"Evolution is very dependent on life being present in order to evolve"
Where is the divide between chemistry and a lifeform? As I understand it life is generally considered to have probably started from complex chemistry. This site http://www.nrao.edu/index.php/learn/science/chemistryoflife even talks about evidence of "chemical evolution"!
Have a look at the "David Kelly affair" which led to the Hutton Inquiry which led to the BBC avoiding investigative journalism of NuLabours government (they still are in many ways) and finally look at recent discussions at the whole situation as it has become clear that the BBC were correct! Even if you are not that interested in the UK this relates to an item of interest to most of the world: the claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction able to launch in 45 minutes.
That's not every author and every corporation. There's another problem to consider as well: rights. Some publishers buy world English rights, but when they release the book they might put out a hardback in the US followed by a paperback a year or so later. At some stage they might release the book in the UK or Australia as a paperback. If they put the thing on the web as a free download around the time the US paperback is coming out (and long before there's a UK or Australian paperback), then people in the UK and AUS who can't get hold of the actual book will just download the freebie ebook instead.
As a UK person who likes several Baen books authors I have done exactly that..... except the there is no "instead" as I then buy the paperback as soon as I can get ahold of it.
IANAL but as I understand it (in a common law jurisdiction like the UK and most former colonies) it is the COURTS decision, not the JUDGES decision that forms the precedence, the judge is mainly the mouthpiece. One of the reasons for having a jury is that the normal opinion of society SHOULD adjust the law. This however mainly applies to the unwritten parts of the law rather than the written (statute) parts.
As I say I have a different opinion about the definition, I consider laws designed for controlling the palette of available thoughts to be a version of thought crime and I consider these laws or at least their implementation to be about that. I also don't necessarily consider that 1984 is the only possible source for a definition of the phrase!
As to protest being stopped not being about thought crime:- How are people to think about something if they never hear about it because every media grabbing protest is squashed BEFORE it can be staged? (The police USED TO allow the protests to continue for a while, typically about half an hour, then make the arrest(s), in order to respect their freedom of speech.) Not that many people go to non-"media" sources like I (and presumably since you are here, you) do!
Well since this discussion is about another possession law, it thought that example relevant. Also the way I see it thought crimes are about the authorities trying to control the way you think and one of the ways to do that is to stop you possessing items that are involved in the thinking they don't like. If there was a way of directly telling what you think then I think this this government would make a laws using that as evidence of wrong thought!
There has also been prosecutions for speech relating to terrorism. There has also been inappropriate detentions ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Wolfgang for a famous, if brief, example). There have also been a number of well documented cases of the police stopping protesters whilst on route to a protest, this probably being the most famous http://www.statewatch.org/news/2004/dec/05fairford-appeal.htm, although they tend to use breach of the peace laws for justification for this sort of thing. I see the fact that the police would act this way (which is a change in their behaviour) as an example of the climate of authoritarian control that this government has fostered.
You might find a google search for guilty terrorism site:bbc.co.uk interesting, in particular note how high a proportion of the links are for possession or speech (all be it not private speech) (aka incitement) but not actual terrorism or assistance to terrorism. And this is simply the cases that warrant a BBC news story.
One of the most famous cases is http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm where she was found guilty of having articles "likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism" but NOT of "possessing an article for a terrorist purpose", in other words they had no evidence that she was actually intending to commit terrorism, just that she had materials that could be used for it.
Thought crimes are already here in the guise of several of the "anti-terrorism" crimes, like (IIRC) "possession of items likely to be useful to terrorists". A London A-Z has been publicly included in a haul of such material from one person (along with leaflets/books, IIRC there were NO non-reading materials in that haul). There have already be some successful prosecutions under such laws.
In the breakfast news programs today I saw that they are now putting cameras in the lollipops of school crossing keepers. I also noticed that they were hidden and that there was none of the legally (Data Protection Act) required (ASAIK-IANAL) notification signs.
However, I do believe that the hereditary peers are actually a small minority in the Lords these days
And the only reason these bad laws get through the Lords anyway is because the New Labour "Constitutional Reforms" have changed the make up of the Lords. (To have more political types or to be "more representative".)
Possibly, IANAL, however as I see it there are some differences, in the case of the game AT the point of purchase the product has the spec on the box (or website for online), including (in all cases I have seen) both minimum and recommend specifications.
At the time of the purchase of the COMPUTER (n.b. not Vista, it is the computer sale that is in question IIRC) there was no (at point of sale, or in the case of before Vista release anywhere!) available indications about the disparity between different CLASSES of performance (such as Aero verses non-Aero).
You can for a sufficiently powerful value of "You", i.e. God (were he/she/it to exist) presumably could, so couldn't it reasonably(sic) be assumed that God wants science?
I am afraid I am going to have to say Me Too to this. I have the tubes over my head disabled at work for this reason (I don't need a dim office, just not a standard brightly lit one).
