The first years are undoubtedly important for a child. I just don't buy that being away from the parents for part of the day is harmful after a certain young age (lower than seven). In fact, it seems to be a good thing, at least from the studies I've seen here. There's certainly no evidence from harm from the system of widespread free daycare we get here, afaik.
Define harm. On the surface all a human requires is food, shelter and clothing to continue to function, except that is not really the case. We also have other social and spiritual needs that, if they aren't met, will cause us great pain. Because of that pain they will eventually cause others pain. I don't know if you are familiar with the saying: "Hurt people hurt people." but it is definitely true. A child that is suffering because of unmet social or spiritual needs doesn't understand where the pain is coming from so they can't ask for it like they can ask for more food or clothes. It just builds until it can't be stuffed/controlled anymore.
Going to daycare can meet some of the social needs of a child but without you there they may not learn the kinds of things that you want them to learn. I'm not just talking about bad words or situations that are beyond their maturity to handle. I'm talking about what characteristics are favored because it's a group setting. If your child is inherently shy, compliant and can play quietly for long periods of time then they will probably be ignored while the adults spend most of their time trying to keep the unruly, rambunctious kids from causing chaos. Kids can be very mean to each other for various reasons and in a group setting kids may be forced to adapt in unhealthy ways to cope because there are too many interactions for the adult(s) to weigh in on all of them.
What I've discovered is a good warning sign that we are not spending enough time with out kids is that we don't enjoy our time with them. I'm not saying that every minute is pure joy but if, on the whole, we don't WANT to spend more time with our own children then there is something wrong.
More importantly, if we accept your argument that being away from parents estranges the child from them, it should be a strong argument for equality. After all, if you spend all your time with mom and little with dad, as per the gender roles people think are so important, you'd be estranged from your father. This is especially true if he adopts a classical gender role and stays away from touchy feely bonding.
The argument I'm trying to make is at least twofold. One, if your child spends much more interactive time with someone other than you than they will turn out different than you in very fundamental, world-view type ways, which can lead to estrangement. Two, if your child is not getting their social and spiritual needs met then they will be estranged from everyone, including you. It's just a matter of degree. I think my family is fairly healthy but I'm still not happy with the amount of time I get to spend with my kids. I've never heard of anyone regretting how much time they spent with their family.
I should point out that as a Christian I believe that only through surrendering our lives to Jesus can our spiritual needs be met, but I recognize that not everyone believes that. If you have found another way to fill that void in your child then I'm happy for you.
There's also something to be said for daycare and similar social services, and their effect on fertility and how parents combine work and family. But then I'm from one of those countries Fox News thinks is socialist.
I guess that depends on whether you think you can pay someone to love, encourage, and teach your child as well as you can. Personally, I believe the first 7 years of a child are absolutely critical to the development of how they view themselves and the world. Those views will influence everything that they do. If you want your child to reach the conclusion early on that they are just a "cog in the machine" and making money is more important than being with them then you will have achieved your goal.
Just don't be surprised when you retire and find that your children don't really value spending time with you over doing what they want. There won't be any malice or anger. Just an innate understanding of how much we should sacrifice for family.
There is a difference between having one child, for the experience, and three children, to ensure the continued expansion of your people group. The statistics say that women in developed nations are mostly having a child for the experience.
And, I'm not sure what world YOU live in if you think that having children AND a career is part of the ideal world. My ideal world is completely narcissitic, self-centered, and involves lots of nubile young women who never get pregnant. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, my world isn't even close to my ideal. You need to get rid of the Ms. magazines from your house and start fantasizing like a MAN.
I suppose you could be purposely obtuse and come away with that! I think it's fairly clear that if most jobs can be done by men or women and the society treats women as "equivalent" to males then most women will chose to work rather than have children. Since doing a good job raising children is WAY more work then most 20th century jobs, it's understandable. If your mom didn't have at least 2.1 to 2.3 children, assuming a developed country, then she contributed to the decline of your ethnicity. This has a number of consequences including the difficulty in funding retirement programs, like Social Security and Medicare, and replacing workers as the workforce ages.
I agree, except for one thing. By your definition, software engineering isn't really a profession either. There is no professional association that accredits software engineers or kicks them out for writing crappy software. The barrier to entry isn't really that high either. I have yet to see a commercial software application that had any REAL warranty. Software warranties boil down to: "if it works, great. If it doesn't then too bad for you". If there are no consequences then there is no need to have a legally responsible engineer.
I still find it amazing that companies are so heavily dependent on software that nobody really stands behind. I think this explains why IT can
be such a miserable job. The company has to have someone to blame!
It seems that Gnostics vary in their belief from individual to individual. The lack of consensus on what Gnosticism is leads me to believe that people are making it up as they go along.
