I'm not sure what your point is here, since it seems to be a non sequiteur to my original post.
I never suggested "work done" had no value, and never suggested artists shouldn't be compensated for their work.
My point (which you seem to have comprehensively missed) were that:
1) Calling it "theft" is inaccurate and misleading. It's not theft, since nothing was stolen (if you can steal "time", I'd be very impressed - it's an intangible concept). Actually, the term is "copyright infringement", which is a much morally-greyer area than "theft", and one which is still somewhat open to debate.
The only reason the *AA (and yourself) use the term "theft" is because it's an unarguably negative (and emotive) term, and it implies anyone arguing against them is in favour of theft. This is exactly like calling abortion "murder" - the real debate's actually a lot more complex than that (when does "a foetus" become "a person", mother's rights, etc), but the anti- party can sidestep all the complication and necessity of rationally defending their position by framing the debate in terms of "you're either with me, or in favour of murder".
"Theft" means depriving of property. "Copyright infringement" means duplicating a work (at your own expense), and violating someone else's copyright. They aren't the same thing, and we have different terms for a reason.
Thus, claiming "theft" is inaccurate, since nobody's actually removed property from them.
2) What they're claiming is loss of potential sales, and blaming it on filesharers. "Lost sales" are impossible to prove - I could easily launch a new product and claim I "should" be getting a million sales a day, but who's to say this is realistic?
They implicitely assume with every *AA-funded study that every single person who downloads would otherwise buy every single song o ntheir machines, and this is patently false - someone will pick up something for free that they'd never in a million years actually pay for, simply because it's free.
In fact, the worst example was one study which (if you read the fine print) assumed that the presence of one song on a computer meant the user would definitely have bought the entire album it was released on. This is clearly complete bullshit, but it gives the *AA lovely inflated figures to bandy around, making the problem look far, far worse than it is.
The claim that the "possibility for piracy" is translating to "demonstrable lost sales" is completely unproven, or even counter-indicated by studies (many of which show filesharers buy more music than average, possibly because they can "try before they buy").
For the first three years (at least) that Big Media was claiming digital piracy was killing its sales, CD/DVD sales were in fact still rising, one year at record levels. They were basically crying wolf - they knew damn well their sales were still going up, but lied and claimed they weren't, so they'd have a big stick to beat piracy with.
Last time I read up on it CD sales had actually finally dropped off slightly (for the first year since they started complaining), and this was again trumpeted by the *AA as entirely due to filesharers. However, they (unlike other studies done at the same time) conveniently ignored the fact that they were in the middle of an economic downturn, sales of the newer music DVDs were climbing at record levels, the internet has made unsigned and indy bands infinitely more accessible to the layman, and the fact that the overwhelming majority of recent "pop" was manufactured, artificial, soulless, meaningless drivel, and people are increasingly starting to realise this.
Basically, they're misrepresenting their position, deliberately. They have yet to prove a single correlation between filesharing and loss of revenue, and many studies don
The article doesn't mention differences between old and regrown limbs, but I'd be surprised if they were identical - so much (IIRC) of our development is environmental as well as genetic, I'd be surprised if the regrown part was exactly the same colour/size as the original.
That said, even being able to regrow a slightly different-looking arm is pretty fucking awsome;-)
From TFA, the only organ which won't regenerate is the brain, so there are no worries about accidentally bisecting someone and ending up with twins.
Also, remember this is real-life we're talking about here - you have to survive long enough to regrow the damaged parts. Chop off a finger (or a major limb), and you'll still have a functioning (if injured) body that can recover.
Chop someone's head off, and the head's going to die within seconds for lack of blood/oxygen - not nearly long enough to regrow a new body.
Now, if we could find some way to keep the head alive for long enough (eg, hook it up to a blood-oxygenator and pump artificial nutrients into it), it might just be possible...
That makes sense (and actually, now you mention it, the "two different types of immune system" thing does ring a bell...).
"I would expect that a good short term solution for humanity is to leave healing alone and allow the fast scar tissue generation scheme to proceed. Then in the event of injuries that require regeneration the procedure can be initated in a clinical environment where infection can be controlled."
To be honest, I think it's more likely you'd have your scarring mechanism turned off (either by gene therapy on your whole body, or possibly locally to the injury-site). IIRC, once scarring has set in the scar-tissue actually prevents any regeneration occurring. If so, it may well be an all-or-nothing choice - either regeneration or scarring. At the very least, to regenerate an scarred-over injury I'd expect you'd probably have to recreate the wound again.
If so, I doubt we'd use gene therapy to willingly turn off scarring altogether, since this would make us unreasonably dependant on medication and antibiotics. More likely, we'd use some mechanism (tailored virus? donor cells?) to give localised gene-therapy to the site of the wound (like today, with experimental treatments for diabetes), and leave the rest of the body as-is.
"In the far future it might be possible to redesign our immune systems to be effective with full-time regeneration (this would also probably eliminate almost all of the diseases we currently suffer from)... those of us alive today may be able to live several hundred years."
I'm not so sure - this advance would basically prevent scarring, but it say nothing about disease or old age, which are very different things with very different causes (eg, telomere loss, which this doesn't necessarily protect against, or cancer, which it could actually cause). For example, even regenerating reptiles still get sick, and still die of old-age.
That said, it's an incredibly exciting development with profound implications for society. We could be looking at the end of acquired (non-genetic) disabilities altogether, and that's fucking awesome.
It depends what you mean by "heal". Eg, if you get your ear pierced the open wound will "heal" (close the wound) over the course of a few months to leave a neat circular hole through your ear, with skin on the inside.
If you then take out the piercing, the hole will generally slowly close up, until it's eventually absorbed back into your body and disappears.
So yes, the wound does "heal" (in the sense of "closing the hole") when you take the piercing out (sometimes earlier, like eyebrow piercings which frequently grow out even with the jewellery left in).
However, the actual open wound (in the sense of a hole into your body, not all the way through it) generally heals within a few days or months (depending what you get pierced) of first getting it done.
"I'd like to point out that most users, when asked if they'd like to try another operating system that's more secure and more stable, would either say "what's an operating system" or "ok, that sounds great" - having no idea what they're agreeing to, but hearing "security" or "stabiilty" and not wanting to sound stupid. And then they'd still buy that gardening software, possibly the mac version."
You're right. However, if they (ostensibly) know what OS they're running and buy the wrong app, that's their fault for not reading up more. If they agree to switching OS, they can't complain if they don't like the result, because they had the choice to switch, and the opportunity to ask more questions before doing so (of course, a proper techie should explain the implications even so, but this is an acceptable minimum).
"Choopping one's leg off isn't a good analogy, either, since that's pretty irreversible. Changing operating systems is rather minor, though."
