What does a guy in jail Denmark for hacking in to computers there have to do with America? Can I get a fap fap fap over here?
Just in case it's an honest question: the fact that he's in Denmark at all instead of Sweden, and the fact that he's in solitary confinement no less, is likely due to the fact that he's the cofounder of The Pirate Bay as much as it has to do with his alleged hacking activities. The REASON it has to do with TPB is completely because the US doesn't like that he was flouting US copyright law for years, even though what he was doing was perfectly legal in Denmark and Sweden.
Of course, doing a search on Slashdot could have told you this and much more.
The issue isn't that he's being held for questioning regarding alleged hacking, it's that he's been held beyond the allowed time in solitary confinement with no amenities. This is seen by many to be more a "make an example of you" punishment than protecting the state because they believe giving him access to humanity to be too dangerous.
I'm not sure how much of this autonomous cars would fix -- one thing that would happen is that passengers would start becoming frustrated with how slow their cars were driving -- as an autonomous car would have to obey all laws of the road. Thus, instead of two cars driving side-by-side blocking others from passing, you'll have ALL cars moving at that speed.
Of course, I see the "out" being that for liability's sake, there will likely be a manual override on the autopilot -- which means you'll still have people wanting to "go faster" manually driving their cars and thus further slowing down the max speed of the autonomous vehicles.
You see, road safety doesn't decrease linearly with speed, it decreases exponentially. City/Road planners and autonomous systems have to take this into consideration.
So if EVERY car was autonomous with no override, we could do away with things like lights at intersections -- the cars could calculate and agree upon the optimal order through the intersection as they were approaching it. But as long as the cars can't be sure if someone's going to make an illogical decision, they have to obey the lowest common denominator to be safe.
I would juxtapose that with the advertisements these very same businesses often use with "Fake" customers (actors) that claim how great the service is on television and on the radio. If the business is allowed to make False statements of fact regarding the quality of their services and have it protected by the first amendment, how can the public be denied the same right? I do not see how this is any different that the very same businesses fraudulent claims in advertising.
That isn't what this ruling is about however -- that would be the following ruling, once the issues of fact are settled (were these people customers, etc). If it is shown that EITHER side acted with malice, there are consequences.
Does anyone have a link to the comments in question on Yelp? Seeing these, we could probably easily figure out whether the statement were indented to damage the business or if they were intended as humour/trolls, or as a response to shady advertising.
From what I've seen so far, it looks like Hadeed suspects a competitor of trying to depress sales of their products using falsehoods.
Oh, and businesses aren't allowed to make false statements of facts... misleading, yes -- but those commercials all have fine print stating that it was a paid endorsement, re-enactment, or other similar thing -- meaning that they've had reviews like this, just not by these people, or straight out admitting that the entire ad is fictional. If similar fine print was added to the yelp comments, they'd probably be covered.
"Endeavor to be one of the people writing the algorithms" would probably be a good idea.
You'd better make sure you're REALLY good -- because those algorithms are going to have to protect you from the masses -- both the ones who think they go too far and the ones who think they don't go far enough.
Wear a tshirt with a message written in a carefully formatted font so it causes a buffer overflow, giving your tshirt root privileges. Mine would have the decss code on it, so the drone starts shooting pirated DVDs at everybody. The RIAA will make short work of the problem at that point.
The RIAA/MPAA have been using bots to select and engage targets for years....
It would be interesting to know how long these printed artificial limbs will hold up compared to a conventional prosthetic limb. It would also be interesting to know how much a conventional prosthetic could be made for w/o all of the overhead. I realize that in the US there's a ton of money dumped into testing, trials, FDA approval, lawyers and fear of being sued. But why can't conventional prosthetic limbs be made in countries like this without all of the legal BS? Obviously they can be printed w/o it. I don't know what the average yearly wage is in Sudan, but $100 could be a rather sizable amount of money. Regardless, good for Mr. Ebeling for trying to make a difference.
