So you are saying that once MS became the largest provider of operating systems (strictly speaking, they are and never were a true monopoly, there have always been alternative OSes, including the one I am using right now), they should have been prohibited by law from improving their product (any improvement would of course have a negative impact on a competitor)?
I guess we will just have to agree to disagree in that area.
The fact embryonic cloning had not been accomplished does not mean the ideas were not around before then. Believe me, they were. Whats more, guess who was president in '98 and '99. If you guessed Bush, guess again.
As per your statement on bacteria in corpses, they are not considered part of the corpse. There is bacteria in the glass on my desk, that does not make the glass a living thing.
Read my post again, I think I was rather clear. The relevant portion is reproduced below (and no, that does not make that post a living thing), with emphasis added to the part you missed:
"You mean cellular. Molecules cannot metabolize, grow, reproduce, or react to their environment (
at least not in the sense we are talking about)."
Is a point coming anytime soon? None of that changes the fact Bush did not halt existing work as often implied by his opponents.
Whats more, the idea that stem cell research was unknown before Bush (and thus that it is too new to have recieved funding before him) is plain wrong. The ideas certainly were around well before he took office.
" How many of those life funtions does an embryo have?"
It can engage in growth, metabolism, and can respond and adapt to its environment, just like any other living thing from a bacteria to an insect to an adult human being. The only thing that it is at the time not capable of is reproduction, though if you are going to use that to disqualify it as alive then the only living humans are adult men (with working testes) and once a month adult women (with working overies).
" When you get to the molecular level how dead is that corpse really?"
You mean cellular. Molecules cannot metabolize, grow, reproduce, or react to their environment (at least not in the sense we are talking about). That said, he had better be dead or he is not a corpse.
"Government-funded researchers invented the calculus, the mechanical (and electronic) computer, and the internal combustion engine, and gave that research to the public, so that commercial and charitable use could be made of them."
Oh please. I could name dozens of products and ideas invented and developed by the private sector, naming four from government funded programs proves nothing.
Regardless, it is more than no funding at all (like how it was before Bush) and in no way effects private funding. Claiming that it is a ban or leaving out the "federal funding" part is either wrong or disingenuous.
dead
adj. deader, deadest
1. Having lost life; no longer alive.
life n. pl. lives (lvz)
1.
1. The property or quality that distinguishes living organisms from dead organisms and inanimate matter, manifested in functions such as metabolism, growth, reproduction, and response to stimuli or adaptation to the environment originating from within the organism.
Pretty standard words actually.
"Is an embryo more alive because you consider it to have some mythical soul or because under the right conditions it may become alive?"
No, it is alive because it meets the criteria for life. Why wouldn't it? Because you don't think it has a mythicial soul?
Life and death are biological concepts, not moral ones. If you cannot seperate the two, then you really have missed the point.
Embryonic stem cell research was not banned. Federal funding was given for embryonic stem cell research but limited to pre-existing lines.
There is a huge difference between the two.
Re:Nothing for you to see here. Please move along
on
SCO.com Defaced
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· Score: 0, Troll
SCO are thieves? They are making a legal argument. Even if that argument has no merit (which I guess you are assuming to be true), that doesn't make them theives. Besides, IBM's lawyers are more than capable of defending their company.
Its not that not enough research has been done, its that knowing those costs requires nothing short of clairvoyance. There is no experiement we can make that will tell us what the effects of burning x barrels of oil over y number of years will be on the environment z years from now.
Whats more there are other things we would need to magically know. We need to know what sociological effects these policies would have. How would they effect the economy? How would that effect the development of future technologies? How would that effect changes in how world societies function. Think you have a test that will determine all that?
150 years ago, what were society's concerns regarding the environment and pollution? Rapid deforestation (remember lumber was a huge source of energy and construction material) and horse shit in the streets. Small horseless automobiles were a pipedream, plastics were unknown, and good luck trying to explain nuclear power to the locals. Do you really think you can predict what the world will be like 150 years from now?
