I'm sorry, but when I hear the term 'denier' in relation to this topic, I want to invoke Godwin's Law unless the term can be put in definite context. If someone doesn't agree with you, it doesn't make them a denier unless you can show their motivation for 'denieing' something they know is likely true (and usually their motivation is something akin to faith... or some significant personal motivation). It also has a Nazi overtone... granted that sometimes the comparison to the thought processes of that era is sometimes appropriate (i.e. I don't always think Godwin's Law applies), it should not be used casually... otherwise Godwin's Law definitely will apply.
Here is the crux of the issue: There is someone who doesn't agree with your theory, so you insult and belittle them, and equate them to people who support an ethos that says it is OK to systematically murder 11+ million people. WTF? On the other hand if you can show proof that these people are doing it out of some dogmatic reasoning or some personal faith or personal greed over the well being of the planet, then do it... and we can call them 'deniers'. Simply disagreeing with you and exercising their inherent right to prove their point doesn't cut it.
I do think that people who are trying to come up with alternate theories are likely having funding turned off (regardless of the subject at hand). That is the nature of 'unbiased scientific research'. It has been the documented case for decades. So in this case where else are they to go to earn a living? They make their money by researching. I would prefer to have competing theories on this. I do agree that ultimately, the man made global warming camp will win, but why feel threatened by competing ideas? Who cares who funds the research? It ultimately has to stand up to a peer review process or fall... which has a danger of this argument circling back on itself... so I'll
break;
You will not convince people of the merits of your position by insulting them (unless of course you know they will never be convinced, and then you can do it for your own amusement if you feel strongly enough about it). You will only succeed in creating more enemies.
Consensus doesn't count for squat in science. In the early 20th century, Einstein was derided and castigated for his theories which ran against some of the biggest names of the day in physics. The consensus was that Einstein was wrong. Now we know he was correct and they weren't. Scientists are some of the most biased people in the world, very possessive of their own theories. If you go against them, they will try to punish you as they take it as a personal insult since you are challenging their reasoning... which is their raison d'etre.
I think there is good evidence to suggest CO2 is involved the temperature increase, but the information that temps have increased on Mars as well make me think that perhaps there is more than one factor. Even if CO2 is the main culprit, we shouldn't be shooting down other people for stating something different. If we do that, we may "throw the baby out with the bathwater" and miss some interesting important discovery that might come because someone is trying to disprove global warming. Good science looks in more than one direction for an answer. Sometimes it is limited resources that forces us to look in only a few or even one direction. Hopefully it is not from putting on self imposed blinders... and in this case, it applies equally to both sides of the debate.
Personally, I think acting on the CO2 theory is good in two ways. I believe it does help against global warming, and it will make the air easier to breath. Nothing wrong with either.
I wasn't talking about teachers that force you to turn in homework. I think those kinds of teachers are the worst kinds, in my experience usually being rigid and dogmatic. I am talking about doing homework for your own sake, in order to be able to understand the subject better.
Any teacher that assigns any sort of grade for completing homework has missed the point. The only way to tell if the student understands the curriculum is by test scores. I would possibly add projects to a limited degree. Providing of course that the teachers are the type who insist the projects also be verbally presented/challenged to see if the student has actually done the research and understands/comprehends the subject.
Why didn't the British govt need this in the 70's and 80's when IRA bombings were several times a year?
To play the devil's advocate: Maybe they did need it, but couldn't get away with it then. Maybe if they had implemented the kinds of changes they have now, the IRA (and the UDF) would have been less of a force.
Personally I don't like the idea of the government (or anyone) minding my business. I feel uncomfortable with people invading my personal space by reading over my shoulder... both physically and metaphorically. Cold logic tells me that if I am not doing anything wrong, I don't have anything to worry about. But we all like to stick our hand in the cookie jar now and again. Being able to go against the grain sometimes is what encourages free thought and new discoveries (thinking outside the buzz worded box). Mass thinking is not always right and often wrong. Being forced into total compliance with the masses is bad for any country's competitive edge and the spirit of its people. Big brother will make it happen though, if you let him. Please don't let him.
Some would say that the added security is worth the cost of reduced liberty and freedom. I think that the benefits of the freedom to stray from the path now and then are worth the added risks.
I'm not sure if anyone should have marked this funny. It seems so close to what is likely to happen that it should be marked insightful (but only because there is no category titled "scary as hell").
The salary surveys are good if you are moving from one region to another. You need to have some way to know the market rate if you are moving to a new area.
