Constitutionally, it's just him and the VP, standing around outside somewhere. He does have the constitutional power to sign bills into law, so legally he probably demand, in the courts, that Congress budget him a pen or other writing utensil. But that's it.
Not to be terribly pedantic, but this isn't quite accurate. He doesn't have the power to sign bills into law. He has ten days (minus Sundays) to look at a bill after it's passed by congress before it automatically gets passed.
What he has is the power to veto bills, which is the only reason he has need for a pen.
Methylene blue was used at the end of the century as a successful treatment for malaria. It disappeared as an anti-malarial during the wars in Asia, as U.S. soldiers disliked its two inevitable, fully reversible side effects: green urine and blue sclera.
Am I the only one who thinks it'd be pretty cool to look like I'm on melange?
Considering how contagious ebola is, you'd also be putting a swift and dramatic end to the lives of everyone else around you. We're only fortunate that we can't get it through airborne transmission. Monkeys can though, so it's only a matter of time.
Ebola is seriously not something to mess with. Give me alzheimers any day.
The desktop so quickly gets cluttered with so many program shortcuts, files and folders, and file and folder shortcuts that it becomes a nightmare within weeks. The start menu at least has only applications and application-related links.
Some people really do treat their desktop the same way they treat their desk top.
Yes, this is a trademark issue. As it is, Hasbro does have to protect their "Scrabble" trademark if they want to keep it. There are better and worse ways of doing so through, and I'm pretty sure this isn't one of the better ways.
The timing of the matter is a little suspicious if trademark was the focus of the suit. IANAL, but since Hasbro didn't have any competing product in Facebook until the lawsuit, I think the Scrabulous guys can get away with not paying much damages if they quickly changed their name to something entirely unrelated and re-released it. After all, it's not like they outright called their product "Scrabble."
The American system is vastly better in this respect, and as a result I think it works a lot better at teaching creativity and free thinking, as well as adapting to each person's individual needs.
I'm not sure how you got the second half from the first, but it doesn't really follow. Have you ever heard of the concept that too many choices are not better for a person, but worse? See, they did this experiment where they put a varying number of different flavors of a certain product on a supermarket shelf, to see how many people bought the product. Well, what they found was that naturally, as more flavors were introduced, more people were likely to buy, as the extra variations filled the niche that different people desire. Then, to their surprise, as they kept increasing the amount of flavors, the number of people who bought the product actually started dropping sharply.
What these researchers found out was that too many choices confused people, so that they ended up frustrated, threw their arms up into the air, and left to buy something else altogether.
The US education system is like that, if you only look at the good parts. That is, the open-endedness of the system, the ability to go anywhere and do anything. The education system reflects the idea of the American dream.
Unfortunately, the bad parts significantly outnumber the good parts. The nannying. The whole idea that there are no winners or losers anymore. The bullying. The typecasting and stereotyping.
Part of it has to do with television. Kids these days watch a lot of TV. Kids are immensely impressionable. What has been happening is that kids are now mimicking behaviors they see on television. Television shows that feature jocks and nerds and such aren't a reflection of reality anymore, reality is actually reflecting television. Well, it's not so simple, as such behaviors have been around for the longest time, since the first time one man of one color killed another man of a darker color just because the second man was darker. But, television reinforces it, makes it seem like that's how things are and ought to be. And so instead of things getting better (which is what a good system is supposed to be), they're getting worse.
And it's worse for math and science. Television likes to show the science-loving students as the rejects, the outcasts. They tend to have the "cool," good-looking ones that everyone wants to be as the stupid ones. The entire idea of jocks stems from this. Why can't someone be well studied and physically excellent? So kids, consciously or unconsciously gravitate towards the cool end of the spectrum, by dumbing themselves down. It's most noticeable in girls, where popularity effectively means being dumb. People wonder why there's such a drop-off of interest in science among young girls. Yes, they're discouraged from match and science by old schoolers, but that should mean that they're putting their vast intellect to other uses. But they're not doing that either. They're dumbing themselves down to be more likable and more popular among the jock-type boys who act stupid and don't bother trying to become smart because the think that's how they're supposed to be.
