It's great that you want to wait until you're married to have sex. Have at it. Just stop this nonsense that somehow anyone else who doesn't do the same is condemned for eternity or is a sinner or whatever else you can come up with.
Why? Are you worried he/she's right? Personally, I welcome people condemning people for eternity. So long as they're merely condemning people, they're following those rules about now getting involved in non-Christian courts. So that means they're not lobbying state or federal governments to push their agenda on others with force. They can say whatever words they like, condemn people all they like, and urge others to socially pressure people to not do things. And me and others like me will do the same and condemn them for all those ludicrous things they themselves admit to not follow yet cannot give any firm basis to stop following (arbitrarily using two condtradictory statements and then waving one's hands to clarify what the "good book" really means doesn't count as a firm basis). So, while they picket the couple's home because they didn't wait for marriage to have sex, I'll picket the picketers for creating signs (I'm sure they're in heaven, and hence such is a violation of the 2nd commandment) and using the lord's name in vain (I'd assume our omnipotent God already knows and doesn't need to be encouraged on what to do, nor does he need people explaining the punishment He will set out; really, speaking for God in any way is pretty well using his name in vain, just as it would be if one spoke for someone else on Earth).
Aside from that wayward rant, my point is that I'm perfectly happy to have the discussion and the ridicule and the societal pressure. Those things can almost always be worked through, given time. It's the government pressure that invariable is inflexible, used by society at its leisure to oppress selectively those it dislikes, and reaches into bedrooms and bathrooms and all other sorts of rooms to dictate things, the ethical system of any person or group, which the government not only has no business but surely should have no means to assess or enforce. Now how to resolve disputes properly is beyond me, really, but codefied law for abridging the freedoms of others at least seems to be a base compropmise. Sadly, few people (you included, it seems) seem to recognize that it's not a freedom to not be offended. It's just a shame more people don't take their own advice and "Suck it up".
The real trick is to learn to understand that we're creatures of infinite desire...Many major religions try to fill an infinite hole with an infinite God....
We're not creatures of infinite desire. We're just creatures of very big desires. Once you grow old enough (or wise enough, as the case may be), you realize that any sort of infinite God bestowing any sort of infinite gift upon us, either of heaven or hell or any other metric of infinite (ie, for all eternity), is an ultimately cruel endeavor. It then seems little surprise that many people have come to reject any sort of infinite God, if not directly because such a God would be effectively cruel and hence without mercy (consider the situation of ending an animal's existance to cease its suffering as a mercy killing) then because if Man is made in the image of God and he is not infinite in things such as desires, then the only things Man might be is singular (infinity divided by (+/-)infinity => (+/-)1, as any other scale factor than zero would lead to a value of (+/-)infinity; and anything divided by zero is undefined, and that wouldn't very well work).
The constitution specifically excludes threats against the president's life from protected speech.
The US Constitution? The constitution of another country? In the US Constitution it's made perfectly clear that (a) all legislative power of the US federal government comes from Congress, (b) the President has very limited scope to do anything outside of enforcing legislation, and (c) Congress can't abridge speech. All states of the Union, further, have to uphold the Constitution. How this is worded would leave many states to censor individuals, but virtually all states have Constitutions with similar language preventing the abridging of speech. The use of the phrase "protected speech" is merely a recent justification for why exactly the US Constitution and various is ignored.
For an example of what my state's Constitution says: Article I, Section 9. "No law shall be passed, restraining the free interchange of thought and opinion, or restricting the right to speak, write, or print, freely, on any subject whatever: but for the abuse of that right, every person shall be responsible." From the sounds of the law, abusing the right to free speech (ie, locking someone up) would require everyone to be locked up. I'm not so sure you'd want to pass that sort of law.
>>And there's lots of links to sites blocked by China.
>Visable in CHINA??? I think not.
There you go, adding extra qualifiers. I'd assume lots of links to blocked sites are visible in China, simply because news organizations end up pointing out sites that are blocked and the great Chinese firewall is still limited to humans blacklisting stuff. So, Google removing links just makes it harder for external to China mirrors from being easily found through Google. Sounds pretty similar to the situation with the DMCA and scientology.
>>>Unlike the examples of France, Germany, and China. Nothing in US law would prevent that site from saying that they believe that Scientology is a cult and is dangerous.
>>Until the Scientologists write a skeptics handbook, copyright it, and then claim sites are copying from it. What better way to use the system?
>Okay you do know that is just nuts don't you?
You seem to be implying that I didn't already recognize that I believed that Scientologists are a bit nuts. Or were you trying to call me nuts for believing that Scientology would perform acts that could reasonably be justified by its members (to stop "unjust" mocking) to further its aims?
>A Banned book? A book banned just because of the ideas in it?
My understanding that it has less to do with the ideas and more to do with the symbolism involved in neo-nazi groups. Neo-nazis have their own spin on the exact ideals of the nazi movement, hence the neo-nazi term.
>Not a TV show, movie or magazine but a book?
Yes, a book. Are TV shows, movies, or magazines more worthy of being banable? Or are you stating that they're more likely to be banned (ie, that it's possible) because they're a newer medium and considered more trivial (ie, able to be obscene)?
>Do you know how hard it is in the US to get a book banned?
Pretty hard. Books are oddly respected in the face of obscenity charges. I'm not sure why this is the case, given that the Miller test doesn't differentiate (judgementally) depiction and description, but I guess it stems from the arguments that child pornography (a chief area that was pushed to be banned) must involve the harm of a child, as mere descriptions of fantasy are hard to prove causing actual harm. To that end, I'd imagine a biography or autobiography that included description of such illegal acts by the biographee would be more likely to be labelled obscene, but against the respect for the artistic value of a biography would probably nullify this complaint.
>I can go and buy the Communist Manifesto, Mein Kampf, the little Red Book, or any number of books that criticize the current government of the US. How can you even comment on what is censorship when you seem to accept the concept that an idea is too dangerous to be allowed to be published doesn't fill you with dread?
Where did I say it didn't fill me with dread? I was pointing out that France and Germany have moved to eradicate "Mein Kampf" completely, even of its symbolic value.
>Yes the US needs to reform copyright law. It is way too restrictive and the US needs to codify fair use into law.
Good luck. The US can't even seem to define obscenity completely without relying on vague "artistic value" and "community standard", the latter of which makes the whole US a minefield.
>But banning a book? I had no idea that there was any place in Europe so totalitarian that a book of political ideas was illegal? THAT is scary to me. Who should decide what is safe to think?
No one, really.
>I can understand restricting photographs but text?
Can I assume this is because of child pornography and probably bestiality?
>Words?
For everyone but the copyright owner, that's what copyright is all about.
>Ideas? Don't you understand that restricting ideas that you happen to dislike is just as dangerous and restricting the ideas you do agree with?
You can threaten anyone with a law suite at anytime.
Right, and I can threaten you with a lawsuit for making puppies sad. If it weren't for the fact that scientologists have won lawsuits in the past involving copyright and further that the DMCA basically makes it the case that caving in is the easy way out (ie, without the DMCA scientologists could sue Google even after they took whatever links down, since not only would it be a sign that they recognize the copyright violation but further had infringed in the past), I doubt google would be quick to bend over backwards. But if I threatened them with a lawsuit claiming they made puppies sad? They'd probably just blow it off (at least until I won a few lawsuits over the argument).
What I don't understand is how people can confuse freedom of speech with copyrights issues.
Let's see.. I can claim a site is violating my copyright and have it taken down. So, watch me go off and claim an abortion website is infringing my copyright. Or that one white supremecy site. Or that NAZI website (I own the copyright to Mein Kampf, don't you know). Isn't it amazing how quickly the DMCA can be used to take down sites and/or links to sites, if only for a short time. Yes, I wonder how people could confuse the two.
The site in question was posting copyrighted material.
Oh noes!
There where LOTS of links to that "blocked" site that was critical of Scientology.
And there's lots of links to sites blocked by China.
The site was not limited in creating any statement that they wanted too.
So long as it didn't post "too much" copyrighted material. Watch out skeptics guide to the bible, you're quoting it all to prove how the whole thing has contradictions. Got to take that website down. Should have used one of the bibles that wasn't copyrighted. Too bad critics of Scientology don't have that luxury.
Just can not post material that they didn't own the copyright on.
Fair use doesn't exist. And even if it did, it's amoral to post the work of another 'cause, you know, the original author deserves the money for their work or something. This is especially true when it comes to religious texts. It's all about making the clergy of the religion wealthy, not enlightenment of the soul. Stupid me.
Unlike the examples of France, Germany, and China. Nothing in US law would prevent that site from saying that they believe that Scientology is a cult and is dangerous.
