Linux gaining mainstream acceptance is a good thing because it means software freedom is gaining mainstream acceptance. A linux distro that is locked into a bunch of proprietary restrictions does not advance software freedom, so it's not really much of a gain for the broader open source community if such a distro were to gain a lot of ground.
And furthermore, such a distro wouldn't have the broad support of the open source community, and therefore any success that it enjoyed would be more due to marketing, rather than the benefits that open source usually offers.
What is science fiction? What is fantasy? It's like asking "What is heavy metal?". Yeah, there's definitely some defining characteristics, but you can't take a song and go "Power chords: check, distortion: check, ok, must be heavy metal." You have to listen to a song and decide if, all things considered, it feels like heavy metal. To you. Somebody else may associate it with industrial rock.
Genres are descriptive, not prescriptive. They're a useful way to say "all these artists have this common theme or style in their works". You're upset because a genre that used to include a lot of authors you enjoyed is now changing to include a lot of authors you don't like. Personally I think there's a touch of elitism or old-schoolism there, but furthermore - who cares? The genre describes certain things about books, but it shouldn't prescribe either what the writer writes or which books the reader reads.
Maybe someday, debating what's hard sci-fi and what's soft sci-fi will be seen to be just as silly as debating whether a song is folk-punk or country-punk.
other than a few buzzwords and the general tone of his one and only original novel, nothing Gibson has written about has actually come true.
In Idoru, he writes about a virtual celebrity, a "person" who has been conjured into being by programmers and designers, and through marketing become a popular celebrity personality, despite not actually existing. It's an idea that was toyed with in Max Headroom, but Gibson's more realistic vision has come true with alarming clarity. Take the Gorillaz, for example, not to mention real virtual celebs in Japan...
If you're typing this on a computer, you purchased gasoline. You just bought it as a part of the price of the equipment.
Absolutely right. And I do not need this computer, it's just something I like to have. Things we don't need, but like to have are known as "luxuries".
Is all your food grown on-site?
No, but I don't purchase it or contribute to the demand for its production or transport.
Did someone use a truck or a backhoe to install that pipe that brings you your drinking water?
Yes, and I prefer to use and pay for those pipes because it's more convenient than using well and rainwater - I don't need them and neither do you.
Do you squat over a hole in the ground, or use a toilet that was manufactured somewhere else and transported to you?
I prefer the latter. But it's pretty obvious that the former would work just fine - it's a stretch to claim that people need a shiny white throne to receive their excrement.
Is all your clothing made in your community?
No, but again I don't purchase it or contribute to the demand for its production or transport.
Just because you didn't burn it yourself doesn't mean you didn't purchase it indirectly... don't kid yourself that you could live anything like your current lifestyle without it.
Dead on. I do indirectly consume some gasoline, and it would be almost impossible to maintain my current lifestyle without it. But I don't need to maintain my currently lifestyle, and neither does almost anyone else.
be careful about climbing up on that pedistal and telling everyone how you don't need gasoline.
I'm not just saying I don't need gasoline, I'm saying you don't need it either. Currently I do indirectly use some, as do most people, but it's important not to let ourselves evade responsibility for our consumption by using the justification that maintaining our current lifestyles is necessary - that we don't have a choice in the matter and are therefore somehow absolved of wrongdoing.
even if you personally don't burn a molecule of gasoline or other fossil fuels, you are benefiting from all the people that do so on your behalf.
This is a very good point and should be acknowledged, although it is true that the vast majority of gasoline consumed by an average first-worlder is done directly (e.g. feeding their car). I see now that my statement that I don't buy gas was interpreted as some kind of claim to total ethical/environmental purity. I didn't mean it that way, it was just to illustrate the fact that there are many people, including myself, who are able to live comfortable, pleasant lifestyles with extremely minimal gasoline consumption, and therefore gasoline can't realistically be characterized as a human need.
I'll bet if I went down your shopping list I'd find more than a few things you could do without, but don't because you don't have to.
Believe it or not (you may not) I don't go shopping. I bought some inner tubes for my bicycle last month, but other than that I haven't bought anything from a store for...I don't really keep track, but at least half a year. I glean my food from the excess of farmers and supermarkets, used clothes are surprisingly easy to find for free (and will last many years), and it's amazing how much furniture, electronics, household stuff, etc. you can find on "trash day" that would've gone to the landfill otherwise.
That's not the point though, just some trivia. I do indirectly consume gasoline, and I financially support other destructive industries as well (like the electricity company). But I realize that these things are in fact luxuries, which is why it's so easy for me to go without all that I do. It's the context that's important. The knowledge that every time I choose to turn on my computer I'm making a choice which causes real damage means that I am conscientious and sparing with my use. It also means that I make an effort to counterbalance the damage I have voluntarily incurred by doing positive things to offset it. It would be much easier to just write it off as "I need to use the computer - end of story," and I can understand what motivates people to think that way, but it's dishonest and irrational, and that's not what we need in a healthy society.
Congrats on living in either a city with good (non-internal-combustion-based) public transportation... Or a third-world hellhole. Or having a large enough fortune to never need to leave the house.
It's not usually my style to bite on the ad-hominem attacks, but I guess it's relevant in this case. The public transit where I live sucks and I've taken it probably 4 or 5 times the whole time I've lived here. I live in the global north, in a developed nation, but not in a big city. I leave the house every weekday to go to work (7 or 8 miles on a bicycle), and the amount of money I live on actually puts me well below the poverty line.
