Obviously, the author fell asleep in the first five minutes of his Biology 101 course and missed the professor's remark that evolution is not teleological.
I think that if we were to live longer, everything would end up costing more so that we would end up needing to work more, and not having the chance to take that sabbatical. I'd love to be wrong about this, but I fear that I'm not.
I completely agree that it'd be preferable to dying. I was just expressing my desire for a different way of life, where I don't just have those few hours when I'm not working and not sleeping to do what I want to do. Weekends are a big help here, but I still spend 5 of every 7 days at work.
I'd like to think that it might be possible to have an extra day off every week without putting in more time at the office: three days off, four days on, three days off sounds pretty good to me. However, the system just isn't designed that way right now.
I should add that I'm reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", and I'm feeling pretty sad about the fate of the working class. And, since I'm not a member of the leisure class, I suspect I'm a member of the working class.
If we had a few centuries to play around with, I'm sure that we'd somehow manage to spend it working and not playing. Instead of retiring at age 65, we'd retire at age 665, and we'd have until we were expected to die 10 years later to enjoy the finer things in life.
...or a three hour long invasive therapy I have to go through every morning (much like showering)
Oh, so that's why Slashdotters have an aversion to showering: they're doing it wrong! It shouldn't take three hours, and it definitely shouldn't be invasive.;)
There are a great many good reasons to be vegan, or at least purely vegetarian, but the welfare of animals doesn't actually qualify
Except that the domesticated food animals would not exist, and hence, not suffer at all, if we did not eat them. (I understand that this was not the grandparent's point. I just thought I'd add my two cents.)
I appreciate that you recognize that there are good reasons to be vegan or vegetarian. Thank you!
What do you think people are? Non-animals? We're in the Animal Kingdom, no?
they are all animals...we are humans...why shouldn't we eat them
So, by this logic, and, assuming people are animals, we should eat them, too? Even though I'm vegan, I can identify a good argument for eating animals. This is not a good argument.
Am I of the 'overly aggressive type' that you feared? I hope you understand that our difference of opinion about this matter does not make us enemies.
If you really want to shift roads expenses to us rural people - go for it. But don't be surprised when the delivery cost on food becomes astronomical to you people who are so foolish to live so far away from it.
That, or the cost is absorbed by subsidies. You seemed to have neglected them in your post.
Things are rarely as simple or black-and-white as they appear.
Which drugs are you referring to when you say, 'Drugs kill'? Caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, crack, LSD, etc.? It wasn't obvious from your post.
Did you mean only those drugs that are currently illegal?
Cool; the bill that prevents companies from patenting things for which prior art exists must have just passed the other day! This will easily reduce the number of patent-related stories on Slashdot by 75%!
Of course, I'm only kidding. It's important to remember that the Patent Office isn't very good at preventing people from patenting things for which prior art exists. Apple could patent the jog wheel. The patent would then need to be invalidated.
Thank you for your explicitness in your unqualified assertion that the Democrats will lose the election. We will know you were correct if Bush wins the election, and we will know you were incorrect if Kerry wins the election.
Unky Herb: "Hang up, call me back, and say the exact opposite of everything you just said!"
Lead engineer (on phone): "Uhhh, Homer Simpson is a...brilliant man who has come up with many...well-thought-out, practical ideas, and is insuring the financial future of this company. Oh, and his personal hygiene is beyond reproach."
My first Debian install was tricky, but I've gotten much better at it. First, I partition the hard drive, and then format and mount the partitions. Experience helps here. I know I'll want/,/home,/usr,/var,/var/log, and/tmp on different partitions.
Then, I try to figure out the driver I need for my sound and network cards. I select only those modules I know I need. You can even try inserting the modules into the kernel one-by-one if you're not sure which you need. You'll soon figure out the right one.
Then, I skip the tasksel and dselect stuff. I'm left with a very minimal install. I run apt-get to install an xserver and gnome. After that, I run apt-get when I know I need something like sshd. It's a different approach to most OS installs I've done, where I install everything and only use the things I need. With Debian, I install only those things I know I need.
