I will never vote for Ron Paul because of his absurd stance on the treasury and floating currency.
A) The value of gold is just as arbitrary as that of a floating currency, but is set by the world market. If you think gold's market value is at all representative of its intrinsic value, think about this for a while. Perhaps some average of many resources would work better, but see points (B) and (C).
B) Fixing a currency against some external reference costs time and money (see China). It's particularly unstable, as the more people bet against your price fixing, the more it costs you to upkeep it.
C) Lack of control over currency valuation removes a mechanism for stabilizing an economy. See EU financial crisis. There are huge downsides to a lack of currency autonomy, and the Eurozone is an amazing example of this.
The idea of a gold standard is half-baked at best. That said, if I could rip parts off various politicians to form some frankencandidate, there would be some Ron Paul in there.
Off topic: Can we call it Al Frankencandidate?
Not to mention that usage of electric cars is somewhat independent of local power source. Saying "We should not use electric cars until our grid is powered with flowers and sunshine" ignores the fact that grid energy source changes are a seperate goal which could be approached in tandem, or after electric vehicles are fully adopted.
It certainly seems easier to exchange a few generating facilities for cleaner alternatives than it does to replace the entire fleet of vehicles on the roads. Why delay the much harder of the two tasks?
I cannot speak for everyone, but I find it frightening that there are people who deify her. I'm not saying she is dangerous as an individual, but that she is really a clown. Her step down from Alaskan governor was the most absurd thing I think I've ever witnessed. But somehow people seem to think she is a symbol for something. For what, I don't know, because she certainly is not a champion of women's rights. Maybe a symbol for irony?
I am not certain, but I was under the strong impression that federal reserve employees were not employed by the federal government, but by the fed directly. The fed FAQ states this:
No. Employees of the Federal Reserve Banks are not government employees. They are paid as part of the expenses of their employing Reserve Bank.
No matter how you look at it, the fed is an exceptional case, but I believe GP provided an accurate description. Oh, and
Are the Federal Reserve Banks private companies?
The Federal Reserve Banks, created by an act of Congress in 1913, are operated in the public interest rather than for profit or to benefit any private group.
Commercial banks that are members of the Federal Reserve System hold stock in the Reserve Bank in their region, but they do not exercise control over the Reserve Bank or the Federal Reserve System. Holding stock in a regional Reserve Bank does not carry with it the kind of control and financial interest that holding publicly traded stock affords, and the stock may not be sold or traded. Member banks do, however, receive a fixed 6 percent dividend annually on their stock and elect six of the nine members of the Reserve Bank's board of directors.
Although they are set up like private corporations and member banks hold their stock, the Federal Reserve Banks owe their existence to an act of Congress and have a mandate to serve the public. Therefore, they are not really "private" companies, but rather are "owned" by the citizens of the United States.
This sounds "mostly private" to me, since the board is 2/3 privately elected, and pays shareholder interest fix at a pretty nice 6%, considering it is essentially guaranteed by the entire financial system's stability.
Have you ever paid for cable television? Your subscription is subsidized by the advertising revenue. Would you prefer paying multiple times your current bill to have no ads? Most people would not do this.
Have you ever used a web-interface based e-mail service for free? These would not existing without the advertising. It costs the company money to store, maintain, and manipulate your data. Either you need to pay them, or an advertiser does. Or the taxpayer, in the case of municipal e-mail services.
Granted, though, I will not be rushing to buy the HP AdBoxPro2000XLS.com Special Edition. But there are certainly users who A) appreciate a free service and B) do not mind receiving ads to use such a service.
What you don't realize is that under that normal printer exterior is a titanium endoskeleton. It will probably run itself through the wall in slow motion in the near future. The wall will collapse and you will think it destroyed, but moments after you leave it will crawl out of the reckage with it's shiny bits showing. The uprising is coming.
"Literally decades" puts you at least as far back as 1990. You had a paperless office in 1990? Or is this decimal decades, and you are simply indicating the units of your.2 time without a printer?
I have not changed any part of my computer (OK, I may have swapped the RAM out when I was building my HTPC) for over two years, and can still play any game I've tried on high settings. Oh, and I built the thing for under $800. The processor is still plenty powerful. Maybe I'll pick up a new video card in another year or so, but it will be a ~$150 one. Only crazy people are "having to constantly be upgrading". My advice: don't be cheap and buy a $50 video card expecting it to last indefinitely. Do some reading before you buy your parts. And don't think that 200fps with 32xAA is the bare minimum. PS WoW plays fine on my netbook.
