Actually, the case is not about the amount. The case is about whether companies negotiating a patent licensing deal should have to negotiate, or whether they can get a jury to set a rate (or deny one) for them (after the court wisely decided not to do so).
Microsoft was the company that *proposed* the 2.5% rate, and then had the temerity to call it exorbitant after Google accepted their offer.
Allow me to modify the bit you quoted, then. I usually try to be more careful, and I apologize:
...If he would at least qualify his criticism of private space industry's probability of establishing a Mars colony...
Why do we decry the ability of the private sector to do stuff in space? I'm not saying "they absolutely will establish a Mars base!", I'm taking issue with anyone saying outright that it can't be done. It's a silly statement, regardless of whether it's made by a well-respected Doctor of Philosophy in Astrophysics, or someone who is somewhat less qualified.
Don't get me wrong, I like the guy, and he's curt and painfully correct on many far more controversial topics. I just think that on this statement, there is room for disagreement.
...but there was only progress because there was a huge push to out-compete the Soviets. It's not as if NASA grew engineers in a lab, they hired them from the public sector. They did create the field (easy to do in a vacuum), but not most of the technology. I'm all for upping NASA's budget (I'd pay an extra grand a year in taxes without complaint), but that's not going to happen. Saying that private industry *can't* do spaceflight is as silly as predicting that they couldn't have done commercial air services. We just need to be supportive of whoever is succeeding as much as we're collectively able to be.
...okay, but that's discounting competition and price pressure. The incentive is to be cheaper than the alternatives, so people will buy your space services, right?
I was hoping that my comment about commercial entities trying to make things *not* cost too much would have been noticed, but I guess not. Also, you seem to be replying to someone else's comment (or you're being deliberately incoherent...not sure which).
Assuming that the guy who started paypal, tesla, and spacex doesn't understand that space is dangerous is just stupid.
Honestly, it's a severely myopic view to say that Tyson (who is brilliant) has some insight to correctly predict that history won't repeat itself. I think the folks at Lockheed, Boeing, McDonnel Douglass, et al have had just a slight impact on advancing things like aerospace beyond what NASA could have done on their own.
How else do we learn more about the dangers of space without being able to go there cheaply enough to gather useful data? Mr. Tyson is probably incorrect. If he would at least qualify his criticism of private space industry with "probably won't", then maybe I'd be able to take it seriously, but he didn't, so I can't.
Not the dangerous and vicious ones, the ones that couldn't interpret human gestures and sounds. The primary difference between wild and domesticated canines is that domesticated canines can understand us to a certain extent.
...How anyone in his right mind can imply that such a device is qualitatively no different than, say, a baseball bat or a straight razor is simply beyond me.
That's a straw-man argument. The statement was that the deciding factor in whether a weapon is dangerous is the intent of the person wielding the weapon. That has nothing to do with the effectiveness of the weapon when used as such.
I tend to be unafraid of the large number of police officers and US soldiers that we allow to carry firearms because I trust their intent. That speaks to the danger posed to me (or you) by the person holding the gun, and not by the gun itself.
Aim for a crowd and you mitigate most of those obvious deficiencies, but (again) that's not the point.
I understand that vehicles are not designed to kill people...that was a large part of my statement, along with an acknowledgment that the motivation of a gun owner or SUV owner is where the danger lies. If that wasn't the case, we wouldn't give guns to our soldiers or law enforcement officers because of the obvious danger of the weapons they possess.
I stand by my earlier statement that your distinction between "designed to kill" and "not designed to kill" is not the most important one.
Ok, that's all well and good (and for that matter, I think people should have to take a safety and competency course before being able to purchase a firearm legally), but we're talking about people intentionally using things to bring about deaths, not just whether there's a potential for danger.
What's the least dangerous man-made item that can be used to kill someone that should *not* be restricted? How do you draw the line? Why focus on the objects and not the general fitness of people operating or wielding a given type of item regardless of any discussion about objects designed as weapons specifically?
...That means you get accidental deaths. And that also means that when we fail at the people end of things the damage is that much more catastrophic.
