One insight I've heard on the scaling issue is that Sony is trying to stay away from scaling in general. They spent so long touting "True HD" gameplay in native 1080p, but should the system scale just like the 360, developers could easily develop for 720p native (or even lower) and then just have it scaled up. No doubt this would've happened, and then that would be one more thing to tick on the negative PR list.
So Sony left out scaling support to prevent developers from doing what they actually are doing? That has to be the most ridiculous rationalization that I've ever heard. Sony could certainly have made the development environment support only development at 1080i or even 1080p if they wanted to, with downscaling to 720p but no upscaling, forcing developers to either develop at full resolution or go to a lot of extra work and expense to develop their own code to support development at 720p. They didn't do so. Moreover, it doesn't explain why the PS3 can't even downscale Blu-Ray for 720p TV sets.
So, I really don't want to buy a PS3, and I'm not impressed with the system really at all. I'm really happy whenever something bad happens to Sony because, They Are Dicks. This is fact.
Yes it is. But if you know the history of consoles, who isn't? Nintendo was for a long time, despite their current good guy image. Microsoft still is; if anything, their record is worse than Sony's. Sega perhaps was not (if you give them a pass for "blast processing" and abandoning the 32X), but look what happened to them.
The problem with the PS3 is that after all this time it still doesn't really seem to be quite finished. Currently, games do not automatically support both of the major HD resolutions, 1080i and 720p (never mind 1080p). Most games will output only in 720p, relying upon the 1080i/p TVs to do a decent job of scaling. Some HDTVs have poor scalers, whereas others (primarily CRT-based monitors) will only accept a 1080i signal and are incapable of displaying a 720p signal at all, in which case they are limited to playing PS3 games in 480p (ED rather than HD). Early expectations that Sony would be able to correct this problem with a software update have not been realized. A recent software update seems to offer the potential for games to support a kind of kluged version of 1080i with reduced horizontal resolution, but this would have to be supported by additional coding in the games themselves, and does not help existing games. PS3 Blu-Ray movies, on the other hand, output only at 1080i/p, requiring 720p HDTVs (the vast majority of flat panel HDTVs) to do their own scaling. Again, not all do a good job of this. In contrast, the XBox360 seamlessly handles any standard output resolution from 480i to 1080p (although it has only component output, and most 1080p TVs will accept that resolution only over DVI).
This is an amazing deficiency. For example, there are a variety of scaling DVD players that are capable of scaling conventional DVDs to any output resolution, including 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i (and even one or two that will go to 1080p). Essentially all HD capable set-top cable and satellite adaptors and PVRs have this capability. So do stand-alone HDDVD and Blu-Ray players. The XBox 360-associated HDDVD player will output at either 720p, 1080i, or 1080p, although it does not upconvert standard DVDs.
Another surprising omission is the lack of an infrared port. Sure, the PS3 uses RF for its controller (and its optional DVD remote). But at least Microsoft uses RF control as well, but they saw fit to provide the XBox 360 with an infrared port, making it compatible with widely used universal IR remotes.
I hadn't seen Sonic Rivals. I looked at some screenshots, and it does seem to be doing what I had in mind, at least in terms of 2D gameplay in a 3D world. I'm not sure about the race aspect, though--I think that I'd rather have a solo game more like the traditional Sonic titles. I'd like to try it, but I don't have a PSP, and I don't know anybody who does. But it least it sounds like Sega is thinking in a promising direction regarding the franchise.
I have Sonic Rush, and I agree that it is an excellent game, but it's not what I'm talking about.
What I have in mind is a game with 3D graphics and (mostly) 2D gameplay, along the lines of Nights on the Dreamcast or Pandemonium on the PS1, providing the 3D eye candy that players of console (as opposed to handheld) games expect, but with classic 2D Sonic speed and gameplay.
3D is the heart of the problem. In full 3D, there is just too much freedom of movement to manage the speed required for a Sonic game. I can't understand why Sega doesn't release a "3D on a 2D track" Sonic game, along the lines of Nights.
And how would then the ITMS actually encourage more Ipod sales, which it was designed for, when _any_ other mp3 player out there could play the files bought from the ITMS? Wasnt the mantra not always "Apple doesnt make any mentionable profit with the ITMS, but it drives Ipod sales up"?
