...is plain geekiness. It is a very male preserve - I.e. favoring interaction with things and abstractions over interaction with other people. Geekiness is a rather low-status trait in today's society, unless it bears fruit in the form of cash.
No mod points, sadly - but entirely true. Personally, I am hoping for a standoff where the pirates keep a marginal upper hand, so that me and other tech-savvy people can continue to reap the benefits of piracy while product flow is uninterrupted. I haven't bought a CD or rented a movie in years. (2000/2001 or something for CD:s I think, 2002 for movies)
...going through their predictions list for once. Also, he played the umpire quite well - that's some pretty harsh judgements. (Wrong on iPhone/iTV - heh.)
"Ethical actions are actions that limit suffering"
Says who? Who's suffering? Everyones? Then we need a standardized, objective scale of suffering. Which doesn't exist. Heh.
"I don't see how there can be different codes of ethics."
I, and many others do. Empirically, people have been running wildly different codes of ethics, although with certain similarities, over the course of history.
In 2001, there was a total of 29 573 firearms-related deaths in the US.
The source is the same as before, the CDC har a handy death-o-matic, where you can see who died from what each year: (You can also get newer data than 2001 - up to 2004 at the moment, it seems)
"Crime does not disappear, it just moves to where there are no camera's "
True of some crime (drug dealing), much less true of other kinds of crime (bar room brawls, club queues, theft, robbery, etc) that is location-dependent.
Given all the qualifiers in that classic statement, it's nearly meaningless. But it sounds good, and I guess that's what matters in the end, soundbite-wise.
"essential liberties" vs. "a little temporary safety" - heh.
How about "essential safety" vs. "a little temporary liberty"? Or "a little essential temporary liberty" vs... oh, never mind...
It will be shipping on pretty much all new computers headed for clueless users over the next year - it is certain that it will rapidly overtake LINUX in both regular and (more importantly) clueless user market share.:P
I admit it - There really is no prof. Beata Brattenschlick at the University of Copenhagen. At least I think not. And if there is, I doubt she is really a professor of Deconstruction. I hope.
I believe this line of reasoning to be mistaken to some degree - evolution of man and squirrel alike indeed continued apace until ~approx 100 000 years ago, when modern man first left Africa and the laws of evolution ceased to apply to humans, due to the plasticity of spandrels. Hence, positing evolution of humanity is incorrect in timespans extending much further back than a mere 6000 years. After this no evolution whatsoever has taken place among humans, and therefore the article referenced above must be incorrect.
It is hard to determine if this study and many other recent similar ones implying recent evolution in humans are driven by mere ignorance or if more sinister motives are at work. The author referenced here, one Nicholas Wade, is notable for engaging in ideologically dubious activities, such as his recent book "Before the Dawn". He must be watched closely, or his dangerous line of thinking might be allowed to spread among the easily manipulated masses.
Prof. Beata Brattenschlick Dept. of Deconstruction, University of Copenhagen
Being able to digest milk can be incredibly valuable in an environment where protein and many other nutrients present in milk are scarce (a fair assumption regarding conditions a couple of thousand years back).
But yes, of course smarts can pay off to various degrees in Darwinian terms too, depending on what niche you are looking to fill.
This post being rated 5 insightful is an atrocity, simply put.
"Basically, by rooting for this thing to fail is basically saying you hate children."
This line alone is so... incredible. Brimming with self-righteousness, while simultaneously narrow-mindedly stupid. Now, think for a minute: Is really what third world children need in their education a Laptop? Is really what first world children need a laptop?
Where is the serious research that backs up the claim that computers in schools bring the kind of return on investment that will justify the cost?
This is not to say a cheap and rugged third-world laptop is a bad idea. Not at all. But given to students? I'd just like to see some indication it will actually work first.
Pretty decent analogy. Still, the whole "Putin did it because he's bad" line of reasoning can also be analogized to the "Saddam has WMD because he's bad" approach before the Iraq war. Jumping to conclusions in intelligence matters can be hazardous.
