I imagine the pigeon shoot is being done on private property, so it's not like they can just do it wherever they want.
As for the rules near power plants, if model or full scale aircraft are prohibited, the discharging of firearms and hunting probably is too.
I'm pretty sure the hunters were shooting at the model because 1) they were already equipped to do it, 2) it sounded like fun, and 3) they thought they could get away with it. They might claim to be "defending their property" or "defending their privacy", but the police really ought to have a *very* dim view of them discharging firearms at other people's property to do so. Since the police aren't getting involved, the SHARK folk should be suing the hunters for damages -- hit them in the pocketbook.
The hunters could claim that it's tresspassing, but that's a criminal matter, not a civil one, and even if it were the case (which has not been established) it wouldn't give them the right to fire at other people's property.
"Most of us don't own what's under our land, for example."
Wrong. You own what is under you unless you've explicitly given up those rights. e.g., mineral rights sales.
Yes, and most of us have probably given up those rights. Or more accurately, those rights were not part of what we purchased when we purchased the land for our homes.
It sucks, but it's the way things have turned out. If you have an old house, especially one that's stayed in the family for generations, you probably own the mineral rights. If it's a new development, probably not.
Basically back in the day model airplanes didn't go far enough, fast enough, or high enough to matter. There was no video back to the ground that a hobbiest could afford, so it was "stay under 400', and keep it in sight", and basically no rules.
It was never "stay under 400 feet" -- that figure comes from an FAA "advisory" circular that was not mandatory. The AMA has a rule that limits you to 400' within a few miles of an airport, but that's not mandatory either.
Gliders especially are often flown higher than that -- I've gotten mine up to 2500' feet, for example. (And yes, it's a speck that high.)
You're right about "keep it in sight", however. People played with R/C planes with autopilots, but they were rare until recently, and now the FPV stuff has become quite common.
I think you're right on about the implications for the hunters. The courts will see this as a model plane, and the pilots can probably sue the hunters for the damage. (Really, the hunters should be given criminal charges for vandalism, perhaps aggravated for having been done with firearms, but obviously the police aren't interested in that.) The courts probably won't see it as an attack on a manned aircraft, however -- as it's not one.
As I see it, the SHARK folk should get an ultralight or single engine plane and do their surveillance from that. If the hunters shoot at that, the police will have to descend upon the hunters with extreme fury. Yes, they'll need to stay higher, but they can also use better camera equipment.
And even if it is legally tresspassing, that doesn't mean you get to destroy other people's property, no matter where it is. There's laws against that sort of thing.
That said, I do have to question the wisdom of flying a $4k R/C device over a field where somebody is known to be hunting birds. Legal or not, they're almost guaranteed to start taking potshots at your place/helicopter/multicopter. The next step would probably be to get a lawyer and look to sue them for damages, but it's never clear how that sort of thing will go and it's probably best avoid.
If the SHARK people can afford a $4K multicopter, probably the next step is an ultralight or small single engine plane with a human pilot -- us that for their surveillance. If the hunters start shooting at that, the police will *have* to get involved and will probably take it *very* seriously. They will have to obey the FAA regulations (well, their multicopter has to as well, but they're more lax there), which probably means staying up higher than they'd prefer, but it'll also be easier to bring camera equipment with longer lenses so that'll probably work as well.
... Aside from the odd animated gif here and there, I've not really thought I'd encountered one in a LONG time...
Shocked to see it as word of the year...
Even in 2012, animated gifs are more common than you give them credit for. People are even doing really neat things with them such as this (and I've got to admit, a 256 color palette is hard to work with, but they've made it look pretty good for the most part.)
I do concur though, it's odd for it to be the "word of the year" this far after its prime.
1. Write software to do steps #1 and #2 automatically 2. Sell said software. 3. Profit!
I actually suggested this to my employer a decade ago when they had a similar problem with a leaked memo, and they said "thanks" but never followed up on it. I haven't gone looking, but I'll bet there's software out there that does it already.
Regardless, what if someone typos your ESN over another. How does one prove they should not be on the list?
Simply calling the carrier and telling them it's your phone and you did not steal it would probably suffice.
