You've reminded me of something my economics teacher once taught me. He mentioned a survey which asked:
"Which of these options is better for the United States Economy:
A. U.S. GDP rises 4% and Japan's rises 12%
B. U.S. GDP rises 2% and Japan's rises 1%"
Most respondents picked B.
It's more like the federal government declaring that a mile is now exactly 1.6 km, instead of 1.609344km. It's not Ford's fault that the definition of a mile has changed- they didn't issue faulty speedometers, the government changed things on them long after their speedometers were built, installed, and sold.
They may be getting paid less than they were, but I'm not sure that qualifies as being 'substandard' pay. Since the 'tech bubble' caused overinflated salaries for IT people (which I think most people, even those in IT, would agree with) then the end of the bubble means that salaries return to a reasonable value. Everyone I know in IT, including myself, is making plenty of money, so I'm not seeing a problem. Finding your first job out of college can be a pain, since everyone seems to want people with experience- but once you're in you have a lot of options to choose from.
I'm not entirely sure why so many people believe that hiring an American is somehow more virtuous than hiring a foreigner. Is it just thinly disguised racism? A belief that Americans are more worthy of a job because of where they happened to be born? Or is it just a fear that they aren't as qualified for their own job as someone else could be?
Because Aliens are busy sitting at home experiencing virtual realities. Once computer simulations reach a certain point, you can create a universe bigger and more entertaining than the real one.
I didn't realize that the US passports were being wrapped in foil- that makes it much more difficult for random people to access your tag. As my post (hopefully) shows, there are reasons why you don't want random people having access to your full name, much less any additional data.
That broadcasts your information. This makes it so much easier to stalk people you've just met! Of course, if I was a criminal I'd just use this to make a list of people going on a nice long overseas flight... plenty of time to stop by their house and help myself to a few things.
Couldn't I fire an alcoholic who drinks on the job? Or a cokehead who snorts at work? Why couldn't I fire a sex chat addict who is chatting up "girls" instead of working? (Of course, this is coming from someone posting on/. instead of working... hmm... )
Many ants (as an example) will herd aphids, and care for aphids much like humans care for cows. Other species care for acacia trees, to the point where they kill off competing plants in the area to maximize the survival chances of the acacia. Admittedly, these ants are instictivly acting to ensure their own survival, but another species benefits.
Actually old-school chess had 'Councilors' instead of queens, that could only move diagonally 1 space foward and back. Since pawns could only turn into Councilors, the game was saying 'if you start out as a pawn, you can't get very far'. Nothing controversial about that.
The Big problem is that parent is a troll
on
Saving U.S. Science
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· Score: 1
"A simple bankers rule of thumb will come into play here. You have to earn 2x your debt in order to live on it. That means a US Graduate needs a starting salary for a BS Degree of about $80,000 to live. Only an idiot couldn't see the impossibility here."
Yes, and that means that if I have a debt of $1000 I'll need $2000 a year to live on. Oh, wait, no it doesn't! I don't know where he gets this "Simple Banker's rule of thumb" But he's totally wrong. Even with $40,000 in debt you can live well above the poverty line on $30,000 a year- it's not like you have to pay it all off your first year out of college. Also, I think pretty much everything else he says in his post is completely wrong, stupid, or written by a crackhead.
For instance:
If you grow up in the USA and get a CS type degree whether you use debt or income you have to pay for your degree by using DOMESTICALLY TAXED income that equals about $250,000 of taxes by the time you graduate from time of birth. I think he's trying to say that raising a child for the first 25 years of life costs the U.S. Government $250,000 dollars- a ridculous number, averaging over $10,000 a year. Where he's getting that number from seems to be the cost that PARENTS pay to raise their own children in the United States, not the cost paid by the U.S. Government. I'm not sure how that's relevant to the discussion... Of course U.S. parents spend more on their kids, they have the money to do so. If I'm making less than $10000 a year, I can't spend it all on my kids.
