...it's Apple's choice. No matter how dumb or greedy it seems. As consumers, we get to vote with our wallets and optionally grumble. Where I live, there's no AT&T, so Apple makes no iPhone sales here. I'd love to buy for my family — that'd be 5 units — but without a carrier, it's just a glorified iPod and there's no point.
It does sting a little... we've got a lot of Macs between us and consider ourselves loyal Apple customers... oh well.
I think Apple deliberately made the iPhone "easy" to make it as open as possible whilst still giving lip service to AT&T's locking and security requirements.
Perhaps so. However, I am not going to do that; I am not interested in a fairly expensive phone without a warranty or technical support, which appears to be the current policy. Nor am I interested in one that may break with an upgrade, or which is unable to upgrade while the rest of the field is. I am even less interested in handing out such hardware to my family. That wouldn't be a favor.
I see the mods, high on their usual dose of incompetence crack, modded my post "troll"; as if my opinion, and the opinions of the other 250 million non-GSM, non-AT&T customers were completely irrelevant. Funny, but my current cellphone works fine on all the networks - I travel often, and I've yet to find anywhere I can't connect except in the deep boonies of Montana or similar, where there is no service.
The iPhone is simply a non-starter for me. I can easily afford to buy them for my familiy, but it would be pointless, as the phone won't work here. That's a fact, regardless of what slashdot's core of oh-so-qualified moderators may think.
It won't matter to me what his prices are. An incredibly short-sighted error, IMHO. I'm good for five of them (three kids and my SO.) But no connectivity, no buy.
How about the ability to use it in the huge areas of the country that aren't covered by their one pitiful provider? If I bought one now, it'd be about as functional as an iPod, and I already have one of those...
Oh well. Guess they don't want to sell them to me, my SO, and our three offspring.
You're not required to swear to "god" in a US court. If you aren't Christian or otherwise object to swearing on a bible they have to allow you some other sort of swearing in.
I'm afraid you've missed the point on this one.
Scenario one: The Jury contains Christians. I walk in, they offer a bible. I decline. They fall back to non-biblical swearing. The Christians are thinking... what?
Scenario two: The Jury contains Christians. I walk in, there's a non-biblical swearing-in. That's all there is to it.
In the first scenario, I am forced to reveal my religious outlook to the jury, who could easily decide I'm a bad guy just on that basis (don't even try to deny it, I meet people like that all the time.) In the second, no one reveals their religious outlook, and so this potential difference in treatment is eliminated. I am in a considerably better position to have my case considered on its merits.
That's why a non-religious swearing-in is inherently better than a fallback from a religious swearing in.
In my honest opinion, he's a very talented singer. All the more so for being able to do it after what I will charitably characterize as an unfortunate amount of drug use.
As for the characterization of talent, I suppose the first thing I'd ask you is, can you sing the songs he sang, precisely the way he sang them? If not, I'd say it is clear that he has a talent that you do not. I know I can't do it, and I have a reasonably good voice. So he has a talent that I do not. I've been working as a musician since the late 1960's; one of my bands used to do an entire set of Black Sabbath, and the vocals were always a distinct challenge.
I tolerate your atheism; why won't you tolerate my beliefs as well?
I can't speak for the fellow you replied to, but I can tell you why I have a problem with religionists in the USA. It is because they have employed the legal and political systems to impose their beliefs, and behaviors based upon their beliefs, and symbols based upon their beliefs, and declarations based upon their beliefs, upon those who do not share them — one of whom, of course, is me.
For instance, I can't purchase liquor on Sunday; heck, in some places, I can't even shop. My money declares my (completely non-existent) trust in your deity. The country's very oath invokes the Christian god. The pledge of allegiance, something I don't otherwise have a problem with, is now layered with Christian sentiments that literally poison my otherwise highly patriotic willingness to give of myself. The expectation in the courtroom is that I swear to god; if I don't, I am literally putting my future at risk. My own taxes are being directly funneled into "faith-based initiatives." I have to bear the tax burden for religions I find abhorrent, intolerable or simply ridiculous, while they get a (nearly) free ride for property taxes (believe me, I'm in a position to know the facts on this one all too well, I bought an ex-church to live in, the first year we paid the (delayed) assessment for the church, which was $500; the second year, we paid almost five times that as "regular" folks.) There is more, but by now you should be getting the flavor of why I think the legal and political system has been co-opted by Christians.
