I have seen Elephants personally, so I have very high confidence that Elephants exist. On the other hand, if someone tells me there are about 12,000 African elephants worldwide, I don't know offhand how reliable such a figure is. It's not just the really unlikely cases, i.e. that elephants have gone extinct since the last time I actually verified one's existence and there's a massive conspiracy to hide that fact, that affect that reliability, but the other, much more probable cases, such as people doing elephant surveys maybe missing some, or someone accidentally adding or dropping a zero while writing a newspaper article, or someone misremembering old information. (Hint, I just pulled that figure from my posterior, deliberately without looking it up, to make an example).
I'd be a fool to think the two facts were equally reliable. If I carefully specify that at least 3 elephants existed the last time I went to the local zoo, I can approach 100% confidence, but as soon as I get outside that carefully selected area, it is actually the more reasonable thing to do to assume that there is some significant uncertainty. For some propositions, the amount of uncertainty that is likely is very great indeed.
Now consider this proposition: "The scientific method is the most reliable means of determining the truth that can possibly exist". Can that be proved? Either there is a proof within science of that claim, which means the proof is only as reliable as science itself is, and science still could have any level of reliability including a very poor one, or there's a proof outside of science, which means there is some superior method to proving things and so the claim is actually false by counterexample.
If I put in in terms of reliability, I would have to, reasonably, claim that it seems more reliable to say that the scientific method is the most reliable method yet developed than to claim nothing better can possibly be discovered. I'd think it very unreliable indeed to declare that there are not even any minor improvements to the scientific method even remotely possible. So yes, in that sense, science requires faith. I have faith that I should continue using the scientific method on many problems, I have both a logical opinion that, where science does not yield ready answers, I should try various forms of logical or philosophical reasoning and a rule of thumb that is derived only from my own experience that says much the same thing. I may even hold the same opinion as a matter of cultural condition as well. Note that I did not say I have a scientific opinion that I should use logic where science doesn't yield immediate results, as that too makes no sense. How can science tell me what to do when science isn't producing results (at least yet)?
Putting it into a single simple phrase means losing a lot, but it's pretty fair to say Godel's second great proof shows that Formal Systems (like mathematics) have statements that are true, but can't be proven within the system. The more powerful a system is, the more (in general) it has such truths, and doing something that extends such a system's power actually makes the situation worse, not better.
If you want to condense that to a single, clipped phrase: "Truth extends beyond provability."
By the way, Godel's third great proof shows that God exists - sorry to bother all the Atheist slashdotters with that bit of trivia.
For those of you who don't know who Godel was, Einstein kept him around at Princeton to check Einstein's calculations and help with the hard parts, and the greatest work on Math of the 19th century, the Principia Mathematica, was overturned entirely by that pesky second proof.
And it was the quantum mechanicians who 'disproved reality'. Google "Copenhagen Interpretation", "Many Worlds Theory" "Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrödinger", or "Werner Heisenberg" for details.
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I'd support setting the whole long term holding period as high as 5 years, with a sliding scale between the full long term rate for the first year and a bit better each quarter after that the investor stays invested in the same thing. Add in requirements that the company have some particular percentage of US employees and bank in the US, or the scale goes back towards the short term rate by various proportions. Even setting the employee percentage at a simple 50% would probably be enough to induce investors to avoid stocks where the issuer was moving to more and more outsourcing. (that's by costs, not by headcount, allowing any US based company to still put up to half its employee compensation into places where they think they can get cheap help, yet be able to rely on the US legal system and defense). We would end up with Kramer or somebody similar listing those risky stocks that were approaching 55%, 53% and so on, to where most of them would keep a bit of additional margin.
I'm a former military officer - armored cav for much of my career, with stints in intelligence and signal slots and wartime service. I was once asked by an interviewer who was already aware of this from my resume "Have you ever had any life or death decision-making responsibilities?" A little discussion revealed he did not think literal life or death responsibility for the 30+ people in the unit under my command, in wartime, in actual combat, counted. He meant decisions or responsibilities that could have cost significant money, and nothing else. I could easily have answered that one to his satisfaction - signing for training equipment alone when I was the leader of an advance detachment meant there had been times when I was the person responsible for easily more than 100 times the value of his whole company (M1 tanks and Apache helicopters and such add up fast). Instead I walked out of that interview.
I mention this because that person is precisely the person that company will doubtless delegate to go through some potential employee's facebook pages.
The right to vote and the right to free speech are tightly enmeshed.
One of the smartest things said here. A person is exercising their own right of free speech when they actively seek to hear the speech of another, for example by looking for a candidate's web page and reading the candidate's platform. Not only is it a violation of the candidate's right for the government to block his or her speech, it's a violation of that same right in the listener, who may become the active speaker at just about any time. The right to vote itself includes the right to find out what the candidate you are voting for claims to stand for, and the right to criticise or announce your support of that candidate (or referendum or whatever). Thousands of closely related actions to the actual voting itself, such as posting signs or writing letters, are all free speech, and even donating money has a free speech component according to the court. Saying that a corporation cannot actually cast a vote, but it still enjoys all the related rights in the political arena, is claiming that the right to vote itself is merely the right to flip a lever or touch a screen, and has nothing to do with the process of making up your mind whom or what to vote for. Ultimately, it's an argument that just so long as the system still lets people physically access the voting machines, then efforts to keep them from learning about what they are voting on are not violations of their rights.
