Re:A simple syllogism, indeed
on
Fish with Limbs
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· Score: 1
A. Flawed because traits are neither desireable nor undesireable; they simply confer differing degrees of survival advantage in different situations.
so a trait that confers survival advantage of our species is neither undesireable nor desireable? Asking as a human, why not?
B. Flawed because "reinforcement of those traits" is not "of utmost importance for the furthering of the species".
Again, why not?
Period. News flash: Humans don't have to take any action for evolution to work. In fact, it worked just fine before we came along, and will work just fine after we're gone
no argument.
However, that has nothing to do with evolution. Humans have no place judging whether a given set of genes are *evolutionarily viable* - and we don't need to. Evolution through natural selection will determine both viability and long-term success.
Ahh, the problem with your argument. If humans evolved the capacity for thought, then we did so because it presented an advantage in reproduction. Now that we are thinking beings, are you saying that we should stop using our thinking powers to present greater advantages in the long-term viability of the species? I'm not suggesting that humans can 100% accurately predict environmental changes requiring adaptation, or even come close to 100%, but don't we as a species have an obligation to ourselves to attempt to further the species to the best of our ability? Even amoebas do that, though they know not why. I think that if natural selection is right, then we owe it to ourselves to make the best guesses we can about what traits are desireable, and reinforcing them. Also according to natural selection, it is of course the duty of "inferior" beings to attept to promulgate their genes despite our attempts.
The problem is that the human psyche has a hard time reconciling this thought because the very intelligence that we've possibly evolved also gives us compassion, a trait that could very well be our downfall should Darwinian evolution turn out to be correct.
Not surprising, given the quality of the stuff you've tried to pass off as "logical" in your posts.
Kant suggested that if a theory, carried out to its extreme, results in an impossible condition, then it must be wrong. While I can't totally agree with either Kant or Darwin, I think that there is value in looking at the extremes of ideas, regardless of whether those extremes actually come to pass or not. I was merely trying to show that evolution can very easily devolve into genocide.
Re:Eugenics? Pull the other one...
on
Fish with Limbs
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· Score: 1
1) The "civilized races", etc. (first sentence)
- Genocidal practices of the colonial era, anyone? I don't see Darwin ENDORSING this - just saying it will "almost certainly" happen. Which it has. And may continue to.
If Darwin saw genocide of "inferior" races as the natural cause of his own theory, then wouldn't it follow that he would endorse it? I find it rather hard to believe that he would present natural selection as being a universally good thing (since it rewards creatures and species with desireable traits), yet suggest that it is somehow bad at the same time to reward those species. This is the point of the original AC's argument - that it's very hard to separate natural selection and racism, because one tends to follow the other.
As a simple syllogism:
A.If you believe that some humans have more desireable traits than others (which you have to, if you believe in evolution)
B. and you believe that reinforcement of those traits is of utmost importance for the furthering of the species (which is arguably another truism when talking about evolution)
C. then it must follow that you believe that it's at least not evil for persons with undesireable traits to be prevented from passing those traits on.
Of course, he's also indulging in the Caucasion-centric view of civilization that was typical of his culture...
I can understand the argument that Darwin was afflicted with the racism typical of his era and society, but I can't agree - rather I think that his racism was inorexably linked to his understanding of the implications that his theory entailed.
Re:Eugenics? Pull the other one...
on
Fish with Limbs
·
· Score: 1
I'd like to see some kind of quote before I believe that Darwin "wholeheartedly believed in this sort of proposition"; I think that's complete hogwash, but I could be wrong. Again, got a citation from a reliable source?
How about Darwin's own pen?
"At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes... will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla."