Now, speaking generally, the problem goes much further. I am offended by all of this because I am not religious, and I am constantly compelled to deal with these religious things. But it isn't just me. Muslims aren't likely to be delighted with finding Christianity in their face all the time, either. Nor are Jews. Nor a whole list of other folks.
What I advocate is a religious and political system that is absolutely free of religious rules, religious oaths, religious slogans, religious tax breaks, religious marriage rationales (for government-sanctioned marriages... churches and religions and their adherents can do anything they like, of course) and so on. Under these conditions, no one would ever be asked in court to make a religious statement and be put in the position of having to state a religious denial or difference from the jury; marriage would be a state of co-ownership and co-obligation instead of one of a puritan sexual measure and an arbitrary enumeration of two; property taxes would be based on property ownership, not religious claims and the lack of them; non-government stores and service providers could stay open any hours they decided made sense for them, for any reason(s) the owner(s) found sufficient; money would simply be money; a pledge of national allegiance would be just that, not a declaration that the country exists under someone's favorite diety; no religious statue or platitude would look upon me from the halls (or lawns) of justice... and so on.
And frankly, I'm all for your religious scientists pursuing ID and any other idea they might have as to how all this stuff got here. I think they're almost certainly wrong, but the only way to know that is to pursue every question to its ultimate limit of supporting evidence and/or contrary indications. However, I think it is very important that such questions be asked without requiring the rest of us to agree either that the question itself is sensible or that the proposed answers are sensible.
So if I seem not very tolerant of your beliefs from time to time, keep in mind I may have just tried to buy a quart of scotch to lubricate an evening of movie-watching at home and found the liquor store closed for the day. Or something along those lines. I run into these things much more often than you might imagine. And they piss me off mightily.
by assuming that only someone of lesser intelligence could disagree with you, you're not respecting his right to have a different opinion.
I didn't make any such assumption. I simply observed his behavior and concluded from those observations he wasn't very bright. I do respect his right to have a different opinion, you're utterly bewildered if you think otherwise. He can have any opinion he likes and I'll defend his right to have it. I'll also defend my right to assess it, however, with just as much vigor. As for your reasoning, I find it very weak, but I'm really not interested in going one more level of indirection here. You're just as entitled to your opinion as the rest of us. Even when you're wrong.:-)
it [the confederate flag] has nothing to do with slavery
That is an extremely naive and disingenuous viewpoint. Certainly there were many issues; but slavery was prominent among them and to claim otherwise denies enormous parts of the historical record. For both the north and south, it was an economic and social hard-line issue. Several of my ancestors died fighting for, or otherwise assisting, the north. One while assisting illicit transport of slaves out of the south. Others fought for the south. I have diaries, photos, artifacts and newspaper accounts that attest to the highly volatile and key nature of the issue for the time, and that's just in my own genealogical work. If you actually dig into history in general, you'll find an enormous amount of corroborating material.
On top of all this, the issue of slavery remains a very sore point with many people, as does more recent prejudice that descends directly from the attitudes of the very worst slaveholders. Because of that, the wearing of a confederate flag is a downright dumb thing to do; the symbol today is a veritable magnet for the very worst in human nature, specifically involuntary slavery. It makes no more sense than to wear a sign that says "I hate niggers" and then try to explain that what you meant was you hate "ignorant people", or to wear a swastika, and try to explain you're just waving an old Christian symbol about. These things mean what society decides they mean; and both you and Mr. Nugent should know that without anyone having to explain it to you. So the rest of us assume you do know, and attribute the common meaning to your use of symbols.
Whatever it is you think intelligence is, any person who profoundly believes something for which there is no evidence, and in fact a ginormous mountain of evidence pointing in the opposite direction, doesn't have it
I presume you're still talking about religion. I am unaware of any evidence for or against the proposition that "god did it"; I am aware of numerous views of what "it" actually consists of (and this is the basis for the difference between a creationist and the religious person who waves hands vaguely at a hubble deep space photo, asserting there "has to be" a god because otherwise, it's just too grand (or whatever.))
Personally, I am a hard line atheist, meaning literally a person without any shred of belief in a god or gods; but this is not due to any "mountain of evidence" pointing that way (I'm not even certain you could assemble evidence for a non-concept.) It is due to no evidence pointing the other way, towards the positive assertion that there is a god or gods. I have observed that it is in very few cases indeed that assertions without evidence turn out to be even marginally correct. This leaves me with no confidence whatsoever in the idea of a god or gods.