Prison time requires doing something criminal (in theory at least). Criminal Negligence is called that for a reason, because it can get a person prison time. Simple negligence cannot. Maybe it's not obvious given how far the law has moved from its roots in common law and the various state and federal constitutions, but a person who doesn't even realize they own a portion of corp X while corp X is acting on their behalf, is displaying negligent behavior, which normally can give them liability (and damned well should). There's just about no way that could equal criminal negligence - how could you direct someone to cut legal corners, take unwarranted risks, or actually violate laws, if you really didn't even know they were representing you?
"Hi, I'm not a shareholder in corp X, but I'm directing you, its CEO, to violate that OSHA rule, so as to maximise the profits I don't get from you people."
See, the law is full of definitions of such things as "malicious intent", "having a guilty mind", and such. If you're really unclear where "the line" should be drawn, right there it is, with 99%+ of your theoretical cases already worked out.
Do we divide jail time in other cases where there are multiple felons involved? No? We don't say there's only one life sentence allowed for one murder and split that between four guys who conspired together to commit that murder, do we? So why are you speculating about such an absurdity here, as a consequence of owners sharing legal risks? We don't let the guy who just drove the getaway car off, either. Normally, we sentence people for their share of involvement. Who took what steps, who gave what orders? What did your hypothetical fund manager say or do to make him either simply or criminally responsible?
I'm pretty sure you're joking, but, isn't that a possibility? As the summary puts it, the laws certainly don't help. Well, what do people tend to do when the law isn't fixing a perceived problem? Attempts at tougher laws and vigilante justice are overwhelmingly the most common 'solutions' humans adopt.
This is one of my concerns regarding all sorts of unpopular or personally harmful activities. There's always some contingent that either wants to pass more and more laws and give more power to the government, or to just take the law into their own hands when the first solution doesn't work*. Take tobacco use. Once the users become a small enough minority, making it completely illegal is likely to follow, (and in the US increased power and budget to the DEA, which will get the task of enforcement). Alternatively, people will start inciting mob activity, probably with highly exaggerated claims about the risks of second hand smoke.
*with 'work' meaning 100% effectiveness at no social or economic cost, with nobody dissenting.
But in a case such as this, those re-releases would still have to be accompanied by publicity, which would encourage people to go out and get a copy. As it becomes more widely argued that the originals are superior, it also becomes more common people will get a copy of the original version instead of the new one that is generating the publicity. If the work has entered the public domain, that original version can be released by anyone, cheaply, while they benefit from the publicity surrounding the new release. With digital/internet distribution possible, cheaply becomes free (and legal in such cases), making the problem worse.
There's certainly some cases where re-release wouldn't much be affected by the time until the original expires or would even be driven by it. For example, releasing a version with less explicit violence or nudity or strong language to make a version that's more 'family friendly'. But Lucas has made 'family friendly' changes incrementally, and it's doubtful that there have been that many parents either pressing for them or choosing to buy based on them. Short copyright wouldn't encourage more re-releases in a case like the Star Wars films - it might encourage fewer overall releases, but with more comprehensive changes aimed at creating a more consistant goal.
Not only that, but the OP is posting about a composer who had a very wide range, from Serialist compositions ala Schoenberg, to inventing about a third of the techniques that now distinguish film music, to incorporating various jazz and folk music elements in some of his best known works. The joke exists in an older version about Shostakovich, with more justification, and has been updated here.
This is the comment where I inform you that if I hadn't used all my mod points just a few minutes ago, your post would have gotten one, but don't specify whether that's good or bad for you.
If you look at the real linguistic roots of the word anarchy, it means, not "no law", but "no rulers" - In essence, phrases such as "government by laws and not men" describe a form of anarchy. Having one group that is much less than the whole of the populace frame the laws, and be relatively immune from their penalties, is one, mostly inferior, option among some quite more acceptable alternatives.
Supposedly, the Incans had a legal system where the penalties for acts grew if the person found guilty was more highly placed in society. A farmer charged with public drunkenness paid a small fine, a craftsman a larger one, a merchant might face lashing, and a politician execution. (I say 'supposedly' because there is some real dispute in archaeological circles over just what the Inca society was like, whether there are traces of it we can infer from the later Mayans, and such - maybe it was but a brief moment before the Incans lost such a system to rising corruption, or there were still some privileged people who were immune, or maybe they really made it work for many generations).