Minor for you, maybe. For me, after staggering home from work at 18:00 every day, still having to shower, put the tea on and see my significant other for some time that evening, maybe it's a bit more major. For a clueless elderly person with zero technical skills, it's a major deal, especially when their supposedly "trusted" techie is trying to charge them £120 to fix what he broke.
If they can't afford to pay £120 (especially for no good reason), they can't do it themselves and the only person they know who can do the job refuses to because of his own stupidity, they're out of options - I'd say that's effectively pretty irreversible.
"I don't particularly think it's a good idea to just randomly change OSs, but that also applies to changing versions of windows - if someone came in with Win 98, it'd be a good idea to bump them to Win 2K or XP for security update availability reasons."
Fine, as long as you explain to them what you'd like to do to their equipment, and they agree. IT's their PC - merely knowing more or occasionally doing them a favour does not mean you own their machine, and doesn't give you the right to decide how it works over them.
"Reinstalling '98 would also result in that new peice of software not working,"
What? Do you mean with a slash-and-burn format-and-reinstall, instead of just reinstalling Windows over the top? Then yes, it'll stop the program working only until until you or they re-install it. If you installed it the first time you can install it the second. If they installed it the first time, they can do it. I don't see your point here.
There's a world of difference between temporarily stopping a program working as an unavoidable side-effect of what they asked you to do, and knowingly allowing them to buy software which won't work on their machine because you're unnecessarily lied to them about what they're actually running.
Or are you implying that every piece of software relseased in the last few years won't work on Win98? Hate to tell you, but that's completely inaccurate. And even if they do buy the WinXP-only version, they'll only have themselves to blame. They've been told what version of Windows they have at some point (or could ask a trustworthy techie friend) - they've bought the wrong thing through their own stupidity, not because they've been deliberately and needlessly mislead by someone they trusted.
"and would be just as likely to result in some kind of lawsuit..."
I don't think so. "A piece of software unavoidably needing reinstallation due to a problem with the machine that you asked them to fix" (or "the wrong piece of software you bought solely through your own stupidity") is very different to "someone you trust unnecessarily lying to you, and as a result breaking all your already-purchased programs and/or allowing you waste money on something they already know wouldn't work, solely because of their unnecessary action
I remember reading something amany years ago that suggested speed of response to injury was the important factor.
Lizards and "regenerating" reptiles generally don't generate scar tissue. Instead, in response to an injury their body slowly regrows the damaged part.
Mammals, on the other hand, prioritise closing the wound to prevent infection - we very quickly form scar tissue which effectively blocks the wound to infection, but also prevents regrowing the damaged part.
I always understood this was an evolutionary adaptation, but I've never worked out why mammals apparently have so much more to fear from infection than reptiles - is it something to do with our relative complexity, or is it a warm-blooded/cold-blooded thing?
Either way, with our longer lifespans, greater ability at saving individuals with serious injuries and our modern disinfectants and antibiotics, I'd be prepared to swap a slight increase in infectability for the ability to regenerate any wound short of a headshot!
Piracy is possibly depriving an organisation of sales.
Theft is definitely depriving a company of property.
They're only equivalent in the slightest if you assume:
"Possibly" is the same as "definitely" (when all the studies we've seen show otherwise), and
"The potential for a sale" is the same as "definite tangible property", like money or goods (which is such clearly bogus wishful thinking that I'm surprised anyone ever buys the argument).
"Company makes money. Customer is drunk. Everyone's happy. Why do we need lawyers for this?"
Because the *AA still think it's better to have 99% of a tiny cake than slightly less of a cake many, many times the size.
And where there's a worry, or the potential for disagreement, there's a pair of lawyers right in the middle, profiting from it like crazy.
I dunno - would the body forcibly reject the piercing, or would it (as now) just heal up around it and only plug the hole when the piercing was removed?
In the second case, it only permits more extreme piercings...
Yeah. This is an interesting marketing slogan, but with a moment's thought it very obviously translates to "shit, 78% of users got bored and stopped playing after less than a day's playing - how can we try to spin this into a good thing?".
I understand the motivation (and it's a valient effort), but it Just Doesn't Work.
I've never played iClod, and I wish the organisers well, but this is not a good advert for their game.
"OK by that argument, if some one calls me to fix there PC because they are having problems with their word processor and it turns out that they are using notepad am I not allowed to tell them to use Word because I percieve it as better than notepad?"
Try actually reading the GP, and you'll see that (in fact) this is exactly what he's suggesting - you explain the situation, and present them with a choice.
You don't unilaterally decide for them, as if they were some kind of young child or mental deficient.
However, I find myself increasingly wondering if you are in fact a troll. Your vociferously defence of an ethically untenable position and your choosing not to bother even properly reading the (quite short) GP post bears all the hallmarks...
"You mean that a year ago, when my brother upgraded my mothers Win 3.11 to Win98, that's what relegates Linux to distant third place?"
OS comparison is entirely beside the point, but no, that's not what did. Timing was what initially relegated Linux to third choice. What keeps Linux third choice is shocking (and completely unconscious) arrogance like yours.
Basically, you seem to think there's your opinion, and the wrong one. Unfortunately, you're massively in the minority, and so destined to stay there.
"Not only Linux geeks do this, ask *any* geek to reinstall your Windows machine, and you'll get whatever OS he has lying around if you don't bring your own."
The sound shouting-down you're getting would indicate otherwise. Normal people would just ask for the Windows CD, and explain if you don't have it you either have to buy another one or use this (free) operating system that I'm recommending, and which can be made to look almost exactly just like your old one.
"You'd sue your family (or friends)? I'm glad I'm not related to you in any way."
You'd arrogantly and unnecessarily stitch up your own family (or friends) on a whim, and try to charge them £120 to rectify the damage you caused to their machine? I'm glad I'm not related to you in any way.
"And without any of the paperwork (for the house) and safety systems (for the plumbing and electricity) in order, because you get a friend who "knows a bit about pipes/cables/hosues" to do it, instead of paying full price for getting an authorized plumber/electrician/engineer to do it right."
So, if you know a "bit about pipes" and a mate asks you to replumb his kitchen sink, do you:
i) Read up on it and do the best you can ii) Confess to him you don't have the skills needed, and advise him to go to a professional, or iii) Knock his entire house down, piss on the rubble then give him a spare portakabin you had lying around to live in, and ask him to buy a new house if he doesn't like it?
So you're deliberately deleting a working, legitimate Windows install, replacing it with Linux against the wishes of the user, then (when they complain) trying to charge then £120 for another version of Windows, because you deleted the one they already own?
You, sir, are a fucking disgrace. You embody everything the public finds repellent about the "arrogant techie" stereotype, and are unethical, deceitful and (if any money or reward changes hands as a result of your "service") likely comitting fraud to boot.