Until the Scientologists write a skeptics handbook, copyright it, and then claim sites are copying from it. What better way to use the system?
However China would never allow a public site to say that China needs Democratic reform,
Well, not so long as it's copyrighted by someone else, anyways. Seriously, though, China only has control over websites within its borders and the means to attempt to block sites outside of it through filters. You're right, China would probably never intentionally allow such sites to be visible to the majority of Chinese.
and France and Germany do not allow anyone post pro Nazi information.
Or anti-Nazi information, if it quotes too much from Mein Kampf. They don't want conspiracists to sneak publication of a banned book.
While I hate the Nazis as much as anyone I can see a clear difference between getting bent over copyrights and preventing a person of group from stating their opinion.
Sure, there's a clear difference. And clearly copyright is being used in the second sphere. To ignore this is to ignore that copyright can't be abused, which is just ignorance. Any means of suppressing speech has the potential for abuse. Of course, I'm personally against copyright since I don't see the moral basis for it. The fact that it can be used to suppress speech is only something that further urges me to be against it.
Yes, silly us for assuming that the government was the one that made copyright and the DMCA. All along, it was really the scientologist who made it and use force to ensure it exists. Stupid us.
I refuse to accept that letting 120 years pass (or however long is the maximal lifespan of a human) is a sufficient basis to absolve a country of crimes commited in its name. Part and parcel of being a functionally immortal entity is being held responsible for all functions commited as that entity. This is probably why revolutions tend to happen.
>>One has to completely ignore the 4th amendment to not recognize a crime was commited.
>That's not a crime, that's a constitutional violation!:)
Actually, all constitutional violations are high crimes and treason. Unfortunately, Congress isn't likely to punish itself for writing unconstitutional law, and that's a large problem, IMO.
>Mr America says "I have a gun and I know how to use it, so behave yourself", while Mr Iran says "I don't have a gun right now, but the moment I do you're a dead man". I can't comprehend thinking that the US's position isn't better.
It's not "I have a gun". It's "I have thousands/millions of guns, aimed right at everyone's head, so behave yourself". The fact that the gun is cocked and all it would take is a false alarm to pull the trigger has me *very* worried. Mind you, Mr Russia is in a similar situation.
>>Iran might, eventually, make some nukes. The US has thousands. I'd say at the moment the US is a much greater threat.
>Yes, at the moment. Of course, in over half a century the US has only used nukes in a single conflict nad it tried fairly hard to avoid others that would involve nukes. Can you reasonably assure me that Iran will behave in a similar way, if and when it gets some?
No. I can only only unreasonably assure you based on the assumption that the leaders of Iran want to live. It seems to be the basis upon which China, America, Russia, Pakistan, India, Israel, France, the UK, and North Korea have all not started a nuclear war (feel free to include other countries that do/might have nukes). Maybe Iran will be different. And maybe Israel or America will overreact and start WW3. Do level heads prevail when MAD is possibly in play? I don't think we really need Russia and America pointing guns at everyone's heads to not start a nuclear war. But if we do, then I further need not fear Iran because it's the fear of Russia and America that overcomes all.
Yea, it's like that one time I demanded a googolplex of dollars, and then through negotiation got it down to $1 trillion. Boy was the government willing to give me the money then. Good thing to know that all it takes is being unreasonable fom the start to get what you really want.
The funny thing is, you might deserve a promotion. It's the simple fact that a lot of companies are owned by shareholders whose only recourse for information a lot of the time is through news sources. So, if it is the case that the CEO is mismanging aspects of the business, it's probably a good basis to fire the CEO. If you're a shareholder, you're interested in making money, not towing the line for the CEO. To that end, you *want* people to snitch on mismanagement of a massive scale. Imagine how much better Enron shareholders would be if the accounting fraud was found sooner and reported at large. It might make sense to not want people to snitch when the shareholders are in on the scam. But in the long term, more information is advantageous to the owners. It's funny, though, that so many people seem to treat the CEO as owner.
>>Remember slavery? How many Africans were killed, exactly?
>Big difference between slaves who died 150-300 years ago, and protesters who died less than twenty years ago.
Time is not an excuse if it's the same regime. Last I checked, the US is still the US.
>>Many forced sterilisations back around the beginning of the twentieth century, and lots of Americans who think that we should bring back that kind of eugenics.
>That was a long time ago.
See comment above about time.
>>Executing convicts? At least China doesn't execute children and the mentally incompetent. Oh wait, America finally bannd executing the mentally incompetent, although children are still fair game.
>And the idiots in the Supreme Court outlawed the practise anyway last year, in clear contravention of precedent and the plain meaning of the Constitution.
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
I don't think any type of execution could be considered non-cruel. And don't try to claim that the "and" only outlaws cruel and unusual punishment. It says "punishments". Ie, "cruel punishments and unusual punishments".
>>Censorship? Obviously you haven't been paying attention to the Republican's latest attempt to stop the media from revealing their crimes.
>You're begging the question: was there a crime? There's a lot of very strong evidence that there was not.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
One has to completely ignore the 4th amendment to not recognize a crime was commited.
>The laws in question would merely prevent publishing legitimate secrets, which is no big deal at all.
Who defines what's a legitimate secret? I guess the courts get to. So, how long until there's an actual trial over Bush's "legitimate" hiding of warrantless wiretapping?
>>And the constant threats against Iran...
>You mean the rogue state lead by a lunatic who worships an imam in a well and who threatens to wipe Israel from the map? You think we shouldn't try to keep them in line?
Just as much as the rest of the world should have and still should keep the US in check for threatening to wipe most the world off the map if Russia ever attacked. You do know that Russia still has nukes and ICBMs, right? I've yet to hear any sign that the US doesn't still support MAD. Oh, and please feel free to try to rationalize how pointing hundreds of ICBMs at many other countries with nuclear warheads is somehow "better" than vague threats without the means to actually do what is threatened. Iran might, eventually, make some nukes. The US has thousands. I'd say at the moment the US is a much greater threat.
>>Don't dupe yourself -- America is a fascist state, and has been for some time now.
>... in any case, your objections are irrelevant: even were we as bad as you think, that would not make the Chinese any better in an absolute sense.
True. No matter how fascist the US is, it doesn't make China a better place to live in.
Bullying is a bigger problem than your simplistic solution of hitting back can solve.
Just to throw in my two cents, you're right that the mentioned "solution" isn't a panacea to bullying. There's rarely panaceas for any problem. But the mentioned solution, to support a child defending themselves through force, is really the only step a person being bullied can really take. You seem to recognize that bullies don't tend to be restricted in their physical access so it is mental access that is the usual limiter. But the only means to limiting physical access is to literally adequately imprison the bully (a determined enough bully could run away from any non-confinement or non-adequate confinement and hunt down their victim) and possibly all their friends/associates (to prevent retrobution).
None of this, though, does anything to solve the situation in the present instance of being bullied. So, one has to hope that there is a time that you're bullied sufficiently that the above confinement is enforced but not so bullied that you end up dead. It's simply the case that short of escalation, most bullies know the system well enough to not "cross the line" to actually be locked up. Truthfully, it'd probably take a murder to lock up most bullies anyways, as denying the freedom of people indefinitely for what the might do is a horribly crappy system that few people are in favor of and battery/theft-from-another-non-adult by non-adults is not considered a serious crime. So, there's no simple legal win position.
/ seriously thinks UNIX like systems need to go the way of VAXen.
To an extent I agree. But the only paradigm I've seen that's a good replacement for UNIX is something like EROS, and I'm still waiting for a working implementation.// well, actually not so much the systems themselves, but the assinine UNIX mentality of "harder is better" and "more documentation eliminates the need for good design."
Actually, the mentality is "simpler [code] is better", often to the point of requiring the user to do some bizzaro things to make things work right. GNU has really worked to fill in these gaps, probably because when reimplementing things they got fed up with problems innate to the old tools. Admittedly, some of the solutions are really just hacks of a sort (--).
, which set back Computer Science departments and academia 15 years behind industry.
I'd say it's the reverse. I'd say UNIX is much like unicellular life. Unicellular life is simple, multiples rapidly, and it functions well at the limited number of tasks it does. Without life like this, there'd simply never have been the means to build more complex, multicellular life. And even with this more complex life, there's still many nitches where unicellular life is still best. UNIX was/is a very good design for the job it's itended to do. But it's clearly not the solution to a lot of complex problems. Oh, and Windows isn't remotely either, as it's stuck in the same paradigm of VMS/UNIX, but with some more complex ACLs slapped on top./// fortunately, one of the unintended side-effects of Linux is that the mentality, at least amongst Linux users, is slowly, ever so slowly, fading away.