It's not the exclusivity of the files, but the convenience of the integration with iTunes and the ITMS that encourages iPod sales. So even if other mp3 players can play the songs, they still won't be able to connect to iTunes. Users will have to manually load the songs into their non-Apple mp3 players, rather than simply telling iTunes, "update the songs on my iPod every time I plug it in." It will be a selling point for those who don't want their songs limited by DRM, and further encourage iPod sales. For example, I'd probably buy songs from ITMS if not for the DRM, which prevents me from streaming music through other devices on my home network, such as my TiVo and XBox 360. So instead, I buy CDs and rip songs to iTunes.
It's worth noting that even after the stupidity of Boston public officials netted the city a windfall of $2 million dollars in sorry-we-didn't-anticipat-that-anybody-could-be-th at-stupid money from Turner Broadcasting--over twice what the the city wasted on its absurd overreaction--the poor dudes who put up the signs are still being prosecuted. They didn't come up with the idea, or make the signs, they didn't intend to scare anybody, they were just young guys doing a job. But somebody has to pay for exposing the mayor, the attorney general, and the police, as the idiots that they are. So they'll accept the Turner money--and perhaps take a bit off the top for themselves (this is Boston, after all)--and scapegoat the innocent guys who put up the signs.
I posted a similar reply to a different post earlier, but the difference is in Boston a few of the the second round of the litebrites were put on critical infrastructure--including *underneath* both the BU and Longfellow bridges (the latter of which turned out to be something coincidentally reported and not related to ATHF) and more seriously at the bus stop at the Sullivan Square T station 20ft up on the the main pillar supporting the elevated I-93 right above it...an obvious target if you wanted to kill people stuck in traffic and cause major transportation disruption.
But anybody with even minimal knowledge of explosives should have realized instantly that the signs were way too small to cause damage to such structures. Not to mention that if somebody was going to place a bomb on a bridge, they'd probably paint it the same color as the bridge to camouflage it, not festoon it with "look at me" lights.
I can't believe that Apple would accept a patchwork of restrictions, with some songs protected and others not, for the same reason that Apple has been so adamant against different pricing for different songs. Remember, Apple has made its reputation on simplicity and clarity. "All songs, same price, same rules" fits that model. "Read the fine print to learn the restrictions on your purchase" does not. On the other hand, if Apple could get the big 4 to agree to drop DRM, they'd have enough clout that they could afford to make it a requirement for everybody else.
So you take a lousy quality 128 kbps file, convert it to.wav (which is what burning it), then re-encode it again in.mp3 (probably with the lousy encoder built into itunes). I take it sound quality is pretty low on your priority list, huh?
If it was all that high, I wouldn't be using any kind of compressed format, or listening to it on a portable player with dinky little earphones--I'd be playing the CD (or maybe even vinyl) on my expensive home stereo.
Why would Apple want to lose DRM, even if they could? That would potentially break their iTunes-iPod monopoly (since you could play non-DRM'ed songs on other players besides the iPod).
Not really. Selling DRM-free music is not at all the same thing as making the iTunes Music Store available to other mp3 players. You could move music from iTunes to other players, but it wouldn't be as convenient. Which is pretty much true today. Songs ripped in mp3 format by iTunes can be manually loaded into other players--it just isn't automatic as it is with an iPod. You can even move iTunes Music Store music to other players, but you have to burn it to disk and re-rip it to iTunes in mp3 format.
If you want to see how Jobs *REALLY* feels about DRM, just look at how Apple treats indie artists and studios that specifically DON'T want their music DRM'ed. While companies like eMusic sell these same songs without DRM, Apple FORCES them to take DRM. Apple knows damn well that DRM is in their best interests. Jobs is just posturing.
I can't imagine Apple agreeing to have some songs with and some without DRM, for the same reason that Apple has refused to accept different prices for different songs. Charging more for some songs would probably make more money for Apple, but it would totally destroy the fundamental simplicity of the iTunes music store, and simplicity and clarity is, after all, Apple's major selling point for all of their products. Forcing users to keep track of different privileges for different songs would be even worse.
I wonder if there is an opportunity for TiVo here. After all, the DirecTiVoHD has a USB port, although it is not currently active, and a perfectly good over-the-air tuner. And DirecTV is no longer selling these units, is running out of refurbs to replace old ones, and is introducing new mpeg-4 HD channels which this unit cannot receive. I wonder if TiVo's deal with DirecTV would allow TiVo to "take over" these units. TiVo could download (via phone) a bit of code to activate the USB port so you could hook it up to the internet, then TiVo could offer a reduced price TiVo sub for OTA shows, as well as access to downloaded shows. This could be an attractive offer for DirecTiVoHD owners "abandoned" by DirecTV
Read this [boingboing.net] then decide if it's worth it.