"All these users are older people who use their computers for web browsing and printing mostly, and I take my experiences so far as a kind of scientific 'evidence' that this class of users can't tell the difference."
So that makes it alright? Supposing one of them goes and buys a new family-tree plotting app, or garden-design program (to choose two examples my aunty recently bought) - what happens then? They're faced with a long, expensive call to tech support, which likely still won't the problem that you caused them. Eventually they (stupidly) turn to you again, and what do you tell them?
"Oh, right, yeah, that won't work - get your money back from the shop, if you can get them to believe that a version of 'Windows' won't run this certified 'Windows' application. Oh, and (if you're exceptionally lucky) here's a barely-maintained buggy-as-fuck butt-ugly hobby OSS version of something so pathetically niche that it'll never attract any kind of decent development community, to replace the version you just spent half your pension buying."
"If you service machines for friends and family try this. Don't ask, just do what is good for them. After all they are putting their absolute trust in your computer knowledge, to do anything less is to fail them in."
More like: "After all, they are putting their absolute trust in your computer knowledge, so to do this is to utterly and arrogantly violate that trust in the worst way possible."
Look, if you're sick of fixing computers for family, friends or others, just fucking tell them. Give them a choice of either switching to (your special version of) Linux or compensating you for the time you waste fixing their Windows boxes.
Alternatively, they can stop coming to you altogether and instead pay to have a computer shop fix it.
Under no circumstances is it ever ethical to violate their trust, especially not because you think you've got away with it so far.
For comparison, suppose you went to the doctor, and he told you you had gangrene. You'd expect some explanation of the options and some (pretty strong) recommendations, but ultimately it's your decision what happens.
You wouldn't expect the doctor to simply club you unconscious, chainsaw off your leg and bandage the stump.
"So what?" he might say - I've prevented it spreading to the rest of your system and killing you! You'll retain the use of your other limbs, and for anything you can't do with them, here's a half-arsed prosthetic replacement for your missing limb. Sure it might look a bit nasty, and doesn't always work too well, and sometimes breaks, but look - you can take the cover off and mess about with how it works inside! Ok, you're not a prosthetics expert, and so probably never will, but this clearly makes up for my complete lack of consultation before my arbitrarily rearranging your entire physiology!"
Jesus. Whatever happened to professional ethics?
You're the kind of person that gives us geeks a bad name.
Indeed. I also love the unnecessary hyperbole - not "little satellites", "mini satellites" or even "microsatellites", but nanosatellites? Are they really one-billionth the size of a regular satellite?
Well done University of Toronto for letting marketing spin and trendy buzzwords get in the way of the facts - now what are we going to call them when when we finally develop orbital devices a bit smaller than a virus?
Tsk, tsk, tsk... whatever happened to precise nomenclature? Bloody kids these days... no respect... we have these different prefixes for a reason, y'know...
Forgive me... Firstly, I never meant to imply that downloaders and filesharers are in any way equivalent to luminaries such as Ghandi or MLK - you made that comparison, not me. I merely intended to explain that I knowingly break the law for similar reasons to the ones they offered - namely, to protest perceived injustice. I am perfectly capable of purchasing all the CDs and DVDs I want, but I refuse to for two reasons:
1) By establishing an oligarchy and purchasing legislation to protect it, the *AA have secured an unfair and undemocratic monopoly on popular media, and therefore culture.
2) I refuse to obey the law (and not download) when the very people loudly telling me not to are unethical (draconian artist contracts, inadequate artist compensation and self-serving extensions of copyright), or even convicted criminals (monopoly practices, payola, etc), themselves.
I do purchase DVDs and CDs from local and unsigned artists - in fact, I actually run a promotions company dedicated to promoting them. I merely refuse to support an industry cartel that seems to have no concept of ethics, and that's presently engaged in invading and occupying my own damn culture.
Secondly, I recommend you read my post again. I never once claimed to use exactly the same tactics as Ghandi, merely that I considered what I do to be Civil Disobedience. Your appear to believe Ghandi's Tactics == Civil Disobedience, but this is merely a shortcoming in your own understanding of the term. I also recommend you read the Wikipedia article you linked to for a handy definition of Civil Disobedience: "Civil disobedience encompasses the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands and commands of a government or of an occupying power without resorting to physical violence."
No mention of voluntarily submitting to arrest, and no mention of the necessity of notifying authorities before you do it. Merely the refusal to follow a rule or law you consider unjust.
In addition, while I don't believe strongly enough to stand upand become a martyr by daring them to sue me, I do talk about downloading and filesharing (legal and illegal) to non-techies, and help other people to learn how to use the applications whenever they show interest.
Ghandi's precise tactics (Satyagraha) are only a subset of civil disobedience, not the whole thing. Even the Wikipedia article you linked to make this clear.
Indeed. I remember well Jon Katz's articles (although many people bitched about him, I always found his articles at least "thought-provoking", if not always "right"), although I somehow missed his unmasking and ignominious exit from/.
I was also around for the tenure of Michael Sims as editor, his mod-bombing of unfavourable comments and eventually his (extremely welcome) exit.
Suffice it to say that although Slashdot hardly has as enviable record in choosing editors, I regard the eventual removal of two such objectionable fuckwits as proof that they at least aspire to impartiality. I mean, if they were prepared to come out and proudly state a biased position, I'd stop reading tomorrow.
Obviously those ultimately in charge of/. need some serious lessons in choosing reliable and mature staff, but I think on the whole they prefer impartiality - they're just not very good at ensuring it happens, or removing staff members who are plainly pissing on their legacy.
Given this assumption, I still feel disappointed when they're obviously acting in a self-serving manner, although I'm not particularly surprised by it.
Come on slashdot - grow a spine and report on things unfavourable to you. Putting your fingers in your ears and going "Lalalalalalala" only feeds the trolls, and makes the rest of us think less of you.
I don't even think that the usual advice given ("simply don't buy the DRMed media") is realistic. This is my culture. I contribute to it, and I have a right to take part in it. My culture is disseminated (and knitted together) by its mass-media - its music, its TV shows, its films, its art.
If I refuse to partake of the mass-media, I inevitably divorce myself from the culture - I have proven this to myself by not owning a TV for two years. Although it started as simple economics (I was a student, and too broke to afford the licence), I now can't watch much TV before it begins to annoy me (product placement, obvious bias in "impartial" shows, and all... the... damned... advertising...). The net result of this is that I have become more familiar with "online" culture, and somewhat divorced from "mainstream" culture - I can't discuss TV programs with friends, unless they're the ones I download. I can't discuss topical news items, unless they're mirrored on the BBC/CNN/Reuters news sites.
If I refuse to suffer DRMed media, in the future I will in effect be denied access to my own culture.