If you bought it on craigslist or ebay, then it probably is stolen, and maybe the police will take it off your hands and return it to the rightful owner.
If you bought it new from the carrier and somebody just fat-fingered the ESN, you'll just show them the receipt (or your carrier will provide proof) that you did buy it and it's not stolen and they'll fix it. It may be that only phones purchased new from the carriers will be so entered anyways, so they're not likely to make such mistakes (as they'll have a record of exactly what phone you bought and have been using.)
Certainly, I would not expect thieves and people who know they have stolen phones to contact the carriers about their phones being disabled (as it's a good way to go to jail), so anybody who contacts them and says the phone wasn't stolen probably could be reasonably trusted. The only exceptions will be people who bought used phones -- and in that case, the serial numbers and ESNs could be verified and if it's the stolen phone, return it, and if not, fix the database.
In my experience, it's pretty much awful "by definition".
If it wasn't awful, people wouldn't be calling it legacy code. They'd be calling it good code, no matter how old it was. It's a derogatory term, at least in my experience. And the older the code is, no matter how skilled or conscientious the authors were (though of course these things do often delay it), the higher the odds that people will start referring to it as the derogatory term "legacy code".
Really though, if I look the term up on wikipedia, they've got a bunch of different definitions --
1: source code that relates to a no-longer supported or manufactured operating system or other computer technology. 2: code inserted into modern software for the purpose of maintaining an older or previously supported feature. 3: it can also apply to executable code that no longer runs on a later version of a system, or requires a compatibility layer to do so. 4: source code inherited from someone else 5: source code inherited from an older version of the software. 6: code without tests
Personally, I was thinking of #4 and #5, and in general, if they're "good" code, people don't really call them legacy code so much -- it's just "the" code.
But in spite of my own preconceived idea of what the term means, if the original poster really wanted a useful answer, he probably shouldn't have used such an ambiguous term -- or if he did, he should have been clear about which definition he was referring to.
As I see it, how to avoid it was the wrong question to ask -- as you really can't avoid it. But what you can do is look for a place with good programming practices (and is open to your own good programming practices, if you're such a person) so at least the code can last as long as possible without getting labelled "legacy code". Though really -- if your code stays in use for decades, that's a testament to your code that goes beyond mere "maintainability" or "elegance", however these things are defined.
Work for a startup. Any place that has been around for any significant length of time is likely to have legacy code.
Realistically, a startup could very well have legacy code too, but it's likely to have much less if it has any. In effect, you'll be the one making the legacy code for those who come after you (or yourself, if you stick around that long.)
Not sure why legacy code is such a problem though. If it works and works well, why replace it? And if it doesn't work, it should have already been replaced.
My field is not astrophysics, but I do know telescope time is hard to come by, so you get what you get.
I didn't go any further than a bachelor's degree in Astronomy and Physics (I got both), and certainly that's not the field that pays the bills (need a PhD for that), but I can say this --
1: you're right, (good) telescope time is hard to come by, so you take what you can get, but
2: the vast majority of work done doesn't involve doing actually using a telescope. It's either analyzing data that you took a while back while you were on the telescope, or data somebody else took involving a telescope, or it doesn't involve telescope data at all.
Clickers and tickers are by far the most common. Most users are merely incapable of discerning "normal" HDD noises from those that are the harbingers of data loss. These users, by and large, will attribute most #3 scenarios to #2... but it's obvious upon inspection that the drive is tapping out "Jingle Bells" to anyone who listens.
Often drives that have done a #2 will make strange noises *after* the fact, but with no unusual noises made before they failed.
Or at least no unusual noise that one would actually notice under normal conditions -- i.e. in a computer, with fans running nearby, possibly other hard drives, etc.
excessive heat (discolored casing), or some other outside influence. I even worked on one that had been shot.
Hard drives don't get enough power to heat them up enough to discolor the casing. Though certainly, you can have one component burn up and release all it's magic smoke, so you'll have a scorched spot on the PCB.
