Better yet, instead of redirecting H1-B fees to inner schools, reduce the number of STEM related H1-Bs. This should allow wages in these fields to increase and with increased wages there will be more people wanting to pursue careers in those fields. You would think a country based on capitalism would understand how supply and demand works.
That said, neither a consumption or service economy is sustainable for the long run.
Please, tell my why you think this. I haven't had enough entertainment for today.
Let me rephrase it. According to the World Bank, neither a consumption based economic system or a service based economic system are sustainable for the long run as they will both create trade deficits, force a devaluing of currency and ultimately lower the standard of living in that country.
They do point out, however, in third world and developing countries, it is preferable to start with a service based economy because of the low capital investment, but at some point in the development a shift needs to occur to a manufacturing based economic system or a balanced economic system.
And machines in general; that they displaced 90% of the jobs that existed 150 years ago.
That is correct, machines displaced the workers, not computers and robots, like previously stated.
With regards to the type of economy, according to the Bureau of Statistics as a percentage of GDP it is consumption, then service, then manufacturing. But none of those categories have a majority, so it is officially a mixed economy. That said, neither a consumption or service economy is sustainable for the long run.
Not mine - Dems and Pubs are both asshats. Any change that reduces the intrusion of government into my daily habits is a good change, regardless of party.
Too bad you probably won't be able to find incandescent bulbs anyhow. Production has been ramped way back, or disassembled on these by the companies that make/made them. With the production lines gone, there is no way they are going to put them back into production. Why would they. It's too big of a gamble to start up again and then be told that they are banned again when the winds change.
I've heard from friends in other countries that there is even talk of bring them back due to so many people not wanting to go through the "hassle" of disposing of them properly. I'm a big fan of being able to choose, but I prefer CFL/LED when I can find ones in a spectrum I like. I've found some that I much prefer to incandescent, then there are many that are awful. I know a few people who have had CFL catch on fire too. I guess you have a few more components that can fail catastrophically compared to a standard bulb.
Menards has been selling 18 packs of incandescent bulbs for $1.99. The shelves are stock full of them because the ban was never on the sell of them, but the manufacturing of them and the manufacturers turned out tons of product. By the time the oversupply is used up, production will have ramped back up.
Since most of these bulbs come from SE Asia, the profit margin is really good -- better than the CFLs and LEDS. Businesses will sell whatever gives them the best yield on the good old supply and demand curve and because of the obscenely low cost to manufacture incadescents, it will win out every time.
You have put the cart before the horse. Government depends on society, people, and business providing products and services. We pay taxes and suffer interference with our lives, freedom, and the pursuit of happiness. The US constitution, widely imitated by other nations, provided for minimal government and led to decades of prosperity and happiness for American colonials. As time passed, the cancer of government grew, and along with it, an increasingly lazy and irresponsible public ignored the peril. Now, we see people so ignorant of human history that they foolishly claim in public forums that government is necessary for anything beyond providing a common defense and preserving domestic order. Thomas Paine would be amazed at the lack of "Common Sense." All of the benefits you describe above, without exception, were provided by the private sector until government moved in and took over. If you want to live like a troglodyte, just keep on parroting government propaganda and buying in to their nihilistically incompetent schemes.
Those with power have always lorded it over those without, regardless of the form of government. As such government is not a cancer, it is exactly what those with power have chosen it to be. The founding fathers valued freedom from the tyranny of the king and that is the government they created. After the depression, those in power wanted to protect against monopolies and corruption and that was the focus of government. In the 60s, those with power, felt the government should solve many of the countries social problems and that is the government they created. Today's people in power are mainly large capitalists and they are shaping the government towards their values.
What al lof that means is that unless you are the ones in power, you will always be on the outside and the government will be seen as infringing on your rights. Government is not the problem. The people running the government (both elected officials and those that support them) are.
Well, Bush signed it into law and now Obama is repealing it. Does that affect your opinion?