I'm not saying everyone should be exactly like me 'cause I'm so great. What I am saying is: I'm nobody special, I'm not very smart, rich, gifted, or in any other way exceptional, and I'm able to live with no direct consumption of gasoline, and astonishingly low indirect consumption. The reason I can do this isn't because of any special power I have, but because I actually make an effort. And it follows that almost all unremarkable people like me could do similarly if they really wanted.
A three-hour (each way) bicycle trip to and from work every day
You don't need to work there. You prefer to work there because the pay is good, or the work is especially enjoyable.
I live somewhere that we actually get this white fluffy shit called "snow" for three to five months out of the year, on which bicycles work about as well as pissing in the wind
I hear ya about biking in the snow:) Nevertheless, there are plenty of a) places you could live where snow isn't such a problem, or b) places you could work where commuting isn't so difficult. You choose to live where you do because you like it, not because you have to.
But don't insult us all by pretending that 90% of us (in the civilized world) can get by without gasoline.
It's not about insulting (although I admit my initial post was a little biting), it's about pointing out the obvious truth. It's easy to take our luxuries for granted to the point that we think they're inalienable rights, but they're not, and we shouldn't treat them that way.
Obviously, neither me nor anyone else is going to give up all their luxuries. But consider how much in your life you could do without if you had to, and not only will you feel much more blessed, you'll be able to more objectively re-evaluate whether your consumption and lifestyle choices are really worth the damage they do, instead of just writing them all off as "needs".
Assuming that you live in a "modernized" country (and I think that's safe to assume considering that you're posting on Slashdot), the removal of gasoline from your life would have a catastrophic effect on the quality of your life.
True for me personally, but there are plenty of people in "modernized" countries who would get by fine if gas ran out tomorrow. We choose not to participate in permaculture, because we prefer to do something else instead.
My typical commute to work, which is slightly over 6 miles, I do on foot, running, every morning.
Good for you, that kicks ass:)
I've also lived in and visited more rural locations... For them, cars are a necessity.
I know people who live in rural areas who don't depend on cars or gasoline. Futhermore, if living somewhere requires a car to survive, we don't need to live there. There are plenty of places one can live that don't necessitate a car, but we choose not to live there because we prefer living somewhere else.
Calling people greedy whose needs are different than yours is simply ignorant.
If someone's diabetic, ok, they have different needs from me and I respect that. If someone prefers to live on a ranch, or is too lazy to ride a bike, or wants to have 8 children, those aren't "different needs", those are different preferences. I respect those too, I'm simply stating the obvious fact that we don't need to do any of those things, we're voluntarily choosing to - and should therefore be responsible and considerate about the damage that they cause - because when you get down to the unpleasant truth, we could prevent it if we wanted to.
I'd say that's a very fucked up definition of luxury... I dare you to live one month without any of your "luxuries"...
For the record, I have done exactly that for much longer than a month before, but that's beside the point. I do have luxuries, just like you and everyone else, and if I had to get rid of them all forever, my life wouldn't be as fun. I also often catch myself taking them for granted - beginning to believe that they're not luxuries at all but things I need in some absolute, urgent sense.
They're not. There's nothing wrong with having luxuries, but call them what they are. Calling something a "need" has an implicit subtext that we have an inherent "right" to have it. I'm not calling for the elimination of all luxuries, I'm calling for perspective. Realize that we can go without a lot of the things we take for granted, and it's a lot easier to reconsider how much we want of them, and if it's worth all the consequences. By refusing to acknowledge this reality, we give ourselves a free ticket to continue doing exactly as we like, without caring about the result.
They do? Oh shit, what happens if you don't get it? 'cause I haven't bought gasoline in...let's see...ever. And neither have a whole lot of people on this planet, who somehow seem to be getting by okay, and are even enjoying themselves most of the time.
Characterizing luxuries as "needs" is just a cop out that spoiled people use to justify being greedy. "I need my cellphone", "Oh, I need my coffee", "I just have to have my car"...fuck that. You need food, you need clothes, you need shelter, and sometimes you need medicine. Maybe you'd like more than that, maybe you deserve more than that, but you don't need it.
The implication of "needing" something is that no matter what it takes to get it, that's ok. CO2 emmissions? Government repression? Child slavery? Hey, that sucks, but what can we do, we/need/ our [fill in the blank]. Which is exactly why we find ourselves killing and dying for perceived needs like oil.
It's interesting that you put prostitution on that list. While the other negative things that you (perhaps a little one-sidedly) attribute to poor people are arguably accurate, customers of prostitutes are very predominantly wealthy or middle class. Not all the vices and ills of society can be associated with the poor:)
Even if you are stuffing all your money into your mattress, you are still doing something that creates value.
I don't get it, I thought consumption (and the money required for consumption) was the problem? Seems like producing value is the opposite of consumption. Someone pays me $50 to fix their computer. I do it, take their $50, and stuff it in my mattress. How has this increased CO2 emissions?
By being unemployed and living from welfare, you make sure that you aren't contributing to anyone, instead, figuratively speaking, you are stealing other peoples tax money.
So you're still getting income and spending it on CO2 producing stuff (like food, clothes, shelter), the only difference is you're getting it from the government instead of an employer, and you don't have to create any value to get it. Again, I'm confused - how does creating value automatically increase CO2 emissions? Assuming of course the process you use to create value doesn't involve creating greenhouse gases or destroying vegetation. Obviously an airplane pilot or a coal miner does, but there are plenty of ways to create value that don't.
If it's profitable, it usually means their customers are making money by buying their power too. Which means that their customers now have more money to spend. See above.