In 30 or so years, I've had one hard drive attempt to cook itself. It was a ST-251 that had something wrong with it where the entire drive would get (literally) too hot to touch after a while, even when installed somewhere with (normally) adequate air flow. No idea why. That said, the drive still worked, so it didn't actually succeed in cooking itself.
(In that same period, I've had a few dozen drives die on me in other ways, but that was the only one that was trying to cook itself.)
As for "other outside influence", I think we can agree that most drives fail due to causes other than being shot with a gun.
With traditional mechanical drives, you usually get a clicking noise accompanied by a time period where you can offload data from the drive before it fails completely.
Usually? No.
This does happen sometimes, but it certainly doesn't happen "usually". There's enough different failure mechanisms for hard drives that there isn't any one "usual" method --
1- drive starts reporting read and/or write errors occasionally, but otherwise seems to keep working 2- drive just suddenly stops working completely all at once 3- drive starts making noise (and performance usually drops massively), but the drive still works. 4- drive seems to keep working, but smart data starts reporting all sorts of problems.
Personally, I've had #1 happen more often than anything else, usually with a healthy serving of #4 at about the same time or shortly before. #2 is the next most common failure mode, at least in my experience.
Anyhow, given that JavaScript runs on the client, that shouldn't be as big a problem as if they wrote code running on a server, as long as reasonable precautions have been taken to vet what you do with incoming data.
There's still plenty of room for security holes, if that's what you're after.
Just because the code runs on the client, that doesn't mean it's not important. I can understand why a company would want everybody to know the basics of programming, but making the people who's jobs have nothing to do with programming (and therefore have little programming experience) contribute production code seems like a strange policy.
... as long as it doesn't strike in those first few minutes where I have a freshly installed system and am using IE to download FIrefox (IE is great for this, by the way!)... then I should be safe!
Your cited organization has a list called "therapeutic use exceptions", right there on their front page. If Lance has a legitimate, therapeutic use exception for a specific drug at a specific time, is his use within these exceptions still considered doping?
The WADA probably thinks "no", and would probably not call him a liar for claiming that he was not doping if it was in reference to that specific use.
(I guess if you wanted to be *sure* what they think, you could ask.)
Though really, just because an organization has the word "Doping" in their name, that doesn't mean theirs is the only possible definition of the word.
You simply prove that Armstrong was correct in just dropping out of any defense.
I haven't proven anything. I've simply described how words can have different meanings to different people and in different contexts.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence though, and barring said evidence, the simplest solution still tends to be more likely.
I mean, which is more likely to be possible?
A ten-plus year coverup effort assisted by who knows how many people, being able to fool labs in how many different places at how many different times, your life being put under the microscope for years on end OR Lance Armstrong is a very talented, able cyclist.
Well, you've not really been fair to the doubters in your second example. More accurate would be :
Lance Armstrong is a very talented, able cyclist. In fact, he's the most talented, able cyclist ever, and been found to be even more talented and able than many world class cyclists who *have* been caught using prohibited substances.
(If you put it like that, then it's not quite so clear which is more likely, is it?)
But my point was more about what Occam's Razor really is. It's a useful tool in the sciences, but it sometimes fails -- sometimes the more complicated scenario is actually the correct one. It's not something to be used in a proof of anything.
Personally, I think they need to leave Lance alone. Maybe he did it, maybe not -- I don't know. But all their "witnesses" have been given strong incentives to testify against Lance, even if they have to make stuff up, and the only real science in this witchhunt -- the actual blood tests -- have all show him to be clean.
Therefore, the child doesn't deserve to be punished with death for a crime he or she didn't commit.
It's not punishment. It is a medical procedure. Furthermore, it is a medical procedure being performed on someone who is not you, therefore you have no say in the matter. If and when it is your uterus which has been forcibly impregnated, then by all means, you will get to make that call.
It's not nearly that simple.
If you feel that life begins at conception and the fetus is a full fledged human being entitled to all the legal protections any other human is and killing this fetus is murder (as many do, especially religious folk with strong conservative political leanings), then it's not so simple at all.
If you believe this, by allowing the abortion you're allowing the child to be punished with death for a crime they did not commit.
If you don't allow the abortion, then you're forcing the mother to be punished by having to house a fetus that was forced upon her.