Obama can only sign legislation, he doesn't introduce it. That happened in Congress. So, unless you are saying that Obama should veto the budget bill because of the light bulbs, he has no choice but to repeal it.
You seem to contradict yourself. In one post you claim the US is a service based economy, now you claim it is a manufacturing based economy. You need to make up your mind.
Of course, none of this has anything to do with your original claim that computers and robots have displaced 90% of the jobs in the past 150 years. Maybe that is because they haven't been around except for the past 30 years. But maybe you have an answer how all of the jobs lost prior to computers were somehow related to them?
One thing I struggle with is implementing it online. I tend to use it more for paper-work, such as my file cabinet and writing notes onto note cards.
I concur. I started using GTD with a Livescribe pen and Evernote, but while it can be made to work, it's not ideal. Evernote is good at storing things for reference, etc., but it's not the ideal interface for GTD. I also tried Remember the Milk and a few others. Each have their advantages and disadvantages. I have since shifted to an iPad using notability to capture notes and synch them with Evernote or Dropbox. I am also following closely the project Getting Things Gnome. On Linux, it includes a desktop client, and there is a web version. I haven't implemented anything with it because it is still under development.
I would actually pay for a solution that would let me do this the way I want and was cross-platform.
Hah, well to be fair it was me that corrected my mistake. If you have read the book, you'll also know it has nothing to do with memorization. In fact, it is an organization system that allows you to separate thinking from working, and thus facilitates getting things done. I highly recommend it.
Yes, I try and follow GTD myself. It does free one up from having to keep all of the superfluous stuff from occupying my limited memory! Years ago, that task was accomplished using a Daytimer. I would say that it allows me to memorize stuff that really needs to be memorized (which is actually very little) and to easily access most of the stuff that I thought I had to memorize. That said, I still struggle, however, trying to keep it organized through Evernote.
Although there is a lot of information online about GTD, I tell people to read the book to get a more complete understanding. I, too, highly recommend it.
the unemployment rate would be a lot higher than it is today.
We've become a service oriented economy. Do you understand what that means?
Yes, I understand (and I assume you are referring to the US). However, most economist would argue that a service based economy is not sustainable. In addition, most economists would argue that the US is not a service based economy, but instead a consumption based economy, fueled by cheap credit and cheap goods from SE Asia. That, too, is deemed to be not sustainable and even dangerous because it places US manufacturers more in the role of resellers than manufacturers and they lose control of even the most basic resources involved.
I think you have me confused with someone else.....
I do serious software, where my skill with the tools mean I don't have such a productivity hit as others who need java or.net to keep up. I prefer C/C++ but I do turn my hand to quite a few different technologies as appropriate.
Server side programming in C/C++ can be done and many do, but I would question why? Since most server side work is to serve up various web pages, they tend to be constrained by IO not memory or cpu. Not only is there the initial development time, which seems not to be an issue for you, given your sill level, but there is also maintenance work, where the next person might not have your level of expertise in C/C++.
Just like Java can be used for client side programming, although it isn't optimum, it would seem that C/C++ would not be the first choice on server side. As for Anything.Net, I only use it if a client or project requires it. I find that it is good at doing many things, but not great at any of them. The one thing it has going for it is that it is a Microsoft technology, so decision makers who don't necessarily know any better tend to specify it in the requirements. That keeps it alive and kicking. In the 60s and 70s, the old adage was "Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM." Today, the old adage still rings true if you substitute "Microsoft" for "IBM" at least at the enterprise level.
While there are a lot of funny posts to this request, there are some real techniques that help improve one's retention. In no particular order:
1) Get ample sleep and have a regular schedule for sleep 2) Increase the amount of exercise you do (improves blood flow to the brain). 3) Minimize use of alcohol and other recreational drugs 4) Take handwritten notes while in class and while studying (notes must be handwritten, not typed) 5) Drink caffeinated beverages, but not to excess -- too much has a detrimental effect (ADHD meds work even better than caffeine, but require a prescription to be legal) 6) Don't cram for exams, instead study every day at the same time. 7) Leave time to read novels (studies show that reading novels stimulate areas of the brain used for recall in other situations)
One thing that is fairly common in the above is consistency, whether with sleep, study times, etc. Shakespeare said "Consistency, what a rare gem, though art." When it comes to study habits, that is definitely true. Regardless of one's recall ability, the above suggestions, when used consistently, will improve one's capabilities.
