tsotha, I appreciate you taking the time to reply. I'll just go through your post in quote-response format as that's probably best.
As I said, a lack of rigorous thinking. Is it "proof by assertion day"? Do you have any evidence at all to back up the assertion Iraq oil contracts were given to US companies at below market rates? Ive never seen that documented anywhere.
Certainly. I said that I was able to provide references for everything I stated. Link. The Indpendent is a major British newspaper and you can be certain that this article would have been thoroughly jumped on by the UK government were anything not supported. Paragraphs three and four detail the proposed law that mandates oil revenues should be apportioned between Iraq and US companies. Ostensibly this is in return for investment in infrastructure, but the Iraq government has no choice in this and you can be certain the US companies are making a killing on it. A further story is here. These laws have now gone through and return on investment is forecast to be anywhere in the region of 42 to 162 percent. Standard market rate would be 12%. I recommend you read this article if you want a comprehensive overview of foreign countries expected gains from Iraqi oil reserves.
As far as Cheney getting deferred compensation from Haliburton... so what? That kind of thing is pretty normal for CEOs. I'm pretty sure they were obligated to pay him whether or not the company made money.
It indicates motive and bias on the part of the vice president. If someone gives you $1million US dollars a year, there is an obligation. He also retains a number of unexercised stock options giving him a strong personal, financial interest in the succcess of the company. As promised, I can provide references. Link. Note that this is based on a report by the US government's own Congressional Research Service. Cheney's defence has consisted of "I spent $15,000 on an insurance policy in case the company goes under so it doesn't matter to me". Where he found a company willing to take $15,000 in return for a potential $5,000,000+ outlay, I have no idea, but in any case, it looks to me like he has been paid well for services and is now fulfilling them. I don't know how can honestly look at the former head of a corporation, receiving massive annual sums, owning stock in that corporation who then awards huge no-bid contracts to that corporation on behalf of the government and think that it is all above board, but it certainly isn't me.
Surely you must be joking about the donations thing. Large companies in the US donate to both sides. That's the way the game is played. Yes, it's corrupt, but good luck changing it since both parties are swilling at the same trough
All I wish to say here is that my point was that it was corrupt. You are again thinking in partisan terms that I do not. That corporations hedge their bets and bribe both Republican and Democrats does not reduce the importance of the fact that bribery has taken place. I again remind you that I am not a US citizen and have not been subject to the divide and conquer brainwashing that affects the population there, in which pointing out the faults of one side excuses the faults of another. I belong to neither side, but care only about the american people themselves.
Denying oil to the Chinese? Okay, now youve crossed into never-never land. Oil is fungible. The Chinese don't need to buy oil from Iraq because they can buy it from the Russians. O
Well, I suppose if you believe it was about oil, then that makes a certain amount of sense. Well, actually not, since that never made sense as a rationale for the war. But based on what I see on Kos and Digg (and, unfortunately, slashdot) rigorous thinking isnt a strong point on the left.
Well I hate to confuse your preconceptions, but I'm not on your "left." I don't believe there's anything in my post that suggests socialist leanings. But you are clearly a victim of the divide and conquer system that exists in the USA, whereby any criticism of an action must be partisan and false.
That Iraq had nothing to do with oil, is laughable. You no doubt think it was coincidence that major oil companies made large donations to Bush's campaign or that they had former executives in senior positions in the Bush adminstration (including a vice president who receives an annual $1million dollars from a certain Halliburton in "defferred compensation"). I suppose it is also coincidence that after the replacement government was put in, Iraq signed lucrative, below market rate deals with US oil companies against the interests of the country itself?