The other thing to consider is that this makes prosthetics for children (who have this annoying tendency to grow) MUCH easier -- I'm sure someone could even design a limb that is designed to be expandable, so that you only have to re-print a few key parts as the child grows, instead of having to make a new limb every year.
Extra fuel efficiency would be nice, but I am most excited about the prospect of the engine itself lasting longer. Less friction = less heat, less wear & tear, etc. A cool, frictionless engine could potentially last for half-million miles before needing replacement. At my paltry 10-20k miles per year, I could potentially never have to buy another car again.
It'd at least last until your car started failing emissions tests and safety regulations....
Then again, I think that's been my experience for the past 20 or so years, even with the piston rings. Proper maintenance (including the odd part replacement outside the engine) is all a modern car really needs to last for 30+ years.
This was figured out more than 100 years ago. A rubber sheet can be mapped to a scalar theory of gravity. If you made it past the first two lectures of a class on General Relativity, you would know that Relativity is a tensor theory. That is why it is so horrendously complicated.
Maybe they should be using a tensor bandage instead of a rubber sheet then?:D
OK; this is an almost direct quote of something I wrote back in, hmm... around 2003. Coincidence, or are you the Will that used to get blasted by a certain bot with infamous quotes?
Most American consumers are ignorant to the mounting evidence indicating that the laborers whom they have to thank for cultivating these products are being grossly exploited, live in spiraling poverty, and, in some cases, are modern-day slaves.
...says the guy typing his snarky comments in on a Chinese-made laptop. At least with coffee, you can seek out "fair trade coffee", which comes with a somewhat believable assurance that the farmer who produced it actually was paid a fair price for it. There are no "fair trade computers" that I'm aware of.
"Fair Trade" has been around long enough that it is commonly abused/exploited. However, fairDeal builds on top of that, and they fact-check a bit more and add a bit of credibility on top of Fair Trade (as well as certifying organic).
I wonder when we'll get Certified Organic Fair Trade laptops....
Stop trying to be so pedantic. In common vernacular "twice as hot" and "twice as cold" mean multiply the temperature by 2. No one is trying to be scientific about it and trying to make it into something it's not just shows your own limited understanding of their meaning.
Actually, that's not true -- "twice as hot" and "twice as cold" refer to relative heat loss/gain of the average human being, which is significantly different from environmental temperature.
For instance, if you stick a ceramic mug and a steel mug in the freezer overnight, then take them out, they'll be the same temperature, but the steel mug will feel "twice as cold" due to conductivity -- it's removing heat from the contact point with your skin twice as fast as the ceramic mug.
I've actually thought it was plausible... core samples seem to show that there was an increase in a lot of the atmospheric conditions similar to now not too long before the last ice age. Get ready for the third world to become the only livable world for human beings...
...in geological time. So we're good for a few thousand years.
Nobody's fingers ever fell off from hailing a cab. It just doesn't happen. And if you're hailing a cab, you're probably in an urban heat island where the temperature is a good 5-10F above the rural areas where the true cold is felt.
Your concern is misplaced and probably should be directed more towards our furry four-legged friends. There are a lot of people that leave them outside without a second thought in this type of weather. They can handle chilly weather but when your leave them out in ball-busting cold a wet nose is a hindrance and not an asset.
I agree with everything you've said... However, Chicago, for example, is supposed to hit -60F tonight *in the city*. Yes, that's INSIDE the heat island, which is supposed to be blasted away by the high winds. For anyone unused to these temperatures, dressing incorrectly WILL result in frostbite in short order. You don't leave skin exposed other than your face, and that should be covered by a proper hood. Poly/plastic clothing will crack and shatter at those temperatures. It's all about being outside of the norm as far as safety goes -- get a good dump of snow in central California, and it's a disaster -- because drivers don't know what to do and the roads aren't engineered for it. Ohio's getting temperatures significantly below 0 with snow, and this again is significantly different from regular weather patterns -- so people's regular habits won't keep them safe and warm.