This is a good tip I got once, and it works for most types of negotiating: Always be willing to walk away if you don't get what you want. That means if you don't get what you want, really walk away and don't look back. If they really want you, they will follow and compromise and you win. If they don't, you won't feel bad about getting less than you want. That doesn't mean you might not haggle a bit with them. What it does mean is that you will be able to work from a position of advantage. And you won't have a look of desperation.
If you really need the job, you can always bluff, but in the end you really need the job so take what you can get. That is why it is always better to look for work while you are working. You can afford to walk away.
From personal experience, if I did math homework I would get grades in the 80s or 90s. If I didn't, I would barely pass a test or even fail. Homework works, QED. However, that's math, not some feel good crap that your last link seems to advocate.
Current industry predictions suggest that by 2020 silicon devices will have shrunk to about 20 nanometres......after this... graphene will come into their own. And that gives scientists time to perfect the tricky fabrication methods...
I think if this is to be used in consumer products, market forces will tell them how long they have. Big leaps often come in short time spans. 13 years is a long time and it seems the longer we wait for something to come to market, the more likely it seems to be vapour ware. If this is pure research, they can take their time (and pure research is a good thing too).
I got so sick of the shitty search utility in XP I installed cygwin just to be able to use 'find' and 'grep'. These can always find what I am looking for. I had too many instances in XP 'search'ing for files that I knew contained particular phrases that returned no search results.
I prefer to keep a portable turntable in my pants. The vinyl tends to skip when I fart, but I can really hear the difference between crappy digital and the analog. The vinyl record sounds better too.
I do. And so do a lot of others. That's why the pro-woman-killing-anti-education-except-if-you're- canadian-Taliban-who-support-Al Quaida-supporting-NDP, the 'ditto'-Bloq Quebecois, and the Liberals can suck my left nut.
The same for condescending leftist activist non-elected judges who think they should be the ones making laws. I'm glad Harper put lay people on the judicial selection boards. I have been advocating this for years. They should also put a majority of lay people on the law society boards as well, seeing as how they can't stop holding themselves above the rest of the population.
In fact, pilots are known for judging the quality of an aircraft by its appearance... the best planes just *look* like they belong in the air.
This is a good way to ensure that new ideas get shot down, even if they are good ones... to follow your analogy.:-)
I actually favour your argument, but this example reminds me that there are two sides to the coin. It reminds me of the Boing Company versus Skunk Works competition for the Joint Strike Fighter. The Boing plane was butt ugly, but had some good design points, including a way less complex VTOL mechanism. But the Skunk Works plane looked kewler. Granted there were probably a few other things under consideration for the selection, but I would bet money that at the end of the day, it was how the planes looked rather than what they actually could do.
Canada did not deny entry to Arar. He went to the United States and they deported him to one of his "official" countries that he held citizenship in. They wouldn't have had a choice of where to send him if he had only a Canadian citizenship. I don't like torture, but I am sick and tired of people coming here and playing the Canadian government from two sides. People need to be held accountable for their own actions, or inactions in the case of not fighting to revoke their previous citizenships.
This guy can fuck right off. This is a consequence of Canada allowing dual citizenships and being pussies about it. If he had a single Canadian citizenship, the U.S. would have had no diplomatic alternative than to to deport him back to Canada. However he was allowed and chose to keep a Syrian citizenship as well. Too bad for him that he made that choice. Why should Canada have to fight to protect him or anyone who are detained by authorities in countries that they freely chose to maintain citizenship in? If he got sent there and tortured, yeah that's bad. But he shouldn't blame Canada for that or ask and get compensation. If he were a citizen of only Canada, it wouldn't have happened. Why should Canada take precidence over which country he is deported to? [sarcasm]Because we're nicer?[/sarcasm]
Same for the Lebanese who came to Canada, got dual citizenship and moved back to Lebanon... and got Canada to spend millions of dollars to evacuate them when Israel invaded by invoking their 'Canadian citizenship'. And a lot of them complained they weren't evacuated from a war zone the way they liked. They can all fuck off too.
Canada needs immigrants economically. And most who come here are good people. But it should be all or nothing. You want to be a citizen, then you should be a citizen of one country. You shouldn't expect to sit on the fence and pick and choose to your liking. Of course that brings the riddle: Why did the Canadian cross the road? To get to the middle. Enough already... and I am Canadian.
And by the way, the U.S. still won't let Arar into their country. They claim they deported him on more than just the word of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
...not trying to sound cliche. Unless you are developing a web site for you to look at exclusively.