Oil was a principle reason for the invasion of Iraq. The occupation of Iraq and the installation of a friendly government was intended to achieve a number of goals. A primary one was to secure a rich oil supply for US companies. A second one was to deny that oil to the burgeoning Chinese economy which desperately needs cheap oil to fuel its rapid growth (Afghanistan serves a similar purpose in allowing a landroute for a pipeline to the Eastern European oil reserves making it economical to purchase this oil in competition). Yet another goal was to prevent Iraq from switching to a different currency than the US dollar for oil purchases. Such a shift would send a strong economic shockwave through the US economy that receives considerable support from owning the de facto currency for such a critical and volume commodity. Finally, there were secondary goals. It was intended to send a strong message to Iran and to ensure military conditions in the Middle East that were favourable to the US. It was a means by which the Bush government could deflect criticism away from itself and it was a means by which the military-industrial complex could continue to justify it's gross funding in the face of continuing peace.
So how am I doing, considering "rigorous thinking isn't a strong point on Slashdot?" After all, I've just provided a supportable explanation of witnessed events. I can provide references for any facts I've stated and my conclusions fit with them. All you did was make insulting statements and a statement without any support. You are welcome to attempt to explain where my reasoning has failed, however.
As to Bush's Shadowy Masters, all you need to do is have a look at where the money has flowed during this decade. The owners and directors of some big companies such as Haliburton and Bechtel are a good place to start looking.
Of course, ultimately they're controlled by the five Illuminati Primus, as you say. At least you got that right.
Ah, but Bush's purpose has always been to look stupid. Corruption in Washington? No problem - Bush will just trip as he gets off an aircraft or try to leave through a locked door - and that'll take the front page. Polling research apparently showed that one of the things people held against Gore was that he was perceived as too intelligent. Apparently that put a lot of voters off. The US public has had the message that a good honest heart trumps intelligence and planning by Disneyzilla for so long now, that they prefer to vote for someone who plays the bumbling idiot. Unscrupulous Hollywood villains are the ones that plan and consider - people have seen that right there on the screen.
No - Bush's "stupidity" is his greatest asset. I'm not saying that he's secretly a genius or anything, but somebody there knows how to use idiocy for fun and profit.
But there have always been some nasty schemers behind Bush, and it's them who are starting to look stupid this time around. In all seriousness, we don't need Cold Fusion for the occupation of Iraq to be a mistake.
So how did the h's get back into the language again in English? Homo remains pronounced with the h in the UK. If the 'h' was dropped early on, it must have re-appeared in England, then?
Marks and Spencers do the same in the UK. They charge a few pence for the carrier bag and it's already stopped me getting bags from them. It's a little ironic that I struggle down the street with packets of food under my arm to save a few pence, when I end up spending a few quid more just because I've gone to such an expensive supermarket.:)
Bush and his Shadowy Masters(TM) are going to look pretty stupid if a cheap and plentiful power source suddenly appears. How much has the occupation of Iraq cost, so far? We may need to start working on getting that Lunar Helium, though. Maybe they should have invaded the Moon.
If it's true that this is in the movie, then it's not an issue of whether it's more or less unbelievable than the religious miracles. The issue is that now you have both and they're from disparate contexts. You can have a bit of sci-fi and keep the audience's belief. You can have a miracle take place and the audience will still be with you. But have God and Flying Saucers in the same plot-line and it turns into an mess. It's like telling a joke at a funeral. It can be pulled off, but you better know what you're doing.
You might be right. I understand that the muslim rule of Jerusalem before it was retaken in the Crusades was very tolerant of different relgions. And muslims on the whole are very tolerant of the other abrahamic religions themselves (though Atheism usually goes down like a lead balloon). There's a popular theory at the moment that polytheism is inherently more tolerant than monotheism and it's easy to accept because it seems to make sense... But as said, it's very hard to do controlled experiments with societies. It may well be related to how powerful the religion is in the political life of the aggressor society. For example, the Romans had their religions, and they wielded influence with the people, but I don't think they were a major political force in and of themselves. Similarly, the mongols may have been polytheistic, but I don't think there was a powerful, united religious body influencing them. But in the Crusades for example, there was a powerful religious class that was politically active. Tying religious intolerance to its position in society makes sense as in order to maintain its position in society it must ensure it counters rivals in that sphere in any external or internal groups. That's probably a better indicator than monotheistic or polythestic.
