"...or you might net about a million farmer."
No, farmers register for use.
"I would really prefer the government stop spying on all Americans in a mostly futile effort to catch a relatively small number of Muslim extremists."
Yes, ever so much easier to follow the trail of debris and body parts, eh? Yes, they are small in percentage and number, but they do mega-death and damage. I prioritize for proaction, not reaction.
"I would prefer the government had focused on dismantling Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan..."
Actually, they are. Perhaps you don't read enough news. Or, maybe you think those organizations are small monoliths, restricting their members and activities to that area?
"All the spying that is going on has NO restraints on it, and is ripe for and probably is being abused."
Are you referring to the activity in the article? Did you read the article? They are buying data from the commercial sector and using it. This is spying how?
"Sure its possible another 9/11 plot slips through the cracks, but its a smaller price to pay than the one we are paying by turning the U.S. in to a police state, reviled by the rest of the world, and that is what we are getting."
That is merely your opinion, and one that shows you have no problem with straw arguments. By the way, privacy != anonymity.
"A new 9/11 plot might kill some people but the war in Iraq has killed far more people than 9/11 did and in a year or so it will have killed more Americans than 9/11 did, having passed the 2500 mark this week."
Yes, a new 9/11 might kill as many U.S. citizens and far fewer fanatics in an hour as the whole Iraq war has.
"...make a real difference in the world, and in the eyes of Muslims, like resolve the mess in Israel."
And the hidden meaning there is what, "pushing Israel into the sea"?
Your last paragraph is interesting. In it you list things the FBI should have done (which would have "stopped" 9/11), which is pretty much exactly what they're trying to do now. (You don't think they would have discovered the Saudis learning to take off and not land without the "mining", do you?) Yet, you ask that they do none of these things. How then do you suggest they determine those individuals that are doing suspicions things which might lead to another 9/11?
I especially like your last barb where you elevate your exquisite political perceptions above "most people". Nice touch of self-authority there.
"Now throw all them onto that list of felons who can't vote, just like they did with all the black people in Florida..."
That's been demonstrated to be fiction. The votes disposed of were split along party and racial lines because they were random. If you have proof otherwise, link it.
Webster's:
5. to observe secretively or furtively with hostile intent (often fol. by on or upon).
There is nothing hostile about checking a prospective employee for idiocy off the site. That idiocy is what allowed those VA records to be stolen. Don't want to look like a fool? Don't act like one. If you post info on a public forum, expect all sections of the public to have access.
No, no, no. One more time for all the goddamn programmers here. Copyright is not only about coding. It is about all media and its contents. If I write a short story, I need the copyright from the git-go so some agent can't steal it before publication. If I shoot some film, I need the copyright from the git-go so some editor can't just pilfer my work. Etc. There's more -- much more -- to life than programming.
You forgot the last part. That's where you explain that the loss of copyright brought about the demise of any new efforts at creativity because no one would get friggin' paid.
Yes it is an argument. Murder and child molestation ARE illegal, watching a public display within your own home is not. Perhaps, in your derth of logic, what you meant to say was "what is the moral difference?" No, there's a great difference there as well.
Perhaps your problem is in not understanding there's a difference between reality and abstract example?
"If you steal from one source, that is plaigiarism, if you steal from many, well, that's just research."
Uh, no. Stealing from any number of sources is plagerism. Using resources, quoting them and arranging the resultant conclusions into a well thought out paper is research.
When I read your first line I thought, "Does this idiot not understand the difference in standards of the subject under discussion?" Then I read the rest and realized you didn't. Shame.
Well, I'm so glad you're a "rabid environmentalist". Too bad you're incredibly stupid as well. Do you realize that spiking trees only causes more of them to be cut down to replace the spiked ones (the spiked logs are rolled off and discarded -- wasting wood), the production of more steel saw blades to replace the ruined ones (causing more mining and energy usage) and the artifical increase of all wood products?
All this, just to satisfy some inner glee you have at causing a short and wasteful disturbance in the production line.
"Observing patterns and creating models based on observed patterns, and making predictions based on those models, is, as far as I'm concern, a scientific posture."
Not really relevant what you (or I) think is a "scientific posture". This appears to be a conflation on your part of two definitions of the word science.
Webster's:
1. a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws: the mathematical sciences.
2. systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.
3. any of the branches of natural or physical science.
4. systematized knowledge in general.
5. knowledge, as of facts or principles; knowledge gained by systematic study.