I find vigorous sex at bedtime really helps me to fall asleep quickly. Unfortunately, I've been wearing a cast on my hand for the last two weeks and my quality of sleep has really suffered.
Playboy, in the 70s, suggested having your girlfriend give a BJ while your were studying, then the next day, while taking the test, just remember the experience from the night before. They actually had some data to back it up (although I doubt it was statistically valid), and it seemed to only work with someone there was an emotional connection with.
That said, being/., the biggest problem to implement that study technique will be finding a girlfriend.
An outdated hack? That sounds mean... SWT was great at the time when it was needed. It is the reason why Eclipse never felt like a bloated, slow memory hog, in comparison to other Java applications of similar scope, like Netbeans. With SWT you had native, memory efficient UI components, whereas AWT/Swing duplicated everything into inefficient Java heap memory with slow Java2D rendering. It is true that now, with all the performance improvements Java and Swing have received, you barely notice a difference, so SWT isn't as essential as it used to be, but I still think it has the nicer API. Today I would probably use JavaFX
All true, but let's not forget that SWT was never meant to be used for general applications. From the start, it was created to develop the Eclipse IDE. The fact that other people used it for their own purposes doesn't change that.
You can have a native platform UI with Java if you use SWT instead of Swing or JavaFX. There is some benefit to be had from Java applications looking uniform across all operating systems, however.
I would second this (not the SWT part but the uniformity accross operating systems). Look at various apps that run in browsers (regardless of the technology involved). None of them have a native look and feel, but if you are on a PC or Mac or tablet or use IE or Firefox or Chrome, as long as the rendering works, people are happy.
Native look and feel is nice in theory, but the reality is that with the rise of the internet, it is no longer relevant.
Sometimes reliability is more important then having a pretty UI.
Having a non-standard and unreliable user interface tends to make your application less usable (and in some cases unusable). It doesn't matter if you think java is more reliable than something else if it's not meeting its UI requirements. BTW, crashing less because less people can use your application does not mecessarily mean it's more reliable overall. It just means you've successfully prevented your users from finding all of your bugs.
In the enterprise, where JAVA is primarily used, I'm pretty sure you will find that reliability and functionality outweigh UI requirements. The prettiest UI in the world is worthless if the application doesn't do what is needed. Hell, all of those VB apps had crappy interfaces, but people used them all the time. Besides, today, JAVAs primary use is server-side and there isn't any UI requirement.
Yep, they have done so well with it that everyone turns JAVA off in their browsers. Gotta love the lack of security it gives.
Are you confusing javascript with JAVA? None of the browsers I use come with built in JAVA. I have to install it if I want to use it. Javascript, on the otherhand, is a totally different story.
There is no limit on the work that could be done. Even if machines did 100% of the work done by humans 150 years ago, we'd still have plenty to do.
Why don't we have 95% of the population exploring one branch of science or another? Why can't more books be written? More movies be done? More people help those who need help?
Would it be so bad to live in a world where there is 0% NEED to work and everyone just decides whether they want to be a medic, or an astrophysicist, or a script writer, or...
Only amazingly lazy people believe everyone would stop "working" if it was voluntary. Even if the only payment was respect by the society, joy, or simply to fight boredom, most people would do something.
Who is going to train all of those future scientists and from what will they be paid for their services? Who will purchase all of those books and see all of those movies? In a world where nobody works, nobody gets paid. In a world that nobody gets paid, people go hungry. In a world where people go hungry, there is much unrest. In a world where there is much unrest, the strong take from those who cannot defend themselves. We've had such a society. It was called the dark ages. Nobody was required to work and if they did, the king or the overlord took it all.