Two problems. First, we can't put a dollar amount on the "total" costs of oil because we don't know what all the effects are, nor do we know what all the effects are of the hydrogen system suggested by the poster. There are too many unknowns in the equation.
Second, costs are real unless you have a magical way of generating infinite resources for the project. And each expense has to be justified against spending that money elsewhere. For instance if you were to instead build the nukes in more convienient locations, you could spend the money you save there on increased safety or security, which makes the population better off.
A) Someone has to man the power plant. If you put it out someone in the middle of Alaska, you would have to fly people out there each shift.
B) Green groups would get pissed off, as the 'boonies' usually have native wildlife populations, and if they percieve that you are putting them at danger, they will get all pissy.
C) Nuclear power plants, if properly maintained, are actually very safe. So there really is no point to doing that.
"
First MS encorporated Stacker into it's OS without Stac's approval or agreement, and basically challenged them to do something about it."
Actually it was DoubleSpace, which Stac claimed infringed on its patent. There is a difference between stealing code and infringing on a patent.
"Third MS replaced Stacker with an inferior competitor who *would* agree to their terms."
While I am not entirely familiar with this particular event, are you under the belief that Stac should have been granted a monopoly over all disk compression software and that companies should not be allowed to seek out competitors?
"The company headed for bankruptcy."
Yeah, 10 years later after the.com bubble popped.
"Here I loose track, but I believe that at this point Stac settled with MS."
Stac won the lawsuit and were awarded $120 million in '94. Then they reached a settlement in which MS invested in the company and were paid millions of dollars over several years. Not a bad deal.
" My assertions work even better when Microsoft sues others."
Then why don't you find an example of that?
"I referred to the stacker case because it was an example of Microsoft aggressively throwing money into a losing case, something that you claim they would never do."
No, thats not what I said at all. I said they wouldn't initialize a lawsuit they knew they had no chance at winning. The Stac case does not count as
A) They didn't initialize it, Stac Electronics did. If they are sued they have to defend themselves, ignoring it is not an option.
And B) They didn't know they had no chance at winning. Look around you and you will find dozens of people on/. claiming software patents (like Stacker) are not valid.
Yes it does. MS cannot control who sues them, unless you believe they have some sort of brain control device. The issue was whether or not they would sue someone when they knew they could not win.
"If their opponent runs out of cash before the end of the lawsuit, they're toast, and the question of whether they could ultimately win the case in theory is moot."
You are aware that in the case you cited, Stac Electronics did not run out of money? Because it sounds like you are not all that familiar with the case. It does nothing to back up you assertions.
Could you please be more specific? Clearly you cannot mean Stac Electronics vs Microsoft over the patent for Stacker, as that was a patent lawsuit initialized and won by Stac for their patent.
"They have ultimately lost many expensive lawsuits. "
Sure they have. But how many of those did they initialize knowing they had no chance in hell of winning.
"If stupid patents could really be taken out by a couple of small-time lawyers, then things like the one-click patent wouldn't still be in force."
Well the one-click patent is no longer in force. The injunction against Barnes and Noble was lifted nearly four years ago, and the two parties have since settled their differences. And as far as I know, they have not sued another company over "one-click" shopping, even though there are those in the industry who do consider it a valid patent.
Do you seriously think MS became the world's largest software company by throwing money into lawsuits they know they will lose?
"Or use threats of litigation to nip any new potential competitors in the bud while they're still small."
Believe it or not, most companies MS (or IBM, or HP, or GE, or virtually any other company out there) might consider a potential competitor can afford a lawyer or two (as my peers on/. have indicated ad nauseum, finding problems with most of these patents does not require a dream team lawyer firm). Note that 28 year olds living in their parent's basement do not count.
Except it will cost MS money to defend it. Whats more, after they lose they no longer have the patent which defeats the point of getting it in the first place.
I believe the common practice is to use these patents as bargining tools with other companies. Such as "I want your patent for really cool item, so I'll trade you rights for really cool item for the rights to all this crap that I got through the patent system." It really isn't going to be worth it to go after small companies, especially when the patent is such that even a novice lawyer could defeat you. Also they can point to their long list of patents for pride reasons.
