It's amazing how much science has become a religion. We can't learn from the past. Here's an example of someone who had the audacity to buck the system. Obviously anyone who disagrees that Evolution is a fact, because it has been "backed by over 10,000 peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals," is a religious fool, as Scientific American clearly shows. Emphasis added to quoted story below:
A brilliant Hungarian doctor of the last century named Ignaz Semmelweis, understood the control of deadly infectious diseases. Articles in the book, None Of These Diseases by S. I. McMillen, M.D., and in the Encyclopedia Britannica documents the work of Semmelweis.
As a young doctor in Vienna in 1845 he was appalled by the staggering death rate by infection of women who gave birth in hospitals. While most children were born at home at that time, usually the homeless or sick, gave birth to their children in the local hospitals.
The level of infectious puerperal (childbed) fever was horrendous with between 15 and 30 percent of such mothers dying in hospital. At that time this tragic situation was considered normal. Dr. Semmelweis noted that every morning the young interns examined the bodies of the mothers who had died and then immediately, without washing their hands, went to the next ward where they would examine the expectant mothers.
Semmelweis insisted that the doctors under his supervision wash their hands vigorously in water and chlorinated lime prior to examining their patients. Immediately, the mortality rate caused by infection among the expectant mothers fell to less than 2 percent dying due to these infections. Despite these fantastic improvements the senior hospital staff despised Dr. Semmelweis's medical innovations and eventually fired him. Most of his medical colleagues rejected his new techniques and ridiculed his demands that they wash their hands because they could not believe infections could be caused by something invisible to the naked eye.
Later he took a position in the St. Rochus Hospital, Pest, Hungary [Budapest],which was experiencing an epidemic of puerperal fever in the ward where mothers were giving birth. Immediately, his new sanitary procedures had a positive effect, with the mortality rate dropping to less than 1 percent instead of the 15 percent that was normal in other hospitals.
During the following six years, he received the approval of the Hungarian government which sent medical advisory letters to all district authorities demanding that all medical staff follow Dr. Semmelweis's sanitation instructions. Although the beneficial results of washing hands were obvious, the medical establishments of Europe and North America continued to ignore his techniques. Patients continued to die needlessly of infectious diseases while they were in the hospital. Decades of rejection by his colleagues finally drove Dr. Semmelweis to a nervous breakdown that placed him in a mental institution. Tragically, due to an infection he received through a cut on his hand during an operation in 1865, Dr. Semmelweis succumbed to the same disease he spent his life trying to alleviate. Dr. Joseph Lister, the father of modern antisepsis (the science of fighting infection), said of him, "I think with the greatest admiration of him and his achievement."
Actually, TMI was a great example of how people under pressure can make exactly the wrong decisions at critical times, and that's about all. If you read about the disaster, you'll find that: 1) A few key, poor decisions prevented the automatic failsafes from working in the best way 2) Other failsafes kicked in to avert a major disaster 3) The federal government passed laws aimed at preventing Homer Simpsons from overriding the automatic systems because of TMI.
Jay Forrester and his work in System Dynamics shows that people tend to make poor decisions when they don't see things from a system perspective. The same can be said about nuclear power. Everyone wants their light to work when they flip the switch, they just don't want power lines, electric plants, ugly transformers, etc.
Those are very typical "scientific" arguments for the geologic column and other things like evolution. I remember watching a video about dandelions and how if you mow them short for many years they grow shorter, etc. The logic is this. I do a core sample in a river, measure the sediment, wait a year, measure the sediment, and voila! I know how old the riverbed is by measuring how much sediment! Sounds fishy? Same argument for the Grand Canyon. It's MILLIONS of years old because, you measure how much it is eroded each year, divide by the depth, and that's how old it is. That's the result of uniformitarianism everything is SOOO simple.
Okay, now add fossils. "In general" fossils appear from simplest at the bottom to more complex at top. That "proves" evolution. Until you find a layer where there are simple and complex fossils. Uh oh. Did I disprove the geologic column? NO! I just say that I had some catastrophic event that "mixed" the fossils. How do I know? Because evolution says that the simpler fossils are older.
Thus you have this amazing circular proof. Evolutionary theory validates the geologic column theory and the geologic column validates evolution.