For anybody thinking this is a great idea, there is nothing stopping you from forming a commune right now. There, nobody will have to work, of course, that is, unless they wants to eat. The problem is, one can always leave a commune, but if the entire society is based on it, the system fails. Your post describes all of these wonderful things, scientists, books, movies, etc., but ignores the necessities of life like food and shelter and the like. In such a society, how will these things be done? For instance, if you break your arm and the doctor sets it, how will you pay him/her, by reciting poetry? How will that put food on their table? History has shown that because of human nature, a utopian society won't work and there is nothing a robot or computer can do to change that.
Why shouldn't machines eventually take the jobs humans currently do, but could be done better by a computer?
They already do 90% of the jobs that were done by humans 150 years ago.
If that were true, the unemployment rate would be a lot higher than it is today. Maybe you are confusing technological shifts (ie no longer needing buggy whips because of the automobile) with work. Even in a modern auto factory most of what the robots do is spot welding. 50 years ago, those cars wouldn't be spot welded, they would be bolted together. So, did computers and robots cause the displacement of the worker or did the shift to unibody construction?
Or take railroads, which were a leading employer at the turn of the previous century, the loss of most jobs came from dieselization, and radio communications instead of computers and robots. That's not to say that computers aren't important in modern railroading, just that they weren't the cause of the major decline in railway employees.
In agriculture, was it computers and robots that have displaced the workers or the advances in farm machinery? In another decade, we may have automated combines, so the farmer won't need to sit in the cab, but even still, that would not be computers and robots replacing the workers from 100 years ago. That replacement was well established long before the modern computer age.
The point to all of this, particularly when looking at a 150 years span, is that most jobs that have been lost, have been to advances in regular technology, not computers and robots. Computerization and robotics are only a small factor. Now, if you want to shrink the timeframe down to something like 30 years, then yes, there have been job losses, but nowhere near 90%.
Why shouldn't machines eventually take the jobs humans currently do, but could be done better by a computer? Wouldn't that leave everyone with the option to use their minds rather than muscles for those things humans are best at, such as true creativity? I personally think robots at McDonald's would be far superior and everyone's life will be so much richer there won't be the need for the concept of minimum-wage and grunt-work jobs. Except for those who really prefer the grunt part.
So, when most jobs are performed by computers and robots and the vast majority of people are sitting around using their minds for "true creativity," how will the people who own the corporations that own the computers and robots get paid from the people enriching their minds who no longer have a source of income? Put differently, how will the public at large, who are now unemployed, pay for the goods and services needed?
There are only two solutions to this problem, either we become a utopian society or a feudal society. The problem with a utopian society is that it has to do away with greed and self-interest to be successful. History shows we already tried the feudal system, where those at the top did very well, but everybody else, the peasants, suffered enormously.
That's going to inconvenience him about as much as spam mail in the spam folder, considering all the e-mail people send is going to be automatically filed away to the social folder.
(snip)
I was somewhat pissed off that Google made accepting those e-mails the default in the google+ settings, but I can see why some people would turn it on. In any case, anyone can turn it off.
That is true, however, unless his social folder is somehow different than the normal one, it won't discriminate against those he might want to see and the junk ones. So either the folder fills up and he ignores everything in it or he just shuts it off. Either way, it is a simple way to show how the decision could be abused. If the only recourse is to turn it off, then why turn it on in the first place?
If you want to know who he is, just look him up on Google+
Better yet, look him up on Google+ and send him an email. After all, he states that this linking of Google+ and Gmail won't cause an increase of unsolicited email.
Slashdot Mirror
Better yet, instead of redirecting H1-B fees to inner schools, reduce the number of STEM related H1-Bs. This should allow wages in these fields to increase and with increased wages there will be more people wanting to pursue careers in those fields. You would think a country based on capitalism would understand how supply and demand works.
