The wisdom of crowds works when everyone is looking in the same area for the answer to a question with a somewhat fuzzy answer. The group average can often be better than any single expect that attempts to calculate it. However this is a poor approach when the crowd isn't even looking in the right place. Simple majority decision making would be disastrous for many of the big decisions organizations make. The pubic is massively ignorant on scientific issues and continues to be plagued by religious, corporate, and state imposed falsehoods. Freeing people from these shackles and providing full education for all could allow us to crowd source more important decisions and lead to a more efficient and just society.
This change hasn't been justified on any grounds. It puts the 'Close' button near the 'File' menu and other drop-downs which makes it easier to misclick and close applications. It's not a common layout across WIMP GUIs. It's an unnecessary and pointless variation on what people expect.
That looks pretty annoying and is sure to confuse any new users I try to migrate from Windows or an earlier version of Ubuntu. I hope debian isn't planning something similar, because this might be enough to make me switch back to debian for my x86 desktops.
"The entire point of organized science is to let anyone read"
Ya, but Popular Science, is about the popularization of existing research, not the nitty gritty of the research itself. Real science--peer review journals--are even more closed off than commercial magazines. Given science's reputation for free inquiry and openness, it's ironic that scientific publications are the last vestige of closed media in an increasingly open society.
If we had sane copyright laws, most of the issues would already be in the public domain. However, I still see this is a major gesture of support for free culture.
I only buy books and music from authors who publish for free online.
Maybe I should extend the same policy towards zines?
Start a political party or GTFO
Private financing of elections. Restrictive ballot access laws (third parties often need more signatures to get on than the two main parties). First past the post. Single member districts. Winner take all elections. No proportional representation. No shadow cabinets. Corporate power. Brand recognition of the major parties. Fundamental limits of all electoral politics. Fundamental limits of all state actions. Etc. . .
There are dozens of reasons why third parties are a waste of time in the USA. I'll vote for 'em, but I would never give them my time or money. It would take a revolution and a new constitution in order for third parties to become viable here. Resources are better spend in labor and community organizing in order to take direct action.
People can believe whatever they want. But face it, few freely choose their religion. Most just go about beliveing whatever their parents foisted on them.
We need to acknowledge that we live in a society. We no longer live in hunter gatherer tribes. Two parents are not longer sufficient to raise a child. It take a whole society. Whatever material and ideas that the parents give to their offspring, they got from the larger group. Whether we like it or not, child rearing is already a part of mass society. We need to stop allowing parents to use the violence of restricting necessities (affection, food, shelter) to indoctrinate youth into religion. Young people are given the choice: have faith in some crazy shit, or give up your whole support system. We need enough public social support for youth (food, personal care and relationships, shelter, education, etc) in order that they be free to disobey their crazy parents.
'freedom from religion' is enshrined...in the Constitution of the People's Republic of China
Redbait much? . . .
Can we not have freedom of speech, assembly, etc and still have freedom from religion? Sure, we could never "ban" religion. However, we could stop all state support for organized religion and support resources for secular education. Shut down cults that actively defraud people (depending on how broadly you define this, it could do away with 60-99% of religions)
So, taking it to the absurd
Exactly. Your slippery slope shit is fallacious.
group who think that lima beans are a threat to the world.....using violence against lima bean growers
Lima beans are not a threat to our existence as a species. They are actually pretty good for your health. Apocalyptic, dogmatic, irrational faith is a major threat in a age of WMDs. It is also a barrier to having a participatory democratic society. If everyday people are going to make important social decisions, they need to not be totally fucking ignorant and crazy.
...the state gets involved...
I don't support the existence of the state. The state is a monopoly on the use of force. The use of force depends on the ethics of situation. It should never be reserved to a particular institution to use as they please.
Um, so which religions teach tax cuts for the rich?
Actually there are Evangelical Christian churches that preach that kinda "cross of gold" bullshit. But...that wasn't my point. My point is that by focusing on homophobia and etc bigotries, the churches have gotten the working class to ignore their class interest and support a candidate simply for having conservative social values.