Put simply, I resent an oligarchy of over-compensated middlemen making me choose between freedom and being an outcast in my own society.
I view it as justified civil disobedience to crack and disseminate circumventions for DRM, and view the current use of DRM the same way I'd view slavery - unethical, unjust and an infrigement of my personal liberty.
That's interesting - I'd always thought it was a pretty good example of impartiality to even be willing to run pro-Microsoft ads on such an institutionally pro-linux site as Slashdot.
And TBH I don't know where RMS got the idea that the whole of Slashdot consider him a hero. Quite a lot of the/. crowd seem to view his unrealistic, dogmatic, hippy, philosophical proclamations more as a liability or an embarassment these days.
Me? I'm mildly anti-microsoft (due soeley to their documented behaviour and priorities), mildly pro-linux (in theory - I don't run a linux box, but approve of the idea of open-source). I'm pro-slashdot running MS ads (partly for the irony, partly for the perceived impartiality), and mildly anti-RMS (he's done some very good things for computing, but he has a habit of disappearing so far up his own arse he couldn't see daylight with a telescope).
That said, I'm disappointed Slashdot isn't running the story. Not surprised, but still disappointed.
Well I don't know about physical beatings or indentured servitude, but the DRM schemes I've seen the *AA advocate so far have struck me as uncomfortably close to being fucked right in the arse...
That's a very good point - you can't "buy" DRMed media, since it (by design) excludes the first-sale doctrine. The definition of buying ("obtain by purchase; acquire by means of a financial transaction") clearly isn't fulfilled, since you never actually own (/acquire/obtain) the media. I don't own something if I have to ask someone else every time I want to play it - that's borrowing, by definition - temporary permission to use the item, given by the real owner.
Given this clear violation of basic definitions, isn't it possible to sue companies who offer to "sell" DRMed music for misrepresentation?
"I know there are some here who defend this with "you buy a licence to play the music", not a licence to own it. That may be true but it isn't in anyway expressed clear enough when you "buy" it."
Again, this is easily proven false. If you bought a licence to play the music, you shouldn't have to re-buy the music, ever. Ok, you can make a case for there being a nominal fee for the replacement of media (eg, upgrading tapes to CDs/DVDs), but especially with digital media the cost is basically zero.
Certainly in no way is it justified to ask you to buy a licence to play the music, then re-buy the same licence again for exactly the same amount of money simply because the media-format changes. You've already paid for the un-time-limited right to listen to the music, so they have no right at all to demand you pay again simply to exercise that right.
Short answer - currently you neither own nor license music and popular media. You pay the price of owning it outright, but get less than the rights of licensing it. The *AA have their cake and eat it (purchasing representatives to ensure this state of affairs continues), and the consumers get f'ed in the arse.
How did this state of affairs ever come to be accepted?
1) You're generalising from what you perceive as the prevailing attitude of an entire region to the motives of two people, one of whom isn't even from (or living in) the region. This is clearly a scientifically and statistically meaningless inference.
2) From your tone you aren't from Northern Ireland, or at least don't like the people/place/culture. You're also generalising about a group you're used racial epithets ("noddies") to describe. Clearly you have no personal bias at all, then.
3) You raise doubts about the impartiality of the study, but haven't yet provided a single piece of evidence worth the name that there's definitely anything wrong with it.
4) While there may be (even well-acknowledged) potential sources of bias (gender-bias in the IQ test, institutionalised misogyny in NI, etc), none of these (either) have been proven beyond a doubt.
5) You're arguing that your opposition to the study isn't emotionally-caused, but you're ignoring logic and fleeing to personal opinion and emotive arguments on every point. I'm arguing that we simply can't know whether the study is trustworthy or not without more information.
"Algebra? I was actually thinking about back in school when we had to solve third order differential equations with just paper and pencil."
I'm not taking the piss, but isn't that still algebra? I wasn't denigrating the activity (or your grasp of it), but differentiation is still algebra, isn't it?
"Some people can easily hold big chunks of the equation in their minds at once and can repeatedly do a lot of basic mathematic operation correctly... To some degree this is influenced by practice, but in others it is truly how much you can fit in your head at once and how well you can recognize patterns."
And you don't think you can increase your mental "working space" with practice? I know mine has expanded massively since I learned programming, and all the neurology/psychology studies I've read have suggested the same thing. The brain is enormously plastic, and practicing something even as basic as "holding several things in mind at once" rapidly leads to improvement in that area.
While presumably you eventually approach fundamental limits to mental abilities like this (hey, finite number of neurons, right?;-), all the evidence seems to indicate that almost everyone can improve massively on their "starting" position with enought training or practice.
"How do you demonstrate intelligence except through application? Where does the speed of learning fit into the definition of intelligence. It is the capacity to learn, not the speed with which one learns. If anything I'd say the best judge of intelligence is the ability to create new concepts or recognize patterns. How can these things be judged, aside from through results though?"
This is a fair point - it's impossible to demonstrate "raw intelligence", and you do always need some form of application. The trick is to make the application as simple and "thin" as possible. Eg, memorising lists of facts by rote is a terrible way of assessing intelligence (since memory has almost nothing to do with it). Offering mathematical and linguistic problems is better, since it's more about problem solving and applying intelligence than memorising items. Better yet are "progressive matrices" tests, which are almost pure pattern-spotting and deductive reasoning.
Obviously no IQ test is perfect, but when we've got a scale (PM tests) whish give sensible human-equivalent IQ scores for dolphins, or chimps, I have a hard time accepting that all IQ tests are equally poor, and hence completely worthless.
"I assert that not only IQ tests, but every creation is biased by it's creator."
What possible evidence do you have to support that (definite) assertion? Even if some tests are biased (which I'm not arguing with), how on earth can you possibly extend that to assert all tests always are? This is a complete logical non-sequiteur.
For example (to take the famous one), based on personal experience you can assert that "all crows are black", but you can never prove this, since to prove it would involve finding and observing every crow in existence. In contrast, I can assert "some crows may be white" - you can never prove this wrong (for the same reason as above), but I can prove it right by producing just one white crow.
Basically, it might be a belief, but you can't for one second prove that this is right. And that's exactly what I was complaining about in my first post - people emotively claiming things that aren't based on evidence, simply because that's what our culture has programmed them to believe.
"The reason I find a bias against women so very believable is because it has been demonstrated repeatedly in the past with the most common IQ tests."
I agree that many IQ tests were extremely likely to have been biased... However... if all IQ tests exhibit a slight tendency for men to score higher, what's the difference in evidence between "every
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure what your point is here, since it seems to be a non sequiteur to my original post.
I never suggested "work done" had no value, and never suggested artists shouldn't be compensated for their work.