That said, neither a consumption or service economy is sustainable for the long run.
Please, tell my why you think this. I haven't had enough entertainment for today.
Let me rephrase it. According to the World Bank, neither a consumption based economic system or a service based economic system are sustainable for the long run as they will both create trade deficits, force a devaluing of currency and ultimately lower the standard of living in that country.
They do point out, however, in third world and developing countries, it is preferable to start with a service based economy because of the low capital investment, but at some point in the development a shift needs to occur to a manufacturing based economic system or a balanced economic system.
And machines in general; that they displaced 90% of the jobs that existed 150 years ago.
That is correct, machines displaced the workers, not computers and robots, like previously stated.
With regards to the type of economy, according to the Bureau of Statistics as a percentage of GDP it is consumption, then service, then manufacturing. But none of those categories have a majority, so it is officially a mixed economy. That said, neither a consumption or service economy is sustainable for the long run.
Not mine - Dems and Pubs are both asshats. Any change that reduces the intrusion of government into my daily habits is a good change, regardless of party.
Too bad you probably won't be able to find incandescent bulbs anyhow. Production has been ramped way back, or disassembled on these by the companies that make/made them. With the production lines gone, there is no way they are going to put them back into production. Why would they. It's too big of a gamble to start up again and then be told that they are banned again when the winds change.
I've heard from friends in other countries that there is even talk of bring them back due to so many people not wanting to go through the "hassle" of disposing of them properly. I'm a big fan of being able to choose, but I prefer CFL/LED when I can find ones in a spectrum I like. I've found some that I much prefer to incandescent, then there are many that are awful. I know a few people who have had CFL catch on fire too. I guess you have a few more components that can fail catastrophically compared to a standard bulb.
Menards has been selling 18 packs of incandescent bulbs for $1.99. The shelves are stock full of them because the ban was never on the sell of them, but the manufacturing of them and the manufacturers turned out tons of product. By the time the oversupply is used up, production will have ramped back up.
Since most of these bulbs come from SE Asia, the profit margin is really good -- better than the CFLs and LEDS. Businesses will sell whatever gives them the best yield on the good old supply and demand curve and because of the obscenely low cost to manufacture incadescents, it will win out every time.
You have put the cart before the horse. Government depends on society, people, and business providing products and services. We pay taxes and suffer interference with our lives, freedom, and the pursuit of happiness. The US constitution, widely imitated by other nations, provided for minimal government and led to decades of prosperity and happiness for American colonials. As time passed, the cancer of government grew, and along with it, an increasingly lazy and irresponsible public ignored the peril. Now, we see people so ignorant of human history that they foolishly claim in public forums that government is necessary for anything beyond providing a common defense and preserving domestic order. Thomas Paine would be amazed at the lack of "Common Sense." All of the benefits you describe above, without exception, were provided by the private sector until government moved in and took over. If you want to live like a troglodyte, just keep on parroting government propaganda and buying in to their nihilistically incompetent schemes.
Those with power have always lorded it over those without, regardless of the form of government. As such government is not a cancer, it is exactly what those with power have chosen it to be. The founding fathers valued freedom from the tyranny of the king and that is the government they created. After the depression, those in power wanted to protect against monopolies and corruption and that was the focus of government. In the 60s, those with power, felt the government should solve many of the countries social problems and that is the government they created. Today's people in power are mainly large capitalists and they are shaping the government towards their values.
What al lof that means is that unless you are the ones in power, you will always be on the outside and the government will be seen as infringing on your rights. Government is not the problem. The people running the government (both elected officials and those that support them) are.
Well, Bush signed it into law and now Obama is repealing it. Does that affect your opinion?
Obama can only sign legislation, he doesn't introduce it. That happened in Congress. So, unless you are saying that Obama should veto the budget bill because of the light bulbs, he has no choice but to repeal it.
You seem to contradict yourself. In one post you claim the US is a service based economy, now you claim it is a manufacturing based economy. You need to make up your mind.