...Catholics...
Catholics in the USA tend to ignore the bigotry that exists in the church and vote their economic interest. There are even left wing members of the clergy. But the USA is mostly protestant, not Catholic.
Social contract theory
I never was given the option to sign any social contract! I doubt most people would choose the organized oppressive violence of the state, the exploitation of capitalism, and the lies of religion if given a choice. Most people would choose anarchy: peace, freedom, self organization.
However irrational religions are, they serve also usefull purposes.
Useful for the elite.
If the shift would be to[sic] rapid, you'll get chaos and the world reverting quickly to a state worse than before the shift.
You're on slashdot and you don't see how self organization, voluntary association, and mutual aid, can work? Hierarchy and exploitation are chaos. Democracy and freedom could give us more peace and order.
the gods are...completelly real...as constructs which proved hugely beneficial during our evolution; they wouldn't be so prevalent otherwise.
Once again, beneficial to those in charge, not the rest of us. Pie in the sky when you die; That's a lie!
Since you're trying to oppress (even if legal and morally right) someone, I as an "ethical person" have the RIGHT to use force on you? What's the criteria?
I don't propose oppressing anyone. I propose giving young people the right to free association. This means taking away the parent's right the keep youth as chattel. Adults should not be able to have title (custody) of other human beings, if such title gives them to right to indoctrinate and censor. So...when young people come together to learn (as they inevitably will...youth are extremely curious as long as church and school don't kill it), they do so under a free environment. Parents should not be able to impose compulsory church, and the state should not be able to impose compulsory schooling. Learning should be free, voluntary, and open.
As to the larger question of when to use force...that's really quite easy in theory. You can deliberately cause harm as long as the harm you cause is less than the harm you are preventing by employing such force. Easy in theory, not so easy to work out in practice...but hey, that's the problem of civilization.
There is no universal, objective standard for "good ethics"
Nope. Moreover religion and government's ethical standards have been particularly bad....but hopefully we can have some kind of pragmatic utilitarian definition of ethics without getting into too much philosophical pointlessness. Something like, "rules that give us the greatest personal autonomy, satisfaction of desires, absence of pain, etc". Preservation of proportionality: "Your say in a decision should be to the degree that the decision effects you"
But we are only as good as our deeds; and a crime is still crime, even if it is committed against criminals.
The goodness of our actions should not be judged by whether they are legal or illegal. It was once illegal to help transport an escaped slave, engage in non-marital sex, etc. It is still illegal to DDoS evil religions, grow certain plants, copy cryoto algorithms freely, take pictures of yourself if you are underage, etc.
O I admit it's a dangerous idea. I just think it's worth the price. I believe that our freedom and survival as a species depends on doing away with irrational faith and building an educated participatory society. When you seriously start challenging hierarchy, you can expect the powerful to react. Let's specifically look at historical precedents for throwing off the yoke of reactionary religion. The democratic Spanish constitution enacted in 1931 established complete separation of Church and State in what had been a theocratic monarchy for centuries. It excluded the Church from education. This was one of the major reasons for the rise of Franco's fascism. In the first weeks of the Spanish Civil War, the fascists slaughtered teachers from the secular schools (as similar right wing forces had done to Francisco Ferrer, founder of the anti-authoritarian and anti-clerical modern schools decades earlier).
We need to be prepared for these kinds of reactionary forces if we are serious about liberating ourselves. There is a lot of violence hidden behind modern respectability. Tacit threats. Our current complacency exists because we are afraid to act and are unprepared for the consequences. Get the fuck ready. Organize.
As long as parents have the legal "right" to force their (property) offspring into organized religion, ethical people have the RIGHT to use force to oppose such religions.
The State and Capital depend on religion to keep people focused on social wedge issues so they don't question the fundamental power structures of our society. Poor Americans vote for tax cuts for the rich, ecological policies that will make the world unlivable for future generations, and imperialistic wars, all because the candidates supporting such insanity also pander to "faith" by attacking science and LGBTQ folk. Unfortunately, the most victimized sectors of the working class are also the most exploited by religion. Each generation passes the meme on to the next. We can only end this vicious cycle of enforced irrationality by attacking the source.