-Charles Darwin, "The Descent of Man", 2nd edition, New York, A L. Burt Co., 1874, p. 178
small nitpick: Many extreme audiophiles run very expensive tube amplifiers in their home setups. I can't seem to find a link right now, but I know I've seen tube home receivers for sale at costs of upwards of $2-3 grand. I haven't actually ever heard one of these, but they're probably pretty decent if people 'in the know' are willing to spend that much on them
Definately agree that tube is better for creating music. I can proudly say that I own a Peavey 5150 half-stack that will never again see the open market, because its tone so amazingly exceeds the long line of solid state amps that I had before it.
thanks much for the info. Hmmm... I wonder why MS makes it so counterintuitive. I would hope that if a Media Player-style EU antitrust case ever came up over Messenger, they'd find against Microsoft. Sure it's removable, but not easily so.
You mean like Windows Messenger is already integrated into XP? I'm on my XP work computer right now, in Add/Remove Windows components. Windows Messenger is unchecked (as it has been for several months, since I set the machine up). I still have Windows Messenger in my system tray, and clicking on it brings it right up...
As far as I can tell, they already have an integrated messenger that can't be removed. Imagine what it would do to yahoo if they did start integrating both AIM and Windows Messenger.
Same thing happened to me with a band called Murder By Death. I ended up driving 6 hours to see them in Milwaukee (from Southern Illinois), and then followed them to Chicago the next night because they were so amazing. How did I hear about them? Someone on the Internet (www.stlpunk.com) was talking about them, so I downloaded a couple songs. Now I've seen them 4 times, and bought just about every piece of merch that they have for sale.
I've found a lot more great bands this way too: Silverstein, Mewithoutyou, and Zao, just to name a few. I can remember, in the days before P2P, lamenting that no one was making good music. The reality was simply that the major labels were doing a piss-poor job of delivering to me music that I was interested in. Once I took it upon myself, my musical experience has become infinately richer.
Isn't that sort of what the Windows installer does for games anyway? It detects what version of the OS is running, installs any patches it needs (like Direct X), and creates whatever registry keys that it needs, based on what version of Windows is running. There's no reason that a Linux installer package can't do the same thing for a game through Wine.
Granted, the analogy is not totally accurate, but I think that it's close enough to build a business on. Also, there's probably no reason why game distributors couldn't create this function on the Windows version disks that they're already selling. That way, we'd see lots more games available for Linux.
I imagine that the system requirements for running things through wine might be a bit steeper, but the people who care about this have powerful computers anyway.
Yes, I'd pay for it, because I would finally have a really good reason to move my main performance (gaming) rig to Linux rather than just my spare PII 333.
Who you represent? I represent the smallest planet
Attorney in this tourney versus those who've tried to ban it
If you don't agree go see Interplanet Janet
Cause sun is star, like Pluto is planet
Lend me all your ears and let me state my case
About all the types of satellites you must embrace
Cause like my parents, great grandparents
This planet was an immigrant
To deport it makes no sense
It's an upstanding member of the solar system
Apply the laws of earth and make it a victim
Of Proposition 187
When Pluto spawns a moon it will apply to the heavens
I will damn thee like Judas of Iscariot
If you demote this mote remote to affiliate
It's like taking ET's custody from Elliot
Support your Lilliput, cause simply put
Yeah, I really like Parsec and Carwars for my Ti99/4a, and that's what's really keeping me from moving to the modern world of Windows (just kidding).
I think I can agree that people don't want to give up great old games for a new platform - I still have a Win98 partition for Need For Speed 3 and Episode 1 Pod Racer, because they won't run on anything BUT 9.x. However, I disagree when you say that it's a bad thing to try to get Windows games to run on a Linux distro. The best way to do it is to create a distro that includes the best in open source games, as well as a clean, easy to use, GUI Wine interface for the Linux newbies (like myself). Next, push the game developers that ARE making Linux ports to make sure that it's labeled big and bold on the box.
Actually, I don't know a whole lot about the K engines yet either (my 2000 Civic has a d16y8 - sohc vtec), but I have heard complaints from other Honda owners about how things are harder to get to... Possibly because everything's hidden underneath big plastic shrouds now. I think they also went to coil packs now instead of a distributer - makes changing the timing much more of a hassle. Really, I think that the complaining from Honda owners is due the the (arguably accurate) perception that the B16 (and B18) engines were perfection, and shouldn't be messed with.
