but neither did the US by the point that Germany surrendered.
So you're saying that because the US didn't have nukes that it is irrelevant if the Germans did? I assure you it only appears irrelevant because the Nazi's didn't complete the development of them. If they had, I'm sure you would understand the significance.
First, as you have conceded in your other post it was not the theory of relativity nor the disregard for it.
Which doesn't change my point at all since the relevant point was the effect of their ideology on their nuclear development, not the particular theory involved.
Pointing out that you tried to cover your ass by adding a weasel word ("Part of what undid Nazi Germany") does not change the core meaning of your statement.
Yes, actually, it does. Words have meaning, you see. If you use particular words in a statement, they do change the meaning. That's why we use them. Saying something is "part of" the reason for something qualifies the statement as being different than claiming that it is "the whole" reason. Calling it a weasel word adds nothing to the discussion but an unfounded insult.
I mean... I somehow have this feeling that you are clad top to bottom in weasel skin.
Oh... You can argue later that you sad "some part", but it is quite obvious what the main statement implies.
It wasn't obvious to me that I meant anything other than exactly what I said. I guess I should have consulted with you to find out what I really meant first. How was I to know that putting words in my statement wouldn't convey the meaning accordingly? I'll make sure to remember, it's not the words I use or what I think I mean, the meaning of my statements will be revealed by denzacar.
Hadith is no more than a collection of n-th person accounts of something attributed to Muhammad.
Yet I never discussed their origin, I used them to indicate fundamentalist Muslim views on Jews. Since it is easily verifiable that many muslims place great importance on the Hadith, your ranting does nothing to refute my point.
Information alone means nothing without resources. Be they material or intellectual.
Funny that in the same post you say that...
... both got their hands on some of Nazi V2 rockets and scientists.
... you acknowledge that Soviet and US were advanced by Nazi tech and scientists. It's hard to tell if you're trying to refute my point or make it.
Nazi Germany had resources. In any case, I got the idea from
Tongues of conscience: War and the scientist's dilemma by Robert William Reid but I can't find my copy to give a better reference. I will summarize: The Nazis were reluctant to use a Jew's ideas (Einstein) due to their racist ideology. This hampered their attempts to produce nuclear weapons.
So, unless someone can show me that the Nazis embraced Einstein's ideas, that they made no attempt to develop nuclear bombs or that nuclear weapons wouldn't have dramatically helped the German war effort, I don't see what anybody really has to say. If I said that some other rigid philosophy like a fundamentalist religion caused people to be hampered in technological development (If men were meant to fly,...) I wouldn't meet nearly the opposition here. The failure of the Nazi's was to a large degree caused by their ideology, in part because of ideas (and thus technology) they rejected as a result of racism. Nobody here has given me any cause to back down from that claim.
I think you're mixing up the concept of mass-energy equivalence with the theory of relativity. Mass-energy equivalence (ie. e=mc^2) was used during the development of the atom bomb.
Sounds like you're right on that, I admit I don't know the science, but I read this book http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/140053 (Some time ago, imperfect memory) but they were definitely working on nukes and certainly didn't develop them as much as they could have due to rejecting science based on ideology. The fact that nukes were hypothetical to them rather than real is the point. Had they developed them first...
It's not like the lottery, or magic, it's physics and it will work for anyone who applies it. Had they applied the "Jewish" knowledge they rejected the outcome of WWII would possibly been very different regardless of other problems the Nazi's had.
Perhaps you could have benefited from reading my post before criticising it. "Part of what undid Nazi Germany" You are aware the Nazi's were working on nuclear bombs as well aren't you? Pretty difficult if you won't use relativity. I suspect that if they had developed it first that it could possibly had an effect on the outcome of the war, but I could be wrong I suppose.
As for Muslim fundamentalists...
They don't think that Jews or "Jewish science" are inferior. Who told you that?
You really don't read before replying, do you? "I'm not sure why the fundamentalist Muslims don't have a religious problem with nukes for the same reason, perhaps it needs to be pointed out to them." I directly stated that they don't have a problem with it. I said I didn't know why. In any case:
The Hadith
Bukhari, vol. IV, chapter 524, p. 333: The Prophet said, "A group of
Israelites were lost. Nobody knows what they did. But I do not see
them except that they were cursed and transformed into rats, for if
you put the milk of a she-camel in front of a rat, it will not drink it, but if
the milk of a sheep is put in front of it, it will drink it."
If you subscribe to the theory that freedom, human rights etc always grow as economy grows, all's well and good. Me, I always remember about Nazi Germany.
Part of what undid Nazi Germany is that they wouldn't use the Theory of Relativity because it was the work of a Jew and therefore inferior according to their ideology. As a result, although they did have high technological advancement, it was significantly hampered. I'm not sure why the fundamentalist Muslims don't have a religious problem with nukes for the same reason, perhaps it needs to be pointed out to them.