How do we make US workers competitive in a world where there are billions of people who can live on so much less? Seriously, do you have any suggestions? Can we stop bitching dlbout [sic] the problem and start solving it?
I think you are looking at the wrong problem. The problem is our standard of living. We want to have more leisure time and/or more control of our working conditions. We need better health-care and education and secure place to live without working to death in order to earn it.
We DON't need to be competing with foreign workers. You mentioned Jim Crow. It's a racist jingoism that has convinced Americans that they deserve to profit off of the wages of those in the developing world. We can have a better standard of living when we realize that the Indian programmer has the same interests that we do, and that the Indian's boss and our boss have more in common with each other than with us.
You mentioned the high cost of taxes and of commuting. We need to start living in cities again. Suburban sprawl has cost us both in commuting costs and by atomizing us and keeping us from having a real community. It's simply more efficient to live near more people. With a real community, we wouldn't need the state to provide services. With real community, we wouldn't be duped into funding the terror war and the drug war. The suburbs tend to be the more reactionary conservative parts of the nation, while the urban areas are the more progressive.
You mentioned the labor movement. Real democratic radical unions are the only way workers can gain more power. Imagine if both you and the workers in the developing world were in the same union. International solidarity could prevent corporations from constantly moving production to whichever nation has the worst labor and human rights records. We need democratic accountable unions. Not the AFL/CIO or SEIU or the Teamsters. We need unions like the UE and the IWW.
The ultimate goal should be workers self management of all industry. Wall Street speculators and bosses are in it to make money for themselves in the short term, while workers interests are in creating sustainable jobs with good wages, benefits, and working conditions.
Ok hi, heh, ok heh. My name is Roxxy. Most of you know me as um oom ugh um most of you know me as Roxxy. I suppose if you're watching this you probably know me as Roxxy, but um ugh ugh most of you don't know me as moldy lunchbox and um so yeah thats my gaia username on gaiaonline and I told my gaiaonline friend buddy per. One second I'm uncomfortable. I told my gaiaonline buddy friend um that ADMIRAL AWESOME that I would make a video just for him. So I'm doing it, here it is, ADDIE LOVE YOU ARGH HAAH ARGH HAAH ARGH HAAH I LOVE YOU! And um um so lets see ugh what about urgh... just so you know cuz I know you're watching this addie cuz you're such a conceaded BASTARD.. umm I don't normally talk like this, I'm normally like all over the place like I am right now, but its a calmer voice most of the time unless I'm like really hyped up cuz then its even different still from this, but let me try again with my calmer voice. Ahem.. ugh erm.. Yeah I'm really like, its-its fun, its cool there it is its going again ARGH cuz its just so crazy. Um erm it um is.. I love you, I love addie because hes really like fun to talk to and stuff and like hes um like I met him only like 2 days ago and we're like married and it is crazy because we love each other so much. And um ugh we are twinies like all over the place, it is like crazy! His avatar is like a manwhore and I.. had a avatar like a really long time ago.. it was a SLUT AVATAR! *Gasp* And um right and he made an avatar to match my first skirt one, IT WAS SO CUTE IT WAS SO NICE I LOVE ADDIE!
I only saw the weird "open a new window" mode once, I think it was on Solaris 10. Ubuntu, Opensolaris, etc all seam to have configured gnome to use the normal "browser" mode. If the distros set the gnome configuration, does it really matter what the default is?
I was under the impression that the evidence of SSRIs being effective at all was pretty small, and that whatever effect they may have would be on mood. Chemicals that effect Dopamine, like amphetamines, do more for motivation.
If you want to be happy, straighten out your life...maybe check out SSRIs....if you want to be motivated, driven, not lazy, amp it up...(just remember to time it right so you can still sleep).
I'm reminded of Sun's inability to shift to commodity processors.
