All logic and semantics be damned; the law is clear.
The law said slavery was right and good. The law said that women being forbidden to vote was right and good. The law said that dark skinned people were to ride on the back of the bus, and use separate bathrooms, and drink from separate fountains. The law says that "interstate commerce" means "intrastate commerce." The law was, and remains, completely clear on these and similarly wrongheaded matters. And in so doing, it is completely, utterly, wrong. As is precisely the case here.
The law is the world's least worthy foundation to base an argument upon as it is commonly formulated by incompetents, sycophants, and the morally and ethically bereft, not in any particular order and in various combinations. So based, unsurprisingly, your argument fails utterly. My position is based upon facts and reason and recognition of the worth of production. Unless you strive for the same, your arguments will remain at the playground level. Selfish, baseless, failures.
Damning logic and semantics, as you say, puts you in precisely the same place as the people who made those laws. Clear, yes; clearly wrong. Wielding a power you have no ethical foundation for, while intentionally blinding yourself to obvious human truths, in most unworthy self-service.
Just remember, the movie industry wants you to die too, metaphorically speaking; and they have law, punishment, and money on their side. They can break you financially; they can have you sent away; they can see to it that you become highly undesirable to employers. And the kicker is, they really, really want to do those things to you and all those like you.
I applaud your willingness to fight for what you want. I will also applaud when they catch you and, in their willingness to fight, ruin your life. Where's my popcorn? I'm going to need some salt and a glass of Mountain Dew, too.:)
You do understand that when they make a movie, it takes a lot of effort and money, right? And, if everyone goes "hey, it's not theft", then they won't get that money, right? And then they won't have either the money or inclination to make you the next movie. Got that? No more great movies for you to copy without paying.
Luckily, most people understand this. The number of "if I copy an expensively produced product it's not theft" ideologues is far smaller than the number of "hey thanks for making this awesome thing, here's the x$ you asked for it" supporters of the arts.
None of this has ANYTHING to do with work product that someone INTENDED to give you. I write free software; it is my intent that you get it for free, and all I'm really looking for in return is that you enjoy it if it suits you to do so, and hopefully give me feedback so I can improve it, as I use it as well. But, as any reasoning person might work out without trouble, I am able to do this because doing so does not cost me much money. If it cost me 100 million dollars, as do many movies, you can bet that I would be expecting recompense for its use.
Books take a long time to write. Software too, if it's more than trivial. I've spent years on mine. Movies. Music can be very difficult to get right (I'm not talking about desktop-DJ music, I'm talking about the work product of musicians) and it can take quite some time to put together an album, for instance. You want these people to keep making cool stuff, do you not? Or would you prefer that everyone copy everything that currently exists without paying and all the artists go get jobs at McDonalds, nevermore to create for us?
I know I enjoy the new stuff. So I don't steal or copy. If payment is specified, and I think the entertainment is worth the money, I buy it. If not, I don't. In that way I encourage the stuff I like, and ignore the stuff I don't.
It seems so obvious to me that this is the reasonable and correct way to behave. I just can't wrap my head around the "copying is ok because it's not a material exchange" idea as either reasonable or prudent. To me, all I see is the content producer spent money, and the copier didn't. That's a one-way money pipe. Eventually, all one way pipes run out of content. Because duh.
Echo was a roaring success. Still is. We -- my SO and I -- own both an Echo and an Echo dot. They. Are. Awesome. We use them for all manner of things. Time, alarms and timers, spelling, definitions, weather, music (particularly the Echo dot, which actually has a hardwired stereo connection (also bluetooth) for audio instead of a built-in medium-fi mono speaker), direct control of lights, temperature... there's also a lot to be said for being able to talk to the thing when your hands are full, you're walking out the door, lying in bed, in the bath, etc. There are quite a few Echo-controllable devices out there now; plus, the IFTTT website works with it, which opens up a lot more easy-to-manage options.