What does this have to do with TiVo? TiVo owners have already essentially agreed to all of this. TiVo software updates are routinely automatically downloaded by TiVo, and while there is no way for the normal user to "remove" TiVo software, you lose most or all of the unit's features if you do not maintain your subscription.
I don't know about you but I personally would not want to have to wait an hour to download a TV show. It seems like if you were that interested in the show you could simply record it when the episode first airs...
As a TiVo owner, I'm used to flagging a show to record days in advance. I'm usually in no great hurry to watch that particular show, because I have hours of my favorite shows already stored on my TiVo. Eventually, it shows up on the menu. I would of course record a show when it comes on, and save the 2 bucks...unless of course I didn't get interested in the show until mid season, or even 2nd season, or the TiVo missed it because of a sporting event or news interruption.
Unavailability of shows in HD is a significant negative. The XBox360 will download many shows in HD, although the list of available shows (for any quality) is very limited. But are we sure that they won't have HD? The FAQ just says "better than series 2 best quality." For that matter, for a lot of shows I'd be satisfied with DVD quality...wide-screen 480p.
opting out is only for them to collect personal information, they still send your anonymous data.
This is completely untrue. From TiVo's privacy policy:
TiVo does collect Anonymous Viewing Information; that is, information about viewing choices made while using your TiVo DVR, but that does not identify you as an individual or household. In other words, there is no personally identifiable information associated with your Anonymous Viewing Information that could identify the Anonymous Viewing Information as coming from you or your household. You can elect to block TiVo from collecting Anonymous Viewing Information.
Since TiVo's privacy policy is publicly available and easy to check, I am curious about your motivation for posting such a lie. Do you have some personal score to settle with TiVo, or are you shorting their stock?
Well that's a very nice promise, but what it misses is that the danger of abuse is a very good reason to avoid something, even if you know no abuse of the system is occuring at present. While this VP can make promises right now, he cannot guarantee that at no point in the future will these techniques be used against customers. TiVo might change their policies, or get bought-out by someone else. Moreover, by building the infrastructure to monitor their customers like this, they are creating an avenue for attack.
Any time you run a program on your computer, you are basically trusting the publisher to respect your privacy, unless you have personally inspected the code and have the competence to recognize any possibly obfuscated code designed to report back. I don't see how TiVo is any different from this. TiVo informs customers of just what information they are collecting, and how to opt out.
Personally, I choose not to opt out, because I want advertisers and content producers and others to know what I'm watching--maybe that will encourage them to produce more of the stuff I like.
I'm in total agreement. I thought it was common knowledge from the start that this was part of TiVo's business model, and is a large part of the reason I've never entertained a TiVo purchase. I just can't see paying a monthly fee to provide a company with data that they're going to turn around and sell.
So why not simply turn it off? This is a user-selectable option. The default is "on," but TiVo has always been quite open about informing customers that they are doing this and how to opt out.
I really get tired of these quantum leap suppositions from scientists who can't predict the weather this week much less over the next millennium.
This deserves some sort of award as one of the stupidest arguments of all time. Anybody with even minimum intelligence should be able to figure out that the notion that short term prediction is easier than long term prediction is idiotic.
I certainly can't tell you with any great certainty whether it is going to be warmer next week than it is today. But I can damn well tell you with great confidence whether it is going to be warmer 6 months from now than it is today!
The fact that you use the same language that is associated with the holocaust shows the irrationality of your side of the subject.
I wasn't aware that the holocaust had somehow trademarked "denial." It is my impression that nobody has a monopoly on denial. After all, there are evolution deniers, relativity deniers, moon landing deniers, global warming deniers, AIDS/HIV deniers, germ theory deniers, etc., etc. Denying something that is widely accepted seems to be one of the more prevalent forms of crackpottery, and hardly unique to any particular topic.
Even before 9/11, I knew better than to do so without informing the authorities - if I can't inform someone in charge, I attach a note to the device saying "this is a sound monitoring device for project XXX. If you have any questions, call John Smith at (617) 555-8944."