And this is less true of an SUV than it is of a gun? I don't think your distinction between items you categorize as "causes death only" and ones you categorize as "not built primarily for killing" is the most important one here.
The person you replied to made a valid, logical point about the person operating the killing device being the deciding factor in whether it causes a death. That's just as true for a driver running over her estranged lover repeatedly or plowing through a crowd at a mall in her SUV as it is for a shooter trying to see how many first graders he can kill.
That doesn't mean it's *only* the people at fault, just that they are a bigger factor than their chosen implement of destruction. Claiming "false dichotomy" is convenient and could be viewed as correct for a certain interpretation of the statements you replied to, but misses the point.
To paraphrase a fictional character from a popular movie, "A *person* is reasonable. *People* are dumb, stupid, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it.", the weapon used, whether purpose-built or not, is a distant second to the wielder, in terms of what constitutes a danger.
I think a stand-up comic making this same joke might make people uncomfortable, but wouldn't be jailed for it. That's one of the (many) problems with arresting people for thoughtcrimes...there's no way to be objective about humor.
If "lol...j/k" isn't enough to indicate that a statement shouldn't be taken seriously, then what is? What's on the government-approved list of acceptable metaphors for "batshit crazy"?
"Convicted of what?" sounds like a good way to continue this conversation. Being stupid is generally not a felony, and neither is exercising your first amendment rights by making a statement of some sort.
Depends on whether you think there is a right for adults to enter into a union generally, I suppose.
If we keep the word "marriage" in the mix, then you have the federal government ruling by proxy. If it's only about the legality of a contract, then plenty of things sole their stigma and at the same time become disassociated from the word.
If I can form a corporation with my wife or share ownership of a company with two highschool friends, why can I not enter into another type of contract with them that conveys the same benefits as marriage? Weddings are ceremonial and about love and feelings. That has nothing to do with the government. Unions are contracts and they allow partners that enter into them to do things on each others' behalf.
Why do we get "stuck on stupid" trying to make those two different ideas part of one thing?
The problem has never been with the union that legal marriage codifies, the problem has always been with a disagreement over the definition of the word. The federal government shouldn't have ever been saying that they viewed people as married. They should have been recording and notarizing their unions in order to give both parties the rights that a civil union is meant to convey.
Unfortunately, nobody seemed to want the federal government to start talking about civil unions, so now the federal government has adopted the second of two equally incorrect (incorrect because the federal government should not be allowed to opine on things related to sexual preference between consenting adults) stances on marriage.
In short, previously they fucked things up in one direction, and now they've done the same thing in the other direction. The federal judiciary, legislature, or executive branch saying "hey, marriage is man plus woman" is not more incorrect than them saying "hey, marriage is man plus man or man plus woman or woman plus woman". They should say "government will not define marriage in any way. we will recognize all unions of two persons previously legally defined as marriage as civil unions, which will be afforded the same rights and protections between consenting adults as what was once called marriage".
Actually, it sounds like the government wants to make this a mostly moot point (just saw an article about the FTC saying that advertisements in search results must be clearly identifiable, regardless of how they are delivered).
Doing that would make it pretty easy to remove them or hide them conditionally with a browser plug-in.
Understood. I was under the impression that a question (a leading one, sure) was being asked. I didn't assume from what I read that there was an assumption that all scientists fell into that category, but rather that a question was being asked about whether the situation was percieved by the answerer as systemic or isolated.
If one holds an opinion on a subject, but has limited evidence, shouldn't they ask questions and learn what people more directly involved think and know? How do you formulate the question to get an answer that either bolsters or disagrees with your premise?
My question to you has to do with the difference between a question and a statement. I'm not saying I necessarily disagree with you, I'm saying that what you're calling a statement seems to be a question to me.
...ok. Is this because he's talking about scientists specifically? The same phrase applied to other groups (patent lawyers or politicians, for example) would be just as much of a subjective statement, wouldn't it? How might he have asked the question differently so that you would have been something other than dismissive...or is it the question itself you disliked?
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, the case is not about the amount. The case is about whether companies negotiating a patent licensing deal should have to negotiate, or whether they can get a jury to set a rate (or deny one) for them (after the court wisely decided not to do so).