I didn't choose to be a Christian because it made sense to me or seemed like the best choice among other religions. I chose Christianity because I recognized a number of divine interventions in my life that led me to the Christian church. Even though I don't agree 100% with any pastor, I believe that people that have "given their lives to Jesus" share a common bond with myself. I believe that God communicates with me through the Holy Spirit and the bible has given me a baseline that allows me differentiate the Holy Spirit from other voices.
If Gnosticism works for you then that's great. I'm curious because I'm interested in new trends in religion. Despite the fact that most Christian churches push hard the need to "spread the gospel", I'm good with just being responsible for myself and my family. Trying to represent God to others is fraught with peril.
I tried searching for "gnostic" and "gnosticism" and it seems to be Christianity mixed with various mystical ideas. You're going to have to post a link to what YOU define as the "Gnostic approach" if you want me to know what you're talking about. Ideally, it would detail how it differs from basic Pentecostal or Evangelical theology. All I know now is that a Jesuit wouldn't sign-off on it.
The smartest people with bad input will make bad decisions. It's simply a matter of "garbage in, garbage out". The real issue is not how smart people are but where do they get their information about how the world REALLY works. This is mostly about how people REALLY work. This is Slashdot so I know I'll get hammered because of my worldview but I'm feeling feisty today.
I believe the Christian bible tells us how people work with and without God's wisdom in them. The financial crisis is a perfect example of how smart people with a worldview different from God's can make such incredible errors. If you believe that most intelligent people are capable of "enlightened self-interest" then you would probably not see the crisis coming. The bible says that if you are not content with what you have then you will NEVER be content no matter how much money you have. "Unbridled Greed" is redundant. The only greed that exists is the unbridled kind.
America, despite the number of people that profess to be Christians, is considered to be a post-Christian country by many Christian denominations because it has become a title without an underlying belief system that matches scripture to a high degree. Because of this many people have switched to a worldview that ignores the selfish, self-centered nature of man that we are all born into. This means that they fail to understand that the system of laws and regulations in this country that mostly worked in the past, because more people "did the right thing", don't work anymore because people can always find a way around the laws if they don't want to do the right thing.
Be prepared for more smart people doing foolish things as this country heads for "every man for himself". Us Anglo-Saxons like order too much to go completely feral but I do expect things to get worse before they get better because people still think that the government can fix this country. The Republican party let things get bad and the Democratic party will let things get worse so hopefully most people will be disabused of the idea that government cares about people that can't pay for the legislation they want.
Maybe you're not aware that the majority of pharmaceuticals are derived from isolating the active chemicals in plants and animals that are already known to have beneficial effects on humans. These chemicals are concentrated, put in a pill and sold as some "breakthrough" in medicine. The pills are obviously more powerful because of the higher concentration of the active ingredient but also cause more side effects because they don't have the supporting chemicals that were in the plant and often put a heavy load on the liver.
The problem in this country is that many people have put their faith in pills and live and eat in very unhealthy ways believing that the pills will ultimately save them. This is not a smart way to live. The pills are designed to treat a symptom but they generally don't fix the underlying issue which is probably poor nutrition and lack of exercise in the majority of cases. The herbal medications that do work, work more slowly and can't help people that wait until their body is in crisis to seek medical attention.
If you don't believe me maybe you'll believe a pharmacist. If you're going to take a pill then take the RED pill and find out the truth about drugs and our medical system.
I would be surprised if anyone understands much beyond their own narrow area of expertise. The world, especially the economic and political world has become incredibly complex. The US tax code alone is thousands of pages that probably no one fully understands. The total number of laws in the US would be completely unmanageable without Lexus-Nexis and even with that it is incredibly hard to be sure when you're breaking a law or not! We have created a minefield for businesses that really insures that any business that has been around for a while can be prosecuted for something. The patent trolls and environmentalists are just the beginning! According to one article, the US spends about 2% of the GDP on lawyers and I expect it to get worse.
This country is screwed in a number of ways but the regulatory and legal impediments really seem like the stake in the heart. It is slowing reforms in health care, energy and food production at the least. Some laws keep out herbal solutions that could replace some pharmaceutical solutions because hundreds of years of anecdotal evidence isn't good enough. Some laws slow or kill nascent industries because the regulatory threshold is so high that it becomes cost prohibitive to jump through all the hoops. I have seen it happen for biodiesel pump introduction. Food subsidies artificially pick the food winners because it hides the real cost of production. It is why so many foods use corn syrup sweeteners instead of sugar.
I believe that most of the laws were made with good intent but that the cumulative effect has been to crush progress that would have made the common man's life better instead of just making the rich even richer. The laws have become a straight-jacket that keep common sense from prevailing.