My point (which you seem to have comprehensively missed) were that:
1) Calling it "theft" is inaccurate and misleading. It's not theft, since nothing was stolen (if you can steal "time", I'd be very impressed - it's an intangible concept). Actually, the term is "copyright infringement", which is a much morally-greyer area than "theft", and one which is still somewhat open to debate.
The only reason the *AA (and yourself) use the term "theft" is because it's an unarguably negative (and emotive) term, and it implies anyone arguing against them is in favour of theft. This is exactly like calling abortion "murder" - the real debate's actually a lot more complex than that (when does "a foetus" become "a person", mother's rights, etc), but the anti- party can sidestep all the complication and necessity of rationally defending their position by framing the debate in terms of "you're either with me, or in favour of murder".
"Theft" means depriving of property. "Copyright infringement" means duplicating a work (at your own expense), and violating someone else's copyright. They aren't the same thing, and we have different terms for a reason.
Thus, claiming "theft" is inaccurate, since nobody's actually removed property from them.
2) What they're claiming is loss of potential sales, and blaming it on filesharers. "Lost sales" are impossible to prove - I could easily launch a new product and claim I "should" be getting a million sales a day, but who's to say this is realistic?
They implicitely assume with every *AA-funded study that every single person who downloads would otherwise buy every single song o ntheir machines, and this is patently false - someone will pick up something for free that they'd never in a million years actually pay for, simply because it's free.
In fact, the worst example was one study which (if you read the fine print) assumed that the presence of one song on a computer meant the user would definitely have bought the entire album it was released on. This is clearly complete bullshit, but it gives the *AA lovely inflated figures to bandy around, making the problem look far, far worse than it is.
The claim that the "possibility for piracy" is translating to "demonstrable lost sales" is completely unproven, or even counter-indicated by studies (many of which show filesharers buy more music than average, possibly because they can "try before they buy").
For the first three years (at least) that Big Media was claiming digital piracy was killing its sales, CD/DVD sales were in fact still rising, one year at record levels. They were basically crying wolf - they knew damn well their sales were still going up, but lied and claimed they weren't, so they'd have a big stick to beat piracy with.
Last time I read up on it CD sales had actually finally dropped off slightly (for the first year since they started complaining), and this was again trumpeted by the *AA as entirely due to filesharers. However, they (unlike other studies done at the same time) conveniently ignored the fact that they were in the middle of an economic downturn, sales of the newer music DVDs were climbing at record levels, the internet has made unsigned and indy bands infinitely more accessible to the layman, and the fact that the overwhelming majority of recent "pop" was manufactured, artificial, soulless, meaningless drivel, and people are increasingly starting to realise this.
Basically, they're misrepresenting their position, deliberately. They have yet to prove a single correlation between filesharing and loss of revenue, and many studies don
The article doesn't mention differences between old and regrown limbs, but I'd be surprised if they were identical - so much (IIRC) of our development is environmental as well as genetic, I'd be surprised if the regrown part was exactly the same colour/size as the original.
;-)
That said, even being able to regrow a slightly different-looking arm is pretty fucking awsome
From TFA, the only organ which won't regenerate is the brain, so there are no worries about accidentally bisecting someone and ending up with twins.
Also, remember this is real-life we're talking about here - you have to survive long enough to regrow the damaged parts. Chop off a finger (or a major limb), and you'll still have a functioning (if injured) body that can recover.
Chop someone's head off, and the head's going to die within seconds for lack of blood/oxygen - not nearly long enough to regrow a new body.
Now, if we could find some way to keep the head alive for long enough (eg, hook it up to a blood-oxygenator and pump artificial nutrients into it), it might just be possible...
And there are others who only buy because they discovered the band through piracy or bootlegging (I've done this myself).
Metallica, for example, owe their "big break" almost solely to bootleg copies of their demo tapes or early releases.
That makes sense (and actually, now you mention it, the "two different types of immune system" thing does ring a bell...).
"I would expect that a good short term solution for humanity is to leave healing alone and allow the fast scar tissue generation scheme to proceed. Then in the event of injuries that require regeneration the procedure can be initated in a clinical environment where infection can be controlled."
To be honest, I think it's more likely you'd have your scarring mechanism turned off (either by gene therapy on your whole body, or possibly locally to the injury-site). IIRC, once scarring has set in the scar-tissue actually prevents any regeneration occurring. If so, it may well be an all-or-nothing choice - either regeneration or scarring. At the very least, to regenerate an scarred-over injury I'd expect you'd probably have to recreate the wound again.
If so, I doubt we'd use gene therapy to willingly turn off scarring altogether, since this would make us unreasonably dependant on medication and antibiotics. More likely, we'd use some mechanism (tailored virus? donor cells?) to give localised gene-therapy to the site of the wound (like today, with experimental treatments for diabetes), and leave the rest of the body as-is.
"In the far future it might be possible to redesign our immune systems to be effective with full-time regeneration (this would also probably eliminate almost all of the diseases we currently suffer from)... those of us alive today may be able to live several hundred years."
I'm not so sure - this advance would basically prevent scarring, but it say nothing about disease or old age, which are very different things with very different causes (eg, telomere loss, which this doesn't necessarily protect against, or cancer, which it could actually cause). For example, even regenerating reptiles still get sick, and still die of old-age.
That said, it's an incredibly exciting development with profound implications for society. We could be looking at the end of acquired (non-genetic) disabilities altogether, and that's fucking awesome.
It depends what you mean by "heal". Eg, if you get your ear pierced the open wound will "heal" (close the wound) over the course of a few months to leave a neat circular hole through your ear, with skin on the inside.
If you then take out the piercing, the hole will generally slowly close up, until it's eventually absorbed back into your body and disappears.
So yes, the wound does "heal" (in the sense of "closing the hole") when you take the piercing out (sometimes earlier, like eyebrow piercings which frequently grow out even with the jewellery left in).
However, the actual open wound (in the sense of a hole into your body, not all the way through it) generally heals within a few days or months (depending what you get pierced) of first getting it done.
"I'd like to point out that most users, when asked if they'd like to try another operating system that's more secure and more stable, would either say "what's an operating system" or "ok, that sounds great" - having no idea what they're agreeing to, but hearing "security" or "stabiilty" and not wanting to sound stupid. And then they'd still buy that gardening software, possibly the mac version."
You're right. However, if they (ostensibly) know what OS they're running and buy the wrong app, that's their fault for not reading up more. If they agree to switching OS, they can't complain if they don't like the result, because they had the choice to switch, and the opportunity to ask more questions before doing so (of course, a proper techie should explain the implications even so, but this is an acceptable minimum).
"Choopping one's leg off isn't a good analogy, either, since that's pretty irreversible. Changing operating systems is rather minor, though."
