Are you implying that this attorney, working for the RIAA and therefore presumably knowledgeable about copyright law, didn't know that claiming personal-copies-as-illegal was a lie?
I think that attorney should be fired for gross incompetence. I mean come on, it's a copyright attorney, it should know these things.
It's an issue of how the interface is revealed. Putting the primary functions up front in a clear and obvious manner means *all* users can use the basic functions immediately. The more advanced functions should then be logically and methodically discoverable as needed. Those users who don't care can have the basic functions with little or no investment in learning while those desirous of more advanced features can learn them through the same methods they already use -- either trial and error or RTFM.
So the perfect remote has some small number of standard function buttons and then one more button that *begins* to reveal the more advanced features in a progressive manner. Oh, and at the bottom of the stack should be the one button that controls all and sets the thing for uber-user mode persistently so the discovery process doesn't have to be repeated every time the user wants to make use of those advanced functions.
...if I like Kucinich > Edwards > Obama > Clinton (not my actual preference order, but it illustrates my case), I may nevertheless list Obama 2nd and Edwards 3rd in the primary because Obama has a better chance of beating the front runner... I understand your point but it drives me crazy. People think that voting is a competition that they have to win and will do all kinds of things to improve that feeling of "Winning" even if it means backing a less favored candidate. Voting doesn't work unless people actually commit to voting by their actual preference instead of voting for "the one who will win".
It's this sort of thinking that has helped keep 3rd parties down for a long time. If people voted their conscience, instead of backing the winning horse (or voting to keep *that* guy out), it's true that their candidate probably still wouldn't win. But having a third party get a significant number of votes would make some people sit up and take notice. Of course, in my cynical world view, that would just make the PTBs game the system even more to keep the third party down....
I'm not sure that's what 200 proved. More it proved that poorly designed ballots can confuse people (note that I've never seen a butterfly ballot, so I could be talking out my ass (an amazing feat that I'm beginning to master!)).
I'm also not sure that "many people won't understand" is a valid reason to not use a better system. It's a matter of presentation. A well-designed ballot that clearly states what the voter is to do should be easily handled by most people. And if you go electronic (ignoring for the moment all the problems with the current electronic implementations) it gets really easy: Screen 1 "Please select your top choice for this office" Screen 2 "If your top choice doesn't win, please select who you'd like instead". Dead simple.
And the backend mechanism: IRV, Condorcet, whatever, can be changed as needed once you get people into a mode of selecting more than one candidate.
If there was ever an argument for instant runoff elections, that's it right there. I like candidate A, but if he/she doesn't get enough votes, then I go for candidate B. That way you don't completely lose just 'cause your first vote didn't win.
It's easy enough to set up something to keep you from accidentally opening up IE [...] Sort of like riding in a car with a big red button on the dash. If you push the button, then trunk monkeys will jump out and begin disassembling the car as you drive. Sure you could put all kinds of safety devices around it to prevent you from accidentally pushing the button, and that's great, but you also have to make sure you don't:
1) turn the volume down while the left turn signal is on 2) open the glove box with no passenger in the car while traveling north 3) use the rear-right grab-handle and play an FM station above 103.9 on the dial
as all of these actions along with about 15 other undocumented actions will *also* cause the trunk monkeys to jump out and tear the car apart.
Wouldn't it just be easier to open the trunk, shoot the monkeys, rip the button from the dash and be done with it? Unfortunately no, because the car maker designed the car so that without monkeys and a big red button, the car just won't run at all.
The buttons were placed and designed by user feedback. Just because half the respondents want the button on the left and half want it on the right, doesn't mean you should average and put it in the middle...
It's obvious. Teach them the open source alternatives. Is your job to teach *interfaces* or *skills*? Teaching the skills required to do a half-decent job in video editing, web-design, and image-editing is a greater problem than how to navigate a particular interface. Teach the kids how to look at what they are designing, how to interpret the results of their actions and how to adjust those actions to get the results they want. *Those* skills will carry them much farther than learning a particular interface.