Of course, none of this has anything to do with your original claim that computers and robots have displaced 90% of the jobs in the past 150 years. Maybe that is because they haven't been around except for the past 30 years. But maybe you have an answer how all of the jobs lost prior to computers were somehow related to them?
One thing I struggle with is implementing it online. I tend to use it more for paper-work, such as my file cabinet and writing notes onto note cards.
I concur. I started using GTD with a Livescribe pen and Evernote, but while it can be made to work, it's not ideal. Evernote is good at storing things for reference, etc., but it's not the ideal interface for GTD. I also tried Remember the Milk and a few others. Each have their advantages and disadvantages. I have since shifted to an iPad using notability to capture notes and synch them with Evernote or Dropbox. I am also following closely the project Getting Things Gnome. On Linux, it includes a desktop client, and there is a web version. I haven't implemented anything with it because it is still under development.
I would actually pay for a solution that would let me do this the way I want and was cross-platform.
Hah, well to be fair it was me that corrected my mistake. If you have read the book, you'll also know it has nothing to do with memorization. In fact, it is an organization system that allows you to separate thinking from working, and thus facilitates getting things done. I highly recommend it.
Yes, I try and follow GTD myself. It does free one up from having to keep all of the superfluous stuff from occupying my limited memory! Years ago, that task was accomplished using a Daytimer. I would say that it allows me to memorize stuff that really needs to be memorized (which is actually very little) and to easily access most of the stuff that I thought I had to memorize. That said, I still struggle, however, trying to keep it organized through Evernote.
Although there is a lot of information online about GTD, I tell people to read the book to get a more complete understanding. I, too, highly recommend it.
If that were true,
It's true.
the unemployment rate would be a lot higher than it is today.
We've become a service oriented economy. Do you understand what that means?
Yes, I understand (and I assume you are referring to the US). However, most economist would argue that a service based economy is not sustainable. In addition, most economists would argue that the US is not a service based economy, but instead a consumption based economy, fueled by cheap credit and cheap goods from SE Asia. That, too, is deemed to be not sustainable and even dangerous because it places US manufacturers more in the role of resellers than manufacturers and they lose control of even the most basic resources involved.
So all of that said, your point was what?
wha? .net? me?
I think you have me confused with someone else.....
I do serious software, where my skill with the tools mean I don't have such a productivity hit as others who need java or .net to keep up. I prefer C/C++ but I do turn my hand to quite a few different technologies as appropriate.
Server side programming in C/C++ can be done and many do, but I would question why? Since most server side work is to serve up various web pages, they tend to be constrained by IO not memory or cpu. Not only is there the initial development time, which seems not to be an issue for you, given your sill level, but there is also maintenance work, where the next person might not have your level of expertise in C/C++.
Just like Java can be used for client side programming, although it isn't optimum, it would seem that C/C++ would not be the first choice on server side. As for Anything.Net, I only use it if a client or project requires it. I find that it is good at doing many things, but not great at any of them. The one thing it has going for it is that it is a Microsoft technology, so decision makers who don't necessarily know any better tend to specify it in the requirements. That keeps it alive and kicking. In the 60s and 70s, the old adage was "Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM." Today, the old adage still rings true if you substitute "Microsoft" for "IBM" at least at the enterprise level.
*David Allen
If the original poster had better recall abilities, he would have caught that!
While there are a lot of funny posts to this request, there are some real techniques that help improve one's retention. In no particular order:
1) Get ample sleep and have a regular schedule for sleep
2) Increase the amount of exercise you do (improves blood flow to the brain).
3) Minimize use of alcohol and other recreational drugs
4) Take handwritten notes while in class and while studying (notes must be handwritten, not typed)
5) Drink caffeinated beverages, but not to excess -- too much has a detrimental effect (ADHD meds work even better than caffeine, but require a prescription to be legal)
6) Don't cram for exams, instead study every day at the same time.