Could any modern society develop a system like that? It seems hard enough to move things towards more equal treatments - just look at how difficult it has been in the US to get the idea even considered seriously that Congress members 'public service' should entitle them to a retirement program and medical assistance no better than what Social Security and Medicare provide to the general public. Making the penalties harsher for screwing up the higher you go is very far from the way things are usually done.
There was a fellow on Usenet who posted using the nym "Mirror Spock". He took several recordings of Simon and Garfunkel's 'Sounds of Silence', including both separate tape tracks and premixed versions, and remixed from them all somehow or other. it seems that one version, Art Garfunkel was recovering from a cold and they shifted the harmony down a fifth or something like that so he could hit the notes, but like the basic release it had all of Bob Dylan's band including Glen Campbell as the studio musicians. Another version had what several industry pros thought was really the best Art Garfunkel performance, but was never released because there were some problems with the backup performers. Some other sources included bootleg live performance tapes or something like that. Word was that the original performers heard this and loved it even though the studio was annoyed about it all, although I can't prove that part's true. I'd assume this person knew pro recording techniques to get a decent mix from everything, but it sort of proves there are (rare) people who can take 'one speech from a novel' or 'one color from a painting', and put something back in its place, and actually improve it.
Suppose someone claimed that they were the performer on a recording of John Cage's 4'33", and not the person credited for it. How on Earth could you prove it one way or another?
At the very least, since a child can't give informed consent or be legally responsible for contracts, any sale of porn involving real children is just like a case of commercial non-porn where the photographer failed to get a model release. Basically, it's frequently illegal to distribute content at all where the model's release doesn't exist (There are, of course, some exceptions, such as photos of a public figure, but unless the child in question is Brooke Shields or some such, those wouldn't apply). As to these being actionably criminal acts, it's possible to prosecute a distributor for not destroying illegal content when the court orders, whether that distribute continues to sell it or simply warehouses it. Even if you made simple possession legal in general, all it would take is a court order that the material was illegally produced for lack of model's release reasons, and anyone can be enjoined from distributing or continuing to possess it, and ignoring that order would still escalate the matter to criminal levels.The only way to get around that would be to change the law so that possession of this child porn was somehow more legal than the general case for possession.
Secondly, let me put the ball back in your court. How do you enforce the laws against both creation and distribution of content whether because it's 'obscene', or just because it's done without model releases, unless you can also have a law against possession? This is one of the general arguments for all sorts of laws against possession - how do you get the possessor to divulge who illegally produced or illegally distributed X (child porn, cocaine, or just a bootleg CD), if you can't prosecute the possession itself?
SIPRNet is for traffic up to classification Secret. The Military also has NIPRNET (Non-Classified Internet Protocol Router Network) for less sensitive information, and presumably something nebulously above and beyond SIPRNet for any transmission of TS data. This is actually a very good model of how to do things (IMHO), but expensive. Cost wise, that theoretical model might entail a hospital using multiple isolated networks, with one for HIPAA traffic, perhaps another for ordering controlled pharmaceuticals and radioisotopes, and another, more deeply isolated one for WILDFIRE reports and such, and essentially all traffic to/from the CDC in Atlanta and such agencies. Practically, the projected expense would probably drive the hospital to stick with sending all HIIPAA traffic by VPN over the regular Internet (if they are at least consistently up to that standard already).
I'm sure what you describe is real, but in my area, we have Krogers competing with Food City, Walmart and others. Krogers is union, pays about 2 bucks an hour better than Walmart, and several workers there have told me they get close to full time hours so they can qualify for for health insurance. Krogers also has an automated checkout station set while in this locale Walmart doesn't. Food City has automated stations, plus a really awkward layout for the non-automated ones, a pharmacy that is closed completely three days a week and has odd, short hours the rest of the time, and lots of things they do worse than Walmart to balance anything automation is gaining them. Quality? Maybe... There's some better brands at the Krogers I don't see at Walmart, but prices for them are close to the same things at Fresh Market, usually a bit better. Fresh market is high, has noticible quality gains and losts of exotic brands, herloom foods, imports and such, and doesn't have automated lanes. Incidentally, the Food City has very similar prices and quality to Walmart, within say 3%. So, like you, I don't see any strong correlation between automation and prices or value, but unlike you, I do see one of the local companies that is fielding automation seemingly passing some benefits to either the customers or their workers.
I don't think your metrics are entirely practicable. A lot of basic products tend to be priced very close to commodity levels whatever else the store does, so what you notice with regard to price may vary more because of what foods you choose than it does by the store's profit model. It could be that all sorts of stores in a given area charge about the same for cornflakes or basic chicken noodle soup, but one chain marks up the fruit bits and granola cereals, or the hearty soups much more than the other. Same with 'worker's rights' - maybe someone pays better, but is anyone really likely to both pay better and hire more people? I wouldn't expect something like adding some automated service lanes to cause such big differences that all the price margins would change or all the employee issues would improve.
