Memorizing ability != Intelligence
Einstein got lost waking home.
English is not the first language for some people.
Maybe he was in a hurry.
Maybe he is too addicted to Slashdot to devote much time to one post.
So you think we should be bastards to people who are stupid? What if they are retarded? Or is it only constrained to a certain mental range.
I am not the best at spelling, but I read a lot and have done very well on IQ, SAT, GRE, and every other standardized test I have taken. Some people's brains just works differently than others. I do usually use spell check to be safe, but come on, this is freakin' Slashdot, not a thesis paper.
Go read that site - it's full of religious fanatism and discrimination.
This is a typical response from people of the Left to people who don't have the same beliefs that they do. They are doo-doo heads!! Whaa!! Name calling does not help anything. This is a typical fear tactic to keep people from speaking their mind by for fear that they will be accused of being someone they are not. Seriously, whether they are right wing or left wing has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not they deserve to have their free speech taken away. This kind of thinking is leading us down the most slippery slope of them all.
I think the fact that there it is mainly right-wing sites that are worried about this (I have heard about Canada's speech codes from several mainstream news sources, though) is perhaps the most disturbing of all. What I mean is that there are so many people like you who want to take away the freedoms of those who disagree with you, that the only people now who care about people who get their rights taken away are the ones who have the same beliefs/skin color/etc as those being oppressed. This is absolutely sick and pathetic . These people simply have opinions. There is nothing wrong with that. Quite frankly, Canada's immigrations policies are somewhat screwed up. Ever notice how many terrorist make it into the US? The idea of wanting to limit immigration is not limited to "religious fanatists" as you so eloquently put it. Have you ever been to Boulder, CO? Not exaclty what you would call a right-wing city.
I guess that people who target minorities based on their own 'moral high ground' find it highly annoying that they themselves are a targeted minority based on other people's 'moral high ground'. Isn't it ironic?
Besides, Canada is a democratic country - if full free speech (i.e. trolling) were something the democratic majority of the population wanted, then it'd be there by now.
What's so ironic about it? People from both sides have always abused their power when they can. However, for probably the last 40 years the Left has had much more of a cultural influence than the Right, and have been pushing to silence anyone who disagrees with the most extreme left-wing ideas for about 20 years. The whole situation reminds me of "Animal Farm" by George Orwell. The bad part about this is that the Left has traditionally stood for freedom and civil liberties. Now they just fight for power. Don't believe it? Read the book "The New Thought Police" by Tammy Bruce. She is a lesbian liberal who was the former president of NOW, and became so disturbed by oppressive tactics they and other left-wing organizations were using that she quit and wrote a book about it. The whole idea of having a republic is that you have certain basic rights that the majority cannot take away.
Yes, many right wingers have tried to oppress dissenters in the past, but this is much less common now since they do not have enough cultural influence. You cannot say that just because two people have the same beliefs that they are guilty of each other's crimes. I don't blame all the people in other countries who don't like the US with the murders that only a few of them carry out or support. Would I say they should all have their rights taken away simply because they share beliefs with those have done wrong?
Every four years, there's a choice between two equally incompetent people.
That may be true, but there are other leaders than just the president who play a role in government, and many of these choices tend to have at least one competent person when compared to a presidential race, because special interest groups do not have enough money to buy puppets for the smaller races. You cant always get what you want, but you can get what a large percentage of the people want and as long as people care about the rights of the
If these are the main differeneces then we are in trouble. The most important differences are:
1) We have a bill of rights, though it seem it is being reduced from the original 10.
We can say whatever we want against the government (a right it seems many slashdotters are very well aware of) and we and are families will not get killed/tortured for it. We don't even have to look farther than across our northern border to find a country that doesn't have freedom of speech. Canadianfreespeech.com Or in freedom loving Germany: Gotta LoveFreedom What scares me more than incidents like this in which someone is being held illegaly is what becomes legal for the police and government once the thought police have full power.
2) If we don't like our leaders, we can elect them out in 4 years or less.
Without these, we would have something similar to most of the dictatorships in the world, and Iraq is what happens when a dictatorship goes bad -- really bad.
So yes, things like this should be fought, but hating our country and the good things about it is only going to make things worse. We need to remember those things to remind ourselves what we are fighting for. We must remember that in this case the law is on our side. Why not try to file a lawsuit against the people who are illegally holding this guy? Or would we rather try to see how far we can stretch reality by bad comparisons and speculation in an effort to make the US look bad?
WARNING: Copying of any Nintendo game is illegal and is stricly prohibited by domestic and international copyright laws. "Back-up" or "archival" copies are not authorized and are not necessary to protect your software. Violators will be prosecuted.