Consequently, I would be fascinated to hear about your "ginormous mountain" of evidence against the idea of a god or gods, if that indeed is what you were referring to. Please do elaborate so that I can see how it is that an intelligent person cannot possibly fall into the mental model of religion in such a way as to accept it.
Care to back that statement up with something a bit more substantive?
Sure. Try this on for size. Or his views on subjugating weaker animals to violent death for entertainment. Or this quote: "America is like Canada. If you can't speak English, get the f**k out!" Or his anti-gay stance. Or his recent wearing of a confederate flag on stage. Really, the man is a train wreck when it comes to exhibiting reason and positions derived by reason.
That's not to say that you aren't entitled to your own opinion of the man; mine is simply that he's not a very bright fellow. Loud, in firm possession of a platform to speak from, and with no shortage of sycophants, but none of that in and of itself is any indicator of above-average intelligence at work.
"Gullibility" is an unkind word, because all children are credulous. Credulity is a biological necessity, as it turns out.
Gullibility is indeed a negative concept; it describes the (unfortunate) carryover of credulity from childhood into adulthood, where it is no longer very closely associated with fitness, and in fact tends to lower fitness. I wasn't addressing the credulity of children, I was addressing the gullibility of adults. This is precisely why I said what I said, the way I said it.
I don't hold his demonstrated lack of intelligence against him, if that's what you mean.
I like a good deal of his music, and play it — I'm a rock/metal/blues guitarist. Then again, I like to sing Christmas carols, particularly in harmony, and I'm certainly not a Christian.:)
Do "superstitious concepts" mean religion in general
As far as I am concerned, the various religions are a subset of cases within superstition; I would not class astrology as religion, but I do think it slots perfectly into superstition. The same goes for ghosts, all classes of magic that are not simply misunderstood natural events, homeopathy, anthropocentric views in general (religion is that in specific), and a host of others from phrenology to past lives. Creationism itself is a subset of religion.
Someone who will violate the laws of his country and scripture is still to be respected because he wouldn't make false statements on other subjects?
Generally speaking, I have a little trouble with the general concept that paying taxes is a moral act, particularly when the taxes go for trillions of dollars in war-making activities that only a small fraction of the population agree with, not to mention funding attacks against one's self. More specifically, from St. Thomas Aquinas, one can learn a good bit about how Christianity views the laws of man:
...in so far as it deviates from right reason it is called an unjust law; in such case it is no law at all, but rather a species of violence.
It's odd that they are even smart enough to do something so nasty when they are so stupid (or brainwashed as children and never learn critical thinking as happens to most poor "religious" folks) as to believe in this creationist crapola.
It isn't as simple as all that. There are plenty of very intelligent religionists. You can find solid evidence of this if you do a little directed reading of some of the deeper works on religion; textual criticism is one area I've found to be well populated with intelligent and insightful people, for instance.
Susceptibility to superstitious concepts has more to do with gullibility than it does intelligence, and unfortunately, the two aren't strongly related.
One example I like to cite is a PhD in psychology who fell for one of the Nigerian "prince" scam letters; managed to get himself published in the newspapers, because he lost six figures to the scam and he was smart enough to collect a PhD. Not stupid; but quite gullible.
Just as artistic or musical abilities are not tied to intelligence (see Ted Neugent and/or Ozzy Osbourne for prime examples of strong musical talents without significant indicators of intelligence), there's no indication that the other major religious susceptibility factors — fear of the unknown, gullibility, deep need for a father-figure post-puberty — are tied to intelligence (one way or the other) either. This is bolstered by adherents to religion falling all over the intelligence curve.
Personally, I like to think of the mind as having a 3d version of a set of pie slices. Slices overlap a bit, but generally exist as discrete elements which may reinforce one another, or not. Athleticism, intelligence, artistic vision, spatial adeptness, empathy, intuition, leadership, various types of fear, various types of stubbornness, the ability to make sideways connections (look for people who pun a lot, and well), the affinity for mathematics, the affinity for geometrics, fairness, honor, the ability to hold a "big picture" (certain classes of gamers, chess players, jet pilots, Hawking, Einstein) and so on. As a personal model of mine, it does a better job of accounting for the myriad types of people I've encountered in the last fifty years than a more basic "that person must be stupid" approach.
Yes. It's been looked at by our IP legal firm twice; once originally, and once because we thought the "at run time" might represent a loophole (it doesn't - installation software isn't exempt.)