I do agree with you that a clear, easy to navigate site is important... who wouldn't agree with that? But at the same time, an overwhelming number of the average public are attracted more to graphics containing 'cool' looking web sites than 'Plain Jane' web sites. The web sites that are trying to sell or advertise a product or service to the general public need to appeal to the general public. That is one of the reasons why web sites are redesigned so often, to attract new people. It can't be 'cool' unless it is new and on the 'bleading edge'. As far as 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder': the people creating the site, if they really know what they are doing, know their target audience. They will appeal to what they know the majority of that group finds beautiful. But most people belong in that big general public demographic...
Another reason it needs to be fancy is that it shows the viewers that there is something behind the web site. They will assume that there are people willing to invest time (=money) in the site design, meaning they are looking at something that is likely to be more legitimate (we all make assumptions in life... we have to). When people see a product being advertised on a text only web page and an equivalent product on a 'cool' web site complete with good graphics, they will usually go for the product with a well designed graphics laden site. And I am not talking about some horrible mishmash of graphics put together by someone using their windows front page lite or whatever the hell windows comes with these days. It's basically like the reason you wear a suite or good clothes to a client's site. To make a good impression.
Yes, but that is always true. If you live in any democratically elected republic, dominion, constitutional monarchy, whatever, and the military decides to overthrow the government (and has the ability to do so), then the checks and balances will go out the window. I said the military, but if there were a popular uprising, it could happen as well. So I think I would make an addition to your caveat: "So those constitutional checks are only effective if backed by sufficient force"... 'and that force agrees to play by the rules.' This goes for the Queen, and any president or prime minister. Any place you hear of a coup taking place this holds true. Some force decides to ignore the rules of government for that country, and by definition you have a revolution and a change in the type of government. I would hazard that you could argue this even in places with non-democratically elected/lead governments. Take the fall of the Soviet Union for example where that force incidentally, was not military and not particularly violent (well until the very end, and even then it was very limited)... even though some might argue that they had a democratically elected government.
In Fiji, the Queen was a part of the government: the head of state. In that case the Queen was actually doing something quite correct: telling the GG to reappoint the democratically elected government which was overthrown in a coup (breaking the rules). So the checks and balances worked, until the caveat we discussed was broken.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
I forgot to add that perhaps the best thing is to not worry about who funds the research, as long as full disclosure about the funding is made.
I'm sorry, but when I hear the term 'denier' in relation to this topic, I want to invoke Godwin's Law unless the term can be put in definite context. If someone doesn't agree with you, it doesn't make them a denier unless you can show their motivation for 'denieing' something they know is likely true (and usually their motivation is something akin to faith... or some significant personal motivation). It also has a Nazi overtone... granted that sometimes the comparison to the thought processes of that era is sometimes appropriate (i.e. I don't always think Godwin's Law applies), it should not be used casually... otherwise Godwin's Law definitely will apply.
Here is the crux of the issue: There is someone who doesn't agree with your theory, so you insult and belittle them, and equate them to people who support an ethos that says it is OK to systematically murder 11+ million people. WTF? On the other hand if you can show proof that these people are doing it out of some dogmatic reasoning or some personal faith or personal greed over the well being of the planet, then do it... and we can call them 'deniers'. Simply disagreeing with you and exercising their inherent right to prove their point doesn't cut it.
I do think that people who are trying to come up with alternate theories are likely having funding turned off (regardless of the subject at hand). That is the nature of 'unbiased scientific research'. It has been the documented case for decades. So in this case where else are they to go to earn a living? They make their money by researching. I would prefer to have competing theories on this. I do agree that ultimately, the man made global warming camp will win, but why feel threatened by competing ideas? Who cares who funds the research? It ultimately has to stand up to a peer review process or fall... which has a danger of this argument circling back on itself... so I'll
You will not convince people of the merits of your position by insulting them (unless of course you know they will never be convinced, and then you can do it for your own amusement if you feel strongly enough about it). You will only succeed in creating more enemies.
An unsubstantiated claim on Slashdot purporting to be from a professor... very credible. Is your name essjay?
I am not a UofW alumni. However if you are, then perhaps it is true... a professor making a claim without citing references...
Consensus doesn't count for squat in science. In the early 20th century, Einstein was derided and castigated for his theories which ran against some of the biggest names of the day in physics. The consensus was that Einstein was wrong. Now we know he was correct and they weren't. Scientists are some of the most biased people in the world, very possessive of their own theories. If you go against them, they will try to punish you as they take it as a personal insult since you are challenging their reasoning... which is their raison d'etre.