So why do the **AAs seem to want this? They don't have SWAT teams, highly trained well armed investigators, or special laws protecting their 'agents' in the line of duty, after all. Why help the government in a law enforcement role, if that makes you look like just another police agency, but you don't have the power to deal with criminals who take it off the internet and get physical? There are people out there talking second amendment remedies, secession, and extreme violence daily - look like just another piece of the government's police apparatus instead of a private organization, and some of the nuttier ones are likely to make your boardrooms the next Oklahoma Federal Building. Against such, the **AAs have what, exactly, in the way of physical defenses? I don't think anybody at the MPAA has gone to Universal or Time/Warner or whomever and said next year's budget needs to include an advanced pistol training range for our accountants, replacing all the windows in building X with 3 inch plexiglass, or equipping a rapid response company with a few armored personnel carriers in case someone makes this mess physical, so presumably, they think the other police agencies they are joining will protect them. That really sounds mind numbingly stupid - wanting to play cop but be the only group not assuming any responsibility for their own physical defense.
There's some differences between individual contract or trust and a statutory requirement for everyone, but there's also a lot of overlap:
1. Violations put people in court either way. If someone violates a contract with you, you will usually have to turn to the courts to resolve your differences just as often as if they violate a statute. The court will more frequently be on solid ground in settling a case based on someone violating a statutory requirement. If the first few cases have been resolved decently and set proper precedents, a lot of subsequent enforcement becomes routine (and if there are bad precedents, you have a problem whether it is standard law or a one shot contract you are litigating). For a custom contract, it's pretty easy to be drawn into litigation and find out only after spending a lot on legal fees that you don't have nearly the strong case you initially thought you had. There's also a deterrent effect for statutory requirements that builds as the related body of case law multiplies, so that people trying to skirt the edge of compliance learn that they simply can't win in court by any of their methods, and that deterrence is much less when it comes to custom contracts because the borderline cases are all unique and somebody usually convinces themselves that the precedents won't apply to their 'novel' dispute.
2. So much data is interrelated. You can have a very good custom contract with Party X, but if Persons A, B, and C, have all had problems with Party X, and they didn't sign very good contracts first, it's pretty easy for Party X to get the courts to forbid disclosure as part of the settlement, even if A, B, or C sometimes, somehow, wins. A statutory requirement can compel Party X to disclose other legal info to you (for example reporting the existence of outstanding cases in a stock prospectus), so if you have a more standard contract, or some dealing outside of normal contract law (such as that example stock purchase), you are still protected, or if you haven't signed a contract at all yet, your time wasted deciding whether to deal with Party X at all can be minimised. As long as other people, by not realising they should have some of the protections you sought by contract, can also affect you, statutory regulations can protect you and them.
The nearest 'local' mall for me is 21 miles away (and we're talking strip mall, not big mall). The nearest place with some of the stores I routinely favor is 32, and there are products I have bought in the last 6 months that were not physically available within 220 miles in any brick and mortar store. I have bought over 20 items this year that were shipped from over 3,000 miles away, including a book that left its press in the hands of a Laotian native who bicycled with it to a town in Viet-Nam, where it went in the back of a physician's car for two days, ending up in Hong Kong when his cousin took over and finished that leg of the route, where it was packed into a 'containerized' shipping system, otherwise mostly full of dry cat food (, bulk, uncoated, green), and crossed the pacific to San Francisco to become a UPS delivery to me a few days later. (All this was recounted when I tracked the package via Amazon's links. Thanks Dr. Trin and family). If anyone can actually calculate the ecological consequences of that, besides my book smelling vaguely like those little chlorophilised nuggets they put in dry cat food to give kitties fresher breath, I'd really like to see the math.
In fact, this sort of case sounds like just where the study may have gone wrong. Did they compare the cost to ship from a remote warehouse to the end consumer with the cost to drive to a local store, when, to compare apples to apples, the second half of the equation should have included the cost to ship in bulk from some central warehouse to the local store plus the cost to drive locally? Did they include the cost to sometimes drive to a store that was out of the product, or did they assume consumers always do the sensible thing and call first, and screw-ups with inventory and such don't routinely occur. (It's dirty statistics to assume from the start one group always acts rationally or in an idealised manner, when your overall conclusion is the other group is probably making a mistake). That's not really clarified in the article, and the whole article also sounds like the people writing it thought there were very few cases where it would make more sense to order online, yet, their parameters seem to fit about 80 million Americans for the majority of their purchases, and most of them for a decent fraction. I know Great Britain is smaller, but it's not that tiny such that 'everything' is somehow within 50 Km., plus they use smaller trucks for more of their shipping to small towns, which should add a bit to the percentages, so I doubt it applies there as well as they claim.
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That's according to Sir Karl Popper, not Steven Hawking. (And why are several posters in this thread putting an 's' on Hawking's name?).