I have lost three whole afternoons trying to make it work again - when Windows found the new graphic card and installed it automatically in less than a minute. You use what suits you - fine, I'm happy for you - why to you need to start a crusade with each occasion ?
To grow the install base -> to motivate hardware vendor support -> so the graphics card works
The FOSS community can not afford to ignore the FUD and political underhandedness of the major desktop OS company if we want our tools to work, since they have shown themselves determined to prevent competing products form working when possible.
Also, I have just as much trouble using windows as I hear of people having with linux, the issues are just different. I don't have time to spend babysitting an OS either, yet that leads me to prefer linux over windows because that's where my experience is.
That's because we agree on the effects, but not the desirability of them, of allowing representative government even for minorities. You seem happy to be a part in the machine, manufactured by the state and bolted into place. Imagine for a moment that you are a living being instead of a part of a machine. That you grow in an environment rather than perform a function in a machine. How much greater are the possibilities?
What is the point of any governing instance if it cannot agree with itself for 5 minutes and actually, you know.. govern things?
There are a multitude of laws that no political party with any representation in my country disagrees on. Go wild then, government, prohibit murder, theft, etc. If it is hard to implement controversial laws, they are more likely to be thoroughly debated rather than forced through. That's a good thing, by the way, it is a way of killing bad ideas.
Last election here in Norway, FrP (if memory serves me right) got more than 33% of the votes. That is pretty damn significant considering the number of big political parties we have here. Still, they were beat by a three-party union because FrP didn't want to comprimize their views to cooperate with someone with whom they don't really agree that much.
So the truth emerges, you don't really want majority rule, you want your minority to rule. Yes, 33% is a minority, even if it is the biggest one.
The result is that this last decade has seen Norway controlled by smaller parties, none of which represent the majority of us voters and who can't agree with each other enough to get anything done.
Apparently none of your politicians has any ideas compelling enough in their logic and benefits to convince the majority. Why do you want a system that makes the implementation of mediocre ideas easier?
I don't know about you, but I sure as hell don't want to live in a country where morons like the above are actually given a fist-full of gravel and pointed at the "machine".
That's one reason to limit government: to lessen the impact the morons have on your life. That said, if you have enough morons to undo your government, your voting rules are probably the least of your problems.
"Majority rules" means just that. If me and 9 friends are having a movie night and 6 of us want to watch The Matrix and the other 4 want to watch 4 other movies, what do you expect we'd end up watching, hm?
Yet you don't want real majority rules, you want 33% to rule the rest. In any case, a group of friends choosing to watch a movie together is a voluntary activity. If the other 4 really don't want to watch the Matrix, I suppose they could do something else. In such a situation the majority are not "ruling" in a way comparable to having others political ideas forced on you.
I do not own a TV station or a newspaper, so no matter how I express myself, I simply cannot reach enough people. Its a waste of my energys to engage in something so futile.
What you need is a counter to let you know how many people read your post, and therefore how wrong you are. How irrationally pessimistic have you become that you post on the internet a comment that you can not reach enough people with a message?
It's not an inalienable right if the government can "alienate" it at will.
That's a misunderstanding of what an inalienable right is, as far as I can tell. The concept is explained in Leviathan http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3207
If you do a text search for "alienable", the first result takes you to the following:
Not All Rights Are Alienable
Whensoever a man Transferreth his Right, or Renounceth it;
it is either in consideration of some Right reciprocally transferred
to himselfe; or for some other good he hopeth for thereby.
For it is a voluntary act: and of the voluntary acts of every man,
the object is some Good To Himselfe. And therefore there be some Rights,
which no man can be understood by any words, or other signes,
to have abandoned, or transferred. As first a man cannot lay down
the right of resisting them, that assault him by force, to take
away his life; because he cannot be understood to ayme thereby,
at any Good to himselfe. The same may be sayd of Wounds, and Chayns,
and Imprisonment; both because there is no benefit consequent to
such patience; as there is to the patience of suffering another
to be wounded, or imprisoned: as also because a man cannot tell,
when he seeth men proceed against him by violence, whether they
intend his death or not. And lastly the motive, and end for which
this renouncing, and transferring or Right is introduced, is nothing else
but the security of a mans person, in his life, and in the means
of so preserving life, as not to be weary of it. And therefore if a man
by words, or other signes, seem to despoyle himselfe of the End,
for which those signes were intended; he is not to be understood
as if he meant it, or that it was his will; but that he was ignorant
of how such words and actions were to be interpreted.
A few paragraphs further on:
A Mans Covenant Not To Defend Himselfe, Is Voyd
A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is alwayes voyd.
For (as I have shewed before) no man can transferre, or lay down
his Right to save himselfe from Death, Wounds, and Imprisonment,
(the avoyding whereof is the onely End of laying down any Right,)
and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no Covenant
transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may
Covenant thus, "Unlesse I do so, or so, kill me;" he cannot Covenant thus
"Unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me."