Microsoft was the company that *proposed* the 2.5% rate, and then had the temerity to call it exorbitant after Google accepted their offer.
Allow me to modify the bit you quoted, then. I usually try to be more careful, and I apologize:
Why do we decry the ability of the private sector to do stuff in space? I'm not saying "they absolutely will establish a Mars base!", I'm taking issue with anyone saying outright that it can't be done. It's a silly statement, regardless of whether it's made by a well-respected Doctor of Philosophy in Astrophysics, or someone who is somewhat less qualified.
Don't get me wrong, I like the guy, and he's curt and painfully correct on many far more controversial topics. I just think that on this statement, there is room for disagreement.
...but there was only progress because there was a huge push to out-compete the Soviets. It's not as if NASA grew engineers in a lab, they hired them from the public sector. They did create the field (easy to do in a vacuum), but not most of the technology. I'm all for upping NASA's budget (I'd pay an extra grand a year in taxes without complaint), but that's not going to happen. Saying that private industry *can't* do spaceflight is as silly as predicting that they couldn't have done commercial air services. We just need to be supportive of whoever is succeeding as much as we're collectively able to be.
...okay, but that's discounting competition and price pressure. The incentive is to be cheaper than the alternatives, so people will buy your space services, right?
I was hoping that my comment about commercial entities trying to make things *not* cost too much would have been noticed, but I guess not. Also, you seem to be replying to someone else's comment (or you're being deliberately incoherent...not sure which).
They didn't work for NASA in the 60's and 70's...why would that be different today?
Assuming that the guy who started paypal, tesla, and spacex doesn't understand that space is dangerous is just stupid.
Honestly, it's a severely myopic view to say that Tyson (who is brilliant) has some insight to correctly predict that history won't repeat itself. I think the folks at Lockheed, Boeing, McDonnel Douglass, et al have had just a slight impact on advancing things like aerospace beyond what NASA could have done on their own.
How else do we learn more about the dangers of space without being able to go there cheaply enough to gather useful data? Mr. Tyson is probably incorrect. If he would at least qualify his criticism of private space industry with "probably won't", then maybe I'd be able to take it seriously, but he didn't, so I can't.
No, they've made zombies.
Plus, it makes identity theft that much more convenient!~
As a place to gather, if you are a groklaw regular: http://www.grokthelaw.freeforums.net
Not the dangerous and vicious ones, the ones that couldn't interpret human gestures and sounds. The primary difference between wild and domesticated canines is that domesticated canines can understand us to a certain extent.
That's a straw-man argument. The statement was that the deciding factor in whether a weapon is dangerous is the intent of the person wielding the weapon. That has nothing to do with the effectiveness of the weapon when used as such.
I tend to be unafraid of the large number of police officers and US soldiers that we allow to carry firearms because I trust their intent. That speaks to the danger posed to me (or you) by the person holding the gun, and not by the gun itself.
Aim for a crowd and you mitigate most of those obvious deficiencies, but (again) that's not the point.
I understand that vehicles are not designed to kill people...that was a large part of my statement, along with an acknowledgment that the motivation of a gun owner or SUV owner is where the danger lies. If that wasn't the case, we wouldn't give guns to our soldiers or law enforcement officers because of the obvious danger of the weapons they possess.
I stand by my earlier statement that your distinction between "designed to kill" and "not designed to kill" is not the most important one.
Ok, that's all well and good (and for that matter, I think people should have to take a safety and competency course before being able to purchase a firearm legally), but we're talking about people intentionally using things to bring about deaths, not just whether there's a potential for danger.
What's the least dangerous man-made item that can be used to kill someone that should *not* be restricted? How do you draw the line? Why focus on the objects and not the general fitness of people operating or wielding a given type of item regardless of any discussion about objects designed as weapons specifically?
Absolutely. We'd all be much safer.
But then we'd have to know where the dangerous midsize sedans are, too...and the dangerous compact and subcompact cars, of course. :)
And this is less true of an SUV than it is of a gun? I don't think your distinction between items you categorize as "causes death only" and ones you categorize as "not built primarily for killing" is the most important one here.