If you come from somewhere colder, old habits just kick in and you're fine (for the most part). But if you come from somewhere warmer, you really don't know what to do, and the media don't make it any better, providing all sorts of horror stories and conflicting advice. Best bet is to stay home and stay safe, in this situation.
Yeah, but it will deliver 1080p and 720p video to you with lower bandwidth requirements. Less buffering and fewer artifacts (because of lowered data requirements and a corresponding lower rate of dropped packets).
So do we call the new 4k video we show on these 4k screens 4096p? When do I get a smartphone that can record at this resolution direct to VP9? For that matter, I'd love to record to VP9 in 1080p -- that'd fit a lot of video on a 32GB SD card.
Seeing your gripe at Asimov's article I am very curious... What are your predictions for 2064?
The Year of Linux on the Desktop?
Certainly. But since the invention of seamless human-computer interface brain implants will have relegated desktop computers into the area of retro-computing by 2057, it will still mean that it will only be for geeks.
Seeing your gripe at Asimov's article I am very curious... What are your predictions for 2064?
The Year of Linux on the Desktop?
Nah; Microsoft will have been acquired by Taco Bell by that time... which will then have split up to become a bunch of Baby Bells. One of those Baby Bells will rename itself Microsoft, and split off to only handle the multi-flavoured algae part of the industry, consuming their only competitor, Algae Tastes & Technologies. Their most popular menu item will be the Zune, available in regular, large, and X-Box.
It's Facebook. Is it reasonable to expect complete privacy with any part of it? Email at least has some expectation of privacy, but even there, the big providers scan your email for targeted advertising.
I really don't think a reasonable person expects a lot of "privacy" at Facebook, certainly "private messages" are only private from other users, not Facebook bots...
If a message is stated as "Private" it should be treated entirely as private. I think that implication would hold up in any court as a reasonable expectation, regardless of how Facebook mines Public or Shared content. Dangerous precedent otherwise.
Facebook doesn't have "Private Messages" -- they just have "Messages". So this debate is moot.
Actually, facebook's protocols should have been open by now. What if the first telephone company ever (AT&T?) didn't open up their protocols? Would that be acceptable? Answer: No. What if e-mail was a closed protocol run by google? Would that be acceptable? Answer: No.
So why are facebook's protocols open (a mass communication service like the others)?
1. Facebook operates over HTTP and HTTPS -- they're both open protocols that run on the TCP/IP stack, which is open, which run on top of a number of different network stacks, most of which are open.
3. Google's protocols aren't open as far as I know -- only the SMTP, POP and IMAP protocols, plus whatever APIs they wish to release are open. This says nothing about how most of GMail works. This is due to Google adopting an open standard and building upon it, something which Facebook also did (they also use SMTP, POP and IMAP for perimeter-facing communications).
4. To answer your real question: Most of Facebook's stuff is closed because it's in-house. They don't have to interoperate with anyone to make their system work. Anyone who wants to work with their system can use their published APIs. Having a facebook account is not a basic right, nor is it a necessity -- I've done just fine using plain old SMTP and IMAP plus land line and in-person visits -- and before SMTP and IMAP, I used pieces of paper. I have no idea how the central processing facilities of the world's mail carriers work, and they're likely not public for the most part -- just the formatting required for them to receive the mail is public (the API).
If i send a private message to someone on facebook, I feel I deserve the same level of privacy as if I was using gmail to send it.
I know this was likely meant as a joke... but there's a reason Facebook renamed their "private messages" to "messages" years ago. And it's not because they wanted to be more like Google.
If creationist were open for debate, then they wouldn't be creationist and believe what was written by somebody hundreds of years ago without accepting any revisions.
They've accepted quite a few revisions. Then there's the fact that the majority don't actually understand the original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek in anything but a literal (limited) modern translation that ignores cultural norms of the time when the words were originally written down. Then of course there's the fact that the bulk of the Hebrew and Aramaic works were actually part of oral tradition and weren't written down in their current form until hundreds of years after they were originally introduced -- many of the stories can be traced back through other cultures with cultural adaptations as well.