Only engineers get excited about Operating Systems. It is an important utility but it is still only a utility. It is there to facilitate the running of the applications that ACTUALLY do what we want. The fact that Microsoft has kept everyone upgrading the operating system for so long when there has been minimal "added value" for most people after Windows 95 is amazing to me. I understand that "nobody gets fired for specifying Microsoft Windows" and that it is the safe choice for an increasingly complicated IT infrastructure. I also understand that the very utilitarian nature of operating systems meant that, inevitably, there was only going to be a limited number of competing ones since the one with the preponderance of popular applications was going to win out. The cost, in terms of money and pain, to change OS's must be greater than I imagine.
According to Merriam-Webster sexism is either "prejudice or discrimination based on sex" or "behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex"
As far as the first definition, I haven't found anyone that didn't think people of their sex, male or female, wasn't superior to the other sex. I don't think there is much argument that men and women think differently and can't possibly identify with the opposite sex except in some narrow way. If you have learned to function with the abilities that come with your particular gender then your ego, in the healthy, clinical sense, will value those abilities. You can only evaluate life in the terms that you understand and can identify with so the other sex seems inferior just because they are lacking something that you, necessarily, consider valuable.
As far as the second condition, we all cling to stereotypes to help us function. We have to start somewhere in our relationships with others and in the beginning, all we know is probably what they look like and their gender. Based on past relationships we have built up some expectations, good and bad, for each gender and have to act on that until we discover more information. It's just bad luck for the first competent female programmer you meet if you're a guy who has never met a woman who had the slightest interest in programming or was any good at it. That guy might not think it was worth his time to find out if the female was good at programming or not because the odds favor finding a guy that is good at programming.
The whole concept of forcing people not to be sexist, or racist, or communist, or whatever "ist" they are is just not workable. People will change their overt behavior but not their belief. All it means is that people will be forced to lie to you to avoid punishment.
It sometimes takes a long time but people need to work out for themselves that their belief system is wrong and choose to make a change. Also, if people had the maturity and guts to find the community that works for them rather than trying to fight everyone that doesn't see things their way we would have a lot fewer problems. We already have laws against actions that hurt other people. What we don't need are "thought" laws that punish people for bad thinking that hurt feelings. It's time for more people to have some faith that there is a place, somewhere, that works for them. To summarize: STOP WHINING!!!
I'm afraid YOU are the one that is incorrect. Not because you are technically incorrect but because a corporation can BUY it's way out of any prosecution. If an individual, even a member of a corporation, breaks the law they are potentially open criminal and/or civil prosecution but at the corporate level this only happens in the most egregious violations because money makes these things go away.
This occurs quite often for environment violations. It might feel good to put someone in jail but it doesn't make the violation go away. If the company can pay to fix the problem, or at least greatly ameliorate it, then criminal prosecution never takes place. In this way, people use a corporation to evade personal responsibility since the money didn't come out of their pocket.
Also, in corporations, as in government, there are a multitude of people involved in most activities. Since it's hard to prove what someone ACTUALLY knew at the time of the decision, there can be plausible deniability. You may ended up prosecuting someone dumb enough to do something illegal because their job depended on it but you probably won't reach the person that orchestrated the whole thing.
So don't be naive and think that just because we have laws, that everyone is prosecuted equally under the law
Several people pointed out that you can "lock up" a corporation by dissolution/stopping if from doing business. This is unworkable for two reasons.
Firstly, if a corporation couldn't make a profit anymore then it would "un-incorporate" and possibly a new corporation with a different name and the same people would pop up. I have heard of this happening for smaller limited-liability corporations that specialized in government bid projects and were banned from bidding. They just started over with a new name. The government, local, state or federal, is so bureaucratically constrained that this seems to work most of the time.
Secondly, people are only starting to realize just how little power they have over corporations. I think the latest government bailouts prove that government is here to serve the corporations and they only make a show of punishing them to get reelected. Only the most egregious corporate wrongdoings have caused anyone to even go to jail.
My point was really to show how completely wrong it is to treat corporations as legal entities. The key to civilization working properly is to maintain personal responsibility. When a person's reputation is at stake they are more likely to do the right thing. Being able to hide behind people that have no real stake in the outcome of their decisions, other than being fired, has made our society what it is today.
Corporations are fined when they are caught breaking the law because, so far, that's all the courts can do. Please explain how anyone can "lockup" a corporation and I'll be the first support it. The whole idea of incorporating is to AVOID personal responsibility. If someone could hold the CEO, or anyone in the company, personally responsible for the actions of a corporation then the whole concept of a corporation becomes mostly useless.
The US Navy had dumped waste of all kinds in deep ocean trenches off the coast of California for years. I'm sure they have stopped now but the total to date had to be WAY more than the mafia have dumped.
There are ticking time-bombs of toxic waste that are just waiting for the ocean to eat through the barrels so they can kill massive amounts of wildlife. They are so deep that it would probably be very expensive, if it's even possible, to recover the waste. I wish I could include a link to some authoritative site that will confirm the information but it's not the kind of information that our government wants to publicize. I only found out about it through someone who was in charge of hazardous waste management at a major defense research company.