You can't have it both ways -- it's one or the other. Either you're allowing the mother to kill the fetus, or forcing her to let it live inside her until it's born. Either way, somebody is being punished for a crime they did not commit.
Of course, if you don't believe that a fetus is a full fledged human being yet, then things become much simpler.
Occam's Razor is so dull these days, using it makes hair grow back...
Again, one does not "use" Occam's Razor to prove anything.
Yes, the most likely scenario in 9/11 is that Al-Queda hatched a plot to attack the US and it worked, and Occam's Razor suggests that you should consider that this is what really happened (since it's the simplest scenario in the popular usage, or because it has the fewest assumptions in more formal language) -- but one can't use Occam's Razor to "prove" that it wasn't really a Bush conspiracy or anything else on this list. For all we know, maybe one of the nutty conspiracy theories was actually correct.
Because he has admitted to taking banned substances, both steroids and EPO, as part of his cancer treatment (to mitigate the effects of chemotherapy). That use was within the rules.
He can hardly say he's never taken banned substances when he's already admitted that he has.
If said substances are normally banned, but were not banned *for him* because they were part of his cancer treatment, then he can honestly say that he was not taking banned substances.
You're welcome to interpret his statement how you see fit, but so is he, and if you're trying to determine if *he* lied or not, his interpretation is more important than yours.
If you buy it new on eBay, they get zero sales (it had already been purchased, they already have the money) but the people who stockpile will be more likely to continue to do so.
That *exact* same argument also applies if you buy it at Walmart, Amazon, etc. The only differences are in how long they keep the movie in stock before they sell it and how long they might have to wait to replenish their stock if they run out.
If you buy it used on eBay, they get zero (additional) sales, but people who sell used movies will be more likely to continue buying them.
I'm pretty sure Disney (and other content producers) would like to ban this practice -- but the law is not behind them on this. Not yet, anyways.
They could do like the PC game makers are doing, however -- require online activation to an account that contains all your games and they can't be removed. Yes, you could make separate accounts for every game, but that is a pain in the neck, and once you've played the game it's too late to change your mind.
If they can find a way to make this palatable to the consumers, they'll be doing it. (For PC gamers, it was forced on them, and I imagine the console gamers are next. It's a little harder to do with a movie, but Disney has smart people working for them, I imagine they'll figure out a way eventually. Divx was sort of an early venture into this -- it failed, but they'll learn from that mistake and try something else.)
If you pirate it, they get zero sales.
And they'd like to stop this practice too -- and the law *is* behind them on it. (The law is pretty ineffective at stopping it for several reasons, but it *is* against the law.)
In the long term, stupidity leads to failure, always.
And if it doesn't lead to failure, the term just wasn't long enough... is that it?
Back in the real world, it looks like Battleship is going to make a reasonable profit. They may consider it a failure -- maybe it didn't make as much money as they were hoping, but even so... making money isn't particularly stupid. It's not like they're burning bridges -- not everybody hated the movie as much as you did, and I imagine that their last movies weren't awesome either, yet you still went to see Battleship. Were you really expecting an awesome movie?
I believe the number of people that want to "own" a movie constitute a small minority. Very small.
How small?
I mean, Walmart has a pretty big section of DVDs and Bluray movies for sale, and it seems like there's a pretty large number of people who collect movies.
Yes, the movies are available for rent for $1 at a Redbox, but people still spend $15 to buy the movie. While people who are willing to pay that much of a premium to "own" the movie probably are indeed a minority -- I don't think they're a "very small minority".
While you may not want to re-watch anything produced by Hollywood -- it seems that many do. And many others seem to keep buying movies but yet rarely watch what they own.
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I imagine the pigeon shoot is being done on private property, so it's not like they can just do it wherever they want.
As for the rules near power plants, if model or full scale aircraft are prohibited, the discharging of firearms and hunting probably is too.
I'm pretty sure the hunters were shooting at the model because 1) they were already equipped to do it, 2) it sounded like fun, and 3) they thought they could get away with it. They might claim to be "defending their property" or "defending their privacy", but the police really ought to have a *very* dim view of them discharging firearms at other people's property to do so. Since the police aren't getting involved, the SHARK folk should be suing the hunters for damages -- hit them in the pocketbook.