Also, it doesn't help that none of the parts are easily interchangeable anymore - yet. You could match heads and blocks with almost any engine within the same letter series, which made tweaking them much easier. You could put a B18 vtec Type R head on a B20 CRV block, and end up with a 2 liter Type R engine, instead of a 1.8. Then you could put your 2 Liter DOHC vtec in a 1987 CRX, and it would fit, with minimal mods (you'd need a ITR chip, transmission, and a wiring harness, mounts, and a large rubber mallot to mate it up). Result: a naturally aspirated car, pushing over 200HP (100HP/ltr!), that weighed under a ton. Here's hoping that they continue their tradition of interoperability. Alas, I don't think that anyone's successfully dropped a K20 in a 6th gen Civic yet.
Free rental car, free labor/parts, and less than 24 hours later I had my car.
At 29,999, it damned well better be free - Most cars with that few miles are still under warranty. I still get free parts/labor on my used Honda, with 89,000 miles.
The point is not about warranty work - that has to be done by the dealer anyway. The point is non-warranty work that *ought* to be able to be done by any mechanic. How will you feel when you have to have your valves adjusted at 100,000 miles, and the only place that can do it is the Saturn dealer, who will charge twice as much as a comparibly experienced independant mechanic? The only reason that a normal mechanic can't work on these cars is because of manufacturer lockout.
I keep waiting for someone to realize that there is a hobbyist market out here that would love to have cars that are both modern and easy to work on. Honda seemed to have this right for about 10 years (great cars from about 1989-2000) - specifications were well-documented, computers were easily hackable, and many parts were interchangable. Alas, they seemed to start moving away from this in 2001 with the new K series engines. Anyone want to help me produce a Gnu/CAR under the GPL?
My band (an independant) self-produced a CD a couple years ago. It was of fairly high quality - not quite up to major label standards, but more than adequate for a small local band. Our drummer's brother recorded it for free in his basement with about $1200 worth of mikes and mixers, and an $899 Gateway computer. Marketing was done with street teams (basically us handing out singles to people in line at other shows in the St. Louis area), and through our website. Cost: Almost free.
We sold them for $5 on the website, and asked a "suggested donation" of $5 to buy them at shows. We put all of the mp3s up on the website, and gave out maybe half of our few hundred copies for free (as promotional copies). We found with the suggested donation model that almost everyone would give something, and all it took was $1 to get back the cost of the CD. This was offset by the fact that some people would give $10, instead of $5.
Result? We made back the cost of the CD, and had more than enough money to make more merch. In fact, our goal was never to make money off of the CD, but to make enough back to pay for it. That's why we gave half of the run away for free.
Point being: I don't feel sorry for these people in any way, shape, or form. If the RIAA cannot make money back selling a CD for $17-20, then it's time for them to start looking at 1. Why the CD costs that much to begin with, and 2. Why people don't want to pay for the crap that's on the CD. We weren't the best band in the world *by far,* but people were still willing to buy the CD because we got out there and played shows to promote it. Yes, money can be made by CD sales, even with P2P.
Before anyone asks: yes, I know the link in my sig is broken again, but I'll fix it when I get home. #$*%%#$ IIS!
After reading several/. stories related to hard disks, I've noticed that the discussion almost always turns to reliability horror stories... and everyone seems to hate one company or another. This seems to point to the fact that with hard drives, as with anything, YMMV.
On a side note, I've had 2 WD drives that ran in always-on systems for 2-3 years with no problems (still running - a 40 and a 60 Gig). I've got a 120GB Seagate that's gone for a year always on - no problems. I've got a 20GB Quantum that's ran since 1999, with no problems. OTOH, my office runs 300 Gateways and Dells with various Maxtors, and we've returned 50-60 hard drives in the past year alone. Other people swear by Maxtors, though.
I'm starting to think that maybe it has something to do with lower-quality drives being shipped to the bulk manufacturers... I dunno, though, my 5yo workhorse Quantum originally came out of a Dell.