But I digress -- you'll find almost as many versions of creationism as you will creationists -- because language shifts, so "literal" readings of texts shift too. There's plenty of room there for debate, if you apply the right lever.
Since they hold no precept to reason, they've already cut press releases to the faithful saying they won; in their world it's true.
If you're bashing them for lacking reason, please don't use the same arguments they'd use. Homo Sapiens Sapiens is a reasoning being. While they may start from a false premise, and don't admit to basing their entire argument on reason but instead base some of it on words written down by others -- this is exactly what the majority of people who "abide by reason" do as well -- the human brain isn't able to hold the entire argument at one time, and converts "reason" to narratives as part of the storage and recall process. You may consider yourself "more reasonable" than them, but if you deny that you are at some level an irrational being AS WELL AS being a reasoning being, you're denying pretty much the same thing they are. Or are you arguing that at some point, Homo Sapiens Sapiens forked into Homo Sapiens Rationalis and Homo Sapiens Irrationalis? Basically, your argument thus far smacks of the same reasoning that has been the hallmark of bigotry through the ages.
Those who do abide by reason already know it's true; this won't make it any more true.
Do you have any personally gained scientific proof to back this up? People, having brains that are at once rational and irrational, often flip-flop between what they believe by reason and what they take on faith, on any given topic, based on the arguments of other people. In this debate, there are a group of people going into it who have thought out both arguments and believing one thing is true, and a group of people going into it believing something else is true. Then there are the majority of people, who are going to see a spectacle, and take everything on faith based on what they've been told before; they can't be bothered to reason it out for themselves, and would prefer to have someone else tell them what to think. These people will now have to make a choice -- they could choose to go with what they've known (evolution is true/false, creationism is true/false), or they could change their minds on either of those items, coming to a new conclusion based on the arguments presented.
I really don't see what this will accomplish. If somebody *wants* to learn, they'll wiki it and learn from that starting point. It they don't, pushing it in their face just wastes time and annoys the pig.
In this case, Ham invited the debate, so won't be annoyed. Nye accepted, so shouldn't be annoyed either. Everyone else is attending, so they obviously want to learn something. What makes you think that most people learn by looking something up on a wiki that is always trotted out as a shaky source of information, vs actually witnessing two humans duke it out, like they have for centuries? Only people who have a strong grasp of critical thinking should be basing any sort of learning beyond the rudimentary on Wikipedia. After all, I'm sure you'll find a lot of people aren't too happy with its coverage of creationism OR evolution -- and it would take an entire lifetime to follow all the references for both and test out all the arguments for yourself.
In short, it's attitudes like yours that drive many people into blindly believing things like Ham's flavour of creationism.
It's impossible to debate a scientific subject with someone who doesn't know the science. You end up with a Gish gallop that's impossible to keep up with or refute reasonably.
Indeed -- but the trick is, you shouldn't be depating the scientific subject -- you should be debating the faith subject. For the science, all you have to do is lay the groundwork, make clear what the suppositions are and leave it to the audience to confirm or deny it themselves. Otherwise, you're trying to brainwash people into believing a scientific theory, which never ends well -- just look at both sides of the climate change debate.
Frankly, I think the people who say animals can do these things are just full of crap.
Unlike the dogs in the test, who have no problems voiding their bowels in the appropriate direction....
Interestingly, those other things you say animals can do, humans can do too, given enough sensory deprivation of the senses that aren't used for that purpose. Next thing you're going to tell me is that your dog can talk and actually posted that comment on slashdot... after all, humans are animals too, and can magically do these things.
I was thinking that this was a good reason to keep a dog with you if exploring uncharted territory though; not only can you use the excrement to find your way back, you can also take your bearings from it.
I wonder if this extends to other animals as well... for animals excreting patties or drops, it wouldn't be too useful, but for those excreting logs it could be a useful addition to moss and sun tracking:)
Slashdot Mirror
What does a guy in jail Denmark for hacking in to computers there have to do with America? Can I get a fap fap fap over here?