I used to run RedHat. It took me many hours to install MythTV, figuring out which packages I needed, trying to resolve the dependencies.
Now I run Debian unstable. It took me a few seconds to add a package source for MythTV to my list of sources, run apt-get update, and then apt-get install. apt-get took care of everything.
Similarly, I wanted to install an ssh server on a Debian box. I just typed 'apt-get install sshd', and apt-get took care of the rest. I shelled into the box a couple of seconds later.
Debian unstable is much more recent, but supposedly less stable, than Debian stable or Debian testing. I've never experienced any stability issues, save for the rare mozilla crash. I measure my uptime in months, not days or weeks.
By changing your sources list, you can easily add unstable and even non-free package sources.
I choose to run Debian because it works very well and fits nicely with my ideals. I switched away from Microsoft because I didn't want to be locked into their technologies, and I switched away from RedHat because I didn't want to pay for security updates and I'm too lazy to answer their survey.
Debian is free as in speech and free as in beer. It does not lock me into a rigid view.
Sorry, but I can't allay your fears. I failed the lifestyle polygraph three times. The first time, I was told I was lying when I said I had not committed a serious crime; we're talking rape, murder, extortion, and the like. I assure you, I have not. The first polygrapher also berated me for being vegan.
The second time, I was told that I was telling the truth about not committing a serious crime. Well, I gave exactly the same answer as I had during the first polygraph. Did I uncommitt a serious crime? Did I forget I had committed it since my first polygraph?
It seems, however, according to the polygraph at least, that I was stupid enough to experiment with drugs or to sell drugs sometime between my first and second polygraph. For, during the second polygraph, I was 'lying' when I said I had not.
During the third polygraph, where I was told I am very lucky (for it is apparently very rare for someone to be seen a second time, let alone a third; I assure you it is not rare), I was not lying about not using or selling drugs, but the serious crime problem popped up again.
As an experiment during the third polygraph, I lied when I answered one of the questions about all of the information on my form being correct. I took a trip to Canada (my first time leaving the USA) after my second polygraph, but I never amended my form to include it, because I didn't want to have to go through the hassle. The polygrapher wasn't really interested in my answer to this question, apparently.
It was an interesting experience, and gave me some good anecdotes to share with others, but it didn't help anyone figure out if I was telling the truth or not.
I took three polygraphs as part of a process to obtain a security clearance (no, I didn't get it.) I believe the effectiveness of the polygraph has little to do with the 'technology', and a lot to do with the theater surrounding the examination.
'It doesn't appease me that many defenders of the polygraph know it is junk science but defend its use because many people confess to crimes during interviews done before or after being given the test. The machine may not be able to detect lies accurately but, as Richard Nixon said, "it scares the hell out of people." The end justifies the means.'
I agree to an extent, and I would add that, in the case of a democratically elected leader, the leader does represent the people and should represent the will of the people. However, it seems of late that the leader of a country (and I'm not necessarily talking about the U.S. here) often seems out of step with the will of the people.
What happens when the leader of a country represents the people but does not reflect the will of the peope?
'With less then three weeks until the U.S. presidential election, President George Bush has received endorsements from two world leaders, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Austraslian [sic] Prime Minister John Howard.'
So now we're equating heads of state with states themselves?
"[B]lasts of hatred", huh? Is it ok if I use that as an example of hyperbole next time I'm forced to come up with one? I promise I'll properly attribute it to you, Anonymous Coward.
Except if the Republicans lose, right? I mean, they wouldn't try to contest the election, especially considering the big fuss they raised when the Democrats tried it four years ago, right?
Slashdot Mirror
Obviously, the author fell asleep in the first five minutes of his Biology 101 course and missed the professor's remark that evolution is not teleological.
I think that if we were to live longer, everything would end up costing more so that we would end up needing to work more, and not having the chance to take that sabbatical. I'd love to be wrong about this, but I fear that I'm not.