I'd say GNU is responsible more for this. Truthfully, though, it'd be a pretty drastic fork away from anything *nix-like before there will be real progress in this area. The good part, though, is that Linux could provide the means to this new OS's driver needs. Applications, though, would probably be a massive rewrite.
While you've brought up many good points of unions gone bad, the funny thing is the number of things you list which seem to apply equally well to corporations. For example, corporations are more interested in short term profits than the survivability of the company. Further, a lot of the illegal actions that are performed by a corporation are rarely punished or when they are they are treated more as civil matters as it's virtually impossible to prove any individual at fault for systematic negligence. As even as unions can be, I think the problem isn't unions themselves (or corporations themselves, for that matter). The problem is that the law takes steps to support the existance of such organizations through direct enforcement at times (closed shop/subsidies/tax breaks) as well as ignoring infringement of the law (bullying/negligence/anti-trusts). You even hint at this, noting a firm problem is that unions cannot compete against each other, since everyone is forced to join that one that exists for a company.
So, I believe that unions and corporations should exist, but not under any special privileges. And I think anti-trust laws should only be invoked over cabals, not the open union of people or companies. It is when information is closed off that the free market can fail to function properly. And using force to force people to join or not join organizations is an obvious interference in the market place. The biggest issue throughout history between employers and labor has seemed to be ignoring the law for one or the other. Perhaps recognizing it for both would solve most problems.
I'll admit my example was contrived. My point was more to counter the apparent belief that non-determinism implies that you can't trace to the cause to an effect. Truthfully, in both the deterministic and non-deterministic case an effect may or may not be easily traceable to its cause. That's more a factor of whether the mapping of cause to effect is a function, and I'd claim that can hardly be claimed to be the case (the simplest thought is that to go around an object, once can either go right then left or left then right, both leading to the same effect (equal time to reach the objective) with the same start point).
But as soon as you can determine why a person makes a particular choice, you leave the door open for some amount of determinism.
This assumes it's at all possible. It's a stretch to assume that all humans have equal weight to all scenarios based on upbringing (again, nature vs nuture), so at some level one is bound to simply guessing or asking (and then further trying to evaluate the truthfulness of statements made).
However, they will point to those other cases and if you say that the agent chose 3 because the current state was 2 and the agent prefers 3's then you've opened the door for determinism....
The real issue, though, is that if a person is already in state 3, then determining that a person was in state 2 and transitioned to it for some reason can never violate non-determinism. Why? Because as you give as an example, non-determinism doesn't mean there's no determinism, just that there's the possibility of non-determinism.
To that end, the question of non-determinism is more about the ability to predict the future and if there really is randomness or merely an inability for humans to gather the necessary information to predict the future. Given that the "system" is the universe, I'm disinclined to believe that we have the means to store all the information of the system and then further run it faster in emulation than the real system such that we could make prognastigative efforts with absolute certainty even *if* the universe were deterministic.
Trying to use constructs as large as people then would only be useful for grand and general estimations, not actually reliable predictions. And to that end, it would seem appropriate to use such estimations merely for one's own precautions, not as some sort of mechanism to "mark" others for what they are estimated to do. Adding something like non-determinism might only help people who desire to act like they can predict the future to know otherwise and act accordingly. But I'm agnostic as well on the truth, and consider what I already know about the best case, I don't think it matters very much.
In a non-deterministic universe things happen without any discernable cause.
No. Non-determinism means that there are multiple possible outcomes.
As soon as you assign cause you start to imply determinism
Again, no. Consider the following:
Deterministic: f(1) = 1 f(2) = 2 f(3) = 3
Non-deterministic: f(1) = 0 or 1 f(2) = 2 or 3 f(3) = 4 or 5
If one sees the effect of 3, in the deterministic case one knows the cause is 3, while in the non-deterministic case one knows the cause is 2. Just because a function isn't involved does not mean that there isn't a finite mapping.
However, if things just happen randomly, that's also a problem for Free Will.
Not really. Randomness means unpredictable to a limited sense. The point of free will is that a result is random until the person makes a choice. It is the choice that removes randomness (quite like how the environment selects from random mutation in evolution). The real issue is explaining how choice itself is non-deterministic.
The fundamental problem with Jonathan Zuck's argument is that he's mis-casted the characters in his play. While he's right that the open source movement could be well cast as some of the Renaissance, the Dominician priest who would view such as vanity is actually the proprietary movement. This is clear in his statement: For leading Linux users like TiVo and Adaptec, the ability to protect key intellectual property is essential. TiVo and Adaptec are stuck in the old ways and are more interested in reverting back to it because they view it as necessary, just as one's religion becomes the means to comfort oneself against the rapidly changing times.
The simple fact is, then, that RMS is closer to the Founding Fathers of the USA or those who fought against the Dominician priest. This is because RMS looked back into history to recognize the likely fate of a simply open-source movement, as previous similar movements were usurped; so, he attemped to create a mechanism to guard against those who would try to remove freedom in the name of the "necessary". One has to look no further than the fact that proprietarism comes from the state to recognize that it is a construct of man, not the natural state. This is true as well of state sponsored religion, and it seems hardly surprising then that many people would call for the state to support them as they believe their religion cannot stand alone (obviously not true for all people). I only wonder why he doesn't see the same pattern of history as well.
If you follow the GPL, you have a license to use OSS. Break the GPL, and well, you don't have that license anymore.
Oh the number of errrors... Well, let's begin. The GPL is FSS, not OSS. Use of FSS/OSS/etc isn't bound by you having a license to the GPL/BSD/whatever; use is an innate property of legally possessing a copyrighted work. It's bound to the person who gave you a copy having proper redistribution rights (and you're liable, at least in the US, if they don't). This means your violation of the license would occur upon redistribution outside of the terms of the license and its nullification would open you up for punishment for all copies you redistributed; it would do nothing to halt your use of the legal copy you obtained.
This is fundamentally different from an EULA, which tries to force upon you use requirements that harken back to book publishers including EULAs inside the cover of books in an attempt to do the same sort of legal entrapment EULAs do today. The two major defenses to combating an EULA are to return the product (one of the stated bases why EULAs have yet to be wholly declared null) or to, if possible, circumvent agreement to the EULA (clearly this is paramount to seeing a contract lying inside your new home already signed by the person you just bought it from with further restrictiosn, and you cleverly ripping it up). None of these hoops are present in the GPL because most people never have a reason to agree to it.
You're partially right. While it's true that the majority of the people you list might not be called suckers, the majority of them plus iTunes users would likely be called idiots by many people. Just to break it down.
Idiots ------ They use iTunes They drive SUVs in suburban and urban environments. They lease, perpetually, or they buy new cars every 5 years. They choose not to save anything. They fail to pay off their credit cards in a timely manner, incurring interest and finance charges. They buy too many things, therefore incurring credit card debt in the first place.
Possibly Idiots --------------- They choose not to invest in 401k plans--401k plans may not be the long term wisest use of one's money, especially given various caps applied to them. They default on loans--loans, especially student loans, are vested on an assumption of employment, which obviously cannot be guaranteed; I don't think one need to necessarily be an idiot to get into a situation where an economic depression might cause one to default on a loan where it wasn't unreasonable to take the loan in the first place.
The reason, btw, that I'd be more likely to classify the group as idiots instead of suckers is primarily that many of these idiots might, in the long term, never have to pay off their debt due to bankruptcy law. Since one can't, for example, reclaim all that imported beer one drank, it's possible that for a period of time a person will live much better off than they had any chance of living otherwise (consider, for a moment, a person stuck in a minimum wage job without the means to advance (well, aside from a student loan--and that assumes the person has any reasonable chance fo being accepted in college)).
Of course, they're still idiots, in the sense they've hurt others, but they're not really suckers. This holds true with the acceptance of DRM under any terms, as it promotes the belief that people are willing to accept DRM. It's stupid to encourage something unnecessary, just as it's stupid to buy lots of things on credit with no reasonable hope to pay for them. It's just sad that too many people are so willing to let it all slide in the name of "supporting the artists" and getting it online; it feels like people have been brainwashed into accepting shit because something worse kept being threatened, and that same feeling, btw, seems to loomy over the Bush presidency. Or can you really say you *want* DRM and consider it a feature?
If someone breaks into my house and steals one of my guns am I liable for what they do with it? No.
