That's my biggest gripe with Stephenson. Love his writing, love his characters, and he *sets up* a great plot... but his endings have gone downhill, IMHO, since Snow Crash.
Hmm... sounds like a job for strong encryption. I was thinking more of a database, though... and the security issues there are frightening. Hell, just the *stupidity* issues there are frightening!
I'd think you could easily program around that, ditto for contact lenses. Temperature, presence of pulse, etc. - would be hard to fake, I think. Especially with retinal scans.
Sorry - I was not assuming your statement was about the future, I was making a (semi-) gentle suggestion that the USA could aim higher in its quest for the "Good Neighbour of the Year" award.;-)
Furthermore, I don't completely disagree with you - I think the USA could well have been more tyrannical *in a military sense* than it has been. That may not be a great comfort to people in countries like Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Iraq (to pick a few), but it's true.
I don't think we really need to worry about the USA "destroy(ing) the world". However, I do think the *economic* policies the USA has foisted on the rest of the world (including its neighbours) are detrimental to many people's well-being. As global "free"-trade market forces play themselves out, and the corporations calling the tune outsource jobs in pursuit of profit, this has come to include USA citizens.
Your points are well-taken, and you seem to have a good grasp of the realities for people in other countries. The main point of my post was to suggest that you ask what your neighbours actually think rather than telling us what you think we think.
I think. It's hard to remember. And I never remember which hat I'm wearing, 'cause I have dual citizenship!;-)
I would think the scan will have to be renewed on a fairly regular basis.
Still, this leaves me wondering. We hear a lot of negative stuff about universal ID cards of one stripe or another (I won't go so far as to call it FUD, it may be quite reasonable). Most of the cautions expressed seem to revolve around duplication / forgery by criminals etc.
Anyone have any info on how hard it would be to fool an iris (or retina) scanner? Might be a good substitute for universal IDs. I mean, the ostensible principles of univeral IDs aren't all bad...
Being, among other things, an HR guy, I advertise in exactly one place - the (Canadian) federal government Job Bank. Generates plenty of applications, most of them related to the job. Is there nothing similar in the USA?
Just out of interest, what is required in terms of belief in order for something to be categorized as a religion, rather than simply a belief about the world?
I've always liked the definition Clifford Geertz published in 1966. This is something of a standard in anthropological circles:
A religion is
(1) a system of symbols which acts to
(2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in (humans) by
(3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and
(4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that
(5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic. (Geertz 1966: 4)
Hong Kong would be starving without food imports. As for Japan being self-sufficient in foodstuffs, I'd love to see a citation on that. Seems to me they import a lot of food from my country, anyway.
The inescapable truth is that nearly every global problem facing humanity today is either directly caused or exacerbated by our growing numbers. For more information, I highly recommend Lindsay Grant's excellent book _Juggernaut_.
People in the world aren't hungry because evil Americans build cities on fertile land. People in the world are hungry because they live under the thumb of brutal dictators. You want to feed the world? Promote freedom and capitalism around the world.
I beg to differ. People in the world are hungry because they have overpopulated their environment and outstripped its capacity to support them. It's a harsh truth, but still a truth: If we (humans) don't manage our fertility, natural forces will manage our mortality.
...and if you like Powers, you might also like Steven Erikson's stuff. Steve's stuff has some Powers influence and will probably appeal to Powers' fans.
Go anywhere in the third world and find out what gets accepted more readily: A US $100 bill or a Canadian $100 bill.
As it happens, I'm a citizen of both countries, and I've had occasion to use both types of money in several first- and third-world countries. Never had a problem with either.:-)
Man, that's sad. Don't you folks have parental leave? Here, you can take 35 weeks off when your child is born, and draw Employment Insurance. It's great.
...are certainly taught here (in Manitoba, Canada). The easiest way to remember it is the "three-second rule" - you should leave three seconds between your vehicle and the vehicle in front of you. And that's in GOOD weather! Our weather is shite, so in winter, I'll often go to 5 seconds or more. Cheers!