Part of the problem has to do with the nanny state. I read somewhere that it is the rise of feminism, and the feminism of society that's destroying all of the fun in life. Everything has to be 100% safe now. Everything needs a label. And if anybody gets so much as a scratch on the playground, it's time to bring out the lawyers. And this idea of babying every child has extended to emotions as well. Children don't win or lose anymore. Now the winner goes home happy and the loser sues for emotional distress. Actually, the loser doesn't sue, the loser's parents sue. So what this means is that nobody knows their strengths and weaknesses, because suddenly everybody seems to be equally good at everything.
Yeah, it's great that a future tailor thinks he has the same chance of becoming a medical surgeon as a future medical
Yeah, I'm sure everyone knows someone. That, by no means, is evidence of any trend whatsoever. I know someone who's into snuff films. But that by no means indicates a rising popularity of snuff films. I can replace "Snuff films" with almost anything and it'll still hold true.
Fact of the matter is that summer blockbusters that are done decently well and marketed well are largely immune to any effects downloading might or might not have to movie going. In fact, look at Iron Man. Poorly marketed, but very well received. Now contrast that with Meet Dave. I don't know if Meet Dave is in the newsgroups yet, but I know that the acquaintance of mine who doesn't go to movies because of downloading will never watch it.
Simply speaking, a good movie will draw viewers to the box office. A bad one won't. Piracy has no effect on ticket sales either way. The only effect piracy has on a movie's revenue stream is on DVD sales, and only because DVD's are so grossly overpriced.
There's a big difference between something mostly works, and mostly doesn't work. Joe's drug mostly works. A bad movie is one that mostly doesn't work.
When something mostly works, and it doesn't work for you when you try it because of the marketing hype, it's call being unlucky. When something mostly doesn't work, it's called being lied to. Quite frankly, I'd rather be unlucky than lied to.
It's not urbanization that's the problem, it's suburbanization.
Everybody wants their 3000 sq. ft. home, which needs to be heated in the winter and cooled in the summer. If everyone used to live in a 1000 sq. ft. apartment, then home energy consumption per capita has gone up 3 times. Compound that with the fact that an apartment building tends to be more efficient at heating 1000 families than 1000 houses, and it gets worse.
On top of that, in surburbia, everybody needs a car for transportation. An urban family might have one car per four or five people, for special occasions. They'd walk or take mass transit to do their daily tasks. In surburbia, they'd have two or three per four or five people, and even if not, they have to travel much greater distances to get to their destination (10-15 miles vs. 2-3 miles). Again, transportation energy consumption has gone up 3 times.
There are reasons for "greening" up urban areas. Reducing energy consumption and rising energy costs are not among them.
First time, I read that as "guy with a hand towel." And I thought to myself, if one could dig, sieve, and operate a vibrator with a towel, then Douglas Adams was right!
Then I reread your comment, and it wasn't nearly as inspiring anymore.
Let's see among the major corporations in the technology sector and outside, who will defend this new position, and will speak out against it (or not speak at all, for that matter). Then we'll really see which companies are evil, and which ones truly have large software patent portfolios only for self-defense purposes.
Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, Oracle, IBM, HP, Cisco, TI, Intel, AMD, Nvidia, Sony, Nokia, Nintendo, I'm looking at you guys.
Better yet, ask them for a definition of a hero. See whether they come up with a vague, idol-type of definition, or whether they can consciously make the distinction. I would give you that if they could figure out the more specific definition of hero even if it took them hours or days, that they would fall into the category of knowing what hero means. But I think most people would present the vague one and call it quits.
It's like the short video experiment on seeing how many college students know the definition of suffrage by asking them to sign a petition against women's suffrage. A few actually ask what suffrage means, and some even know the definition of the word, but the majority just sign and assume suffrage means suffering.
Just because something is hovering at the edge of our consciousness doesn't mean we're actually conscious of it. And the farther a concept leaves our consciousness, the faster it disappears.