1: Oh, I generally agree that having excact genomes for every individual is even more (by far) useful than just using racial designations - still, we don't actually have that data, and we won't for quite some time.
2: "The majority of Black Americans are not genetically similar to the majority of Africans in Africa, and when you look in Africa, most Africans in African are not genetically similar to each other, so the current appearance based concept of races does not work"
As I referenced above, computer-designated race grouping empirically works decently well for sorting people into groups, and matches self-identified race to a high degree in the US. (As pointed out elsewhere in the thread, this is not the case everywhere in the world)
"I don't know what race you are but lets assume you are German, would you take the German medicine, made by the African scientist? Of course not, so why would you expect the African to take their race based medicine?"
I'm not German, but rather Swedish. Still, if an african scientist came up with a medicine that cut my risk of surviving a heart attack radically (but which did silch for people of african descent), as is the case with BiDil, I would gladly take it (as I prefer life to death).
"Sickle cell, sure, it exists, but it's not like the majority of people have that trait, so thats not a good trait for race based medicine unless you want to make skin cancer treatment a race based medicine too, which I think would be just as backwards."
I would certainly change my advice to a white person with regards to sunbathing compared to a black person.
"which means genetically there is little to no difference now between a black in the USA, and a hispanic in south America."
Best estimates I've seen estimate low black admixture on average in Mexicans, and pretty low european admixture in US blacks. Quantification is the important thing here, and merely stating that people have mixed doesn't cut it - the critical factor is the extent to which it has happened.
"Trait based medicine I agree with. Ancestor based medicine I agree with. Lineage based medicine I agree with, if you can trace back to a common ancestor, you are of the same tribe."
Well, "race" is merely the concept of family, tribe and ancestry taken one step further. Every criticism you level at race can be levelled at the concept of "tribe" or "family". Families mix, have no fixed boundries and can have pretty different genes in many respects - but few people object to the concept nonetheless.
"If you believe in the concept of race, you are a racist, it's that simple."
It is interesting to see how the concept of racism has slipped, but that is somewhat beside the point. If I'm a racist or not is irrellevant to the discussion at hand - this discussion is about the usefulness of race as a genetic concept.
"If you can admit to being a racist, then you can discuss the social concept that is race. If you arent a racist and you are say, a geneticist, a transhumanist, or whatever, then you'll understand that appearance does not make up the majority of the genetic differences between two humans."
No, but appearance is not independent of ancestry. And ancestry, via heredity, natural selection, genetic drift, geographical isolation and many other factors impact the makeup of the entire genome - not just the genes that code for appearance. Hence, appearance correlates with other traits, that are not related to appearance. This is also why race is a useful concept - if you tell me a person is "black" in the United States, I will be able to not only discern that he most likely has a darker than average skin tone, but is also more liable to suffer from sickle-cell anemia, and is far more likely to gain benefit from taking a race-specific medicine such as BiDil.
"You want an example? Let's say homosexuality is genetic and is biological, are homosexuals a race? Sure they could be considered a genetic race, if you based it on gene science, but you cannot look at a person and automatically see their race as homosexual."
Like I said above, most modern concepts of race are based on ancestry, not on some single genetic similarity. (For instance, there are lactose tolerant groups of humans in both northern Europe and certain areas of Africa - that doesn't mean that calling all lactose tolerant people a "race" is very helpful, unless we radically alter how most people percieve the concept of race).
Rather, it is much more helpful to concieve of race as an (extremely) extended partly inbred family. Indeed, most criticisms levelled at the concept of race can be aimed at the concept of family. Where does your family end?
"The problem with classical racists is that they classify race as only CERTAIN genes, they only judge race based on how people LOOK, which means there is no science at all, it's classic eugenics"
As I pointed out above, how people look tends to give a reasonably high (but variable, see Brazil example elsewhere in thread) quality estimate of their overall ancestry, and hence of the makeup of their overall genome. Also, this has nothing whatsoever to do with eugenics, except through an excessively long chain of somewhat tortured logic. (Which usually involves Hitler somewhere along the road...)