Here's an example. The petrified forest in CA is "225 million years old" Why? because the process of petrification takes many millions of years. Well, except for the case of Mount Saint Helens where it took... Take a breath. 23 years. The eruption also carved a canyon that in scientific terms took 1000 years to form. So in other words, if you ignored all other evidence and looked at that canyon, you would say that it took 1000 years to form, when in actuality it took. Take another breath. FIVE DAYS!
I think I'll continue to take the geologic column with a grain of salt. Yes, it looks good in theory, but things aren't always that simple in the real world.
Just to clarify, "non-scientific" worldview means that the existence of a supreme being is something that cannot be proven within the realm of science. Thus both "Creationists" and "Evolutionists" view evidence and theorize within their view of how things came about. Even in the scientific method, you create a hypothesis before doing the intensive data collection. It's just that most people aren't stating their worldviews in the hypothesis statement as assuptions.
Interestingly enough, the "evolutionists" are the ones that say "we have no presuppositions!!!" where the "creationists" are willing to admit that the existence of God is their fundamental presupposition. Just an observation.
Basically, intelligent design is saying that you have to be consistent when you analyze "intelligence". In other words, you look at a building and go through a mental process and end up saying, "this was designed by _someone_" You look at a computer program and say "this was designed by _someone_" You also look at certain things (e.g. pink noise) and say "this is random." SETI does this - they are looking for signals that indicate intelligence.
However, when you look at, for example, human beings, if you went through the same mental process you have to contradict yourself - you see something that is complex, you see something that exhibits a pattern, but you say, "this is random noise".
You're correct that there aren't any REAL scientific claims, but "forensic" science is never really able to "claim" anything, it just suggests a more or less likely scenario. For example, quantum mechanics suggests that a bullet could disappear from a gun and reappear in your chest, but a forensic evidence would probably suggest that the bullet was shot from the gun.
So, in other words, Intelligent Design suggests that, in order to validate their non-scientific worldview (that there is no god) scientists are unable to consistently apply logic to whether something is designed or not, IF that design implies the existance of a god.
Our illustrious friend is somewhat accurate with his point #2 in general, but it's interesting that many GAME-CHANGING research has fallen under that. Here are some examples:
Galileo - Theorized that the Sun was the center of the "universe" and not the Earth. Galileo was, by and large demonized by the current SCIENTIFIC community.
General Relativity - Theorized that time Quantum Mechanics - Theorized that "fundamental particles" did not follow the accepted laws of motion (i.e. Newtonian). Even Einstein did not accept Quantum.
Boltzmann - committed suicide over the rejection of his ideas merely because "atoms" were out of favor. His theories were later proven.
One word.... INADMISSABLE IANAL, but, I bet that private information obtained on John Doe from eBay by a "law enforcement official" without a search warrant will get nixed by a judge.
There are two things that make this less dangerous. #1 it costs eBay to fulfill these requests, and they aren't going to be capable of handling all the requests coming in *if* police feel they can just send in a fax and get their answer for free. #2 the police will be looking for specific info, and the process of getting a search warrant for that info is not "expensive" enough to risk having the evidence be inadmissable in court if they do, in fact find something.
1) If you have non-public information (SSN, CC#, addresses, etc.) on someone, you are partially liable if you offer that to someone for a fee for what that person does with the information.
2) You can't obtain information on someone deceitfully and sell it.
#2 seems pretty obvious. #1 has a lot of implications for all these companies that have your mortgage records, etc., which IMHO is a good thing. In other words, "Quicken Loans" becomes an accomplice to a con artist if they sold that con artist a list of their outstanding loans and contact info.
This is not in any way talking about public info, though, so if you pay me $25 to get someone's phone number from the white pages, you can harass that person all you want and it won't come back to me. At least based on that decision.
I agree. Since any credit check degrades your credit rating you should ask for financial compensation for the credit check itself.
I know about the point reduction because when I was a college graduate with no credit, I would get discounts from Sears and JCPenney's, etc., because they would give me 10%-20% discounts for "signing up for their cards" Since I had no credit (no student loan, no credit cards, no auto loans, etc.) I always got turned down and the 5-10min to hear that was worth the $20 or more I would save. That was, until I decided I really should get a credit card. When I started applying for real credit cards, they published the denial reason as "too many credit checks within the last XXX days."