I think you're presupposing that all possible things someone can spend money on have the same CO2-emission potential. $1 worth of burnt coal (in the form of electricity) produces X amount of CO2. If MiracleTurbine becomes successful, and I get to keep that dollar, I'm not necessarily going to spend it on something that also emits X CO2. In fact, it'd probably be pretty difficult to do worse than paying a company to burn up as much coal as possible for $1 and give me the energy produced. Buying gasoline could be as bad, maybe, but most alternative uses will not be, therefore there will be less "CO2 emissions-per-dollar-spent".
the most efficient way of reducing CO2-emissions is to not earn a living.
Actually, given the premise that consumption in general is the cause of CO2 emissions, the most efficient way of reducing emissions would be to earn a living and then not spend any of it. After all, if you refuse to work, your potential employer will just take that money and do something else with it, right? Something that will probably contribute to CO2 emissions. So the most efficient thing to do would be to earn a lot of money and then sit on it - literally, take it out of the bank (banks invest your money in CO2 emitting companies/governments) and put it under your bed, or just destroy it entirely. This is the only way you can really be sure it won't be used for CO2-emitting consumption, and the more money you "take out of circulation" this way, the less consumption is possible.
The problem with this strategy is, unfortunately, that the government creates as much money as they want. If money is taken out of circulation, they can just add more in to replace it and keep the cycle of consumption going. Really, money is only effective when spent, which brings me back to my original point. Strategically spending money (give money only to institutions which are helping to reduce CO2 emissions, boycott outright those which increase it) is possible, and unfortunately in a capitalist economy, probably the best available way to create a net positive impact on CO2 emissions.
You deliberately buy things that aren't as cost-effective as other stuff, but that reduces CO2-emissions. Unfortunately your money aren't "lost", someone will get rich, such as the bank, or the company CEO, so even this method isn't 100% convincing to me.
Seems like if you deliberately spend money on things that are less polluting than the mainstream offerings, you're helping to make that industry more economically viable. For example: if you buy residential wind turbines, the company that makes them will profit. Yes, some of that money will probably be spent on things that cause pollution, like employee salaries or airline tickets, however it will also be spent on improving and marketing a product that can reduce pollution dramatically.
No institution or individual can ever have zero negative impact on the environment, but they can have a greater positive impact, so that their damage is offset overall. The question becomes, is a supposedly "green" institution really helping the environment more than they're hurting it? Some companies really are, and it's great to give them business, but some are just using environmental concerns as a marketing niche, and giving them money will do nothing but enrich them, and possibly allow them to create more pollution.
I agree with your general sentiment, though. The key is being critical and informed about where your money goes. When you spend money, it doesn't just disappear - it goes on to pay for things that may be destructive or immoral, and couldn't happen without your money. Or, it may go on to pay for things that are constructive and really awesome. Though the amount of money you spend may be similar, the difference between these transactions is vast when you consider the consequences.
Re:How will the FSF/GNU handle the GPL 3 revolt?
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GCC 4.2.1 Released
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· Score: 1
All an OEM has to do to get around the GPL3 provisions is to (shock, horror) not use any GPL3 code.
All an OEM has to do to get around the restrictions of any license is to not use code protected under that license. The point of GPL3 is not to say "all hardware manufacturers must let their source be modified", it's to allow open source software developers to insist "if you want to use code that me and my friends wrote for free on your commercial device, you can't try to prevent people like us from modifying it further".
GPL3 is just irrelevant grandstanding by RMS that doesn't protect diddly squat.
The license itself doesn't do squat - no license does. It's just a tool that developers can use to enforce the terms on which they'd like to see their code used. There may be some special circumstances when GPL2 is more appropriate for a project, just as sometimes LGPL is better. But I think in general GPL3 protects the spirit of free/open source software more strongly, and once people have gotten all this fear-of-change out of their systems, developers will embrace it.
Re:How will the FSF/GNU handle the GPL 3 revolt?
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GCC 4.2.1 Released
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· Score: 4, Insightful
as a software developer you feel that the new version of GPL was not written with software developers in minds, and for software developers benefit.
The license was written with hackers and tinkerers in mind. It was designed specifically for our benefit, because it protects our ability to write and modify open source code on consumer hardware devices which employ open source code.
If that's not important to you personally, fine. But you should realize that as computer use shifts further and further from desktops to phones, pdas, and other highly proprietary platforms, there are a lot of free/open source developers who will appreciate the "rights" protected by GPLv3, even as they complain about it now.
Unfortunately, they shouldn't have to pay for TV or Internet either, but they do.
Internet access requires expensive labor and infrastructure - it cannot be provided for free. Televisions require expensive electronic parts - they cannot be provided for free. Lack of censorship doesn't require anything other than politicians leaving us alone - it can and absolutely should be provided for free.
I should have switch ON uncensored TV, not have to switch it OFF.
Whether you have to switch it on or switch it off, that doesn't really matter to me. Sure, have the filter on by default, just make it obvious and easy to turn off (for the responsible owner, not the kid obviously). I think if there were such a switch - sort of like Google's SafeSearch or the V-Chip, that would do the job just fine either way.
But insisting that it's OK to censor broadcast media across the board simply because you can order cable to get uncensored TV is very different. Most people in the developed world can afford a TV (10 or 20 bucks for an old one at a thrift store), but there are probably a lot more people than you'd imagine who cannot afford cable. The only TV media available to them is broadcast, and they shouldn't be limited to censored information simply because they're too poor to "switch off the filter".
That's a good point. In terms of indecency laws, there is no difference between those phrases. Just goes to show that you can be quite vulgar and disrespectful without using any profanity. It's the meaning and sentiment behind the words that matters, not the vocabulary employed to express it.
I don't think they could link protesters to this. The person needs to be directly and knowingly assisting terrorist activities related to Iraq in order to be covered by this order.