This reminds me of an incident in which I was mistakenly under the impression that you could install each copy of Windows XP on 1 desktop as well as 1 laptop. When I called Microsoft to activate it, they informed me that this was only the case with Office XP. I asked the the lady why this was the case, and she replied, "Because its illegal." I then preceded to tell her that this should have been clear on the box, and how she shouldn't even be talking about what is illegal considering she works for Microsoft. Corporations have this idea that they can tell you what to do and automatically that is the law.
If you pay for the physical cartridge/package/cd, then why do these compainies try to say that it is "illegal" to sell them used, as if they are on the list of controlled substances. If you are really paying for the right (for you personally) to own the and use the code, then making as many personal copies as you want should be perfectly legal, as long as you don't distribute them.
If companies had more respect for consumers, most consumers would have more respect for them, and the the whole piracy thing would be less of an issue.
Yes, it probably is a hoax (and a bloody one at that), but you, like many poeple, seem to have a misunderstanding of Occam's Razor. It says that a theory should not be more complicated than needed to explain a particular phenomenon. Many people, including one of my physics professors, seem to equate complex with uncommon or hard to believe. It does not even say that the simplest theory is ALWAYS true, but that we should lean toward the simplest theory if it explains something as well as a more complicated one, essentially "slicing off" parts of the theory that don't help it explain things better.
The problem with people who are skeptical of everything that doesn't fit into the current scientific theories (which have nothing against aliens other than the time it would take for them to get here) is that they want to eradicate theories that are strange or complex altogether, even when there is not another one that can explain EVERYTHING.
Most skeptics of crop circles for example, sipmly say that they are all made by people using rope and boards, but they ignore the details that this theory does not explain. (I'm not sure if I believe that aliens are making crop circles, but I would certainly like to hear a theory that actually could exlain the nuances of the more complicated ones - the things skeptics won't touch.)
It is good to be skeptical of things that are not believable, but if skeptical opionions are to be taken seriously, they must include some sort of alternative theory that actually explains how and why something happens. If you don't you are showing that people who jump to far-out conclusions can some up with solutions better than you. (Not you personally, but you get the idea.)
One of the reasons why there are so many innocent poeple in prison is the fact that police departments overuse Occam's Razor. This is also one of the reasons why cops are rarely suspected of crimes in an investigation. That would just be too far-out and complicated.
Does any one know why paypal charges so much for the person who is receiving the payment if it is a credit card payment? I have used paypal for a while to make payments, and I really liked it up until seeing the fees for accepting credit card payments, which are quite rediculous. Do retailers have to pay a percentage to accept credit card payments?
I really liked this movie, though I feel as though there is a bigger point that the movie was trying to make that I didn't quite get. Expecially the part about the "cube" being built because nobody knows what their work is really being used for. Anybody else catch that?
I wasn't around when they came out, so I'm not real sure how much credit they got back then. Both are great movies because they make serious points but are absolutely hilarious.
Don't make the same mistake twice
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Umm, I'm not sure if our leaders knew about these atrocities back then or not, but just because our previous leaders made mistakes doesn't mean our current leader has to follow suit. If presidents thought like this, we would still have slavery in this country.
Please name one Republican-supported birth control initiative that doesn't start and end with "abstinance"
Just because there are no government initiatives from Republicans doesn't mean Republicans are against birth control. It simply means that these things don't work, and my previous comment included and example of why they don't work. I know many other people who felt the same way in high school / junior high. Republicans, and also Democrats on other issues, in general do not feel that it is the government's job to keep kids from making dumb mistakes and make up for parents who don't do their jobs.
Birth control education simply does not work. Wait, isn't this supposed to be about US jobs jumping ship? Oh yeah, I guess this relates because when you compare the imbeciles coming out of our wonderful public education system to kids in Asia, we simply don't cut it. Why? It is our youth culture. You know, the wonderful "post-sexuality movement" culture you seem to love so much. The only students who get a good education out of it are the ones who are prepared to go against the social norms. In other countries, students are respected for their intelligence and scholastic achievements. In the US, students are respected for how many blow jobs they give/receive. We prepare students for a lifetime of welfare checks and government reliance because they cannot make good decisions for themselves.
If foreign students stopped coming to our universities and then staying here, this country would be in very bad shape. I am the only American student in some of my classes (grad school), and it is quite emberassing sometimes knowing how they feel about the US ecuacation system.
Umm, what have you been smoking? This ranks right up there with "I invented the internet". I sure haven't met one that is against birth control, but I'll keep looking.