Could Echo be better? Sure. Lots. The developer program, for instance, is really badly thought out. It works, but it's mega-clumsy and far more complicated than it needs to be, plus there are rigid secure server requirements for non-cloud use that simply do not need to be there for local control applications. Instead of speech parsing, it currently only uses canned lists of expected input (despite the fact that it can STT/TTS anything you say with very high accuracy. Just tell it "Simon says yadda yadda" and it'll STT what you said, TTS it back, and you can hear that it gets it right almost every time.) Couldn't hardly *be* more clumsy than expected list pseudo-parsing. But... it works. Which I suspect is their only real metric at the 3rd party developer level.
Is there anything anywhere near as good as Echo out there yet? Definitely not.
Anything coming? Perhaps. The "Watson" project looks like it might yet actually get rolling. They say they are shipping 3D printed units to select beta testers. I'm waiting until I can actually order one, then I will be happy to see about developing for it (I already have extensive text parsing code, and I'm not short of ideas or applications right here.)
The holy grail for these devices is non-cloud speech recognition that is available for interaction over the LAN. Watson says they'll be open, so that takes care of the LAN issue, but it's still a cloud-based speech system at this point, which means if the net, your ISP, your network, anything along the line is down, the device becomes clueless, just like Echo. Speech recognition is a hard problem, so it may be a while before we can have reliable local TTS/STT devices. But when we do... oh, yeah.:)
After the runaway and well-deserved success of the Echo (and now its awesome little brother, the Echo Dot), Amazon's entitled to a complete flop, which is what a ~$300 e-reader will almost certainly be.
Let's say you launch one probe every second. If boost phase is half an hour, a number that has been bandied about here, then you would need 1,800 high power laser installations (30m x 60s), all running full blast, all the time. That's going to set you back a few unbacked treasury notes. In the building of them, and in the power consumption, and in the maintainance, and the repair, and the real estate, not to mention a very, very, very, very, very, very large number of probes. But you need even more; because you have to KEEP sending them for the whole time the signal is walking back to you or the near end of the chain of relays will have been receding from you at 20% of light speed for quite some time when the return signal gets to them. And all of this presumes you can build enough complexity and power into the probe to cover a second's worth of distance at near light speed (because light propagation speed is the issue here) such that, after lets say ten years, for the probes that are out in the "big dark", they will still be carrying enough power to actually hear the incoming signal (run the receiver) and relay it (run the transmitter.)
Get my point? The distances involved make almost anything you try along these lines, to understate the case, "non-trivial."
I suspect the propulsion laser will be here in the solar system. Not on a probe the size of a cellphone. Because shining a light on your own sail is like standing on a sailboat blowing into its sails. You're not exerting leverage on the craft. Only on yourself. Also because a laser needs a power source, assuming you could get around the prior physics issue.
The big question here is, as was stated above, how will it get any information back? As an information gathering instrument for our benefit, that seems like the critical question even if everything else is quite reasonable, as it may well be, although I'm just going by the fact that Hawking is in on this. I kind of doubt he failed to do the math.:)
Now, as a probe carrying information from us, to any space-faring critters in the target system... I imagine that would be quite interesting to them, just as we would be interested if a small device came into our solar system being dragged, or having been dragged, more or less, by a light sail.
Even just as a "we sent something to another star and got it there, assuming it didn't run into something along the way" seems pretty cool to me. And considering some of the things humans have done at similar costs... a few hundreds of millions of dollars, if TFS has it right... yachts, etc... it also seems plenty worthy.
Doesn't appear to work that way. Homepage and settings only, numbered items only.
A shame, really. If it worked as you suggest, it would be considerably more useful. To everyone including the handicapped. And an inclusive, comprehensive solution is always a great deal better than an exclusive, restricted solution if both are practical -- as they are in this case.
for many men, part of the reward for parenting is some sense of immortality. I'll bet there's some animal instinct involved here.
To whatever extent that observation is true, instinct (or idiocy) is all it can be. Because children in no sense confer immortality. They, and their offspring, aren't you, won't act like you, and after just a couple of generations, subsequent offspring will pretty much forget you even existed, or even if they are vaguely aware of it, simply won't care.