Unfortunately not. Check this:
(i) to have committed, or to pose a significant risk of committing, an act or acts of violence that have the purpose or effect of:
This means that whether or not you intended to support terrorist activities, if the executive branch determines that your actions had "the effect of": (A) threatening the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq; or
(B) undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq or to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people;
...then your assets can be frozen. Remember the rhetoric about how the anti-war movement was emboldening terrorists, and encouraging them to keep fighting? It wouldn't be a terrible stretch to claim that opposing the war "has the effect of threatening the stability of the Government of Iraq".
What if you loudly oppose and try to stop the gargantuan no-bid Iraq reconstruction contracts being awarded to corrupt US contractors like Haliburton and Bechtel? Sounds pretty close to "having the effect of undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction".
Now, perhaps a jury of our peers would think differently, but if you're asking the underlings of the president to make the judgment calls on this, such stretches of logic are entirely possible, and therefore very likely.
But make sure you donate a lot all at once, before your assets are frozen for supporting a political organization that's "undermining" Bush's Iraq War effort.
The key is if you have a product that requires lots of service to sell effectively (there are many but not all), there is plenty of incentive for independant resellers to undercut the others, and when undercutting takes place it will be worse for all participants (including the customer, eventually)
Basically what you're claiming is that it's OK for a company to use legal exploits to keep their product prices artificially high, because they really need the money.
Let me break it down for you: In this makeup arrangement, there are two things being sold: 1) The makeup itself. 2) The service of a professional application of the makeup. Now, if you want to look really good, you should probably buy both of these. But if you just want the makeup, the company is saying "No, you must also pay our professionals to apply it, because we know what's best for you." They're basically forcing a package on you, the same way that cable ISPs sometimes say "Yes, we can give you internet access for a reasonable price, but you have to buy our cable TV service for twice as much too." They're exploiting the fact that they have a partial monopoly to force you to pay for more than you want.
Now, the reflexive capitalist response is "Well, if their business model is bad they'll go out of business." or "if u don't like it then don't buy from them lol". But the problem is that the makeup company in this case has something of a vertical monopoly - they control the manufacturing, retailing, and application of their product, and are using that vertical integration to unfairly muscle out anyone else who tries to compete in any one of those businesses. What they're really afraid of is not unskilled individuals buying the makeup cheap on the internet and making themselves look ugly, they're afraid of professional beauticians buying the makeup for cheap and applying it well, thereby introducing competition for the "official" salons.
Or are you just out there to lecture about some psychology experiment you've read about?
I just thought the experiment was relevant to the topic (especially since the experiment used a remote-controlled machine to inflict pain), and I thought you might be interested. I guess you're not, but that's ok too.
Yeah, but would you say that someone eating a hamburger is more violent than someone butchering a cow?
It depends on whether you're looking from the perspective of the inflicter or the victim. For example, who is more violent: a pilot who launches a cruise missile at a building, or a professional boxer? Certainly the boxer takes more enjoyment from fighting, and is more emotional and passionate about it, so based on the inflicter's disposition, I guess the boxer is more violent. But if you look at it from the perspective of the victims, I think it's safe to say the occupants of the building would feel that they had suffered far worse violence than the guy at the other end of the boxing gloves would.
But the question is kind of flawed in my opinion. "Is someone violent?" is like asking "Is someone bad?". Maybe there's a way to tell, but it's much easier and more useful to evaluate their actions. After all, what good is it for people to have non-violent dispositions from their perspectives if the actions they takes still result in violence? The act of firing a cruise missile into a building definitely has a more violent result than pummeling someone, even if it doesn't disturb the person doing it as much.
So to answer your question, I think the act of paying someone to slaughter a cow for you is equally as violent as slaughtering it yourself, because the result is the same, but the psychological distance of the hamburger-eaters allows them to do it much more often, thereby having an overall more violent effect. I mean think about it: How many people buy hamburgers, compared to the amount of people willing to personally kill cows? Obviously, the psychological distance has enabled many people to perform a violent act that they would not ordinarily be willing or able to do, therefore the distance has increased overall violence.
This war machine is a life saver (especially our own!!)
It's true that it will definitely save American lives. It will also make it easier and less risky to kill foreign people. Intuitively, it seems like the result of that would be a lot more foreign people getting killed.
Now, you seem to make the claim that since this plane is such an efficient killer, it will actually result in/less/ foreign people getting killed, because they'll be so overpowered they won't bother to fight, and the war will be over sooner. I think that expectation is based on outdated military assumptions. The US military already vastly overpowers its enemies in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, but that's not causing them to surrender, just to fall back on guerilla tactics. The power of the US military is not a significant factor for the Iraqi resistance in determining whether or not to fight and kill. This plane will not change that.
What this plane will do is make it easier and less risky for the US military to conduct bombing runs. The more bombing runs get done, the more people (innocent and otherwise) get killed.
In general, new US military advances do result in more death.
Sure, anything "can be defined" as just about anything. The key issue here, is that violence is not defined that way by anyone except you!
You're technically correct, joto - the best kind of correct:)
I think the point was that the more physical distance there is between the inflicter and the victim of violence, the more emotional distance there tends to be as well. Obviously there's not a statistical correlation between meters of distance and degree of violence, the point is that the more detached the inflicter is from the scene of violence, the more willing they are to be brutal and abusive. The Milgram experiment is excellent proof of this.
A good example of this is how many, many people are perfectly willing to eat a hamburger without a second thought, but would balk at the prospect of killing a live cow themselves - or at least be uncomfortable doing so. The psychological "distance" from the actual violence makes it much more acceptable to the average person.