Maybe what you meant to say was that Republicans are against giving condoms to children instead of giving them an education. To children, this is similar with what the Canadian government is doing with CD-Rs. Hey, you've paid your tax, now pirate whatever you want!
I don't know about you but the only thing that sex education did for me was to make me feel like I was the only one in the 8th grade not having sex and that I needed to get a move on. It wasn't until several years later that I found out that wasn't the case.
This is very interesting. I don't understand why people who read Slashdot are not loving this stuff? Everyone writes about how Segways are stupid, and seem to be continuing the trend for this compact gas-powered bike. Seriously, I thought people on Slashdot were interested in technology. You must admit, both the Segway and this bike are design marvels. Sure, they may not be practical for everyone. Whether they are going to make it to Joe Sixpack's garage or not should be somewhat irrelevant to people more concerned about new technology than "Corporate America Today". Anyone can pick stuff apart and find possible problems with things. I remember reading previous posts about Segways from people who had something to say about how they were impractical because they might not work in the rain, were too heavy, etc.
This guy's website addresses these issues, gives pictures and video clips of the actual thing in use. This is the type of stuff that "nerds" should love. Or would you rather see an article that gives only a few facts and then complain/make up possible problems about the facts that are not given? Should we change the slogan from "News for Nerds" to "News for Amish and others critical of new and upcoming technology"?
Karma: Looking Good - I finally used "Joe Sixpack" in a post and I have a sig about my Karma!
Yes, good point. Maybe I should have clarified/spellchecked my post. Anyway, what I meant was that I would rather have common sense any day than follow statements like these so-call 7 "rules" for spotting bad science, or statements like "you can't trust anyone who has something to gain". Some things have to be taken on a case-by-case basis. A previous post already showed very clearly how Darwin failed most of these 7 tests, but was unfortunately downmodded because someone must have interpreted it as saying "Darwin was wrong".
Whenever anything about the existence of a god/ evolution, etc. comes up on slashdot, people go into the "its a proven fact and all scientists agree" mode. The problem is that scientific theory is always changing. We shouldn't automatically take what the majority of scientists believe to be absolute truth. History has shown us this. People should value their own ability to look at results and determine truth for themselves. I have to reason to doubt the theory of relativity or quantum mechanic theories, because I have seen the experiments and I haven't seen anything to make me believe that they are not true. Thus, I used logic, reasoning, my past experiences, and common sense to deduce that these theories make sense. (Though I have some suspicions that a few quantum mechanics theories will be overturned in the next hundred years.)
The interpretation of scientific observations and experiments are subject to human logic. Every theory/law/proof has underlying assumptions which are taken to be true but (for the most part) cannot be proved. For all I know my entire life has been one dream and I am living somewhere that actually has a completely different set of physical laws. I use reasoning and my past experience to decide that this possibility is not true, but I must do this first before I decide how to interpret any kind of "scientific" evidence.
At the heart of the scientific method is basic common sense and logic. Science is simply what we get when we apply it and make our best "educated" guess as to what is going on, and then test our guesses.
The basic assumptions that most scientists make might be different than the assumptions that other people might make, and science itself cannot be used to verify or discredit these assumptions. Otherwise, they would not be part of the basic assumptions. I used evolution as an example. People who say evolution is the absolute truth and has been proven and the existence of a god has been disproved do not understand this concept, yet several comments have been posted about this article which stat this, and for some reason have been modded up. Evolution is probably the best theory (actually several theories, the latest is not the same as the original in the "gradual change" mechanism) if you make the assumption that life on earth arose without any outside help. If you make this assumption, you cannot use it to try to prove there is no god; otherwise it would be circular reasoning. If you don't make this assumption, then you must stop calling people "junk scientists" who have theories about origins which involve a god or extraterrestrial life. No "7 rules" or other simplistic guidelines are going to change this.
Never trust data given by the person that is going to benefit from the decision you make upon it.
I share Jesus's teachings with people on a regular basis. Do I think I will ever benifit from it? No. I do think other people can, however.
I don't think people understand the many ways scientists might benifit from trying to disprove the existance of a creator:
1) If there is no god, scientists become the ultimate deliverers of "truth".
2) If there is a god, all observations of physics and the universe could become invalid any at any second. That would certainly be a dismal future for something you have devoted your life to.
Science is great, but please don't put it ahead of common sense.
What is more important is learning about LOGIC. This is something few hard-nosed evolutionints seem to understand.
BTW, I can think of more than a few famous scientists who failed at least one of these seven tests. Can you?
