I'll be the first to condemn the national-level political will of this country. National leaders here are elected less for their leadership ability or ideas than for their skill at remaining non-offensive without crossing the line into appearing weak. It's the epitome of bland irresponsibility, and I can't possibly defend it. I expect you and I would agree more than we'd disagree on many peripheral subjects.
The sticking point for me on the topic is simply this blithe assumption that seems lately more and more prevalent in the world that a walk down every street in every town in the U.S. is actually a swim through a sea of nonstop ignorance and fundamentalist fog-vision.
It's simply not the concrete reality, and smacks of the same kind of ignorance "Americans are" purported to all exercise. The government is the result of elections, yes. But not consensus. And the dissenters are not a small minority by any measure.
I could just as easily have said "I observe far more bright people randomly in the grocery store than I do liverless ultra-masochists." But I appreciate the thrust of your argument. I CAN'T say "I've randomly plucked 1,000 Americans from throughout the nation and engaged each of them in extensive conversation about life, the universe and everything". But then, I said from the start that there are some pretty dramatic regional variations in American perspective.
And I'm also a big fan of cynicism, as are you, based on your "most people are no better than paranoid, delusional, shaved chimpanzees" statement. At this point, however, it seems like we're not talking so much about Americans and their inherent capacities, but human beings and their relationships with their organizational leaders.
You won't get any argument from me about the inmates having successfully taken over the asylum (or the perhaps the zoo) in the United States.
I know far more bright people than I do liverless ultra-masochists.
Taking it as given that a generalization can have worthwhile utility doesn't negate the clumsiness of statements clearly meant to suggest that all but a tiny percentage of marginalized Americans stumble fearfully from cheeseburger to church to the couch to watch Fox News.
I don't mind my country of origin getting called out for being the home of millions of people who lazily and habitually defer to the loudest voice in the room, rather than take a moment to form their own opinion.
And I don't mind the actions of my government being loudly decried as arrogant, clumsy, and in some cases: motivated by genuine corruption.
Nor do I mind when religious zealots of any nation are criticized for allowing a narrow set of dogma and ritual dictate their entire world view.
What I DO mind:
I resent statements that begin with "Americans are...", "Americans believe...", and "America thinks..."
The United States consists of roughly THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE spread (thinly!) from one North American coast to another. I live in the northeastern USA. I have more in common with my friends in Quebec than I do with Texans, Floridians, or even West Virginians. And I guarantee you there are plenty of Austin, Texas residents who take issue with being lumped in with the entire state. Or even their neighbors.
The U.S. is a very big place, brimming with brilliant, vibrant and insightful individuals whose eyes are pointed right out into the big bright world outside. It's a country born out of a vast cultural confluence -- constantly in flux not only as one moves across state lines, but year to year, as well.
Please keep in mind that there are many of us in the U.S. who DO understand the significance of an established peer-approved scientific theory, who DON'T believe that might always makes right, and -- believe it or not -- even hold onto a thick immutable optimism that our homeland might one day come around.
I estimate only three days before someone successfully compiles Krugle on a shiny new Mactelnix box and ushers in the Singularity overnight, and twenty years ahead of schedule.
"I'm sorry Sergey... I'm afraid I can't do that..."
I don't see where Intel would enjoy any strategic advantage in participating.
Burger King has in the past been fond of touting its #2 status -- as has Pepsi.
But the big boys, McDonald's and Coke, generally like to pretend that #2 doesn't exist. After all, it would only publicly legitimize their fear of a threat by doing so. AMD gets positive publicity whether they play and win, play and lose, or if Intel refuses the contest.
Whereas Intel can only AT BEST hope to win the contest and essentially say "Hey, it's actually true that there are viable alternatives to our technology out there, but just remember that for the time being we outperform the competition by 1.23%."
Your complaint about the F-Lock key stirred up my own longtime irritation with it. It's the only thing I dislike about my MS Natural Multimedia Keyboard.
Realizing how many others were bothered by this prompted me to Google "F-Lock key" and discover this wonderful little registry hack. Note that there are several versions -- be sure to use the right one.
This works! A quick 30-second test of F5-Refresh and PrtScn image pasting have yielded perfect results. My function keys now behave like function keys regardless of the status of the [F] LED.
Now if only this worked when trying to hit F6 during SATA driver initialization in WinXP setup, and F2-activated BIOS access.
Slashdot Mirror
Gabriel from AdBlock here.
Here is our response to Wladimir's post:
http://blog.getadblock.com/201...