People take the old greenback a lot more seriously than they do the full color mickeymouse currency from a lot of other places (i.e. Disneyworld, Canada, France, etc.)
I call horse-puckey trollbait. Effective anti-counterfeiting measures have been absent from USA currency for a long time, and even now the US lags far behind most of the world.
I would suggest that the only people who take the "greenback" more seriously (as a piece of paper) than other banknotes are counterfeiters -- and, of course, US citizens with some odd romantic (or maybe jingoistic) attachment to archaic technology.
So, the US government is too lazy to fix their "broken" currency? Instead, they compel private companies to fix their problem for them.
I've often wondered about this. Media from other countries make much of the USA's laughably counterfeitable currency. Some have gone so far as to suggest that there is some reason why the US gov't WANTS a currency that can easily be duplicated.
Now, I can't think why that would be the case - but really, you've got to wonder...
Yeah, it's definitely you. And a whole bunch of other people who have bought the "it's too early to tell" line.
I used to live on the shores of Hudson Bay, and the ice used to break up at the end of June/early July. It's happening a lot earlier now. The result? Polar bears are losing weight and dying more often because they can't hunt as long. Things don't look good for the Hudson Bay bear population.
Or let's look at another species - murres. Twenty years ago, they mostly fed on arctic cod they found under the sea ice. Now they are feeding more on capelin because the cod, apparently, are getting harder to find.
A few years back, my folks were some of the biologists on an expedition to chart the surface heat budget of the Arctic Ocean. The idea was to drive a Canadian icebreaker into the ice pack and freeze it in for over a year, then use it as a research platform. They expected no trouble finding thick ice.
Much to the surprise and alarm of pretty much all of those involved, they couldn't find ice thicker than about 2 metres. This is a hugely significant change.
Climate change is not a theory, it's a reality, and more evidence is showing up every day. And it's not going to be pretty for a lot of species, and a lot of fragile ecosystems, and ultimately - I suspect - for ourselves.
What I mean by 'idea' is of coarse that it has to understand the conceps 'hole', 'suitable larva to lay an egg in', etc... I wouln't even know how to begin to program that in a computer.
What I mean is that insects probably don't "understand" or form "concepts" as we do. I don't think a nervous system of insectile complexity supports awareness to that degree.
Which really begs the question - how do they do it, then? I figure it's a system of what we might think of as hard-coded heuristics - in other words, built in rules rather than ideation. It's no less awe-inspiring to contemplate.
And that brings us to the question, to what degree are we (and other cerebrally endowed species) subject to that kind of hard-wiring? Personally, I think it's a lot more than the "free-will" types would like to admit. I suspect it's one of those questions, though, where we can approach understanding but never quite grasp the definitive answer in all its complexity.
... is confidentiality laws. Regulations in my field prohibit emailing certain information (yes, even though we COULD use PGP etc., the legislators havent' caught on). Faxing is OK.
To be able to do this it must have a general idea about what a hole in the ground is and how to make it.
I don't think there's any reason to assume that insects have ideas the way we think (of) "ideas". However, they do seem to have behaviour programmed into them... and that's plenty interesting and cool.
I've sometimes wondered whether ants, with their chemical communication systems, might not in effect form a single distributed organism, with its neurotransmitters on the outside.
I see you drink a lot of fruit juice. While on the whole I think your dietary strategy is better-founded than that of people who live on high-fructose corn syrup (e.g. non-diet soda), it's worth noting that fruit juices contain high levels of sugars. This can cause problems around insulin release etc.
My work involves the odd bit of contact with dieticians, and the last one I spoke with recommended no more than a couple of glasses of real (100%) fruit juice a day. Cheers!
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That's my biggest gripe with Stephenson. Love his writing, love his characters, and he *sets up* a great plot... but his endings have gone downhill, IMHO, since Snow Crash.
Hmm... sounds like a job for strong encryption. I was thinking more of a database, though... and the security issues there are frightening. Hell, just the *stupidity* issues there are frightening!
I'd think you could easily program around that, ditto for contact lenses. Temperature, presence of pulse, etc. - would be hard to fake, I think. Especially with retinal scans.