Thanks for posting your comment. I think you might have just prompted some insight
Anthropology and History are two areas where it's always been difficult to set up controlled experiments. But I think I could make a passable argument that the Romans were better (from the point of view of the invaded) than they would have been if they were monotheists. The Romans had an active policy of finding parallels between local gods and their own gods. They were actually very tolerant of other religion (if not of those who used religious talk to incite rebellion). It's hard not to think that this would have been different if they were monotheists, resulting in much more oppression and bloodshed.
I can't comment on the Japanese, Aztecs and Mongols as I don't know enough about their historical religions.
These are important indicators that Scientology is a cult and a dangerous one. I fully agree there, but I would say that you've missed out a couple of distinctions that are more important. After all, churches do take money from their parishoners to keep going - and as it's reasonably voluntary, that's not so bad (though you can dislike it as 'false advertising' if you are not a believer). The serious issue is that Scientology enforces your membership through nightmare tactics of social isolation, inducing altered mental states for their benefit and a whole raft of nasty, very damaging techniques. Yes - religions take a long slow approach in that most believers are raised in the religion, but ultimately the forces that keep you in a religion or bring you into it are weak ones. A cult like Scientology, is very, very different. It's not so much cost that is the vital difference, as it is choice.
The root of the problem, in my opinion, is that management is tied to status and seen as the one who must know more and be in charge. A manager should be seen more as an administrator who facilitates the work of those who actually provides the goods or services that the company offers. Managers play a useful role when they organize work. That sometimes overlaps with being in charge, but not always. Being in charge is a secondary role that is often unnecessary. However, it's mostly seen the other way around and this is the problem. Now the cause of that problem has to do with human society and the status games we play.
I never considered that possibility. That's devious. I'll be on my guard for that in future - cheers. I think however, I've developed a bit of an intuition for film trailers. I sometimes see ones where the trailer makers have obviously struggled a little to convey what the movie is about or to take something funny in context and show it out of context... and this is often a sign that the film is a bit more original and hard to define than other genre movies.
Or you could subscribe to a Science Fiction magazine. They usually have good review sections as well as some good short sci fi for the busy reader. My personal recommendation is Interzone magazine. It's pretty good, British but I think you can get it everywhere and it also has the best film reviews I've ever read (albeit always arriving long after I've seen the film). Definitely worth it for people who don't have the time to work their way through a bookshop looking for the occasional good sci fi.
Movie taste is always going to be subjective (I met someone who enjoyed Titanic, once), but Hulk was a very good film, to me. I did a complete double-take when I saw that Ang Lee was going to direct it, for the same reasons you did, but what he brought to the film was a lot of energy and innovation. The little touches, such as the way Nick Nolte's eyes linger over the split screen of him being escorted from prison to meet his son... they really lifted the film out of the ordinary superhero muck. And Ang Lee understood what was needed to get the audience to suspend their disbelief to accept a big green man hurling tanks about - THAT impressed me. It was the same unapologetic "here's something fantastic and I don't care" that they pulled in Silver Surfer (though that's more of a kid's film).
The only other superhero movies I've seen that really got the level of reality that Hulk achieved were Hellboy (in a weird sort of way) and X-Men 1, maybe 2. Usually in this genre, you're just watching people playing roles in the plot, rather than real characters.
If people have enough information to make an informed choice, then they can still choose to do what their government advises them to do if that is what they wish. Censorship and government propaganda reduces actual information and thus limits options. Logically, a system without censorship is more free and flexible than one without yet doesn't reduce possible options. That makes a system without censorship better for the people.
This would be great if everything was available with a.deb file which it is not.
It's true that not everything is available, but if the objection is that "normal" people aren't able to install things that aren't convenient.debs, you have to ask how if "normal" people want these less common applications. The most common stuff, the stuff that people actually want, is available as.debs. If I can get convenient debs of gcc (and I can), then anything "normal" should be available.
And you think disasters like this have a long term effect on the World's population why? Have you seen the speed with which the human race can repopulate itself after wars and disasters? No - the loss here is not in terms of overall population which you seem to think would be a good thing, but in human knowledge, experience peace and happiness. This is a great loss and it doesn't bring benefits in the way you seem to think.