The *problem* however is that the DMCA still bars the distribution of *tools* for breaking copy protection, no matter what they're used for. So, yes, you *can* break the protection on that CD if it's for a fair purpose, but *only* if you do all the work of doing so yourself. This was why the "making it easy" issue came up.
Not disputing your point about the DMCA at all (AFAIK it is true), but does anyone else find it interesting that Office Max is still allowed to distribute Sharpies? Yet more proof that this is, in essence, an unenforceable law.
3 - the severe price gouging (cost, economics)that cell phone companies insist on foisting as reasonable, particularly the scummy business practices.
Maybe you're trolling... I'll bite.
In my town, it costs $50/month to have an active land line, thanks to the wonders of deregulation. Then, since we're on a small local carrier, it's a toll call to anywhere out of town.
OR
I can pay $40/month for a cell phone with more minutes than I'll ever use in a month, as well as free long distance, free nights and weekends, and no roaming charges (through Verizon). Plus, I'm not chained to my house when I'm expecting important calls.
For me, cellular service just makes more economic sense, and I miss my land line much less than I thought I would.
Yeah, I just noticed that. Seems like my work copy of XP runs regedt32, regardless of which command you use. Seems like maybe MS has taken regedit out completely.
llzackll says that there's no key in there for it, so you might try (as others have suggested) giving the user permission to the Warcraft folder in Program Files, and the Local Settings (hidden) folder in the user's profile.
Other than that, I'm not really sure, not having an installed copy of the game in front of me. It has to be a permissions issue somewhere, it's just a matter of finding it.
Slashdot Mirror
so a trait that confers survival advantage of our species is neither undesireable nor desireable? Asking as a human, why not?
B. Flawed because "reinforcement of those traits" is not "of utmost importance for the furthering of the species".
Again, why not?
Period. News flash: Humans don't have to take any action for evolution to work. In fact, it worked just fine before we came along, and will work just fine after we're gone
no argument.
However, that has nothing to do with evolution. Humans have no place judging whether a given set of genes are *evolutionarily viable* - and we don't need to. Evolution through natural selection will determine both viability and long-term success.
Ahh, the problem with your argument. If humans evolved the capacity for thought, then we did so because it presented an advantage in reproduction. Now that we are thinking beings, are you saying that we should stop using our thinking powers to present greater advantages in the long-term viability of the species? I'm not suggesting that humans can 100% accurately predict environmental changes requiring adaptation, or even come close to 100%, but don't we as a species have an obligation to ourselves to attempt to further the species to the best of our ability? Even amoebas do that, though they know not why. I think that if natural selection is right, then we owe it to ourselves to make the best guesses we can about what traits are desireable, and reinforcing them. Also according to natural selection, it is of course the duty of "inferior" beings to attept to promulgate their genes despite our attempts.
The problem is that the human psyche has a hard time reconciling this thought because the very intelligence that we've possibly evolved also gives us compassion, a trait that could very well be our downfall should Darwinian evolution turn out to be correct.
Not surprising, given the quality of the stuff you've tried to pass off as "logical" in your posts.
Kant suggested that if a theory, carried out to its extreme, results in an impossible condition, then it must be wrong. While I can't totally agree with either Kant or Darwin, I think that there is value in looking at the extremes of ideas, regardless of whether those extremes actually come to pass or not. I was merely trying to show that evolution can very easily devolve into genocide.
- Genocidal practices of the colonial era, anyone? I don't see Darwin ENDORSING this - just saying it will "almost certainly" happen. Which it has. And may continue to.
If Darwin saw genocide of "inferior" races as the natural cause of his own theory, then wouldn't it follow that he would endorse it? I find it rather hard to believe that he would present natural selection as being a universally good thing (since it rewards creatures and species with desireable traits), yet suggest that it is somehow bad at the same time to reward those species. This is the point of the original AC's argument - that it's very hard to separate natural selection and racism, because one tends to follow the other.