This is a great point. However, as long as some sort of "album" compilation still exists, this could be an impetus for the making of better albums as well. (I sure hope albums remain. I love listening to old Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd albums that were written as ALBUMS, not as a collection of random songs)
If an album sucks, bands will be lucky to get $1-$2 dollars per album, depending on how many "hits" are on it. If an album is good, more people will buy the whole thing. If bands have to sell a certain number of full albums to make a profit, they might be more likely to try to make a good album, as apposed to a few good songs which will make them 1/5 as much money or less.
The experimentation/song quality effect is already in existence with the current market the way it is. Record companies would rather have bands create duplicates of their previous albums than experiment. However, the public will only put up with so many crappy duplicates. Most people learn to trust a band and are willing to pay for songs that they have never heard (because the "fillers" aren't played on the radio). If a band produces a few "so-so" albums, people will be unlikely to buy their latest album without hearing it, but if their previous albums were full of good songs, people will buy their latest album without thinking about it, thus creating opportunity for good bands to experiement.
Of course all this depends on the ratio of people who are into the bands/groups they like to the the poeople who only want to hear the few songs that are currently being played every hour on the local Top 40 station. Hopefully, the latter is limited to junior high students.:)
Blasted fake reposts!!! I guess the funny rating should have tipped me off, but the original story was just as funny. It sure sounded like something the Dell CIO would say.:)
Unix leader Linus Torvalds states that there are 7000 users of Unix. How many users of Unix are there? Let's see. The number of Unix versus Wannabee posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 Unix users. Unix posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of Unix posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of Unix. A recent article put Unix at about 80 percent of the Unix market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 Unix users. This is consistent with the number of Unix Usenet posts.
WHAT??? This is a horrible combination of bad English, bad logic, and ignorance.
I'm not sure if they are saying there are 7000, 700 or 36400 users of Unix, but I can assure you that every engineering student at every university is a regular user of Unix. Almost everyone in research that requires any type of simulation uses Unix. Almost all design work and large databases systems use Unix. Not to mention banks, webservers, etc.
This shows that you can never trust numbers spouted off by people with an agenda.
Real science presumes that the answer is *not* known, and tries to guess an answer based on what is actually evident in the world.
Those who believe in evolution and in creation are obviously both trying to come up with guesses based on what they have observed in the world! The only difference is that their experiments are not simple but based on an entire lifetime of observations. I do not see evolutionists changing their mind every time a discovery is made that seems to go against evolution. Why? The same reason a Creationist doesn't -- An entire lifetime of observations.
Historically, science has not limited itself to the idea that there is no possibilty of God, outside forces, etc. Newton was sure of his theories only up to the point that God or outside forces could be working. It was not until the last hundred years that the scientific community has assumed the nonexistance of God in scientific theories. (This doesn't mean that they took a stance saying there is no god, but that the assumption that no gods can be interfering with the "laws" of the universe is required or else nothing can be determined to be always true.) While this idea makes some sense, it also means that what you are calling SCIENCE CANNOT BE USED TO DISPROVE GOD OR ANY OF HIS ACTIONS! Any scientific theory that is not assumed to be accompanied with the phrase "Unless there is an unseen god or "force" extrenal to the universe" is BY ITS VERY NATURE CIRCULAR REASONING. This means evolution is a valid theory as long as the hand of God (or some other intelligent "being") played no part in species development. Even if a new species is observed today, does that prove that a god did not have an unseed hand in creating the mutation?
The idea that God created all species in a progression is a perfect answer to what is observed in nature, but is not considered a scietific explanation based only on the modern definition of science.
I think that different keyboards for specific user groups would be great, but there needs to be some standardization as well. I know I am not the only person who gets tired of turning the caps on accidentally when I am trying to hit CTRL, since I spend about half my time on a Sun keyboard and half on a "standard" keyboard.
A simple solution would be to make a standard meta key such as Sun keyboards have, and Meta+(each letter key) = a commonly used symbol. Its a real pain any time you have to bend your wrists more than a few degrees from their normal positions.
Maybe you could fill us in instead of acting like you are better than other people. I think the poster pointed something out that few of us knew. Besides, with all lawsuits by copyright and trademark holders trying to claim more they are entitled to, this is a perfectly valid thing to ponder, especially when considering who owns the trademark.
Is this a discussion or an Eminem ego standoff for geeks? You do understand how civilized discussions work, don't you?
The TV also has a message about grandma. According to the television, she is having a "normal day."
Just what I need, Microsoft keeping track of my grandma! Well, if they couldn't get Windows into her house, maybe they can get me to put some Microsoft technology in her house for her...
Honey, have you downloaded the latest service pack for our house yet?
So it seems that hollywood and the MPAA is not content to have an entertainment monopoly. They also want to force their ideologies on you if you want the privilege of being entertained.