Thus, you should ask the employer to pony up some $$$ if they want to hurt your credit rating.
On the privacy issue thing. I think privacy is overrated. Everyone screams "privacy" until something happens that they don't like, and then they're out digging dirt on whomever. For example: Presidential elections. You see the media tracking down the guy's third grade bully to go on air saying that he got hit in the eye once by the candidate. I protect mine within reason, but I think that where you spend your money ends up being a very public thing.
If we don't help Israel, Palestinians and Muslims will destroy Israel, then come for the US. I don't necessarily think that we should be in the business of global diplomacy, but it's stupid to assume that Islam's hatred of the US is solely due to our involvement in Israel.
Remember, in Islam, you kill the Infidels (non-Muslims) that won't accept your rule. Any Muslim that tells you otherwise is either lying or hasn't read his Koran. Same goes with Christianity. Any "Christian" who says that there are many paths to God is either lying or hasn't read his Bible.
First you say "the environment as a whole is much too complex of a system for us to understand the effects that we are having on it", and then you say that we are "wrecking our planet."
Seems to me that is exactly what is coming out of the rabidly environmentalist camp. 1) The assumption that the earth, without human "interference" would be "perfect/pristine". 2) The assumption that the vast majority of environmental changes we see are a result of human, not natural activity.
Every model I've seen for the destruction of the world eliminates one thing: PRICE. Forrester, for example, would have us believe that starving people are going to prefer to buy consumer goods which require the transformation of arable land to non-arable land rather than food. Yeah, very likely. "I'm going to starve, but at least I'll do it in style in my new Boxster S!!!" Many people have said it better than I - people are economically minded. When the Western capitalistic, wasteful life becomes too expensive, we'll change, but right now, we choose big houses, bug cars and big trips because we can afford to. When gas prices were $2 a gallon here, people were much less likely to drive on huge vacations.
As a student at LFM http://lfm.mit.edu, we did tours at the following places:
HP Medical (now Agilent) in New Hampshire - the cool part was watching a wave soldering station and a very fast pick-and-place surface mount maching
Polaroid in MA - there was an awesome plastic injection molding machine for those little drawers in the film packs, plus the processing of the springs was cool.
Eastman Gelatine in Peabody, MA - not for the weak of stomach - they make gelatin, kosher, from cattle bones. We went through the whole process, which includes some pretty cool chemical vats. Watching the stuff ooze out in the last step was pretty cool.
Kodak in Rochester - we saw the manufacture of single use cameras. Some pretty cool machines that place the film in the camera, but most of it is manual. We also saw them make the kiosks that go into Wal-Mart for scanning and printing as well as the digital camera assembly. At their museum, you can look down into where most of the motion pictures are stored today.
Detroit - I'm from here and have toured the following plants: Lansing Grand River (not operational yet), Hamtramck (Full-size Caddies and Buicks), Orion (Full-Size Buick). Ford Windsor Engine plant. All very cool, but since I'm automotive it's all old hat.
Ford Explorer - Kentucky - at the time it was the fastest (87 per hour) assembly plant in the US. They don't start the Explorers until the last step of the process, unlike GM that has them idling for the last (seems like) half hour of the assembly process.
Alcoa - near Evansville, IN. Another very cool tour. Didn't get to see too much of the process, but what we saw (where the oxide is removed and the final rolling as well as some quality testing) was cool. That plant has about the best union-management relationship I've seen.
Dell - Austin TX. Not too much to see there, although interesting for geeks. There are some interesting things, such as how they handle their suppliers and how they do testing (they balked when I told them how they could save time and money using Linux for burn-in). We saw an Optiplex plant and a Workstation/Server plant.
Garrett Turbocharger - LA. If you can, watch them finish the test on a turbo unit. They pump air through it until it explodes to make sure it isn't dangerous. They have a laser welder that is very cool to watch. Interesting to see their precision since the tolerances on turbos are so tight.