So, that said, it doesn't really matter which platform you use as much as it matters that it is an available platform that they can easily (and legally?) get their hands on. When I was taking programming classes back in '86-87, one of the most frustrating issues was that while we had Pascal at school (Apple ][e's) we didn't have it at home (mix of C-64's and trash-80's). That meant that whatever we learned in school had to be translated into something else to use outside of school.
hmm... now that I think about it, maybe that was a good thing. Whatever. Anyway, the platform the kids can get their hands on to use outside of school, legally, would be the open source ones. This is based on the assumption that not *all* the kids are in a position to just go out and buy/crack Photoshop...
How are we supposed to keep this all straight? Either the mods are on crack or the mods are geniuses of sardonic delayed humor or the mods... oh wait, I've got mod points!! d'oh!
They don't want to know what the public will think these terms mean. They want to know what terms will make people spend their money. Subsequently they've found out what people thought it would mean and are currently reaping the "rewards" of that.
More and more MS is looking clueless on this. They made some moves designed to get people to buy as a way to shore up a product that was failing before it even launched. Now they've found out that the words they used to get people to buy were also creating an expectation that MS couldn't deliver. Now people feel they've been duped. The bullet has indeed landed in the foot.
Yeah, but the silk just doesn't feel the same in second life as it does in... um. So... we're putting in 220 in the whole house and I've got bundled 2x cat6, coax piped to each room. Hey wanna come check out my new Holley 4-barrel double-pumper? aw crap. that didn't come out right either.
I don't disagree. I was responding to the OP's idea of some kind of malware that deletes a file here and there causing slow, untraceable data loss.
As to backups. Well, I guess that explains the erosion of privacy. If people don't care enough to backup their shit, why should they care who knows what about them?
It goes undetected for several years... data loss is attributed to poor system performance/upgrades/hardware failures. If it's indistinguishable from normal poor system maintenance/structure/whatever, then who cares? Whether last year's TPS reports are lost because of my own negligence or due to some malicious code, the result is the same -- a useless piece of data is gone. The trick is to make sure this malicious code actually deletes things that are *useful* -- things whose deletion has meaning.
I delete old useless stuff all the time. If I was to change the selection of things I delete from my personal hand-selection method to some random method where the same number of files were deleted randomly, I'd wager the results wouldn't be different in any significant way. The important stuff has regular backups. Hell most of the unimportant stuff is backed up regularly as well. If this malicious code happens to hit the one in a hundred files that *actually* matters, the worst case scenario is a day's changes is lost. Sure if it hits the right file on the right day the results could be bad, but ISTM the odds of hitting the right combination are inversely proportional to the "badness" factor. And to remain undetectable, it has to be some version of random -- if the malware hits the same combination repeatedly because it knows that's the combination that causes real damage, that will raise some serious red flags.
Honestly, with the dreck that accumulates around here, I'd be thankful for something that randomly deletes some old stuff...
... when I was in highschool. I ended up putting off my CS education until now (20 years later) because after I'd maxed out the available options in highschool (and they were really good too...) I couldn't bear *repeating* it all in college and ended up dropping out. I'm sure I'm not alone in this sentiment. Something like this would probably have helped catapult me past that point and into a real career in CS... where I've belonged this whole time.
Granted there were opportunities even then (class of '88 here). My first two jobs were computer oriented. One was teaching a introductory programming class at the local library and the other was writing some code for the school district (got $600 for that!!). But even so, the opportunities were few and far between. The result is that I'm now fully qualified to operate the bar at the engineering/cs dept mixers;-)
I don't think we necessarily disagree here, but are looking at different sides of the issue.
It's irrelevant how many people benefit from a particular feature, so long as those who benefit from that feature have access to that feature. Bad analogy warning: how many color-blind people need a certain kind of high-contrast color-scheme to be able to read their screens effectively? For arguments sake, lets say it's a few thousand. In the event that this particular option is *not* available, those people are screwed -- they can use a computer, buts it's difficult for them and they never quite no why. When that option is made available their computing experience improves dramatically. Is that not worth it? (note, I know that was totally made up crap, but I think it illustrates the point). Similarly in desktop environments, if the user is given choice and opportunity to exercise that choice, then the overall community improves because those who don't quite conform to the "norm" are still able to be productive.
I'm sort of rambling, I know. Look, the total of providing choice in the desktop marketplace is pretty low, ISTM. Some of the more esoteric desktop environments are created and maintained by small handfuls of people who make a big impact for those particular users who benefit from their work. Those same developers would have minimal impact on larger scale projects, so to argue that the effort is wasted is really false, because it's not wasted. It's put to good use fulfilling a corner case requirement that would otherwise be ignored.