Yes, I do know it is highly unlikely, and that's why I also know it is highly unlikely Linux will ever see a whole raft of commercial applications. The solution is to create a standard GUI; as long as Linux doesn't do that, it's going to remain way out in left field. IMHO.
There ain't no such thing as "no license", except for public domain.
Certainly there is. I can sell you anything I like that I have rights to without requiring you to look at, agree to, or be bound by, any license. And in fact, I do exactly that with a major application right here. Look ma, no license! None at install time, either, in case you were thinking I slipped one in somewhere else.
Further, you can develop for Windows without ever having bought Windows, it's just a binary format you have to cobble up; people do that (cross-develop) all the time. The Windows and OS X widgets are available in such applications for use, no license, no nothing. You're confused if you think the situation is otherwise. Under Linux, there are restrictions, however. You can't use a GPL or LGPL item. Linux is the limited territory here, not Windows, and not OS X.
This is incorrect.
No, it isn't. It's plain English. Regarding (0), you're not getting any source, or anything that will compile or be involved in any non-runtime link. Period. So (0) is "right out", as Monty Python would say. Regarding (1), it says, and I quote:
A suitable mechanism is one that (a) uses at run time
a copy of the Library already present on the user's computer
system (emphasis mine)
That's all it says; it does not say, nor mean, anything even remotely like that which you attribute to it. If I don't provide source code, I have to link as described there, which says that I must use a copy of the library already present. There is no permission to distribute LGPL'd libraries given or implied; these are the two conditions of 4, one of which must be met. Neither can be; therefore, I can't produce my software for linux unless I develop my own GUI, as it requires a GUI; and no, I'm not inclined to create yet another redundant GUI for Linux. Though it needs an obligation-free one quite badly.
Remember, 4must be met; and 4 offers (0) or (1). Not any of these imaginative alternatives you made up.
The only "suffering" of vendor lock-in I've noticed thus far is having to jump through a few extra hoops to build midnight commander, as it's GPL and the OSF (not Apple, mind you, but the OSF via the GPL) have locked Apple out of the resources it needs to make such a build a doddle. Aside from that, the OS enables me to use wonderful GUI applications that are powerful, smooth, reliable, attractive and suit me to a "T". Apple has made no attempt to harm me with regard to the OS, and so I'm quite comfortable using it. We're developing for it as well. We built a fully working port for Linux, but unfortunately, even the LGPL (as opposed to the GPL) poses legal and support minefields we aren't going to get involved in, so it'll never see the light of day. Lock-in isn't the problem you think it is. Lock-out is the thing that I keep running into.
Also, I consider "profit" to be a positive thing. Just so we're clear.
I'm not sure what "native" means with respect to Linux
Part of the OS; available to everyone, no charge, no license, etc. Compare to the OS widgets in Windows or OS X. For either OS, you can code up something that uses them, they're 100% standard and you don't need to worry about them. They're always there. There is no obligation; no fee to the developer. You know how you can count on Linux to provide memory allocation? Graphics widgets should be the very same way as far as I'm concerned. Not that I'm suggesting X and all its various window managers and widget sets should be dumped, I'm not; but the OS needs a standard set to start with.
LGPL, which should be good enough for commercial development. Or am I missing something here?
Yes, you're missing section 4(d) of the LGPL which requires (0) that I, as a vendor, either provide source code for my application (never going to happen for several reasons, each sufficient unto itself) or (1) requires me to only use libraries that are already installed on the user's system, which means I can't ensure that an installation will work by distributing and installing them with my own installer, which in turn means I'd be incurring end-user frustration and reputation and support costs I am entirely unwilling to bear because some number of installations will fail outright.
Our rock-solid policy is that the install has to work every time, period. It is entirely unacceptable to leave the user floundering about, searching for compatible libraries, fonts, or anything else. This is one of the reasons I think Linux ought to have an always-there set of OS level widgets.
Such widgets could be minimal, perhaps like the OS widgets of Windows 95, but they ought to allow you to code up a basic application, have menus, etc., without having to get into any questions of whether your application will install correctly.
It has nothing to do with "open source"; it has to do with the OS vendor coming from outside and shutting your OS down. That won't happen with either Linux or OS X.
Umm... how does one have more control with OS X than Windows?
Apple doesn't have a policy of reaching out and shutting down copies of its OS. So if Apple's servers go down, OS X will continue to work, still be able to to install and re-install and run indefinitely, and generally be unaffected. None of this is true for Microsoft, as we have seen demonstrated lately.