The hunters could claim that it's tresspassing, but that's a criminal matter, not a civil one, and even if it were the case (which has not been established) it wouldn't give them the right to fire at other people's property.
"Most of us don't own what's under our land, for example."
Wrong. You own what is under you unless you've explicitly given up those rights. e.g., mineral rights sales.
Yes, and most of us have probably given up those rights. Or more accurately, those rights were not part of what we purchased when we purchased the land for our homes.
It sucks, but it's the way things have turned out. If you have an old house, especially one that's stayed in the family for generations, you probably own the mineral rights. If it's a new development, probably not.
Basically back in the day model airplanes didn't go far enough, fast enough, or high enough to matter. There was no video back to the ground that a hobbiest could afford, so it was "stay under 400', and keep it in sight", and basically no rules.
It was never "stay under 400 feet" -- that figure comes from an FAA "advisory" circular that was not mandatory. The AMA has a rule that limits you to 400' within a few miles of an airport, but that's not mandatory either.
Gliders especially are often flown higher than that -- I've gotten mine up to 2500' feet, for example. (And yes, it's a speck that high.)
You're right about "keep it in sight", however. People played with R/C planes with autopilots, but they were rare until recently, and now the FPV stuff has become quite common.
I think you're right on about the implications for the hunters. The courts will see this as a model plane, and the pilots can probably sue the hunters for the damage. (Really, the hunters should be given criminal charges for vandalism, perhaps aggravated for having been done with firearms, but obviously the police aren't interested in that.) The courts probably won't see it as an attack on a manned aircraft, however -- as it's not one.
As I see it, the SHARK folk should get an ultralight or single engine plane and do their surveillance from that. If the hunters shoot at that, the police will have to descend upon the hunters with extreme fury. Yes, they'll need to stay higher, but they can also use better camera equipment.
And even if it is legally tresspassing, that doesn't mean you get to destroy other people's property, no matter where it is. There's laws against that sort of thing.
That said, I do have to question the wisdom of flying a $4k R/C device over a field where somebody is known to be hunting birds. Legal or not, they're almost guaranteed to start taking potshots at your place/helicopter/multicopter. The next step would probably be to get a lawyer and look to sue them for damages, but it's never clear how that sort of thing will go and it's probably best avoid.
If the SHARK people can afford a $4K multicopter, probably the next step is an ultralight or small single engine plane with a human pilot -- us that for their surveillance. If the hunters start shooting at that, the police will *have* to get involved and will probably take it *very* seriously. They will have to obey the FAA regulations (well, their multicopter has to as well, but they're more lax there), which probably means staying up higher than they'd prefer, but it'll also be easier to bring camera equipment with longer lenses so that'll probably work as well.
Does anyone actually even USE gifs anymore??
Aside from the odd animated gif here and there, I've not really thought I'd encountered one in a LONG time...
Shocked to see it as word of the year...
Even in 2012, animated gifs are more common than you give them credit for. People are even doing really neat things with them such as this (and I've got to admit, a 256 color palette is hard to work with, but they've made it look pretty good for the most part.)
I do concur though, it's odd for it to be the "word of the year" this far after its prime.
1. Write software to do steps #1 and #2 automatically
2. Sell said software.
3. Profit!
I actually suggested this to my employer a decade ago when they had a similar problem with a leaked memo, and they said "thanks" but never followed up on it. I haven't gone looking, but I'll bet there's software out there that does it already.
You're not thinking like Kevin Mitnick.
Nope, probably not.
"How could one game the system?"
Well, I guess we'll soon find out, won't we? (I don't expect large problems, but we'll see ...)
Regardless, what if someone typos your ESN over another. How does one prove they should not be on the list?
Simply calling the carrier and telling them it's your phone and you did not steal it would probably suffice.
If you bought it on craigslist or ebay, then it probably is stolen, and maybe the police will take it off your hands and return it to the rightful owner.