I completely agree that it'd be preferable to dying. I was just expressing my desire for a different way of life, where I don't just have those few hours when I'm not working and not sleeping to do what I want to do. Weekends are a big help here, but I still spend 5 of every 7 days at work.
I'd like to think that it might be possible to have an extra day off every week without putting in more time at the office: three days off, four days on, three days off sounds pretty good to me. However, the system just isn't designed that way right now.
I should add that I'm reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", and I'm feeling pretty sad about the fate of the working class. And, since I'm not a member of the leisure class, I suspect I'm a member of the working class.
If we had a few centuries to play around with, I'm sure that we'd somehow manage to spend it working and not playing. Instead of retiring at age 65, we'd retire at age 665, and we'd have until we were expected to die 10 years later to enjoy the finer things in life.
...or a three hour long invasive therapy I have to go through every morning (much like showering)
;)
Oh, so that's why Slashdotters have an aversion to showering: they're doing it wrong! It shouldn't take three hours, and it definitely shouldn't be invasive.
But, you know, if Julia Roberts has twins..
Ohhh, Julia Roberts is having twins!? Why are we still talking about this Bhopal thing? I mean, it happened in India!
So, about these twins...do we know the sexes? Birth weights?? Paternity???
Sweet! This is even better than going to prison so that I can play video games, watch cable TV, and eat three squares a day. Where do I sign up?
It's not a good idea because it poses a significant, and unusual, risk to human life
I agree. And, there's a possibly animals might get hurt, too.
Ah, a fellow Slashdot vegan. Do you visit veganporn, by any chance? I read about this at veganporn earlier this morning.
There are a great many good reasons to be vegan, or at least purely vegetarian, but the welfare of animals doesn't actually qualify
Except that the domesticated food animals would not exist, and hence, not suffer at all, if we did not eat them. (I understand that this was not the grandparent's point. I just thought I'd add my two cents.)
I appreciate that you recognize that there are good reasons to be vegan or vegetarian. Thank you!
What do you think people are? Non-animals? We're in the Animal Kingdom, no?
they are all animals...we are humans...why shouldn't we eat them
So, by this logic, and, assuming people are animals, we should eat them, too? Even though I'm vegan, I can identify a good argument for eating animals. This is not a good argument.
Am I of the 'overly aggressive type' that you feared? I hope you understand that our difference of opinion about this matter does not make us enemies.
That, or the cost is absorbed by subsidies. You seemed to have neglected them in your post.
Things are rarely as simple or black-and-white as they appear.
My desired result is that the voting machines accurately record and tally the votes as the voters intended. Your code doesn't do that.
I'd like to see their code to make sure that it does just that.
Which drugs are you referring to when you say, 'Drugs kill'? Caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, crack, LSD, etc.? It wasn't obvious from your post.
Did you mean only those drugs that are currently illegal?
Cool; the bill that prevents companies from patenting things for which prior art exists must have just passed the other day! This will easily reduce the number of patent-related stories on Slashdot by 75%!
Of course, I'm only kidding. It's important to remember that the Patent Office isn't very good at preventing people from patenting things for which prior art exists. Apple could patent the jog wheel. The patent would then need to be invalidated.
Thank you for your explicitness in your unqualified assertion that the Democrats will lose the election. We will know you were correct if Bush wins the election, and we will know you were incorrect if Kerry wins the election.
Obligatory Simpsons quote:
Unky Herb: "Hang up, call me back, and say the exact opposite of everything you just said!"
Lead engineer (on phone): "Uhhh, Homer Simpson is a...brilliant man who has come up with many...well-thought-out, practical ideas, and is insuring the financial future of this company. Oh, and his personal hygiene is beyond reproach."
My first Debian install was tricky, but I've gotten much better at it. First, I partition the hard drive, and then format and mount the partitions. Experience helps here. I know I'll want /, /home, /usr, /var, /var/log, and /tmp on different partitions.