If anybody actually looked closely enough to see such a note, they probably would have realized that it couldn't possibly contain a bomb of any magnitude. The proprietor of a shop in Cambridge told me that one had been delivered to his store's address and a guy showed up asking for permission to set it up outside the store. Unfortunately, a customer apparently took it home before this all happened, so I didn't get a chance to examine it personally.
Rule 1 of IEDs - Make them look like something else.
Have you ever heard of any case where a bomb has flashing lights on it? Usually, they look like an anonymous backpack or a bag. If you are going to disguise a bomb, you make it look like something ordinary--or maybe valuable if you want to sucker somebody into messing with it. A flashing sign placed out of reach is about as unlikely a choice as it is possible to imagine.
Rule 2 - Place them where they can do the most damage.
Yes, in the middle of a crowd of people. There's a reason why so many bombings are in public transportation vehicles, restaurants, or at major public gatherings. They aren't hanging from an overpass--if you wanted to blow up an overpass, you'd need a truck full of explosives, not a dinky little sign.
As a taxpayer in Massachusetts, I want Time Warner to pony up the cost of the public safety overtime. I's also like them to reimburse the lost wages of all of the hourly employees stuck on busses and subway trains, but that will never happen.
As a taxpayer in Massachusetts, I am grateful for Time Warner for revealing the cluelessness of those who are responsible for protecting our safety. Fire everybody who thought this was a threat and start over.
As someone who lives in Boston, I'm glad they decided to take these precautions. You have to take these all seriously, because who knows if they're threats or not? I'm mad as hell about this ad campaign because when it comes time to pay for all the police activity today, you can bet your ass Ted Turner won't offer to foot the bill.
Yeah, right, because everybody knows that terrorists love to festoon bombs with flashing pictures to attract attention.
As somebody who also lives in Boston, I think that what this reveals is the utter incompetence of the officials who are responsible for our security, which is why they are now so enraged. Yes, when a hysterical citizen reported the first one, it might have been worth the effort for somebody to go take a look at it, but it should have ended there. Anybody who thinks that this is what a threat looks like probably wouldn't recognize the real thing if he sat on it.
I think home video archiving will always be a "niche" use. Most people have little interest in doing much home archiving aside from a few home movies and the like, and much of that can be done just fine with DVD drives. Just as with VCRs and DVD players, acceptance of HD disk formats will be driven by availability and price of prerecorded media and the price of the players. Eventually, of course, all computers will have some kind of recordable optical disk, but that will be driven mainly for the need for data archiving.
The only way of evaluating the success of a trait that really makes sense evolutionarily is the fraction of the population of that species carrying the trait as a function of time. But that doesn't take into account survival of the species, or of what you might call its "evolvability" -- it's ability to continue to evolve or to give rise to other species. That is probably appropriate from an evolutionary point of view, since in most circumstances natural selection doesn't really much "care" about survival of the species. It will quite happily paint a species into a corner where extinction is inevitable.
It is important not to fall into the trap of confusing evolutionary success with value. While natural selection may have replaced the hand of god as an explanation of the origin of species diversity (at least for educated people), it is easy to fall into the habit of presuming that because something has evolved, it must be good. But natural selection is not a god, and it doesn't care about us. While we may of course be happy that we have evolved, that doesn't mean that natural selection has our best interests at heart. And there is no reason why we shouldn't interfere with natural selection, so long as we make sure that we know what we are doing.
Slashdot Mirror
So Sony left out scaling support to prevent developers from doing what they actually are doing? That has to be the most ridiculous rationalization that I've ever heard. Sony could certainly have made the development environment support only development at 1080i or even 1080p if they wanted to, with downscaling to 720p but no upscaling, forcing developers to either develop at full resolution or go to a lot of extra work and expense to develop their own code to support development at 720p. They didn't do so. Moreover, it doesn't explain why the PS3 can't even downscale Blu-Ray for 720p TV sets.
Yes it is. But if you know the history of consoles, who isn't? Nintendo was for a long time, despite their current good guy image. Microsoft still is; if anything, their record is worse than Sony's. Sega perhaps was not (if you give them a pass for "blast processing" and abandoning the 32X), but look what happened to them.