Re:Getting back to the topic...
on
Time To Dump XP?
·
· Score: 1
I'm not sure what you are basing your IQ figures on, but IQ tests are not percentage based, and are normalized. I also doubt that the block-building and various other pedantic activities involved in typical IQ tests are significantly affected by computer skills or how many video games you've played.
A well documented reason for IQ normalization shifts in similar/identical tests is that people these days are IQ-obsessed. Many people go around taking multiple tests, which obliterates the already-tenuous link between IQ and real intelligence. You can easily "study" for any of the activities on the test. Ask a psychologist what an IQ test is useful for, and you will get an answer along the lines of "Not much, other than diagnosing significant functional loss after a traumatic brain injury."
Trying map intelligence, a clearly multi-faceted and complicated trait, to a one-dimensional variable is just idiotic, and while interesting for coffee table discussions, is meaningless.
Your employer cannot video tape you without your consent. Consent can be verbal, written, or implied. Your employer telling you they are going to video tape you means your choice to continue working (almost all employer/employee relationships in the US are considered at-will, ie you can leave at any time for any reason regardless of anything you may have signed) implies consent.
There has been some distinction made between "automatic" (pre-programmed) analysis vs "by-hand" (ie direct human observation) analysis of video. In the case of traffic cameras, no one ever sees the video/pictures until after a crime has been committed and recognized as such. Not to mention that there is the good old argument that driving is a privilege. In either case, a police officer is not protected from traffic cameras anywhere I am aware of, whether on or off duty.
In most areas malls/stores are required to put up signs notifying you of cameras and remote surveillance. Once again your choice to shop implies consent. This is a private entity recording you while you are on their property. When a police officer is in your yard you have (in many places) the right to film them. And if an officer is at a mall, no one is saying the cameras must be systematically turned off. (No one who understands what is going on, anyway)
Anyway, none of your examples are very good. The fact is that anywhere you would expect to be filmed, police are also expected to be filmed. The issue at hand is whether a human with a mobile camera can go around videoing anyone they want, which (in most places) is banned, once again regardless of whether they are filming a police officer. Go try walking around with a camera in various public places with active police/security, and see how often you are told to put the camera away. This is a law on the books. There is the possibility for an officer to overlook an infraction, and perhaps they are less likely to do so if they are the object of interest for the video, but that is like getting upset because a judge can hand down a harsher sentence if you piss him off. This is the nature of discretionary enforcement/sentencing. And no, the alternatives are not any better.
Slashdot can't handle second order logic functions. OP was saying OR AND NAND. Also, you framed your argument wrong. Properly: your solution is more elegant/efficient.:D
That is just what slashdot has degraded into over the years. Uber-bloat. It has nothing to do with HTML/javascript and all to do with poor design. I quit after the 15636th ninja zombie invite.
Expect Google to fight in court, and all other search providers to bow without complaint. Google will lose. Slashdot headline reads: "Google is clearly evil."
I agree. Personally I don't find this surprising or disturbing. Infrastructure is infrastructure is infrastructure, and in wartime it is a target, a necessity, and a matter of national security.
Just because I'm not guilty of a crime does not mean that I don't have an embarrassingly large dildo in my bad (and therefore a search could cause emotional distress without warrant).
As my sibling stated, this is a false dichotomy. There are things worth hiding which are not illegal.
As for the police, the only reasonable interpretation of the law is that police have the same protections as any other working citizen, unless explicitly excepted from said protections (which is a legislative issue). When is a police officer open for videoing? When at home? When on duty and going to the restroom (double duty:)? When on a lunch break but in uniform? This is murky, as the party taping an officer may not know the officer's exact status. Can you record the police officer if another citizen (non officer) is talking to them? This constitutes filming that person without consent.
I do agree that police should have a reasonable expectation to be recorded under certain circumstances, but the courts (in general) have rather unambiguous laws to interpret which forbid specific forms of recording of any person, with no exceptions (or none applicable).
Oh, and about tfs: Police are not seeking the right. They are enforcing their right. The question is whether we should take away this right.