Minor for you, maybe. For me, after staggering home from work at 18:00 every day, still having to shower, put the tea on and see my significant other for some time that evening, maybe it's a bit more major. For a clueless elderly person with zero technical skills, it's a major deal, especially when their supposedly "trusted" techie is trying to charge them £120 to fix what he broke.
If they can't afford to pay £120 (especially for no good reason), they can't do it themselves and the only person they know who can do the job refuses to because of his own stupidity, they're out of options - I'd say that's effectively pretty irreversible.
"I don't particularly think it's a good idea to just randomly change OSs, but that also applies to changing versions of windows - if someone came in with Win 98, it'd be a good idea to bump them to Win 2K or XP for security update availability reasons."
Fine, as long as you explain to them what you'd like to do to their equipment, and they agree. IT's their PC - merely knowing more or occasionally doing them a favour does not mean you own their machine, and doesn't give you the right to decide how it works over them.
"Reinstalling '98 would also result in that new peice of software not working,"
What? Do you mean with a slash-and-burn format-and-reinstall, instead of just reinstalling Windows over the top? Then yes, it'll stop the program working only until until you or they re-install it. If you installed it the first time you can install it the second. If they installed it the first time, they can do it. I don't see your point here.
There's a world of difference between temporarily stopping a program working as an unavoidable side-effect of what they asked you to do, and knowingly allowing them to buy software which won't work on their machine because you're unnecessarily lied to them about what they're actually running.
Or are you implying that every piece of software relseased in the last few years won't work on Win98? Hate to tell you, but that's completely inaccurate. And even if they do buy the WinXP-only version, they'll only have themselves to blame. They've been told what version of Windows they have at some point (or could ask a trustworthy techie friend) - they've bought the wrong thing through their own stupidity, not because they've been deliberately and needlessly mislead by someone they trusted.
"and would be just as likely to result in some kind of lawsuit..."
I don't think so. "A piece of software unavoidably needing reinstallation due to a problem with the machine that you asked them to fix" (or "the wrong piece of software you bought solely through your own stupidity") is very different to "someone you trust unnecessarily lying to you, and as a result breaking all your already-purchased programs and/or allowing you waste money on something they already know wouldn't work, solely because of their unnecessary action
I remember reading something amany years ago that suggested speed of response to injury was the important factor.
Lizards and "regenerating" reptiles generally don't generate scar tissue. Instead, in response to an injury their body slowly regrows the damaged part.
Mammals, on the other hand, prioritise closing the wound to prevent infection - we very quickly form scar tissue which effectively blocks the wound to infection, but also prevents regrowing the damaged part.
I always understood this was an evolutionary adaptation, but I've never worked out why mammals apparently have so much more to fear from infection than reptiles - is it something to do with our relative complexity, or is it a warm-blooded/cold-blooded thing?
Either way, with our longer lifespans, greater ability at saving individuals with serious injuries and our modern disinfectants and antibiotics, I'd be prepared to swap a slight increase in infectability for the ability to regenerate any wound short of a headshot!
Exactly.
Piracy is possibly depriving an organisation of sales.
Theft is definitely depriving a company of property.
They're only equivalent in the slightest if you assume:
"Possibly" is the same as "definitely" (when all the studies we've seen show otherwise), and
"The potential for a sale" is the same as "definite tangible property", like money or goods (which is such clearly bogus wishful thinking that I'm surprised anyone ever buys the argument).
"Company makes money. Customer is drunk. Everyone's happy. Why do we need lawyers for this?"
Because the *AA still think it's better to have 99% of a tiny cake than slightly less of a cake many, many times the size.
And where there's a worry, or the potential for disagreement, there's a pair of lawyers right in the middle, profiting from it like crazy.
I dunno - would the body forcibly reject the piercing, or would it (as now) just heal up around it and only plug the hole when the piercing was removed?
In the second case, it only permits more extreme piercings...
Yeah. This is an interesting marketing slogan, but with a moment's thought it very obviously translates to "shit, 78% of users got bored and stopped playing after less than a day's playing - how can we try to spin this into a good thing?".
I understand the motivation (and it's a valient effort), but it Just Doesn't Work.
I've never played iClod, and I wish the organisers well, but this is not a good advert for their game.
"OK by that argument, if some one calls me to fix there PC because they are having problems with their word processor and it turns out that they are using notepad am I not allowed to tell them to use Word because I percieve it as better than notepad?"
Try actually reading the GP, and you'll see that (in fact) this is exactly what he's suggesting - you explain the situation, and present them with a choice.
You don't unilaterally decide for them, as if they were some kind of young child or mental deficient.
However, I find myself increasingly wondering if you are in fact a troll. Your vociferously defence of an ethically untenable position and your choosing not to bother even properly reading the (quite short) GP post bears all the hallmarks...
"You mean that a year ago, when my brother upgraded my mothers Win 3.11 to Win98, that's what relegates Linux to distant third place?"
OS comparison is entirely beside the point, but no, that's not what did. Timing was what initially relegated Linux to third choice. What keeps Linux third choice is shocking (and completely unconscious) arrogance like yours.
Basically, you seem to think there's your opinion, and the wrong one. Unfortunately, you're massively in the minority, and so destined to stay there.
"Not only Linux geeks do this, ask *any* geek to reinstall your Windows machine, and you'll get whatever OS he has lying around if you don't bring your own."
The sound shouting-down you're getting would indicate otherwise. Normal people would just ask for the Windows CD, and explain if you don't have it you either have to buy another one or use this (free) operating system that I'm recommending, and which can be made to look almost exactly just like your old one.
"You'd sue your family (or friends)? I'm glad I'm not related to you in any way."
You'd arrogantly and unnecessarily stitch up your own family (or friends) on a whim, and try to charge them £120 to rectify the damage you caused to their machine? I'm glad I'm not related to you in any way.
"And without any of the paperwork (for the house) and safety systems (for the plumbing and electricity) in order, because you get a friend who "knows a bit about pipes/cables/hosues" to do it, instead of paying full price for getting an authorized plumber/electrician/engineer to do it right."
So, if you know a "bit about pipes" and a mate asks you to replumb his kitchen sink, do you:
i) Read up on it and do the best you can
ii) Confess to him you don't have the skills needed, and advise him to go to a professional, or
iii) Knock his entire house down, piss on the rubble then give him a spare portakabin you had lying around to live in, and ask him to buy a new house if he doesn't like it?
So you're deliberately deleting a working, legitimate Windows install, replacing it with Linux against the wishes of the user, then (when they complain) trying to charge then £120 for another version of Windows, because you deleted the one they already own?
You, sir, are a fucking disgrace. You embody everything the public finds repellent about the "arrogant techie" stereotype, and are unethical, deceitful and (if any money or reward changes hands as a result of your "service") likely comitting fraud to boot.