Sun has sold systems with intel CPUs for years. They also kept making SPARC systems. This is good because having their own platform allowed them to have something to innovate with and also gave their existing SPARC customers an upgrade path. Commodity x86 processors may have the best initial purchase price to performance ratio, but Suns T series UltraSPARCs appear to have a better TCO to performance ratio. Since the T1 and T2 have better performance per watt and higher throughput, I run them in my servers instead of hot inefficient x86 CPUs. Sun is years ahead of intel on massively multicore systems.
Your analogy really isn't fair. Intel is the big monolithic "GM" with the inefficient but powerful and popular engine. Sun is the import. The smaller but more modern company with an engine design that uses less energy. Guess which one is the way of the future?
I find many aspects of smart phones compelling, with one exception: the cost of the phones, which typically exceeds that of a traditional box. I understand all of the benefits of smart phones (and the downsides, thanks) but I'm very hung up on spending more for less.
You have to pay more to fit all that technology into a smaller package! If you don't care about space, just run a virtualized desktop on traditional desktop hardware.
BTW I would recommend diskless workstations for thin clients. They may not be the cheapest, but they are full featured, fairly affordable, and well supported.
If you total up all the productivity lost to fighting spam and time wasted getting spam, it's probably cheaper to just put the spammers out of business by giving every male on earth free Viagra.
When an application can make the soundsystem stop working for all other applications, than there is a bug in the soundsystem, not just the application that caused the problem.
Who here runs Linux on anything with more than 16 cores?
My personal server. A debian based distro of Gnu/Linux is much easier for me to admin than Solaris. Massively multicore is the future. I wouldn't buy any new computer with less than 16 cores/hardware threads. Well, except for laptops and embedded systems.
Slashdot Mirror
The wisdom of crowds works when everyone is looking in the same area for the answer to a question with a somewhat fuzzy answer. The group average can often be better than any single expect that attempts to calculate it. However this is a poor approach when the crowd isn't even looking in the right place. Simple majority decision making would be disastrous for many of the big decisions organizations make. The pubic is massively ignorant on scientific issues and continues to be plagued by religious, corporate, and state imposed falsehoods. Freeing people from these shackles and providing full education for all could allow us to crowd source more important decisions and lead to a more efficient and just society.
This change hasn't been justified on any grounds. It puts the 'Close' button near the 'File' menu and other drop-downs which makes it easier to misclick and close applications. It's not a common layout across WIMP GUIs. It's an unnecessary and pointless variation on what people expect.
That looks pretty annoying and is sure to confuse any new users I try to migrate from Windows or an earlier version of Ubuntu. I hope debian isn't planning something similar, because this might be enough to make me switch back to debian for my x86 desktops.
"The entire point of organized science is to let anyone read"
Ya, but Popular Science, is about the popularization of existing research, not the nitty gritty of the research itself. Real science--peer review journals--are even more closed off than commercial magazines. Given science's reputation for free inquiry and openness, it's ironic that scientific publications are the last vestige of closed media in an increasingly open society.
If we had sane copyright laws, most of the issues would already be in the public domain. However, I still see this is a major gesture of support for free culture.
I only buy books and music from authors who publish for free online.
Maybe I should extend the same policy towards zines?
Start a political party or GTFO
Private financing of elections. Restrictive ballot access laws (third parties often need more signatures to get on than the two main parties). First past the post. Single member districts. Winner take all elections. No proportional representation. No shadow cabinets. Corporate power. Brand recognition of the major parties. Fundamental limits of all electoral politics. Fundamental limits of all state actions. Etc. . .
There are dozens of reasons why third parties are a waste of time in the USA. I'll vote for 'em, but I would never give them my time or money. It would take a revolution and a new constitution in order for third parties to become viable here. Resources are better spend in labor and community organizing in order to take direct action.
People can believe whatever they want. But face it, few freely choose their religion. Most just go about beliveing whatever their parents foisted on them.