If you bought it new from the carrier and somebody just fat-fingered the ESN, you'll just show them the receipt (or your carrier will provide proof) that you did buy it and it's not stolen and they'll fix it. It may be that only phones purchased new from the carriers will be so entered anyways, so they're not likely to make such mistakes (as they'll have a record of exactly what phone you bought and have been using.)
Certainly, I would not expect thieves and people who know they have stolen phones to contact the carriers about their phones being disabled (as it's a good way to go to jail), so anybody who contacts them and says the phone wasn't stolen probably could be reasonably trusted. The only exceptions will be people who bought used phones -- and in that case, the serial numbers and ESNs could be verified and if it's the stolen phone, return it, and if not, fix the database.
In my experience, it's pretty much awful "by definition".
If it wasn't awful, people wouldn't be calling it legacy code. They'd be calling it good code, no matter how old it was. It's a derogatory term, at least in my experience. And the older the code is, no matter how skilled or conscientious the authors were (though of course these things do often delay it), the higher the odds that people will start referring to it as the derogatory term "legacy code".
Really though, if I look the term up on wikipedia, they've got a bunch of different definitions --
1: source code that relates to a no-longer supported or manufactured operating system or other computer technology.
2: code inserted into modern software for the purpose of maintaining an older or previously supported feature.
3: it can also apply to executable code that no longer runs on a later version of a system, or requires a compatibility layer to do so.
4: source code inherited from someone else
5: source code inherited from an older version of the software.
6: code without tests
Personally, I was thinking of #4 and #5, and in general, if they're "good" code, people don't really call them legacy code so much -- it's just "the" code.
But in spite of my own preconceived idea of what the term means, if the original poster really wanted a useful answer, he probably shouldn't have used such an ambiguous term -- or if he did, he should have been clear about which definition he was referring to.
As I see it, how to avoid it was the wrong question to ask -- as you really can't avoid it. But what you can do is look for a place with good programming practices (and is open to your own good programming practices, if you're such a person) so at least the code can last as long as possible without getting labelled "legacy code". Though really -- if your code stays in use for decades, that's a testament to your code that goes beyond mere "maintainability" or "elegance", however these things are defined.
Work for a startup. Any place that has been around for any significant length of time is likely to have legacy code.
Realistically, a startup could very well have legacy code too, but it's likely to have much less if it has any. In effect, you'll be the one making the legacy code for those who come after you (or yourself, if you stick around that long.)
Not sure why legacy code is such a problem though. If it works and works well, why replace it? And if it doesn't work, it should have already been replaced.
My field is not astrophysics, but I do know telescope time is hard to come by, so you get what you get.
I didn't go any further than a bachelor's degree in Astronomy and Physics (I got both), and certainly that's not the field that pays the bills (need a PhD for that), but I can say this --
1: you're right, (good) telescope time is hard to come by, so you take what you can get, but
2: the vast majority of work done doesn't involve doing actually using a telescope. It's either analyzing data that you took a while back while you were on the telescope, or data somebody else took involving a telescope, or it doesn't involve telescope data at all.
Clickers and tickers are by far the most common. Most users are merely incapable of discerning "normal" HDD noises from those that are the harbingers of data loss. These users, by and large, will attribute most #3 scenarios to #2... but it's obvious upon inspection that the drive is tapping out "Jingle Bells" to anyone who listens.
Often drives that have done a #2 will make strange noises *after* the fact, but with no unusual noises made before they failed.
Or at least no unusual noise that one would actually notice under normal conditions -- i.e. in a computer, with fans running nearby, possibly other hard drives, etc.
excessive heat (discolored casing), or some other outside influence. I even worked on one that had been shot.
Hard drives don't get enough power to heat them up enough to discolor the casing. Though certainly, you can have one component burn up and release all it's magic smoke, so you'll have a scorched spot on the PCB.
In 30 or so years, I've had one hard drive attempt to cook itself. It was a ST-251 that had something wrong with it where the entire drive would get (literally) too hot to touch after a while, even when installed somewhere with (normally) adequate air flow. No idea why. That said, the drive still worked, so it didn't actually succeed in cooking itself.