While many in the slashdot community may not mind constant sex, violence, murder, torture, communist propaganda etc. in thier movies, I personally get tired of seeing it. Most psychologists agree that what you see and hear has and effect on your behavior, even if it is only subconsiously. If I do not want to use part of what I buy, I have that right. Hollywood should be happy they have the right to put this kind of stuff in their movies. Trying to take away other poeple's freedoms is not showing much appreciation for these rights.
Slashdot Mirror
Memorizing ability != Intelligence Einstein got lost waking home. English is not the first language for some people. Maybe he was in a hurry. Maybe he is too addicted to Slashdot to devote much time to one post. So you think we should be bastards to people who are stupid? What if they are retarded? Or is it only constrained to a certain mental range. I am not the best at spelling, but I read a lot and have done very well on IQ, SAT, GRE, and every other standardized test I have taken. Some people's brains just works differently than others. I do usually use spell check to be safe, but come on, this is freakin' Slashdot, not a thesis paper.
This is a typical response from people of the Left to people who don't have the same beliefs that they do. They are doo-doo heads!! Whaa!! Name calling does not help anything. This is a typical fear tactic to keep people from speaking their mind by for fear that they will be accused of being someone they are not. Seriously, whether they are right wing or left wing has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not they deserve to have their free speech taken away. This kind of thinking is leading us down the most slippery slope of them all.
I think the fact that there it is mainly right-wing sites that are worried about this (I have heard about Canada's speech codes from several mainstream news sources, though) is perhaps the most disturbing of all. What I mean is that there are so many people like you who want to take away the freedoms of those who disagree with you, that the only people now who care about people who get their rights taken away are the ones who have the same beliefs/skin color/etc as those being oppressed. This is absolutely sick and pathetic . These people simply have opinions. There is nothing wrong with that. Quite frankly, Canada's immigrations policies are somewhat screwed up. Ever notice how many terrorist make it into the US? The idea of wanting to limit immigration is not limited to "religious fanatists" as you so eloquently put it. Have you ever been to Boulder, CO? Not exaclty what you would call a right-wing city.
I guess that people who target minorities based on their own 'moral high ground' find it highly annoying that they themselves are a targeted minority based on other people's 'moral high ground'. Isn't it ironic? Besides, Canada is a democratic country - if full free speech (i.e. trolling) were something the democratic majority of the population wanted, then it'd be there by now.
What's so ironic about it? People from both sides have always abused their power when they can. However, for probably the last 40 years the Left has had much more of a cultural influence than the Right, and have been pushing to silence anyone who disagrees with the most extreme left-wing ideas for about 20 years. The whole situation reminds me of "Animal Farm" by George Orwell. The bad part about this is that the Left has traditionally stood for freedom and civil liberties. Now they just fight for power. Don't believe it? Read the book "The New Thought Police" by Tammy Bruce. She is a lesbian liberal who was the former president of NOW, and became so disturbed by oppressive tactics they and other left-wing organizations were using that she quit and wrote a book about it. The whole idea of having a republic is that you have certain basic rights that the majority cannot take away. Yes, many right wingers have tried to oppress dissenters in the past, but this is much less common now since they do not have enough cultural influence. You cannot say that just because two people have the same beliefs that they are guilty of each other's crimes. I don't blame all the people in other countries who don't like the US with the murders that only a few of them carry out or support. Would I say they should all have their rights taken away simply because they share beliefs with those have done wrong?
Every four years, there's a choice between two equally incompetent people.
That may be true, but there are other leaders than just the president who play a role in government, and many of these choices tend to have at least one competent person when compared to a presidential race, because special interest groups do not have enough money to buy puppets for the smaller races. You cant always get what you want, but you can get what a large percentage of the people want and as long as people care about the rights of the
1) We have a bill of rights, though it seem it is being reduced from the original 10.
We can say whatever we want against the government (a right it seems many slashdotters are very well aware of) and we and are families will not get killed/tortured for it. We don't even have to look farther than across our northern border to find a country that doesn't have freedom of speech. Canadianfreespeech.com
Or in freedom loving Germany: Gotta Love Freedom
What scares me more than incidents like this in which someone is being held illegaly is what becomes legal for the police and government once the thought police have full power.
2) If we don't like our leaders, we can elect them out in 4 years or less.
Without these, we would have something similar to most of the dictatorships in the world, and Iraq is what happens when a dictatorship goes bad -- really bad.
So yes, things like this should be fought, but hating our country and the good things about it is only going to make things worse. We need to remember those things to remind ourselves what we are fighting for. We must remember that in this case the law is on our side. Why not try to file a lawsuit against the people who are illegally holding this guy? Or would we rather try to see how far we can stretch reality by bad comparisons and speculation in an effort to make the US look bad?