Intel in Phoenix, AZ - You won't be able to do this tour, but very cool to see them make chips and discuss various clean room rules (sneezing, throwing up, etc.) Also, testing machines and very interesting to watch security measures (pre 9/11, even)
Boeing. You, of course have to do this tour. We saw the 777 line, but also toured the test facility where they were finishing up testing on one of the ISS modules, and toured where they make the wing spar (one solid piece of aluminum that is milled down)
Okay, I'll say that I also never agreed to a license agreement when I bought my DVD player that said I would only use CCA-licensed software to play movies on it. I got a box with a DVD-ROM drive and no documentation. Isn't part of agreeing to a contract a "meeting of the minds?" If they don't include that agreement, then I'm free.
Apparently, there is also an issue over whether a user is authorized to access the information through a purchase of a DVD. No DVD I ever bought has any print on it that said "You agree only to use this DVD in players licensed by the CCA." If that is the case, there is no restriction on reverse-engineering, since I own a license to the data on the DVD.
That eliminates the "trade secret" part, and all that's left is the DMCA case, which will probably end up going to the Supreme Court anyway.
I remember back when OS/2 Warp was released with built-in (although pretty cumbersome) voice recognition. Bill Gates boldly announced that the next version of Microsoft Windows would have voice recognition capability... Hmmm 98, 98SE, 2000, Me, XP. Sounds like a bad case of vaporware, or more likely, fraud. Methinks it was an attempt to divert attention from OS/2 without costing MS a penny.
Economically speaking, the way to prevent the tragedy of the commons (overuse and abuse of public goods) is to come up with ways of charging based on use. For example, you come up with a price for pollution, sell "pollution credits" and let the open market figure out the rest.
GPS tracking, though... That's pretty stupid and invasive. How long will it be before they stick the GPS info on a map and voila - instant speeding tickets. Coordinate that with info on traffic light timing and you can ticket someone for blowing a red light any time of day or night.
My two cents - if you really want a use-based tax, you roll the tax into gasoline. If the person isn't using it to drive, they're using it for a small engine - the kind that put out a whole lot more pollution than most cars.
Interesting. With all the crap that Hollywood is trying to put into the broadcast and device channel. Seems all that is needed is some upstarts with a better model (e.g. free internet radio stations) where the ARTISTS and not the MIDDLEMEN are the prime benefitters.
All you need is some Blair Witch - type directors/producers/actors and you could really turn Hollywood on its head to where the real plots, etc. get the $$$.
Maybe some sort of eBay like rating/payment system on top of a high-bandwidth media server. Sounds like a winner.
I agree that corporate pressure is going to force some people to falsify documents, make false claims, etc., but those are the same people that would have done it under other pressure (e.g. Cold Fusion). Science doesn't have the "corner" on honest people that will sacrifice everything for the truth. Neither does engineering, computer science, whatever. People are going to do bad things no matter what field they're in and the field is supposed to have ways (e.g. peer review) to alleviate and correct those problems. I could just as easily say that the media causes these problems by publishing stories that have not gone through even minimum peer review - because in the media, accuracy is always second to newsworthiness and speed.
Those definitely were some stupid things, but I remember SGI was trying to get into the big internet server market. At the same time, they were selling us buggy hardware and saying "well, if your running the bleeding edge, you're going to have some hiccups." In some ways, the move away from the ultra cool looking computer that's unreliable for everyday work to the servers they're putting out now that are more reliable was a good move. They weren't going to make money on the year they had before their super-cool, super-fast architectures became mainstream. At least selling the machines at 10x the price an equivalent machine would cost a year later.
Now I just have to submit a patent application for "address verification via circuit-switched connection for gift coordination" AKA calling my mom to ask for my brother's address to send a gift.
Kind of reminds me of some Dell patents on their wall of invention. "Battery retention device for a laptop" AKA the same as a battery retention device for every other electronic device, but this one's for a LAPTOP!
Sure, the RIAA business model is crap, but that doesn't mean that we should "enlighten" them by stealing their music. I think that a pay-per-use or per-song model is much better.
To make this an example, remember shareware? You as a shareware author have the right to set terms on your programs. I wrote a few (back in the CompuServe days) and had no idea whether they received a lot of use, no use or what - because no one felt like coughing up the money. A copyright gives me the right to decide how I share my work with others. It also gives the public the right to have the work after a certain period of time. Just because digital data is easy to transmit doesn't mean it should be free.