I can tell that while I was working at a certain large company with an extensive patent portfolio (not MS, BTW), they encourage their employees to seek patents for anything they think might be novel. Otherwise someone would likely come up with a real patentable idea but fail to report it thinking that it isn't worth it.
Wake me up when one of these is upheld in court. That will be news. The patent office still hasn't even approved this one (and with its current rate, it will likely take a few years before it is).
I can apply for a patent for starting a fire with two sticks. Its even possible the patent office will rubber stamp it a few years later. But it is meaningless because there is no way a judge would accept it.
No, because the boy wasn't suing Jackson. Jackson was being charged with a criminal offense. Thus if he really did pay the kid off not to testify (there has never proof that I know of that that is what happened), that was a case of bribing a witness.
Yes, one case is (alleged) bribery while the other is a settlement, you have the two backwards.
Jackson was faced with criminal charges, not a lawsuit. The difference is that you cannot (legally) pay off the victim in a criminal trial to make the charges go away. You can do so in a civil trial. As far as I know (and I havn't yet RTFA) this was a civil case.
Slashdot Mirror
I guess we will just have to agree to disagree in that area.
The fact embryonic cloning had not been accomplished does not mean the ideas were not around before then. Believe me, they were. Whats more, guess who was president in '98 and '99. If you guessed Bush, guess again.
As per your statement on bacteria in corpses, they are not considered part of the corpse. There is bacteria in the glass on my desk, that does not make the glass a living thing.
Whats more, the idea that stem cell research was unknown before Bush (and thus that it is too new to have recieved funding before him) is plain wrong. The ideas certainly were around well before he took office.
BTW, your link is broken.
It can engage in growth, metabolism, and can respond and adapt to its environment, just like any other living thing from a bacteria to an insect to an adult human being. The only thing that it is at the time not capable of is reproduction, though if you are going to use that to disqualify it as alive then the only living humans are adult men (with working testes) and once a month adult women (with working overies).
" When you get to the molecular level how dead is that corpse really?"
You mean cellular. Molecules cannot metabolize, grow, reproduce, or react to their environment (at least not in the sense we are talking about). That said, he had better be dead or he is not a corpse.
Oh please. I could name dozens of products and ideas invented and developed by the private sector, naming four from government funded programs proves nothing.
Regardless, it is more than no funding at all (like how it was before Bush) and in no way effects private funding. Claiming that it is a ban or leaving out the "federal funding" part is either wrong or disingenuous.
Pretty standard words actually.
"Is an embryo more alive because you consider it to have some mythical soul or because under the right conditions it may become alive?"
No, it is alive because it meets the criteria for life. Why wouldn't it? Because you don't think it has a mythicial soul?
Life and death are biological concepts, not moral ones. If you cannot seperate the two, then you really have missed the point.
Uhh, his problem wasn't just that he couldn't walk. This treatment, had it been reproduced, would not have cured him.
There is a huge difference between the two.
SCO are thieves? They are making a legal argument. Even if that argument has no merit (which I guess you are assuming to be true), that doesn't make them theives. Besides, IBM's lawyers are more than capable of defending their company.
Whats more there are other things we would need to magically know. We need to know what sociological effects these policies would have. How would they effect the economy? How would that effect the development of future technologies? How would that effect changes in how world societies function. Think you have a test that will determine all that?
150 years ago, what were society's concerns regarding the environment and pollution? Rapid deforestation (remember lumber was a huge source of energy and construction material) and horse shit in the streets. Small horseless automobiles were a pipedream, plastics were unknown, and good luck trying to explain nuclear power to the locals. Do you really think you can predict what the world will be like 150 years from now?
Second, costs are real unless you have a magical way of generating infinite resources for the project. And each expense has to be justified against spending that money elsewhere. For instance if you were to instead build the nukes in more convienient locations, you could spend the money you save there on increased safety or security, which makes the population better off.
B) Green groups would get pissed off, as the 'boonies' usually have native wildlife populations, and if they percieve that you are putting them at danger, they will get all pissy.