This reminds me of an incident in which I was mistakenly under the impression that you could install each copy of Windows XP on 1 desktop as well as 1 laptop. When I called Microsoft to activate it, they informed me that this was only the case with Office XP. I asked the the lady why this was the case, and she replied, "Because its illegal." I then preceded to tell her that this should have been clear on the box, and how she shouldn't even be talking about what is illegal considering she works for Microsoft. Corporations have this idea that they can tell you what to do and automatically that is the law.
If you pay for the physical cartridge/package/cd, then why do these compainies try to say that it is "illegal" to sell them used, as if they are on the list of controlled substances. If you are really paying for the right (for you personally) to own the and use the code, then making as many personal copies as you want should be perfectly legal, as long as you don't distribute them.
If companies had more respect for consumers, most consumers would have more respect for them, and the the whole piracy thing would be less of an issue.
Yes, it probably is a hoax (and a bloody one at that), but you, like many poeple, seem to have a misunderstanding of Occam's Razor. It says that a theory should not be more complicated than needed to explain a particular phenomenon. Many people, including one of my physics professors, seem to equate complex with uncommon or hard to believe. It does not even say that the simplest theory is ALWAYS true, but that we should lean toward the simplest theory if it explains something as well as a more complicated one, essentially "slicing off" parts of the theory that don't help it explain things better.
The problem with people who are skeptical of everything that doesn't fit into the current scientific theories (which have nothing against aliens other than the time it would take for them to get here) is that they want to eradicate theories that are strange or complex altogether, even when there is not another one that can explain EVERYTHING.
Most skeptics of crop circles for example, sipmly say that they are all made by people using rope and boards, but they ignore the details that this theory does not explain. (I'm not sure if I believe that aliens are making crop circles, but I would certainly like to hear a theory that actually could exlain the nuances of the more complicated ones - the things skeptics won't touch.)
It is good to be skeptical of things that are not believable, but if skeptical opionions are to be taken seriously, they must include some sort of alternative theory that actually explains how and why something happens. If you don't you are showing that people who jump to far-out conclusions can some up with solutions better than you. (Not you personally, but you get the idea.)
One of the reasons why there are so many innocent poeple in prison is the fact that police departments overuse Occam's Razor. This is also one of the reasons why cops are rarely suspected of crimes in an investigation. That would just be too far-out and complicated.
Style error? Talk about dogma!
Does any one know why paypal charges so much for the person who is receiving the payment if it is a credit card payment? I have used paypal for a while to make payments, and I really liked it up until seeing the fees for accepting credit card payments, which are quite rediculous. Do retailers have to pay a percentage to accept credit card payments?
Wow!
Good Job. Sounds like you're a white rapper with some street knowledge.
So I'm a little confused. Is this what you mean by tolerance?
I really liked this movie, though I feel as though there is a bigger point that the movie was trying to make that I didn't quite get. Expecially the part about the "cube" being built because nobody knows what their work is really being used for. Anybody else catch that?
I wasn't around when they came out, so I'm not real sure how much credit they got back then. Both are great movies because they make serious points but are absolutely hilarious.
Umm, I'm not sure if our leaders knew about these atrocities back then or not, but just because our previous leaders made mistakes doesn't mean our current leader has to follow suit. If presidents thought like this, we would still have slavery in this country.
Just because there are no government initiatives from Republicans doesn't mean Republicans are against birth control. It simply means that these things don't work, and my previous comment included and example of why they don't work. I know many other people who felt the same way in high school / junior high. Republicans, and also Democrats on other issues, in general do not feel that it is the government's job to keep kids from making dumb mistakes and make up for parents who don't do their jobs.
Birth control education simply does not work. Wait, isn't this supposed to be about US jobs jumping ship? Oh yeah, I guess this relates because when you compare the imbeciles coming out of our wonderful public education system to kids in Asia, we simply don't cut it. Why? It is our youth culture. You know, the wonderful "post-sexuality movement" culture you seem to love so much. The only students who get a good education out of it are the ones who are prepared to go against the social norms. In other countries, students are respected for their intelligence and scholastic achievements. In the US, students are respected for how many blow jobs they give/receive. We prepare students for a lifetime of welfare checks and government reliance because they cannot make good decisions for themselves.
If foreign students stopped coming to our universities and then staying here, this country would be in very bad shape. I am the only American student in some of my classes (grad school), and it is quite emberassing sometimes knowing how they feel about the US ecuacation system.
Umm, what have you been smoking? This ranks right up there with "I invented the internet". I sure haven't met one that is against birth control, but I'll keep looking.