And, of course, he advocates trade barriers on foreign goods to 'save' the US economy. But how can you argue with eloquence like:
If you push the classic educate etc and R&D solution you only accelerate the decline of the USA as all new products displace the old the trade goes to the location over seas displacing the domestic work. It is a suicide pill. Drink the cool aid folks if you doubt this one!
(Numbers are approximate, they didn't have exact numbers in the article)
DS (600K+) > XBox360 (500K++) > PS2 (500K+) > Wii (500K) > PSP (350K) > PS3 (~200K)
It looks like the PS2 and the Xbox 360 are both outselling the new consoles- which is surprising to me. Still, it seems Nintendo is the big winner, since they are selling an average of two games per Wii on top of actually selling a console for a profit. Microsoft seems to be doing a lot better with their 360 sales than I expected they would- I guess people decided getting a Wii or PS3 wasn't worth the effort when there was an good console readily available.
The article actually mentions that there were people with negative wealth in developed countries- mostly caused by massive credit card debt, as you described. That's why buying a house is usually vastly superior to renting- while you pay slightly more per month, most of the money becomes assets- while renting only gives short-term benefit.
Look at it this way- would you rather live in 1980 on your present salary or 2006 on your present salary? Sure, in 1980 your salary could buy a nicer house, but there would be no internet, no cell phones, 25 years of lost medical advances, and hugely expensive computers. I would prefer living in a society where even the 'poor' have access to cheap, useful technology.
If I have a Million-dollar house, and I have 20% of it paid off, then my net assests are ($1,000,000-$800,000)=$200,000. I could sell the house today for $1 million, pay off my debts, and have $200,000 in the bank. To put it another way- I own 20% of a million-dollar house, and the bank owns the rest. Therefore, I own $200,000 of a house- and that's worth a lot more than some dirty shirt.
I'm a double major (math and CS) and I'd like to think that I can program AND do math. In fact, my job requires both! The purpose of math in CS degrees is to encourage logic, pattern-recognition, and problem-solving, things a good coder needs. Admittedly, most programmers won't ever use advanced math. Even I don't use calculus on the job- just very interesting trig.
I don't see how 'Because he's $GROUP' is an emotional argument. The horrific acts of $GROUP throughout history are well documented. It's hard to find any $GROUP who were good, so why take a chance?
If you pick any category of people that's been around long enough, you can find horrible atrocities they committed. Whether you pick based on religion, ethnicity, or social class, you can find some monsters. Likewise, in any sufficiently large group of people you can find some decent, likable guys. Claiming that because individuals in $GROUP has done bad things in the past, a different individual in $GROUP will do bad things in the future is a fallacy.
Actually, what I've heard suggests that the 360 will actually be profitable for Microsoft, and earn them money for a change. Furthermore, the Xbox 360 (so far) has sold the most units of any next-gen system. You can claim that PS3's will eventually win out over the 360, but if the PS3 continues to have supply issues, that can't happen. Even if the supply issues are fixed, it looks like Microsoft will be turning a profit long before the PS3 ever will.
Of course, Microsoft could turn more profit than Sony and have less marketshare- just like the Xbox had more marketshare than the gamecube but fewer profits. Sony could pull ahead from 3rd place where it currently is, but that won't happen until at least march of next year, and won't realistically happen until a year from now (if it happens at all). There's just not enough PS3s manufactured.
To sum up:
1. Nintendo's making the most money.
2. Microsoft has the most next-gen marketshare
And Sony isn't making enough systems to ever hit #1 or #2.
This isn't a rip on Sony's console, it just doesn't matter how good their system is if they can't sell it.
Note that I say 'Most people see frats...'. Obviously not all people in frats are morons, just like all morons are not in frats. Still, people who flunk out of college because they partied instead of studying are morons. If all you want to do is party don't go to college in the first place.
Honestly, that's why we mock frats right there. Most people see frats as a group of morons who focus on getting drunk and laid, so they pool their resources to throw as many keggers as possible in a semester. (I know there are frats who don't meet that description, but they are in the minority). I think the 'buying your friends' charge is just silly, though- just because you're in a group doesn't mean they will be your friends.