As a simple syllogism:
A.If you believe that some humans have more desireable traits than others (which you have to, if you believe in evolution)
B. and you believe that reinforcement of those traits is of utmost importance for the furthering of the species (which is arguably another truism when talking about evolution)
C. then it must follow that you believe that it's at least not evil for persons with undesireable traits to be prevented from passing those traits on.
Of course, he's also indulging in the Caucasion-centric view of civilization that was typical of his culture...
I can understand the argument that Darwin was afflicted with the racism typical of his era and society, but I can't agree - rather I think that his racism was inorexably linked to his understanding of the implications that his theory entailed.
How about Darwin's own pen?
"At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes
-Charles Darwin, "The Descent of Man", 2nd edition, New York, A L. Burt Co., 1874, p. 178
Definately agree that tube is better for creating music. I can proudly say that I own a Peavey 5150 half-stack that will never again see the open market, because its tone so amazingly exceeds the long line of solid state amps that I had before it.
He did say this year.
sorry, SNL joke
As far as I can tell, they already have an integrated messenger that can't be removed. Imagine what it would do to yahoo if they did start integrating both AIM and Windows Messenger.
I've found a lot more great bands this way too: Silverstein, Mewithoutyou, and Zao, just to name a few. I can remember, in the days before P2P, lamenting that no one was making good music. The reality was simply that the major labels were doing a piss-poor job of delivering to me music that I was interested in. Once I took it upon myself, my musical experience has become infinately richer.
Granted, the analogy is not totally accurate, but I think that it's close enough to build a business on. Also, there's probably no reason why game distributors couldn't create this function on the Windows version disks that they're already selling. That way, we'd see lots more games available for Linux.
I imagine that the system requirements for running things through wine might be a bit steeper, but the people who care about this have powerful computers anyway.
Yes, I'd pay for it, because I would finally have a really good reason to move my main performance (gaming) rig to Linux rather than just my spare PII 333.
Attorney in this tourney versus those who've tried to ban it
If you don't agree go see Interplanet Janet
Cause sun is star, like Pluto is planet
Lend me all your ears and let me state my case
About all the types of satellites you must embrace
Cause like my parents, great grandparents
This planet was an immigrant
To deport it makes no sense
It's an upstanding member of the solar system
Apply the laws of earth and make it a victim
Of Proposition 187
When Pluto spawns a moon it will apply to the heavens
I will damn thee like Judas of Iscariot
If you demote this mote remote to affiliate
It's like taking ET's custody from Elliot
Support your Lilliput, cause simply put
Pluto is a planet
--2 Skinnee J's, Pluto
I think I can agree that people don't want to give up great old games for a new platform - I still have a Win98 partition for Need For Speed 3 and Episode 1 Pod Racer, because they won't run on anything BUT 9.x. However, I disagree when you say that it's a bad thing to try to get Windows games to run on a Linux distro. The best way to do it is to create a distro that includes the best in open source games, as well as a clean, easy to use, GUI Wine interface for the Linux newbies (like myself). Next, push the game developers that ARE making Linux ports to make sure that it's labeled big and bold on the box.
Also, it doesn't help that none of the parts are easily interchangeable anymore - yet. You could match heads and blocks with almost any engine within the same letter series, which made tweaking them much easier. You could put a B18 vtec Type R head on a B20 CRV block, and end up with a 2 liter Type R engine, instead of a 1.8. Then you could put your 2 Liter DOHC vtec in a 1987 CRX, and it would fit, with minimal mods (you'd need a ITR chip, transmission, and a wiring harness, mounts, and a large rubber mallot to mate it up). Result: a naturally aspirated car, pushing over 200HP (100HP/ltr!), that weighed under a ton. Here's hoping that they continue their tradition of interoperability. Alas, I don't think that anyone's successfully dropped a K20 in a 6th gen Civic yet.
At 29,999, it damned well better be free - Most cars with that few miles are still under warranty. I still get free parts/labor on my used Honda, with 89,000 miles.