Slashdot Mirror
It's amazing how much science has become a religion. We can't learn from the past. Here's an example of someone who had the audacity to buck the system. Obviously anyone who disagrees that Evolution is a fact, because it has been "backed by over 10,000 peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals," is a religious fool, as Scientific American clearly shows. Emphasis added to quoted story below:
A brilliant Hungarian doctor of the last century named Ignaz Semmelweis, understood the control of deadly infectious diseases. Articles in the book, None Of These Diseases by S. I. McMillen, M.D., and in the Encyclopedia Britannica documents the work of Semmelweis.
As a young doctor in Vienna in 1845 he was appalled by the staggering death rate by infection of women who gave birth in hospitals. While most children were born at home at that time, usually the homeless or sick, gave birth to their children in the local hospitals.
The level of infectious puerperal (childbed) fever was horrendous with between 15 and 30 percent of such mothers dying in hospital. At that time this tragic situation was considered normal. Dr. Semmelweis noted that every morning the young interns examined the bodies of the mothers who had died and then immediately, without washing their hands, went to the next ward where they would examine the expectant mothers.
Semmelweis insisted that the doctors under his supervision wash their hands vigorously in water and chlorinated lime prior to examining their patients. Immediately, the mortality rate caused by infection among the expectant mothers fell to less than 2 percent dying due to these infections. Despite these fantastic improvements the senior hospital staff despised Dr. Semmelweis's medical innovations and eventually fired him. Most of his medical colleagues rejected his new techniques and ridiculed his demands that they wash their hands because they could not believe infections could be caused by something invisible to the naked eye.
Later he took a position in the St. Rochus Hospital, Pest, Hungary [Budapest],which was experiencing an epidemic of puerperal fever in the ward where mothers were giving birth. Immediately, his new sanitary procedures had a positive effect, with the mortality rate dropping to less than 1 percent instead of the 15 percent that was normal in other hospitals.
During the following six years, he received the approval of the Hungarian government which sent medical advisory letters to all district authorities demanding that all medical staff follow Dr. Semmelweis's sanitation instructions. Although the beneficial results of washing hands were obvious, the medical establishments of Europe and North America continued to ignore his techniques. Patients continued to die needlessly of infectious diseases while they were in the hospital. Decades of rejection by his colleagues finally drove Dr. Semmelweis to a nervous breakdown that placed him in a mental institution. Tragically, due to an infection he received through a cut on his hand during an operation in 1865, Dr. Semmelweis succumbed to the same disease he spent his life trying to alleviate. Dr. Joseph Lister, the father of modern antisepsis (the science of fighting infection), said of him, "I think with the greatest admiration of him and his achievement."
Actually, TMI was a great example of how people under pressure can make exactly the wrong decisions at critical times, and that's about all. If you read about the disaster, you'll find that:
1) A few key, poor decisions prevented the automatic failsafes from working in the best way
2) Other failsafes kicked in to avert a major disaster
3) The federal government passed laws aimed at preventing Homer Simpsons from overriding the automatic systems because of TMI.
Jay Forrester and his work in System Dynamics shows that people tend to make poor decisions when they don't see things from a system perspective. The same can be said about nuclear power. Everyone wants their light to work when they flip the switch, they just don't want power lines, electric plants, ugly transformers, etc.
Those are very typical "scientific" arguments for the geologic column and other things like evolution. I remember watching a video about dandelions and how if you mow them short for many years they grow shorter, etc. The logic is this. I do a core sample in a river, measure the sediment, wait a year, measure the sediment, and voila! I know how old the riverbed is by measuring how much sediment! Sounds fishy? Same argument for the Grand Canyon. It's MILLIONS of years old because, you measure how much it is eroded each year, divide by the depth, and that's how old it is. That's the result of uniformitarianism everything is SOOO simple.
Okay, now add fossils. "In general" fossils appear from simplest at the bottom to more complex at top. That "proves" evolution. Until you find a layer where there are simple and complex fossils. Uh oh. Did I disprove the geologic column? NO! I just say that I had some catastrophic event that "mixed" the fossils. How do I know? Because evolution says that the simpler fossils are older.
Thus you have this amazing circular proof. Evolutionary theory validates the geologic column theory and the geologic column validates evolution.