There are many rewards that may arise from parenting. Immortality isn't one of them. The illusion of immortality might be, though. If you are really careful not to think too clearly about it.
Raising children costs money approximately 15k a year
Well, for severely minimal standards of "raising", as in "I didn't let the kid starve or go naked", it might. Otherwise, it's absurdly optimistic. If you meant "at some time in the past", sure. But as of recently, today and into the future? No. And of course there are many indirect monetary costs as well; choices made because one has children, rather than in the direct raising of a specific child. These can range from the house you buy and where you live (for instance, to control which school district the child(ren) are educated in) to the hours you work (because someone has to be there to supervise them over large parts of their lives) to what furniture and equipment you outfit your home with, to the vehicles you choose, and so on and so forth.
Not saying you can't raise a kid for 15k/year. Sure you can. But you almost certainly won't. Even if you think you are, it's probably just that other taxpayers are footing part of the bill for you.
Look up the word "metaphore" in wikipedia, it might help.
"Metaphore" is not in Wikipedia. I assume it is an agent or bearer of a specified thing that has self-referential characteristics. Is that what you meant to convey?
Inquiring minds want to know. Well, at least, one does.:)
The 10 has everything you might expect from a flagship Android phone in 2016.
I read TFA, and I didn't see anything about cordless charging. That is a feature I not only expect, but require from a "flagship Android phone." Without it, what I expect is that the charging connector will become unusable like it has in every non-cordless-charging phone I've owned. And which, since the advent of cordless charging, is now only a (very) bad memory.
(delighted user of a Galaxy S7 w/cordless charging here. Thanks, Samsung.)
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And of course this can't happen when there are a larger number of people looking for jobs, amirite?
The law said slavery was right and good. The law said that women being forbidden to vote was right and good. The law said that dark skinned people were to ride on the back of the bus, and use separate bathrooms, and drink from separate fountains. The law says that "interstate commerce" means "intrastate commerce." The law was, and remains, completely clear on these and similarly wrongheaded matters. And in so doing, it is completely, utterly, wrong. As is precisely the case here.
The law is the world's least worthy foundation to base an argument upon as it is commonly formulated by incompetents, sycophants, and the morally and ethically bereft, not in any particular order and in various combinations. So based, unsurprisingly, your argument fails utterly. My position is based upon facts and reason and recognition of the worth of production. Unless you strive for the same, your arguments will remain at the playground level. Selfish, baseless, failures.
Damning logic and semantics, as you say, puts you in precisely the same place as the people who made those laws. Clear, yes; clearly wrong. Wielding a power you have no ethical foundation for, while intentionally blinding yourself to obvious human truths, in most unworthy self-service.
NOW the discussion is over. Cheers. :)
Just remember, the movie industry wants you to die too, metaphorically speaking; and they have law, punishment, and money on their side. They can break you financially; they can have you sent away; they can see to it that you become highly undesirable to employers. And the kicker is, they really, really want to do those things to you and all those like you.
I applaud your willingness to fight for what you want. I will also applaud when they catch you and, in their willingness to fight, ruin your life. Where's my popcorn? I'm going to need some salt and a glass of Mountain Dew, too. :)
You do understand that when they make a movie, it takes a lot of effort and money, right? And, if everyone goes "hey, it's not theft", then they won't get that money, right? And then they won't have either the money or inclination to make you the next movie. Got that? No more great movies for you to copy without paying.
Luckily, most people understand this. The number of "if I copy an expensively produced product it's not theft" ideologues is far smaller than the number of "hey thanks for making this awesome thing, here's the x$ you asked for it" supporters of the arts.
None of this has ANYTHING to do with work product that someone INTENDED to give you. I write free software; it is my intent that you get it for free, and all I'm really looking for in return is that you enjoy it if it suits you to do so, and hopefully give me feedback so I can improve it, as I use it as well. But, as any reasoning person might work out without trouble, I am able to do this because doing so does not cost me much money. If it cost me 100 million dollars, as do many movies, you can bet that I would be expecting recompense for its use.