6. a particular branch of knowledge.
7. skill, esp. reflecting a precise application of facts or principles; proficiency.
The scientific method requires a testable hypothesis. One cannot do this with weather, as indicated by a predecessor post. Weather can fall into 4, 5 or 6, not 1 (because we don't know the generalized laws), 2 (because we can't experiment on a sufficient scale) or 7 (because it ain't precise).
How cute. You rebut a paragraph about ad hominum with ad hominum. If you were trying to be funny, you missed a bit. If you weren't... you fit.
The subject of criticism's feelings about said criticism is not to be taken into consideration when making the criticism.
"That's precisely what I mean, those (stupid & ill-informed) protests were a reaction to criticism from without. Plenty of moslems have done things as bad as the cartoons without the same reaction."
So, you mean that because their culture (the violent protesters) reacts by becoming violent against any criticism, one shouldn't criticize, but wait patiently (for centuries) for them to become self-enlightened? Puh-lease.
Your entire fifth paragraph falls apart logically. Use the northwestern yew as an example. Extremely rare species which supplies a useful anticancer compound. Were they harvested to extinction? No. Were they replaced by other yews from around the world? No. Why? It is that species which has the compound. Your paragraph falls apart historically. Which, ironically, is the very rational you use to promote it. Odd, that.
Of course, no world-wide enemy of civilization. This despite the bombings in Africa, Europe, Indo-Asia and other areas taken credit for by these exact same individuals. No, of course we made them into what they are now.
"If we were to charge Google for their traffic, it wouldn't amount to anything next to, say, iFilm/YouTube/planet(quake/halflife/etc) or local companies' ftpds and httpds that their employees connect to from home."
Slashdot Mirror
"As a general rule, your book/record/film is going to profit in its first five years of life or never."
Who's rule? Yours? A rule apparently made up and pulled out an orifice. Only one contradiction is needed -- Dick Francis.
An ego synonym for the penis enlarger.
"...or you might net about a million farmer."
No, farmers register for use.
"I would really prefer the government stop spying on all Americans in a mostly futile effort to catch a relatively small number of Muslim extremists."
Yes, ever so much easier to follow the trail of debris and body parts, eh? Yes, they are small in percentage and number, but they do mega-death and damage. I prioritize for proaction, not reaction.
"I would prefer the government had focused on dismantling Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan..."
Actually, they are. Perhaps you don't read enough news. Or, maybe you think those organizations are small monoliths, restricting their members and activities to that area?
"All the spying that is going on has NO restraints on it, and is ripe for and probably is being abused."
Are you referring to the activity in the article? Did you read the article? They are buying data from the commercial sector and using it. This is spying how?
"Sure its possible another 9/11 plot slips through the cracks, but its a smaller price to pay than the one we are paying by turning the U.S. in to a police state, reviled by the rest of the world, and that is what we are getting."
That is merely your opinion, and one that shows you have no problem with straw arguments. By the way, privacy != anonymity.
"A new 9/11 plot might kill some people but the war in Iraq has killed far more people than 9/11 did and in a year or so it will have killed more Americans than 9/11 did, having passed the 2500 mark this week."
Yes, a new 9/11 might kill as many U.S. citizens and far fewer fanatics in an hour as the whole Iraq war has.
"...make a real difference in the world, and in the eyes of Muslims, like resolve the mess in Israel."
And the hidden meaning there is what, "pushing Israel into the sea"?
Your last paragraph is interesting. In it you list things the FBI should have done (which would have "stopped" 9/11), which is pretty much exactly what they're trying to do now. (You don't think they would have discovered the Saudis learning to take off and not land without the "mining", do you?) Yet, you ask that they do none of these things. How then do you suggest they determine those individuals that are doing suspicions things which might lead to another 9/11?
I especially like your last barb where you elevate your exquisite political perceptions above "most people". Nice touch of self-authority there.
"Now throw all them onto that list of felons who can't vote, just like they did with all the black people in Florida..."
That's been demonstrated to be fiction. The votes disposed of were split along party and racial lines because they were random. If you have proof otherwise, link it.
Yes. Constitution first, then treaties; no override.
And what will they use to judge you before they hire you? Trust?
Webster's:
5. to observe secretively or furtively with hostile intent (often fol. by on or upon).
There is nothing hostile about checking a prospective employee for idiocy off the site. That idiocy is what allowed those VA records to be stolen. Don't want to look like a fool? Don't act like one. If you post info on a public forum, expect all sections of the public to have access.