(In that same period, I've had a few dozen drives die on me in other ways, but that was the only one that was trying to cook itself.)
As for "other outside influence", I think we can agree that most drives fail due to causes other than being shot with a gun.
With traditional mechanical drives, you usually get a clicking noise accompanied by a time period where you can offload data from the drive before it fails completely.
Usually? No.
This does happen sometimes, but it certainly doesn't happen "usually". There's enough different failure mechanisms for hard drives that there isn't any one "usual" method --
1- drive starts reporting read and/or write errors occasionally, but otherwise seems to keep working
2- drive just suddenly stops working completely all at once
3- drive starts making noise (and performance usually drops massively), but the drive still works.
4- drive seems to keep working, but smart data starts reporting all sorts of problems.
Personally, I've had #1 happen more often than anything else, usually with a healthy serving of #4 at about the same time or shortly before. #2 is the next most common failure mode, at least in my experience.
Isn't "JavaScript code" an oxymoron?
No, it's not.
Anyhow, given that JavaScript runs on the client, that shouldn't be as big a problem as if they wrote code running on a server, as long as reasonable precautions have been taken to vet what you do with incoming data.
There's still plenty of room for security holes, if that's what you're after.
Just because the code runs on the client, that doesn't mean it's not important. I can understand why a company would want everybody to know the basics of programming, but making the people who's jobs have nothing to do with programming (and therefore have little programming experience) contribute production code seems like a strange policy.
... as long as it doesn't strike in those first few minutes where I have a freshly installed system and am using IE to download FIrefox (IE is great for this, by the way!) ... then I should be safe!
Your cited organization has a list called "therapeutic use exceptions", right there on their front page. If Lance has a legitimate, therapeutic use exception for a specific drug at a specific time, is his use within these exceptions still considered doping?
The WADA probably thinks "no", and would probably not call him a liar for claiming that he was not doping if it was in reference to that specific use.
(I guess if you wanted to be *sure* what they think, you could ask.)
Though really, just because an organization has the word "Doping" in their name, that doesn't mean theirs is the only possible definition of the word.
You simply prove that Armstrong was correct in just dropping out of any defense.
I haven't proven anything. I've simply described how words can have different meanings to different people and in different contexts.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence though, and barring said evidence, the simplest solution still tends to be more likely.
I mean, which is more likely to be possible?
A ten-plus year coverup effort assisted by who knows how many people, being able to fool labs in how many different places at how many different times, your life being put under the microscope for years on end
OR
Lance Armstrong is a very talented, able cyclist.
Well, you've not really been fair to the doubters in your second example. More accurate would be :
Lance Armstrong is a very talented, able cyclist. In fact, he's the most talented, able cyclist ever, and been found to be even more talented and able than many world class cyclists who *have* been caught using prohibited substances.
(If you put it like that, then it's not quite so clear which is more likely, is it?)
But my point was more about what Occam's Razor really is. It's a useful tool in the sciences, but it sometimes fails -- sometimes the more complicated scenario is actually the correct one. It's not something to be used in a proof of anything.
Personally, I think they need to leave Lance alone. Maybe he did it, maybe not -- I don't know. But all their "witnesses" have been given strong incentives to testify against Lance, even if they have to make stuff up, and the only real science in this witchhunt -- the actual blood tests -- have all show him to be clean.
How do you define "doped" ?
(And even more importantly, how does *he* define "doped"?)
If the definition is "used substances that were not permitted" or something along those lines, then he has not yet been shown to have doped.
Therefore, the child doesn't deserve to be punished with death for a crime he or she didn't commit.
It's not punishment. It is a medical procedure. Furthermore, it is a medical procedure being performed on someone who is not you, therefore you have no say in the matter. If and when it is your uterus which has been forcibly impregnated, then by all means, you will get to make that call.
It's not nearly that simple.
If you feel that life begins at conception and the fetus is a full fledged human being entitled to all the legal protections any other human is and killing this fetus is murder (as many do, especially religious folk with strong conservative political leanings), then it's not so simple at all.
If you believe this, by allowing the abortion you're allowing the child to be punished with death for a crime they did not commit.