Slashdot Mirror
Certainly. I said that I was able to provide references for everything I stated. Link. The Indpendent is a major British newspaper and you can be certain that this article would have been thoroughly jumped on by the UK government were anything not supported. Paragraphs three and four detail the proposed law that mandates oil revenues should be apportioned between Iraq and US companies. Ostensibly this is in return for investment in infrastructure, but the Iraq government has no choice in this and you can be certain the US companies are making a killing on it. A further story is here. These laws have now gone through and return on investment is forecast to be anywhere in the region of 42 to 162 percent. Standard market rate would be 12%. I recommend you read this article if you want a comprehensive overview of foreign countries expected gains from Iraqi oil reserves.
It indicates motive and bias on the part of the vice president. If someone gives you $1million US dollars a year, there is an obligation. He also retains a number of unexercised stock options giving him a strong personal, financial interest in the succcess of the company. As promised, I can provide references. Link. Note that this is based on a report by the US government's own Congressional Research Service. Cheney's defence has consisted of "I spent $15,000 on an insurance policy in case the company goes under so it doesn't matter to me". Where he found a company willing to take $15,000 in return for a potential $5,000,000+ outlay, I have no idea, but in any case, it looks to me like he has been paid well for services and is now fulfilling them. I don't know how can honestly look at the former head of a corporation, receiving massive annual sums, owning stock in that corporation who then awards huge no-bid contracts to that corporation on behalf of the government and think that it is all above board, but it certainly isn't me.
All I wish to say here is that my point was that it was corrupt. You are again thinking in partisan terms that I do not. That corporations hedge their bets and bribe both Republican and Democrats does not reduce the importance of the fact that bribery has taken place. I again remind you that I am not a US citizen and have not been subject to the divide and conquer brainwashing that affects the population there, in which pointing out the faults of one side excuses the faults of another. I belong to neither side, but care only about the american people themselves.
Well I hate to confuse your preconceptions, but I'm not on your "left." I don't believe there's anything in my post that suggests socialist leanings. But you are clearly a victim of the divide and conquer system that exists in the USA, whereby any criticism of an action must be partisan and false.
That Iraq had nothing to do with oil, is laughable. You no doubt think it was coincidence that major oil companies made large donations to Bush's campaign or that they had former executives in senior positions in the Bush adminstration (including a vice president who receives an annual $1million dollars from a certain Halliburton in "defferred compensation"). I suppose it is also coincidence that after the replacement government was put in, Iraq signed lucrative, below market rate deals with US oil companies against the interests of the country itself?
Oil was a principle reason for the invasion of Iraq. The occupation of Iraq and the installation of a friendly government was intended to achieve a number of goals. A primary one was to secure a rich oil supply for US companies. A second one was to deny that oil to the burgeoning Chinese economy which desperately needs cheap oil to fuel its rapid growth (Afghanistan serves a similar purpose in allowing a landroute for a pipeline to the Eastern European oil reserves making it economical to purchase this oil in competition). Yet another goal was to prevent Iraq from switching to a different currency than the US dollar for oil purchases. Such a shift would send a strong economic shockwave through the US economy that receives considerable support from owning the de facto currency for such a critical and volume commodity. Finally, there were secondary goals. It was intended to send a strong message to Iran and to ensure military conditions in the Middle East that were favourable to the US. It was a means by which the Bush government could deflect criticism away from itself and it was a means by which the military-industrial complex could continue to justify it's gross funding in the face of continuing peace.
So how am I doing, considering "rigorous thinking isn't a strong point on Slashdot?" After all, I've just provided a supportable explanation of witnessed events. I can provide references for any facts I've stated and my conclusions fit with them. All you did was make insulting statements and a statement without any support. You are welcome to attempt to explain where my reasoning has failed, however.
As to Bush's Shadowy Masters, all you need to do is have a look at where the money has flowed during this decade. The owners and directors of some big companies such as Haliburton and Bechtel are a good place to start looking.
