"the only difference is, the Christian right, for example, will at least admit their views are based on blind faith"
Faith is defined as trusting in God because He has revealed himself; nothing blind about that.
The origin of the word is 'steadfast' or 'loyal', and there was never any idea, until Pascal and Kierkegaard made their unhelpful contributions, that faith is blind/irrational. Trust, after all, only makes sense when trustworthiness is established. It is stupid to say "I'll trust you" to someone who hasn't earned it.
Christians claim that God's revelation of himself is direct, and to any individual who sincerely and persistently asks for it; as Christ said "Knock and it shall be opened to you". It trumps the claim of the agnostic "It is impossible to prove the existence of a God", and doesn't do atheists many favours either.
It may not solve the problem of why so many religions claim exclusivity (though they share more than they disagree on), but it is a rational basis for belief in the existence of God.
"That God doesn't exist so faith must be blind" is presumption since it is impossible to prove that God doesn't exist, so far as anyone can tell.
"the amount of damage (direct and indirect) that has been perpetrated on humanity in the name of vague ethereal omnipotent beings is so stunning that very few people even realize it"
That's a myth perpetrated by Dawkins and others. Most religions are explicitly peace-seeking. Christianity, for example, has God himself say "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.".
Even if a particular religion isn't explicitly peace-seeking most wars and abuses laid at the foot of religions could very well be caused by power-greedy men (and there are many of them), or men with other worthless motives, using religion for their own ends. There are many recognised examples in history. The situation isn't as clear as given by Dawkins et al. And then there are the fanatics, of whom all movements are afflicted.
Another example of religious non-abuse is Catholic priests. By all available statistics (and there aren't many, strangely) there are less Catholic priests abusing kids than the general population. That salient fact is missing from almost all criticism of the Catholic clergy on this issue. And yet the propaganda is so intense that most catholic clergy in the UK dress casually when travelling in order to avoid being spat on and punched. Long gone is the priest in a cassock of Hitchcock's "I Confess". I speak as a witness as some of these fellows are acquaintances.
Even the inquisition itself is worthy of a more lenient modern eye. As Tennyson said "The blackest lie is the half truth", with which the Inquisition was mostly concerned, and now increasingly: modern science.
Biblical literalism, upon which creationism depends, is a minority christian idea. Most Christians are not bound to such a view of the Bible, and can accept that God's words to Moses may have been aimed at a non-scientist.
Protestantism, which holds that the Bible has no higher authority on Earth, is liable to biblical literalism since otherwise the Bible requires an interpreter with authority over the Bible (like Catholics and Orthodox, who claim the guidance of God for their authority). Interestingly most protestants indulge in biblical interpretation anyway. It's a mess.
The context of this debate is not examined: Christians, in the main, are not formal creationists.
It is particularly scandalous because Creationists are delivering a message within a realm in which they have no authority, science, rather than witnessing to God the Saviour: Jesus Christ.
Quoting 'more to come'...."why the Pickaxe book is what killed Ruby"
I'll be interested in what he says, at least on this subject. I;ve never liked the pickaxe book. It was a most unexciting read that failed to get me in to meta programming, one of Ruby's major strengths. Considering how enjoyable the forerunner was, "The Pragmatic Programmer", this book put me off any other of their productions, since it appears that when these authors tackle concrete material they can't deliver.
A highly dynamic, introspective language, like ruby, is by its nature going to be a slower language. And Ruby is one of the most dynamic, and one of the slowest. Python is also dynamic, and is also slow for it. These languages are NEVER going to be fast. Whereas Java's dynamic/introspective languages features are so limited they have no practical performance penalty.
When I was a kid a neighbour knew I liked higher quality music playback. He happened to have a cheap Rotel based HI-FI setup. The amp was 27 watts which surprised me as I had assumed more was better, but it seemed plenty loud enough. He put "Momentary Lapse of Reason" (Pink Floyd) on his turntable (a quality record player) and I very nearly had a religious experience.
Since then I've realised that most people have no idea what true Hi-Fi is, and have expensive junk instead. If they heard the real thing they wouldn't bother even with CDs.
I doubt it. They're so nearly equivalent that proficiency in one disqualifies the other. In the case of Rails/Django, I'm finding that Rails' poor docs (ambiguities, the lack-of, and little cross-referencing) is a pain in the butt. Further Rails has no support for prepared statements (does Django?). And rails hosting options (mongrel etc) are not solid.
It is possible that if you are a meta-programming addict that Ruby might be worth learning as it goes quite a lot further than Python.
To spell it out : it is expensive to produce a web app compared to a desktop app, so if you don't need the advantage of no installation and universal access (or near enough), which is almost always the case for internal projects (specific business needs), then save yourself a ton of money and use VB or Java or Delphi or MFC.
"And there doesn't seem to be a significant advantage to web apps..... for specific business needs."
A business with a specific internal developement requirement doesn't usually require the advantages of web apps, and would save themselves a lot of money by doing it as a desktop app.
Perhaps I'm wrong but it does seem to me that for specific business needs coding up a desktop app is hugely quicker than doing it as a web app. And there doesn't seem to be a significant advantage to web apps.