Here's an example. The petrified forest in CA is "225 million years old" Why? because the process of petrification takes many millions of years. Well, except for the case of Mount Saint Helens where it took... Take a breath. 23 years. The eruption also carved a canyon that in scientific terms took 1000 years to form. So in other words, if you ignored all other evidence and looked at that canyon, you would say that it took 1000 years to form, when in actuality it took. Take another breath. FIVE DAYS!
I think I'll continue to take the geologic column with a grain of salt. Yes, it looks good in theory, but things aren't always that simple in the real world.
To use a familiar analogy to describe punctuated equilibrium...
Fish...
????
HUMANS!!!
I agree. Pretty hard to disprove.
Just to clarify, "non-scientific" worldview means that the existence of a supreme being is something that cannot be proven within the realm of science. Thus both "Creationists" and "Evolutionists" view evidence and theorize within their view of how things came about. Even in the scientific method, you create a hypothesis before doing the intensive data collection. It's just that most people aren't stating their worldviews in the hypothesis statement as assuptions.
Interestingly enough, the "evolutionists" are the ones that say "we have no presuppositions!!!" where the "creationists" are willing to admit that the existence of God is their fundamental presupposition. Just an observation.
Basically, intelligent design is saying that you have to be consistent when you analyze "intelligence". In other words, you look at a building and go through a mental process and end up saying, "this was designed by _someone_" You look at a computer program and say "this was designed by _someone_" You also look at certain things (e.g. pink noise) and say "this is random." SETI does this - they are looking for signals that indicate intelligence.
However, when you look at, for example, human beings, if you went through the same mental process you have to contradict yourself - you see something that is complex, you see something that exhibits a pattern, but you say, "this is random noise".
You're correct that there aren't any REAL scientific claims, but "forensic" science is never really able to "claim" anything, it just suggests a more or less likely scenario. For example, quantum mechanics suggests that a bullet could disappear from a gun and reappear in your chest, but a forensic evidence would probably suggest that the bullet was shot from the gun.
So, in other words, Intelligent Design suggests that, in order to validate their non-scientific worldview (that there is no god) scientists are unable to consistently apply logic to whether something is designed or not, IF that design implies the existance of a god.
Our illustrious friend is somewhat accurate with his point #2 in general, but it's interesting that many GAME-CHANGING research has fallen under that. Here are some examples:
Galileo - Theorized that the Sun was the center of the "universe" and not the Earth. Galileo was, by and large demonized by the current SCIENTIFIC community.
General Relativity - Theorized that time
Quantum Mechanics - Theorized that "fundamental particles" did not follow the accepted laws of motion (i.e. Newtonian). Even Einstein did not accept Quantum.
Boltzmann - committed suicide over the rejection of his ideas merely because "atoms" were out of favor. His theories were later proven.
So, you have to be careful.
One word.... INADMISSABLE IANAL, but, I bet that private information obtained on John Doe from eBay by a "law enforcement official" without a search warrant will get nixed by a judge.
There are two things that make this less dangerous. #1 it costs eBay to fulfill these requests, and they aren't going to be capable of handling all the requests coming in *if* police feel they can just send in a fax and get their answer for free. #2 the police will be looking for specific info, and the process of getting a search warrant for that info is not "expensive" enough to risk having the evidence be inadmissable in court if they do, in fact find something.
IANAL, but it appears that the decision is:
1) If you have non-public information (SSN, CC#, addresses, etc.) on someone, you are partially liable if you offer that to someone for a fee for what that person does with the information.
2) You can't obtain information on someone deceitfully and sell it.
#2 seems pretty obvious. #1 has a lot of implications for all these companies that have your mortgage records, etc., which IMHO is a good thing. In other words, "Quicken Loans" becomes an accomplice to a con artist if they sold that con artist a list of their outstanding loans and contact info.
This is not in any way talking about public info, though, so if you pay me $25 to get someone's phone number from the white pages, you can harass that person all you want and it won't come back to me. At least based on that decision.
I agree. Since any credit check degrades your credit rating you should ask for financial compensation for the credit check itself.
I know about the point reduction because when I was a college graduate with no credit, I would get discounts from Sears and JCPenney's, etc., because they would give me 10%-20% discounts for "signing up for their cards" Since I had no credit (no student loan, no credit cards, no auto loans, etc.) I always got turned down and the 5-10min to hear that was worth the $20 or more I would save. That was, until I decided I really should get a credit card. When I started applying for real credit cards, they published the denial reason as "too many credit checks within the last XXX days."