For man by nature chooseth the lesser evill, which is danger of death
in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death
in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men,
in that they lead Criminals to Execution, and Prison, with armed men,
notwithstanding that such Criminals have consented to the Law,
by which they are condemned.
So having an inalienable right to life, for example, does not mean the government can never kill you, it means you can't be understood to be bound to an agreement that costs you your life. It is in "CHAPTER XIV OF THE FIRST AND SECOND NATURALL LAWES, AND OF CONTRACTS".
This only keeps the "honest" registered sex offenders from using these types of sites.
It lowers the bar to get a second conviction. Registered sex offenders who break this law taking reasonable precautions to remain anonymous would be unlikely to ever get caught unless they come to the attention of LEO's pretending to be children. If they are caught online and suspected of grooming kids, it makes it much easier to obtain sufficient evidence of a criminal act.
This post should not be taken as support for this law.
If it's legal to store backup copies of your discs, but you can't legally buy a tool to make them, it seems that the only way to exercise your fair use rights is to download backup copies from BitTorrent and similar services.
Indeed. As far as I understand the law in my own country, there would be less penalty for downloading a movie without paying at all than there would for ripping a copy from a legally purchased DVD. You would be facing a lawsuit rather than criminal charges. It's ridiculous.
Re:Yup, beware of fascists... they are over THERE!
on
Leaving the GPL Behind
·
· Score: 1
The thing doesn't even have a furnace. I mean, really, how can you kill anyone with that?
killall -9 anyone
RTFM. People like you drive me nuts, if you can't be bothered to do anything to solve your own problem why should I help you for nothing. Don't bother me with any more questions like this.
Re:Yup, beware of fascists... they are over THERE!
on
Leaving the GPL Behind
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Nobody is going to put you in the GNU/Death Camps.
So you admit they exist then.
You are correct, nobody will put you in them. Indeed, you must assemble the GNU/Death Camp yourself. The chain-link fence, razor wire, etc. are available for you to use under the terms of the GNU/DCL. If you are having trouble with assembly or use of GNU/Death Camps, don't even think about posting questions here unless you've RTFM, googled it and searched the mailing list archives.
Actually I would disagree. I dare say that a person's credit history might be an excellent way to look at how a person manages their tasks/duties.
[snip]
Thoughts?
I was thinking that if they're under financial pressure they'd likely be willing to work overtime when required and probably very motivated to keep their job. Didn't you hear about the GFC? Even in good times though, bad credit rating alone is not enough to tell you if it was due their lack of management skills etc.
Did I refer to anything other than this specific case?
Yes, you said "The only reason to mod a console for MOST people, not the nerds on/., is to play pirated games."
Well the Australian High Court, who tried the case, decided unanimously that you are wrong. They reasoned regarding the motivation of those placing the region encoding restrictions in the products though: "In effect, and apparently intentionally, those restrictions reduce global market competition. They inhibit rights ordinarily acquired by Australian owners of chattels to use and adapt the same, once acquired, to their advantage and for their use as they see fit."
Text of the decision http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/high_ct/2005/58.html
So in FACT, they decided that everyone has a valid reason to use a mod chip, that being to enable them to play a game legally bought from another region (should they ever choose to purchase one).
The reason I referred to the issue as "hair-splitting" is because arguing over whether copyright violation is or isn't theft, for the most part, doesn't get one anywhere in the discussion of whether it's a valid action or not - whether or not it should be criminal, for instance. Calling copyright violation "theft" imposes a judgement that it should be considered criminal: but not calling it theft doesn't imply that it shouldn't be considered a crime.
If calling it theft defines the outcome then the argument over whether to call it theft is not hair-splitting. Effectively what you say here is that if you use the word theft, judgement made, case closed, if you don't, it's open to discussion. In order to discuss the issue without a predefined conclusion it is necessary to stop calling it theft.
There's a difference between actually paying for something, and stealing it. If you don't pay for it, you stole it. It's EXTREMELY simple
So you would take the position that I stole the linux distribution I use? I didn't pay for it. What about the air I'm breathing? I didn't pay for that either. It would seem that there is at least one more level of complexity to the issue than you acknowledge in your post.
the only reason he was modding consoles was for people to play games they had pirated and didn't pay a dime for.
So say you. The Australian High Court and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission think otherwise.
Describing the decision as a win for console owners, ACCC chairman Professor Allan Fels said Sony's arguments had failed because the copyright protection measures used by Sony placed limitations on the right of console owners to play games they had purchased overseas.
-The ACCC has long believed that region coding is detrimental to consumer welfare as it severely limits consumer choice and, in some cases, access to competitively priced goods. The ACCC was concerned to ensure that technology which can overcome these unfair restrictions remains generally available for consumer use," Fels said.
Windows is very popular in China and you can bet most installations are pirated.