Slashdot Mirror
Linux gaining mainstream acceptance is a good thing because it means software freedom is gaining mainstream acceptance. A linux distro that is locked into a bunch of proprietary restrictions does not advance software freedom, so it's not really much of a gain for the broader open source community if such a distro were to gain a lot of ground.
And furthermore, such a distro wouldn't have the broad support of the open source community, and therefore any success that it enjoyed would be more due to marketing, rather than the benefits that open source usually offers.
Yes, now who wants to join the new Free Source Community?
Genres.
What is science fiction? What is fantasy? It's like asking "What is heavy metal?". Yeah, there's definitely some defining characteristics, but you can't take a song and go "Power chords: check, distortion: check, ok, must be heavy metal." You have to listen to a song and decide if, all things considered, it feels like heavy metal. To you. Somebody else may associate it with industrial rock.
Genres are descriptive, not prescriptive. They're a useful way to say "all these artists have this common theme or style in their works". You're upset because a genre that used to include a lot of authors you enjoyed is now changing to include a lot of authors you don't like. Personally I think there's a touch of elitism or old-schoolism there, but furthermore - who cares? The genre describes certain things about books, but it shouldn't prescribe either what the writer writes or which books the reader reads.
Maybe someday, debating what's hard sci-fi and what's soft sci-fi will be seen to be just as silly as debating whether a song is folk-punk or country-punk.
other than a few buzzwords and the general tone of his one and only original novel, nothing Gibson has written about has actually come true.
In Idoru, he writes about a virtual celebrity, a "person" who has been conjured into being by programmers and designers, and through marketing become a popular celebrity personality, despite not actually existing. It's an idea that was toyed with in Max Headroom, but Gibson's more realistic vision has come true with alarming clarity. Take the Gorillaz, for example, not to mention real virtual celebs in Japan...
If you're typing this on a computer, you purchased gasoline. You just bought it as a part of the price of the equipment.
... don't kid yourself that you could live anything like your current lifestyle without it.
Absolutely right. And I do not need this computer, it's just something I like to have. Things we don't need, but like to have are known as "luxuries".
Is all your food grown on-site?
No, but I don't purchase it or contribute to the demand for its production or transport.
Did someone use a truck or a backhoe to install that pipe that brings you your drinking water?
Yes, and I prefer to use and pay for those pipes because it's more convenient than using well and rainwater - I don't need them and neither do you.
Do you squat over a hole in the ground, or use a toilet that was manufactured somewhere else and transported to you?
I prefer the latter. But it's pretty obvious that the former would work just fine - it's a stretch to claim that people need a shiny white throne to receive their excrement.
Is all your clothing made in your community?
No, but again I don't purchase it or contribute to the demand for its production or transport.
Just because you didn't burn it yourself doesn't mean you didn't purchase it indirectly
Dead on. I do indirectly consume some gasoline, and it would be almost impossible to maintain my current lifestyle without it. But I don't need to maintain my currently lifestyle, and neither does almost anyone else.
be careful about climbing up on that pedistal and telling everyone how you don't need gasoline.
I'm not just saying I don't need gasoline, I'm saying you don't need it either. Currently I do indirectly use some, as do most people, but it's important not to let ourselves evade responsibility for our consumption by using the justification that maintaining our current lifestyles is necessary - that we don't have a choice in the matter and are therefore somehow absolved of wrongdoing.
even if you personally don't burn a molecule of gasoline or other fossil fuels, you are benefiting from all the people that do so on your behalf.
This is a very good point and should be acknowledged, although it is true that the vast majority of gasoline consumed by an average first-worlder is done directly (e.g. feeding their car). I see now that my statement that I don't buy gas was interpreted as some kind of claim to total ethical/environmental purity. I didn't mean it that way, it was just to illustrate the fact that there are many people, including myself, who are able to live comfortable, pleasant lifestyles with extremely minimal gasoline consumption, and therefore gasoline can't realistically be characterized as a human need.
I'll bet if I went down your shopping list I'd find more than a few things you could do without, but don't because you don't have to.
Believe it or not (you may not) I don't go shopping. I bought some inner tubes for my bicycle last month, but other than that I haven't bought anything from a store for...I don't really keep track, but at least half a year. I glean my food from the excess of farmers and supermarkets, used clothes are surprisingly easy to find for free (and will last many years), and it's amazing how much furniture, electronics, household stuff, etc. you can find on "trash day" that would've gone to the landfill otherwise.
That's not the point though, just some trivia. I do indirectly consume gasoline, and I financially support other destructive industries as well (like the electricity company). But I realize that these things are in fact luxuries, which is why it's so easy for me to go without all that I do. It's the context that's important. The knowledge that every time I choose to turn on my computer I'm making a choice which causes real damage means that I am conscientious and sparing with my use. It also means that I make an effort to counterbalance the damage I have voluntarily incurred by doing positive things to offset it. It would be much easier to just write it off as "I need to use the computer - end of story," and I can understand what motivates people to think that way, but it's dishonest and irrational, and that's not what we need in a healthy society.
Congrats on living in either a city with good (non-internal-combustion-based) public transportation... Or a third-world hellhole. Or having a large enough fortune to never need to leave the house.
:) Nevertheless, there are plenty of a) places you could live where snow isn't such a problem, or b) places you could work where commuting isn't so difficult. You choose to live where you do because you like it, not because you have to.
It's not usually my style to bite on the ad-hominem attacks, but I guess it's relevant in this case. The public transit where I live sucks and I've taken it probably 4 or 5 times the whole time I've lived here. I live in the global north, in a developed nation, but not in a big city. I leave the house every weekday to go to work (7 or 8 miles on a bicycle), and the amount of money I live on actually puts me well below the poverty line.