Perhaps you'd like to clear up why MS software isn't good enough for your business, but you still sell software that runs exclusively on it
WinImages was originally designed for Windows 95 from an Amiga codebase, then upgraded to run under Windows 98, 2000 and NT (Intel, PowerPC and MIPS.) At the time, Windows was not seen by me as a threat to its users. That's the main answer. Native OS X software, newly coded but derived from WinImages, is under development now. We have a working Linux version already, but without a native widget library that doesn't involve GPL obligations or similar problems, its not going to be released.
(that is, unless WinImages runs using Wine)
Don't know if it runs under Wine (though I expect that it would, we're almost fanatical about not using OS resources if we can avoid it, so the demands on Wine should be minimal) but it does run under Parallels and Win98, which is where I run it myself.
Maybe this guy could take a load of photos of himself in different fancy dress outfits and put them on a section of his website that required registration!
Hmmm. Is this what you are suggesting? (SFW... sort of) [runs away]
Slashdot Mirror
It does sting a little... we've got a lot of Macs between us and consider ourselves loyal Apple customers... oh well.
Perhaps so. However, I am not going to do that; I am not interested in a fairly expensive phone without a warranty or technical support, which appears to be the current policy. Nor am I interested in one that may break with an upgrade, or which is unable to upgrade while the rest of the field is. I am even less interested in handing out such hardware to my family. That wouldn't be a favor.
I see the mods, high on their usual dose of incompetence crack, modded my post "troll"; as if my opinion, and the opinions of the other 250 million non-GSM, non-AT&T customers were completely irrelevant. Funny, but my current cellphone works fine on all the networks - I travel often, and I've yet to find anywhere I can't connect except in the deep boonies of Montana or similar, where there is no service.
The iPhone is simply a non-starter for me. I can easily afford to buy them for my familiy, but it would be pointless, as the phone won't work here. That's a fact, regardless of what slashdot's core of oh-so-qualified moderators may think.
It won't matter to me what his prices are. An incredibly short-sighted error, IMHO. I'm good for five of them (three kids and my SO.) But no connectivity, no buy.
How about the ability to use it in the huge areas of the country that aren't covered by their one pitiful provider? If I bought one now, it'd be about as functional as an iPod, and I already have one of those...
Oh well. Guess they don't want to sell them to me, my SO, and our three offspring.
Ah. No mountain, then. That's pretty much what I thought.
I'm afraid you've missed the point on this one.
Scenario one: The Jury contains Christians. I walk in, they offer a bible. I decline. They fall back to non-biblical swearing. The Christians are thinking... what?
Scenario two: The Jury contains Christians. I walk in, there's a non-biblical swearing-in. That's all there is to it.
In the first scenario, I am forced to reveal my religious outlook to the jury, who could easily decide I'm a bad guy just on that basis (don't even try to deny it, I meet people like that all the time.) In the second, no one reveals their religious outlook, and so this potential difference in treatment is eliminated. I am in a considerably better position to have my case considered on its merits.
That's why a non-religious swearing-in is inherently better than a fallback from a religious swearing in.
In my honest opinion, he's a very talented singer. All the more so for being able to do it after what I will charitably characterize as an unfortunate amount of drug use.
As for the characterization of talent, I suppose the first thing I'd ask you is, can you sing the songs he sang, precisely the way he sang them? If not, I'd say it is clear that he has a talent that you do not. I know I can't do it, and I have a reasonably good voice. So he has a talent that I do not. I've been working as a musician since the late 1960's; one of my bands used to do an entire set of Black Sabbath, and the vocals were always a distinct challenge.
I can't speak for the fellow you replied to, but I can tell you why I have a problem with religionists in the USA. It is because they have employed the legal and political systems to impose their beliefs, and behaviors based upon their beliefs, and symbols based upon their beliefs, and declarations based upon their beliefs, upon those who do not share them — one of whom, of course, is me.
For instance, I can't purchase liquor on Sunday; heck, in some places, I can't even shop. My money declares my (completely non-existent) trust in your deity. The country's very oath invokes the Christian god. The pledge of allegiance, something I don't otherwise have a problem with, is now layered with Christian sentiments that literally poison my otherwise highly patriotic willingness to give of myself. The expectation in the courtroom is that I swear to god; if I don't, I am literally putting my future at risk. My own taxes are being directly funneled into "faith-based initiatives." I have to bear the tax burden for religions I find abhorrent, intolerable or simply ridiculous, while they get a (nearly) free ride for property taxes (believe me, I'm in a position to know the facts on this one all too well, I bought an ex-church to live in, the first year we paid the (delayed) assessment for the church, which was $500; the second year, we paid almost five times that as "regular" folks.) There is more, but by now you should be getting the flavor of why I think the legal and political system has been co-opted by Christians.