The point is not about warranty work - that has to be done by the dealer anyway. The point is non-warranty work that *ought* to be able to be done by any mechanic. How will you feel when you have to have your valves adjusted at 100,000 miles, and the only place that can do it is the Saturn dealer, who will charge twice as much as a comparibly experienced independant mechanic? The only reason that a normal mechanic can't work on these cars is because of manufacturer lockout.
I keep waiting for someone to realize that there is a hobbyist market out here that would love to have cars that are both modern and easy to work on. Honda seemed to have this right for about 10 years (great cars from about 1989-2000) - specifications were well-documented, computers were easily hackable, and many parts were interchangable. Alas, they seemed to start moving away from this in 2001 with the new K series engines. Anyone want to help me produce a Gnu/CAR under the GPL?
Nice Troll
My band (an independant) self-produced a CD a couple years ago. It was of fairly high quality - not quite up to major label standards, but more than adequate for a small local band. Our drummer's brother recorded it for free in his basement with about $1200 worth of mikes and mixers, and an $899 Gateway computer. Marketing was done with street teams (basically us handing out singles to people in line at other shows in the St. Louis area), and through our website. Cost: Almost free.
We sold them for $5 on the website, and asked a "suggested donation" of $5 to buy them at shows. We put all of the mp3s up on the website, and gave out maybe half of our few hundred copies for free (as promotional copies). We found with the suggested donation model that almost everyone would give something, and all it took was $1 to get back the cost of the CD. This was offset by the fact that some people would give $10, instead of $5.
Result? We made back the cost of the CD, and had more than enough money to make more merch. In fact, our goal was never to make money off of the CD, but to make enough back to pay for it. That's why we gave half of the run away for free.
Point being: I don't feel sorry for these people in any way, shape, or form. If the RIAA cannot make money back selling a CD for $17-20, then it's time for them to start looking at 1. Why the CD costs that much to begin with, and 2. Why people don't want to pay for the crap that's on the CD. We weren't the best band in the world *by far,* but people were still willing to buy the CD because we got out there and played shows to promote it. Yes, money can be made by CD sales, even with P2P.
Before anyone asks: yes, I know the link in my sig is broken again, but I'll fix it when I get home. #$*%%#$ IIS!
On a side note, I've had 2 WD drives that ran in always-on systems for 2-3 years with no problems (still running - a 40 and a 60 Gig). I've got a 120GB Seagate that's gone for a year always on - no problems. I've got a 20GB Quantum that's ran since 1999, with no problems. OTOH, my office runs 300 Gateways and Dells with various Maxtors, and we've returned 50-60 hard drives in the past year alone. Other people swear by Maxtors, though.
I'm starting to think that maybe it has something to do with lower-quality drives being shipped to the bulk manufacturers... I dunno, though, my 5yo workhorse Quantum originally came out of a Dell.
Not disputing your point about the DMCA at all (AFAIK it is true), but does anyone else find it interesting that Office Max is still allowed to distribute Sharpies? Yet more proof that this is, in essence, an unenforceable law.
because he worked for Ford long before he worked for Chrysler.
Maybe you're trolling... I'll bite.
In my town, it costs $50/month to have an active land line, thanks to the wonders of deregulation. Then, since we're on a small local carrier, it's a toll call to anywhere out of town.
OR
I can pay $40/month for a cell phone with more minutes than I'll ever use in a month, as well as free long distance, free nights and weekends, and no roaming charges (through Verizon). Plus, I'm not chained to my house when I'm expecting important calls.
For me, cellular service just makes more economic sense, and I miss my land line much less than I thought I would.
The sausage king of Chicago!!
llzackll says that there's no key in there for it, so you might try (as others have suggested) giving the user permission to the Warcraft folder in Program Files, and the Local Settings (hidden) folder in the user's profile.
Other than that, I'm not really sure, not having an installed copy of the game in front of me. It has to be a permissions issue somewhere, it's just a matter of finding it.