We need to acknowledge that we live in a society. We no longer live in hunter gatherer tribes. Two parents are not longer sufficient to raise a child. It take a whole society. Whatever material and ideas that the parents give to their offspring, they got from the larger group. Whether we like it or not, child rearing is already a part of mass society. We need to stop allowing parents to use the violence of restricting necessities (affection, food, shelter) to indoctrinate youth into religion. Young people are given the choice: have faith in some crazy shit, or give up your whole support system. We need enough public social support for youth (food, personal care and relationships, shelter, education, etc) in order that they be free to disobey their crazy parents.
Then we will see quite the revolution!
'freedom from religion' is enshrined ...in the Constitution of the People's Republic of China
Redbait much? . . .
Can we not have freedom of speech, assembly, etc and still have freedom from religion? Sure, we could never "ban" religion. However, we could stop all state support for organized religion and support resources for secular education. Shut down cults that actively defraud people (depending on how broadly you define this, it could do away with 60-99% of religions)
So, taking it to the absurd
...the state gets involved...
...Catholics...
Exactly. Your slippery slope shit is fallacious.
group who think that lima beans are a threat to the world.....using violence against lima bean growers
Lima beans are not a threat to our existence as a species. They are actually pretty good for your health. Apocalyptic, dogmatic, irrational faith is a major threat in a age of WMDs. It is also a barrier to having a participatory democratic society. If everyday people are going to make important social decisions, they need to not be totally fucking ignorant and crazy.
I don't support the existence of the state. The state is a monopoly on the use of force. The use of force depends on the ethics of situation. It should never be reserved to a particular institution to use as they please.
Um, so which religions teach tax cuts for the rich?
Actually there are Evangelical Christian churches that preach that kinda "cross of gold" bullshit. But...that wasn't my point. My point is that by focusing on homophobia and etc bigotries, the churches have gotten the working class to ignore their class interest and support a candidate simply for having conservative social values.
Catholics in the USA tend to ignore the bigotry that exists in the church and vote their economic interest. There are even left wing members of the clergy. But the USA is mostly protestant, not Catholic.
Social contract theory
I never was given the option to sign any social contract! I doubt most people would choose the organized oppressive violence of the state, the exploitation of capitalism, and the lies of religion if given a choice. Most people would choose anarchy: peace, freedom, self organization.
However irrational religions are, they serve also usefull purposes.
Useful for the elite.
If the shift would be to[sic] rapid, you'll get chaos and the world reverting quickly to a state worse than before the shift.
You're on slashdot and you don't see how self organization, voluntary association, and mutual aid, can work? Hierarchy and exploitation are chaos. Democracy and freedom could give us more peace and order.
the gods are...completelly real...as constructs which proved hugely beneficial during our evolution; they wouldn't be so prevalent otherwise.
Once again, beneficial to those in charge, not the rest of us. Pie in the sky when you die; That's a lie!
Since you're trying to oppress (even if legal and morally right) someone, I as an "ethical person" have the RIGHT to use force on you? What's the criteria?
I don't propose oppressing anyone. I propose giving young people the right to free association. This means taking away the parent's right the keep youth as chattel. Adults should not be able to have title (custody) of other human beings, if such title gives them to right to indoctrinate and censor. So...when young people come together to learn (as they inevitably will...youth are extremely curious as long as church and school don't kill it), they do so under a free environment. Parents should not be able to impose compulsory church, and the state should not be able to impose compulsory schooling. Learning should be free, voluntary, and open.
As to the larger question of when to use force...that's really quite easy in theory. You can deliberately cause harm as long as the harm you cause is less than the harm you are preventing by employing such force. Easy in theory, not so easy to work out in practice...but hey, that's the problem of civilization.
There is no universal, objective standard for "good ethics"
Nope. Moreover religion and government's ethical standards have been particularly bad....but hopefully we can have some kind of pragmatic utilitarian definition of ethics without getting into too much philosophical pointlessness. Something like, "rules that give us the greatest personal autonomy, satisfaction of desires, absence of pain, etc". Preservation of proportionality: "Your say in a decision should be to the degree that the decision effects you"
But we are only as good as our deeds; and a crime is still crime, even if it is committed against criminals.