Taking risks for rewards is acceptable. Taking risks for little, if any, reward is crazy. I don't see how you can compare exploring Earth as equivalent to exploring space. There has been a long history of rewards with the exploration of Earth that are worth the costs. There is no history yet of space exploration giving rewards worth the cost. Since the costs are astronomical to explore space and we already have a good idea of what we'll find from unmanned exploration, I'd say the rewards just aren't there yet.
Now if the situation changes dramatically, like aliens start colonizing our solar system, then the risks may be worth it. This doesn't mean that private individuals or corporations won't finance trips to space but our government certainly won't. The majority of the population have other things they want their government to spend money on that are much more important to them.
From personal experience I can assure you that age will begin to fix the problem of "being too smart". You will eventual start having those "senior moments" where you forget what you're doing or some detail about the task at hand. The young whippersnappers will start to run circles around you and make all that knowledge and experience you have seem irrelevant. You won't be able to push yourself as hard mentally as you once did.
Aren't you glad that there is light at the end of the tunnel?
This is true for the most part so WHY would anyone want to work for them? This is part of the schizophrenic nature of our society. We have good people that form watchdog organizations like environmental and human right abuse groups. They have stopped some of the worst corporate evil and are widely supported. We have people like Ralph Nader that have forced companies to act like better citizens. If it weren't for these groups our country would be as polluted and oppressive as China.
On the other hand, when it comes to finding a job, most people don't really care about the environmental or human rights records of the company they work for. When the company finally moves overseas because they don't have to worry about how much they pollute or exploit people, employees complain about losing their jobs when they shouldn't have worked there in the first place.
More people in the U.S. are recognizing the environmental and human toll that many corporations are taking here and should act accordingly. It's better to have a clear conscience and a future then short term rewards that can't possibly go on forever.
Everyone should see the documentary The Corporation before they decide where they want to work.
The questions you need to ask are along the lines of: "How did your incredible company come up with such an awesome product that will change the universe and make lots of money at the same time?". Even if they say otherwise, managers and HR people love the smell of bullshit. No one ever got fired for being too much of a flatterer.
The next thing you need to do is pledge not let your life or conscience stop you from giving 120% to the company. Then explain how your in-depth experience allows you to make whatever your manager expects become a reality. You are a team player that always keeps the interest of the company foremost in your mind. You would go to sleep at night thinking about how to make (substitute name of company) a worldwide success.
Don't forget to add that you can do all this for half the cost of someone in Bangladesh.
If you follow my advice you too can live a life of well-paid stress and frustration. If you find that your soul can't handle corporate life then numb it with alcohol and/or drugs to avoid having to deal with the bigger issues in life, like why you're here and what is your purpose.
All you need to do is establish a relationship with a vendor that sells to the government and has what you think you want. Tell them up front that you want them to bid on your purchase request, however that works at your facility, and give them their product number. The purchasing department usually isn't very technical and has no way of verifying whether the item meets the specs or not so they take the vendors word for it. If anybody questions it later you can just blame the vendor for shipping the wrong item.
Remember, with the government you can only try your best then cover your ass in case someone tries to screw you.
Nobody has to endure racist and sexist jokes at work. They can quit!
I've walked away from awful work environments for less than that.
Everyone needs to find a place in this world that works for them and
not try to make where they are conform to everything they want.
There are already enough laws on the books. They won't protect
you if you're a selfish, self-centered, "feel entitled to everything you want", jackass!
I bought the cheapest DDR400 RAM I could find at Fry's and it failed the memtest86. I had to manually change the BIOS to DDR333 for it to run reliably and pass the memory test. It has worked fine ever since, which has been almost a year.
If you really feel compelled to get into programming then don't let anyone talk you out of it.
Having said that, there are downsides to aging in the software industry. This may not be a problem for you but based on my experience, young people are more interested in impressing their bosses by getting code out quickly. Managers usually can't tell bad code from good code so they like people that produce code quickly because it means less money, in the short term anyway.
The more mature/older programmer will usually be a bit more careful and spend more time designing the software. This usually leads to quicker delivery of product but makes managers nervous because they really want to see products in QA/testing ASAP. Once the product is in test then the "usually overly optimistic" manager will assume that they are only a few bugs away from release. If the programmer says the code is not done then you're stuck but if the code is in QA then you can just declare the remaining bugs as features and you're ready for product launch. The manager retains more control that way.
This has happened far too often in my experience and is why I prefer open source software to commercial software if I can find it. More often then not, open source programmers don't want to be embarrassed by releasing buggy programs so they take extra pains to design and test their code, where commercial programmers can be severely for chastised for delaying product release so they will release whatever they have as soon as possible. The saying "Haste makes waste" was never more true than in programming. It's easier to create a patch later and release today then it is to do a thorough job in the first place.