Maybe what you meant to say was that Republicans are against giving condoms to children instead of giving them an education. To children, this is similar with what the Canadian government is doing with CD-Rs. Hey, you've paid your tax, now pirate whatever you want!
I don't know about you but the only thing that sex education did for me was to make me feel like I was the only one in the 8th grade not having sex and that I needed to get a move on. It wasn't until several years later that I found out that wasn't the case.
This is very interesting. I don't understand why people who read Slashdot are not loving this stuff? Everyone writes about how Segways are stupid, and seem to be continuing the trend for this compact gas-powered bike. Seriously, I thought people on Slashdot were interested in technology. You must admit, both the Segway and this bike are design marvels. Sure, they may not be practical for everyone. Whether they are going to make it to Joe Sixpack's garage or not should be somewhat irrelevant to people more concerned about new technology than "Corporate America Today". Anyone can pick stuff apart and find possible problems with things. I remember reading previous posts about Segways from people who had something to say about how they were impractical because they might not work in the rain, were too heavy, etc.
This guy's website addresses these issues, gives pictures and video clips of the actual thing in use. This is the type of stuff that "nerds" should love. Or would you rather see an article that gives only a few facts and then complain/make up possible problems about the facts that are not given?
Should we change the slogan from "News for Nerds" to "News for Amish and others critical of new and upcoming technology"?
Karma: Looking Good - I finally used "Joe Sixpack" in a post and I have a sig about my Karma!
Yes, good point. Maybe I should have clarified/spellchecked my post. Anyway, what I meant was that I would rather have common sense any day than follow statements like these so-call 7 "rules" for spotting bad science, or statements like "you can't trust anyone who has something to gain". Some things have to be taken on a case-by-case basis. A previous post already showed very clearly how Darwin failed most of these 7 tests, but was unfortunately downmodded because someone must have interpreted it as saying "Darwin was wrong".
Whenever anything about the existence of a god/ evolution, etc. comes up on slashdot, people go into the "its a proven fact and all scientists agree" mode. The problem is that scientific theory is always changing. We shouldn't automatically take what the majority of scientists believe to be absolute truth. History has shown us this. People should value their own ability to look at results and determine truth for themselves. I have to reason to doubt the theory of relativity or quantum mechanic theories, because I have seen the experiments and I haven't seen anything to make me believe that they are not true. Thus, I used logic, reasoning, my past experiences, and common sense to deduce that these theories make sense. (Though I have some suspicions that a few quantum mechanics theories will be overturned in the next hundred years.)
The interpretation of scientific observations and experiments are subject to human logic. Every theory/law/proof has underlying assumptions which are taken to be true but (for the most part) cannot be proved. For all I know my entire life has been one dream and I am living somewhere that actually has a completely different set of physical laws. I use reasoning and my past experience to decide that this possibility is not true, but I must do this first before I decide how to interpret any kind of "scientific" evidence.
At the heart of the scientific method is basic common sense and logic. Science is simply what we get when we apply it and make our best "educated" guess as to what is going on, and then test our guesses.
The basic assumptions that most scientists make might be different than the assumptions that other people might make, and science itself cannot be used to verify or discredit these assumptions. Otherwise, they would not be part of the basic assumptions. I used evolution as an example. People who say evolution is the absolute truth and has been proven and the existence of a god has been disproved do not understand this concept, yet several comments have been posted about this article which stat this, and for some reason have been modded up. Evolution is probably the best theory (actually several theories, the latest is not the same as the original in the "gradual change" mechanism) if you make the assumption that life on earth arose without any outside help. If you make this assumption, you cannot use it to try to prove there is no god; otherwise it would be circular reasoning. If you don't make this assumption, then you must stop calling people "junk scientists" who have theories about origins which involve a god or extraterrestrial life. No "7 rules" or other simplistic guidelines are going to change this.
I share Jesus's teachings with people on a regular basis. Do I think I will ever benifit from it? No. I do think other people can, however.
I don't think people understand the many ways scientists might benifit from trying to disprove the existance of a creator:
1) If there is no god, scientists become the ultimate deliverers of "truth".
2) If there is a god, all observations of physics and the universe could become invalid any at any second. That would certainly be a dismal future for something you have devoted your life to.
Science is great, but please don't put it ahead of common sense.
What is more important is learning about LOGIC. This is something few hard-nosed evolutionints seem to understand.
BTW, I can think of more than a few famous scientists who failed at least one of these seven tests. Can you?