7) Leave time to read novels (studies show that reading novels stimulate areas of the brain used for recall in other situations)
One thing that is fairly common in the above is consistency, whether with sleep, study times, etc. Shakespeare said "Consistency, what a rare gem, though art." When it comes to study habits, that is definitely true. Regardless of one's recall ability, the above suggestions, when used consistently, will improve one's capabilities.
I find vigorous sex at bedtime really helps me to fall asleep quickly. Unfortunately, I've been wearing a cast on my hand for the last two weeks and my quality of sleep has really suffered.
Playboy, in the 70s, suggested having your girlfriend give a BJ while your were studying, then the next day, while taking the test, just remember the experience from the night before. They actually had some data to back it up (although I doubt it was statistically valid), and it seemed to only work with someone there was an emotional connection with.
That said, being /., the biggest problem to implement that study technique will be finding a girlfriend.
An outdated hack? That sounds mean... SWT was great at the time when it was needed. It is the reason why Eclipse never felt like a bloated, slow memory hog, in comparison to other Java applications of similar scope, like Netbeans. With SWT you had native, memory efficient UI components, whereas AWT/Swing duplicated everything into inefficient Java heap memory with slow Java2D rendering. It is true that now, with all the performance improvements Java and Swing have received, you barely notice a difference, so SWT isn't as essential as it used to be, but I still think it has the nicer API. Today I would probably use JavaFX
All true, but let's not forget that SWT was never meant to be used for general applications. From the start, it was created to develop the Eclipse IDE. The fact that other people used it for their own purposes doesn't change that.
You can have a native platform UI with Java if you use SWT instead of Swing or JavaFX. There is some benefit to be had from Java applications looking uniform across all operating systems, however.
I would second this (not the SWT part but the uniformity accross operating systems). Look at various apps that run in browsers (regardless of the technology involved). None of them have a native look and feel, but if you are on a PC or Mac or tablet or use IE or Firefox or Chrome, as long as the rendering works, people are happy.
Native look and feel is nice in theory, but the reality is that with the rise of the internet, it is no longer relevant.
Sometimes reliability is more important then having a pretty UI.
Having a non-standard and unreliable user interface tends to make your application less usable (and in some cases unusable). It doesn't matter if you think java is more reliable than something else if it's not meeting its UI requirements. BTW, crashing less because less people can use your application does not mecessarily mean it's more reliable overall. It just means you've successfully prevented your users from finding all of your bugs.
In the enterprise, where JAVA is primarily used, I'm pretty sure you will find that reliability and functionality outweigh UI requirements. The prettiest UI in the world is worthless if the application doesn't do what is needed. Hell, all of those VB apps had crappy interfaces, but people used them all the time. Besides, today, JAVAs primary use is server-side and there isn't any UI requirement.
Java tainted perception of Java on the server - all those Enterprise program's we're forced to use, they tole us all how good Java is.
The only thing Java has going for it is the salesmen for the shitty consultancies who sell such crap to the management.
So your solution on the server side is what, .Net? How is that significantly any better than Java on the server?
Yep, they have done so well with it that everyone turns JAVA off in their browsers. Gotta love the lack of security it gives.
Are you confusing javascript with JAVA? None of the browsers I use come with built in JAVA. I have to install it if I want to use it. Javascript, on the otherhand, is a totally different story.
There is no limit on the work that could be done. Even if machines did 100% of the work done by humans 150 years ago, we'd still have plenty to do.
Why don't we have 95% of the population exploring one branch of science or another? Why can't more books be written? More movies be done? More people help those who need help?
Would it be so bad to live in a world where there is 0% NEED to work and everyone just decides whether they want to be a medic, or an astrophysicist, or a script writer, or...
Only amazingly lazy people believe everyone would stop "working" if it was voluntary. Even if the only payment was respect by the society, joy, or simply to fight boredom, most people would do something.