Thus, you should ask the employer to pony up some $$$ if they want to hurt your credit rating.
On the privacy issue thing. I think privacy is overrated. Everyone screams "privacy" until something happens that they don't like, and then they're out digging dirt on whomever. For example: Presidential elections. You see the media tracking down the guy's third grade bully to go on air saying that he got hit in the eye once by the candidate. I protect mine within reason, but I think that where you spend your money ends up being a very public thing.
If we don't help Israel, Palestinians and Muslims will destroy Israel, then come for the US. I don't necessarily think that we should be in the business of global diplomacy, but it's stupid to assume that Islam's hatred of the US is solely due to our involvement in Israel.
Remember, in Islam, you kill the Infidels (non-Muslims) that won't accept your rule. Any Muslim that tells you otherwise is either lying or hasn't read his Koran. Same goes with Christianity. Any "Christian" who says that there are many paths to God is either lying or hasn't read his Bible.
First you say "the environment as a whole is much too complex of a system for us to understand the effects that we are having on it", and then you say that we are "wrecking our planet."
Seems to me that is exactly what is coming out of the rabidly environmentalist camp. 1) The assumption that the earth, without human "interference" would be "perfect/pristine". 2) The assumption that the vast majority of environmental changes we see are a result of human, not natural activity.
Every model I've seen for the destruction of the world eliminates one thing: PRICE. Forrester, for example, would have us believe that starving people are going to prefer to buy consumer goods which require the transformation of arable land to non-arable land rather than food. Yeah, very likely. "I'm going to starve, but at least I'll do it in style in my new Boxster S!!!" Many people have said it better than I - people are economically minded. When the Western capitalistic, wasteful life becomes too expensive, we'll change, but right now, we choose big houses, bug cars and big trips because we can afford to. When gas prices were $2 a gallon here, people were much less likely to drive on huge vacations.
As a student at LFM http://lfm.mit.edu, we did tours at the following places:
HP Medical (now Agilent) in New Hampshire - the cool part was watching a wave soldering station and a very fast pick-and-place surface mount maching
Polaroid in MA - there was an awesome plastic injection molding machine for those little drawers in the film packs, plus the processing of the springs was cool.
Eastman Gelatine in Peabody, MA - not for the weak of stomach - they make gelatin, kosher, from cattle bones. We went through the whole process, which includes some pretty cool chemical vats. Watching the stuff ooze out in the last step was pretty cool.
Kodak in Rochester - we saw the manufacture of single use cameras. Some pretty cool machines that place the film in the camera, but most of it is manual. We also saw them make the kiosks that go into Wal-Mart for scanning and printing as well as the digital camera assembly. At their museum, you can look down into where most of the motion pictures are stored today.
Detroit - I'm from here and have toured the following plants: Lansing Grand River (not operational yet), Hamtramck (Full-size Caddies and Buicks), Orion (Full-Size Buick). Ford Windsor Engine plant. All very cool, but since I'm automotive it's all old hat.
Ford Explorer - Kentucky - at the time it was the fastest (87 per hour) assembly plant in the US. They don't start the Explorers until the last step of the process, unlike GM that has them idling for the last (seems like) half hour of the assembly process.
Alcoa - near Evansville, IN. Another very cool tour. Didn't get to see too much of the process, but what we saw (where the oxide is removed and the final rolling as well as some quality testing) was cool. That plant has about the best union-management relationship I've seen.
Dell - Austin TX. Not too much to see there, although interesting for geeks. There are some interesting things, such as how they handle their suppliers and how they do testing (they balked when I told them how they could save time and money using Linux for burn-in). We saw an Optiplex plant and a Workstation/Server plant.
Garrett Turbocharger - LA. If you can, watch them finish the test on a turbo unit. They pump air through it until it explodes to make sure it isn't dangerous. They have a laser welder that is very cool to watch. Interesting to see their precision since the tolerances on turbos are so tight.