I have seen Elephants personally, so I have very high confidence that Elephants exist. On the other hand, if someone tells me there are about 12,000 African elephants worldwide, I don't know offhand how reliable such a figure is. It's not just the really unlikely cases, i.e. that elephants have gone extinct since the last time I actually verified one's existence and there's a massive conspiracy to hide that fact, that affect that reliability, but the other, much more probable cases, such as people doing elephant surveys maybe missing some, or someone accidentally adding or dropping a zero while writing a newspaper article, or someone misremembering old information. (Hint, I just pulled that figure from my posterior, deliberately without looking it up, to make an example).
I'd be a fool to think the two facts were equally reliable. If I carefully specify that at least 3 elephants existed the last time I went to the local zoo, I can approach 100% confidence, but as soon as I get outside that carefully selected area, it is actually the more reasonable thing to do to assume that there is some significant uncertainty. For some propositions, the amount of uncertainty that is likely is very great indeed.
Now consider this proposition: "The scientific method is the most reliable means of determining the truth that can possibly exist". Can that be proved? Either there is a proof within science of that claim, which means the proof is only as reliable as science itself is, and science still could have any level of reliability including a very poor one, or there's a proof outside of science, which means there is some superior method to proving things and so the claim is actually false by counterexample.
If I put in in terms of reliability, I would have to, reasonably, claim that it seems more reliable to say that the scientific method is the most reliable method yet developed than to claim nothing better can possibly be discovered. I'd think it very unreliable indeed to declare that there are not even any minor improvements to the scientific method even remotely possible. So yes, in that sense, science requires faith. I have faith that I should continue using the scientific method on many problems, I have both a logical opinion that, where science does not yield ready answers, I should try various forms of logical or philosophical reasoning and a rule of thumb that is derived only from my own experience that says much the same thing. I may even hold the same opinion as a matter of cultural condition as well. Note that I did not say I have a scientific opinion that I should use logic where science doesn't yield immediate results, as that too makes no sense. How can science tell me what to do when science isn't producing results (at least yet)?
Putting it into a single simple phrase means losing a lot, but it's pretty fair to say Godel's second great proof shows that Formal Systems (like mathematics) have statements that are true, but can't be proven within the system. The more powerful a system is, the more (in general) it has such truths, and doing something that extends such a system's power actually makes the situation worse, not better.
If you want to condense that to a single, clipped phrase: "Truth extends beyond provability."
By the way, Godel's third great proof shows that God exists - sorry to bother all the Atheist slashdotters with that bit of trivia.
For those of you who don't know who Godel was, Einstein kept him around at Princeton to check Einstein's calculations and help with the hard parts, and the greatest work on Math of the 19th century, the Principia Mathematica, was overturned entirely by that pesky second proof.
And it was the quantum mechanicians who 'disproved reality'. Google "Copenhagen Interpretation", "Many Worlds Theory" "Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrödinger", or "Werner Heisenberg" for details.
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I'd support setting the whole long term holding period as high as 5 years, with a sliding scale between the full long term rate for the first year and a bit better each quarter after that the investor stays invested in the same thing. Add in requirements that the company have some particular percentage of US employees and bank in the US, or the scale goes back towards the short term rate by various proportions. Even setting the employee percentage at a simple 50% would probably be enough to induce investors to avoid stocks where the issuer was moving to more and more outsourcing. (that's by costs, not by headcount, allowing any US based company to still put up to half its employee compensation into places where they think they can get cheap help, yet be able to rely on the US legal system and defense). We would end up with Kramer or somebody similar listing those risky stocks that were approaching 55%, 53% and so on, to where most of them would keep a bit of additional margin.
I'm a former military officer - armored cav for much of my career, with stints in intelligence and signal slots and wartime service. I was once asked by an interviewer who was already aware of this from my resume "Have you ever had any life or death decision-making responsibilities?" A little discussion revealed he did not think literal life or death responsibility for the 30+ people in the unit under my command, in wartime, in actual combat, counted. He meant decisions or responsibilities that could have cost significant money, and nothing else. I could easily have answered that one to his satisfaction - signing for training equipment alone when I was the leader of an advance detachment meant there had been times when I was the person responsible for easily more than 100 times the value of his whole company (M1 tanks and Apache helicopters and such add up fast). Instead I walked out of that interview.
I mention this because that person is precisely the person that company will doubtless delegate to go through some potential employee's facebook pages.
The right to vote and the right to free speech are tightly enmeshed.
One of the smartest things said here. A person is exercising their own right of free speech when they actively seek to hear the speech of another, for example by looking for a candidate's web page and reading the candidate's platform. Not only is it a violation of the candidate's right for the government to block his or her speech, it's a violation of that same right in the listener, who may become the active speaker at just about any time. The right to vote itself includes the right to find out what the candidate you are voting for claims to stand for, and the right to criticise or announce your support of that candidate (or referendum or whatever). Thousands of closely related actions to the actual voting itself, such as posting signs or writing letters, are all free speech, and even donating money has a free speech component according to the court. Saying that a corporation cannot actually cast a vote, but it still enjoys all the related rights in the political arena, is claiming that the right to vote itself is merely the right to flip a lever or touch a screen, and has nothing to do with the process of making up your mind whom or what to vote for. Ultimately, it's an argument that just so long as the system still lets people physically access the voting machines, then efforts to keep them from learning about what they are voting on are not violations of their rights.