Just in case it's an honest question: the fact that he's in Denmark at all instead of Sweden, and the fact that he's in solitary confinement no less, is likely due to the fact that he's the cofounder of The Pirate Bay as much as it has to do with his alleged hacking activities. The REASON it has to do with TPB is completely because the US doesn't like that he was flouting US copyright law for years, even though what he was doing was perfectly legal in Denmark and Sweden.
Of course, doing a search on Slashdot could have told you this and much more.
The issue isn't that he's being held for questioning regarding alleged hacking, it's that he's been held beyond the allowed time in solitary confinement with no amenities. This is seen by many to be more a "make an example of you" punishment than protecting the state because they believe giving him access to humanity to be too dangerous.
I'm not sure how much of this autonomous cars would fix -- one thing that would happen is that passengers would start becoming frustrated with how slow their cars were driving -- as an autonomous car would have to obey all laws of the road. Thus, instead of two cars driving side-by-side blocking others from passing, you'll have ALL cars moving at that speed.
Of course, I see the "out" being that for liability's sake, there will likely be a manual override on the autopilot -- which means you'll still have people wanting to "go faster" manually driving their cars and thus further slowing down the max speed of the autonomous vehicles.
You see, road safety doesn't decrease linearly with speed, it decreases exponentially. City/Road planners and autonomous systems have to take this into consideration.
So if EVERY car was autonomous with no override, we could do away with things like lights at intersections -- the cars could calculate and agree upon the optimal order through the intersection as they were approaching it. But as long as the cars can't be sure if someone's going to make an illogical decision, they have to obey the lowest common denominator to be safe.
I would juxtapose that with the advertisements these very same businesses often use with "Fake" customers (actors) that claim how great the service is on television and on the radio. If the business is allowed to make False statements of fact regarding the quality of their services and have it protected by the first amendment, how can the public be denied the same right? I do not see how this is any different that the very same businesses fraudulent claims in advertising.
That isn't what this ruling is about however -- that would be the following ruling, once the issues of fact are settled (were these people customers, etc). If it is shown that EITHER side acted with malice, there are consequences.
Does anyone have a link to the comments in question on Yelp? Seeing these, we could probably easily figure out whether the statement were indented to damage the business or if they were intended as humour/trolls, or as a response to shady advertising.
From what I've seen so far, it looks like Hadeed suspects a competitor of trying to depress sales of their products using falsehoods.
Oh, and businesses aren't allowed to make false statements of facts... misleading, yes -- but those commercials all have fine print stating that it was a paid endorsement, re-enactment, or other similar thing -- meaning that they've had reviews like this, just not by these people, or straight out admitting that the entire ad is fictional. If similar fine print was added to the yelp comments, they'd probably be covered.
What To Do?
"Endeavor to be one of the people writing the algorithms" would probably be a good idea.
You'd better make sure you're REALLY good -- because those algorithms are going to have to protect you from the masses -- both the ones who think they go too far and the ones who think they don't go far enough.
Wear a tshirt with a message written in a carefully formatted font so it causes a buffer overflow, giving your tshirt root privileges.
Mine would have the decss code on it, so the drone starts shooting pirated DVDs at everybody. The RIAA will make short work of the problem at that point.
The RIAA/MPAA have been using bots to select and engage targets for years....
It would be interesting to know how long these printed artificial limbs will hold up compared to a conventional prosthetic limb. It would also be interesting to know how much a conventional prosthetic could be made for w/o all of the overhead. I realize that in the US there's a ton of money dumped into testing, trials, FDA approval, lawyers and fear of being sued. But why can't conventional prosthetic limbs be made in countries like this without all of the legal BS? Obviously they can be printed w/o it. I don't know what the average yearly wage is in Sudan, but $100 could be a rather sizable amount of money. Regardless, good for Mr. Ebeling for trying to make a difference.
The other thing to consider is that this makes prosthetics for children (who have this annoying tendency to grow) MUCH easier -- I'm sure someone could even design a limb that is designed to be expandable, so that you only have to re-print a few key parts as the child grows, instead of having to make a new limb every year.
