It's quite clear from this exchange that you don't know what the word "falsifiable" means. It doesn't matter that you can't tell the difference at first. It is possible, using new, purely factual information (like finding the previously unknown pattern), to greatly discredit the idea that mutations are random. Thus the idea that mutations are random is able to be shown to be false - thus "falsifi-able".
But until that pattern is known, it's complete hubris to suggest that random is a final answer. It's claiming knowledge that you simply don't have, a conclusion that is simply not supported.
It doesn't mean that it's been show to be false, or is likely to be disproven, it just has to be possible to falsify it.
Unfortuneately, though, with the word "random", that CONCEPT in general isn't falsifiable. Just finding a pattern isn't enough to falsify it- patterns exist in every random generation, that's the whole point of fractals.
I gave you a whole list of ways to falsify that assumption in a previous post.
NONE of which were valid, because they still had assumptions in them.
That's absurd.
Not at all, it's an assumption not based in fact- like Mother Theresa continuing to be Catholic 50 years after her last "feeling of being one with Christ and the Church", it's an act of FAITH. And faith does not belong in science.
No, my point is more of a generic one. If you don't like the action the free market is taking, find another supplier or become a new supplier. Those are the appropriate responses to this, not "the sky is falling let's try to stop it."
Thus raising the question- why the heck is the government buying from them to begin with? Or did they miss the fact that all the drives were "Made in China" with the fine quality control (or lack thereof) that implies?
Yeah, but think about how many Semi trailers of hard drives a day they must get at the NSA for all their "wiretapping" needs.. That could be a huge chunk of revenue!
And by having their own factory, they can have economy of scale PLUS being able to sell their own proprietary back door drives to the public.
I'm not trolling. I actually do believe that a democratic government should be responsive to the majority of the voters and that the United States has the natural resources to be 100% self-sufficient and that conservative social values are the best way to be human (tried, evolved, and tested over the last million years).
Or are you forced, at gunpoint or armtwisted, to buy chinese stuff?
Have you bothered to read the GATT treaty? Certain products *MUST* be made in the second world, by the lowest common bidder, because otherwise the UN would be forced to blockade our ports. Magnets are among these, and gee, speakers, hard drives, and those little wooden trains my 4-year old likes so much all have magnets in them. China is the *ONLY* country by international law allowed to produce magnets right now.
If your arguments are true, you buy local always, and what you are not able to buy you produce yourself.
Almost true- I'm law abiding above all else, and for me local production has to be legal. I'd much rather *all* local production be legal- that's why I'm against the free traitors after all- but it simply isn't.
And yet- our government calls it a national security risk when a Chinese company tries to buy a Canadian company....something we shouldn't care about because we shouldn't be buying military kit from either.
The US government is wise not trust a Chinese implementation of those standards for its data, because the US government can't guarentee the absence of Chinese-added backdoors.
So stop buying from Seagate and put a few tax dollars back into manufacturing hard drives here. You provide jobs for Americans *and* data security for the federal government. Win-win to me.
I understand being paranoid about it. What I don't understand is why they don't simply write into all those wonderful governmental contracts "Must not be manufactured in China", which would simply cut out a HUGE market for these companies that outsource.
So a Chinese Company wants to buy a Canadian (?!?!?) company that makes hard drives. Fine. Stop buying Seagate for the NSA, and move on with our lives.
That implies, of course, that the Democrats have the courage to fight the resultant propaganda war and/or aren't so addicted to their own pork to use such a tactic.
Given the difference in cost between Republican Pork and Democrat Pork, the only thing they have to risk in the net balance is a veto and a shutdown of the federal government.
It's quite true there wasn't a conflict like Iraq, and we didn't lose over three thousand US troops in combat. But thousands died, just most of them weren't Americans.
Yes, but how will they defeat the infamous Bush Administration Amnesia that will prevent any member of the Administration from remembering any wrongdoing whatsoever?
Just as well George Washington didn't rely on magic, or you'd all be speaking English. Er, wait...
Actually, in a way, he relied on exactly the same sort of magic- historians now know he funded his campaigns on a whiskey business producing around 5000 gallons of distilled spirits every year. The only difference between genetically engineered e-coli making gasoline out of cellulose and yeast making alcohol out of corn mash is the genetics of the microorganisms- other than that it's precisely the same process.
Wait, we have to stop innovating and maintaining our position so our poor don't shoot our rich? That makes no sense.