You're not a steward of everyone. Hence you're not liable to protect others from the theft of your gun. From an ethics perspective, it has nothing to do with taking resonable steps and everything to do with promises made. So unless you promised to keep the gun under lock and key (and I'm assuming that you were actually asked, not fundamentally forced to agree), you shouldn't be at all liable even if you leave your gun fully loaded sitting at a table, unguarded, in the middle of a heavy-crime area.
Of course in that situation I wouldn't expect to get the gun back except after its use as a murder weapon. In any case, once you start taking on the information of others, there's generally an explicit policy against the redistribution of that information except under a very small set of circumstances. To that end, negligence against that policy is inherently a violation of trust, among other things, and I would say clearly unethical. So, it would make sense for people to sue and try to gain some compensation for the breech.
Even if they'd done everything reasonable and it was shown that the information was still obtained, there'd be a basis to sue. It might seem a bit extreme or unfair to take this position, but people and companies should make preparations for the worst and be willing to compensate and take responsibility for the situation. A promise is something that one has to take with deep consideration. If it's the case that they can use a circumstance to break it with zero punishment, then clearly no promise is absolute, and if that's the case, they shouldn't be taking the information in the first place, since they clearly inheriently intend to leak it anyway at some point (ie, it's a known risk which has a 100% probability of occuring given enough time).
No, by that fucked up line of reasoning, you're not alive, so you can't kill yourself. Seriously, though, would you consider being under an oppressive theocracy (nothing to stop this from being the result of a democracy), an oppressive dictatorship, or simply being a non-citizen really living? Or would you consider it a debasement of your rights and something you should fight against to reclaim your life and your ability to choose how to live it?
The founders of the US fought and risked their lives to have lives. Many died as a consequence of this, choosing to die fighting rather than living a non-life--okay, clearly they weren't trying to die, but they knew that there was the risk of dying and took the chance because even defeat, which against such a strong Empire as Britain really made the whole affair seem rather suicidal, was better than the continued oppression of the British Empire. There's been many other countries who have fought similar wars of independence as a result of some great injustice(s) being levelled against them, treating them as inferior and at times unworthy of life. It may seem rather cold and callus to equate liberty and living, but clearly they must be deeply related if it is the case that there is no liberty if one can be at a whim be executed or injured by government police/death squads. Those who are simply unwilling to be vigilante for the cause of liberty will certainly not have it and be inherently at risk of losing their life.
So, perhaps it's not best to intermingle the two words when it might be misunderstood what exactly is being spoken about, but many times they are one and the same. So, I'm sorry if it sounded like I wanted people to die, for that is furthest from the truth. I wish for people to live and fight for their lives/liberty because it requires a large majority to continuously keep up the fight against the slow and insiduous removal of liberty. United we stand, divided we fall. My sadness comes in the division of us.
Just to throw this out there, there was a nice Star Trek: TNG episode (The Drumhead) about just this. It even had the nice additional issue of racism thrown in (well, that and lying about it). Of course it's just a replaying of the McCarthy era witch-hunts. The only real sad part is how some people seem to not learn from history; or perhaps they simply believe other people are stupid and haven't. In either case, I would say that such remarks are really a grounds for dismisal at minimal.
I'll throw in another sci-fi reference--this time from Stargate SG-1 (Between Two Fires)--to justify it, One crucial point to the episode is that a lack of transparency in government and further lying about it is considered even worse than murder. Now, one might at first think this to be silly, but one of the things that seems clear about witch-hunts as well as all other unconstitutional acts is that the courts in the USA rarely do more than announce the laws as void. In the span until that point, the government gets to abuse people however it pleases and very often not only does the whole act not fully become voided--it is, afterall, these repeated sorts of cases that have pressured more latitude to protecting against "eminent threats" at the expense of liberty--but new laws with altered language but similar effect are passed by the legislature--look no further than the many censorship laws aimed at stopping pornography on the internet.
It is sad that legislatures are not punished for writing unconstitutional law nor police or other executive branch individuals for following an unconstitutional law. It is also sad that people do not value liberty over life, disregarding that a life without liberty is not living at all. It is almost certainly this reason that the people of the USA do not consider a violation of government worse than murder. With great power comes great responsibility. Sadly, there doesn't seem great accountability, and so the most one can hope to obtain is an apology or possibly money. Neither of these punishments fit the crime.
You first. Seriously. You're very insistent, so I assume you have them.
Perhaps you've heard of the concept of "innocent until proven guilty"? How about "due process of law"? The simple fact is that the purpose of due process is to allow for a court of law to determine the guilt or innocence of an individual. Until that time which they are found guilty, they are to be treated as innocent. Further, without due process of law, it is illegal to take their property without just compensation or hold a person indefinitely. Even holding a person indefinitely when a person *is* found guilty is limited to being proportional to the crime one is found guilty of.
All in all, if there were actual trials occuring, then there'd be the transcripts and court records that would include the proof that many people demand. This is one of the main reasons so many people are calling for a trial, as a trial is designed to be a fair mechanism of deciding a person's guilt. The only reasonable explanations that I can think of for not wanting to hold trials is either that there is a lack of proof or that there is fear that a fair trial will in some way provide too much information to the enemy. Neither of these seem sufficient excuse for holding a person who is by definition innocent.
the BSAA (BlackSmith Artisans Association) has just announced that using a imperial hammer to pound metric sized nails is not 'Fair Use'. Nothing in the BMCA (Blacksmith Millenium Conservation Act) covers the use of imperial hammers with the wrong region-sized nails nor interfering with the jammer technology to allow the use of hammers with any sized nails. Further, the existance of imperial-sized nails and meric hammers removes any claim of necessity to mix the two. We must remember that it is a moral right for Blacksmiths to continue to be well paid, even in the days of industrialization. No amount of moderization can justify a drastic reworking of the mold upon which Blacksmiths are paid--civilization itself might end.
Imagine, for a moment, that because of some minute error, the language of the law for murder was written incorrectly such that it was impossible to find someone guilty of the crime. Would you support indefinitely holding all murder suspects to avoid letting murderers go free?
I hope you'd say no. I know I would say know. Why? Because the sort of logic that would allow them to hold a person indefinitely for one crime could easily be extended to all other crimes by intentionally fucking up other laws. Really, if they simply did not have the power to ban such games, there would almost certainly be either a) a rapid move by the government to make proper 18+ ratings or b) you'd be stuck with a system that allows a few 16 and 17 years to play a game when you'd rather they didn't. But in the end, it's simply the case that giving the government the power to infringe upon rights because of how badly the laws they've written are written gives the government absolute power. That's a sad state of affairs.
>>Just because you can say it doesn't mean there aren't consequenses from saying it!
>This is such a god damm strawman argument and I am so sick and tired of it. >People who say that freedom of speech and of the press are important values >(like the GP) aren't saying that speech should be free from consequences. >However consequences is defined in a very particular way.
It'd be nice if you gave a definition and not examples.
>When people, correctly, say that there are "consequences" to speech, they >aren't talking about bombings, riots, murder, and all that bullshit.
Actually, "people" might very well mean that.
>Stop equating some doofus at some university for getting himself kicked out >because he posts stuff on the internet (a legal consequence), with people who >riot in the streets, burn buildings, cause violence, kill each other, and >threaten to kill the people who said stuff they disagree with half a world >away.
Why not? Both are possible illegal (regardless of your claim to the contrary).
>Muslims, including many moderates, feel that a paper should not be allowed to >insult their religion. That is the very definition of a violation of free >speech.
If the Muslims are in power (ie, they run the government), yes.
>Threatening to kill Danish citizens is not a "consequence" of freedom of >speech.
Actually, that is a consequence. Threats are speech too.
>Pissing someone off doesn't give them the right to burn shit, and kill people. >That is not a valid "consequence" of speech.
You're right. But it's not a valid consequence precisely because burning shit, killing people, etc is already illegal. That doesn't mean people won't respond with violence to things they disagree with. What it does mean is that the government will not turn a blind eye to such violence because it dislikes the speech as well (look at the government protecting Klan members). It also means that the government will not preemptively make speech illegal and remove rights or privileges based on it (so, no withholding food stamps from political radicals or kicking out students from public funded universities for the things they say).
So, none of this protects you from the angry mobs directly (ie, you might still see riots and murder). It does mean that justice will be carried out, though, even when you're dead. So, to put it bluntly, consequences are all actions that are carried out as a side-effect of an act, illegal or legal. To turn a blind eye to this is to ignore that it takes courage to speak when there are those who would wish you dead. Now, if you wish to speak of justifiable consequences, that's really a whole other matter. But it's amazing how people who dislike certain things can justify almost anything.
Slashdot Mirror
It's great that you want to wait until you're married to have sex. Have at it. Just stop this nonsense that somehow anyone else who doesn't do the same is condemned for eternity or is a sinner or whatever else you can come up with.