Who is going to train all of those future scientists and from what will they be paid for their services? Who will purchase all of those books and see all of those movies? In a world where nobody works, nobody gets paid. In a world that nobody gets paid, people go hungry. In a world where people go hungry, there is much unrest. In a world where there is much unrest, the strong take from those who cannot defend themselves. We've had such a society. It was called the dark ages. Nobody was required to work and if they did, the king or the overlord took it all.
For anybody thinking this is a great idea, there is nothing stopping you from forming a commune right now. There, nobody will have to work, of course, that is, unless they wants to eat. The problem is, one can always leave a commune, but if the entire society is based on it, the system fails. Your post describes all of these wonderful things, scientists, books, movies, etc., but ignores the necessities of life like food and shelter and the like. In such a society, how will these things be done? For instance, if you break your arm and the doctor sets it, how will you pay him/her, by reciting poetry? How will that put food on their table? History has shown that because of human nature, a utopian society won't work and there is nothing a robot or computer can do to change that.
Why shouldn't machines eventually take the jobs humans currently do, but could be done better by a computer?
They already do 90% of the jobs that were done by humans 150 years ago.
If that were true, the unemployment rate would be a lot higher than it is today. Maybe you are confusing technological shifts (ie no longer needing buggy whips because of the automobile) with work. Even in a modern auto factory most of what the robots do is spot welding. 50 years ago, those cars wouldn't be spot welded, they would be bolted together. So, did computers and robots cause the displacement of the worker or did the shift to unibody construction?
Or take railroads, which were a leading employer at the turn of the previous century, the loss of most jobs came from dieselization, and radio communications instead of computers and robots. That's not to say that computers aren't important in modern railroading, just that they weren't the cause of the major decline in railway employees.
In agriculture, was it computers and robots that have displaced the workers or the advances in farm machinery? In another decade, we may have automated combines, so the farmer won't need to sit in the cab, but even still, that would not be computers and robots replacing the workers from 100 years ago. That replacement was well established long before the modern computer age.
The point to all of this, particularly when looking at a 150 years span, is that most jobs that have been lost, have been to advances in regular technology, not computers and robots. Computerization and robotics are only a small factor. Now, if you want to shrink the timeframe down to something like 30 years, then yes, there have been job losses, but nowhere near 90%.
Why shouldn't machines eventually take the jobs humans currently do, but could be done better by a computer? Wouldn't that leave everyone with the option to use their minds rather than muscles for those things humans are best at, such as true creativity? I personally think robots at McDonald's would be far superior and everyone's life will be so much richer there won't be the need for the concept of minimum-wage and grunt-work jobs. Except for those who really prefer the grunt part.
So, when most jobs are performed by computers and robots and the vast majority of people are sitting around using their minds for "true creativity," how will the people who own the corporations that own the computers and robots get paid from the people enriching their minds who no longer have a source of income? Put differently, how will the public at large, who are now unemployed, pay for the goods and services needed?
There are only two solutions to this problem, either we become a utopian society or a feudal society. The problem with a utopian society is that it has to do away with greed and self-interest to be successful. History shows we already tried the feudal system, where those at the top did very well, but everybody else, the peasants, suffered enormously.
That's going to inconvenience him about as much as spam mail in the spam folder, considering all the e-mail people send is going to be automatically filed away to the social folder.
(snip)
I was somewhat pissed off that Google made accepting those e-mails the default in the google+ settings, but I can see why some people would turn it on. In any case, anyone can turn it off.
That is true, however, unless his social folder is somehow different than the normal one, it won't discriminate against those he might want to see and the junk ones. So either the folder fills up and he ignores everything in it or he just shuts it off. Either way, it is a simple way to show how the decision could be abused. If the only recourse is to turn it off, then why turn it on in the first place?
I agree with your views. Google has jumped the damned shark.
Or, maybe, Google is the shark, a lean, mean, killing machine, devouring everything in it's way.
If you want to know who he is, just look him up on Google+
Better yet, look him up on Google+ and send him an email. After all, he states that this linking of Google+ and Gmail won't cause an increase of unsolicited email.