It does in a country that is slowly slipping from a first world, three class system with high class mobility to a third world two class feudalism with no class mobility. Also, note, we don't need to "stop innovating"- we need to just have a different goal for our innovation, a rising tide that floats all boats instead of a Tsunami that blows away the town but floats your personal house to the highest mountain.
No, theories that can't be attacked on a factual basis aren't science. They may have a place in philosophy or religion, but not science.
Fine- and since randomization is not falsifiable, it has no place in science.
Which doesn't matter. If we assume it's random
Which is a non-falsifiable assumption, which has no place in science.
and it isn't, then it's possible for someone to find a pattern and make predictions and thus show the theory to be false - thus it's falsifiable
Once again, an unknown pattern and a random pattern are not distinguishable from one another.
Science hasn't discovered a purpose to the universe, or very much evidence that one exists - that's a fact.
And science hasn't discovered for sure that there is no purpose to the universe either- it's a question that does not belong to science at all.
And, for many of us, that's what religion is seen to be - a way to deal with irrational emotions so that one can get on with one's life.
Uh, yes, it's a way to explain irrational emotions in a rational way.
They aren't the same. It boggles my mind that anyone could seem them as even vaguely similar.
They are both assumptions- beliefs that have NO supporting evidence and are NOT falsifiable.
"Mutations appear to occur randomly" is a valid, scientific statement. "Mutations appear to have a pattern associated with them" and "mutations seem to be planned" are not. "I don't know" is an important part of science, but you don't get to rewrite the rules because you don't like the outcome.
NO, "Mutations appear to occur randomly" is no more valid than "mutations appear to be planned". Both are assumptions of fact in a realm where no fact exists. You can't just assume anything and call it science, you have to PROVE it rigorously.
I don't want to diminish the immaterial rewards of doing something well, but it seems odd to make sure that better work leads to them but can never lead to material gain. Look at any other field: I do a better job of cleaning and my house is cleaner, meet more women and I get more dates, find a better way to build muscle and I can stay fit easier. I really don't know why economics should be made an exception to the rule that if you put more into something so that it becomes more productive, you'll get more of the same out of it.
An interesting question from a capitalist, since that's the entire point of capitalism. Those who put the effort in, the workers, get the minimum wage possible to assure retention, while those who put no effort in, the stockholders, reap the rewards of profit. Isn't that what absolutely every form of economics since feudalism has been about, the transfer of the wealth from the productive to the unproductive?
I really don't see it that way. Doctors still make more than office workers, who make more than blue collar people.
Actually, in recent years, no they don't. The insurance companies and HMOs have a tendency to steal the profit from doctors- and many office workers make a LOT less than a blue collar union employee, when you figure in the overtime.
People with hourly wages get overtime, and seniority still counts in a lot of places.
Hourly wages do get overtime, but seniority is largely looked down upon, with many 45-50 year olds being handed "early retirement" to get rid of them and push them out of the workforce. That's why senior citizens are the third largest employment group of fast food restaurants.
The unusual people who are over- or under-rewarded by our economy are a big issue and get a lot of attention, but 80% of people still earn in rough proportion to what they produce.
No, actually not. They earn a small fraction compared to what they produce- the rest is taken by C-level executives and stockholders. Otherwise the company wouldn't be able to stay in business in today's short-term profit stock world.
First off, as an extreme example, not many men can donate eggs to fertility clinics. Plus, education isn't the only thing that affects how much value a person can produce.
That's funny- I just had somebody in another discussion on the trade imbalance claiming we can educate our way out of this mess (I only halfway agreed with him- right before pointing out that a Bachelor's degree at any 4-year US school now will cost you around $40,000 in tuition and books; where an India Institute of Technology graduate can be had for $4000 and will do the exact same job).
BTW, I was trying to bait you. I salute you for being able to resist the temptation.
Now that this discussion is in the realm of "last week's news"- I have to ask, because often times my autistic stupidity makes me appear smart when I'm really not. The only thing I could think of might be racism with the Happily Ever After reference....but I've got nothing against black people (I'm a culturalist, not a racist, which is why I'm also pro-legal-immigrant to the extent that I want the non-enforcement arm of ICE completely automated, but I'm so anti-illegal-immigrant that I wouldn't mind a Stalin-like purge of 12 to 20 million residents that seem to need deportation).
This ignores productivity gains. Wages rise as a national productivity rises.