Perhaps one day something even better than Django (or Rails) will come along and equal the power of desktop development, but I don't think it has happened yet.
Actually the Kernel has only been good since Vista. Before Vista multi-threaded synchronization used 'events', which are very hard to get right and the result has been a lot of subtle bugs.
Since Vista we now have condition variables which the rest of the sane world has had for a while now. It is not entirely MS's fault: they were threading pioneers, and condition variables weren't an option at the time.
Still to be addressed is least privilege access control: but that isn't entirely a Kernel problem.
Start with Euclid's books and progress organically from there. And always be prepared to research words, like 'induction' (used in maths but has serious philosophical problems). And pick up plenty of 'popular' maths book: they give depth and dimension to dry old equations.
If you just go to a library and get a collection of books, or pay for a course, you will learn to solve equations and yet understand very little. It would certainly be enough for employment purposes, but not for enjoyment and creativity that might actually be finacially much more rewarding.
Actually Windows is quite well behaved in this respect.
Try running a harddrive activity utility to track down the app accessing your platters. It will probably turn out to be 3rd party. Process Monitor should do it.
Tiered meters? Like water and electricity meters? Not likely. In the UK we can sign up to limited band-width (at a cheaper price, but I would rather pay for what I use) without anyone violating our houses with meters.
You probably need flat-rate for net access because :
1)you download a lot, but are unwilling to pay for it (but in fairness you should)
or perhaps because
2)you need insurance against the effect of infection by a spamming worm
The latter would be better detected if your rate of usage were clearly visible as it would be with a metered system. Perhaps there would be less spamming worms as a result.
Compare the webhost world, which operates under natural conditions: there aren't many that offer unlimited bandwidth because they would have to be crazy!!!, or clever at writing T&Cs! Or, of course: criminal.
Net neutrality is artificial: and when nature hits out it'll disappear because it has no basis in hard reality.
Slashdot Mirror
Faith is defined as trusting in God because He has revealed himself; nothing blind about that.
The origin of the word is 'steadfast' or 'loyal', and there was never any idea, until Pascal and Kierkegaard made their unhelpful contributions, that faith is blind/irrational. Trust, after all, only makes sense when trustworthiness is established. It is stupid to say "I'll trust you" to someone who hasn't earned it.
Christians claim that God's revelation of himself is direct, and to any individual who sincerely and persistently asks for it; as Christ said "Knock and it shall be opened to you". It trumps the claim of the agnostic "It is impossible to prove the existence of a God", and doesn't do atheists many favours either.
It may not solve the problem of why so many religions claim exclusivity (though they share more than they disagree on), but it is a rational basis for belief in the existence of God.
"That God doesn't exist so faith must be blind" is presumption since it is impossible to prove that God doesn't exist, so far as anyone can tell.
"the amount of damage (direct and indirect) that has been perpetrated on humanity in the name of vague ethereal omnipotent beings is so stunning that very few people even realize it"
That's a myth perpetrated by Dawkins and others. Most religions are explicitly peace-seeking. Christianity, for example, has God himself say "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.".
Even if a particular religion isn't explicitly peace-seeking most wars and abuses laid at the foot of religions could very well be caused by power-greedy men (and there are many of them), or men with other worthless motives, using religion for their own ends. There are many recognised examples in history. The situation isn't as clear as given by Dawkins et al. And then there are the fanatics, of whom all movements are afflicted.
Another example of religious non-abuse is Catholic priests. By all available statistics (and there aren't many, strangely) there are less Catholic priests abusing kids than the general population. That salient fact is missing from almost all criticism of the Catholic clergy on this issue. And yet the propaganda is so intense that most catholic clergy in the UK dress casually when travelling in order to avoid being spat on and punched. Long gone is the priest in a cassock of Hitchcock's "I Confess". I speak as a witness as some of these fellows are acquaintances.
Even the inquisition itself is worthy of a more lenient modern eye. As Tennyson said "The blackest lie is the half truth", with which the Inquisition was mostly concerned, and now increasingly: modern science.
Biblical literalism, upon which creationism depends, is a minority christian idea. Most Christians are not bound to such a view of the Bible, and can accept that God's words to Moses may have been aimed at a non-scientist.
Protestantism, which holds that the Bible has no higher authority on Earth, is liable to biblical literalism since otherwise the Bible requires an interpreter with authority over the Bible (like Catholics and Orthodox, who claim the guidance of God for their authority). Interestingly most protestants indulge in biblical interpretation anyway. It's a mess.
The context of this debate is not examined: Christians, in the main, are not formal creationists.
It is particularly scandalous because Creationists are delivering a message within a realm in which they have no authority, science, rather than witnessing to God the Saviour: Jesus Christ.
Quoting 'more to come'...."why the Pickaxe book is what killed Ruby"
I'll be interested in what he says, at least on this subject. I;ve never liked the pickaxe book. It was a most unexciting read that failed to get me in to meta programming, one of Ruby's major strengths. Considering how enjoyable the forerunner was, "The Pragmatic Programmer", this book put me off any other of their productions, since it appears that when these authors tackle concrete material they can't deliver.