Of course, ultimately they're controlled by the five Illuminati Primus, as you say. At least you got that right.
Ah, but Bush's purpose has always been to look stupid. Corruption in Washington? No problem - Bush will just trip as he gets off an aircraft or try to leave through a locked door - and that'll take the front page. Polling research apparently showed that one of the things people held against Gore was that he was perceived as too intelligent. Apparently that put a lot of voters off. The US public has had the message that a good honest heart trumps intelligence and planning by Disneyzilla for so long now, that they prefer to vote for someone who plays the bumbling idiot. Unscrupulous Hollywood villains are the ones that plan and consider - people have seen that right there on the screen.
No - Bush's "stupidity" is his greatest asset. I'm not saying that he's secretly a genius or anything, but somebody there knows how to use idiocy for fun and profit.
But there have always been some nasty schemers behind Bush, and it's them who are starting to look stupid this time around. In all seriousness, we don't need Cold Fusion for the occupation of Iraq to be a mistake.
So how did the h's get back into the language again in English? Homo remains pronounced with the h in the UK. If the 'h' was dropped early on, it must have re-appeared in England, then?
Because of the financial cost.
"The harder I work, the luckier I get" - Samuel Goldwyn (apparently).
Marks and Spencers do the same in the UK. They charge a few pence for the carrier bag and it's already stopped me getting bags from them. It's a little ironic that I struggle down the street with packets of food under my arm to save a few pence, when I end up spending a few quid more just because I've gone to such an expensive supermarket.
Bush and his Shadowy Masters(TM) are going to look pretty stupid if a cheap and plentiful power source suddenly appears. How much has the occupation of Iraq cost, so far? We may need to start working on getting that Lunar Helium, though. Maybe they should have invaded the Moon.
If it's true that this is in the movie, then it's not an issue of whether it's more or less unbelievable than the religious miracles. The issue is that now you have both and they're from disparate contexts. You can have a bit of sci-fi and keep the audience's belief. You can have a miracle take place and the audience will still be with you. But have God and Flying Saucers in the same plot-line and it turns into an mess. It's like telling a joke at a funeral. It can be pulled off, but you better know what you're doing.
You might be right. I understand that the muslim rule of Jerusalem before it was retaken in the Crusades was very tolerant of different relgions. And muslims on the whole are very tolerant of the other abrahamic religions themselves (though Atheism usually goes down like a lead balloon). There's a popular theory at the moment that polytheism is inherently more tolerant than monotheism and it's easy to accept because it seems to make sense... But as said, it's very hard to do controlled experiments with societies. It may well be related to how powerful the religion is in the political life of the aggressor society. For example, the Romans had their religions, and they wielded influence with the people, but I don't think they were a major political force in and of themselves. Similarly, the mongols may have been polytheistic, but I don't think there was a powerful, united religious body influencing them. But in the Crusades for example, there was a powerful religious class that was politically active. Tying religious intolerance to its position in society makes sense as in order to maintain its position in society it must ensure it counters rivals in that sphere in any external or internal groups. That's probably a better indicator than monotheistic or polythestic.
Thanks for posting your comment. I think you might have just prompted some insight
Anthropology and History are two areas where it's always been difficult to set up controlled experiments. But I think I could make a passable argument that the Romans were better (from the point of view of the invaded) than they would have been if they were monotheists. The Romans had an active policy of finding parallels between local gods and their own gods. They were actually very tolerant of other religion (if not of those who used religious talk to incite rebellion). It's hard not to think that this would have been different if they were monotheists, resulting in much more oppression and bloodshed.
I can't comment on the Japanese, Aztecs and Mongols as I don't know enough about their historical religions.