Now, speaking generally, the problem goes much further. I am offended by all of this because I am not religious, and I am constantly compelled to deal with these religious things. But it isn't just me. Muslims aren't likely to be delighted with finding Christianity in their face all the time, either. Nor are Jews. Nor a whole list of other folks.
What I advocate is a religious and political system that is absolutely free of religious rules, religious oaths, religious slogans, religious tax breaks, religious marriage rationales (for government-sanctioned marriages... churches and religions and their adherents can do anything they like, of course) and so on. Under these conditions, no one would ever be asked in court to make a religious statement and be put in the position of having to state a religious denial or difference from the jury; marriage would be a state of co-ownership and co-obligation instead of one of a puritan sexual measure and an arbitrary enumeration of two; property taxes would be based on property ownership, not religious claims and the lack of them; non-government stores and service providers could stay open any hours they decided made sense for them, for any reason(s) the owner(s) found sufficient; money would simply be money; a pledge of national allegiance would be just that, not a declaration that the country exists under someone's favorite diety; no religious statue or platitude would look upon me from the halls (or lawns) of justice... and so on.
And frankly, I'm all for your religious scientists pursuing ID and any other idea they might have as to how all this stuff got here. I think they're almost certainly wrong, but the only way to know that is to pursue every question to its ultimate limit of supporting evidence and/or contrary indications. However, I think it is very important that such questions be asked without requiring the rest of us to agree either that the question itself is sensible or that the proposed answers are sensible.
So if I seem not very tolerant of your beliefs from time to time, keep in mind I may have just tried to buy a quart of scotch to lubricate an evening of movie-watching at home and found the liquor store closed for the day. Or something along those lines. I run into these things much more often than you might imagine. And they piss me off mightily.
I didn't make any such assumption. I simply observed his behavior and concluded from those observations he wasn't very bright. I do respect his right to have a different opinion, you're utterly bewildered if you think otherwise. He can have any opinion he likes and I'll defend his right to have it. I'll also defend my right to assess it, however, with just as much vigor. As for your reasoning, I find it very weak, but I'm really not interested in going one more level of indirection here. You're just as entitled to your opinion as the rest of us. Even when you're wrong. :-)
That is an extremely naive and disingenuous viewpoint. Certainly there were many issues; but slavery was prominent among them and to claim otherwise denies enormous parts of the historical record. For both the north and south, it was an economic and social hard-line issue. Several of my ancestors died fighting for, or otherwise assisting, the north. One while assisting illicit transport of slaves out of the south. Others fought for the south. I have diaries, photos, artifacts and newspaper accounts that attest to the highly volatile and key nature of the issue for the time, and that's just in my own genealogical work. If you actually dig into history in general, you'll find an enormous amount of corroborating material.
On top of all this, the issue of slavery remains a very sore point with many people, as does more recent prejudice that descends directly from the attitudes of the very worst slaveholders. Because of that, the wearing of a confederate flag is a downright dumb thing to do; the symbol today is a veritable magnet for the very worst in human nature, specifically involuntary slavery. It makes no more sense than to wear a sign that says "I hate niggers" and then try to explain that what you meant was you hate "ignorant people", or to wear a swastika, and try to explain you're just waving an old Christian symbol about. These things mean what society decides they mean; and both you and Mr. Nugent should know that without anyone having to explain it to you. So the rest of us assume you do know, and attribute the common meaning to your use of symbols.
I presume you're still talking about religion. I am unaware of any evidence for or against the proposition that "god did it"; I am aware of numerous views of what "it" actually consists of (and this is the basis for the difference between a creationist and the religious person who waves hands vaguely at a hubble deep space photo, asserting there "has to be" a god because otherwise, it's just too grand (or whatever.))
Personally, I am a hard line atheist, meaning literally a person without any shred of belief in a god or gods; but this is not due to any "mountain of evidence" pointing that way (I'm not even certain you could assemble evidence for a non-concept.) It is due to no evidence pointing the other way, towards the positive assertion that there is a god or gods. I have observed that it is in very few cases indeed that assertions without evidence turn out to be even marginally correct. This leaves me with no confidence whatsoever in the idea of a god or gods.