This is hard to wrap the mind around, how?
No, no, no. One more time for all the goddamn programmers here. Copyright is not only about coding. It is about all media and its contents. If I write a short story, I need the copyright from the git-go so some agent can't steal it before publication. If I shoot some film, I need the copyright from the git-go so some editor can't just pilfer my work. Etc. There's more -- much more -- to life than programming.
How interesting. I thought the troll was the gp.
Webster's:
fact (fakt), n.
1. something that actually exists; reality; truth: Your fears have no basis in fact.
In other words, facts ARE the truth, there is no difference.
You forgot the last part. That's where you explain that the loss of copyright brought about the demise of any new efforts at creativity because no one would get friggin' paid.
Don't do it in public. Public is for public consumption. Hard to get your mind around that?
Yes it is an argument. Murder and child molestation ARE illegal, watching a public display within your own home is not. Perhaps, in your derth of logic, what you meant to say was "what is the moral difference?" No, there's a great difference there as well.
Perhaps your problem is in not understanding there's a difference between reality and abstract example?
"If you steal from one source, that is plaigiarism, if you steal from many, well, that's just research."
Uh, no. Stealing from any number of sources is plagerism. Using resources, quoting them and arranging the resultant conclusions into a well thought out paper is research.
When you steal someone's IP, what would you call it?
Webster's:
2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment.
When I read your first line I thought, "Does this idiot not understand the difference in standards of the subject under discussion?" Then I read the rest and realized you didn't. Shame.
Well, I'm so glad you're a "rabid environmentalist". Too bad you're incredibly stupid as well. Do you realize that spiking trees only causes more of them to be cut down to replace the spiked ones (the spiked logs are rolled off and discarded -- wasting wood), the production of more steel saw blades to replace the ruined ones (causing more mining and energy usage) and the artifical increase of all wood products?
All this, just to satisfy some inner glee you have at causing a short and wasteful disturbance in the production line.
"Observing patterns and creating models based on observed patterns, and making predictions based on those models, is, as far as I'm concern, a scientific posture."
Not really relevant what you (or I) think is a "scientific posture". This appears to be a conflation on your part of two definitions of the word science.
Webster's:
1. a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws: the mathematical sciences.
2. systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.
3. any of the branches of natural or physical science. 4. systematized knowledge in general.
5. knowledge, as of facts or principles; knowledge gained by systematic study.
6. a particular branch of knowledge.
7. skill, esp. reflecting a precise application of facts or principles; proficiency.
The scientific method requires a testable hypothesis. One cannot do this with weather, as indicated by a predecessor post. Weather can fall into 4, 5 or 6, not 1 (because we don't know the generalized laws), 2 (because we can't experiment on a sufficient scale) or 7 (because it ain't precise).
"(this really happens in certain midwest states,)"
Not to mention, north, south, east and western states, dumbass.
Not a thing you mentioned would make the criticism invalid, only external. And?
How cute. You rebut a paragraph about ad hominum with ad hominum. If you were trying to be funny, you missed a bit. If you weren't... you fit.
The subject of criticism's feelings about said criticism is not to be taken into consideration when making the criticism.
"That's precisely what I mean, those (stupid & ill-informed) protests were a reaction to criticism from without. Plenty of moslems have done things as bad as the cartoons without the same reaction."
So, you mean that because their culture (the violent protesters) reacts by becoming violent against any criticism, one shouldn't criticize, but wait patiently (for centuries) for them to become self-enlightened? Puh-lease.
Your entire fifth paragraph falls apart logically. Use the northwestern yew as an example. Extremely rare species which supplies a useful anticancer compound. Were they harvested to extinction? No. Were they replaced by other yews from around the world? No. Why? It is that species which has the compound. Your paragraph falls apart historically. Which, ironically, is the very rational you use to promote it. Odd, that.
Of course, no world-wide enemy of civilization. This despite the bombings in Africa, Europe, Indo-Asia and other areas taken credit for by these exact same individuals. No, of course we made them into what they are now.
"If we were to charge Google for their traffic, it wouldn't amount to anything next to, say, iFilm/YouTube/planet(quake/halflife/etc) or local companies' ftpds and httpds that their employees connect to from home."
/. head.
You just hit the nail on the
Wow! What a bass-ackwards company that was. There have been GUI interfaces since before the internet.