Prison time requires doing something criminal (in theory at least). Criminal Negligence is called that for a reason, because it can get a person prison time. Simple negligence cannot. Maybe it's not obvious given how far the law has moved from its roots in common law and the various state and federal constitutions, but a person who doesn't even realize they own a portion of corp X while corp X is acting on their behalf, is displaying negligent behavior, which normally can give them liability (and damned well should). There's just about no way that could equal criminal negligence - how could you direct someone to cut legal corners, take unwarranted risks, or actually violate laws, if you really didn't even know they were representing you?
"Hi, I'm not a shareholder in corp X, but I'm directing you, its CEO, to violate that OSHA rule, so as to maximise the profits I don't get from you people."
See, the law is full of definitions of such things as "malicious intent", "having a guilty mind", and such. If you're really unclear where "the line" should be drawn, right there it is, with 99%+ of your theoretical cases already worked out.
Do we divide jail time in other cases where there are multiple felons involved? No? We don't say there's only one life sentence allowed for one murder and split that between four guys who conspired together to commit that murder, do we? So why are you speculating about such an absurdity here, as a consequence of owners sharing legal risks? We don't let the guy who just drove the getaway car off, either. Normally, we sentence people for their share of involvement. Who took what steps, who gave what orders? What did your hypothetical fund manager say or do to make him either simply or criminally responsible?
I'm pretty sure you're joking, but, isn't that a possibility? As the summary puts it, the laws certainly don't help. Well, what do people tend to do when the law isn't fixing a perceived problem? Attempts at tougher laws and vigilante justice are overwhelmingly the most common 'solutions' humans adopt.
This is one of my concerns regarding all sorts of unpopular or personally harmful activities. There's always some contingent that either wants to pass more and more laws and give more power to the government, or to just take the law into their own hands when the first solution doesn't work*. Take tobacco use. Once the users become a small enough minority, making it completely illegal is likely to follow, (and in the US increased power and budget to the DEA, which will get the task of enforcement). Alternatively, people will start inciting mob activity, probably with highly exaggerated claims about the risks of second hand smoke.
*with 'work' meaning 100% effectiveness at no social or economic cost, with nobody dissenting.
But in a case such as this, those re-releases would still have to be accompanied by publicity, which would encourage people to go out and get a copy. As it becomes more widely argued that the originals are superior, it also becomes more common people will get a copy of the original version instead of the new one that is generating the publicity. If the work has entered the public domain, that original version can be released by anyone, cheaply, while they benefit from the publicity surrounding the new release. With digital/internet distribution possible, cheaply becomes free (and legal in such cases), making the problem worse.
There's certainly some cases where re-release wouldn't much be affected by the time until the original expires or would even be driven by it. For example, releasing a version with less explicit violence or nudity or strong language to make a version that's more 'family friendly'. But Lucas has made 'family friendly' changes incrementally, and it's doubtful that there have been that many parents either pressing for them or choosing to buy based on them. Short copyright wouldn't encourage more re-releases in a case like the Star Wars films - it might encourage fewer overall releases, but with more comprehensive changes aimed at creating a more consistant goal.
Not only that, but the OP is posting about a composer who had a very wide range, from Serialist compositions ala Schoenberg, to inventing about a third of the techniques that now distinguish film music, to incorporating various jazz and folk music elements in some of his best known works. The joke exists in an older version about Shostakovich, with more justification, and has been updated here.
You know the big room with the blue ceiling and the green and brown carpet? I think there's some "Nature" hiding in there.
I thought it wouldn't matter to true slashnerds, but then I remembered what their system requirements page said:
"Maya 2011 is also capable of running on other configurations such as boutique distributions of Linux. "
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/pc/index?siteID=123112&id=13577897
Oh Noes! The end of Maya isn't just for Windows!
This is the comment where I question why you didn't follow the "Fixed that for you" meme.
This is the comment where I inform you that if I hadn't used all my mod points just a few minutes ago, your post would have gotten one, but don't specify whether that's good or bad for you.
(Not posting AC, just because I don't wanna).
Isn't it more likely any aliens will pick whomever THEY want?
If you look at the real linguistic roots of the word anarchy, it means, not "no law", but "no rulers" - In essence, phrases such as "government by laws and not men" describe a form of anarchy. Having one group that is much less than the whole of the populace frame the laws, and be relatively immune from their penalties, is one, mostly inferior, option among some quite more acceptable alternatives.
Supposedly, the Incans had a legal system where the penalties for acts grew if the person found guilty was more highly placed in society. A farmer charged with public drunkenness paid a small fine, a craftsman a larger one, a merchant might face lashing, and a politician execution. (I say 'supposedly' because there is some real dispute in archaeological circles over just what the Inca society was like, whether there are traces of it we can infer from the later Mayans, and such - maybe it was but a brief moment before the Incans lost such a system to rising corruption, or there were still some privileged people who were immune, or maybe they really made it work for many generations).