These are important indicators that Scientology is a cult and a dangerous one. I fully agree there, but I would say that you've missed out a couple of distinctions that are more important. After all, churches do take money from their parishoners to keep going - and as it's reasonably voluntary, that's not so bad (though you can dislike it as 'false advertising' if you are not a believer). The serious issue is that Scientology enforces your membership through nightmare tactics of social isolation, inducing altered mental states for their benefit and a whole raft of nasty, very damaging techniques. Yes - religions take a long slow approach in that most believers are raised in the religion, but ultimately the forces that keep you in a religion or bring you into it are weak ones. A cult like Scientology, is very, very different. It's not so much cost that is the vital difference, as it is choice.
The root of the problem, in my opinion, is that management is tied to status and seen as the one who must know more and be in charge. A manager should be seen more as an administrator who facilitates the work of those who actually provides the goods or services that the company offers. Managers play a useful role when they organize work. That sometimes overlaps with being in charge, but not always. Being in charge is a secondary role that is often unnecessary. However, it's mostly seen the other way around and this is the problem. Now the cause of that problem has to do with human society and the status games we play.
Oh, you're welcome. Have fun.
I never considered that possibility. That's devious. I'll be on my guard for that in future - cheers. I think however, I've developed a bit of an intuition for film trailers. I sometimes see ones where the trailer makers have obviously struggled a little to convey what the movie is about or to take something funny in context and show it out of context... and this is often a sign that the film is a bit more original and hard to define than other genre movies.
Cheer up. You only need to cry if those 20 years were spent working at Mickey D's. I'm assuming you've made some progress since then.
Or you could subscribe to a Science Fiction magazine. They usually have good review sections as well as some good short sci fi for the busy reader. My personal recommendation is Interzone magazine. It's pretty good, British but I think you can get it everywhere and it also has the best film reviews I've ever read (albeit always arriving long after I've seen the film). Definitely worth it for people who don't have the time to work their way through a bookshop looking for the occasional good sci fi.
Movie taste is always going to be subjective (I met someone who enjoyed Titanic, once), but Hulk was a very good film, to me. I did a complete double-take when I saw that Ang Lee was going to direct it, for the same reasons you did, but what he brought to the film was a lot of energy and innovation. The little touches, such as the way Nick Nolte's eyes linger over the split screen of him being escorted from prison to meet his son... they really lifted the film out of the ordinary superhero muck. And Ang Lee understood what was needed to get the audience to suspend their disbelief to accept a big green man hurling tanks about - THAT impressed me. It was the same unapologetic "here's something fantastic and I don't care" that they pulled in Silver Surfer (though that's more of a kid's film).
The only other superhero movies I've seen that really got the level of reality that Hulk achieved were Hellboy (in a weird sort of way) and X-Men 1, maybe 2. Usually in this genre, you're just watching people playing roles in the plot, rather than real characters.
That game gets less far-fetched every time I read the news.
But null sweat, corpman, I'm sticking to the Shadows from now on.
If people have enough information to make an informed choice, then they can still choose to do what their government advises them to do if that is what they wish. Censorship and government propaganda reduces actual information and thus limits options. Logically, a system without censorship is more free and flexible than one without yet doesn't reduce possible options. That makes a system without censorship better for the people.
It's true that not everything is available, but if the objection is that "normal" people aren't able to install things that aren't convenient
And you think disasters like this have a long term effect on the World's population why? Have you seen the speed with which the human race can repopulate itself after wars and disasters? No - the loss here is not in terms of overall population which you seem to think would be a good thing, but in human knowledge, experience peace and happiness. This is a great loss and it doesn't bring benefits in the way you seem to think.
Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later.
Actually you can address your additional memory using PAE though I'm not necessarily recommending you do this. I use a 64-bit Linux install and seem to be doing okay. I have had a few FLASH problems, but only an odd non-start on YouTube pages, fixed by hitting reload. It honestly doesn't bother me and has never happened during the playing of a FLASH movie, only on starting one. I expect this to be fixed soon enough and I'm much happier running the 64-bit version. Personally, I'd install the 64-bit version.
Yeah, but that's Opterons. You could probably smear them with jelly instead of thermal paste and they'd still work.
But for most users, people would prefer the "certainty" of running under a manufacturers specifications to the "risk" of overclocking their CPU.