Why? Are you worried he/she's right? Personally, I welcome people condemning people for eternity. So long as they're merely condemning people, they're following those rules about now getting involved in non-Christian courts. So that means they're not lobbying state or federal governments to push their agenda on others with force. They can say whatever words they like, condemn people all they like, and urge others to socially pressure people to not do things. And me and others like me will do the same and condemn them for all those ludicrous things they themselves admit to not follow yet cannot give any firm basis to stop following (arbitrarily using two condtradictory statements and then waving one's hands to clarify what the "good book" really means doesn't count as a firm basis). So, while they picket the couple's home because they didn't wait for marriage to have sex, I'll picket the picketers for creating signs (I'm sure they're in heaven, and hence such is a violation of the 2nd commandment) and using the lord's name in vain (I'd assume our omnipotent God already knows and doesn't need to be encouraged on what to do, nor does he need people explaining the punishment He will set out; really, speaking for God in any way is pretty well using his name in vain, just as it would be if one spoke for someone else on Earth).
Aside from that wayward rant, my point is that I'm perfectly happy to have the discussion and the ridicule and the societal pressure. Those things can almost always be worked through, given time. It's the government pressure that invariable is inflexible, used by society at its leisure to oppress selectively those it dislikes, and reaches into bedrooms and bathrooms and all other sorts of rooms to dictate things, the ethical system of any person or group, which the government not only has no business but surely should have no means to assess or enforce. Now how to resolve disputes properly is beyond me, really, but codefied law for abridging the freedoms of others at least seems to be a base compropmise. Sadly, few people (you included, it seems) seem to recognize that it's not a freedom to not be offended. It's just a shame more people don't take their own advice and "Suck it up".
The real trick is to learn to understand that we're creatures of infinite desire...Many major religions try to fill an infinite hole with an infinite God....
We're not creatures of infinite desire. We're just creatures of very big desires. Once you grow old enough (or wise enough, as the case may be), you realize that any sort of infinite God bestowing any sort of infinite gift upon us, either of heaven or hell or any other metric of infinite (ie, for all eternity), is an ultimately cruel endeavor. It then seems little surprise that many people have come to reject any sort of infinite God, if not directly because such a God would be effectively cruel and hence without mercy (consider the situation of ending an animal's existance to cease its suffering as a mercy killing) then because if Man is made in the image of God and he is not infinite in things such as desires, then the only things Man might be is singular (infinity divided by (+/-)infinity => (+/-)1, as any other scale factor than zero would lead to a value of (+/-)infinity; and anything divided by zero is undefined, and that wouldn't very well work).
The constitution specifically excludes threats against the president's life from protected speech.
The US Constitution? The constitution of another country? In the US Constitution it's made perfectly clear that (a) all legislative power of the US federal government comes from Congress, (b) the President has very limited scope to do anything outside of enforcing legislation, and (c) Congress can't abridge speech. All states of the Union, further, have to uphold the Constitution. How this is worded would leave many states to censor individuals, but virtually all states have Constitutions with similar language preventing the abridging of speech. The use of the phrase "protected speech" is merely a recent justification for why exactly the US Constitution and various is ignored.
For an example of what my state's Constitution says: Article I, Section 9. "No law shall be passed, restraining the free interchange of thought and opinion, or restricting the right to speak, write, or print, freely, on any subject whatever: but for the abuse of that right, every person shall be responsible." From the sounds of the law, abusing the right to free speech (ie, locking someone up) would require everyone to be locked up. I'm not so sure you'd want to pass that sort of law.
>>And there's lots of links to sites blocked by China.
>Visable in CHINA??? I think not.
There you go, adding extra qualifiers. I'd assume lots of links to blocked sites are visible in China, simply because news organizations end up pointing out sites that are blocked and the great Chinese firewall is still limited to humans blacklisting stuff. So, Google removing links just makes it harder for external to China mirrors from being easily found through Google. Sounds pretty similar to the situation with the DMCA and scientology.
>>>Unlike the examples of France, Germany, and China. Nothing in US law would prevent that site from saying that they believe that Scientology is a cult and is dangerous.
>>Until the Scientologists write a skeptics handbook, copyright it, and then claim sites are copying from it. What better way to use the system?
>Okay you do know that is just nuts don't you?
You seem to be implying that I didn't already recognize that I believed that Scientologists are a bit nuts. Or were you trying to call me nuts for believing that Scientology would perform acts that could reasonably be justified by its members (to stop "unjust" mocking) to further its aims?
>A Banned book? A book banned just because of the ideas in it?
My understanding that it has less to do with the ideas and more to do with the symbolism involved in neo-nazi groups. Neo-nazis have their own spin on the exact ideals of the nazi movement, hence the neo-nazi term.
>Not a TV show, movie or magazine but a book?
Yes, a book. Are TV shows, movies, or magazines more worthy of being banable? Or are you stating that they're more likely to be banned (ie, that it's possible) because they're a newer medium and considered more trivial (ie, able to be obscene)?
>Do you know how hard it is in the US to get a book banned?
Pretty hard. Books are oddly respected in the face of obscenity charges. I'm not sure why this is the case, given that the Miller test doesn't differentiate (judgementally) depiction and description, but I guess it stems from the arguments that child pornography (a chief area that was pushed to be banned) must involve the harm of a child, as mere descriptions of fantasy are hard to prove causing actual harm. To that end, I'd imagine a biography or autobiography that included description of such illegal acts by the biographee would be more likely to be labelled obscene, but against the respect for the artistic value of a biography would probably nullify this complaint.
>I can go and buy the Communist Manifesto, Mein Kampf, the little Red Book, or any number of books that criticize the current government of the US. How can you even comment on what is censorship when you seem to accept the concept that an idea is too dangerous to be allowed to be published doesn't fill you with dread?
Where did I say it didn't fill me with dread? I was pointing out that France and Germany have moved to eradicate "Mein Kampf" completely, even of its symbolic value.
>Yes the US needs to reform copyright law. It is way too restrictive and the US needs to codify fair use into law.
Good luck. The US can't even seem to define obscenity completely without relying on vague "artistic value" and "community standard", the latter of which makes the whole US a minefield.
>But banning a book? I had no idea that there was any place in Europe so totalitarian that a book of political ideas was illegal? THAT is scary to me. Who should decide what is safe to think?
No one, really.
>I can understand restricting photographs but text?
Can I assume this is because of child pornography and probably bestiality?
>Words?
For everyone but the copyright owner, that's what copyright is all about.
>Ideas? Don't you understand that restricting ideas that you happen to dislike is just as dangerous and restricting the ideas you do agree with?
Of course I understa
You can threaten anyone with a law suite at anytime.
Right, and I can threaten you with a lawsuit for making puppies sad. If it weren't for the fact that scientologists have won lawsuits in the past involving copyright and further that the DMCA basically makes it the case that caving in is the easy way out (ie, without the DMCA scientologists could sue Google even after they took whatever links down, since not only would it be a sign that they recognize the copyright violation but further had infringed in the past), I doubt google would be quick to bend over backwards. But if I threatened them with a lawsuit claiming they made puppies sad? They'd probably just blow it off (at least until I won a few lawsuits over the argument).
What I don't understand is how people can confuse freedom of speech with copyrights issues.
Let's see.. I can claim a site is violating my copyright and have it taken down. So, watch me go off and claim an abortion website is infringing my copyright. Or that one white supremecy site. Or that NAZI website (I own the copyright to Mein Kampf, don't you know). Isn't it amazing how quickly the DMCA can be used to take down sites and/or links to sites, if only for a short time. Yes, I wonder how people could confuse the two.
The site in question was posting copyrighted material.
Oh noes!
There where LOTS of links to that "blocked" site that was critical of Scientology.
And there's lots of links to sites blocked by China.
The site was not limited in creating any statement that they wanted too.
So long as it didn't post "too much" copyrighted material. Watch out skeptics guide to the bible, you're quoting it all to prove how the whole thing has contradictions. Got to take that website down. Should have used one of the bibles that wasn't copyrighted. Too bad critics of Scientology don't have that luxury.
Just can not post material that they didn't own the copyright on.
Fair use doesn't exist. And even if it did, it's amoral to post the work of another 'cause, you know, the original author deserves the money for their work or something. This is especially true when it comes to religious texts. It's all about making the clergy of the religion wealthy, not enlightenment of the soul. Stupid me.
Unlike the examples of France, Germany, and China. Nothing in US law would prevent that site from saying that they believe that Scientology is a cult and is dangerous.