I think there is good evidence to suggest CO2 is involved the temperature increase, but the information that temps have increased on Mars as well make me think that perhaps there is more than one factor. Even if CO2 is the main culprit, we shouldn't be shooting down other people for stating something different. If we do that, we may "throw the baby out with the bathwater" and miss some interesting important discovery that might come because someone is trying to disprove global warming. Good science looks in more than one direction for an answer. Sometimes it is limited resources that forces us to look in only a few or even one direction. Hopefully it is not from putting on self imposed blinders... and in this case, it applies equally to both sides of the debate.
Personally, I think acting on the CO2 theory is good in two ways. I believe it does help against global warming, and it will make the air easier to breath. Nothing wrong with either.
I wasn't talking about teachers that force you to turn in homework. I think those kinds of teachers are the worst kinds, in my experience usually being rigid and dogmatic. I am talking about doing homework for your own sake, in order to be able to understand the subject better.
Any teacher that assigns any sort of grade for completing homework has missed the point. The only way to tell if the student understands the curriculum is by test scores. I would possibly add projects to a limited degree. Providing of course that the teachers are the type who insist the projects also be verbally presented/challenged to see if the student has actually done the research and understands/comprehends the subject.
To play the devil's advocate: Maybe they did need it, but couldn't get away with it then. Maybe if they had implemented the kinds of changes they have now, the IRA (and the UDF) would have been less of a force.
Personally I don't like the idea of the government (or anyone) minding my business. I feel uncomfortable with people invading my personal space by reading over my shoulder... both physically and metaphorically. Cold logic tells me that if I am not doing anything wrong, I don't have anything to worry about. But we all like to stick our hand in the cookie jar now and again. Being able to go against the grain sometimes is what encourages free thought and new discoveries (thinking outside the buzz worded box). Mass thinking is not always right and often wrong. Being forced into total compliance with the masses is bad for any country's competitive edge and the spirit of its people. Big brother will make it happen though, if you let him. Please don't let him.
Some would say that the added security is worth the cost of reduced liberty and freedom. I think that the benefits of the freedom to stray from the path now and then are worth the added risks.
I'm not sure if anyone should have marked this funny. It seems so close to what is likely to happen that it should be marked insightful (but only because there is no category titled "scary as hell").
The salary surveys are good if you are moving from one region to another. You need to have some way to know the market rate if you are moving to a new area.
This is a good tip I got once, and it works for most types of negotiating: Always be willing to walk away if you don't get what you want. That means if you don't get what you want, really walk away and don't look back. If they really want you, they will follow and compromise and you win. If they don't, you won't feel bad about getting less than you want. That doesn't mean you might not haggle a bit with them. What it does mean is that you will be able to work from a position of advantage. And you won't have a look of desperation.
If you really need the job, you can always bluff, but in the end you really need the job so take what you can get. That is why it is always better to look for work while you are working. You can afford to walk away.
It's free advice. You get what you pay for.
From personal experience, if I did math homework I would get grades in the 80s or 90s. If I didn't, I would barely pass a test or even fail. Homework works, QED. However, that's math, not some feel good crap that your last link seems to advocate.
But what did you think a Bush appointed patent lawyer would come up with anyway? Tort law bad, patent lawsuits good maybe?
I think if this is to be used in consumer products, market forces will tell them how long they have. Big leaps often come in short time spans. 13 years is a long time and it seems the longer we wait for something to come to market, the more likely it seems to be vapour ware. If this is pure research, they can take their time (and pure research is a good thing too).
It's not as bad as stretching your Wii... wait, never mind.
I got so sick of the shitty search utility in XP I installed cygwin just to be able to use 'find' and 'grep'. These can always find what I am looking for. I had too many instances in XP 'search'ing for files that I knew contained particular phrases that returned no search results.
Who has more money?
I prefer to keep a portable turntable in my pants. The vinyl tends to skip when I fart, but I can really hear the difference between crappy digital and the analog. The vinyl record sounds better too.
I do. And so do a lot of others. That's why the pro-woman-killing-anti-education-except-if-you're- canadian-Taliban-who-support-Al Quaida-supporting-NDP, the 'ditto'-Bloq Quebecois, and the Liberals can suck my left nut.
The same for condescending leftist activist non-elected judges who think they should be the ones making laws. I'm glad Harper put lay people on the judicial selection boards. I have been advocating this for years. They should also put a majority of lay people on the law society boards as well, seeing as how they can't stop holding themselves above the rest of the population.