Books take a long time to write. Software too, if it's more than trivial. I've spent years on mine. Movies. Music can be very difficult to get right (I'm not talking about desktop-DJ music, I'm talking about the work product of musicians) and it can take quite some time to put together an album, for instance. You want these people to keep making cool stuff, do you not? Or would you prefer that everyone copy everything that currently exists without paying and all the artists go get jobs at McDonalds, nevermore to create for us?
I know I enjoy the new stuff. So I don't steal or copy. If payment is specified, and I think the entertainment is worth the money, I buy it. If not, I don't. In that way I encourage the stuff I like, and ignore the stuff I don't.
It seems so obvious to me that this is the reasonable and correct way to behave. I just can't wrap my head around the "copying is ok because it's not a material exchange" idea as either reasonable or prudent. To me, all I see is the content producer spent money, and the copier didn't. That's a one-way money pipe. Eventually, all one way pipes run out of content. Because duh.
Okay, surprised it is.
Echo was a roaring success. Still is. We -- my SO and I -- own both an Echo and an Echo dot. They. Are. Awesome. We use them for all manner of things. Time, alarms and timers, spelling, definitions, weather, music (particularly the Echo dot, which actually has a hardwired stereo connection (also bluetooth) for audio instead of a built-in medium-fi mono speaker), direct control of lights, temperature... there's also a lot to be said for being able to talk to the thing when your hands are full, you're walking out the door, lying in bed, in the bath, etc. There are quite a few Echo-controllable devices out there now; plus, the IFTTT website works with it, which opens up a lot more easy-to-manage options.
Could Echo be better? Sure. Lots. The developer program, for instance, is really badly thought out. It works, but it's mega-clumsy and far more complicated than it needs to be, plus there are rigid secure server requirements for non-cloud use that simply do not need to be there for local control applications. Instead of speech parsing, it currently only uses canned lists of expected input (despite the fact that it can STT/TTS anything you say with very high accuracy. Just tell it "Simon says yadda yadda" and it'll STT what you said, TTS it back, and you can hear that it gets it right almost every time.) Couldn't hardly *be* more clumsy than expected list pseudo-parsing. But... it works. Which I suspect is their only real metric at the 3rd party developer level.
Is there anything anywhere near as good as Echo out there yet? Definitely not.
Anything coming? Perhaps. The "Watson" project looks like it might yet actually get rolling. They say they are shipping 3D printed units to select beta testers. I'm waiting until I can actually order one, then I will be happy to see about developing for it (I already have extensive text parsing code, and I'm not short of ideas or applications right here.)
The holy grail for these devices is non-cloud speech recognition that is available for interaction over the LAN. Watson says they'll be open, so that takes care of the LAN issue, but it's still a cloud-based speech system at this point, which means if the net, your ISP, your network, anything along the line is down, the device becomes clueless, just like Echo. Speech recognition is a hard problem, so it may be a while before we can have reliable local TTS/STT devices. But when we do... oh, yeah. :)
Well, I'm on board for your hopes, but I'm afraid I left all my confidence at home for the ride.
After the runaway and well-deserved success of the Echo (and now its awesome little brother, the Echo Dot), Amazon's entitled to a complete flop, which is what a ~$300 e-reader will almost certainly be.
...the ones that have to pay for electricity?
I meant to say, "forsoothe." The quicknesse of my fingerse on the keyboarde was my undoinge.
Oh ye of little faithe, sure 'an it must be true, as they are not the reviled anonymouse cowarde, forsooth!
Let's say you launch one probe every second. If boost phase is half an hour, a number that has been bandied about here, then you would need 1,800 high power laser installations (30m x 60s), all running full blast, all the time. That's going to set you back a few unbacked treasury notes. In the building of them, and in the power consumption, and in the maintainance, and the repair, and the real estate, not to mention a very, very, very, very, very, very large number of probes. But you need even more; because you have to KEEP sending them for the whole time the signal is walking back to you or the near end of the chain of relays will have been receding from you at 20% of light speed for quite some time when the return signal gets to them. And all of this presumes you can build enough complexity and power into the probe to cover a second's worth of distance at near light speed (because light propagation speed is the issue here) such that, after lets say ten years, for the probes that are out in the "big dark", they will still be carrying enough power to actually hear the incoming signal (run the receiver) and relay it (run the transmitter.)