Sorry - I was not assuming your statement was about the future, I was making a (semi-) gentle suggestion that the USA could aim higher in its quest for the "Good Neighbour of the Year" award. ;-)
;-)
Furthermore, I don't completely disagree with you - I think the USA could well have been more tyrannical *in a military sense* than it has been. That may not be a great comfort to people in countries like Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Iraq (to pick a few), but it's true.
I don't think we really need to worry about the USA "destroy(ing) the world". However, I do think the *economic* policies the USA has foisted on the rest of the world (including its neighbours) are detrimental to many people's well-being. As global "free"-trade market forces play themselves out, and the corporations calling the tune outsource jobs in pursuit of profit, this has come to include USA citizens.
Your points are well-taken, and you seem to have a good grasp of the realities for people in other countries. The main point of my post was to suggest that you ask what your neighbours actually think rather than telling us what you think we think.
I think. It's hard to remember. And I never remember which hat I'm wearing, 'cause I have dual citizenship!
I would think the scan will have to be renewed on a fairly regular basis.
Still, this leaves me wondering. We hear a lot of negative stuff about universal ID cards of one stripe or another (I won't go so far as to call it FUD, it may be quite reasonable). Most of the cautions expressed seem to revolve around duplication / forgery by criminals etc.
Anyone have any info on how hard it would be to fool an iris (or retina) scanner? Might be a good substitute for universal IDs. I mean, the ostensible principles of univeral IDs aren't all bad...
Being, among other things, an HR guy, I advertise in exactly one place - the (Canadian) federal government Job Bank. Generates plenty of applications, most of them related to the job. Is there nothing similar in the USA?
[and I would say we're better neighbors than about 1/3 of the world]
;-)
I'd suggest you ask your neighbours.
But seriously, why not aim for the top 5% rather than the top 67%?
For God-fearing Christians, this administration seems to heavily favour "Do unto others before they do unto you" over "Turn the other cheek". :-/
I can see the effect on tension, all right, but wouldn't this also throw the intonation out?
OTOH, it'd be nice to be able to flip between different tunings I use (EADGBE, DADGBE, DADGAD, FACGCE) easily and quickly...
Just out of interest, what is required in terms of belief in order for something to be categorized as a religion, rather than simply a belief about the world?
I've always liked the definition Clifford Geertz published in 1966. This is something of a standard in anthropological circles:
A religion is
(1) a system of symbols which acts to
(2) establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations in (humans) by
(3) formulating conceptions of a general order of existence and
(4) clothing these conceptions with such an aura of factuality that
(5) the moods and motivations seem uniquely realistic. (Geertz 1966: 4)
Resilience through diversity, not absolute immunity.
Absolutely. And not so incidentally, the classic argument in favour of biodiversity!
Hong Kong would be starving without food imports. As for Japan being self-sufficient in foodstuffs, I'd love to see a citation on that. Seems to me they import a lot of food from my country, anyway. The inescapable truth is that nearly every global problem facing humanity today is either directly caused or exacerbated by our growing numbers. For more information, I highly recommend Lindsay Grant's excellent book _Juggernaut_.
People in the world aren't hungry because evil Americans build cities on fertile land. People in the world are hungry because they live under the thumb of brutal dictators. You want to feed the world? Promote freedom and capitalism around the world.
I beg to differ. People in the world are hungry because they have overpopulated their environment and outstripped its capacity to support them. It's a harsh truth, but still a truth: If we (humans) don't manage our fertility, natural forces will manage our mortality.
...and if you like Powers, you might also like Steven Erikson's stuff. Steve's stuff has some Powers influence and will probably appeal to Powers' fans.
Interesting - only a few days after an article about Microsoft trying to take on Google, they seem to be spreading Google-FUD. Coincidence?
Go anywhere in the third world and find out what gets accepted more readily: A US $100 bill or a Canadian $100 bill.
:-)
As it happens, I'm a citizen of both countries, and I've had occasion to use both types of money in several first- and third-world countries. Never had a problem with either.