A highly dynamic, introspective language, like ruby, is by its nature going to be a slower language. And Ruby is one of the most dynamic, and one of the slowest. Python is also dynamic, and is also slow for it. These languages are NEVER going to be fast. Whereas Java's dynamic/introspective languages features are so limited they have no practical performance penalty.
Who's the troll here?
When I was a kid a neighbour knew I liked higher quality music playback. He happened to have a cheap Rotel based HI-FI setup. The amp was 27 watts which surprised me as I had assumed more was better, but it seemed plenty loud enough. He put "Momentary Lapse of Reason" (Pink Floyd) on his turntable (a quality record player) and I very nearly had a religious experience.
Since then I've realised that most people have no idea what true Hi-Fi is, and have expensive junk instead. If they heard the real thing they wouldn't bother even with CDs.
I doubt it. They're so nearly equivalent that proficiency in one disqualifies the other. In the case of Rails/Django, I'm finding that Rails' poor docs (ambiguities, the lack-of, and little cross-referencing) is a pain in the butt. Further Rails has no support for prepared statements (does Django?). And rails hosting options (mongrel etc) are not solid. It is possible that if you are a meta-programming addict that Ruby might be worth learning as it goes quite a lot further than Python.
Well, there are some desktop dev frameworks that might be even slower than web app development; particularly thinking of MFC and Java.
To spell it out : it is expensive to produce a web app compared to a desktop app, so if you don't need the advantage of no installation and universal access (or near enough), which is almost always the case for internal projects (specific business needs), then save yourself a ton of money and use VB or Java or Delphi or MFC.
I didn't notice any buzzwords in "specific business needs".
Business software that is general in usefulness is justified in being written as a web-app. Now think of the opposite.
Your wrote : "No advantage to web apps?!?"
and I wrote :
"And there doesn't seem to be a significant advantage to web apps..... for specific business needs."
A business with a specific internal developement requirement doesn't usually require the advantages of web apps, and would save themselves a lot of money by doing it as a desktop app.
Perhaps I'm wrong but it does seem to me that for specific business needs coding up a desktop app is hugely quicker than doing it as a web app. And there doesn't seem to be a significant advantage to web apps.
Perhaps one day something even better than Django (or Rails) will come along and equal the power of desktop development, but I don't think it has happened yet.
But to be really effective the blackmailer needs a little substance behind his demands for money.
With such disproportiate laws, particularly of seizure, innocent US citizens are now wide open to black-mail.
A determined enemy only has to have a few minutes access to your computer, download a few songs and then report you.
...but all I want is a nice cup of tea.
I think you are very confused as to what 'hate' is.
Actually the Kernel has only been good since Vista. Before Vista multi-threaded synchronization used 'events', which are very hard to get right and the result has been a lot of subtle bugs.
Since Vista we now have condition variables which the rest of the sane world has had for a while now. It is not entirely MS's fault: they were threading pioneers, and condition variables weren't an option at the time.
Still to be addressed is least privilege access control: but that isn't entirely a Kernel problem.
"exceptionally efficient"
If that is right then we are facing the possibility of solid-rock-ice-earth.
Start with Euclid's books and progress organically from there. And always be prepared to research words, like 'induction' (used in maths but has serious philosophical problems). And pick up plenty of 'popular' maths book: they give depth and dimension to dry old equations.
If you just go to a library and get a collection of books, or pay for a course, you will learn to solve equations and yet understand very little. It would certainly be enough for employment purposes, but not for enjoyment and creativity that might actually be finacially much more rewarding.
Try running a harddrive activity utility to track down the app accessing your platters. It will probably turn out to be 3rd party. Process Monitor should do it.
"He said what he meant and he meant what he said."
Just like a private, except that he's a general.
"Wanking" is rough-slang English from England, and means 'masturbating'. But Torvalds sure ain't one of us.
Tiered meters? Like water and electricity meters? Not likely. In the UK we can sign up to limited band-width (at a cheaper price, but I would rather pay for what I use) without anyone violating our houses with meters.
You probably need flat-rate for net access because :
1)you download a lot, but are unwilling to pay for it (but in fairness you should)
or perhaps because
2)you need insurance against the effect of infection by a spamming worm
The latter would be better detected if your rate of usage were clearly visible as it would be with a metered system. Perhaps there would be less spamming worms as a result.
Compare the webhost world, which operates under natural conditions: there aren't many that offer unlimited bandwidth because they would have to be crazy!!!, or clever at writing T&Cs! Or, of course: criminal.
Net neutrality is artificial: and when nature hits out it'll disappear because it has no basis in hard reality.
Neutrality means is that you haven't declared yourself, because
a)you don't yet know what the truth is.
b)you're a coward.
c)you've got a nice mountain view on all sides.
d)you're a ninja, which includes b)
I'm not neutral on net neutrality : I hate, I mean really hate, hate , hate, hate paying for all those mega-downloaders (you know who you are).
Net neutrality means I pay much more than I should.
Net-neutrality=injustice.
"Is saying something negative about the Pope really being anti-Catholic?"
He's replying to "Anti-catholicism: the last acceptable prejudice" : while not addressing that issue.