Slashdot Mirror
You've reminded me of something my economics teacher once taught me. He mentioned a survey which asked:
"Which of these options is better for the United States Economy:
A. U.S. GDP rises 4% and Japan's rises 12%
B. U.S. GDP rises 2% and Japan's rises 1%"
Most respondents picked B.
It's more like the federal government declaring that a mile is now exactly 1.6 km, instead of 1.609344km. It's not Ford's fault that the definition of a mile has changed- they didn't issue faulty speedometers, the government changed things on them long after their speedometers were built, installed, and sold.
They may be getting paid less than they were, but I'm not sure that qualifies as being 'substandard' pay. Since the 'tech bubble' caused overinflated salaries for IT people (which I think most people, even those in IT, would agree with) then the end of the bubble means that salaries return to a reasonable value. Everyone I know in IT, including myself, is making plenty of money, so I'm not seeing a problem. Finding your first job out of college can be a pain, since everyone seems to want people with experience- but once you're in you have a lot of options to choose from.
I'm not entirely sure why so many people believe that hiring an American is somehow more virtuous than hiring a foreigner. Is it just thinly disguised racism? A belief that Americans are more worthy of a job because of where they happened to be born? Or is it just a fear that they aren't as qualified for their own job as someone else could be?
Because Aliens are busy sitting at home experiencing virtual realities. Once computer simulations reach a certain point, you can create a universe bigger and more entertaining than the real one.
I didn't realize that the US passports were being wrapped in foil- that makes it much more difficult for random people to access your tag. As my post (hopefully) shows, there are reasons why you don't want random people having access to your full name, much less any additional data.
That broadcasts your information. This makes it so much easier to stalk people you've just met! Of course, if I was a criminal I'd just use this to make a list of people going on a nice long overseas flight... plenty of time to stop by their house and help myself to a few things.
But if you could patent using tumeric for treating disease isn't that insane? Especially if it has been done for hundreds of years?
There are both software and hardware solutions that do similar things already.
(Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with either company, but have used some of both company's techonology at work.)
If I want to compare every combination of 2 distinct laws out of N laws, it will take me N(N-1)/2 comparisons to do so, which is O(N^2).
Couldn't I fire an alcoholic who drinks on the job? Or a cokehead who snorts at work? Why couldn't I fire a sex chat addict who is chatting up "girls" instead of working? (Of course, this is coming from someone posting on /. instead of working... hmm... )
Many ants (as an example) will herd aphids, and care for aphids much like humans care for cows. Other species care for acacia trees, to the point where they kill off competing plants in the area to maximize the survival chances of the acacia. Admittedly, these ants are instictivly acting to ensure their own survival, but another species benefits.
Actually old-school chess had 'Councilors' instead of queens, that could only move diagonally 1 space foward and back. Since pawns could only turn into Councilors, the game was saying 'if you start out as a pawn, you can't get very far'. Nothing controversial about that.
Yes, and that means that if I have a debt of $1000 I'll need $2000 a year to live on. Oh, wait, no it doesn't! I don't know where he gets this "Simple Banker's rule of thumb" But he's totally wrong. Even with $40,000 in debt you can live well above the poverty line on $30,000 a year- it's not like you have to pay it all off your first year out of college. Also, I think pretty much everything else he says in his post is completely wrong, stupid, or written by a crackhead.
For instance: If you grow up in the USA and get a CS type degree whether you use debt or income you have to pay for your degree by using DOMESTICALLY TAXED income that equals about $250,000 of taxes by the time you graduate from time of birth. I think he's trying to say that raising a child for the first 25 years of life costs the U.S. Government $250,000 dollars- a ridculous number, averaging over $10,000 a year. Where he's getting that number from seems to be the cost that PARENTS pay to raise their own children in the United States, not the cost paid by the U.S. Government. I'm not sure how that's relevant to the discussion... Of course U.S. parents spend more on their kids, they have the money to do so. If I'm making less than $10000 a year, I can't spend it all on my kids.
And, of course, he advocates trade barriers on foreign goods to 'save' the US economy. But how can you argue with eloquence like: If you push the classic educate etc and R&D solution you only accelerate the decline of the USA as all new products displace the old the trade goes to the location over seas displacing the domestic work. It is a suicide pill. Drink the cool aid folks if you doubt this one!