Intel in Phoenix, AZ - You won't be able to do this tour, but very cool to see them make chips and discuss various clean room rules (sneezing, throwing up, etc.) Also, testing machines and very interesting to watch security measures (pre 9/11, even)
Boeing. You, of course have to do this tour. We saw the 777 line, but also toured the test facility where they were finishing up testing on one of the ISS modules, and toured where they make the wing spar (one solid piece of aluminum that is milled down)
Okay, I'll say that I also never agreed to a license agreement when I bought my DVD player that said I would only use CCA-licensed software to play movies on it. I got a box with a DVD-ROM drive and no documentation. Isn't part of agreeing to a contract a "meeting of the minds?" If they don't include that agreement, then I'm free.
Apparently, there is also an issue over whether a user is authorized to access the information through a purchase of a DVD. No DVD I ever bought has any print on it that said "You agree only to use this DVD in players licensed by the CCA." If that is the case, there is no restriction on reverse-engineering, since I own a license to the data on the DVD.
That eliminates the "trade secret" part, and all that's left is the DMCA case, which will probably end up going to the Supreme Court anyway.
I remember back when OS/2 Warp was released with built-in (although pretty cumbersome) voice recognition. Bill Gates boldly announced that the next version of Microsoft Windows would have voice recognition capability... Hmmm 98, 98SE, 2000, Me, XP. Sounds like a bad case of vaporware, or more likely, fraud. Methinks it was an attempt to divert attention from OS/2 without costing MS a penny.
Economically speaking, the way to prevent the tragedy of the commons (overuse and abuse of public goods) is to come up with ways of charging based on use. For example, you come up with a price for pollution, sell "pollution credits" and let the open market figure out the rest.
GPS tracking, though... That's pretty stupid and invasive. How long will it be before they stick the GPS info on a map and voila - instant speeding tickets. Coordinate that with info on traffic light timing and you can ticket someone for blowing a red light any time of day or night.
My two cents - if you really want a use-based tax, you roll the tax into gasoline. If the person isn't using it to drive, they're using it for a small engine - the kind that put out a whole lot more pollution than most cars.
Interesting. With all the crap that Hollywood is trying to put into the broadcast and device channel. Seems all that is needed is some upstarts with a better model (e.g. free internet radio stations) where the ARTISTS and not the MIDDLEMEN are the prime benefitters.
All you need is some Blair Witch - type directors/producers/actors and you could really turn Hollywood on its head to where the real plots, etc. get the $$$.
Maybe some sort of eBay like rating/payment system on top of a high-bandwidth media server. Sounds like a winner.
I agree that corporate pressure is going to force some people to falsify documents, make false claims, etc., but those are the same people that would have done it under other pressure (e.g. Cold Fusion).
Science doesn't have the "corner" on honest people that will sacrifice everything for the truth. Neither does engineering, computer science, whatever. People are going to do bad things no matter what field they're in and the field is supposed to have ways (e.g. peer review) to alleviate and correct those problems.
I could just as easily say that the media causes these problems by publishing stories that have not gone through even minimum peer review - because in the media, accuracy is always second to newsworthiness and speed.
Those definitely were some stupid things, but I remember SGI was trying to get into the big internet server market. At the same time, they were selling us buggy hardware and saying "well, if your running the bleeding edge, you're going to have some hiccups." In some ways, the move away from the ultra cool looking computer that's unreliable for everyday work to the servers they're putting out now that are more reliable was a good move. They weren't going to make money on the year they had before their super-cool, super-fast architectures became mainstream. At least selling the machines at 10x the price an equivalent machine would cost a year later.
Now I just have to submit a patent application for "address verification via circuit-switched connection for gift coordination" AKA calling my mom to ask for my brother's address to send a gift.
Kind of reminds me of some Dell patents on their wall of invention. "Battery retention device for a laptop" AKA the same as a battery retention device for every other electronic device, but this one's for a LAPTOP!
Sure, the RIAA business model is crap, but that doesn't mean that we should "enlighten" them by stealing their music. I think that a pay-per-use or per-song model is much better. To make this an example, remember shareware? You as a shareware author have the right to set terms on your programs. I wrote a few (back in the CompuServe days) and had no idea whether they received a lot of use, no use or what - because no one felt like coughing up the money. A copyright gives me the right to decide how I share my work with others. It also gives the public the right to have the work after a certain period of time. Just because digital data is easy to transmit doesn't mean it should be free.