"This is why racism is wrong, Just analyze the metaphor, if we used racism to justify which computers we buy, we'd all be buying SHIT computers, we wouldnt even open the box to see what CPU is inside because the case would look so nice, so shiny, and so white, that we would not even bother to check the speed of whats inside."
Oh, I generally agree with this sentiment - which is surprising given that I am by default a "racist" because I do not discount the utility of race as a concept. (Which does not mean that I believe society should be based around race, or certain races discrimiated against).
Appearance is certainly what most people go on. As pointed out elsewhere in the thread, it can work rather well for determining ancestry. Even in very mixed situations like Brazil, it provides information about ancestry.
Also, you have the 15-85% cliché all mixed up - it really doesn't say very much. For more information on this, see:
Slashdot Mirror
...is plain geekiness. It is a very male preserve - I.e. favoring interaction with things and abstractions over interaction with other people. Geekiness is a rather low-status trait in today's society, unless it bears fruit in the form of cash.
"should not get you fired by a community that prides itself on allowing people to hold radical or controversial viewpoints."
This is a common misunderstanding. You may hold viewpoints that are considered "radical" or "controversial" by *other* segments of society.
From TFA:
"This confirms what Dan posted earlier today about no user-installable apps."
"user-installable" != "third party". The obvious path Apple have most likely taken is that any third-party apps will be installable only via iTunes.
No mod points, sadly - but entirely true. Personally, I am hoping for a standoff where the pirates keep a marginal upper hand, so that me and other tech-savvy people can continue to reap the benefits of piracy while product flow is uninterrupted. I haven't bought a CD or rented a movie in years. (2000/2001 or something for CD:s I think, 2002 for movies)
Relevant link source from 2 secs of Googling:
http://news.digitaltrends.com/article9178.html
Industry people certainly considered it a "rebranding" - if you believe Cringely was wrong on this point - please...
...going through their predictions list for once. Also, he played the umpire quite well - that's some pretty harsh judgements. (Wrong on iPhone/iTV - heh.)
Both statements are correct - 55% of sucides were by gun, and 57 % of gun deaths were suicides. (2001)
"Ethical actions are actions that limit suffering"
Says who? Who's suffering? Everyones? Then we need a standardized, objective scale of suffering. Which doesn't exist. Heh.
"I don't see how there can be different codes of ethics."
I, and many others do. Empirically, people have been running wildly different codes of ethics, although with certain similarities, over the course of history.
57% of all gun deaths were accidental in 2001
should read
57% of all gun deaths were suicides in 2001
PS. (in all caps for emphasis)
GET A DAMN EDIT FUNCTION SLASHDOT - this is the year 2007 for...
DS.
In 2001, there was a total of 29 573 firearms-related deaths in the US.
h tml
The source is the same as before, the CDC har a handy death-o-matic, where you can see who died from what each year: (You can also get newer data than 2001 - up to 2004 at the moment, it seems)
http://webapp.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/mortrate10_sy.
This means that roughly 57% of all gun deaths were accidental in 2001.
802 cases, or 2,7% of firearms related deaths, were accidental. (2001)
11 348 cases, or 38% were homicides. (2001)
In 231 cases, intent was undetermined. (2001)
...on what brand of "ethical" you are loyal to at the moment...
"But the real issue, the underlying issue, is *why do people perform unethical crimes?*"
I'll have a few whacks:
Because of greed
Because of pride
Because of stupidity
Because of rage
Because of sex
Because of pleasure
Because of a will to power
Just because...
I'm sure you all have things to add to the list.
"Crime does not disappear, it just moves to where there are no camera's "
True of some crime (drug dealing), much less true of other kinds of crime (bar room brawls, club queues, theft, robbery, etc) that is location-dependent.