I wonder what the trade deficit would be if they actually respected our intellectual property and paid the going rate for it instead of stealing it? Funny how we pay them for their stuff but not the other way around.....
Yeah, come back to us when you've paid out for all those US treasury bill the Chinese have. Not with money that's been inflated to be worthless either. The US industrialised while not acknowledging foreign patents and copyrights. Thanks for the example you set, US. Don't you think you prosper more by doing business with wealthy countries? Lay off on the international IP thing, at least for developing countries, it'll be better for all of us in the long run.
Isn't democracy in it self a way of silencing minority views?
No. Minorities often don't get their way, which is ok. Only states aiming for totalitarianism require the minority view to be silenced.
If less than 5% of the population agree with you enough to vote for your party, you shouldn't really be allowed to control anything at all. You're representing a pretty insignificant minority, not the general public.
One person in every twenty probably don't consider themselves insignificant. The Bundestag has 611 members if wikipedia serves me well. If a party got 2% of the vote, why don't they get 12 seats? It's hardly putting them in control, what's the problem with hearing what they have got to say? Is a dissenting view really so threatening? If you don't allow any party with less than 5% to get a seat, you could have 10 minor parties at 4% and have 40% of your population unrepresented with that system.
People like you are gravel in the gears.
Well, I don't think that's flamebait, it's a pretty good representation of my intentions. Democracy itself as implemented was a bunch of people throwing gravel in the gears of the King. The whole system of government is based on making it difficult to get things done. So much quicker and more efficient when the King could just say "Off with his head" without need for those costly, time consuming trials and such. Getting a decision on a law? Used to be the King just issued an edict, if you spoke against it, the consequences were your own fault. None of this messy "parliamentary debate" and "media coverage of issues" that makes things so difficult now! What would Germany be like if Luther hadn't thrown gravel in the Catholic churches gears?
What is really more disturbing, that I want to throw gravel in the gears of a machine that I believe will inevitably work to transform itself into a totalitarian state, or that you see society as a machine, are quite happy with that and presumably realise you are a part in that machine? Who engineered you, friend, who convinced you that you had a purpose in the machine and bolted you in there?
Do you seriously think everyone with an opinion should have the right to directly influence things?
I believe everyone with an opinion has a right to voice it. Naturally those who are unable to convince the majority will have limited success influencing society.
Sorry if I completely failed to understand your point. I'd rather have a government that does it's very best to steer the country in the direction the general mass of the people is pushing, instead of a government that goes absolutely nowhere because it tries to cater to everyones needs at the same time!
I think perhaps you understood my point, but not the reasoning behind it. I've been given very few reasons to trust authority in my life. I don't want the government steering me, I'll steer myself, thanks very much. If the rest of society doesn't want to go that way, I guess they'll end up somewhere different to me, but how will they know if my opinion is silenced? Perhaps more people would agree with minority views if they heard them. As for the government catering to needs, I'm ok if they don't cater to my needs, just also don't get in the way as I cater to the needs of my family and myself.
liar... inbreeding... hypocrite... redneck... sickos like you... mentally disturbed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominum
An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the man", "argument against the man") consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to a characteristic or belief of the person making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim.
Or to be able to play legally bought games from other markets. Damn those thieving consumers, wanting to use their legally purchased but cheaper products!
Gadens added in its statement that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) had stepped in as a friend of the court at Federal Court level to argue that regional coding was detrimental to consumer choice.
global population is increasing at an unsustainable rate and eventually something will have to be done to curb that in order to maintain any reasonable quality of life.
As far as I'm aware, pretty much every industrialised country has close to zero natural population growth. Continue the process of industrialisation and education across the world and this is likely a self-solving problem.
Is that a ways off? Maybe, but why wait until something is a problem to open the dialogue on it? It doesn't hurt to talk about the difficult choices that will have to be made in the future.
I'm partaking in the dialogue, you just don't like my contribution. As to whether those choices have to be made, that is very much unproven. Global warming may yet bring us to the point that much more of the world is a tropical environment, boosting food production to the point that we could have a much larger population. We're not exactly in the world's most fertile period right now you know. We could get back to that if we put enough carbon dioxide into the atmosphere though.
Regarding "sustainable": no rate of increase is sustainable given limited resources, unless you think we will populate space. "Sustainable" is a red herring. Any rate of increase will eventually result in overpopulation, any rate of decrease will eventually result in extinction. Maybe there will be periods of increase and decrease. Just consider the possibility that it won't require a totalitarian state implementing a eugenics program to make that happen.
Slashdot Mirror
The Nazis didn't get nukes
Which was my point ...
but neither did the US by the point that Germany surrendered.
So you're saying that because the US didn't have nukes that it is irrelevant if the Germans did? I assure you it only appears irrelevant because the Nazi's didn't complete the development of them. If they had, I'm sure you would understand the significance.