The problem with the PS3 is that after all this time it still doesn't really seem to be quite finished. Currently, games do not automatically support both of the major HD resolutions, 1080i and 720p (never mind 1080p). Most games will output only in 720p, relying upon the 1080i/p TVs to do a decent job of scaling. Some HDTVs have poor scalers, whereas others (primarily CRT-based monitors) will only accept a 1080i signal and are incapable of displaying a 720p signal at all, in which case they are limited to playing PS3 games in 480p (ED rather than HD). Early expectations that Sony would be able to correct this problem with a software update have not been realized. A recent software update seems to offer the potential for games to support a kind of kluged version of 1080i with reduced horizontal resolution, but this would have to be supported by additional coding in the games themselves, and does not help existing games. PS3 Blu-Ray movies, on the other hand, output only at 1080i/p, requiring 720p HDTVs (the vast majority of flat panel HDTVs) to do their own scaling. Again, not all do a good job of this. In contrast, the XBox360 seamlessly handles any standard output resolution from 480i to 1080p (although it has only component output, and most 1080p TVs will accept that resolution only over DVI).
This is an amazing deficiency. For example, there are a variety of scaling DVD players that are capable of scaling conventional DVDs to any output resolution, including 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i (and even one or two that will go to 1080p). Essentially all HD capable set-top cable and satellite adaptors and PVRs have this capability. So do stand-alone HDDVD and Blu-Ray players. The XBox 360-associated HDDVD player will output at either 720p, 1080i, or 1080p, although it does not upconvert standard DVDs.
Another surprising omission is the lack of an infrared port. Sure, the PS3 uses RF for its controller (and its optional DVD remote). But at least Microsoft uses RF control as well, but they saw fit to provide the XBox 360 with an infrared port, making it compatible with widely used universal IR remotes.
I hadn't seen Sonic Rivals. I looked at some screenshots, and it does seem to be doing what I had in mind, at least in terms of 2D gameplay in a 3D world. I'm not sure about the race aspect, though--I think that I'd rather have a solo game more like the traditional Sonic titles. I'd like to try it, but I don't have a PSP, and I don't know anybody who does. But it least it sounds like Sega is thinking in a promising direction regarding the franchise.
I have Sonic Rush, and I agree that it is an excellent game, but it's not what I'm talking about.
What I have in mind is a game with 3D graphics and (mostly) 2D gameplay, along the lines of Nights on the Dreamcast or Pandemonium on the PS1, providing the 3D eye candy that players of console (as opposed to handheld) games expect, but with classic 2D Sonic speed and gameplay.
3D is the heart of the problem. In full 3D, there is just too much freedom of movement to manage the speed required for a Sonic game. I can't understand why Sega doesn't release a "3D on a 2D track" Sonic game, along the lines of Nights.
It's not the exclusivity of the files, but the convenience of the integration with iTunes and the ITMS that encourages iPod sales. So even if other mp3 players can play the songs, they still won't be able to connect to iTunes. Users will have to manually load the songs into their non-Apple mp3 players, rather than simply telling iTunes, "update the songs on my iPod every time I plug it in." It will be a selling point for those who don't want their songs limited by DRM, and further encourage iPod sales. For example, I'd probably buy songs from ITMS if not for the DRM, which prevents me from streaming music through other devices on my home network, such as my TiVo and XBox 360. So instead, I buy CDs and rip songs to iTunes.
It's worth noting that even after the stupidity of Boston public officials netted the city a windfall of $2 million dollars in sorry-we-didn't-anticipat-that-anybody-could-be-th at-stupid money from Turner Broadcasting--over twice what the the city wasted on its absurd overreaction--the poor dudes who put up the signs are still being prosecuted. They didn't come up with the idea, or make the signs, they didn't intend to scare anybody, they were just young guys doing a job. But somebody has to pay for exposing the mayor, the attorney general, and the police, as the idiots that they are. So they'll accept the Turner money--and perhaps take a bit off the top for themselves (this is Boston, after all)--and scapegoat the innocent guys who put up the signs.
But anybody with even minimal knowledge of explosives should have realized instantly that the signs were way too small to cause damage to such structures. Not to mention that if somebody was going to place a bomb on a bridge, they'd probably paint it the same color as the bridge to camouflage it, not festoon it with "look at me" lights.