From the CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/factsheets/suifacts.htm
"Suicide took the lives of 30,622 people in 2001 (CDC 2004)."
"In 2001, 55% of suicides were committed with a firearm (Anderson and Smith 2003)."
30622x55%=16842 deaths
Given all the qualifiers in that classic statement, it's nearly meaningless. But it sounds good, and I guess that's what matters in the end, soundbite-wise.
"essential liberties" vs. "a little temporary safety" - heh.
How about "essential safety" vs. "a little temporary liberty"? Or "a little essential temporary liberty" vs... oh, never mind...
It will be shipping on pretty much all new computers headed for clueless users over the next year - it is certain that it will rapidly overtake LINUX in both regular and (more importantly) clueless user market share. :P
I admit it - There really is no prof. Beata Brattenschlick at the University of Copenhagen. At least I think not. And if there is, I doubt she is really a professor of Deconstruction. I hope.
I believe this line of reasoning to be mistaken to some degree - evolution of man and squirrel alike indeed continued apace until ~approx 100 000 years ago, when modern man first left Africa and the laws of evolution ceased to apply to humans, due to the plasticity of spandrels. Hence, positing evolution of humanity is incorrect in timespans extending much further back than a mere 6000 years. After this no evolution whatsoever has taken place among humans, and therefore the article referenced above must be incorrect.
o ry-Ancestors/dp/1594200793
8 .htm
It is hard to determine if this study and many other recent similar ones implying recent evolution in humans are driven by mere ignorance or if more sinister motives are at work. The author referenced here, one Nicholas Wade, is notable for engaging in ideologically dubious activities, such as his recent book "Before the Dawn". He must be watched closely, or his dangerous line of thinking might be allowed to spread among the easily manipulated masses.
Prof. Beata Brattenschlick
Dept. of Deconstruction, University of Copenhagen
References:
"Before the Dawn":
http://www.amazon.com/Before-Dawn-Recovering-Hist
"Breakthrough in human genetics":
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N2220502
Being able to digest milk can be incredibly valuable in an environment where protein and many other nutrients present in milk are scarce (a fair assumption regarding conditions a couple of thousand years back).
But yes, of course smarts can pay off to various degrees in Darwinian terms too, depending on what niche you are looking to fill.
This post being rated 5 insightful is an atrocity, simply put.
"Basically, by rooting for this thing to fail is basically saying you hate children."
This line alone is so... incredible. Brimming with self-righteousness, while simultaneously narrow-mindedly stupid. Now, think for a minute: Is really what third world children need in their education a Laptop? Is really what first world children need a laptop?
Where is the serious research that backs up the claim that computers in schools bring the kind of return on investment that will justify the cost?
This is not to say a cheap and rugged third-world laptop is a bad idea. Not at all. But given to students? I'd just like to see some indication it will actually work first.
Pretty decent analogy. Still, the whole "Putin did it because he's bad" line of reasoning can also be analogized to the "Saddam has WMD because he's bad" approach before the Iraq war. Jumping to conclusions in intelligence matters can be hazardous.
1: Oh, I generally agree that having excact genomes for every individual is even more (by far) useful than just using racial designations - still, we don't actually have that data, and we won't for quite some time.
2: "The majority of Black Americans are not genetically similar to the majority of Africans in Africa, and when you look in Africa, most Africans in African are not genetically similar to each other, so the current appearance based concept of races does not work"
As I referenced above, computer-designated race grouping empirically works decently well for sorting people into groups, and matches self-identified race to a high degree in the US. (As pointed out elsewhere in the thread, this is not the case everywhere in the world)
"I don't know what race you are but lets assume you are German, would you take the German medicine, made by the African scientist? Of course not, so why would you expect the African to take their race based medicine?"
I'm not German, but rather Swedish. Still, if an african scientist came up with a medicine that cut my risk of surviving a heart attack radically (but which did silch for people of african descent), as is the case with BiDil, I would gladly take it (as I prefer life to death).