If you don't allow the abortion, then you're forcing the mother to be punished by having to house a fetus that was forced upon her.
You can't have it both ways -- it's one or the other. Either you're allowing the mother to kill the fetus, or forcing her to let it live inside her until it's born. Either way, somebody is being punished for a crime they did not commit.
Of course, if you don't believe that a fetus is a full fledged human being yet, then things become much simpler.
Occam's Razor is so dull these days, using it makes hair grow back...
Again, one does not "use" Occam's Razor to prove anything.
Yes, the most likely scenario in 9/11 is that Al-Queda hatched a plot to attack the US and it worked, and Occam's Razor suggests that you should consider that this is what really happened (since it's the simplest scenario in the popular usage, or because it has the fewest assumptions in more formal language) -- but one can't use Occam's Razor to "prove" that it wasn't really a Bush conspiracy or anything else on this list. For all we know, maybe one of the nutty conspiracy theories was actually correct.
Does Occam's Razor really mean nothing these days?
It never meant anything. It's a *rule of thumb* (especially as it's commonly used), not a rule.
If you're looking at Occam's Razor for advice on what you should investigate first, then that's a good use of it.
If you're looking at Occam's Razor to prove that the unlikely/complicated/etc. situation can't be what really happened, you have failed.
Because he has admitted to taking banned substances, both steroids and EPO, as part of his cancer treatment (to mitigate the effects of chemotherapy). That use was within the rules.
He can hardly say he's never taken banned substances when he's already admitted that he has.
If said substances are normally banned, but were not banned *for him* because they were part of his cancer treatment, then he can honestly say that he was not taking banned substances.
You're welcome to interpret his statement how you see fit, but so is he, and if you're trying to determine if *he* lied or not, his interpretation is more important than yours.
If you buy it new on eBay, they get zero sales (it had already been purchased, they already have the money) but the people who stockpile will be more likely to continue to do so.
That *exact* same argument also applies if you buy it at Walmart, Amazon, etc. The only differences are in how long they keep the movie in stock before they sell it and how long they might have to wait to replenish their stock if they run out.
If you buy it used on eBay, they get zero (additional) sales, but people who sell used movies will be more likely to continue buying them.
I'm pretty sure Disney (and other content producers) would like to ban this practice -- but the law is not behind them on this. Not yet, anyways.
They could do like the PC game makers are doing, however -- require online activation to an account that contains all your games and they can't be removed. Yes, you could make separate accounts for every game, but that is a pain in the neck, and once you've played the game it's too late to change your mind.
If they can find a way to make this palatable to the consumers, they'll be doing it. (For PC gamers, it was forced on them, and I imagine the console gamers are next. It's a little harder to do with a movie, but Disney has smart people working for them, I imagine they'll figure out a way eventually. Divx was sort of an early venture into this -- it failed, but they'll learn from that mistake and try something else.)
If you pirate it, they get zero sales.
And they'd like to stop this practice too -- and the law *is* behind them on it. (The law is pretty ineffective at stopping it for several reasons, but it *is* against the law.)
In the long term, stupidity leads to failure, always.
And if it doesn't lead to failure, the term just wasn't long enough ... is that it?
Back in the real world, it looks like Battleship is going to make a reasonable profit. They may consider it a failure -- maybe it didn't make as much money as they were hoping, but even so ... making money isn't particularly stupid. It's not like they're burning bridges -- not everybody hated the movie as much as you did, and I imagine that their last movies weren't awesome either, yet you still went to see Battleship. Were you really expecting an awesome movie?
I believe the number of people that want to "own" a movie constitute a small minority. Very small.
How small?
I mean, Walmart has a pretty big section of DVDs and Bluray movies for sale, and it seems like there's a pretty large number of people who collect movies.
Yes, the movies are available for rent for $1 at a Redbox, but people still spend $15 to buy the movie. While people who are willing to pay that much of a premium to "own" the movie probably are indeed a minority -- I don't think they're a "very small minority".
While you may not want to re-watch anything produced by Hollywood -- it seems that many do. And many others seem to keep buying movies but yet rarely watch what they own.