This is a great point. However, as long as some sort of "album" compilation still exists, this could be an impetus for the making of better albums as well. (I sure hope albums remain. I love listening to old Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd albums that were written as ALBUMS, not as a collection of random songs)
:)
If an album sucks, bands will be lucky to get $1-$2 dollars per album, depending on how many "hits" are on it. If an album is good, more people will buy the whole thing. If bands have to sell a certain number of full albums to make a profit, they might be more likely to try to make a good album, as apposed to a few good songs which will make them 1/5 as much money or less.
The experimentation/song quality effect is already in existence with the current market the way it is. Record companies would rather have bands create duplicates of their previous albums than experiment. However, the public will only put up with so many crappy duplicates. Most people learn to trust a band and are willing to pay for songs that they have never heard (because the "fillers" aren't played on the radio). If a band produces a few "so-so" albums, people will be unlikely to buy their latest album without hearing it, but if their previous albums were full of good songs, people will buy their latest album without thinking about it, thus creating opportunity for good bands to experiement.
Of course all this depends on the ratio of people who are into the bands/groups they like to the the poeople who only want to hear the few songs that are currently being played every hour on the local Top 40 station. Hopefully, the latter is limited to junior high students.
Blasted fake reposts!!! I guess the funny rating should have tipped me off, but the original story was just as funny. It sure sounded like something the Dell CIO would say. :)
WHAT??? This is a horrible combination of bad English, bad logic, and ignorance. I'm not sure if they are saying there are 7000, 700 or 36400 users of Unix, but I can assure you that every engineering student at every university is a regular user of Unix. Almost everyone in research that requires any type of simulation uses Unix. Almost all design work and large databases systems use Unix. Not to mention banks, webservers, etc.
This shows that you can never trust numbers spouted off by people with an agenda.
Unbelievable!!!
Those who believe in evolution and in creation are obviously both trying to come up with guesses based on what they have observed in the world! The only difference is that their experiments are not simple but based on an entire lifetime of observations. I do not see evolutionists changing their mind every time a discovery is made that seems to go against evolution. Why? The same reason a Creationist doesn't -- An entire lifetime of observations.
Historically, science has not limited itself to the idea that there is no possibilty of God, outside forces, etc. Newton was sure of his theories only up to the point that God or outside forces could be working. It was not until the last hundred years that the scientific community has assumed the nonexistance of God in scientific theories. (This doesn't mean that they took a stance saying there is no god, but that the assumption that no gods can be interfering with the "laws" of the universe is required or else nothing can be determined to be always true.) While this idea makes some sense, it also means that what you are calling SCIENCE CANNOT BE USED TO DISPROVE GOD OR ANY OF HIS ACTIONS! Any scientific theory that is not assumed to be accompanied with the phrase "Unless there is an unseen god or "force" extrenal to the universe" is BY ITS VERY NATURE CIRCULAR REASONING. This means evolution is a valid theory as long as the hand of God (or some other intelligent "being") played no part in species development. Even if a new species is observed today, does that prove that a god did not have an unseed hand in creating the mutation?
The idea that God created all species in a progression is a perfect answer to what is observed in nature, but is not considered a scietific explanation based only on the modern definition of science.
I think that different keyboards for specific user groups would be great, but there needs to be some standardization as well. I know I am not the only person who gets tired of turning the caps on accidentally when I am trying to hit CTRL, since I spend about half my time on a Sun keyboard and half on a "standard" keyboard.
A simple solution would be to make a standard meta key such as Sun keyboards have, and Meta+(each letter key) = a commonly used symbol. Its a real pain any time you have to bend your wrists more than a few degrees from their normal positions.
You do understand how trademarks work, don't you?
Maybe you could fill us in instead of acting like you are better than other people. I think the poster pointed something out that few of us knew. Besides, with all lawsuits by copyright and trademark holders trying to claim more they are entitled to, this is a perfectly valid thing to ponder, especially when considering who owns the trademark.
Is this a discussion or an Eminem ego standoff for geeks? You do understand how civilized discussions work, don't you?
Just what I need, Microsoft keeping track of my grandma! Well, if they couldn't get Windows into her house, maybe they can get me to put some Microsoft technology in her house for her...
Honey, have you downloaded the latest service pack for our house yet?
So it seems that hollywood and the MPAA is not content to have an entertainment monopoly. They also want to force their ideologies on you if you want the privilege of being entertained.
While many in the slashdot community may not mind constant sex, violence, murder, torture, communist propaganda etc. in thier movies, I personally get tired of seeing it. Most psychologists agree that what you see and hear has and effect on your behavior, even if it is only subconsiously.
If I do not want to use part of what I buy, I have that right. Hollywood should be happy they have the right to put this kind of stuff in their movies. Trying to take away other poeple's freedoms is not showing much appreciation for these rights.