Consequently, I would be fascinated to hear about your "ginormous mountain" of evidence against the idea of a god or gods, if that indeed is what you were referring to. Please do elaborate so that I can see how it is that an intelligent person cannot possibly fall into the mental model of religion in such a way as to accept it.
Sure. Try this on for size. Or his views on subjugating weaker animals to violent death for entertainment. Or this quote: "America is like Canada. If you can't speak English, get the f**k out!" Or his anti-gay stance. Or his recent wearing of a confederate flag on stage. Really, the man is a train wreck when it comes to exhibiting reason and positions derived by reason.
That's not to say that you aren't entitled to your own opinion of the man; mine is simply that he's not a very bright fellow. Loud, in firm possession of a platform to speak from, and with no shortage of sycophants, but none of that in and of itself is any indicator of above-average intelligence at work.
Gullibility is indeed a negative concept; it describes the (unfortunate) carryover of credulity from childhood into adulthood, where it is no longer very closely associated with fitness, and in fact tends to lower fitness. I wasn't addressing the credulity of children, I was addressing the gullibility of adults. This is precisely why I said what I said, the way I said it.
As for the rest, I really don't disagree.
I don't hold his demonstrated lack of intelligence against him, if that's what you mean.
I like a good deal of his music, and play it — I'm a rock/metal/blues guitarist. Then again, I like to sing Christmas carols, particularly in harmony, and I'm certainly not a Christian. :)
As far as I am concerned, the various religions are a subset of cases within superstition; I would not class astrology as religion, but I do think it slots perfectly into superstition. The same goes for ghosts, all classes of magic that are not simply misunderstood natural events, homeopathy, anthropocentric views in general (religion is that in specific), and a host of others from phrenology to past lives. Creationism itself is a subset of religion.
Generally speaking, I have a little trouble with the general concept that paying taxes is a moral act, particularly when the taxes go for trillions of dollars in war-making activities that only a small fraction of the population agree with, not to mention funding attacks against one's self. More specifically, from St. Thomas Aquinas, one can learn a good bit about how Christianity views the laws of man:
It isn't as simple as all that. There are plenty of very intelligent religionists. You can find solid evidence of this if you do a little directed reading of some of the deeper works on religion; textual criticism is one area I've found to be well populated with intelligent and insightful people, for instance.
Susceptibility to superstitious concepts has more to do with gullibility than it does intelligence, and unfortunately, the two aren't strongly related.
One example I like to cite is a PhD in psychology who fell for one of the Nigerian "prince" scam letters; managed to get himself published in the newspapers, because he lost six figures to the scam and he was smart enough to collect a PhD. Not stupid; but quite gullible.
Just as artistic or musical abilities are not tied to intelligence (see Ted Neugent and/or Ozzy Osbourne for prime examples of strong musical talents without significant indicators of intelligence), there's no indication that the other major religious susceptibility factors — fear of the unknown, gullibility, deep need for a father-figure post-puberty — are tied to intelligence (one way or the other) either. This is bolstered by adherents to religion falling all over the intelligence curve.
Personally, I like to think of the mind as having a 3d version of a set of pie slices. Slices overlap a bit, but generally exist as discrete elements which may reinforce one another, or not. Athleticism, intelligence, artistic vision, spatial adeptness, empathy, intuition, leadership, various types of fear, various types of stubbornness, the ability to make sideways connections (look for people who pun a lot, and well), the affinity for mathematics, the affinity for geometrics, fairness, honor, the ability to hold a "big picture" (certain classes of gamers, chess players, jet pilots, Hawking, Einstein) and so on. As a personal model of mine, it does a better job of accounting for the myriad types of people I've encountered in the last fifty years than a more basic "that person must be stupid" approach.
Yes. It's been looked at by our IP legal firm twice; once originally, and once because we thought the "at run time" might represent a loophole (it doesn't - installation software isn't exempt.)
Yes, I do know it is highly unlikely, and that's why I also know it is highly unlikely Linux will ever see a whole raft of commercial applications. The solution is to create a standard GUI; as long as Linux doesn't do that, it's going to remain way out in left field. IMHO.
Certainly there is. I can sell you anything I like that I have rights to without requiring you to look at, agree to, or be bound by, any license. And in fact, I do exactly that with a major application right here. Look ma, no license! None at install time, either, in case you were thinking I slipped one in somewhere else.