Get my point? The distances involved make almost anything you try along these lines, to understate the case, "non-trivial."
Yes! And they will move through space by.... JUMPING!
Um. We're talking about a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong path, you know.
I suspect the propulsion laser will be here in the solar system. Not on a probe the size of a cellphone. Because shining a light on your own sail is like standing on a sailboat blowing into its sails. You're not exerting leverage on the craft. Only on yourself. Also because a laser needs a power source, assuming you could get around the prior physics issue.
The big question here is, as was stated above, how will it get any information back? As an information gathering instrument for our benefit, that seems like the critical question even if everything else is quite reasonable, as it may well be, although I'm just going by the fact that Hawking is in on this. I kind of doubt he failed to do the math. :)
Now, as a probe carrying information from us, to any space-faring critters in the target system... I imagine that would be quite interesting to them, just as we would be interested if a small device came into our solar system being dragged, or having been dragged, more or less, by a light sail.
Even just as a "we sent something to another star and got it there, assuming it didn't run into something along the way" seems pretty cool to me. And considering some of the things humans have done at similar costs... a few hundreds of millions of dollars, if TFS has it right... yachts, etc... it also seems plenty worthy.
You would lose that bet handily.
Doesn't appear to work that way. Homepage and settings only, numbered items only.
A shame, really. If it worked as you suggest, it would be considerably more useful. To everyone including the handicapped. And an inclusive, comprehensive solution is always a great deal better than an exclusive, restricted solution if both are practical -- as they are in this case.
But it's a start.
LOL. The earth is also flat. You keep hanging on to those ideas, no doubt they'll come true due to your personal convictions, you bet.
To whatever extent that observation is true, instinct (or idiocy) is all it can be. Because children in no sense confer immortality. They, and their offspring, aren't you, won't act like you, and after just a couple of generations, subsequent offspring will pretty much forget you even existed, or even if they are vaguely aware of it, simply won't care.
There are many rewards that may arise from parenting. Immortality isn't one of them. The illusion of immortality might be, though. If you are really careful not to think too clearly about it.
Well, for severely minimal standards of "raising", as in "I didn't let the kid starve or go naked", it might. Otherwise, it's absurdly optimistic. If you meant "at some time in the past", sure. But as of recently, today and into the future? No. And of course there are many indirect monetary costs as well; choices made because one has children, rather than in the direct raising of a specific child. These can range from the house you buy and where you live (for instance, to control which school district the child(ren) are educated in) to the hours you work (because someone has to be there to supervise them over large parts of their lives) to what furniture and equipment you outfit your home with, to the vehicles you choose, and so on and so forth.
Not saying you can't raise a kid for 15k/year. Sure you can. But you almost certainly won't. Even if you think you are, it's probably just that other taxpayers are footing part of the bill for you.
"Metaphore" is not in Wikipedia. I assume it is an agent or bearer of a specified thing that has self-referential characteristics. Is that what you meant to convey?
Inquiring minds want to know. Well, at least, one does. :)
From TFS:
I read TFA, and I didn't see anything about cordless charging. That is a feature I not only expect, but require from a "flagship Android phone." Without it, what I expect is that the charging connector will become unusable like it has in every non-cordless-charging phone I've owned. And which, since the advent of cordless charging, is now only a (very) bad memory.
(delighted user of a Galaxy S7 w/cordless charging here. Thanks, Samsung.)
"You code like a UX designer"
Those are fighting words. :)
I see you haven't kept up with film technology.
Not to worry. All he's triggered is a Democratic win.
That happened in 1997, when "moderation" was deemed to be "whatever some random person wants to do to a post" by Rob Malda and Jeff Bates.
No need to thank me, glad to be of service.