My original point, though, was trying to understand why people want to combine the efforts of GNOME and KDE. I think people who pursue this don't really understand how enriching choice is. And how important competition is in terms of pushing development. IMO, the overall benefit of having two major and several minor competitors in the desktop market (at least within the linux world) is vastly greater than any boost a combined effort could add to overall linux adoption. And it's not about linux adoption for the sake of adoption. It's about the freedom to use the system the way you want to use the system even if you're the only person who wants to use it that particular way. Combining the efforts of GNOME and KDE would mean that the current users of both those systems would be forced to use a new system that was neither quite GNOME nor KDE. If you assume that those users made a conscious choice about which system they were using, then they've just had that choice taken away from them. The result is instead of two different, happy, groups pursuing their goals, you'd have three groups: unhappy former KDE users, unhappy former GNOME users, and happy GKNDOMEE users. What is the benefit of that?
Oh, and I get way more accomplished if I'm having fun while accomplishing stuff;)
if KDE and GNOME could work things out and deliver a standard Linux desktop... I see this sentiment a lot. I'm not sure I really understand it.
First, both GNOME and KDE are pretty polished, do many things *very* well and in many ways "just work". Frankly so does Windows (at least XP, never touched Vista). I find it hard to believe that either one of those three could be ruled to be a *better* desktop than the other because they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Its really silly to argue whether one or the other is technically superior (ignoring underlying issues here like kernel stability, security etc. just the interface). Maybe for one person, one is better but the person in the next cube might think differently. The biggest gap between Windows and the other two are familiarity. Once you are familiar with one, its *seems* easier. Maybe for one particular task, one works better. These are all fine and reasonable.
Second, the existence of GNOME, KDE, XFCE, fluxbox, IceWM, ratpoison, wmii, xmonad, etc etc etc is one of the strengths of Linux et al. Choice! Every desktop linux user I know uses a different desktop. I use dual-head xmonad and love it. Some friends use GNOME, some KDE, some IceWM. The interesting thing is we're all happy with what we've *chosen*. It works for us.
Third, a side effect of having (and experimenting with) multiple desktops is a user gains general computing skills as opposed to Start->Programs->right-click->foo->bar->baz skills. A user who as tried several different desktops has a better general understanding of the various types of desktops and develops strategies for dealing with them. They can handle an unfamiliar desktop. Maybe not efficiently, but they can do it.
So the way I see it, no one choice is better than the other, objectively. The multiplicity of choices in the linux world is a good thing. Why would you want to combine GNOME and KDE? You'd end up with just fewer choices and probably *not* a superior product, except for those particular people who happen to prefer the resulting product.
I understand the concept of mindshare and getting all these talented devs pointed in the same direction, but where's the fun in that? And where's the choice? You'd end up with a monoculture which is what you get with Windows already. We know that's not good.
Why do people have to get up earlier at all? That just doesn't make any sense. And if you say its because of the change in daylight and farmers or some such I say you're wrong. I live in the northern US (and for many others its worse, but we're extreme enough to have this discussion) and here, even with DST, our sun doesn't actually set til something like 9:00 PM mid-summer versus around 4:30 PM mid-winter. Sunrise varies by an equivalent amount. In fact in mid-summer, you can see the sky starting to lighten by about 3:00 AM, and the frickin' birds are chirping by about 4:30 AM.
So my point is, that if your job/life/whatever is already ruled by the sun, then DST is only getting you part of the way there and you're already dealing with a good 4 hour discrepancy every year. Its really pointless to go through the rigmarole of changing the clocks twice a year. If you need to be up with the sun, then sleep with the curtains open in an east facing room. You'll get up, trust me.
What you did was regurgitate some crap that someone else made up.
Maybe. Or maybe my points, that came directly from the Bible, were what the creator of the universe revealed to the world through special revelation.
Maybe? Maybe? So much for faith.
No, they are not the great revelation of the creator of the universe. They are invariably the words written down by some dudes after being passed orally for decades, centuries or millenia. They have no foundation in reality, other than the contextual bits that are implanted in the most recent versions prior to their writing that have not yet been wiped out by the randomly injected errors inherent in an oral tradition.