The goodness of our actions should not be judged by whether they are legal or illegal. It was once illegal to help transport an escaped slave, engage in non-marital sex, etc. It is still illegal to DDoS evil religions, grow certain plants, copy cryoto algorithms freely, take pictures of yourself if you are underage, etc.
O I admit it's a dangerous idea. I just think it's worth the price. I believe that our freedom and survival as a species depends on doing away with irrational faith and building an educated participatory society. When you seriously start challenging hierarchy, you can expect the powerful to react. Let's specifically look at historical precedents for throwing off the yoke of reactionary religion. The democratic Spanish constitution enacted in 1931 established complete separation of Church and State in what had been a theocratic monarchy for centuries. It excluded the Church from education. This was one of the major reasons for the rise of Franco's fascism. In the first weeks of the Spanish Civil War, the fascists slaughtered teachers from the secular schools (as similar right wing forces had done to Francisco Ferrer, founder of the anti-authoritarian and anti-clerical modern schools decades earlier).
We need to be prepared for these kinds of reactionary forces if we are serious about liberating ourselves. There is a lot of violence hidden behind modern respectability. Tacit threats. Our current complacency exists because we are afraid to act and are unprepared for the consequences. Get the fuck ready. Organize.
I find your ideas intriguing. I'd like to sign up for your newsletter.
K, NP.
For you dropouts who wanna rockout
Right Coast? Got a platform?
Steampunk and other wonderful things
For the One (not yet) Big Union
Now we see the violence inherent in the system!
Left Coast? Doing Being Totally Outta Control?
4chan for anarchists
inb4 should have been behind over 9000 proxies.
As long as parents have the legal "right" to force their (property) offspring into organized religion, ethical people have the RIGHT to use force to oppose such religions.
The State and Capital depend on religion to keep people focused on social wedge issues so they don't question the fundamental power structures of our society. Poor Americans vote for tax cuts for the rich, ecological policies that will make the world unlivable for future generations, and imperialistic wars, all because the candidates supporting such insanity also pander to "faith" by attacking science and LGBTQ folk. Unfortunately, the most victimized sectors of the working class are also the most exploited by religion. Each generation passes the meme on to the next. We can only end this vicious cycle of enforced irrationality by attacking the source.
No Gods!
No Masters!
How do we make US workers competitive in a world where there are billions of people who can live on so much less? Seriously, do you have any suggestions? Can we stop bitching dlbout [sic] the problem and start solving it?
I think you are looking at the wrong problem. The problem is our standard of living. We want to have more leisure time and/or more control of our working conditions. We need better health-care and education and secure place to live without working to death in order to earn it.
We DON't need to be competing with foreign workers. You mentioned Jim Crow. It's a racist jingoism that has convinced Americans that they deserve to profit off of the wages of those in the developing world. We can have a better standard of living when we realize that the Indian programmer has the same interests that we do, and that the Indian's boss and our boss have more in common with each other than with us.
You mentioned the high cost of taxes and of commuting. We need to start living in cities again. Suburban sprawl has cost us both in commuting costs and by atomizing us and keeping us from having a real community. It's simply more efficient to live near more people. With a real community, we wouldn't need the state to provide services. With real community, we wouldn't be duped into funding the terror war and the drug war. The suburbs tend to be the more reactionary conservative parts of the nation, while the urban areas are the more progressive.
You mentioned the labor movement. Real democratic radical unions are the only way workers can gain more power. Imagine if both you and the workers in the developing world were in the same union. International solidarity could prevent corporations from constantly moving production to whichever nation has the worst labor and human rights records. We need democratic accountable unions. Not the AFL/CIO or SEIU or the Teamsters. We need unions like the UE and the IWW.
The ultimate goal should be workers self management of all industry. Wall Street speculators and bosses are in it to make money for themselves in the short term, while workers interests are in creating sustainable jobs with good wages, benefits, and working conditions.