I'm not saying everyone should be exactly like me 'cause I'm so great. What I am saying is: I'm nobody special, I'm not very smart, rich, gifted, or in any other way exceptional, and I'm able to live with no direct consumption of gasoline, and astonishingly low indirect consumption. The reason I can do this isn't because of any special power I have, but because I actually make an effort. And it follows that almost all unremarkable people like me could do similarly if they really wanted.
A three-hour (each way) bicycle trip to and from work every day
You don't need to work there. You prefer to work there because the pay is good, or the work is especially enjoyable.
I live somewhere that we actually get this white fluffy shit called "snow" for three to five months out of the year, on which bicycles work about as well as pissing in the wind
I hear ya about biking in the snow
But don't insult us all by pretending that 90% of us (in the civilized world) can get by without gasoline.
It's not about insulting (although I admit my initial post was a little biting), it's about pointing out the obvious truth. It's easy to take our luxuries for granted to the point that we think they're inalienable rights, but they're not, and we shouldn't treat them that way.
Obviously, neither me nor anyone else is going to give up all their luxuries. But consider how much in your life you could do without if you had to, and not only will you feel much more blessed, you'll be able to more objectively re-evaluate whether your consumption and lifestyle choices are really worth the damage they do, instead of just writing them all off as "needs".
Assuming that you live in a "modernized" country (and I think that's safe to assume considering that you're posting on Slashdot), the removal of gasoline from your life would have a catastrophic effect on the quality of your life.
:)
... For them, cars are a necessity.
True for me personally, but there are plenty of people in "modernized" countries who would get by fine if gas ran out tomorrow. We choose not to participate in permaculture, because we prefer to do something else instead.
My typical commute to work, which is slightly over 6 miles, I do on foot, running, every morning.
Good for you, that kicks ass
I've also lived in and visited more rural locations
I know people who live in rural areas who don't depend on cars or gasoline. Futhermore, if living somewhere requires a car to survive, we don't need to live there. There are plenty of places one can live that don't necessitate a car, but we choose not to live there because we prefer living somewhere else.
Calling people greedy whose needs are different than yours is simply ignorant.
If someone's diabetic, ok, they have different needs from me and I respect that. If someone prefers to live on a ranch, or is too lazy to ride a bike, or wants to have 8 children, those aren't "different needs", those are different preferences. I respect those too, I'm simply stating the obvious fact that we don't need to do any of those things, we're voluntarily choosing to - and should therefore be responsible and considerate about the damage that they cause - because when you get down to the unpleasant truth, we could prevent it if we wanted to.
I'd say that's a very fucked up definition of luxury ... I dare you to live one month without any of your "luxuries"...
For the record, I have done exactly that for much longer than a month before, but that's beside the point. I do have luxuries, just like you and everyone else, and if I had to get rid of them all forever, my life wouldn't be as fun. I also often catch myself taking them for granted - beginning to believe that they're not luxuries at all but things I need in some absolute, urgent sense.
They're not. There's nothing wrong with having luxuries, but call them what they are. Calling something a "need" has an implicit subtext that we have an inherent "right" to have it. I'm not calling for the elimination of all luxuries, I'm calling for perspective. Realize that we can go without a lot of the things we take for granted, and it's a lot easier to reconsider how much we want of them, and if it's worth all the consequences. By refusing to acknowledge this reality, we give ourselves a free ticket to continue doing exactly as we like, without caring about the result.
BUT PEOPLE NEED GASOLINE.
/need/ our [fill in the blank]. Which is exactly why we find ourselves killing and dying for perceived needs like oil.
They do? Oh shit, what happens if you don't get it? 'cause I haven't bought gasoline in...let's see...ever. And neither have a whole lot of people on this planet, who somehow seem to be getting by okay, and are even enjoying themselves most of the time.
Characterizing luxuries as "needs" is just a cop out that spoiled people use to justify being greedy. "I need my cellphone", "Oh, I need my coffee", "I just have to have my car"...fuck that. You need food, you need clothes, you need shelter, and sometimes you need medicine. Maybe you'd like more than that, maybe you deserve more than that, but you don't need it.
The implication of "needing" something is that no matter what it takes to get it, that's ok. CO2 emmissions? Government repression? Child slavery? Hey, that sucks, but what can we do, we
5. Prostitution
:)
It's interesting that you put prostitution on that list. While the other negative things that you (perhaps a little one-sidedly) attribute to poor people are arguably accurate, customers of prostitutes are very predominantly wealthy or middle class. Not all the vices and ills of society can be associated with the poor
Even if you are stuffing all your money into your mattress, you are still doing something that creates value.
I don't get it, I thought consumption (and the money required for consumption) was the problem? Seems like producing value is the opposite of consumption. Someone pays me $50 to fix their computer. I do it, take their $50, and stuff it in my mattress. How has this increased CO2 emissions?
By being unemployed and living from welfare, you make sure that you aren't contributing to anyone, instead, figuratively speaking, you are stealing other peoples tax money.
So you're still getting income and spending it on CO2 producing stuff (like food, clothes, shelter), the only difference is you're getting it from the government instead of an employer, and you don't have to create any value to get it. Again, I'm confused - how does creating value automatically increase CO2 emissions? Assuming of course the process you use to create value doesn't involve creating greenhouse gases or destroying vegetation. Obviously an airplane pilot or a coal miner does, but there are plenty of ways to create value that don't.
If it's profitable, it usually means their customers are making money by buying their power too. Which means that their customers now have more money to spend. See above.