Extra fuel efficiency would be nice, but I am most excited about the prospect of the engine itself lasting longer. Less friction = less heat, less wear & tear, etc. A cool, frictionless engine could potentially last for half-million miles before needing replacement. At my paltry 10-20k miles per year, I could potentially never have to buy another car again.
It'd at least last until your car started failing emissions tests and safety regulations....
Then again, I think that's been my experience for the past 20 or so years, even with the piston rings. Proper maintenance (including the odd part replacement outside the engine) is all a modern car really needs to last for 30+ years.
This was figured out more than 100 years ago. A rubber sheet can be mapped to a scalar theory of gravity. If you made it past the first two lectures of a class on General Relativity, you would know that Relativity is a tensor theory. That is why it is so horrendously complicated.
Maybe they should be using a tensor bandage instead of a rubber sheet then? :D
OK; this is an almost direct quote of something I wrote back in, hmm... around 2003. Coincidence, or are you the Will that used to get blasted by a certain bot with infamous quotes?
Most American consumers are ignorant to the mounting evidence indicating that the laborers whom they have to thank for cultivating these products are being grossly exploited, live in spiraling poverty, and, in some cases, are modern-day slaves.
...says the guy typing his snarky comments in on a Chinese-made laptop. At least with coffee, you can seek out "fair trade coffee", which comes with a somewhat believable assurance that the farmer who produced it actually was paid a fair price for it. There are no "fair trade computers" that I'm aware of.
"Fair Trade" has been around long enough that it is commonly abused/exploited. However, fairDeal builds on top of that, and they fact-check a bit more and add a bit of credibility on top of Fair Trade (as well as certifying organic).
I wonder when we'll get Certified Organic Fair Trade laptops....
Stop trying to be so pedantic. In common vernacular "twice as hot" and "twice as cold" mean multiply the temperature by 2. No one is trying to be scientific about it and trying to make it into something it's not just shows your own limited understanding of their meaning.
Actually, that's not true -- "twice as hot" and "twice as cold" refer to relative heat loss/gain of the average human being, which is significantly different from environmental temperature.
For instance, if you stick a ceramic mug and a steel mug in the freezer overnight, then take them out, they'll be the same temperature, but the steel mug will feel "twice as cold" due to conductivity -- it's removing heat from the contact point with your skin twice as fast as the ceramic mug.
I've actually thought it was plausible... core samples seem to show that there was an increase in a lot of the atmospheric conditions similar to now not too long before the last ice age. Get ready for the third world to become the only livable world for human beings...
...in geological time. So we're good for a few thousand years.
Nobody's fingers ever fell off from hailing a cab. It just doesn't happen. And if you're hailing a cab, you're probably in an urban heat island where the temperature is a good 5-10F above the rural areas where the true cold is felt.
Your concern is misplaced and probably should be directed more towards our furry four-legged friends. There are a lot of people that leave them outside without a second thought in this type of weather. They can handle chilly weather but when your leave them out in ball-busting cold a wet nose is a hindrance and not an asset.
I agree with everything you've said...
However, Chicago, for example, is supposed to hit -60F tonight *in the city*. Yes, that's INSIDE the heat island, which is supposed to be blasted away by the high winds. For anyone unused to these temperatures, dressing incorrectly WILL result in frostbite in short order. You don't leave skin exposed other than your face, and that should be covered by a proper hood. Poly/plastic clothing will crack and shatter at those temperatures.
It's all about being outside of the norm as far as safety goes -- get a good dump of snow in central California, and it's a disaster -- because drivers don't know what to do and the roads aren't engineered for it. Ohio's getting temperatures significantly below 0 with snow, and this again is significantly different from regular weather patterns -- so people's regular habits won't keep them safe and warm.
If you come from somewhere colder, old habits just kick in and you're fine (for the most part). But if you come from somewhere warmer, you really don't know what to do, and the media don't make it any better, providing all sorts of horror stories and conflicting advice. Best bet is to stay home and stay safe, in this situation.