"Sickle cell, sure, it exists, but it's not like the majority of people have that trait, so thats not a good trait for race based medicine unless you want to make skin cancer treatment a race based medicine too, which I think would be just as backwards."
I would certainly change my advice to a white person with regards to sunbathing compared to a black person.
"which means genetically there is little to no difference now between a black in the USA, and a hispanic in south America."
Best estimates I've seen estimate low black admixture on average in Mexicans, and pretty low european admixture in US blacks. Quantification is the important thing here, and merely stating that people have mixed doesn't cut it - the critical factor is the extent to which it has happened.
"Trait based medicine I agree with. Ancestor based medicine I agree with. Lineage based medicine I agree with, if you can trace back to a common ancestor, you are of the same tribe."
Well, "race" is merely the concept of family, tribe and ancestry taken one step further. Every criticism you level at race can be levelled at the concept of "tribe" or "family". Families mix, have no fixed boundries and can have pretty different genes in many respects - but few people object to the concept nonetheless.
"If you believe in the concept of race, you are a racist, it's that simple."
It is interesting to see how the concept of racism has slipped, but that is somewhat beside the point. If I'm a racist or not is irrellevant to the discussion at hand - this discussion is about the usefulness of race as a genetic concept.
"If you can admit to being a racist, then you can discuss the social concept that is race. If you arent a racist and you are say, a geneticist, a transhumanist, or whatever, then you'll understand that appearance does not make up the majority of the genetic differences between two humans."
No, but appearance is not independent of ancestry. And ancestry, via heredity, natural selection, genetic drift, geographical isolation and many other factors impact the makeup of the entire genome - not just the genes that code for appearance. Hence, appearance correlates with other traits, that are not related to appearance. This is also why race is a useful concept - if you tell me a person is "black" in the United States, I will be able to not only discern that he most likely has a darker than average skin tone, but is also more liable to suffer from sickle-cell anemia, and is far more likely to gain benefit from taking a race-specific medicine such as BiDil.
"You want an example? Let's say homosexuality is genetic and is biological, are homosexuals a race? Sure they could be considered a genetic race, if you based it on gene science, but you cannot look at a person and automatically see their race as homosexual."
Like I said above, most modern concepts of race are based on ancestry, not on some single genetic similarity. (For instance, there are lactose tolerant groups of humans in both northern Europe and certain areas of Africa - that doesn't mean that calling all lactose tolerant people a "race" is very helpful, unless we radically alter how most people percieve the concept of race).
Rather, it is much more helpful to concieve of race as an (extremely) extended partly inbred family. Indeed, most criticisms levelled at the concept of race can be aimed at the concept of family. Where does your family end?
"The problem with classical racists is that they classify race as only CERTAIN genes, they only judge race based on how people LOOK, which means there is no science at all, it's classic eugenics"
As I pointed out above, how people look tends to give a reasonably high (but variable, see Brazil example elsewhere in thread) quality estimate of their overall ancestry, and hence of the makeup of their overall genome. Also, this has nothing whatsoever to do with eugenics, except through an excessively long chain of somewhat tortured logic. (Which usually involves Hitler somewhere along the road...)
"This is why racism is wrong, Just analyze the metaphor, if we used racism to justify which computers we buy, we'd all be buying SHIT computers, we wouldnt even open the box to see what CPU is inside because the case would look so nice, so shiny, and so white, that we would not even bother to check the speed of whats inside."
Oh, I generally agree with this sentiment - which is surprising given that I am by default a "racist" because I do not discount the utility of race as a concept. (Which does not mean that I believe society should be based around race, or certain races discrimiated against).
"Race is based on appearance"
Appearance is certainly what most people go on. As pointed out elsewhere in the thread, it can work rather well for determining ancestry. Even in very mixed situations like Brazil, it provides information about ancestry.
Also, you have the 15-85% cliché all mixed up - it really doesn't say very much. For more information on this, see:
http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/002443.html