No, stockholder PROFITS rise as national productivity rises. Wages rise as a function of worker retention- and in a world where it's perceived by management that experience, citizenship, and education are worth nothing, there's no need to retain workers. Why endanger stockholder profits to pay wages you aren't FORCED to pay?
All of this talk about how trade is going to destroy our future, in my respectful opinion, false. The real problem you're talking about occurs if U.S. productivity eventually lags the rest of the world's productivty. That currently isn't the case. It is of note, however that U.S. productivity, which grew in the 1990's, seems to becoming stagnant again, as it has been since the 70's (and is arguably a major factor in why wages have been stagnant).
Productivity is about profits, not wages. During the 1990s, real wages fell when compared to inflation.
Because trade enriches both nations.
If by "nation" you mean the rich. In reality, the poor are just being decimated to pay for the "enrichment".
I know you don't believe that, but I do, and I do think the data is available that proves it: you make the stuff here, it's no longer as cheap for the consumer.
So what? If you have a $20/hr factory job, you can afford the higher prices. If you've got a $7.50/hr restaurant job, you're not even going to be able to afford the lower prices- everything you earn will go to food, clothing, or shelter. Cheap is worthless.
The primary issue we have is to transition the population towards more productive labour -- that would be highly skilled labour, service labour, or knowledge work. The "burger-flipping economy" assumes no increase in education or training in the workforce. This can, and has changed in the past (The G.I's bill of rights after WW2, for example).
All highly skilled labor and knowledge work can be done cheaper in another country. Service labor IS burger-flipping. Why should a corporation pay $40,000 in taxes here, to send an American to college and get back a skilled worker earning $40,000 here, when the same corporation can pay $4000 in taxes in India, send a bright young man to the India Institute of Technology, and have the same skilled worker in India for $10,000/year? That is absolute advantage. The one difference is the job that can't be offshored- the service job- which is shuffling papers and flipping burgers for federal minimum wage.
Slashdot Mirror
Nah, that would take Indians working in Microsoft Hydrabad Research Center.
Since I got it mixed up with Business Objects, which was once also called Seagate. Seagate Software, maker of Crystal Reports.
It's quite clear from this exchange that you don't know what the word "falsifiable" means. It doesn't matter that you can't tell the difference at first. It is possible, using new, purely factual information (like finding the previously unknown pattern), to greatly discredit the idea that mutations are random. Thus the idea that mutations are random is able to be shown to be false - thus "falsifi-able".
But until that pattern is known, it's complete hubris to suggest that random is a final answer. It's claiming knowledge that you simply don't have, a conclusion that is simply not supported.
It doesn't mean that it's been show to be false, or is likely to be disproven, it just has to be possible to falsify it.
Unfortuneately, though, with the word "random", that CONCEPT in general isn't falsifiable. Just finding a pattern isn't enough to falsify it- patterns exist in every random generation, that's the whole point of fractals.
I gave you a whole list of ways to falsify that assumption in a previous post.
NONE of which were valid, because they still had assumptions in them.
That's absurd.
Not at all, it's an assumption not based in fact- like Mother Theresa continuing to be Catholic 50 years after her last "feeling of being one with Christ and the Church", it's an act of FAITH. And faith does not belong in science.
I don't understand. How does being a smuggler help with the government contract?
No, my point is more of a generic one. If you don't like the action the free market is taking, find another supplier or become a new supplier. Those are the appropriate responses to this, not "the sky is falling let's try to stop it."
Then don't vote republican. They're the reason the terrorists want to keep attacking the US anyway due to their colossally moronic foreign policies.
You mean Carter was a Republican? Or did you forget the support for the Shah of Iran which started all the mess between Shia and Sunni again?
Thus raising the question- why the heck is the government buying from them to begin with? Or did they miss the fact that all the drives were "Made in China" with the fine quality control (or lack thereof) that implies?
Yeah, but think about how many Semi trailers of hard drives a day they must get at the NSA for all their "wiretapping" needs.. That could be a huge chunk of revenue!
And by having their own factory, they can have economy of scale PLUS being able to sell their own proprietary back door drives to the public.
I'm not trolling. I actually do believe that a democratic government should be responsive to the majority of the voters and that the United States has the natural resources to be 100% self-sufficient and that conservative social values are the best way to be human (tried, evolved, and tested over the last million years).
Or are you forced, at gunpoint or armtwisted, to buy chinese stuff?