Slashdot Mirror
I will never vote for Ron Paul because of his absurd stance on the treasury and floating currency. A) The value of gold is just as arbitrary as that of a floating currency, but is set by the world market. If you think gold's market value is at all representative of its intrinsic value, think about this for a while. Perhaps some average of many resources would work better, but see points (B) and (C). B) Fixing a currency against some external reference costs time and money (see China). It's particularly unstable, as the more people bet against your price fixing, the more it costs you to upkeep it. C) Lack of control over currency valuation removes a mechanism for stabilizing an economy. See EU financial crisis. There are huge downsides to a lack of currency autonomy, and the Eurozone is an amazing example of this. The idea of a gold standard is half-baked at best. That said, if I could rip parts off various politicians to form some frankencandidate, there would be some Ron Paul in there. Off topic: Can we call it Al Frankencandidate?
Not to mention that usage of electric cars is somewhat independent of local power source. Saying "We should not use electric cars until our grid is powered with flowers and sunshine" ignores the fact that grid energy source changes are a seperate goal which could be approached in tandem, or after electric vehicles are fully adopted.
It certainly seems easier to exchange a few generating facilities for cleaner alternatives than it does to replace the entire fleet of vehicles on the roads. Why delay the much harder of the two tasks?
He entangles us all in His noodley appendages.
I cannot speak for everyone, but I find it frightening that there are people who deify her. I'm not saying she is dangerous as an individual, but that she is really a clown. Her step down from Alaskan governor was the most absurd thing I think I've ever witnessed. But somehow people seem to think she is a symbol for something. For what, I don't know, because she certainly is not a champion of women's rights. Maybe a symbol for irony?
No. Employees of the Federal Reserve Banks are not government employees. They are paid as part of the expenses of their employing Reserve Bank.
No matter how you look at it, the fed is an exceptional case, but I believe GP provided an accurate description. Oh, and
Are the Federal Reserve Banks private companies?
The Federal Reserve Banks, created by an act of Congress in 1913, are operated in the public interest rather than for profit or to benefit any private group.
Commercial banks that are members of the Federal Reserve System hold stock in the Reserve Bank in their region, but they do not exercise control over the Reserve Bank or the Federal Reserve System. Holding stock in a regional Reserve Bank does not carry with it the kind of control and financial interest that holding publicly traded stock affords, and the stock may not be sold or traded. Member banks do, however, receive a fixed 6 percent dividend annually on their stock and elect six of the nine members of the Reserve Bank's board of directors.
Although they are set up like private corporations and member banks hold their stock, the Federal Reserve Banks owe their existence to an act of Congress and have a mandate to serve the public. Therefore, they are not really "private" companies, but rather are "owned" by the citizens of the United States.
This sounds "mostly private" to me, since the board is 2/3 privately elected, and pays shareholder interest fix at a pretty nice 6%, considering it is essentially guaranteed by the entire financial system's stability.
Have you ever paid for cable television? Your subscription is subsidized by the advertising revenue. Would you prefer paying multiple times your current bill to have no ads? Most people would not do this.
Have you ever used a web-interface based e-mail service for free? These would not existing without the advertising. It costs the company money to store, maintain, and manipulate your data. Either you need to pay them, or an advertiser does. Or the taxpayer, in the case of municipal e-mail services.
Granted, though, I will not be rushing to buy the HP AdBoxPro2000XLS.com Special Edition. But there are certainly users who A) appreciate a free service and B) do not mind receiving ads to use such a service.
What you don't realize is that under that normal printer exterior is a titanium endoskeleton. It will probably run itself through the wall in slow motion in the near future. The wall will collapse and you will think it destroyed, but moments after you leave it will crawl out of the reckage with it's shiny bits showing. The uprising is coming.
Those tubes were clogged years ago. Stop treating them like a truck you can dump things on.
"Literally decades" puts you at least as far back as 1990. You had a paperless office in 1990? Or is this decimal decades, and you are simply indicating the units of your .2 time without a printer?
I have not changed any part of my computer (OK, I may have swapped the RAM out when I was building my HTPC) for over two years, and can still play any game I've tried on high settings. Oh, and I built the thing for under $800. The processor is still plenty powerful. Maybe I'll pick up a new video card in another year or so, but it will be a ~$150 one. Only crazy people are "having to constantly be upgrading". My advice: don't be cheap and buy a $50 video card expecting it to last indefinitely. Do some reading before you buy your parts. And don't think that 200fps with 32xAA is the bare minimum. PS WoW plays fine on my netbook.
