where he got the idea with the second paragraph. I trust that nobody is foolish enough to think that there are no exceptions where something is NOT obvious in hindsight, so you yourself surely must have meant 'almost everything'.
If something is obvious in hindsight then it is just a progressive step built upon the existing state of invention. Progressive steps are not truely innovative things that are worthy of patents. The reason is that sooner or later someone else would have made that step. Granting patents on things that would be discovered and become available to the industry without patents hinders forward progress rather than helping.
The standard for a patent should not be whether or not effort went into coming up with a solution. The standard for a patent should be whether or not any other human being would have ever come up with that solution withen the length of the patent. Patents are a government granted monopoly and should not be granted on a daily basis!
There are probably only a couple dozen patents that should have been granted this century.
"And Linux, when administered by someone who does NOT know what he's doing is no more stable than Windows. But Windows can be as stable as Linux when you have a competent administrator. In your scenario, the company would be paying for Linux experts AND Windows experts. Why? Why not just spend the money and get competent Windows administraters?"
Lets not take playing nice with the windows droids too far. Linux when administered by a novice may not be secure, but it is stable upon install with all the typical services you would find on even a desktop distribution running. Windows only becomes stable when you turn everything off but a single stable function.
"www.vmware.com
It's even free (as in beer) now. And you don't have to tweak the guest OS. It runs clean. We use it all the time."
But its slow. Microsoft bought a virtualization software that is tuned to windows rather than a full hardware emulator. It brings dramatic performance gains to the table.
"Also you haven't stated which platform are you reffering to - Linux? Windows? OSX?"
I am a computer technician who performs commercial and residential onsite service. I service hundreds of computers and almost all of them have different hardware configurations. Most systems are windows but since I am something of a linux geek there are no shortage of linux configurations either. I have never seen a system that did not have the previously discussed locking issue. Perhaps if you click on a link and a page is loading an embedded mpeg video you expect the browser to become unresponsive while the content loads? Or perhaps you do not heavily multi-task? I usually have a dozen or so tabs open and while that video says 'loading' or still has the grey box sitting there before it even says loading, I need the browser itself to be responsive.
P.S. The problem occurs with flash content as well. I doubt it is a problem that all these services happen to have in common. It is certainly a FF issue. I suspect the code is blocking somewhere that it shouldn't and everything else is halted while waiting for a timeout or response.
"Your comment is arrogant and typical of a lot of programmers that don't feel someone has worth unless they can code."
True, although coding is the most obvious way to contribute to the project there are other ways. Of course, if you are contributing in any of those ways then I am sure the developers will recognize it and be more considerate of your concerns. If you aren't, then you are just another freeloader and from the perspective of the open source community you truely are worthless, right?
Non-developers can also pay developers to fix things for them; paying a developer for a few hours of his time will get your concerns focused on right away. If you aren't sure how to go about this then search for open source bounty on google and you will find sites that let you post bounties. Even if you have little money and no skills you could start a grassroots advertising campaign.
Simply because you are not a developer doesn't mean you are worthless, but if you aren't worthless from the perspective of (insert any open source project here) then you are contributing and will be able to get developer focus.
I have experienced the same browser locks with FireFox for as long as I can remember (definitely goes back beyond the 1.0 mark). Usually what occurs is that the entire browser locks while the content is loading (be it a video, or pdf, or whatever) and you are unable to switch tabs. Sometimes the browser simply stays unresponsive.
For me, this is the only severe issue I encounter with FireFox on a regular basis. If I am loading a video, pdf, or sometimes even a web page that is slow to respond or is unable to contact the server/resolve dns; I need to be able to open a new tab or switch to an already open tab and view something else while I wait.
At this point in the discussion I believe our differing views really boil down to semantics. You are really saying that a word's meaning can be offensive and do not see the word and the meaning as separate things because the purpose of a word is to express meaning. I being more utilitarian believe that a word as a separate entity from the meaning because it is separate from a technical view (a word is a grouping of sounds and need not have a fixed meaning or even be coherent) and because it is a more flexible stance.
If I am speaking to a friend and an elderly woman overhears me say "Fuck man, I don't think we should go to that piece of shit assembly anyway."; she might then choose to be offended and will have made a choice that is not valid from the view of logic. She might even take an action, complaining to the storekeeper or slapping me. I can review the history of language and discover roots that have led to her emotional response. Her offense can in that way be understood. But simply because something can be understood does not make it logical and taking action due solely to an emotional response is always illogical.
I can understand various popular religions and why people believe in them. If someone makes a statement that fails to give them reverence it evokes strong emotion. That doesn't mean it is not illogical to take on religious views without first following a chain of solid logic and evidence that concludes in that belief. Understanding and empathy do not change that it is illogical to speak or act based solely upon emotion or based upon a line of thinking that at any point uses the word 'feel' in an emotional sense. 'I did 'x' because after speaking with him he seemed honest enough' would be an example we can all relate to and yet is something that clearly illustrates an example of an illogical course of action and thought.