Could any modern society develop a system like that? It seems hard enough to move things towards more equal treatments - just look at how difficult it has been in the US to get the idea even considered seriously that Congress members 'public service' should entitle them to a retirement program and medical assistance no better than what Social Security and Medicare provide to the general public. Making the penalties harsher for screwing up the higher you go is very far from the way things are usually done.
There was a fellow on Usenet who posted using the nym "Mirror Spock". He took several recordings of Simon and Garfunkel's 'Sounds of Silence', including both separate tape tracks and premixed versions, and remixed from them all somehow or other. it seems that one version, Art Garfunkel was recovering from a cold and they shifted the harmony down a fifth or something like that so he could hit the notes, but like the basic release it had all of Bob Dylan's band including Glen Campbell as the studio musicians. Another version had what several industry pros thought was really the best Art Garfunkel performance, but was never released because there were some problems with the backup performers. Some other sources included bootleg live performance tapes or something like that. Word was that the original performers heard this and loved it even though the studio was annoyed about it all, although I can't prove that part's true. I'd assume this person knew pro recording techniques to get a decent mix from everything, but it sort of proves there are (rare) people who can take 'one speech from a novel' or 'one color from a painting', and put something back in its place, and actually improve it.
Suppose someone claimed that they were the performer on a recording of John Cage's 4'33", and not the person credited for it. How on Earth could you prove it one way or another?
At the very least, since a child can't give informed consent or be legally responsible for contracts, any sale of porn involving real children is just like a case of commercial non-porn where the photographer failed to get a model release. Basically, it's frequently illegal to distribute content at all where the model's release doesn't exist (There are, of course, some exceptions, such as photos of a public figure, but unless the child in question is Brooke Shields or some such, those wouldn't apply). As to these being actionably criminal acts, it's possible to prosecute a distributor for not destroying illegal content when the court orders, whether that distribute continues to sell it or simply warehouses it. Even if you made simple possession legal in general, all it would take is a court order that the material was illegally produced for lack of model's release reasons, and anyone can be enjoined from distributing or continuing to possess it, and ignoring that order would still escalate the matter to criminal levels.The only way to get around that would be to change the law so that possession of this child porn was somehow more legal than the general case for possession.
Secondly, let me put the ball back in your court. How do you enforce the laws against both creation and distribution of content whether because it's 'obscene', or just because it's done without model releases, unless you can also have a law against possession? This is one of the general arguments for all sorts of laws against possession - how do you get the possessor to divulge who illegally produced or illegally distributed X (child porn, cocaine, or just a bootleg CD), if you can't prosecute the possession itself?
SIPRNet is for traffic up to classification Secret. The Military also has NIPRNET (Non-Classified Internet Protocol Router Network) for less sensitive information, and presumably something nebulously above and beyond SIPRNet for any transmission of TS data. This is actually a very good model of how to do things (IMHO), but expensive. Cost wise, that theoretical model might entail a hospital using multiple isolated networks, with one for HIPAA traffic, perhaps another for ordering controlled pharmaceuticals and radioisotopes, and another, more deeply isolated one for WILDFIRE reports and such, and essentially all traffic to/from the CDC in Atlanta and such agencies. Practically, the projected expense would probably drive the hospital to stick with sending all HIIPAA traffic by VPN over the regular Internet (if they are at least consistently up to that standard already).
I'm sure what you describe is real, but in my area, we have Krogers competing with Food City, Walmart and others. Krogers is union, pays about 2 bucks an hour better than Walmart, and several workers there have told me they get close to full time hours so they can qualify for for health insurance. Krogers also has an automated checkout station set while in this locale Walmart doesn't. Food City has automated stations, plus a really awkward layout for the non-automated ones, a pharmacy that is closed completely three days a week and has odd, short hours the rest of the time, and lots of things they do worse than Walmart to balance anything automation is gaining them. Quality? Maybe... There's some better brands at the Krogers I don't see at Walmart, but prices for them are close to the same things at Fresh Market, usually a bit better. Fresh market is high, has noticible quality gains and losts of exotic brands, herloom foods, imports and such, and doesn't have automated lanes. Incidentally, the Food City has very similar prices and quality to Walmart, within say 3%. So, like you, I don't see any strong correlation between automation and prices or value, but unlike you, I do see one of the local companies that is fielding automation seemingly passing some benefits to either the customers or their workers.
I don't think your metrics are entirely practicable. A lot of basic products tend to be priced very close to commodity levels whatever else the store does, so what you notice with regard to price may vary more because of what foods you choose than it does by the store's profit model. It could be that all sorts of stores in a given area charge about the same for cornflakes or basic chicken noodle soup, but one chain marks up the fruit bits and granola cereals, or the hearty soups much more than the other. Same with 'worker's rights' - maybe someone pays better, but is anyone really likely to both pay better and hire more people? I wouldn't expect something like adding some automated service lanes to cause such big differences that all the price margins would change or all the employee issues would improve.