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The first years are undoubtedly important for a child. I just don't buy that being away from the parents for part of the day is harmful after a certain young age (lower than seven). In fact, it seems to be a good thing, at least from the studies I've seen here. There's certainly no evidence from harm from the system of widespread free daycare we get here, afaik.
Define harm. On the surface all a human requires is food, shelter and clothing to continue to function, except that is not really the case. We also have other social and spiritual needs that, if they aren't met, will cause us great pain. Because of that pain they will eventually cause others pain. I don't know if you are familiar with the saying: "Hurt people hurt people." but it is definitely true. A child that is suffering because of unmet social or spiritual needs doesn't understand where the pain is coming from so they can't ask for it like they can ask for more food or clothes. It just builds until it can't be stuffed/controlled anymore.
Going to daycare can meet some of the social needs of a child but without you there they may not learn the kinds of things that you want them to learn. I'm not just talking about bad words or situations that are beyond their maturity to handle. I'm talking about what characteristics are favored because it's a group setting. If your child is inherently shy, compliant and can play quietly for long periods of time then they will probably be ignored while the adults spend most of their time trying to keep the unruly, rambunctious kids from causing chaos. Kids can be very mean to each other for various reasons and in a group setting kids may be forced to adapt in unhealthy ways to cope because there are too many interactions for the adult(s) to weigh in on all of them.
What I've discovered is a good warning sign that we are not spending enough time with out kids is that we don't enjoy our time with them. I'm not saying that every minute is pure joy but if, on the whole, we don't WANT to spend more time with our own children then there is something wrong.
More importantly, if we accept your argument that being away from parents estranges the child from them, it should be a strong argument for equality. After all, if you spend all your time with mom and little with dad, as per the gender roles people think are so important, you'd be estranged from your father. This is especially true if he adopts a classical gender role and stays away from touchy feely bonding.
The argument I'm trying to make is at least twofold. One, if your child spends much more interactive time with someone other than you than they will turn out different than you in very fundamental, world-view type ways, which can lead to estrangement. Two, if your child is not getting their social and spiritual needs met then they will be estranged from everyone, including you. It's just a matter of degree. I think my family is fairly healthy but I'm still not happy with the amount of time I get to spend with my kids. I've never heard of anyone regretting how much time they spent with their family.
I should point out that as a Christian I believe that only through surrendering our lives to Jesus can our spiritual needs be met, but I recognize that not everyone believes that. If you have found another way to fill that void in your child then I'm happy for you.
There's also something to be said for daycare and similar social services, and their effect on fertility and how parents combine work and family. But then I'm from one of those countries Fox News thinks is socialist.
I guess that depends on whether you think you can pay someone to love, encourage, and teach your child as well as you can. Personally, I believe the first 7 years of a child are absolutely critical to the development of how they view themselves and the world. Those views will influence everything that they do. If you want your child to reach the conclusion early on that they are just a "cog in the machine" and making money is more important than being with them then you will have achieved your goal.
Just don't be surprised when you retire and find that your children don't really value spending time with you over doing what they want. There won't be any malice or anger. Just an innate understanding of how much we should sacrifice for family.
There is a difference between having one child, for the experience, and three children, to ensure the continued expansion of your people group. The statistics say that women in developed nations are mostly having a child for the experience.
And, I'm not sure what world YOU live in if you think that having children AND a career is part of the ideal world. My ideal world is completely narcissitic, self-centered, and involves lots of nubile young women who never get pregnant. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, my world isn't even close to my ideal. You need to get rid of the Ms. magazines from your house and start fantasizing like a MAN.
I suppose you could be purposely obtuse and come away with that! I think it's fairly clear that if most jobs can be done by men or women and the society treats women as "equivalent" to males then most women will chose to work rather than have children. Since doing a good job raising children is WAY more work then most 20th century jobs, it's understandable. If your mom didn't have at least 2.1 to 2.3 children, assuming a developed country, then she contributed to the decline of your ethnicity. This has a number of consequences including the difficulty in funding retirement programs, like Social Security and Medicare, and replacing workers as the workforce ages.
I agree, except for one thing. By your definition, software engineering isn't really a profession either. There is no professional association that accredits software engineers or kicks them out for writing crappy software. The barrier to entry isn't really that high either. I have yet to see a commercial software application that had any REAL warranty. Software warranties boil down to: "if it works, great. If it doesn't then too bad for you". If there are no consequences then there is no need to have a legally responsible engineer.
I still find it amazing that companies are so heavily dependent on software that nobody really stands behind. I think this explains why IT can be such a miserable job. The company has to have someone to blame!
It seems that Gnostics vary in their belief from individual to individual. The lack of consensus on what Gnosticism is leads me to believe that people are making it up as they go along.