First, as you have conceded in your other post it was not the theory of relativity nor the disregard for it.
Which doesn't change my point at all since the relevant point was the effect of their ideology on their nuclear development, not the particular theory involved.
Pointing out that you tried to cover your ass by adding a weasel word ("Part of what undid Nazi Germany") does not change the core meaning of your statement.
Yes, actually, it does. Words have meaning, you see. If you use particular words in a statement, they do change the meaning. That's why we use them. Saying something is "part of" the reason for something qualifies the statement as being different than claiming that it is "the whole" reason. Calling it a weasel word adds nothing to the discussion but an unfounded insult.
I mean... I somehow have this feeling that you are clad top to bottom in weasel skin.
Oh, the unassailable logic of your arguments, how can I withstand it. Perhaps with my own link to wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominum
Oh... You can argue later that you sad "some part", but it is quite obvious what the main statement implies.
It wasn't obvious to me that I meant anything other than exactly what I said. I guess I should have consulted with you to find out what I really meant first. How was I to know that putting words in my statement wouldn't convey the meaning accordingly? I'll make sure to remember, it's not the words I use or what I think I mean, the meaning of my statements will be revealed by denzacar.
Hadith is no more than a collection of n-th person accounts of something attributed to Muhammad.
Yet I never discussed their origin, I used them to indicate fundamentalist Muslim views on Jews. Since it is easily verifiable that many muslims place great importance on the Hadith, your ranting does nothing to refute my point.
Information alone means nothing without resources. Be they material or intellectual.
Funny that in the same post you say that ...
... both got their hands on some of Nazi V2 rockets and scientists.
... you acknowledge that Soviet and US were advanced by Nazi tech and scientists. It's hard to tell if you're trying to refute my point or make it.
...) I wouldn't meet nearly the opposition here. The failure of the Nazi's was to a large degree caused by their ideology, in part because of ideas (and thus technology) they rejected as a result of racism. Nobody here has given me any cause to back down from that claim.
Nazi Germany had resources. In any case, I got the idea from Tongues of conscience: War and the scientist's dilemma by Robert William Reid but I can't find my copy to give a better reference. I will summarize: The Nazis were reluctant to use a Jew's ideas (Einstein) due to their racist ideology. This hampered their attempts to produce nuclear weapons.
So, unless someone can show me that the Nazis embraced Einstein's ideas, that they made no attempt to develop nuclear bombs or that nuclear weapons wouldn't have dramatically helped the German war effort, I don't see what anybody really has to say. If I said that some other rigid philosophy like a fundamentalist religion caused people to be hampered in technological development (If men were meant to fly,
I think you're mixing up the concept of mass-energy equivalence with the theory of relativity. Mass-energy equivalence (ie. e=mc^2) was used during the development of the atom bomb.
Sounds like you're right on that, I admit I don't know the science, but I read this book http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/140053 (Some time ago, imperfect memory) but they were definitely working on nukes and certainly didn't develop them as much as they could have due to rejecting science based on ideology. The fact that nukes were hypothetical to them rather than real is the point. Had they developed them first ...
It's not like the lottery, or magic, it's physics and it will work for anyone who applies it. Had they applied the "Jewish" knowledge they rejected the outcome of WWII would possibly been very different regardless of other problems the Nazi's had.
As for Muslim fundamentalists...
They don't think that Jews or "Jewish science" are inferior. Who told you that?
You really don't read before replying, do you? "I'm not sure why the fundamentalist Muslims don't have a religious problem with nukes for the same reason, perhaps it needs to be pointed out to them." I directly stated that they don't have a problem with it. I said I didn't know why. In any case:
The Hadith
Bukhari, vol. IV, chapter 524, p. 333: The Prophet said, "A group of Israelites were lost. Nobody knows what they did. But I do not see them except that they were cursed and transformed into rats, for if you put the milk of a she-camel in front of a rat, it will not drink it, but if the milk of a sheep is put in front of it, it will drink it."
Rats seem very inferior to me. YMMV.
If you subscribe to the theory that freedom, human rights etc always grow as economy grows, all's well and good. Me, I always remember about Nazi Germany.
Part of what undid Nazi Germany is that they wouldn't use the Theory of Relativity because it was the work of a Jew and therefore inferior according to their ideology. As a result, although they did have high technological advancement, it was significantly hampered. I'm not sure why the fundamentalist Muslims don't have a religious problem with nukes for the same reason, perhaps it needs to be pointed out to them.
What I am curious about is why a Spaniard is allowed to do so in Mexico. That's more curious than dubious restrictions on import.
What I am curious about is why you bring this up when he didn't mention a Spaniard.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Hispanic
I have lost three whole afternoons trying to make it work again - when Windows found the new graphic card and installed it automatically in less than a minute. You use what suits you - fine, I'm happy for you - why to you need to start a crusade with each occasion ?