I can't believe that Apple would accept a patchwork of restrictions, with some songs protected and others not, for the same reason that Apple has been so adamant against different pricing for different songs. Remember, Apple has made its reputation on simplicity and clarity. "All songs, same price, same rules" fits that model. "Read the fine print to learn the restrictions on your purchase" does not. On the other hand, if Apple could get the big 4 to agree to drop DRM, they'd have enough clout that they could afford to make it a requirement for everybody else.
If it was all that high, I wouldn't be using any kind of compressed format, or listening to it on a portable player with dinky little earphones--I'd be playing the CD (or maybe even vinyl) on my expensive home stereo.
Not really. Selling DRM-free music is not at all the same thing as making the iTunes Music Store available to other mp3 players. You could move music from iTunes to other players, but it wouldn't be as convenient. Which is pretty much true today. Songs ripped in mp3 format by iTunes can be manually loaded into other players--it just isn't automatic as it is with an iPod. You can even move iTunes Music Store music to other players, but you have to burn it to disk and re-rip it to iTunes in mp3 format.
I can't imagine Apple agreeing to have some songs with and some without DRM, for the same reason that Apple has refused to accept different prices for different songs. Charging more for some songs would probably make more money for Apple, but it would totally destroy the fundamental simplicity of the iTunes music store, and simplicity and clarity is, after all, Apple's major selling point for all of their products. Forcing users to keep track of different privileges for different songs would be even worse.
I wonder if there is an opportunity for TiVo here. After all, the DirecTiVoHD has a USB port, although it is not currently active, and a perfectly good over-the-air tuner. And DirecTV is no longer selling these units, is running out of refurbs to replace old ones, and is introducing new mpeg-4 HD channels which this unit cannot receive. I wonder if TiVo's deal with DirecTV would allow TiVo to "take over" these units. TiVo could download (via phone) a bit of code to activate the USB port so you could hook it up to the internet, then TiVo could offer a reduced price TiVo sub for OTA shows, as well as access to downloaded shows. This could be an attractive offer for DirecTiVoHD owners "abandoned" by DirecTV
Unavailability of shows in HD is a significant negative. The XBox360 will download many shows in HD, although the list of available shows (for any quality) is very limited. But are we sure that they won't have HD? The FAQ just says "better than series 2 best quality." For that matter, for a lot of shows I'd be satisfied with DVD quality...wide-screen 480p.
This is completely untrue. From TiVo's privacy policy: Since TiVo's privacy policy is publicly available and easy to check, I am curious about your motivation for posting such a lie. Do you have some personal score to settle with TiVo, or are you shorting their stock?
Personally, I choose not to opt out, because I want advertisers and content producers and others to know what I'm watching--maybe that will encourage them to produce more of the stuff I like.
I certainly can't tell you with any great certainty whether it is going to be warmer next week than it is today. But I can damn well tell you with great confidence whether it is going to be warmer 6 months from now than it is today!
As somebody who also lives in Boston, I think that what this reveals is the utter incompetence of the officials who are responsible for our security, which is why they are now so enraged. Yes, when a hysterical citizen reported the first one, it might have been worth the effort for somebody to go take a look at it, but it should have ended there. Anybody who thinks that this is what a threat looks like probably wouldn't recognize the real thing if he sat on it.
I think home video archiving will always be a "niche" use. Most people have little interest in doing much home archiving aside from a few home movies and the like, and much of that can be done just fine with DVD drives. Just as with VCRs and DVD players, acceptance of HD disk formats will be driven by availability and price of prerecorded media and the price of the players. Eventually, of course, all computers will have some kind of recordable optical disk, but that will be driven mainly for the need for data archiving.
The only way of evaluating the success of a trait that really makes sense evolutionarily is the fraction of the population of that species carrying the trait as a function of time. But that doesn't take into account survival of the species, or of what you might call its "evolvability" -- it's ability to continue to evolve or to give rise to other species. That is probably appropriate from an evolutionary point of view, since in most circumstances natural selection doesn't really much "care" about survival of the species. It will quite happily paint a species into a corner where extinction is inevitable.
It is important not to fall into the trap of confusing evolutionary success with value. While natural selection may have replaced the hand of god as an explanation of the origin of species diversity (at least for educated people), it is easy to fall into the habit of presuming that because something has evolved, it must be good. But natural selection is not a god, and it doesn't care about us. While we may of course be happy that we have evolved, that doesn't mean that natural selection has our best interests at heart. And there is no reason why we shouldn't interfere with natural selection, so long as we make sure that we know what we are doing.