And you are dodging the point, which is that the OP asked for something *other* than the words that your particular tradition professes. In other words, argue the point logically and with your own words. Describe what you believe and why you believe it and how you come to those conclusions without relying on some whack-job hermit in the desert thousands of years ago to describe these things for you.
We all know we do wrong. We have a conscience that tells us.
no. we all know we do things that we "feel" are wrong, but that is a completely subjective matter and is only an extension of the concept of empathy. There is no objective right and wrong.
The rules are not simply a moral guide. The rules do two things. They inform us how perfect God is and how flawed we are.
How? Seriously, how do rules as laid out by a mythical being do anything to inform us about anything? There is no god. There is no objective determination of perfection or imperfection. You keep missing the flaw in your fundamental premise: that there exists a higher power, supreme being, whatever, that has set some standard for right and wrong, perfection and imperfection, sinfullness and non-sinfullness. Every other broken religious concept follows from that. Once you accept the reality that there is no "god" you will see how the rest of your assertions fail and you will realize how you have wasted time and energy attempting to make the universe fit into some plan that doesn't exist.
To speak more directly to one point: I am not "flawed". I simply am. I am an amalgam of substances that collectively produce a series of effects that we call life. I am nothing more nor less than that. An interesting side-effect of that is that this life has evolved a level of complexity that allows for very complex reactions to take place. These complex reactions we have labeled "consciousness". One very interesting side effect of this consciousness is that we have a certain set of extremely complex reactions that are able to mimic and predict the reactions in other amalgams of substances with a similar complexity to our own. Some people call this empathy. It allows us to "feel" things predictively. In other words, I can predict how another separate entity might experience some action, and I can actually do so with some reasonable accuracy by simply imagining how I might experience that same action. One of the side-effects of the predictive feeling is that, in the case of things that to us would not be pleasant, we sometimes think that it would be wrong to cause these feelings in others. Some people have built incredible, complicated, systems based on this idea. These ideas have become what we call "morals". Some groups have attempted to co-opt this concept of "morals" and turn it into something it is not: a proscription from some "god". In reality, it is nothing more than a series of extremely complex reactions stacked a-top one another.
If God gave us a bunch of rules simply to condemn us then yes he would be a bogyman. But, no, that is not the case. He gave the rules, and a way to resolve the gap between us and Him, not based on what we do, but what God did. He provided a way that we could not do ourselves. It is a gift that we can't brag about. I can't say that
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Are you implying that this attorney, working for the RIAA and therefore presumably knowledgeable about copyright law, didn't know that claiming personal-copies-as-illegal was a lie?
I think that attorney should be fired for gross incompetence. I mean come on, it's a copyright attorney, it should know these things.
It's an issue of how the interface is revealed. Putting the primary functions up front in a clear and obvious manner means *all* users can use the basic functions immediately. The more advanced functions should then be logically and methodically discoverable as needed. Those users who don't care can have the basic functions with little or no investment in learning while those desirous of more advanced features can learn them through the same methods they already use -- either trial and error or RTFM.
So the perfect remote has some small number of standard function buttons and then one more button that *begins* to reveal the more advanced features in a progressive manner. Oh, and at the bottom of the stack should be the one button that controls all and sets the thing for uber-user mode persistently so the discovery process doesn't have to be repeated every time the user wants to make use of those advanced functions.
...if I like Kucinich > Edwards > Obama > Clinton (not my actual preference order, but it illustrates my case), I may nevertheless list Obama 2nd and Edwards 3rd in the primary because Obama has a better chance of beating the front runner... I understand your point but it drives me crazy. People think that voting is a competition that they have to win and will do all kinds of things to improve that feeling of "Winning" even if it means backing a less favored candidate. Voting doesn't work unless people actually commit to voting by their actual preference instead of voting for "the one who will win".It's this sort of thinking that has helped keep 3rd parties down for a long time. If people voted their conscience, instead of backing the winning horse (or voting to keep *that* guy out), it's true that their candidate probably still wouldn't win. But having a third party get a significant number of votes would make some people sit up and take notice. Of course, in my cynical world view, that would just make the PTBs game the system even more to keep the third party down....
I'm not sure that's what 200 proved. More it proved that poorly designed ballots can confuse people (note that I've never seen a butterfly ballot, so I could be talking out my ass (an amazing feat that I'm beginning to master!)).