Ok hi, heh, ok heh. My name is Roxxy. Most of you know me as um oom ugh um most of you know me as Roxxy. I suppose if you're watching this you probably know me as Roxxy, but um ugh ugh most of you don't know me as moldy lunchbox and um so yeah thats my gaia username on gaiaonline and I told my gaiaonline friend buddy per. One second I'm uncomfortable. I told my gaiaonline buddy friend um that ADMIRAL AWESOME that I would make a video just for him. So I'm doing it, here it is, ADDIE LOVE YOU ARGH HAAH ARGH HAAH ARGH HAAH I LOVE YOU! And um um so lets see ugh what about urgh... just so you know cuz I know you're watching this addie cuz you're such a conceaded BASTARD.. umm I don't normally talk like this, I'm normally like all over the place like I am right now, but its a calmer voice most of the time unless I'm like really hyped up cuz then its even different still from this, but let me try again with my calmer voice. Ahem.. ugh erm.. Yeah I'm really like, its-its fun, its cool there it is its going again ARGH cuz its just so crazy. Um erm it um is.. I love you, I love addie because hes really like fun to talk to and stuff and like hes um like I met him only like 2 days ago and we're like married and it is crazy because we love each other so much. And um ugh we are twinies like all over the place, it is like crazy! His avatar is like a manwhore and I.. had a avatar like a really long time ago.. it was a SLUT AVATAR! *Gasp* And um right and he made an avatar to match my first skirt one, IT WAS SO CUTE IT WAS SO NICE I LOVE ADDIE!
I only saw the weird "open a new window" mode once, I think it was on Solaris 10. Ubuntu, Opensolaris, etc all seam to have configured gnome to use the normal "browser" mode. If the distros set the gnome configuration, does it really matter what the default is?
I was under the impression that the evidence of SSRIs being effective at all was pretty small, and that whatever effect they may have would be on mood. Chemicals that effect Dopamine, like amphetamines, do more for motivation.
If you want to be happy, straighten out your life...maybe check out SSRIs....if you want to be motivated, driven, not lazy, amp it up...(just remember to time it right so you can still sleep).
I'm reminded of Sun's inability to shift to commodity processors.
Sun has sold systems with intel CPUs for years. They also kept making SPARC systems. This is good because having their own platform allowed them to have something to innovate with and also gave their existing SPARC customers an upgrade path. Commodity x86 processors may have the best initial purchase price to performance ratio, but Suns T series UltraSPARCs appear to have a better TCO to performance ratio. Since the T1 and T2 have better performance per watt and higher throughput, I run them in my servers instead of hot inefficient x86 CPUs. Sun is years ahead of intel on massively multicore systems.
Your analogy really isn't fair. Intel is the big monolithic "GM" with the inefficient but powerful and popular engine. Sun is the import. The smaller but more modern company with an engine design that uses less energy. Guess which one is the way of the future?
Bah...meant to title it smaller != cheaper...o well.
I find many aspects of smart phones compelling, with one exception: the cost of the phones, which typically exceeds that of a traditional box. I understand all of the benefits of smart phones (and the downsides, thanks) but I'm very hung up on spending more for less.
You have to pay more to fit all that technology into a smaller package! If you don't care about space, just run a virtualized desktop on traditional desktop hardware.
BTW I would recommend diskless workstations for thin clients. They may not be the cheapest, but they are full featured, fairly affordable, and well supported.
If you total up all the productivity lost to fighting spam and time wasted getting spam, it's probably cheaper to just put the spammers out of business by giving every male on earth free Viagra.
Why were you wasting all that time trying to censor students?
Part of growing up entails being educated about society. People need street smarts as well as book smarts.
Porn is a huge part of our economy, has enormous impact on people's personal relationships and sexuality, and even effects politics.
Not letting young people know about porn seriously shelters them and cripples their understanding of the world.
When an application can make the soundsystem stop working for all other applications, than there is a bug in the soundsystem, not just the application that caused the problem.
Who here runs Linux on anything with more than 16 cores?
My personal server. A debian based distro of Gnu/Linux is much easier for me to admin than Solaris. Massively multicore is the future. I wouldn't buy any new computer with less than 16 cores/hardware threads. Well, except for laptops and embedded systems.