All very good questions. The British (just for example) endured years of terrorism from the IRA and (more recently) Islamic extremists, who bombed London buses. But they didn't re-organize their entire government, launch a couple of wars, spend a trillion dollars, and revoke civil liberties to deal with it. Of course their government did go along for the ride with George Bush, but not nearly as far or completely.
I don't know if you were being sarcastic, but in case you are not may I point out that pretty much describes what has happened here in the UK.... The home office has been split, the House of Lords have been "reformed" and most civil liberties have been reduced.
If the sin is passed down at the point of conception (and not caused or created BY the conception) then what if a married pair of catholics have sex (without any sinful thought or actions-AFAIK sex between a married couple is not a sin) just after confession (which AFAIK cleans ALL (confessed), even original, sin in catholic doctrine) then wouldn't the child thus conceived be free of sin?
At last a genuine variant of the Chewbacca defense.
"The hire car robot annoyed me so much I pulled its limbs off. This is a documented issue with robots, in this film clip this is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookiee from the planet Kashyyyk..."
It is a great advantage for written works such as novels, poems, etc.
But in that domain (literature) both the authors and readers tend to know the extended rules (from exposure, especially for the readers). Also the normal rules tend to be ignored when required anyway (especially in poems/lyrics), even the rules you are lamenting the loss of!
Thinking further on this I suppose there is the problem of the uneducated (in the dying rules) people seeing the literature as being, to them, confusing and thus them being less likely to be willing read it. This might be one of the reasons for the general reduction in the amount read these days (barring blips caused by things like Harry Potter).
Sure, ALL caps works great for subtly showing that someone is screaming. Typically, however, font styles cannot show what is important information or what is not - which punctuation via commas can - nor can it as easily emphasis when something is more important than otherwise. Sure, the use of bold and italics and help differentiate something, but then you're limited to only a few degrees of importance, whilst word or phrase ordering can give you unlimited degrees of importance.
I am not sure the you do actually get that many degrees of importance from order alone, for instance in the "the dog the cat chased" and "the cat the dog chased" versions are the dog and cat of equal importance, or are the dog or cat more important in the versions they lead?
It would be like telling a carpenter that he has to craft a bed frame by and limiting him to a few small chisels, a hammer, and a screw driver - when before, he had chisels of all different sizes to chose from depending on what he wanted to do.
However the carpenter (author) still has the tools, it is the occasional DIYer that does not have them (and to take the analogy further the normal DIY shops (English teachers) don't stock them anymore, although the trade outlets (writing classes?) probably still do).
Basically you have sort of convinced me that losing tools can be a problem for certain domains, you just have not convinced me that those domains have lost the tools!
Slashdot Mirror
"Evolution is very dependent on life being present in order to evolve"
Where is the divide between chemistry and a lifeform?
As I understand it life is generally considered to have probably started from complex chemistry. This site http://www.nrao.edu/index.php/learn/science/chemistryoflife even talks about evidence of "chemical evolution"!
Not only do WE not know, I am guessing (from the request for more time) that THEY don't know themselves!
I was not claiming it, merely providing an example of non-American fast food prior to the spread of Wimpy etc.
We have had fast food here (Fish and Chips anyone?), I think it is the fast food FRANCHISE that is more specifically American.
So the "tree-huggers", which is normally a derogatory term, were right then?
Have a look at the "David Kelly affair" which led to the Hutton Inquiry which led to the BBC avoiding investigative journalism of NuLabours government (they still are in many ways) and finally look at recent discussions at the whole situation as it has become clear that the BBC were correct! Even if you are not that interested in the UK this relates to an item of interest to most of the world: the claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction able to launch in 45 minutes.
As an assist here are a couple of links the get you started:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr_David_Kelly
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutton_Inquiry
The following seems to be a good (if unorganized) set of articles relating to this.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/davidkelly
As a UK person who likes several Baen books authors I have done exactly that..... except the there is no "instead" as I then buy the paperback as soon as I can get ahold of it.
IANAL but as I understand it (in a common law jurisdiction like the UK and most former colonies) it is the COURTS decision, not the JUDGES decision that forms the precedence, the judge is mainly the mouthpiece. One of the reasons for having a jury is that the normal opinion of society SHOULD adjust the law. This however mainly applies to the unwritten parts of the law rather than the written (statute) parts.
Unfortunately the regulator OFCOM want to relax the rules on advertising. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/20/ofcom_tv_ads/
Any fellow UK people may wish to respond to the consultation here http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/rada/ We have until the 28th of this month.
Publishers Organised Ratings Network?
or since this is in the USA
Publishers Organized Ratings Network
Maybe they could use star ratings of some sort...
What a capital idea my man.
As I say I have a different opinion about the definition, I consider laws designed for controlling the palette of available thoughts to be a version of thought crime and I consider these laws or at least their implementation to be about that. I also don't necessarily consider that 1984 is the only possible source for a definition of the phrase!
As to protest being stopped not being about thought crime:- How are people to think about something if they never hear about it because every media grabbing protest is squashed BEFORE it can be staged? (The police USED TO allow the protests to continue for a while, typically about half an hour, then make the arrest(s), in order to respect their freedom of speech.) Not that many people go to non-"media" sources like I (and presumably since you are here, you) do!