So why do the **AAs seem to want this? They don't have SWAT teams, highly trained well armed investigators, or special laws protecting their 'agents' in the line of duty, after all. Why help the government in a law enforcement role, if that makes you look like just another police agency, but you don't have the power to deal with criminals who take it off the internet and get physical? There are people out there talking second amendment remedies, secession, and extreme violence daily - look like just another piece of the government's police apparatus instead of a private organization, and some of the nuttier ones are likely to make your boardrooms the next Oklahoma Federal Building. Against such, the **AAs have what, exactly, in the way of physical defenses? I don't think anybody at the MPAA has gone to Universal or Time/Warner or whomever and said next year's budget needs to include an advanced pistol training range for our accountants, replacing all the windows in building X with 3 inch plexiglass, or equipping a rapid response company with a few armored personnel carriers in case someone makes this mess physical, so presumably, they think the other police agencies they are joining will protect them. That really sounds mind numbingly stupid - wanting to play cop but be the only group not assuming any responsibility for their own physical defense.
There's some differences between individual contract or trust and a statutory requirement for everyone, but there's also a lot of overlap:
1. Violations put people in court either way. If someone violates a contract with you, you will usually have to turn to the courts to resolve your differences just as often as if they violate a statute. The court will more frequently be on solid ground in settling a case based on someone violating a statutory requirement. If the first few cases have been resolved decently and set proper precedents, a lot of subsequent enforcement becomes routine (and if there are bad precedents, you have a problem whether it is standard law or a one shot contract you are litigating). For a custom contract, it's pretty easy to be drawn into litigation and find out only after spending a lot on legal fees that you don't have nearly the strong case you initially thought you had. There's also a deterrent effect for statutory requirements that builds as the related body of case law multiplies, so that people trying to skirt the edge of compliance learn that they simply can't win in court by any of their methods, and that deterrence is much less when it comes to custom contracts because the borderline cases are all unique and somebody usually convinces themselves that the precedents won't apply to their 'novel' dispute.
2. So much data is interrelated. You can have a very good custom contract with Party X, but if Persons A, B, and C, have all had problems with Party X, and they didn't sign very good contracts first, it's pretty easy for Party X to get the courts to forbid disclosure as part of the settlement, even if A, B, or C sometimes, somehow, wins. A statutory requirement can compel Party X to disclose other legal info to you (for example reporting the existence of outstanding cases in a stock prospectus), so if you have a more standard contract, or some dealing outside of normal contract law (such as that example stock purchase), you are still protected, or if you haven't signed a contract at all yet, your time wasted deciding whether to deal with Party X at all can be minimised. As long as other people, by not realising they should have some of the protections you sought by contract, can also affect you, statutory regulations can protect you and them.
The nearest 'local' mall for me is 21 miles away (and we're talking strip mall, not big mall). The nearest place with some of the stores I routinely favor is 32, and there are products I have bought in the last 6 months that were not physically available within 220 miles in any brick and mortar store. I have bought over 20 items this year that were shipped from over 3,000 miles away, including a book that left its press in the hands of a Laotian native who bicycled with it to a town in Viet-Nam, where it went in the back of a physician's car for two days, ending up in Hong Kong when his cousin took over and finished that leg of the route, where it was packed into a 'containerized' shipping system, otherwise mostly full of dry cat food (, bulk, uncoated, green), and crossed the pacific to San Francisco to become a UPS delivery to me a few days later. (All this was recounted when I tracked the package via Amazon's links. Thanks Dr. Trin and family). If anyone can actually calculate the ecological consequences of that, besides my book smelling vaguely like those little chlorophilised nuggets they put in dry cat food to give kitties fresher breath, I'd really like to see the math.
In fact, this sort of case sounds like just where the study may have gone wrong. Did they compare the cost to ship from a remote warehouse to the end consumer with the cost to drive to a local store, when, to compare apples to apples, the second half of the equation should have included the cost to ship in bulk from some central warehouse to the local store plus the cost to drive locally? Did they include the cost to sometimes drive to a store that was out of the product, or did they assume consumers always do the sensible thing and call first, and screw-ups with inventory and such don't routinely occur. (It's dirty statistics to assume from the start one group always acts rationally or in an idealised manner, when your overall conclusion is the other group is probably making a mistake). That's not really clarified in the article, and the whole article also sounds like the people writing it thought there were very few cases where it would make more sense to order online, yet, their parameters seem to fit about 80 million Americans for the majority of their purchases, and most of them for a decent fraction. I know Great Britain is smaller, but it's not that tiny such that 'everything' is somehow within 50 Km., plus they use smaller trucks for more of their shipping to small towns, which should add a bit to the percentages, so I doubt it applies there as well as they claim.