Further, you can develop for Windows without ever having bought Windows, it's just a binary format you have to cobble up; people do that (cross-develop) all the time. The Windows and OS X widgets are available in such applications for use, no license, no nothing. You're confused if you think the situation is otherwise. Under Linux, there are restrictions, however. You can't use a GPL or LGPL item. Linux is the limited territory here, not Windows, and not OS X.
No, it isn't. It's plain English. Regarding (0), you're not getting any source, or anything that will compile or be involved in any non-runtime link. Period. So (0) is "right out", as Monty Python would say. Regarding (1), it says, and I quote:
A suitable mechanism is one that (a) uses at run time a copy of the Library already present on the user's computer system (emphasis mine)
That's all it says; it does not say, nor mean, anything even remotely like that which you attribute to it. If I don't provide source code, I have to link as described there, which says that I must use a copy of the library already present. There is no permission to distribute LGPL'd libraries given or implied; these are the two conditions of 4, one of which must be met. Neither can be; therefore, I can't produce my software for linux unless I develop my own GUI, as it requires a GUI; and no, I'm not inclined to create yet another redundant GUI for Linux. Though it needs an obligation-free one quite badly.
Remember, 4 must be met; and 4 offers (0) or (1). Not any of these imaginative alternatives you made up.
The only "suffering" of vendor lock-in I've noticed thus far is having to jump through a few extra hoops to build midnight commander, as it's GPL and the OSF (not Apple, mind you, but the OSF via the GPL) have locked Apple out of the resources it needs to make such a build a doddle. Aside from that, the OS enables me to use wonderful GUI applications that are powerful, smooth, reliable, attractive and suit me to a "T". Apple has made no attempt to harm me with regard to the OS, and so I'm quite comfortable using it. We're developing for it as well. We built a fully working port for Linux, but unfortunately, even the LGPL (as opposed to the GPL) poses legal and support minefields we aren't going to get involved in, so it'll never see the light of day. Lock-in isn't the problem you think it is. Lock-out is the thing that I keep running into.
Also, I consider "profit" to be a positive thing. Just so we're clear.
Part of the OS; available to everyone, no charge, no license, etc. Compare to the OS widgets in Windows or OS X. For either OS, you can code up something that uses them, they're 100% standard and you don't need to worry about them. They're always there. There is no obligation; no fee to the developer. You know how you can count on Linux to provide memory allocation? Graphics widgets should be the very same way as far as I'm concerned. Not that I'm suggesting X and all its various window managers and widget sets should be dumped, I'm not; but the OS needs a standard set to start with.
Yes, you're missing section 4(d) of the LGPL which requires (0) that I, as a vendor, either provide source code for my application (never going to happen for several reasons, each sufficient unto itself) or (1) requires me to only use libraries that are already installed on the user's system, which means I can't ensure that an installation will work by distributing and installing them with my own installer, which in turn means I'd be incurring end-user frustration and reputation and support costs I am entirely unwilling to bear because some number of installations will fail outright.
Our rock-solid policy is that the install has to work every time, period. It is entirely unacceptable to leave the user floundering about, searching for compatible libraries, fonts, or anything else. This is one of the reasons I think Linux ought to have an always-there set of OS level widgets.
Such widgets could be minimal, perhaps like the OS widgets of Windows 95, but they ought to allow you to code up a basic application, have menus, etc., without having to get into any questions of whether your application will install correctly.
It has nothing to do with "open source"; it has to do with the OS vendor coming from outside and shutting your OS down. That won't happen with either Linux or OS X.
Apple doesn't have a policy of reaching out and shutting down copies of its OS. So if Apple's servers go down, OS X will continue to work, still be able to to install and re-install and run indefinitely, and generally be unaffected. None of this is true for Microsoft, as we have seen demonstrated lately.
WinImages was originally designed for Windows 95 from an Amiga codebase, then upgraded to run under Windows 98, 2000 and NT (Intel, PowerPC and MIPS.) At the time, Windows was not seen by me as a threat to its users. That's the main answer. Native OS X software, newly coded but derived from WinImages, is under development now. We have a working Linux version already, but without a native widget library that doesn't involve GPL obligations or similar problems, its not going to be released.
Don't know if it runs under Wine (though I expect that it would, we're almost fanatical about not using OS resources if we can avoid it, so the demands on Wine should be minimal) but it does run under Parallels and Win98, which is where I run it myself.
Hmmm. Is this what you are suggesting? (SFW... sort of) [runs away]