Have you bothered to read the GATT treaty? Certain products *MUST* be made in the second world, by the lowest common bidder, because otherwise the UN would be forced to blockade our ports. Magnets are among these, and gee, speakers, hard drives, and those little wooden trains my 4-year old likes so much all have magnets in them. China is the *ONLY* country by international law allowed to produce magnets right now.
If your arguments are true, you buy local always, and what you are not able to buy you produce yourself.
Almost true- I'm law abiding above all else, and for me local production has to be legal. I'd much rather *all* local production be legal- that's why I'm against the free traitors after all- but it simply isn't.
And yet- our government calls it a national security risk when a Chinese company tries to buy a Canadian company....something we shouldn't care about because we shouldn't be buying military kit from either.
The US government is wise not trust a Chinese implementation of those standards for its data, because the US government can't guarentee the absence of Chinese-added backdoors.
So stop buying from Seagate and put a few tax dollars back into manufacturing hard drives here. You provide jobs for Americans *and* data security for the federal government. Win-win to me.
I understand being paranoid about it. What I don't understand is why they don't simply write into all those wonderful governmental contracts "Must not be manufactured in China", which would simply cut out a HUGE market for these companies that outsource.
So a Chinese Company wants to buy a Canadian (?!?!?) company that makes hard drives. Fine. Stop buying Seagate for the NSA, and move on with our lives.
That implies, of course, that the Democrats have the courage to fight the resultant propaganda war and/or aren't so addicted to their own pork to use such a tactic.
Given the difference in cost between Republican Pork and Democrat Pork, the only thing they have to risk in the net balance is a veto and a shutdown of the federal government.
It's quite true there wasn't a conflict like Iraq, and we didn't lose over three thousand US troops in combat. But thousands died, just most of them weren't Americans.
Which is the correct way to run a war.
Yes, but how will they defeat the infamous Bush Administration Amnesia that will prevent any member of the Administration from remembering any wrongdoing whatsoever?
Just as well George Washington didn't rely on magic, or you'd all be speaking English. Er, wait...
Actually, in a way, he relied on exactly the same sort of magic- historians now know he funded his campaigns on a whiskey business producing around 5000 gallons of distilled spirits every year. The only difference between genetically engineered e-coli making gasoline out of cellulose and yeast making alcohol out of corn mash is the genetics of the microorganisms- other than that it's precisely the same process.
And notice, I didn't disagree- I just found it very sad.
So if it's not the USA it's the third world? Maybe you should draw a venn diagram or and try to work out where Japan, Britain, Germany etc should go.
They're becoming third world nations quickly, we've already ruined their economies with foreign trade.
Wait, we have to stop innovating and maintaining our position so our poor don't shoot our rich? That makes no sense.
It does in a country that is slowly slipping from a first world, three class system with high class mobility to a third world two class feudalism with no class mobility. Also, note, we don't need to "stop innovating"- we need to just have a different goal for our innovation, a rising tide that floats all boats instead of a Tsunami that blows away the town but floats your personal house to the highest mountain.
No, theories that can't be attacked on a factual basis aren't science. They may have a place in philosophy or religion, but not science.
Fine- and since randomization is not falsifiable, it has no place in science.
Which doesn't matter. If we assume it's random
Which is a non-falsifiable assumption, which has no place in science.
and it isn't, then it's possible for someone to find a pattern and make predictions and thus show the theory to be false - thus it's falsifiable
Once again, an unknown pattern and a random pattern are not distinguishable from one another.
Science hasn't discovered a purpose to the universe, or very much evidence that one exists - that's a fact.
And science hasn't discovered for sure that there is no purpose to the universe either- it's a question that does not belong to science at all.
And, for many of us, that's what religion is seen to be - a way to deal with irrational emotions so that one can get on with one's life.
Uh, yes, it's a way to explain irrational emotions in a rational way.
They aren't the same. It boggles my mind that anyone could seem them as even vaguely similar.
They are both assumptions- beliefs that have NO supporting evidence and are NOT falsifiable.
"Mutations appear to occur randomly" is a valid, scientific statement. "Mutations appear to have a pattern associated with them" and "mutations seem to be planned" are not. "I don't know" is an important part of science, but you don't get to rewrite the rules because you don't like the outcome.
NO, "Mutations appear to occur randomly" is no more valid than "mutations appear to be planned". Both are assumptions of fact in a realm where no fact exists. You can't just assume anything and call it science, you have to PROVE it rigorously.