Yeah but your MRI is 20 megapixels! Thats half the price per pixel!
You are correct. Kettle is bright red, with gold flecks.
It is worth pointing out the similar idiomatic expression "four times smaller", which means y = x / 4 :D
oh, this is a joke, right?
granted, take it for granted
I'm not sure what you are basing your IQ figures on, but IQ tests are not percentage based, and are normalized. I also doubt that the block-building and various other pedantic activities involved in typical IQ tests are significantly affected by computer skills or how many video games you've played.
/rant
A well documented reason for IQ normalization shifts in similar/identical tests is that people these days are IQ-obsessed. Many people go around taking multiple tests, which obliterates the already-tenuous link between IQ and real intelligence. You can easily "study" for any of the activities on the test. Ask a psychologist what an IQ test is useful for, and you will get an answer along the lines of "Not much, other than diagnosing significant functional loss after a traumatic brain injury."
Trying map intelligence, a clearly multi-faceted and complicated trait, to a one-dimensional variable is just idiotic, and while interesting for coffee table discussions, is meaningless.
Your employer cannot video tape you without your consent. Consent can be verbal, written, or implied. Your employer telling you they are going to video tape you means your choice to continue working (almost all employer/employee relationships in the US are considered at-will, ie you can leave at any time for any reason regardless of anything you may have signed) implies consent.
There has been some distinction made between "automatic" (pre-programmed) analysis vs "by-hand" (ie direct human observation) analysis of video. In the case of traffic cameras, no one ever sees the video/pictures until after a crime has been committed and recognized as such. Not to mention that there is the good old argument that driving is a privilege. In either case, a police officer is not protected from traffic cameras anywhere I am aware of, whether on or off duty.
In most areas malls/stores are required to put up signs notifying you of cameras and remote surveillance. Once again your choice to shop implies consent. This is a private entity recording you while you are on their property. When a police officer is in your yard you have (in many places) the right to film them. And if an officer is at a mall, no one is saying the cameras must be systematically turned off. (No one who understands what is going on, anyway)
Anyway, none of your examples are very good. The fact is that anywhere you would expect to be filmed, police are also expected to be filmed. The issue at hand is whether a human with a mobile camera can go around videoing anyone they want, which (in most places) is banned, once again regardless of whether they are filming a police officer. Go try walking around with a camera in various public places with active police/security, and see how often you are told to put the camera away. This is a law on the books. There is the possibility for an officer to overlook an infraction, and perhaps they are less likely to do so if they are the object of interest for the video, but that is like getting upset because a judge can hand down a harsher sentence if you piss him off. This is the nature of discretionary enforcement/sentencing. And no, the alternatives are not any better.
Slashdot can't handle second order logic functions. OP was saying OR AND NAND. Also, you framed your argument wrong. Properly: your solution is more elegant/efficient. :D
oops, facebook i mean
That is just what slashdot has degraded into over the years. Uber-bloat. It has nothing to do with HTML/javascript and all to do with poor design. I quit after the 15636th ninja zombie invite.
Proof of non-existence, eh? Isn't this slashdot?
Expect Google to fight in court, and all other search providers to bow without complaint. Google will lose. Slashdot headline reads: "Google is clearly evil."
I agree. Personally I don't find this surprising or disturbing. Infrastructure is infrastructure is infrastructure, and in wartime it is a target, a necessity, and a matter of national security.
Just because I'm not guilty of a crime does not mean that I don't have an embarrassingly large dildo in my bad (and therefore a search could cause emotional distress without warrant). As my sibling stated, this is a false dichotomy. There are things worth hiding which are not illegal. As for the police, the only reasonable interpretation of the law is that police have the same protections as any other working citizen, unless explicitly excepted from said protections (which is a legislative issue). When is a police officer open for videoing? When at home? When on duty and going to the restroom (double duty :)? When on a lunch break but in uniform? This is murky, as the party taping an officer may not know the officer's exact status. Can you record the police officer if another citizen (non officer) is talking to them? This constitutes filming that person without consent.
I do agree that police should have a reasonable expectation to be recorded under certain circumstances, but the courts (in general) have rather unambiguous laws to interpret which forbid specific forms of recording of any person, with no exceptions (or none applicable).
Oh, and about tfs: Police are not seeking the right. They are enforcing their right. The question is whether we should take away this right.
I am only going to dignify this with a "no". Several years of organic chemistry is left as an exercise to the reader.