I didn't choose to be a Christian because it made sense to me or seemed like the best choice among other religions. I chose Christianity because I recognized a number of divine interventions in my life that led me to the Christian church. Even though I don't agree 100% with any pastor, I believe that people that have "given their lives to Jesus" share a common bond with myself. I believe that God communicates with me through the Holy Spirit and the bible has given me a baseline that allows me differentiate the Holy Spirit from other voices.
If Gnosticism works for you then that's great. I'm curious because I'm interested in new trends in religion. Despite the fact that most Christian churches push hard the need to "spread the gospel", I'm good with just being responsible for myself and my family. Trying to represent God to others is fraught with peril.
I tried searching for "gnostic" and "gnosticism" and it seems to be Christianity mixed with various mystical ideas. You're going to have to post a link to what YOU define as the "Gnostic approach" if you want me to know what you're talking about. Ideally, it would detail how it differs from basic Pentecostal or Evangelical theology. All I know now is that a Jesuit wouldn't sign-off on it.
The smartest people with bad input will make bad decisions. It's simply a matter of "garbage in, garbage out". The real issue is not how smart people are but where do they get their information about how the world REALLY works. This is mostly about how people REALLY work. This is Slashdot so I know I'll get hammered because of my worldview but I'm feeling feisty today.
I believe the Christian bible tells us how people work with and without God's wisdom in them. The financial crisis is a perfect example of how smart people with a worldview different from God's can make such incredible errors. If you believe that most intelligent people are capable of "enlightened self-interest" then you would probably not see the crisis coming. The bible says that if you are not content with what you have then you will NEVER be content no matter how much money you have. "Unbridled Greed" is redundant. The only greed that exists is the unbridled kind.
America, despite the number of people that profess to be Christians, is considered to be a post-Christian country by many Christian denominations because it has become a title without an underlying belief system that matches scripture to a high degree. Because of this many people have switched to a worldview that ignores the selfish, self-centered nature of man that we are all born into. This means that they fail to understand that the system of laws and regulations in this country that mostly worked in the past, because more people "did the right thing", don't work anymore because people can always find a way around the laws if they don't want to do the right thing.
Be prepared for more smart people doing foolish things as this country heads for "every man for himself". Us Anglo-Saxons like order too much to go completely feral but I do expect things to get worse before they get better because people still think that the government can fix this country. The Republican party let things get bad and the Democratic party will let things get worse so hopefully most people will be disabused of the idea that government cares about people that can't pay for the legislation they want.
Maybe you're not aware that the majority of pharmaceuticals are derived from isolating the active chemicals in plants and animals that are already known to have beneficial effects on humans. These chemicals are concentrated, put in a pill and sold as some "breakthrough" in medicine. The pills are obviously more powerful because of the higher concentration of the active ingredient but also cause more side effects because they don't have the supporting chemicals that were in the plant and often put a heavy load on the liver.
The problem in this country is that many people have put their faith in pills and live and eat in very unhealthy ways believing that the pills will ultimately save them. This is not a smart way to live. The pills are designed to treat a symptom but they generally don't fix the underlying issue which is probably poor nutrition and lack of exercise in the majority of cases. The herbal medications that do work, work more slowly and can't help people that wait until their body is in crisis to seek medical attention.
If you don't believe me maybe you'll believe a pharmacist. If you're going to take a pill then take the RED pill and find out the truth about drugs and our medical system.
I would be surprised if anyone understands much beyond their own narrow area of expertise. The world, especially the economic and political world has become incredibly complex. The US tax code alone is thousands of pages that probably no one fully understands. The total number of laws in the US would be completely unmanageable without Lexus-Nexis and even with that it is incredibly hard to be sure when you're breaking a law or not! We have created a minefield for businesses that really insures that any business that has been around for a while can be prosecuted for something. The patent trolls and environmentalists are just the beginning! According to one article, the US spends about 2% of the GDP on lawyers and I expect it to get worse.
This country is screwed in a number of ways but the regulatory and legal impediments really seem like the stake in the heart. It is slowing reforms in health care, energy and food production at the least. Some laws keep out herbal solutions that could replace some pharmaceutical solutions because hundreds of years of anecdotal evidence isn't good enough. Some laws slow or kill nascent industries because the regulatory threshold is so high that it becomes cost prohibitive to jump through all the hoops. I have seen it happen for biodiesel pump introduction. Food subsidies artificially pick the food winners because it hides the real cost of production. It is why so many foods use corn syrup sweeteners instead of sugar.
I believe that most of the laws were made with good intent but that the cumulative effect has been to crush progress that would have made the common man's life better instead of just making the rich even richer. The laws have become a straight-jacket that keep common sense from prevailing.
Only engineers get excited about Operating Systems. It is an important utility but it is still only a utility. It is there to facilitate the running of the applications that ACTUALLY do what we want. The fact that Microsoft has kept everyone upgrading the operating system for so long when there has been minimal "added value" for most people after Windows 95 is amazing to me. I understand that "nobody gets fired for specifying Microsoft Windows" and that it is the safe choice for an increasingly complicated IT infrastructure. I also understand that the very utilitarian nature of operating systems meant that, inevitably, there was only going to be a limited number of competing ones since the one with the preponderance of popular applications was going to win out. The cost, in terms of money and pain, to change OS's must be greater than I imagine.