Man, that's sad. Don't you folks have parental leave? Here, you can take 35 weeks off when your child is born, and draw Employment Insurance. It's great.
...are certainly taught here (in Manitoba, Canada). The easiest way to remember it is the "three-second rule" - you should leave three seconds between your vehicle and the vehicle in front of you. And that's in GOOD weather! Our weather is shite, so in winter, I'll often go to 5 seconds or more. Cheers!
People take the old greenback a lot more seriously than they do the full color mickeymouse currency from a lot of other places (i.e. Disneyworld, Canada, France, etc.)
I call horse-puckey trollbait. Effective anti-counterfeiting measures have been absent from USA currency for a long time, and even now the US lags far behind most of the world. I would suggest that the only people who take the "greenback" more seriously (as a piece of paper) than other banknotes are counterfeiters -- and, of course, US citizens with some odd romantic (or maybe jingoistic) attachment to archaic technology.
So, the US government is too lazy to fix their "broken" currency? Instead, they compel private companies to fix their problem for them.
I've often wondered about this. Media from other countries make much of the USA's laughably counterfeitable currency. Some have gone so far as to suggest that there is some reason why the US gov't WANTS a currency that can easily be duplicated.
Now, I can't think why that would be the case - but really, you've got to wonder...
Yeah, it's definitely you. And a whole bunch of other people who have bought the "it's too early to tell" line.
I used to live on the shores of Hudson Bay, and the ice used to break up at the end of June/early July. It's happening a lot earlier now. The result? Polar bears are losing weight and dying more often because they can't hunt as long. Things don't look good for the Hudson Bay bear population.
Or let's look at another species - murres. Twenty years ago, they mostly fed on arctic cod they found under the sea ice. Now they are feeding more on capelin because the cod, apparently, are getting harder to find.
A few years back, my folks were some of the biologists on an expedition to chart the surface heat budget of the Arctic Ocean. The idea was to drive a Canadian icebreaker into the ice pack and freeze it in for over a year, then use it as a research platform. They expected no trouble finding thick ice.
Much to the surprise and alarm of pretty much all of those involved, they couldn't find ice thicker than about 2 metres. This is a hugely significant change.
Climate change is not a theory, it's a reality, and more evidence is showing up every day. And it's not going to be pretty for a lot of species, and a lot of fragile ecosystems, and ultimately - I suspect - for ourselves.
What I mean by 'idea' is of coarse that it has to understand the conceps 'hole', 'suitable larva to lay an egg in', etc... I wouln't even know how to begin to program that in a computer.
What I mean is that insects probably don't "understand" or form "concepts" as we do. I don't think a nervous system of insectile complexity supports awareness to that degree.
Which really begs the question - how do they do it, then? I figure it's a system of what we might think of as hard-coded heuristics - in other words, built in rules rather than ideation. It's no less awe-inspiring to contemplate.
And that brings us to the question, to what degree are we (and other cerebrally endowed species) subject to that kind of hard-wiring? Personally, I think it's a lot more than the "free-will" types would like to admit. I suspect it's one of those questions, though, where we can approach understanding but never quite grasp the definitive answer in all its complexity.
Still, it's fun to think about it. Cheers!
... is confidentiality laws. Regulations in my field prohibit emailing certain information (yes, even though we COULD use PGP etc., the legislators havent' caught on). Faxing is OK.
To be able to do this it must have a general idea about what a hole in the ground is and how to make it.
I don't think there's any reason to assume that insects have ideas the way we think (of) "ideas". However, they do seem to have behaviour programmed into them... and that's plenty interesting and cool.
I've sometimes wondered whether ants, with their chemical communication systems, might not in effect form a single distributed organism, with its neurotransmitters on the outside.
Cheers!
I see you drink a lot of fruit juice. While on the whole I think your dietary strategy is better-founded than that of people who live on high-fructose corn syrup (e.g. non-diet soda), it's worth noting that fruit juices contain high levels of sugars. This can cause problems around insulin release etc.
My work involves the odd bit of contact with dieticians, and the last one I spoke with recommended no more than a couple of glasses of real (100%) fruit juice a day. Cheers!