I think you're presupposing that all possible things someone can spend money on have the same CO2-emission potential. $1 worth of burnt coal (in the form of electricity) produces X amount of CO2. If MiracleTurbine becomes successful, and I get to keep that dollar, I'm not necessarily going to spend it on something that also emits X CO2. In fact, it'd probably be pretty difficult to do worse than paying a company to burn up as much coal as possible for $1 and give me the energy produced. Buying gasoline could be as bad, maybe, but most alternative uses will not be, therefore there will be less "CO2 emissions-per-dollar-spent".
the most efficient way of reducing CO2-emissions is to not earn a living.
Actually, given the premise that consumption in general is the cause of CO2 emissions, the most efficient way of reducing emissions would be to earn a living and then not spend any of it. After all, if you refuse to work, your potential employer will just take that money and do something else with it, right? Something that will probably contribute to CO2 emissions. So the most efficient thing to do would be to earn a lot of money and then sit on it - literally, take it out of the bank (banks invest your money in CO2 emitting companies/governments) and put it under your bed, or just destroy it entirely. This is the only way you can really be sure it won't be used for CO2-emitting consumption, and the more money you "take out of circulation" this way, the less consumption is possible.
The problem with this strategy is, unfortunately, that the government creates as much money as they want. If money is taken out of circulation, they can just add more in to replace it and keep the cycle of consumption going. Really, money is only effective when spent, which brings me back to my original point. Strategically spending money (give money only to institutions which are helping to reduce CO2 emissions, boycott outright those which increase it) is possible, and unfortunately in a capitalist economy, probably the best available way to create a net positive impact on CO2 emissions.
You deliberately buy things that aren't as cost-effective as other stuff, but that reduces CO2-emissions. Unfortunately your money aren't "lost", someone will get rich, such as the bank, or the company CEO, so even this method isn't 100% convincing to me.
Seems like if you deliberately spend money on things that are less polluting than the mainstream offerings, you're helping to make that industry more economically viable. For example: if you buy residential wind turbines, the company that makes them will profit. Yes, some of that money will probably be spent on things that cause pollution, like employee salaries or airline tickets, however it will also be spent on improving and marketing a product that can reduce pollution dramatically.
No institution or individual can ever have zero negative impact on the environment, but they can have a greater positive impact, so that their damage is offset overall. The question becomes, is a supposedly "green" institution really helping the environment more than they're hurting it? Some companies really are, and it's great to give them business, but some are just using environmental concerns as a marketing niche, and giving them money will do nothing but enrich them, and possibly allow them to create more pollution.
I agree with your general sentiment, though. The key is being critical and informed about where your money goes. When you spend money, it doesn't just disappear - it goes on to pay for things that may be destructive or immoral, and couldn't happen without your money. Or, it may go on to pay for things that are constructive and really awesome. Though the amount of money you spend may be similar, the difference between these transactions is vast when you consider the consequences.
All an OEM has to do to get around the GPL3 provisions is to (shock, horror) not use any GPL3 code.
All an OEM has to do to get around the restrictions of any license is to not use code protected under that license. The point of GPL3 is not to say "all hardware manufacturers must let their source be modified", it's to allow open source software developers to insist "if you want to use code that me and my friends wrote for free on your commercial device, you can't try to prevent people like us from modifying it further".
GPL3 is just irrelevant grandstanding by RMS that doesn't protect diddly squat.
The license itself doesn't do squat - no license does. It's just a tool that developers can use to enforce the terms on which they'd like to see their code used. There may be some special circumstances when GPL2 is more appropriate for a project, just as sometimes LGPL is better. But I think in general GPL3 protects the spirit of free/open source software more strongly, and once people have gotten all this fear-of-change out of their systems, developers will embrace it.
as a software developer you feel that the new version of GPL was not written with software developers in minds, and for software developers benefit.
The license was written with hackers and tinkerers in mind. It was designed specifically for our benefit, because it protects our ability to write and modify open source code on consumer hardware devices which employ open source code.
If that's not important to you personally, fine. But you should realize that as computer use shifts further and further from desktops to phones, pdas, and other highly proprietary platforms, there are a lot of free/open source developers who will appreciate the "rights" protected by GPLv3, even as they complain about it now.
Unfortunately, they shouldn't have to pay for TV or Internet either, but they do.
Internet access requires expensive labor and infrastructure - it cannot be provided for free. Televisions require expensive electronic parts - they cannot be provided for free. Lack of censorship doesn't require anything other than politicians leaving us alone - it can and absolutely should be provided for free.
I should have switch ON uncensored TV, not have to switch it OFF.
Whether you have to switch it on or switch it off, that doesn't really matter to me. Sure, have the filter on by default, just make it obvious and easy to turn off (for the responsible owner, not the kid obviously). I think if there were such a switch - sort of like Google's SafeSearch or the V-Chip, that would do the job just fine either way.
But insisting that it's OK to censor broadcast media across the board simply because you can order cable to get uncensored TV is very different. Most people in the developed world can afford a TV (10 or 20 bucks for an old one at a thrift store), but there are probably a lot more people than you'd imagine who cannot afford cable. The only TV media available to them is broadcast, and they shouldn't be limited to censored information simply because they're too poor to "switch off the filter".
What's wrong with decency standards on public airwaves? It's not like you can't get cable.
People should not have to pay a monthly subscription fee to uncensor their media.
That's a good point. In terms of indecency laws, there is no difference between those phrases. Just goes to show that you can be quite vulgar and disrespectful without using any profanity. It's the meaning and sentiment behind the words that matters, not the vocabulary employed to express it.
I don't think they could link protesters to this. The person needs to be directly and knowingly assisting terrorist activities related to Iraq in order to be covered by this order.