I'll be the first to condemn the national-level political will of this country. National leaders here are elected less for their leadership ability or ideas than for their skill at remaining non-offensive without crossing the line into appearing weak. It's the epitome of bland irresponsibility, and I can't possibly defend it. I expect you and I would agree more than we'd disagree on many peripheral subjects. The sticking point for me on the topic is simply this blithe assumption that seems lately more and more prevalent in the world that a walk down every street in every town in the U.S. is actually a swim through a sea of nonstop ignorance and fundamentalist fog-vision. It's simply not the concrete reality, and smacks of the same kind of ignorance "Americans are" purported to all exercise. The government is the result of elections, yes. But not consensus. And the dissenters are not a small minority by any measure.
I could just as easily have said "I observe far more bright people randomly in the grocery store than I do liverless ultra-masochists." But I appreciate the thrust of your argument. I CAN'T say "I've randomly plucked 1,000 Americans from throughout the nation and engaged each of them in extensive conversation about life, the universe and everything". But then, I said from the start that there are some pretty dramatic regional variations in American perspective. And I'm also a big fan of cynicism, as are you, based on your "most people are no better than paranoid, delusional, shaved chimpanzees" statement. At this point, however, it seems like we're not talking so much about Americans and their inherent capacities, but human beings and their relationships with their organizational leaders. You won't get any argument from me about the inmates having successfully taken over the asylum (or the perhaps the zoo) in the United States.
I know far more bright people than I do liverless ultra-masochists. Taking it as given that a generalization can have worthwhile utility doesn't negate the clumsiness of statements clearly meant to suggest that all but a tiny percentage of marginalized Americans stumble fearfully from cheeseburger to church to the couch to watch Fox News.
I don't mind my country of origin getting called out for being the home of millions of people who lazily and habitually defer to the loudest voice in the room, rather than take a moment to form their own opinion.
And I don't mind the actions of my government being loudly decried as arrogant, clumsy, and in some cases: motivated by genuine corruption.
Nor do I mind when religious zealots of any nation are criticized for allowing a narrow set of dogma and ritual dictate their entire world view.
What I DO mind:
I resent statements that begin with "Americans are...", "Americans believe...", and "America thinks..."
The United States consists of roughly THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE spread (thinly!) from one North American coast to another. I live in the northeastern USA. I have more in common with my friends in Quebec than I do with Texans, Floridians, or even West Virginians. And I guarantee you there are plenty of Austin, Texas residents who take issue with being lumped in with the entire state. Or even their neighbors.
The U.S. is a very big place, brimming with brilliant, vibrant and insightful individuals whose eyes are pointed right out into the big bright world outside. It's a country born out of a vast cultural confluence -- constantly in flux not only as one moves across state lines, but year to year, as well.
Please keep in mind that there are many of us in the U.S. who DO understand the significance of an established peer-approved scientific theory, who DON'T believe that might always makes right, and -- believe it or not -- even hold onto a thick immutable optimism that our homeland might one day come around.
This is a spectacularly bad idea...
I estimate only three days before someone successfully compiles Krugle on a shiny new Mactelnix box and ushers in the Singularity overnight, and twenty years ahead of schedule.
"I'm sorry Sergey... I'm afraid I can't do that..."
They rejected my application to write a search engine driven by sites linking in. It could've been huge!
I don't see where Intel would enjoy any strategic advantage in participating.
Burger King has in the past been fond of touting its #2 status -- as has Pepsi.
But the big boys, McDonald's and Coke, generally like to pretend that #2 doesn't exist. After all, it would only publicly legitimize their fear of a threat by doing so. AMD gets positive publicity whether they play and win, play and lose, or if Intel refuses the contest.
Whereas Intel can only AT BEST hope to win the contest and essentially say "Hey, it's actually true that there are viable alternatives to our technology out there, but just remember that for the time being we outperform the competition by 1.23%."
Your complaint about the F-Lock key stirred up my own longtime irritation with it. It's the only thing I dislike about my MS Natural Multimedia Keyboard.
Realizing how many others were bothered by this prompted me to Google "F-Lock key" and discover this wonderful little registry hack. Note that there are several versions -- be sure to use the right one.
This works! A quick 30-second test of F5-Refresh and PrtScn image pasting have yielded perfect results. My function keys now behave like function keys regardless of the status of the [F] LED.
Now if only this worked when trying to hit F6 during SATA driver initialization in WinXP setup, and F2-activated BIOS access.
I consider my recent trip to the bathroom a partial success, too. After all, I SAW the toilet.
What makes this comment funny is not that it's funny, but that it was modded "insightful".
Yes, very nice.
But the important question is, can it assemble the puzzle faster than Gary Kasparov?