To grow the install base -> to motivate hardware vendor support -> so the graphics card works
The FOSS community can not afford to ignore the FUD and political underhandedness of the major desktop OS company if we want our tools to work, since they have shown themselves determined to prevent competing products form working when possible.
Also, I have just as much trouble using windows as I hear of people having with linux, the issues are just different. I don't have time to spend babysitting an OS either, yet that leads me to prefer linux over windows because that's where my experience is.
You make my point for me quite elegantly!
That's because we agree on the effects, but not the desirability of them, of allowing representative government even for minorities. You seem happy to be a part in the machine, manufactured by the state and bolted into place. Imagine for a moment that you are a living being instead of a part of a machine. That you grow in an environment rather than perform a function in a machine. How much greater are the possibilities?
What is the point of any governing instance if it cannot agree with itself for 5 minutes and actually, you know.. govern things?
There are a multitude of laws that no political party with any representation in my country disagrees on. Go wild then, government, prohibit murder, theft, etc. If it is hard to implement controversial laws, they are more likely to be thoroughly debated rather than forced through. That's a good thing, by the way, it is a way of killing bad ideas.
Last election here in Norway, FrP (if memory serves me right) got more than 33% of the votes. That is pretty damn significant considering the number of big political parties we have here. Still, they were beat by a three-party union because FrP didn't want to comprimize their views to cooperate with someone with whom they don't really agree that much.
So the truth emerges, you don't really want majority rule, you want your minority to rule. Yes, 33% is a minority, even if it is the biggest one.
The result is that this last decade has seen Norway controlled by smaller parties, none of which represent the majority of us voters and who can't agree with each other enough to get anything done.
Apparently none of your politicians has any ideas compelling enough in their logic and benefits to convince the majority. Why do you want a system that makes the implementation of mediocre ideas easier?
I don't know about you, but I sure as hell don't want to live in a country where morons like the above are actually given a fist-full of gravel and pointed at the "machine".
That's one reason to limit government: to lessen the impact the morons have on your life. That said, if you have enough morons to undo your government, your voting rules are probably the least of your problems.
"Majority rules" means just that. If me and 9 friends are having a movie night and 6 of us want to watch The Matrix and the other 4 want to watch 4 other movies, what do you expect we'd end up watching, hm?
Yet you don't want real majority rules, you want 33% to rule the rest. In any case, a group of friends choosing to watch a movie together is a voluntary activity. If the other 4 really don't want to watch the Matrix, I suppose they could do something else. In such a situation the majority are not "ruling" in a way comparable to having others political ideas forced on you.
I do not own a TV station or a newspaper, so no matter how I express myself, I simply cannot reach enough people. Its a waste of my energys to engage in something so futile.
What you need is a counter to let you know how many people read your post, and therefore how wrong you are. How irrationally pessimistic have you become that you post on the internet a comment that you can not reach enough people with a message?
It's not an inalienable right if the government can "alienate" it at will.
That's a misunderstanding of what an inalienable right is, as far as I can tell. The concept is explained in Leviathan http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3207
If you do a text search for "alienable", the first result takes you to the following:
Not All Rights Are Alienable
Whensoever a man Transferreth his Right, or Renounceth it; it is either in consideration of some Right reciprocally transferred to himselfe; or for some other good he hopeth for thereby. For it is a voluntary act: and of the voluntary acts of every man, the object is some Good To Himselfe. And therefore there be some Rights, which no man can be understood by any words, or other signes, to have abandoned, or transferred. As first a man cannot lay down the right of resisting them, that assault him by force, to take away his life; because he cannot be understood to ayme thereby, at any Good to himselfe. The same may be sayd of Wounds, and Chayns, and Imprisonment; both because there is no benefit consequent to such patience; as there is to the patience of suffering another to be wounded, or imprisoned: as also because a man cannot tell, when he seeth men proceed against him by violence, whether they intend his death or not. And lastly the motive, and end for which this renouncing, and transferring or Right is introduced, is nothing else but the security of a mans person, in his life, and in the means of so preserving life, as not to be weary of it. And therefore if a man by words, or other signes, seem to despoyle himselfe of the End, for which those signes were intended; he is not to be understood as if he meant it, or that it was his will; but that he was ignorant of how such words and actions were to be interpreted.
A few paragraphs further on:
A Mans Covenant Not To Defend Himselfe, Is Voyd
A Covenant not to defend my selfe from force, by force, is alwayes voyd. For (as I have shewed before) no man can transferre, or lay down his Right to save himselfe from Death, Wounds, and Imprisonment, (the avoyding whereof is the onely End of laying down any Right,) and therefore the promise of not resisting force, in no Covenant transferreth any right; nor is obliging. For though a man may Covenant thus, "Unlesse I do so, or so, kill me;" he cannot Covenant thus "Unless I do so, or so, I will not resist you, when you come to kill me." For man by nature chooseth the lesser evill, which is danger of death in resisting; rather than the greater, which is certain and present death in not resisting. And this is granted to be true by all men, in that they lead Criminals to Execution, and Prison, with armed men, notwithstanding that such Criminals have consented to the Law, by which they are condemned.