...then your assets can be frozen. Remember the rhetoric about how the anti-war movement was emboldening terrorists, and encouraging them to keep fighting? It wouldn't be a terrible stretch to claim that opposing the war "has the effect of threatening the stability of the Government of Iraq".
Unfortunately not. Check this:
(i) to have committed, or to pose a significant risk of committing, an act or acts of violence that have the purpose or effect of:
This means that whether or not you intended to support terrorist activities, if the executive branch determines that your actions had "the effect of":
(A) threatening the peace or stability of Iraq or the Government of Iraq; or
(B) undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction and political reform in Iraq or to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people;
What if you loudly oppose and try to stop the gargantuan no-bid Iraq reconstruction contracts being awarded to corrupt US contractors like Haliburton and Bechtel? Sounds pretty close to "having the effect of undermining efforts to promote economic reconstruction".
Now, perhaps a jury of our peers would think differently, but if you're asking the underlings of the president to make the judgment calls on this, such stretches of logic are entirely possible, and therefore very likely.
People, please donate to the ACLU.
But make sure you donate a lot all at once, before your assets are frozen for supporting a political organization that's "undermining" Bush's Iraq War effort.
The key is if you have a product that requires lots of service to sell effectively (there are many but not all), there is plenty of incentive for independant resellers to undercut the others, and when undercutting takes place it will be worse for all participants (including the customer, eventually)
Basically what you're claiming is that it's OK for a company to use legal exploits to keep their product prices artificially high, because they really need the money.
Let me break it down for you: In this makeup arrangement, there are two things being sold: 1) The makeup itself. 2) The service of a professional application of the makeup. Now, if you want to look really good, you should probably buy both of these. But if you just want the makeup, the company is saying "No, you must also pay our professionals to apply it, because we know what's best for you." They're basically forcing a package on you, the same way that cable ISPs sometimes say "Yes, we can give you internet access for a reasonable price, but you have to buy our cable TV service for twice as much too." They're exploiting the fact that they have a partial monopoly to force you to pay for more than you want.
Now, the reflexive capitalist response is "Well, if their business model is bad they'll go out of business." or "if u don't like it then don't buy from them lol". But the problem is that the makeup company in this case has something of a vertical monopoly - they control the manufacturing, retailing, and application of their product, and are using that vertical integration to unfairly muscle out anyone else who tries to compete in any one of those businesses. What they're really afraid of is not unskilled individuals buying the makeup cheap on the internet and making themselves look ugly, they're afraid of professional beauticians buying the makeup for cheap and applying it well, thereby introducing competition for the "official" salons.
Or are you just out there to lecture about some psychology experiment you've read about?
I just thought the experiment was relevant to the topic (especially since the experiment used a remote-controlled machine to inflict pain), and I thought you might be interested. I guess you're not, but that's ok too.
Yeah, but would you say that someone eating a hamburger is more violent than someone butchering a cow?
It depends on whether you're looking from the perspective of the inflicter or the victim. For example, who is more violent: a pilot who launches a cruise missile at a building, or a professional boxer? Certainly the boxer takes more enjoyment from fighting, and is more emotional and passionate about it, so based on the inflicter's disposition, I guess the boxer is more violent. But if you look at it from the perspective of the victims, I think it's safe to say the occupants of the building would feel that they had suffered far worse violence than the guy at the other end of the boxing gloves would.
But the question is kind of flawed in my opinion. "Is someone violent?" is like asking "Is someone bad?". Maybe there's a way to tell, but it's much easier and more useful to evaluate their actions. After all, what good is it for people to have non-violent dispositions from their perspectives if the actions they takes still result in violence? The act of firing a cruise missile into a building definitely has a more violent result than pummeling someone, even if it doesn't disturb the person doing it as much.
So to answer your question, I think the act of paying someone to slaughter a cow for you is equally as violent as slaughtering it yourself, because the result is the same, but the psychological distance of the hamburger-eaters allows them to do it much more often, thereby having an overall more violent effect. I mean think about it: How many people buy hamburgers, compared to the amount of people willing to personally kill cows? Obviously, the psychological distance has enabled many people to perform a violent act that they would not ordinarily be willing or able to do, therefore the distance has increased overall violence.
This war machine is a life saver (especially our own!!)
/less/ foreign people getting killed, because they'll be so overpowered they won't bother to fight, and the war will be over sooner. I think that expectation is based on outdated military assumptions. The US military already vastly overpowers its enemies in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, but that's not causing them to surrender, just to fall back on guerilla tactics. The power of the US military is not a significant factor for the Iraqi resistance in determining whether or not to fight and kill. This plane will not change that.
It's true that it will definitely save American lives. It will also make it easier and less risky to kill foreign people. Intuitively, it seems like the result of that would be a lot more foreign people getting killed.
Now, you seem to make the claim that since this plane is such an efficient killer, it will actually result in
What this plane will do is make it easier and less risky for the US military to conduct bombing runs. The more bombing runs get done, the more people (innocent and otherwise) get killed.
In general, new US military advances do result in more death.
Sure, anything "can be defined" as just about anything. The key issue here, is that violence is not defined that way by anyone except you!
:)
You're technically correct, joto - the best kind of correct
I think the point was that the more physical distance there is between the inflicter and the victim of violence, the more emotional distance there tends to be as well. Obviously there's not a statistical correlation between meters of distance and degree of violence, the point is that the more detached the inflicter is from the scene of violence, the more willing they are to be brutal and abusive. The Milgram experiment is excellent proof of this.
A good example of this is how many, many people are perfectly willing to eat a hamburger without a second thought, but would balk at the prospect of killing a live cow themselves - or at least be uncomfortable doing so. The psychological "distance" from the actual violence makes it much more acceptable to the average person.