Until the Scientologists write a skeptics handbook, copyright it, and then claim sites are copying from it. What better way to use the system?
However China would never allow a public site to say that China needs Democratic reform,
Well, not so long as it's copyrighted by someone else, anyways. Seriously, though, China only has control over websites within its borders and the means to attempt to block sites outside of it through filters. You're right, China would probably never intentionally allow such sites to be visible to the majority of Chinese.
and France and Germany do not allow anyone post pro Nazi information.
Or anti-Nazi information, if it quotes too much from Mein Kampf. They don't want conspiracists to sneak publication of a banned book.
While I hate the Nazis as much as anyone I can see a clear difference between getting bent over copyrights and preventing a person of group from stating their opinion.
Sure, there's a clear difference. And clearly copyright is being used in the second sphere. To ignore this is to ignore that copyright can't be abused, which is just ignorance. Any means of suppressing speech has the potential for abuse. Of course, I'm personally against copyright since I don't see the moral basis for it. The fact that it can be used to suppress speech is only something that further urges me to be against it.
Yes, silly us for assuming that the government was the one that made copyright and the DMCA. All along, it was really the scientologist who made it and use force to ensure it exists. Stupid us.
>If that isn't a different regime, what is?
:)
I refuse to accept that letting 120 years pass (or however long is the maximal lifespan of a human) is a sufficient basis to absolve a country of crimes commited in its name. Part and parcel of being a functionally immortal entity is being held responsible for all functions commited as that entity. This is probably why revolutions tend to happen.
>>One has to completely ignore the 4th amendment to not recognize a crime was commited.
>That's not a crime, that's a constitutional violation!
Actually, all constitutional violations are high crimes and treason. Unfortunately, Congress isn't likely to punish itself for writing unconstitutional law, and that's a large problem, IMO.
>Mr America says "I have a gun and I know how to use it, so behave yourself", while Mr Iran says "I don't have a gun right now, but the moment I do you're a dead man". I can't comprehend thinking that the US's position isn't better.
It's not "I have a gun". It's "I have thousands/millions of guns, aimed right at everyone's head, so behave yourself". The fact that the gun is cocked and all it would take is a false alarm to pull the trigger has me *very* worried. Mind you, Mr Russia is in a similar situation.
>>Iran might, eventually, make some nukes. The US has thousands. I'd say at the moment the US is a much greater threat.
>Yes, at the moment. Of course, in over half a century the US has only used nukes in a single conflict nad it tried fairly hard to avoid others that would involve nukes. Can you reasonably assure me that Iran will behave in a similar way, if and when it gets some?
No. I can only only unreasonably assure you based on the assumption that the leaders of Iran want to live. It seems to be the basis upon which China, America, Russia, Pakistan, India, Israel, France, the UK, and North Korea have all not started a nuclear war (feel free to include other countries that do/might have nukes). Maybe Iran will be different. And maybe Israel or America will overreact and start WW3. Do level heads prevail when MAD is possibly in play? I don't think we really need Russia and America pointing guns at everyone's heads to not start a nuclear war. But if we do, then I further need not fear Iran because it's the fear of Russia and America that overcomes all.
Yea, it's like that one time I demanded a googolplex of dollars, and then through negotiation got it down to $1 trillion. Boy was the government willing to give me the money then. Good thing to know that all it takes is being unreasonable fom the start to get what you really want.
The funny thing is, you might deserve a promotion. It's the simple fact that a lot of companies are owned by shareholders whose only recourse for information a lot of the time is through news sources. So, if it is the case that the CEO is mismanging aspects of the business, it's probably a good basis to fire the CEO. If you're a shareholder, you're interested in making money, not towing the line for the CEO. To that end, you *want* people to snitch on mismanagement of a massive scale. Imagine how much better Enron shareholders would be if the accounting fraud was found sooner and reported at large. It might make sense to not want people to snitch when the shareholders are in on the scam. But in the long term, more information is advantageous to the owners. It's funny, though, that so many people seem to treat the CEO as owner.
>>Remember slavery? How many Africans were killed, exactly?
...
>Big difference between slaves who died 150-300 years ago, and protesters who died less than twenty years ago.
Time is not an excuse if it's the same regime. Last I checked, the US is still the US.
>>Many forced sterilisations back around the beginning of the twentieth century, and lots of Americans who think that we should bring back that kind of eugenics.
>That was a long time ago.
See comment above about time.
>>Executing convicts? At least China doesn't execute children and the mentally incompetent. Oh wait, America finally bannd executing the mentally incompetent, although children are still fair game.
>And the idiots in the Supreme Court outlawed the practise anyway last year, in clear contravention of precedent and the plain meaning of the Constitution.
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
I don't think any type of execution could be considered non-cruel. And don't try to claim that the "and" only outlaws cruel and unusual punishment. It says "punishments". Ie, "cruel punishments and unusual punishments".
>>Censorship? Obviously you haven't been paying attention to the Republican's latest attempt to stop the media from revealing their crimes.
>You're begging the question: was there a crime? There's a lot of very strong evidence that there was not.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
One has to completely ignore the 4th amendment to not recognize a crime was commited.
>The laws in question would merely prevent publishing legitimate secrets, which is no big deal at all.
Who defines what's a legitimate secret? I guess the courts get to. So, how long until there's an actual trial over Bush's "legitimate" hiding of warrantless wiretapping?
>>And the constant threats against Iran
>You mean the rogue state lead by a lunatic who worships an imam in a well and who threatens to wipe Israel from the map? You think we shouldn't try to keep them in line?
Just as much as the rest of the world should have and still should keep the US in check for threatening to wipe most the world off the map if Russia ever attacked. You do know that Russia still has nukes and ICBMs, right? I've yet to hear any sign that the US doesn't still support MAD. Oh, and please feel free to try to rationalize how pointing hundreds of ICBMs at many other countries with nuclear warheads is somehow "better" than vague threats without the means to actually do what is threatened. Iran might, eventually, make some nukes. The US has thousands. I'd say at the moment the US is a much greater threat.
>>Don't dupe yourself -- America is a fascist state, and has been for some time now.
>... in any case, your objections are irrelevant: even were we as bad as you think, that would not make the Chinese any better in an absolute sense.
True. No matter how fascist the US is, it doesn't make China a better place to live in.
Bullying is a bigger problem than your simplistic solution of hitting back can solve.
Just to throw in my two cents, you're right that the mentioned "solution" isn't a panacea to bullying. There's rarely panaceas for any problem. But the mentioned solution, to support a child defending themselves through force, is really the only step a person being bullied can really take. You seem to recognize that bullies don't tend to be restricted in their physical access so it is mental access that is the usual limiter. But the only means to limiting physical access is to literally adequately imprison the bully (a determined enough bully could run away from any non-confinement or non-adequate confinement and hunt down their victim) and possibly all their friends/associates (to prevent retrobution).
None of this, though, does anything to solve the situation in the present instance of being bullied. So, one has to hope that there is a time that you're bullied sufficiently that the above confinement is enforced but not so bullied that you end up dead. It's simply the case that short of escalation, most bullies know the system well enough to not "cross the line" to actually be locked up. Truthfully, it'd probably take a murder to lock up most bullies anyways, as denying the freedom of people indefinitely for what the might do is a horribly crappy system that few people are in favor of and battery/theft-from-another-non-adult by non-adults is not considered a serious crime. So, there's no simple legal win position.
Unix hater's handbook
// well, actually not so much the systems themselves, but the assinine UNIX mentality of "harder is better" and "more documentation eliminates the need for good design."
/// fortunately, one of the unintended side-effects of Linux is that the mentality, at least amongst Linux users, is slowly, ever so slowly, fading away.
it's funny AND true.
Yes, and not true of GNU in many cases.
/ seriously thinks UNIX like systems need to go the way of VAXen.
To an extent I agree. But the only paradigm I've seen that's a good replacement for UNIX is something like EROS, and I'm still waiting for a working implementation.
Actually, the mentality is "simpler [code] is better", often to the point of requiring the user to do some bizzaro things to make things work right. GNU has really worked to fill in these gaps, probably because when reimplementing things they got fed up with problems innate to the old tools. Admittedly, some of the solutions are really just hacks of a sort (--).
, which set back Computer Science departments and academia 15 years behind industry.
I'd say it's the reverse. I'd say UNIX is much like unicellular life. Unicellular life is simple, multiples rapidly, and it functions well at the limited number of tasks it does. Without life like this, there'd simply never have been the means to build more complex, multicellular life. And even with this more complex life, there's still many nitches where unicellular life is still best. UNIX was/is a very good design for the job it's itended to do. But it's clearly not the solution to a lot of complex problems. Oh, and Windows isn't remotely either, as it's stuck in the same paradigm of VMS/UNIX, but with some more complex ACLs slapped on top.