According to Merriam-Webster sexism is either "prejudice or discrimination based on sex" or "behavior, conditions, or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex"
As far as the first definition, I haven't found anyone that didn't think people of their sex, male or female, wasn't superior to the other sex. I don't think there is much argument that men and women think differently and can't possibly identify with the opposite sex except in some narrow way. If you have learned to function with the abilities that come with your particular gender then your ego, in the healthy, clinical sense, will value those abilities. You can only evaluate life in the terms that you understand and can identify with so the other sex seems inferior just because they are lacking something that you, necessarily, consider valuable.
As far as the second condition, we all cling to stereotypes to help us function. We have to start somewhere in our relationships with others and in the beginning, all we know is probably what they look like and their gender. Based on past relationships we have built up some expectations, good and bad, for each gender and have to act on that until we discover more information. It's just bad luck for the first competent female programmer you meet if you're a guy who has never met a woman who had the slightest interest in programming or was any good at it. That guy might not think it was worth his time to find out if the female was good at programming or not because the odds favor finding a guy that is good at programming.
The whole concept of forcing people not to be sexist, or racist, or communist, or whatever "ist" they are is just not workable. People will change their overt behavior but not their belief. All it means is that people will be forced to lie to you to avoid punishment.
It sometimes takes a long time but people need to work out for themselves that their belief system is wrong and choose to make a change. Also, if people had the maturity and guts to find the community that works for them rather than trying to fight everyone that doesn't see things their way we would have a lot fewer problems. We already have laws against actions that hurt other people. What we don't need are "thought" laws that punish people for bad thinking that hurt feelings. It's time for more people to have some faith that there is a place, somewhere, that works for them. To summarize: STOP WHINING!!!
I'm afraid YOU are the one that is incorrect. Not because you are technically incorrect but because a corporation can BUY it's way out of any prosecution. If an individual, even a member of a corporation, breaks the law they are potentially open criminal and/or civil prosecution but at the corporate level this only happens in the most egregious violations because money makes these things go away.
This occurs quite often for environment violations. It might feel good to put someone in jail but it doesn't make the violation go away. If the company can pay to fix the problem, or at least greatly ameliorate it, then criminal prosecution never takes place. In this way, people use a corporation to evade personal responsibility since the money didn't come out of their pocket.
Also, in corporations, as in government, there are a multitude of people involved in most activities. Since it's hard to prove what someone ACTUALLY knew at the time of the decision, there can be plausible deniability. You may ended up prosecuting someone dumb enough to do something illegal because their job depended on it but you probably won't reach the person that orchestrated the whole thing.
So don't be naive and think that just because we have laws, that everyone is prosecuted equally under the law
Several people pointed out that you can "lock up" a corporation by dissolution/stopping if from doing business. This is unworkable for two reasons.
Firstly, if a corporation couldn't make a profit anymore then it would "un-incorporate" and possibly a new corporation with a different name and the same people would pop up. I have heard of this happening for smaller limited-liability corporations that specialized in government bid projects and were banned from bidding. They just started over with a new name. The government, local, state or federal, is so bureaucratically constrained that this seems to work most of the time.
Secondly, people are only starting to realize just how little power they have over corporations. I think the latest government bailouts prove that government is here to serve the corporations and they only make a show of punishing them to get reelected. Only the most egregious corporate wrongdoings have caused anyone to even go to jail.
My point was really to show how completely wrong it is to treat corporations as legal entities. The key to civilization working properly is to maintain personal responsibility. When a person's reputation is at stake they are more likely to do the right thing. Being able to hide behind people that have no real stake in the outcome of their decisions, other than being fired, has made our society what it is today.
Corporations are fined when they are caught breaking the law because, so far, that's all the courts can do. Please explain how anyone can "lockup" a corporation and I'll be the first support it. The whole idea of incorporating is to AVOID personal responsibility. If someone could hold the CEO, or anyone in the company, personally responsible for the actions of a corporation then the whole concept of a corporation becomes mostly useless.
I guess someone forgot to tell the CEO's about the corporations not being piggy banks to be raided.
The US Navy had dumped waste of all kinds in deep ocean trenches off the coast of California for years. I'm sure they have stopped now but the total to date had to be WAY more than the mafia have dumped.
There are ticking time-bombs of toxic waste that are just waiting for the ocean to eat through the barrels so they can kill massive amounts of wildlife. They are so deep that it would probably be very expensive, if it's even possible, to recover the waste. I wish I could include a link to some authoritative site that will confirm the information but it's not the kind of information that our government wants to publicize. I only found out about it through someone who was in charge of hazardous waste management at a major defense research company.