I'm also not sure that "many people won't understand" is a valid reason to not use a better system. It's a matter of presentation. A well-designed ballot that clearly states what the voter is to do should be easily handled by most people. And if you go electronic (ignoring for the moment all the problems with the current electronic implementations) it gets really easy: Screen 1 "Please select your top choice for this office" Screen 2 "If your top choice doesn't win, please select who you'd like instead". Dead simple.
And the backend mechanism: IRV, Condorcet, whatever, can be changed as needed once you get people into a mode of selecting more than one candidate.
Nice lesson, thanks!
I'm converted...
If there was ever an argument for instant runoff elections, that's it right there. I like candidate A, but if he/she doesn't get enough votes, then I go for candidate B. That way you don't completely lose just 'cause your first vote didn't win.
1) turn the volume down while the left turn signal is on
2) open the glove box with no passenger in the car while traveling north
3) use the rear-right grab-handle and play an FM station above 103.9 on the dial
as all of these actions along with about 15 other undocumented actions will *also* cause the trunk monkeys to jump out and tear the car apart.
Wouldn't it just be easier to open the trunk, shoot the monkeys, rip the button from the dash and be done with it? Unfortunately no, because the car maker designed the car so that without monkeys and a big red button, the car just won't run at all.
Damn. too much coffee already.
I'd warrant that many unlicensed pharmacists do a much better job of measuring/weighing/packaging than many licensed pharmacists.
Please go stand by the stairs.
-1, whoosh!!!
rimshot!
It's obvious. Teach them the open source alternatives. Is your job to teach *interfaces* or *skills*? Teaching the skills required to do a half-decent job in video editing, web-design, and image-editing is a greater problem than how to navigate a particular interface. Teach the kids how to look at what they are designing, how to interpret the results of their actions and how to adjust those actions to get the results they want. *Those* skills will carry them much farther than learning a particular interface.
So, that said, it doesn't really matter which platform you use as much as it matters that it is an available platform that they can easily (and legally?) get their hands on. When I was taking programming classes back in '86-87, one of the most frustrating issues was that while we had Pascal at school (Apple ][e's) we didn't have it at home (mix of C-64's and trash-80's). That meant that whatever we learned in school had to be translated into something else to use outside of school.
hmm... now that I think about it, maybe that was a good thing. Whatever. Anyway, the platform the kids can get their hands on to use outside of school, legally, would be the open source ones. This is based on the assumption that not *all* the kids are in a position to just go out and buy/crack Photoshop...
No it's not. It's a very effective and profitable way of using fear to separate people from their money.
How are we supposed to keep this all straight? Either the mods are on crack or the mods are geniuses of sardonic delayed humor or the mods... oh wait, I've got mod points!! d'oh!
They don't want to know what the public will think these terms mean. They want to know what terms will make people spend their money. Subsequently they've found out what people thought it would mean and are currently reaping the "rewards" of that.
More and more MS is looking clueless on this. They made some moves designed to get people to buy as a way to shore up a product that was failing before it even launched. Now they've found out that the words they used to get people to buy were also creating an expectation that MS couldn't deliver. Now people feel they've been duped. The bullet has indeed landed in the foot.
Yeah, but the silk just doesn't feel the same in second life as it does in ... um. So... we're putting in 220 in the whole house and I've got bundled 2x cat6, coax piped to each room. Hey wanna come check out my new Holley 4-barrel double-pumper? aw crap. that didn't come out right either.
I don't disagree. I was responding to the OP's idea of some kind of malware that deletes a file here and there causing slow, untraceable data loss.
As to backups. Well, I guess that explains the erosion of privacy. If people don't care enough to backup their shit, why should they care who knows what about them?
I delete old useless stuff all the time. If I was to change the selection of things I delete from my personal hand-selection method to some random method where the same number of files were deleted randomly, I'd wager the results wouldn't be different in any significant way. The important stuff has regular backups. Hell most of the unimportant stuff is backed up regularly as well. If this malicious code happens to hit the one in a hundred files that *actually* matters, the worst case scenario is a day's changes is lost. Sure if it hits the right file on the right day the results could be bad, but ISTM the odds of hitting the right combination are inversely proportional to the "badness" factor. And to remain undetectable, it has to be some version of random -- if the malware hits the same combination repeatedly because it knows that's the combination that causes real damage, that will raise some serious red flags.