(Numbers are approximate, they didn't have exact numbers in the article)
DS (600K+) > XBox360 (500K++) > PS2 (500K+) > Wii (500K) > PSP (350K) > PS3 (~200K)
It looks like the PS2 and the Xbox 360 are both outselling the new consoles- which is surprising to me. Still, it seems Nintendo is the big winner, since they are selling an average of two games per Wii on top of actually selling a console for a profit. Microsoft seems to be doing a lot better with their 360 sales than I expected they would- I guess people decided getting a Wii or PS3 wasn't worth the effort when there was an good console readily available.
The article actually mentions that there were people with negative wealth in developed countries- mostly caused by massive credit card debt, as you described. That's why buying a house is usually vastly superior to renting- while you pay slightly more per month, most of the money becomes assets- while renting only gives short-term benefit.
Look at it this way- would you rather live in 1980 on your present salary or 2006 on your present salary? Sure, in 1980 your salary could buy a nicer house, but there would be no internet, no cell phones, 25 years of lost medical advances, and hugely expensive computers. I would prefer living in a society where even the 'poor' have access to cheap, useful technology.
If I have a Million-dollar house, and I have 20% of it paid off, then my net assests are ($1,000,000-$800,000)=$200,000. I could sell the house today for $1 million, pay off my debts, and have $200,000 in the bank. To put it another way- I own 20% of a million-dollar house, and the bank owns the rest. Therefore, I own $200,000 of a house- and that's worth a lot more than some dirty shirt.
I'm a double major (math and CS) and I'd like to think that I can program AND do math. In fact, my job requires both! The purpose of math in CS degrees is to encourage logic, pattern-recognition, and problem-solving, things a good coder needs. Admittedly, most programmers won't ever use advanced math. Even I don't use calculus on the job- just very interesting trig.
This is not common enough, even on /.
I don't see how 'Because he's $GROUP' is an emotional argument. The horrific acts of $GROUP throughout history are well documented. It's hard to find any $GROUP who were good, so why take a chance?
If you pick any category of people that's been around long enough, you can find horrible atrocities they committed. Whether you pick based on religion, ethnicity, or social class, you can find some monsters. Likewise, in any sufficiently large group of people you can find some decent, likable guys. Claiming that because individuals in $GROUP has done bad things in the past, a different individual in $GROUP will do bad things in the future is a fallacy.
Actually, what I've heard suggests that the 360 will actually be profitable for Microsoft, and earn them money for a change. Furthermore, the Xbox 360 (so far) has sold the most units of any next-gen system. You can claim that PS3's will eventually win out over the 360, but if the PS3 continues to have supply issues, that can't happen. Even if the supply issues are fixed, it looks like Microsoft will be turning a profit long before the PS3 ever will.
Of course, Microsoft could turn more profit than Sony and have less marketshare- just like the Xbox had more marketshare than the gamecube but fewer profits. Sony could pull ahead from 3rd place where it currently is, but that won't happen until at least march of next year, and won't realistically happen until a year from now (if it happens at all). There's just not enough PS3s manufactured.
To sum up:
1. Nintendo's making the most money.
2. Microsoft has the most next-gen marketshare
And Sony isn't making enough systems to ever hit #1 or #2.
This isn't a rip on Sony's console, it just doesn't matter how good their system is if they can't sell it.
Note that I say 'Most people see frats...'. Obviously not all people in frats are morons, just like all morons are not in frats. Still, people who flunk out of college because they partied instead of studying are morons. If all you want to do is party don't go to college in the first place.
Honestly, that's why we mock frats right there. Most people see frats as a group of morons who focus on getting drunk and laid, so they pool their resources to throw as many keggers as possible in a semester. (I know there are frats who don't meet that description, but they are in the minority). I think the 'buying your friends' charge is just silly, though- just because you're in a group doesn't mean they will be your friends.
Zelda: Twilight Princess won't be out for GameCube until Dec. 8th, if memory serves. This only refers to Wii purchases.