This is a good way to ensure that new ideas get shot down, even if they are good ones... to follow your analogy. :-)
I actually favour your argument, but this example reminds me that there are two sides to the coin. It reminds me of the Boing Company versus Skunk Works competition for the Joint Strike Fighter. The Boing plane was butt ugly, but had some good design points, including a way less complex VTOL mechanism. But the Skunk Works plane looked kewler. Granted there were probably a few other things under consideration for the selection, but I would bet money that at the end of the day, it was how the planes looked rather than what they actually could do.
Canada did not deny entry to Arar. He went to the United States and they deported him to one of his "official" countries that he held citizenship in. They wouldn't have had a choice of where to send him if he had only a Canadian citizenship. I don't like torture, but I am sick and tired of people coming here and playing the Canadian government from two sides. People need to be held accountable for their own actions, or inactions in the case of not fighting to revoke their previous citizenships.
Yes. :-p
According to the alt.muslim website, he holds dual citizenship: Canadian and Syrian. This is not the only reference.
This guy can fuck right off. This is a consequence of Canada allowing dual citizenships and being pussies about it. If he had a single Canadian citizenship, the U.S. would have had no diplomatic alternative than to to deport him back to Canada. However he was allowed and chose to keep a Syrian citizenship as well. Too bad for him that he made that choice. Why should Canada have to fight to protect him or anyone who are detained by authorities in countries that they freely chose to maintain citizenship in? If he got sent there and tortured, yeah that's bad. But he shouldn't blame Canada for that or ask and get compensation. If he were a citizen of only Canada, it wouldn't have happened. Why should Canada take precidence over which country he is deported to? [sarcasm]Because we're nicer?[/sarcasm]
Same for the Lebanese who came to Canada, got dual citizenship and moved back to Lebanon... and got Canada to spend millions of dollars to evacuate them when Israel invaded by invoking their 'Canadian citizenship'. And a lot of them complained they weren't evacuated from a war zone the way they liked. They can all fuck off too.
Canada needs immigrants economically. And most who come here are good people. But it should be all or nothing. You want to be a citizen, then you should be a citizen of one country. You shouldn't expect to sit on the fence and pick and choose to your liking. Of course that brings the riddle: Why did the Canadian cross the road? To get to the middle. Enough already... and I am Canadian.
And by the way, the U.S. still won't let Arar into their country. They claim they deported him on more than just the word of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
...not trying to sound cliche. Unless you are developing a web site for you to look at exclusively.
I do agree with you that a clear, easy to navigate site is important... who wouldn't agree with that? But at the same time, an overwhelming number of the average public are attracted more to graphics containing 'cool' looking web sites than 'Plain Jane' web sites. The web sites that are trying to sell or advertise a product or service to the general public need to appeal to the general public. That is one of the reasons why web sites are redesigned so often, to attract new people. It can't be 'cool' unless it is new and on the 'bleading edge'. As far as 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder': the people creating the site, if they really know what they are doing, know their target audience. They will appeal to what they know the majority of that group finds beautiful. But most people belong in that big general public demographic...
Another reason it needs to be fancy is that it shows the viewers that there is something behind the web site. They will assume that there are people willing to invest time (=money) in the site design, meaning they are looking at something that is likely to be more legitimate (we all make assumptions in life... we have to). When people see a product being advertised on a text only web page and an equivalent product on a 'cool' web site complete with good graphics, they will usually go for the product with a well designed graphics laden site. And I am not talking about some horrible mishmash of graphics put together by someone using their windows front page lite or whatever the hell windows comes with these days. It's basically like the reason you wear a suite or good clothes to a client's site. To make a good impression.
Yes, but that is always true. If you live in any democratically elected republic, dominion, constitutional monarchy, whatever, and the military decides to overthrow the government (and has the ability to do so), then the checks and balances will go out the window. I said the military, but if there were a popular uprising, it could happen as well. So I think I would make an addition to your caveat: "So those constitutional checks are only effective if backed by sufficient force"... 'and that force agrees to play by the rules.' This goes for the Queen, and any president or prime minister. Any place you hear of a coup taking place this holds true. Some force decides to ignore the rules of government for that country, and by definition you have a revolution and a change in the type of government. I would hazard that you could argue this even in places with non-democratically elected/lead governments. Take the fall of the Soviet Union for example where that force incidentally, was not military and not particularly violent (well until the very end, and even then it was very limited)... even though some might argue that they had a democratically elected government.
In Fiji, the Queen was a part of the government: the head of state. In that case the Queen was actually doing something quite correct: telling the GG to reappoint the democratically elected government which was overthrown in a coup (breaking the rules). So the checks and balances worked, until the caveat we discussed was broken. :-)
Yahhhh.... never mind... should have went to bed an hour ago.