Honestly, with the dreck that accumulates around here, I'd be thankful for something that randomly deletes some old stuff...
... when I was in highschool. I ended up putting off my CS education until now (20 years later) because after I'd maxed out the available options in highschool (and they were really good too...) I couldn't bear *repeating* it all in college and ended up dropping out. I'm sure I'm not alone in this sentiment. Something like this would probably have helped catapult me past that point and into a real career in CS... where I've belonged this whole time.
;-)
Granted there were opportunities even then (class of '88 here). My first two jobs were computer oriented. One was teaching a introductory programming class at the local library and the other was writing some code for the school district (got $600 for that!!). But even so, the opportunities were few and far between. The result is that I'm now fully qualified to operate the bar at the engineering/cs dept mixers
(holy hell (1st ...) and rulings (SCOTUS ... ) in the land) (aka ... (unlike t...) ... )
I love scheme too.
How did you get that past the lameness filter?
I don't think we necessarily disagree here, but are looking at different sides of the issue.
;)
It's irrelevant how many people benefit from a particular feature, so long as those who benefit from that feature have access to that feature. Bad analogy warning: how many color-blind people need a certain kind of high-contrast color-scheme to be able to read their screens effectively? For arguments sake, lets say it's a few thousand. In the event that this particular option is *not* available, those people are screwed -- they can use a computer, buts it's difficult for them and they never quite no why. When that option is made available their computing experience improves dramatically. Is that not worth it? (note, I know that was totally made up crap, but I think it illustrates the point). Similarly in desktop environments, if the user is given choice and opportunity to exercise that choice, then the overall community improves because those who don't quite conform to the "norm" are still able to be productive.
I'm sort of rambling, I know. Look, the total of providing choice in the desktop marketplace is pretty low, ISTM. Some of the more esoteric desktop environments are created and maintained by small handfuls of people who make a big impact for those particular users who benefit from their work. Those same developers would have minimal impact on larger scale projects, so to argue that the effort is wasted is really false, because it's not wasted. It's put to good use fulfilling a corner case requirement that would otherwise be ignored.
My original point, though, was trying to understand why people want to combine the efforts of GNOME and KDE. I think people who pursue this don't really understand how enriching choice is. And how important competition is in terms of pushing development. IMO, the overall benefit of having two major and several minor competitors in the desktop market (at least within the linux world) is vastly greater than any boost a combined effort could add to overall linux adoption. And it's not about linux adoption for the sake of adoption. It's about the freedom to use the system the way you want to use the system even if you're the only person who wants to use it that particular way. Combining the efforts of GNOME and KDE would mean that the current users of both those systems would be forced to use a new system that was neither quite GNOME nor KDE. If you assume that those users made a conscious choice about which system they were using, then they've just had that choice taken away from them. The result is instead of two different, happy, groups pursuing their goals, you'd have three groups: unhappy former KDE users, unhappy former GNOME users, and happy GKNDOMEE users. What is the benefit of that?
Oh, and I get way more accomplished if I'm having fun while accomplishing stuff
First, both GNOME and KDE are pretty polished, do many things *very* well and in many ways "just work". Frankly so does Windows (at least XP, never touched Vista). I find it hard to believe that either one of those three could be ruled to be a *better* desktop than the other because they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Its really silly to argue whether one or the other is technically superior (ignoring underlying issues here like kernel stability, security etc. just the interface). Maybe for one person, one is better but the person in the next cube might think differently. The biggest gap between Windows and the other two are familiarity. Once you are familiar with one, its *seems* easier. Maybe for one particular task, one works better. These are all fine and reasonable.
Second, the existence of GNOME, KDE, XFCE, fluxbox, IceWM, ratpoison, wmii, xmonad, etc etc etc is one of the strengths of Linux et al. Choice! Every desktop linux user I know uses a different desktop. I use dual-head xmonad and love it. Some friends use GNOME, some KDE, some IceWM. The interesting thing is we're all happy with what we've *chosen*. It works for us.
Third, a side effect of having (and experimenting with) multiple desktops is a user gains general computing skills as opposed to Start->Programs->right-click->foo->bar->baz skills. A user who as tried several different desktops has a better general understanding of the various types of desktops and develops strategies for dealing with them. They can handle an unfamiliar desktop. Maybe not efficiently, but they can do it.