It's a nightmare scenario if ever there was one.
Taking risks for rewards is acceptable. Taking risks for little, if any, reward is crazy. I don't see how you can compare exploring Earth as equivalent to exploring space. There has been a long history of rewards with the exploration of Earth that are worth the costs. There is no history yet of space exploration giving rewards worth the cost. Since the costs are astronomical to explore space and we already have a good idea of what we'll find from unmanned exploration, I'd say the rewards just aren't there yet.
Now if the situation changes dramatically, like aliens start colonizing our solar system, then the risks may be worth it. This doesn't mean that private individuals or corporations won't finance trips to space but our government certainly won't. The majority of the population have other things they want their government to spend money on that are much more important to them.
From personal experience I can assure you that age will begin to fix the problem of "being too smart". You will eventual start having those "senior moments" where you forget what you're doing or some detail about the task at hand. The young whippersnappers will start to run circles around you and make all that knowledge and experience you have seem irrelevant. You won't be able to push yourself as hard mentally as you once did.
Aren't you glad that there is light at the end of the tunnel?
This is true for the most part so WHY would anyone want to work for them? This is part of the schizophrenic nature of our society. We have good people that form watchdog organizations like environmental and human right abuse groups. They have stopped some of the worst corporate evil and are widely supported. We have people like Ralph Nader that have forced companies to act like better citizens. If it weren't for these groups our country would be as polluted and oppressive as China.
On the other hand, when it comes to finding a job, most people don't really care about the environmental or human rights records of the company they work for. When the company finally moves overseas because they don't have to worry about how much they pollute or exploit people, employees complain about losing their jobs when they shouldn't have worked there in the first place.
More people in the U.S. are recognizing the environmental and human toll that many corporations are taking here and should act accordingly. It's better to have a clear conscience and a future then short term rewards that can't possibly go on forever.
Everyone should see the documentary The Corporation before they decide where they want to work.
The questions you need to ask are along the lines of: "How did your incredible company come up with such an awesome product that will change the universe and make lots of money at the same time?". Even if they say otherwise, managers and HR people love the smell of bullshit. No one ever got fired for being too much of a flatterer.
The next thing you need to do is pledge not let your life or conscience stop you from giving 120% to the company. Then explain how your in-depth experience allows you to make whatever your manager expects become a reality. You are a team player that always keeps the interest of the company foremost in your mind. You would go to sleep at night thinking about how to make (substitute name of company) a worldwide success.
Don't forget to add that you can do all this for half the cost of someone in Bangladesh.
If you follow my advice you too can live a life of well-paid stress and frustration. If you find that your soul can't handle corporate life then numb it with alcohol and/or drugs to avoid having to deal with the bigger issues in life, like why you're here and what is your purpose.
All you need to do is establish a relationship with a vendor that sells to the government and has what you think you want. Tell them up front that you want them to bid on your purchase request, however that works at your facility, and give them their product number. The purchasing department usually isn't very technical and has no way of verifying whether the item meets the specs or not so they take the vendors word for it. If anybody questions it later you can just blame the vendor for shipping the wrong item.
Remember, with the government you can only try your best then cover your ass in case someone tries to screw you.
Nobody has to endure racist and sexist jokes at work. They can quit! I've walked away from awful work environments for less than that. Everyone needs to find a place in this world that works for them and not try to make where they are conform to everything they want.
There are already enough laws on the books. They won't protect you if you're a selfish, self-centered, "feel entitled to everything you want", jackass!
I bought the cheapest DDR400 RAM I could find at Fry's and it failed the memtest86. I had to manually change the BIOS to DDR333 for it to run reliably and pass the memory test. It has worked fine ever since, which has been almost a year.
If you really feel compelled to get into programming then don't let anyone talk you out of it.
Having said that, there are downsides to aging in the software industry. This may not be a problem for you but based on my experience, young people are more interested in impressing their bosses by getting code out quickly. Managers usually can't tell bad code from good code so they like people that produce code quickly because it means less money, in the short term anyway.
The more mature/older programmer will usually be a bit more careful and spend more time designing the software. This usually leads to quicker delivery of product but makes managers nervous because they really want to see products in QA/testing ASAP. Once the product is in test then the "usually overly optimistic" manager will assume that they are only a few bugs away from release. If the programmer says the code is not done then you're stuck but if the code is in QA then you can just declare the remaining bugs as features and you're ready for product launch. The manager retains more control that way.
This has happened far too often in my experience and is why I prefer open source software to commercial software if I can find it. More often then not, open source programmers don't want to be embarrassed by releasing buggy programs so they take extra pains to design and test their code, where commercial programmers can be severely for chastised for delaying product release so they will release whatever they have as soon as possible. The saying "Haste makes waste" was never more true than in programming. It's easier to create a patch later and release today then it is to do a thorough job in the first place.