Well since this discussion is about another possession law, it thought that example relevant. Also the way I see it thought crimes are about the authorities trying to control the way you think and one of the ways to do that is to stop you possessing items that are involved in the thinking they don't like. If there was a way of directly telling what you think then I think this this government would make a laws using that as evidence of wrong thought!
There has also been prosecutions for speech relating to terrorism. There has also been inappropriate detentions ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Wolfgang for a famous, if brief, example). There have also been a number of well documented cases of the police stopping protesters whilst on route to a protest, this probably being the most famous http://www.statewatch.org/news/2004/dec/05fairford-appeal.htm, although they tend to use breach of the peace laws for justification for this sort of thing. I see the fact that the police would act this way (which is a change in their behaviour) as an example of the climate of authoritarian control that this government has fostered.
You might find a google search for guilty terrorism site:bbc.co.uk interesting, in particular note how high a proportion of the links are for possession or speech (all be it not private speech) (aka incitement) but not actual terrorism or assistance to terrorism. And this is simply the cases that warrant a BBC news story.
One of the most famous cases is http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7084801.stm where she was found guilty of having articles "likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism" but NOT of "possessing an article for a terrorist purpose", in other words they had no evidence that she was actually intending to commit terrorism, just that she had materials that could be used for it.
Thought crimes are already here in the guise of several of the "anti-terrorism" crimes, like (IIRC) "possession of items likely to be useful to terrorists". A London A-Z has been publicly included in a haul of such material from one person (along with leaflets/books, IIRC there were NO non-reading materials in that haul). There have already be some successful prosecutions under such laws.
In the breakfast news programs today I saw that they are now putting cameras in the lollipops of school crossing keepers. I also noticed that they were hidden and that there was none of the legally (Data Protection Act) required (ASAIK-IANAL) notification signs.
And the only reason these bad laws get through the Lords anyway is because the New Labour "Constitutional Reforms" have changed the make up of the Lords. (To have more political types or to be "more representative".)
Possibly, IANAL, however as I see it there are some differences, in the case of the game AT the point of purchase the product has the spec on the box (or website for online), including (in all cases I have seen) both minimum and recommend specifications.
At the time of the purchase of the COMPUTER (n.b. not Vista, it is the computer sale that is in question IIRC) there was no (at point of sale, or in the case of before Vista release anywhere!) available indications about the disparity between different CLASSES of performance (such as Aero verses non-Aero).
You can for a sufficiently powerful value of "You", i.e. God (were he/she/it to exist) presumably could, so couldn't it reasonably(sic) be assumed that God wants science?
Give the English the boot? I was talking about the UK!
Shouldn't we be the 0th state since we were in existence first?
I am afraid I am going to have to say Me Too to this. I have the tubes over my head disabled at work for this reason (I don't need a dim office, just not a standard brightly lit one).
If the sin is passed down at the point of conception (and not caused or created BY the conception) then what if a married pair of catholics have sex (without any sinful thought or actions-AFAIK sex between a married couple is not a sin) just after confession (which AFAIK cleans ALL (confessed), even original, sin in catholic doctrine) then wouldn't the child thus conceived be free of sin?
At last a genuine variant of the Chewbacca defense.
"The hire car robot annoyed me so much I pulled its limbs off. This is a documented issue with robots, in this film clip this is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookiee from the planet Kashyyyk..."
But in that domain (literature) both the authors and readers tend to know the extended rules (from exposure, especially for the readers). Also the normal rules tend to be ignored when required anyway (especially in poems/lyrics), even the rules you are lamenting the loss of!
Thinking further on this I suppose there is the problem of the uneducated (in the dying rules) people seeing the literature as being, to them, confusing and thus them being less likely to be willing read it. This might be one of the reasons for the general reduction in the amount read these days (barring blips caused by things like Harry Potter).
Sure, ALL caps works great for subtly showing that someone is screaming. Typically, however, font styles cannot show what is important information or what is not - which punctuation via commas can - nor can it as easily emphasis when something is more important than otherwise. Sure, the use of bold and italics and help differentiate something, but then you're limited to only a few degrees of importance, whilst word or phrase ordering can give you unlimited degrees of importance.I am not sure the you do actually get that many degrees of importance from order alone, for instance in the "the dog the cat chased" and "the cat the dog chased" versions are the dog and cat of equal importance, or are the dog or cat more important in the versions they lead?
It would be like telling a carpenter that he has to craft a bed frame by and limiting him to a few small chisels, a hammer, and a screw driver - when before, he had chisels of all different sizes to chose from depending on what he wanted to do.However the carpenter (author) still has the tools, it is the occasional DIYer that does not have them (and to take the analogy further the normal DIY shops (English teachers) don't stock them anymore, although the trade outlets (writing classes?) probably still do).
Basically you have sort of convinced me that losing tools can be a problem for certain domains, you just have not convinced me that those domains have lost the tools!