So the way I see it, no one choice is better than the other, objectively. The multiplicity of choices in the linux world is a good thing. Why would you want to combine GNOME and KDE? You'd end up with just fewer choices and probably *not* a superior product, except for those particular people who happen to prefer the resulting product.
I understand the concept of mindshare and getting all these talented devs pointed in the same direction, but where's the fun in that? And where's the choice? You'd end up with a monoculture which is what you get with Windows already. We know that's not good.
maybe I'm just getting old.
All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less.
Why do people have to get up earlier at all? That just doesn't make any sense. And if you say its because of the change in daylight and farmers or some such I say you're wrong. I live in the northern US (and for many others its worse, but we're extreme enough to have this discussion) and here, even with DST, our sun doesn't actually set til something like 9:00 PM mid-summer versus around 4:30 PM mid-winter. Sunrise varies by an equivalent amount. In fact in mid-summer, you can see the sky starting to lighten by about 3:00 AM, and the frickin' birds are chirping by about 4:30 AM.
So my point is, that if your job/life/whatever is already ruled by the sun, then DST is only getting you part of the way there and you're already dealing with a good 4 hour discrepancy every year. Its really pointless to go through the rigmarole of changing the clocks twice a year. If you need to be up with the sun, then sleep with the curtains open in an east facing room. You'll get up, trust me.
What you did was regurgitate some crap that someone else made up.
Maybe. Or maybe my points, that came directly from the Bible, were what the creator of the universe revealed to the world through special revelation.
Maybe? Maybe? So much for faith.
No, they are not the great revelation of the creator of the universe. They are invariably the words written down by some dudes after being passed orally for decades, centuries or millenia. They have no foundation in reality, other than the contextual bits that are implanted in the most recent versions prior to their writing that have not yet been wiped out by the randomly injected errors inherent in an oral tradition.
And you are dodging the point, which is that the OP asked for something *other* than the words that your particular tradition professes. In other words, argue the point logically and with your own words. Describe what you believe and why you believe it and how you come to those conclusions without relying on some whack-job hermit in the desert thousands of years ago to describe these things for you.
We all know we do wrong. We have a conscience that tells us.
no. we all know we do things that we "feel" are wrong, but that is a completely subjective matter and is only an extension of the concept of empathy. There is no objective right and wrong.
The rules are not simply a moral guide. The rules do two things. They inform us how perfect God is and how flawed we are.
How? Seriously, how do rules as laid out by a mythical being do anything to inform us about anything? There is no god. There is no objective determination of perfection or imperfection. You keep missing the flaw in your fundamental premise: that there exists a higher power, supreme being, whatever, that has set some standard for right and wrong, perfection and imperfection, sinfullness and non-sinfullness. Every other broken religious concept follows from that. Once you accept the reality that there is no "god" you will see how the rest of your assertions fail and you will realize how you have wasted time and energy attempting to make the universe fit into some plan that doesn't exist.
To speak more directly to one point: I am not "flawed". I simply am. I am an amalgam of substances that collectively produce a series of effects that we call life. I am nothing more nor less than that. An interesting side-effect of that is that this life has evolved a level of complexity that allows for very complex reactions to take place. These complex reactions we have labeled "consciousness". One very interesting side effect of this consciousness is that we have a certain set of extremely complex reactions that are able to mimic and predict the reactions in other amalgams of substances with a similar complexity to our own. Some people call this empathy. It allows us to "feel" things predictively. In other words, I can predict how another separate entity might experience some action, and I can actually do so with some reasonable accuracy by simply imagining how I might experience that same action. One of the side-effects of the predictive feeling is that, in the case of things that to us would not be pleasant, we sometimes think that it would be wrong to cause these feelings in others. Some people have built incredible, complicated, systems based on this idea. These ideas have become what we call "morals". Some groups have attempted to co-opt this concept of "morals" and turn it into something it is not: a proscription from some "god". In reality, it is nothing more than a series of extremely complex reactions stacked a-top one another.
If God gave us a bunch of rules simply to condemn us then yes he would be a bogyman. But, no, that is not the case. He gave the rules, and a way to resolve the gap between us and Him, not based on what we do, but what God did. He provided a way that we could not do ourselves. It is a gift that we can't brag about. I can't say that