Then, I try to figure out the driver I need for my sound and network cards. I select only those modules I know I need. You can even try inserting the modules into the kernel one-by-one if you're not sure which you need. You'll soon figure out the right one.
Then, I skip the tasksel and dselect stuff. I'm left with a very minimal install. I run apt-get to install an xserver and gnome. After that, I run apt-get when I know I need something like sshd. It's a different approach to most OS installs I've done, where I install everything and only use the things I need. With Debian, I install only those things I know I need.
I used to run RedHat. It took me many hours to install MythTV, figuring out which packages I needed, trying to resolve the dependencies.
Now I run Debian unstable. It took me a few seconds to add a package source for MythTV to my list of sources, run apt-get update, and then apt-get install. apt-get took care of everything.
Similarly, I wanted to install an ssh server on a Debian box. I just typed 'apt-get install sshd', and apt-get took care of the rest. I shelled into the box a couple of seconds later.
Debian unstable is much more recent, but supposedly less stable, than Debian stable or Debian testing. I've never experienced any stability issues, save for the rare mozilla crash. I measure my uptime in months, not days or weeks.
By changing your sources list, you can easily add unstable and even non-free package sources.
I choose to run Debian because it works very well and fits nicely with my ideals. I switched away from Microsoft because I didn't want to be locked into their technologies, and I switched away from RedHat because I didn't want to pay for security updates and I'm too lazy to answer their survey.
Debian is free as in speech and free as in beer. It does not lock me into a rigid view.
Sorry, but I can't allay your fears. I failed the lifestyle polygraph three times. The first time, I was told I was lying when I said I had not committed a serious crime; we're talking rape, murder, extortion, and the like. I assure you, I have not. The first polygrapher also berated me for being vegan.
The second time, I was told that I was telling the truth about not committing a serious crime. Well, I gave exactly the same answer as I had during the first polygraph. Did I uncommitt a serious crime? Did I forget I had committed it since my first polygraph?
It seems, however, according to the polygraph at least, that I was stupid enough to experiment with drugs or to sell drugs sometime between my first and second polygraph. For, during the second polygraph, I was 'lying' when I said I had not.
During the third polygraph, where I was told I am very lucky (for it is apparently very rare for someone to be seen a second time, let alone a third; I assure you it is not rare), I was not lying about not using or selling drugs, but the serious crime problem popped up again.
As an experiment during the third polygraph, I lied when I answered one of the questions about all of the information on my form being correct. I took a trip to Canada (my first time leaving the USA) after my second polygraph, but I never amended my form to include it, because I didn't want to have to go through the hassle. The polygrapher wasn't really interested in my answer to this question, apparently.
It was an interesting experience, and gave me some good anecdotes to share with others, but it didn't help anyone figure out if I was telling the truth or not.
I took three polygraphs as part of a process to obtain a security clearance (no, I didn't get it.) I believe the effectiveness of the polygraph has little to do with the 'technology', and a lot to do with the theater surrounding the examination.
From Skepdic:
'It doesn't appease me that many defenders of the polygraph know it is junk science but defend its use because many people confess to crimes during interviews done before or after being given the test. The machine may not be able to detect lies accurately but, as Richard Nixon said, "it scares the hell out of people." The end justifies the means.'
I agree to an extent, and I would add that, in the case of a democratically elected leader, the leader does represent the people and should represent the will of the people. However, it seems of late that the leader of a country (and I'm not necessarily talking about the U.S. here) often seems out of step with the will of the people.
What happens when the leader of a country represents the people but does not reflect the will of the peope?
From the link:
'With less then three weeks until the U.S. presidential election, President George Bush has received endorsements from two world leaders, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Austraslian [sic] Prime Minister John Howard.'
So now we're equating heads of state with states themselves?
"[B]lasts of hatred", huh? Is it ok if I use that as an example of hyperbole next time I'm forced to come up with one? I promise I'll properly attribute it to you, Anonymous Coward.
Except if the Republicans lose, right? I mean, they wouldn't try to contest the election, especially considering the big fuss they raised when the Democrats tried it four years ago, right?