I'd say GNU is responsible more for this. Truthfully, though, it'd be a pretty drastic fork away from anything *nix-like before there will be real progress in this area. The good part, though, is that Linux could provide the means to this new OS's driver needs. Applications, though, would probably be a massive rewrite.
While you've brought up many good points of unions gone bad, the funny thing is the number of things you list which seem to apply equally well to corporations. For example, corporations are more interested in short term profits than the survivability of the company. Further, a lot of the illegal actions that are performed by a corporation are rarely punished or when they are they are treated more as civil matters as it's virtually impossible to prove any individual at fault for systematic negligence. As even as unions can be, I think the problem isn't unions themselves (or corporations themselves, for that matter). The problem is that the law takes steps to support the existance of such organizations through direct enforcement at times (closed shop/subsidies/tax breaks) as well as ignoring infringement of the law (bullying/negligence/anti-trusts). You even hint at this, noting a firm problem is that unions cannot compete against each other, since everyone is forced to join that one that exists for a company.
So, I believe that unions and corporations should exist, but not under any special privileges. And I think anti-trust laws should only be invoked over cabals, not the open union of people or companies. It is when information is closed off that the free market can fail to function properly. And using force to force people to join or not join organizations is an obvious interference in the market place. The biggest issue throughout history between employers and labor has seemed to be ignoring the law for one or the other. Perhaps recognizing it for both would solve most problems.
I'll admit my example was contrived. My point was more to counter the apparent belief that non-determinism implies that you can't trace to the cause to an effect. Truthfully, in both the deterministic and non-deterministic case an effect may or may not be easily traceable to its cause. That's more a factor of whether the mapping of cause to effect is a function, and I'd claim that can hardly be claimed to be the case (the simplest thought is that to go around an object, once can either go right then left or left then right, both leading to the same effect (equal time to reach the objective) with the same start point).
But as soon as you can determine why a person makes a particular choice, you leave the door open for some amount of determinism.
This assumes it's at all possible. It's a stretch to assume that all humans have equal weight to all scenarios based on upbringing (again, nature vs nuture), so at some level one is bound to simply guessing or asking (and then further trying to evaluate the truthfulness of statements made).
However, they will point to those other cases and if you say that the agent chose 3 because the current state was 2 and the agent prefers 3's then you've opened the door for determinism....
The real issue, though, is that if a person is already in state 3, then determining that a person was in state 2 and transitioned to it for some reason can never violate non-determinism. Why? Because as you give as an example, non-determinism doesn't mean there's no determinism, just that there's the possibility of non-determinism.
To that end, the question of non-determinism is more about the ability to predict the future and if there really is randomness or merely an inability for humans to gather the necessary information to predict the future. Given that the "system" is the universe, I'm disinclined to believe that we have the means to store all the information of the system and then further run it faster in emulation than the real system such that we could make prognastigative efforts with absolute certainty even *if* the universe were deterministic.
Trying to use constructs as large as people then would only be useful for grand and general estimations, not actually reliable predictions. And to that end, it would seem appropriate to use such estimations merely for one's own precautions, not as some sort of mechanism to "mark" others for what they are estimated to do. Adding something like non-determinism might only help people who desire to act like they can predict the future to know otherwise and act accordingly. But I'm agnostic as well on the truth, and consider what I already know about the best case, I don't think it matters very much.
In a non-deterministic universe things happen without any discernable cause.
No. Non-determinism means that there are multiple possible outcomes.
As soon as you assign cause you start to imply determinism
Again, no. Consider the following:
Deterministic:
f(1) = 1
f(2) = 2
f(3) = 3
Non-deterministic:
f(1) = 0 or 1
f(2) = 2 or 3
f(3) = 4 or 5
If one sees the effect of 3, in the deterministic case one knows the cause is 3, while in the non-deterministic case one knows the cause is 2. Just because a function isn't involved does not mean that there isn't a finite mapping.
However, if things just happen randomly, that's also a problem for Free Will.
Not really. Randomness means unpredictable to a limited sense. The point of free will is that a result is random until the person makes a choice. It is the choice that removes randomness (quite like how the environment selects from random mutation in evolution). The real issue is explaining how choice itself is non-deterministic.
The fundamental problem with Jonathan Zuck's argument is that he's mis-casted the characters in his play. While he's right that the open source movement could be well cast as some of the Renaissance, the Dominician priest who would view such as vanity is actually the proprietary movement. This is clear in his statement: For leading Linux users like TiVo and Adaptec, the ability to protect key intellectual property is essential. TiVo and Adaptec are stuck in the old ways and are more interested in reverting back to it because they view it as necessary, just as one's religion becomes the means to comfort oneself against the rapidly changing times.
The simple fact is, then, that RMS is closer to the Founding Fathers of the USA or those who fought against the Dominician priest. This is because RMS looked back into history to recognize the likely fate of a simply open-source movement, as previous similar movements were usurped; so, he attemped to create a mechanism to guard against those who would try to remove freedom in the name of the "necessary". One has to look no further than the fact that proprietarism comes from the state to recognize that it is a construct of man, not the natural state. This is true as well of state sponsored religion, and it seems hardly surprising then that many people would call for the state to support them as they believe their religion cannot stand alone (obviously not true for all people). I only wonder why he doesn't see the same pattern of history as well.
If you follow the GPL, you have a license to use OSS. Break the GPL, and well, you don't have that license anymore.
Oh the number of errrors... Well, let's begin. The GPL is FSS, not OSS. Use of FSS/OSS/etc isn't bound by you having a license to the GPL/BSD/whatever; use is an innate property of legally possessing a copyrighted work. It's bound to the person who gave you a copy having proper redistribution rights (and you're liable, at least in the US, if they don't). This means your violation of the license would occur upon redistribution outside of the terms of the license and its nullification would open you up for punishment for all copies you redistributed; it would do nothing to halt your use of the legal copy you obtained.
This is fundamentally different from an EULA, which tries to force upon you use requirements that harken back to book publishers including EULAs inside the cover of books in an attempt to do the same sort of legal entrapment EULAs do today. The two major defenses to combating an EULA are to return the product (one of the stated bases why EULAs have yet to be wholly declared null) or to, if possible, circumvent agreement to the EULA (clearly this is paramount to seeing a contract lying inside your new home already signed by the person you just bought it from with further restrictiosn, and you cleverly ripping it up). None of these hoops are present in the GPL because most people never have a reason to agree to it.
You're partially right. While it's true that the majority of the people you list might not be called suckers, the majority of them plus iTunes users would likely be called idiots by many people. Just to break it down.
Idiots
------
They use iTunes
They drive SUVs in suburban and urban environments.
They lease, perpetually, or they buy new cars every 5 years.
They choose not to save anything.
They fail to pay off their credit cards in a timely manner, incurring interest and finance charges.
They buy too many things, therefore incurring credit card debt in the first place.
Possibly Idiots
---------------
They choose not to invest in 401k plans--401k plans may not be the long term wisest use of one's money, especially given various caps applied to them.
They default on loans--loans, especially student loans, are vested on an assumption of employment, which obviously cannot be guaranteed; I don't think one need to necessarily be an idiot to get into a situation where an economic depression might cause one to default on a loan where it wasn't unreasonable to take the loan in the first place.
The reason, btw, that I'd be more likely to classify the group as idiots instead of suckers is primarily that many of these idiots might, in the long term, never have to pay off their debt due to bankruptcy law. Since one can't, for example, reclaim all that imported beer one drank, it's possible that for a period of time a person will live much better off than they had any chance of living otherwise (consider, for a moment, a person stuck in a minimum wage job without the means to advance (well, aside from a student loan--and that assumes the person has any reasonable chance fo being accepted in college)).
Of course, they're still idiots, in the sense they've hurt others, but they're not really suckers. This holds true with the acceptance of DRM under any terms, as it promotes the belief that people are willing to accept DRM. It's stupid to encourage something unnecessary, just as it's stupid to buy lots of things on credit with no reasonable hope to pay for them. It's just sad that too many people are so willing to let it all slide in the name of "supporting the artists" and getting it online; it feels like people have been brainwashed into accepting shit because something worse kept being threatened, and that same feeling, btw, seems to loomy over the Bush presidency. Or can you really say you *want* DRM and consider it a feature?
If someone breaks into my house and steals one of my guns am I liable for what they do with it? No.