Yeah, but it will deliver 1080p and 720p video to you with lower bandwidth requirements. Less buffering and fewer artifacts (because of lowered data requirements and a corresponding lower rate of dropped packets).
So do we call the new 4k video we show on these 4k screens 4096p? When do I get a smartphone that can record at this resolution direct to VP9? For that matter, I'd love to record to VP9 in 1080p -- that'd fit a lot of video on a 32GB SD card.
Seeing your gripe at Asimov's article I am very curious... What are your predictions for 2064?
The Year of Linux on the Desktop?
Certainly. But since the invention of seamless human-computer interface brain implants will have relegated desktop computers into the area of retro-computing by 2057, it will still mean that it will only be for geeks.
Will Netcraft be dead yet?
Seeing your gripe at Asimov's article I am very curious... What are your predictions for 2064?
The Year of Linux on the Desktop?
Nah; Microsoft will have been acquired by Taco Bell by that time... which will then have split up to become a bunch of Baby Bells. One of those Baby Bells will rename itself Microsoft, and split off to only handle the multi-flavoured algae part of the industry, consuming their only competitor, Algae Tastes & Technologies. Their most popular menu item will be the Zune, available in regular, large, and X-Box.
It's Facebook. Is it reasonable to expect complete privacy with any part of it? Email at least has some expectation of privacy, but even there, the big providers scan your email for targeted advertising.
I really don't think a reasonable person expects a lot of "privacy" at Facebook, certainly "private messages" are only private from other users, not Facebook bots...
If a message is stated as "Private" it should be treated entirely as private. I think that implication would hold up in any court as a reasonable expectation, regardless of how Facebook mines Public or Shared content. Dangerous precedent otherwise.
Facebook doesn't have "Private Messages" -- they just have "Messages". So this debate is moot.
Actually, facebook's protocols should have been open by now. What if the first telephone company ever (AT&T?) didn't open up their protocols? Would that be acceptable? Answer: No. What if e-mail was a closed protocol run by google? Would that be acceptable? Answer: No.
So why are facebook's protocols open (a mass communication service like the others)?
1. Facebook operates over HTTP and HTTPS -- they're both open protocols that run on the TCP/IP stack, which is open, which run on top of a number of different network stacks, most of which are open.
2. AT&T was not the first telco ever -- they're's a reason it's called a "baby Bell" after all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Telephone_Company
3. Google's protocols aren't open as far as I know -- only the SMTP, POP and IMAP protocols, plus whatever APIs they wish to release are open. This says nothing about how most of GMail works. This is due to Google adopting an open standard and building upon it, something which Facebook also did (they also use SMTP, POP and IMAP for perimeter-facing communications).
4. To answer your real question: Most of Facebook's stuff is closed because it's in-house. They don't have to interoperate with anyone to make their system work. Anyone who wants to work with their system can use their published APIs. Having a facebook account is not a basic right, nor is it a necessity -- I've done just fine using plain old SMTP and IMAP plus land line and in-person visits -- and before SMTP and IMAP, I used pieces of paper. I have no idea how the central processing facilities of the world's mail carriers work, and they're likely not public for the most part -- just the formatting required for them to receive the mail is public (the API).
If i send a private message to someone on facebook, I feel I deserve the same level of privacy as if I was using gmail to send it.
I know this was likely meant as a joke... but there's a reason Facebook renamed their "private messages" to "messages" years ago. And it's not because they wanted to be more like Google.
If creationist were open for debate, then they wouldn't be creationist and believe what was written by somebody hundreds of years ago without accepting any revisions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_James_Version
They've accepted quite a few revisions. Then there's the fact that the majority don't actually understand the original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek in anything but a literal (limited) modern translation that ignores cultural norms of the time when the words were originally written down. Then of course there's the fact that the bulk of the Hebrew and Aramaic works were actually part of oral tradition and weren't written down in their current form until hundreds of years after they were originally introduced -- many of the stories can be traced back through other cultures with cultural adaptations as well.