I don't want to diminish the immaterial rewards of doing something well, but it seems odd to make sure that better work leads to them but can never lead to material gain. Look at any other field: I do a better job of cleaning and my house is cleaner, meet more women and I get more dates, find a better way to build muscle and I can stay fit easier. I really don't know why economics should be made an exception to the rule that if you put more into something so that it becomes more productive, you'll get more of the same out of it.
An interesting question from a capitalist, since that's the entire point of capitalism. Those who put the effort in, the workers, get the minimum wage possible to assure retention, while those who put no effort in, the stockholders, reap the rewards of profit. Isn't that what absolutely every form of economics since feudalism has been about, the transfer of the wealth from the productive to the unproductive?
I really don't see it that way. Doctors still make more than office workers, who make more than blue collar people.
Actually, in recent years, no they don't. The insurance companies and HMOs have a tendency to steal the profit from doctors- and many office workers make a LOT less than a blue collar union employee, when you figure in the overtime.
People with hourly wages get overtime, and seniority still counts in a lot of places.
Hourly wages do get overtime, but seniority is largely looked down upon, with many 45-50 year olds being handed "early retirement" to get rid of them and push them out of the workforce. That's why senior citizens are the third largest employment group of fast food restaurants.
The unusual people who are over- or under-rewarded by our economy are a big issue and get a lot of attention, but 80% of people still earn in rough proportion to what they produce.
No, actually not. They earn a small fraction compared to what they produce- the rest is taken by C-level executives and stockholders. Otherwise the company wouldn't be able to stay in business in today's short-term profit stock world.
First off, as an extreme example, not many men can donate eggs to fertility clinics. Plus, education isn't the only thing that affects how much value a person can produce.
That's funny- I just had somebody in another discussion on the trade imbalance claiming we can educate our way out of this mess (I only halfway agreed with him- right before pointing out that a Bachelor's degree at any 4-year US school now will cost you around $40,000 in tuition and books; where an India Institute of Technology graduate can be had for $4000 and will do the exact same job).
BTW, I was trying to bait you. I salute you for being able to resist the temptation.
Now that this discussion is in the realm of "last week's news"- I have to ask, because often times my autistic stupidity makes me appear smart when I'm really not. The only thing I could think of might be racism with the Happily Ever After reference....but I've got nothing against black people (I'm a culturalist, not a racist, which is why I'm also pro-legal-immigrant to the extent that I want the non-enforcement arm of ICE completely automated, but I'm so anti-illegal-immigrant that I wouldn't mind a Stalin-like purge of 12 to 20 million residents that seem to need deportation).
This ignores productivity gains. Wages rise as a national productivity rises.
No, stockholder PROFITS rise as national productivity rises. Wages rise as a function of worker retention- and in a world where it's perceived by management that experience, citizenship, and education are worth nothing, there's no need to retain workers. Why endanger stockholder profits to pay wages you aren't FORCED to pay?
All of this talk about how trade is going to destroy our future, in my respectful opinion, false. The real problem you're talking about occurs if U.S. productivity eventually lags the rest of the world's productivty. That currently isn't the case. It is of note, however that U.S. productivity, which grew in the 1990's, seems to becoming stagnant again, as it has been since the 70's (and is arguably a major factor in why wages have been stagnant).
Productivity is about profits, not wages. During the 1990s, real wages fell when compared to inflation.
Because trade enriches both nations.
If by "nation" you mean the rich. In reality, the poor are just being decimated to pay for the "enrichment".
I know you don't believe that, but I do, and I do think the data is available that proves it: you make the stuff here, it's no longer as cheap for the consumer.
So what? If you have a $20/hr factory job, you can afford the higher prices. If you've got a $7.50/hr restaurant job, you're not even going to be able to afford the lower prices- everything you earn will go to food, clothing, or shelter. Cheap is worthless.
The primary issue we have is to transition the population towards more productive labour -- that would be highly skilled labour, service labour, or knowledge work. The "burger-flipping economy" assumes no increase in education or training in the workforce. This can, and has changed in the past (The G.I's bill of rights after WW2, for example).
All highly skilled labor and knowledge work can be done cheaper in another country. Service labor IS burger-flipping. Why should a corporation pay $40,000 in taxes here, to send an American to college and get back a skilled worker earning $40,000 here, when the same corporation can pay $4000 in taxes in India, send a bright young man to the India Institute of Technology, and have the same skilled worker in India for $10,000/year? That is absolute advantage. The one difference is the job that can't be offshored- the service job- which is shuffling papers and flipping burgers for federal minimum wage.