The person you replied to made a valid, logical point about the person operating the killing device being the deciding factor in whether it causes a death. That's just as true for a driver running over her estranged lover repeatedly or plowing through a crowd at a mall in her SUV as it is for a shooter trying to see how many first graders he can kill.
That doesn't mean it's *only* the people at fault, just that they are a bigger factor than their chosen implement of destruction. Claiming "false dichotomy" is convenient and could be viewed as correct for a certain interpretation of the statements you replied to, but misses the point.
To paraphrase a fictional character from a popular movie, "A *person* is reasonable. *People* are dumb, stupid, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it.", the weapon used, whether purpose-built or not, is a distant second to the wielder, in terms of what constitutes a danger.
WTF? I'm sure I didn't intentionally write that. I find myself completely unable to reconstruct what that sentence should have said.
Right, which is why I pondered what he would be convicted of. He didn't *do* anything aside from type a few words out.
I think a stand-up comic making this same joke might make people uncomfortable, but wouldn't be jailed for it. That's one of the (many) problems with arresting people for thoughtcrimes...there's no way to be objective about humor.
If "lol...j/k" isn't enough to indicate that a statement shouldn't be taken seriously, then what is? What's on the government-approved list of acceptable metaphors for "batshit crazy"?
"Convicted of what?" sounds like a good way to continue this conversation. Being stupid is generally not a felony, and neither is exercising your first amendment rights by making a statement of some sort.
Depends on whether you think there is a right for adults to enter into a union generally, I suppose.
If we keep the word "marriage" in the mix, then you have the federal government ruling by proxy. If it's only about the legality of a contract, then plenty of things sole their stigma and at the same time become disassociated from the word.
If I can form a corporation with my wife or share ownership of a company with two highschool friends, why can I not enter into another type of contract with them that conveys the same benefits as marriage? Weddings are ceremonial and about love and feelings. That has nothing to do with the government. Unions are contracts and they allow partners that enter into them to do things on each others' behalf.
Why do we get "stuck on stupid" trying to make those two different ideas part of one thing?
The problem has never been with the union that legal marriage codifies, the problem has always been with a disagreement over the definition of the word. The federal government shouldn't have ever been saying that they viewed people as married. They should have been recording and notarizing their unions in order to give both parties the rights that a civil union is meant to convey.
Unfortunately, nobody seemed to want the federal government to start talking about civil unions, so now the federal government has adopted the second of two equally incorrect (incorrect because the federal government should not be allowed to opine on things related to sexual preference between consenting adults) stances on marriage.
In short, previously they fucked things up in one direction, and now they've done the same thing in the other direction. The federal judiciary, legislature, or executive branch saying "hey, marriage is man plus woman" is not more incorrect than them saying "hey, marriage is man plus man or man plus woman or woman plus woman". They should say "government will not define marriage in any way. we will recognize all unions of two persons previously legally defined as marriage as civil unions, which will be afforded the same rights and protections between consenting adults as what was once called marriage".
Actually, it sounds like the government wants to make this a mostly moot point (just saw an article about the FTC saying that advertisements in search results must be clearly identifiable, regardless of how they are delivered).
Doing that would make it pretty easy to remove them or hide them conditionally with a browser plug-in.
Understood. I was under the impression that a question (a leading one, sure) was being asked. I didn't assume from what I read that there was an assumption that all scientists fell into that category, but rather that a question was being asked about whether the situation was percieved by the answerer as systemic or isolated.
If one holds an opinion on a subject, but has limited evidence, shouldn't they ask questions and learn what people more directly involved think and know? How do you formulate the question to get an answer that either bolsters or disagrees with your premise?
My question to you has to do with the difference between a question and a statement. I'm not saying I necessarily disagree with you, I'm saying that what you're calling a statement seems to be a question to me.
...ok. Is this because he's talking about scientists specifically? The same phrase applied to other groups (patent lawyers or politicians, for example) would be just as much of a subjective statement, wouldn't it? How might he have asked the question differently so that you would have been something other than dismissive...or is it the question itself you disliked?