But I digress -- you'll find almost as many versions of creationism as you will creationists -- because language shifts, so "literal" readings of texts shift too. There's plenty of room there for debate, if you apply the right lever.
A few things...
Since they hold no precept to reason, they've already cut press releases to the faithful saying they won; in their world it's true.
If you're bashing them for lacking reason, please don't use the same arguments they'd use. Homo Sapiens Sapiens is a reasoning being. While they may start from a false premise, and don't admit to basing their entire argument on reason but instead base some of it on words written down by others -- this is exactly what the majority of people who "abide by reason" do as well -- the human brain isn't able to hold the entire argument at one time, and converts "reason" to narratives as part of the storage and recall process. You may consider yourself "more reasonable" than them, but if you deny that you are at some level an irrational being AS WELL AS being a reasoning being, you're denying pretty much the same thing they are. Or are you arguing that at some point, Homo Sapiens Sapiens forked into Homo Sapiens Rationalis and Homo Sapiens Irrationalis? Basically, your argument thus far smacks of the same reasoning that has been the hallmark of bigotry through the ages.
Those who do abide by reason already know it's true; this won't make it any more true.
Do you have any personally gained scientific proof to back this up? People, having brains that are at once rational and irrational, often flip-flop between what they believe by reason and what they take on faith, on any given topic, based on the arguments of other people. In this debate, there are a group of people going into it who have thought out both arguments and believing one thing is true, and a group of people going into it believing something else is true. Then there are the majority of people, who are going to see a spectacle, and take everything on faith based on what they've been told before; they can't be bothered to reason it out for themselves, and would prefer to have someone else tell them what to think. These people will now have to make a choice -- they could choose to go with what they've known (evolution is true/false, creationism is true/false), or they could change their minds on either of those items, coming to a new conclusion based on the arguments presented.
I really don't see what this will accomplish. If somebody *wants* to learn, they'll wiki it and learn from that starting point. It they don't, pushing it in their face just wastes time and annoys the pig.
In this case, Ham invited the debate, so won't be annoyed. Nye accepted, so shouldn't be annoyed either. Everyone else is attending, so they obviously want to learn something. What makes you think that most people learn by looking something up on a wiki that is always trotted out as a shaky source of information, vs actually witnessing two humans duke it out, like they have for centuries? Only people who have a strong grasp of critical thinking should be basing any sort of learning beyond the rudimentary on Wikipedia. After all, I'm sure you'll find a lot of people aren't too happy with its coverage of creationism OR evolution -- and it would take an entire lifetime to follow all the references for both and test out all the arguments for yourself.
In short, it's attitudes like yours that drive many people into blindly believing things like Ham's flavour of creationism.
It's impossible to debate a scientific subject with someone who doesn't know the science. You end up with a Gish gallop that's impossible to keep up with or refute reasonably.
Indeed -- but the trick is, you shouldn't be depating the scientific subject -- you should be debating the faith subject. For the science, all you have to do is lay the groundwork, make clear what the suppositions are and leave it to the audience to confirm or deny it themselves. Otherwise, you're trying to brainwash people into believing a scientific theory, which never ends well -- just look at both sides of the climate change debate.
Frankly, I think the people who say animals can do these things are just full of crap.
Unlike the dogs in the test, who have no problems voiding their bowels in the appropriate direction....
Interestingly, those other things you say animals can do, humans can do too, given enough sensory deprivation of the senses that aren't used for that purpose. Next thing you're going to tell me is that your dog can talk and actually posted that comment on slashdot... after all, humans are animals too, and can magically do these things.
Any high power lines near your house? Ham radio?
Plus, it only works off-leash in a field.
I was thinking that this was a good reason to keep a dog with you if exploring uncharted territory though; not only can you use the excrement to find your way back, you can also take your bearings from it.
I wonder if this extends to other animals as well... for animals excreting patties or drops, it wouldn't be too useful, but for those excreting logs it could be a useful addition to moss and sun tracking :)
Alternative explanation. Dogs face away from the sun while crapping.
Where is the raw data?
Something about this experiment smells...