So having an inalienable right to life, for example, does not mean the government can never kill you, it means you can't be understood to be bound to an agreement that costs you your life. It is in "CHAPTER XIV OF THE FIRST AND SECOND NATURALL LAWES, AND OF CONTRACTS".
This only keeps the "honest" registered sex offenders from using these types of sites.
It lowers the bar to get a second conviction. Registered sex offenders who break this law taking reasonable precautions to remain anonymous would be unlikely to ever get caught unless they come to the attention of LEO's pretending to be children. If they are caught online and suspected of grooming kids, it makes it much easier to obtain sufficient evidence of a criminal act.
This post should not be taken as support for this law.
If it's legal to store backup copies of your discs, but you can't legally buy a tool to make them, it seems that the only way to exercise your fair use rights is to download backup copies from BitTorrent and similar services.
Indeed. As far as I understand the law in my own country, there would be less penalty for downloading a movie without paying at all than there would for ripping a copy from a legally purchased DVD. You would be facing a lawsuit rather than criminal charges. It's ridiculous.
Writing one yourself would be considered "manufacturing".
DeCSS code is protected speech http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/5020.cfm
I think compiling would be the manufacturing step. Writing it would still be speech.
The thing doesn't even have a furnace. I mean, really, how can you kill anyone with that?
killall -9 anyone
RTFM. People like you drive me nuts, if you can't be bothered to do anything to solve your own problem why should I help you for nothing. Don't bother me with any more questions like this.
Nobody is going to put you in the GNU/Death Camps.
So you admit they exist then.
You are correct, nobody will put you in them. Indeed, you must assemble the GNU/Death Camp yourself. The chain-link fence, razor wire, etc. are available for you to use under the terms of the GNU/DCL. If you are having trouble with assembly or use of GNU/Death Camps, don't even think about posting questions here unless you've RTFM, googled it and searched the mailing list archives.
Actually I would disagree. I dare say that a person's credit history might be an excellent way to look at how a person manages their tasks/duties.
[snip]
Thoughts?
I was thinking that if they're under financial pressure they'd likely be willing to work overtime when required and probably very motivated to keep their job. Didn't you hear about the GFC? Even in good times though, bad credit rating alone is not enough to tell you if it was due their lack of management skills etc.
Did I refer to anything other than this specific case?
Yes, you said "The only reason to mod a console for MOST people, not the nerds on /., is to play pirated games."
Well the Australian High Court, who tried the case, decided unanimously that you are wrong. They reasoned regarding the motivation of those placing the region encoding restrictions in the products though: "In effect, and apparently intentionally, those restrictions reduce global market competition. They inhibit rights ordinarily acquired by Australian owners of chattels to use and adapt the same, once acquired, to their advantage and for their use as they see fit."
Text of the decision http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/high_ct/2005/58.html
So in FACT, they decided that everyone has a valid reason to use a mod chip, that being to enable them to play a game legally bought from another region (should they ever choose to purchase one).
The reason I referred to the issue as "hair-splitting" is because arguing over whether copyright violation is or isn't theft, for the most part, doesn't get one anywhere in the discussion of whether it's a valid action or not - whether or not it should be criminal, for instance. Calling copyright violation "theft" imposes a judgement that it should be considered criminal: but not calling it theft doesn't imply that it shouldn't be considered a crime.
If calling it theft defines the outcome then the argument over whether to call it theft is not hair-splitting. Effectively what you say here is that if you use the word theft, judgement made, case closed, if you don't, it's open to discussion. In order to discuss the issue without a predefined conclusion it is necessary to stop calling it theft.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hair+splitting
-noun
1. the making of unnecessarily fine distinctions.
A distinction that defines the outcome of an argument before it takes place is not "unnecessarily fine".
There's a difference between actually paying for something, and stealing it. If you don't pay for it, you stole it. It's EXTREMELY simple
So you would take the position that I stole the linux distribution I use? I didn't pay for it. What about the air I'm breathing? I didn't pay for that either. It would seem that there is at least one more level of complexity to the issue than you acknowledge in your post.
the only reason he was modding consoles was for people to play games they had pirated and didn't pay a dime for.
So say you. The Australian High Court and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission think otherwise.
Describing the decision as a win for console owners, ACCC chairman Professor Allan Fels said Sony's arguments had failed because the copyright protection measures used by Sony placed limitations on the right of console owners to play games they had purchased overseas.
-The ACCC has long believed that region coding is detrimental to consumer welfare as it severely limits consumer choice and, in some cases, access to competitively priced goods. The ACCC was concerned to ensure that technology which can overcome these unfair restrictions remains generally available for consumer use," Fels said.