C) Nuclear power plants, if properly maintained, are actually very safe. So there really is no point to doing that.
Actually it was DoubleSpace, which Stac claimed infringed on its patent. There is a difference between stealing code and infringing on a patent.
"Third MS replaced Stacker with an inferior competitor who *would* agree to their terms."
While I am not entirely familiar with this particular event, are you under the belief that Stac should have been granted a monopoly over all disk compression software and that companies should not be allowed to seek out competitors?
"The company headed for bankruptcy."
Yeah, 10 years later after the .com bubble popped.
"Here I loose track, but I believe that at this point Stac settled with MS."
Stac won the lawsuit and were awarded $120 million in '94. Then they reached a settlement in which MS invested in the company and were paid millions of dollars over several years. Not a bad deal.
Then why don't you find an example of that?
"I referred to the stacker case because it was an example of Microsoft aggressively throwing money into a losing case, something that you claim they would never do."
No, thats not what I said at all. I said they wouldn't initialize a lawsuit they knew they had no chance at winning. The Stac case does not count as /. claiming software patents (like Stacker) are not valid.
A) They didn't initialize it, Stac Electronics did. If they are sued they have to defend themselves, ignoring it is not an option.
And B) They didn't know they had no chance at winning. Look around you and you will find dozens of people on
Yes it does. MS cannot control who sues them, unless you believe they have some sort of brain control device. The issue was whether or not they would sue someone when they knew they could not win.
"If their opponent runs out of cash before the end of the lawsuit, they're toast, and the question of whether they could ultimately win the case in theory is moot."
You are aware that in the case you cited, Stac Electronics did not run out of money? Because it sounds like you are not all that familiar with the case. It does nothing to back up you assertions.
Could you please be more specific? Clearly you cannot mean Stac Electronics vs Microsoft over the patent for Stacker, as that was a patent lawsuit initialized and won by Stac for their patent.
"They have ultimately lost many expensive lawsuits. "
Sure they have. But how many of those did they initialize knowing they had no chance in hell of winning.
"If stupid patents could really be taken out by a couple of small-time lawyers, then things like the one-click patent wouldn't still be in force."
Well the one-click patent is no longer in force. The injunction against Barnes and Noble was lifted nearly four years ago, and the two parties have since settled their differences. And as far as I know, they have not sued another company over "one-click" shopping, even though there are those in the industry who do consider it a valid patent.
Do you seriously think MS became the world's largest software company by throwing money into lawsuits they know they will lose?
"Or use threats of litigation to nip any new potential competitors in the bud while they're still small."
Believe it or not, most companies MS (or IBM, or HP, or GE, or virtually any other company out there) might consider a potential competitor can afford a lawyer or two (as my peers on /. have indicated ad nauseum, finding problems with most of these patents does not require a dream team lawyer firm). Note that 28 year olds living in their parent's basement do not count.
I believe the common practice is to use these patents as bargining tools with other companies. Such as "I want your patent for really cool item, so I'll trade you rights for really cool item for the rights to all this crap that I got through the patent system." It really isn't going to be worth it to go after small companies, especially when the patent is such that even a novice lawyer could defeat you. Also they can point to their long list of patents for pride reasons.
I can tell that while I was working at a certain large company with an extensive patent portfolio (not MS, BTW), they encourage their employees to seek patents for anything they think might be novel. Otherwise someone would likely come up with a real patentable idea but fail to report it thinking that it isn't worth it.
Wake me up when one of these is upheld in court. That will be news. The patent office still hasn't even approved this one (and with its current rate, it will likely take a few years before it is).
I can apply for a patent for starting a fire with two sticks. Its even possible the patent office will rubber stamp it a few years later. But it is meaningless because there is no way a judge would accept it.
Yes, one case is (alleged) bribery while the other is a settlement, you have the two backwards.
Jackson was faced with criminal charges, not a lawsuit. The difference is that you cannot (legally) pay off the victim in a criminal trial to make the charges go away. You can do so in a civil trial. As far as I know (and I havn't yet RTFA) this was a civil case.
You have still yet to point out an organization he is in charge of?