You're not a steward of everyone. Hence you're not liable to protect others from the theft of your gun. From an ethics perspective, it has nothing to do with taking resonable steps and everything to do with promises made. So unless you promised to keep the gun under lock and key (and I'm assuming that you were actually asked, not fundamentally forced to agree), you shouldn't be at all liable even if you leave your gun fully loaded sitting at a table, unguarded, in the middle of a heavy-crime area.
Of course in that situation I wouldn't expect to get the gun back except after its use as a murder weapon. In any case, once you start taking on the information of others, there's generally an explicit policy against the redistribution of that information except under a very small set of circumstances. To that end, negligence against that policy is inherently a violation of trust, among other things, and I would say clearly unethical. So, it would make sense for people to sue and try to gain some compensation for the breech.
Even if they'd done everything reasonable and it was shown that the information was still obtained, there'd be a basis to sue. It might seem a bit extreme or unfair to take this position, but people and companies should make preparations for the worst and be willing to compensate and take responsibility for the situation. A promise is something that one has to take with deep consideration. If it's the case that they can use a circumstance to break it with zero punishment, then clearly no promise is absolute, and if that's the case, they shouldn't be taking the information in the first place, since they clearly inheriently intend to leak it anyway at some point (ie, it's a known risk which has a 100% probability of occuring given enough time).
No, by that fucked up line of reasoning, you're not alive, so you can't kill yourself. Seriously, though, would you consider being under an oppressive theocracy (nothing to stop this from being the result of a democracy), an oppressive dictatorship, or simply being a non-citizen really living? Or would you consider it a debasement of your rights and something you should fight against to reclaim your life and your ability to choose how to live it?
The founders of the US fought and risked their lives to have lives. Many died as a consequence of this, choosing to die fighting rather than living a non-life--okay, clearly they weren't trying to die, but they knew that there was the risk of dying and took the chance because even defeat, which against such a strong Empire as Britain really made the whole affair seem rather suicidal, was better than the continued oppression of the British Empire. There's been many other countries who have fought similar wars of independence as a result of some great injustice(s) being levelled against them, treating them as inferior and at times unworthy of life. It may seem rather cold and callus to equate liberty and living, but clearly they must be deeply related if it is the case that there is no liberty if one can be at a whim be executed or injured by government police/death squads. Those who are simply unwilling to be vigilante for the cause of liberty will certainly not have it and be inherently at risk of losing their life.
So, perhaps it's not best to intermingle the two words when it might be misunderstood what exactly is being spoken about, but many times they are one and the same. So, I'm sorry if it sounded like I wanted people to die, for that is furthest from the truth. I wish for people to live and fight for their lives/liberty because it requires a large majority to continuously keep up the fight against the slow and insiduous removal of liberty. United we stand, divided we fall. My sadness comes in the division of us.
Just to throw this out there, there was a nice Star Trek: TNG episode (The Drumhead) about just this. It even had the nice additional issue of racism thrown in (well, that and lying about it). Of course it's just a replaying of the McCarthy era witch-hunts. The only real sad part is how some people seem to not learn from history; or perhaps they simply believe other people are stupid and haven't. In either case, I would say that such remarks are really a grounds for dismisal at minimal.
I'll throw in another sci-fi reference--this time from Stargate SG-1 (Between Two Fires)--to justify it, One crucial point to the episode is that a lack of transparency in government and further lying about it is considered even worse than murder. Now, one might at first think this to be silly, but one of the things that seems clear about witch-hunts as well as all other unconstitutional acts is that the courts in the USA rarely do more than announce the laws as void. In the span until that point, the government gets to abuse people however it pleases and very often not only does the whole act not fully become voided--it is, afterall, these repeated sorts of cases that have pressured more latitude to protecting against "eminent threats" at the expense of liberty--but new laws with altered language but similar effect are passed by the legislature--look no further than the many censorship laws aimed at stopping pornography on the internet.
It is sad that legislatures are not punished for writing unconstitutional law nor police or other executive branch individuals for following an unconstitutional law. It is also sad that people do not value liberty over life, disregarding that a life without liberty is not living at all. It is almost certainly this reason that the people of the USA do not consider a violation of government worse than murder. With great power comes great responsibility. Sadly, there doesn't seem great accountability, and so the most one can hope to obtain is an apology or possibly money. Neither of these punishments fit the crime.
You first. Seriously. You're very insistent, so I assume you have them.
Perhaps you've heard of the concept of "innocent until proven guilty"? How about "due process of law"? The simple fact is that the purpose of due process is to allow for a court of law to determine the guilt or innocence of an individual. Until that time which they are found guilty, they are to be treated as innocent. Further, without due process of law, it is illegal to take their property without just compensation or hold a person indefinitely. Even holding a person indefinitely when a person *is* found guilty is limited to being proportional to the crime one is found guilty of.
All in all, if there were actual trials occuring, then there'd be the transcripts and court records that would include the proof that many people demand. This is one of the main reasons so many people are calling for a trial, as a trial is designed to be a fair mechanism of deciding a person's guilt. The only reasonable explanations that I can think of for not wanting to hold trials is either that there is a lack of proof or that there is fear that a fair trial will in some way provide too much information to the enemy. Neither of these seem sufficient excuse for holding a person who is by definition innocent.
the BSAA (BlackSmith Artisans Association) has just announced that using a imperial hammer to pound metric sized nails is not 'Fair Use'. Nothing in the BMCA (Blacksmith Millenium Conservation Act) covers the use of imperial hammers with the wrong region-sized nails nor interfering with the jammer technology to allow the use of hammers with any sized nails. Further, the existance of imperial-sized nails and meric hammers removes any claim of necessity to mix the two. We must remember that it is a moral right for Blacksmiths to continue to be well paid, even in the days of industrialization. No amount of moderization can justify a drastic reworking of the mold upon which Blacksmiths are paid--civilization itself might end.
So remember kids: don't dejammer that hammer.
Imagine, for a moment, that because of some minute error, the language of the law for murder was written incorrectly such that it was impossible to find someone guilty of the crime. Would you support indefinitely holding all murder suspects to avoid letting murderers go free?
I hope you'd say no. I know I would say know. Why? Because the sort of logic that would allow them to hold a person indefinitely for one crime could easily be extended to all other crimes by intentionally fucking up other laws. Really, if they simply did not have the power to ban such games, there would almost certainly be either a) a rapid move by the government to make proper 18+ ratings or b) you'd be stuck with a system that allows a few 16 and 17 years to play a game when you'd rather they didn't. But in the end, it's simply the case that giving the government the power to infringe upon rights because of how badly the laws they've written are written gives the government absolute power. That's a sad state of affairs.
>>Just because you can say it doesn't mean there aren't consequenses from saying it!
>This is such a god damm strawman argument and I am so sick and tired of it. >People who say that freedom of speech and of the press are important values >(like the GP) aren't saying that speech should be free from consequences. >However consequences is defined in a very particular way.
It'd be nice if you gave a definition and not examples.
>When people, correctly, say that there are "consequences" to speech, they >aren't talking about bombings, riots, murder, and all that bullshit.
Actually, "people" might very well mean that.
>Stop equating some doofus at some university for getting himself kicked out >because he posts stuff on the internet (a legal consequence), with people who >riot in the streets, burn buildings, cause violence, kill each other, and >threaten to kill the people who said stuff they disagree with half a world >away.
Why not? Both are possible illegal (regardless of your claim to the contrary).
>Muslims, including many moderates, feel that a paper should not be allowed to >insult their religion. That is the very definition of a violation of free >speech.
If the Muslims are in power (ie, they run the government), yes.
>Threatening to kill Danish citizens is not a "consequence" of freedom of >speech.
Actually, that is a consequence. Threats are speech too.
>Pissing someone off doesn't give them the right to burn shit, and kill people. >That is not a valid "consequence" of speech.
You're right. But it's not a valid consequence precisely because burning shit, killing people, etc is already illegal. That doesn't mean people won't respond with violence to things they disagree with. What it does mean is that the government will not turn a blind eye to such violence because it dislikes the speech as well (look at the government protecting Klan members). It also means that the government will not preemptively make speech illegal and remove rights or privileges based on it (so, no withholding food stamps from political radicals or kicking out students from public funded universities for the things they say).
So, none of this protects you from the angry mobs directly (ie, you might still see riots and murder). It does mean that justice will be carried out, though, even when you're dead. So, to put it bluntly, consequences are all actions that are carried out as a side-effect of an act, illegal or legal. To turn a blind eye to this is to ignore that it takes courage to speak when there are those who would wish you dead. Now, if you wish to speak of justifiable consequences, that's really a whole other matter. But it's amazing how people who dislike certain things can justify almost anything.