Windows is very popular in China and you can bet most installations are pirated.
I wonder what the trade deficit would be if they actually respected our intellectual property and paid the going rate for it instead of stealing it? Funny how we pay them for their stuff but not the other way around.....
Yeah, come back to us when you've paid out for all those US treasury bill the Chinese have. Not with money that's been inflated to be worthless either. The US industrialised while not acknowledging foreign patents and copyrights. Thanks for the example you set, US. Don't you think you prosper more by doing business with wealthy countries? Lay off on the international IP thing, at least for developing countries, it'll be better for all of us in the long run.
Isn't democracy in it self a way of silencing minority views?
No. Minorities often don't get their way, which is ok. Only states aiming for totalitarianism require the minority view to be silenced.
If less than 5% of the population agree with you enough to vote for your party, you shouldn't really be allowed to control anything at all. You're representing a pretty insignificant minority, not the general public.
One person in every twenty probably don't consider themselves insignificant. The Bundestag has 611 members if wikipedia serves me well. If a party got 2% of the vote, why don't they get 12 seats? It's hardly putting them in control, what's the problem with hearing what they have got to say? Is a dissenting view really so threatening? If you don't allow any party with less than 5% to get a seat, you could have 10 minor parties at 4% and have 40% of your population unrepresented with that system.
People like you are gravel in the gears.
Well, I don't think that's flamebait, it's a pretty good representation of my intentions. Democracy itself as implemented was a bunch of people throwing gravel in the gears of the King. The whole system of government is based on making it difficult to get things done. So much quicker and more efficient when the King could just say "Off with his head" without need for those costly, time consuming trials and such. Getting a decision on a law? Used to be the King just issued an edict, if you spoke against it, the consequences were your own fault. None of this messy "parliamentary debate" and "media coverage of issues" that makes things so difficult now! What would Germany be like if Luther hadn't thrown gravel in the Catholic churches gears?
What is really more disturbing, that I want to throw gravel in the gears of a machine that I believe will inevitably work to transform itself into a totalitarian state, or that you see society as a machine, are quite happy with that and presumably realise you are a part in that machine? Who engineered you, friend, who convinced you that you had a purpose in the machine and bolted you in there?
Do you seriously think everyone with an opinion should have the right to directly influence things?
I believe everyone with an opinion has a right to voice it. Naturally those who are unable to convince the majority will have limited success influencing society.
Sorry if I completely failed to understand your point. I'd rather have a government that does it's very best to steer the country in the direction the general mass of the people is pushing, instead of a government that goes absolutely nowhere because it tries to cater to everyones needs at the same time!
I think perhaps you understood my point, but not the reasoning behind it. I've been given very few reasons to trust authority in my life. I don't want the government steering me, I'll steer myself, thanks very much. If the rest of society doesn't want to go that way, I guess they'll end up somewhere different to me, but how will they know if my opinion is silenced? Perhaps more people would agree with minority views if they heard them. As for the government catering to needs, I'm ok if they don't cater to my needs, just also don't get in the way as I cater to the needs of my family and myself.
liar ... inbreeding ... hypocrite ... redneck ... sickos like you ... mentally disturbed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominum
An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the man", "argument against the man") consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to a characteristic or belief of the person making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim.
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/25005,australian-high-court-rules-in-favour-of-modders.aspx
The High Court of Australia has ruled that Australian consumers and overseas travellers can buy cheaper computer games and hardware offshore and modify them locally.
Or to be able to play legally bought games from other markets. Damn those thieving consumers, wanting to use their legally purchased but cheaper products!
Gadens added in its statement that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) had stepped in as a friend of the court at Federal Court level to argue that regional coding was detrimental to consumer choice.
global population is increasing at an unsustainable rate and eventually something will have to be done to curb that in order to maintain any reasonable quality of life.
As far as I'm aware, pretty much every industrialised country has close to zero natural population growth. Continue the process of industrialisation and education across the world and this is likely a self-solving problem.
Is that a ways off? Maybe, but why wait until something is a problem to open the dialogue on it? It doesn't hurt to talk about the difficult choices that will have to be made in the future.
I'm partaking in the dialogue, you just don't like my contribution. As to whether those choices have to be made, that is very much unproven. Global warming may yet bring us to the point that much more of the world is a tropical environment, boosting food production to the point that we could have a much larger population. We're not exactly in the world's most fertile period right now you know. We could get back to that if we put enough carbon dioxide into the atmosphere though.
Regarding "sustainable": no rate of increase is sustainable given limited resources, unless you think we will populate space. "Sustainable" is a red herring. Any rate of increase will eventually result in overpopulation, any rate of decrease will eventually result in extinction. Maybe there will be periods of increase and decrease. Just consider the possibility that it won't require a totalitarian state implementing a eugenics program to make that happen.