"All these users are older people who use their computers for web browsing and printing mostly, and I take my experiences so far as a kind of scientific 'evidence' that this class of users can't tell the difference."
So that makes it alright? Supposing one of them goes and buys a new family-tree plotting app, or garden-design program (to choose two examples my aunty recently bought) - what happens then? They're faced with a long, expensive call to tech support, which likely still won't the problem that you caused them. Eventually they (stupidly) turn to you again, and what do you tell them?
"Oh, right, yeah, that won't work - get your money back from the shop, if you can get them to believe that a version of 'Windows' won't run this certified 'Windows' application. Oh, and (if you're exceptionally lucky) here's a barely-maintained buggy-as-fuck butt-ugly hobby OSS version of something so pathetically niche that it'll never attract any kind of decent development community, to replace the version you just spent half your pension buying."
"If you service machines for friends and family try this. Don't ask, just do what is good for them. After all they are putting their absolute trust in your computer knowledge, to do anything less is to fail them in."
More like: "After all, they are putting their absolute trust in your computer knowledge, so to do this is to utterly and arrogantly violate that trust in the worst way possible."
Look, if you're sick of fixing computers for family, friends or others, just fucking tell them. Give them a choice of either switching to (your special version of) Linux or compensating you for the time you waste fixing their Windows boxes.
Alternatively, they can stop coming to you altogether and instead pay to have a computer shop fix it.
Under no circumstances is it ever ethical to violate their trust, especially not because you think you've got away with it so far.
For comparison, suppose you went to the doctor, and he told you you had gangrene. You'd expect some explanation of the options and some (pretty strong) recommendations, but ultimately it's your decision what happens.
You wouldn't expect the doctor to simply club you unconscious, chainsaw off your leg and bandage the stump.
"So what?" he might say - I've prevented it spreading to the rest of your system and killing you! You'll retain the use of your other limbs, and for anything you can't do with them, here's a half-arsed prosthetic replacement for your missing limb. Sure it might look a bit nasty, and doesn't always work too well, and sometimes breaks, but look - you can take the cover off and mess about with how it works inside! Ok, you're not a prosthetics expert, and so probably never will, but this clearly makes up for my complete lack of consultation before my arbitrarily rearranging your entire physiology!"
Jesus. Whatever happened to professional ethics?
You're the kind of person that gives us geeks a bad name.
And those of us that do have giant sticks shoved up our arses? What of them, eh?
Indeed. I also love the unnecessary hyperbole - not "little satellites", "mini satellites" or even "microsatellites", but nanosatellites? Are they really one-billionth the size of a regular satellite?
Well done University of Toronto for letting marketing spin and trendy buzzwords get in the way of the facts - now what are we going to call them when when we finally develop orbital devices a bit smaller than a virus?
Tsk, tsk, tsk... whatever happened to precise nomenclature? Bloody kids these days... no respect... we have these different prefixes for a reason, y'know...
Trebuchets are a specific type of catapult, so... exactly the point where precision was desired over linguistic simplicity.
IE, probably the point where you decide to post to a website full of pedantic nerds like us, right?
Forgive me... Firstly, I never meant to imply that downloaders and filesharers are in any way equivalent to luminaries such as Ghandi or MLK - you made that comparison, not me. I merely intended to explain that I knowingly break the law for similar reasons to the ones they offered - namely, to protest perceived injustice. I am perfectly capable of purchasing all the CDs and DVDs I want, but I refuse to for two reasons:
1) By establishing an oligarchy and purchasing legislation to protect it, the *AA have secured an unfair and undemocratic monopoly on popular media, and therefore culture.
2) I refuse to obey the law (and not download) when the very people loudly telling me not to are unethical (draconian artist contracts, inadequate artist compensation and self-serving extensions of copyright), or even convicted criminals (monopoly practices, payola, etc), themselves.
I do purchase DVDs and CDs from local and unsigned artists - in fact, I actually run a promotions company dedicated to promoting them. I merely refuse to support an industry cartel that seems to have no concept of ethics, and that's presently engaged in invading and occupying my own damn culture.
Secondly, I recommend you read my post again. I never once claimed to use exactly the same tactics as Ghandi, merely that I considered what I do to be Civil Disobedience. Your appear to believe Ghandi's Tactics == Civil Disobedience, but this is merely a shortcoming in your own understanding of the term. I also recommend you read the Wikipedia article you linked to for a handy definition of Civil Disobedience: "Civil disobedience encompasses the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands and commands of a government or of an occupying power without resorting to physical violence."
No mention of voluntarily submitting to arrest, and no mention of the necessity of notifying authorities before you do it. Merely the refusal to follow a rule or law you consider unjust.
In addition, while I don't believe strongly enough to stand upand become a martyr by daring them to sue me, I do talk about downloading and filesharing (legal and illegal) to non-techies, and help other people to learn how to use the applications whenever they show interest.
Ghandi's precise tactics (Satyagraha) are only a subset of civil disobedience, not the whole thing. Even the Wikipedia article you linked to make this clear.
Indeed. I remember well Jon Katz's articles (although many people bitched about him, I always found his articles at least "thought-provoking", if not always "right"), although I somehow missed his unmasking and ignominious exit from /.
/. need some serious lessons in choosing reliable and mature staff, but I think on the whole they prefer impartiality - they're just not very good at ensuring it happens, or removing staff members who are plainly pissing on their legacy.
I was also around for the tenure of Michael Sims as editor, his mod-bombing of unfavourable comments and eventually his (extremely welcome) exit.
Suffice it to say that although Slashdot hardly has as enviable record in choosing editors, I regard the eventual removal of two such objectionable fuckwits as proof that they at least aspire to impartiality. I mean, if they were prepared to come out and proudly state a biased position, I'd stop reading tomorrow.
Obviously those ultimately in charge of
Given this assumption, I still feel disappointed when they're obviously acting in a self-serving manner, although I'm not particularly surprised by it.
Come on slashdot - grow a spine and report on things unfavourable to you. Putting your fingers in your ears and going "Lalalalalalala" only feeds the trolls, and makes the rest of us think less of you.
Bingo.
I don't even think that the usual advice given ("simply don't buy the DRMed media") is realistic. This is my culture. I contribute to it, and I have a right to take part in it. My culture is disseminated (and knitted together) by its mass-media - its music, its TV shows, its films, its art.
If I refuse to partake of the mass-media, I inevitably divorce myself from the culture - I have proven this to myself by not owning a TV for two years. Although it started as simple economics (I was a student, and too broke to afford the licence), I now can't watch much TV before it begins to annoy me (product placement, obvious bias in "impartial" shows, and all... the... damned... advertising...). The net result of this is that I have become more familiar with "online" culture, and somewhat divorced from "mainstream" culture - I can't discuss TV programs with friends, unless they're the ones I download. I can't discuss topical news items, unless they're mirrored on the BBC/CNN/Reuters news sites.
If I refuse to suffer DRMed media, in the future I will in effect be denied access to my own culture.
Put simply, I resent an oligarchy of over-compensated middlemen making me choose between freedom and being an outcast in my own society.
I view it as justified civil disobedience to crack and disseminate circumventions for DRM, and view the current use of DRM the same way I'd view slavery - unethical, unjust and an infrigement of my personal liberty.
That's interesting - I'd always thought it was a pretty good example of impartiality to even be willing to run pro-Microsoft ads on such an institutionally pro-linux site as Slashdot.
/. crowd seem to view his unrealistic, dogmatic, hippy, philosophical proclamations more as a liability or an embarassment these days.
And TBH I don't know where RMS got the idea that the whole of Slashdot consider him a hero. Quite a lot of the
Me? I'm mildly anti-microsoft (due soeley to their documented behaviour and priorities), mildly pro-linux (in theory - I don't run a linux box, but approve of the idea of open-source). I'm pro-slashdot running MS ads (partly for the irony, partly for the perceived impartiality), and mildly anti-RMS (he's done some very good things for computing, but he has a habit of disappearing so far up his own arse he couldn't see daylight with a telescope).
That said, I'm disappointed Slashdot isn't running the story. Not surprised, but still disappointed.
Well I don't know about physical beatings or indentured servitude, but the DRM schemes I've seen the *AA advocate so far have struck me as uncomfortably close to being fucked right in the arse...
That's a very good point - you can't "buy" DRMed media, since it (by design) excludes the first-sale doctrine. The definition of buying ("obtain by purchase; acquire by means of a financial transaction") clearly isn't fulfilled, since you never actually own (/acquire/obtain) the media. I don't own something if I have to ask someone else every time I want to play it - that's borrowing, by definition - temporary permission to use the item, given by the real owner.
Given this clear violation of basic definitions, isn't it possible to sue companies who offer to "sell" DRMed music for misrepresentation?
"I know there are some here who defend this with "you buy a licence to play the music", not a licence to own it. That may be true but it isn't in anyway expressed clear enough when you "buy" it."
Again, this is easily proven false. If you bought a licence to play the music, you shouldn't have to re-buy the music, ever. Ok, you can make a case for there being a nominal fee for the replacement of media (eg, upgrading tapes to CDs/DVDs), but especially with digital media the cost is basically zero.
Certainly in no way is it justified to ask you to buy a licence to play the music, then re-buy the same licence again for exactly the same amount of money simply because the media-format changes. You've already paid for the un-time-limited right to listen to the music, so they have no right at all to demand you pay again simply to exercise that right.
Short answer - currently you neither own nor license music and popular media. You pay the price of owning it outright, but get less than the rights of licensing it. The *AA have their cake and eat it (purchasing representatives to ensure this state of affairs continues), and the consumers get f'ed in the arse.
How did this state of affairs ever come to be accepted?
Ok, then I'll finish by summing up my arguments:
1) You're generalising from what you perceive as the prevailing attitude of an entire region to the motives of two people, one of whom isn't even from (or living in) the region. This is clearly a scientifically and statistically meaningless inference.
2) From your tone you aren't from Northern Ireland, or at least don't like the people/place/culture. You're also generalising about a group you're used racial epithets ("noddies") to describe. Clearly you have no personal bias at all, then.
3) You raise doubts about the impartiality of the study, but haven't yet provided a single piece of evidence worth the name that there's definitely anything wrong with it.
4) While there may be (even well-acknowledged) potential sources of bias (gender-bias in the IQ test, institutionalised misogyny in NI, etc), none of these (either) have been proven beyond a doubt.
5) You're arguing that your opposition to the study isn't emotionally-caused, but you're ignoring logic and fleeing to personal opinion and emotive arguments on every point. I'm arguing that we simply can't know whether the study is trustworthy or not without more information.
"Algebra? I was actually thinking about back in school when we had to solve third order differential equations with just paper and pencil."
;-), all the evidence seems to indicate that almost everyone can improve massively on their "starting" position with enought training or practice.
I'm not taking the piss, but isn't that still algebra? I wasn't denigrating the activity (or your grasp of it), but differentiation is still algebra, isn't it?
"Some people can easily hold big chunks of the equation in their minds at once and can repeatedly do a lot of basic mathematic operation correctly... To some degree this is influenced by practice, but in others it is truly how much you can fit in your head at once and how well you can recognize patterns."
And you don't think you can increase your mental "working space" with practice? I know mine has expanded massively since I learned programming, and all the neurology/psychology studies I've read have suggested the same thing. The brain is enormously plastic, and practicing something even as basic as "holding several things in mind at once" rapidly leads to improvement in that area.
While presumably you eventually approach fundamental limits to mental abilities like this (hey, finite number of neurons, right?
"How do you demonstrate intelligence except through application? Where does the speed of learning fit into the definition of intelligence. It is the capacity to learn, not the speed with which one learns. If anything I'd say the best judge of intelligence is the ability to create new concepts or recognize patterns. How can these things be judged, aside from through results though?"
This is a fair point - it's impossible to demonstrate "raw intelligence", and you do always need some form of application. The trick is to make the application as simple and "thin" as possible. Eg, memorising lists of facts by rote is a terrible way of assessing intelligence (since memory has almost nothing to do with it). Offering mathematical and linguistic problems is better, since it's more about problem solving and applying intelligence than memorising items. Better yet are "progressive matrices" tests, which are almost pure pattern-spotting and deductive reasoning.
Obviously no IQ test is perfect, but when we've got a scale (PM tests) whish give sensible human-equivalent IQ scores for dolphins, or chimps, I have a hard time accepting that all IQ tests are equally poor, and hence completely worthless.
"I assert that not only IQ tests, but every creation is biased by it's creator."
What possible evidence do you have to support that (definite) assertion? Even if some tests are biased (which I'm not arguing with), how on earth can you possibly extend that to assert all tests always are? This is a complete logical non-sequiteur.
For example (to take the famous one), based on personal experience you can assert that "all crows are black", but you can never prove this, since to prove it would involve finding and observing every crow in existence. In contrast, I can assert "some crows may be white" - you can never prove this wrong (for the same reason as above), but I can prove it right by producing just one white crow.
Basically, it might be a belief, but you can't for one second prove that this is right. And that's exactly what I was complaining about in my first post - people emotively claiming things that aren't based on evidence, simply because that's what our culture has programmed them to believe.
"The reason I find a bias against women so very believable is because it has been demonstrated repeatedly in the past with the most common IQ tests."
I agree that many IQ tests were extremely likely to have been biased... However... if all IQ tests exhibit a slight tendency for men to score higher, what's the difference in evidence between "every