Quite frankly, I don't think anyone who knows and respects the idea of a hero would use the word so nonchalantly. It's the notion of having a "common" usage, and the rise of this usage, that I maintain insults true heroes. Certainly, you are entitled to your ad hominem as you see fit, but even if I am being pedantic, I think this is something worthy of being pedantic for.
Unfortunately, I have to disagree. The average person really doesn't have a good idea of what constitutes heroism. The average person has the vague idea that somebody who does something unusual worthy of acclaimation is a hero, but I don't think most people would be able to get very far beyond that. The media's purposeful distortion of the word for the sake of sensationalism doesn't help at all. But when producing a deliverable on-time and within budget can be heroic to a, I presume, well-educated person as in TFA, I think it is rather illustrative of the sad state of the people indeed.
Not to pick on you specifically, but you're the perfect example of someone whose understanding of hero is by and large accurate, but vague.
Heroes are people (or animals, sentient creatures to be most broad) recognized for putting their lives on the line to do something meaningful for others. Heroes sometimes are rewarded for their actions with only death--not even success necessarily. And yes, there are various degrees of heroism, and to further complicate matters, various degrees of recognition for heroism.
As well, there's a distinction between being heroic, brave, and plain foolhardy, though by no means are the former and latter two attributes mutally exclusive. In particular, heroic acts are done for the benefit of others, often with no or highly disproportionate previously agreed upon compensation. Brave and foolhardy acts, whose distinction lies in whether the actor is competent or otherise, do not have this additonal stipulation.
Any use of hero in a context outside of such a situation not only dilutes the meaning of heroism, but insults the people who are truly heroes. As for why such a dilution happened in the first place, I suspect it has to do with the common aphorism, "You're my hero!" which is indended to mean, "I aspire to be like you." The common use of the phrase, corrupted "hero" to mean anyone who is worthy of anyone's idolatry.
To directly reply, it doesn't really matter whether someone is a professional or an amateur, so long as the intended effect is accomplished. Granted, amateurs are less likely to assist because they know they're more often a liability than of any actual help. But putting on a uniform does not automatically make someone a hero, and vice versa, the lack of formal training doesn't automatically disqualify someone from being a hero or doing something heroic. In fact, I'd argue having a uniform would actually raise the bar for heroism, as most actions considered heroic if done by a passerby would be merely a part of the job for a trained and paid professional. And yes, politicians are the farthest removed from any standard of heroism, as much as anyone else who sits in an armchair and does little else but talk.
I was agreeing with you up until your wifi part. Using somebody else's wifi isn't necessarily stealing their bandwidth. They'd have to be on one of those ridiculous pay per GB plans for it to be stealing. Otherwise, it'd just be using somebody else's wifi. If they didn't want you to use it, they would've locked it, or kicked you out and then locked it (and yes, the unlocked front door analogy works here).
It's stealing if you take a newspaper from a newstand without paying for the newspaper. It's stealing if you take somebody's wallet, or even something as innocous as a comb, out of their purse. Intellectual property cannot be stolen, the temporary right to monopoly granted by the government can only be infringed upon.
Calling ID a philosophy is an insult to all philosophers and thinkers. ID is, at best, a mythology, a fiction, some fanciful story some guy told that got written down. It's like the stories you tell at the bar over a beer, they might be true, they might be made up, but nobody knows and nobody cares. They're just stories.
Philosophy is a method of thinking, perceiving, judging, and acting. Philosophy describes a way of life, or describes aspects thereof. Philosophical writings are not stories, though stories can contain a philosophical message, which the bible and most other holy books do.
It already is. But the FBI have more important matters to deal with than to bust a few kids downloading a CD. Like terrorists. And illegal immigrants. And terrorists.
Slashdot Mirror
You know it's bad when people stop faulting the editors for editorial mistakes and start blaming the submitter.
Constitutionally, it's just him and the VP, standing around outside somewhere. He does have the constitutional power to sign bills into law, so legally he probably demand, in the courts, that Congress budget him a pen or other writing utensil. But that's it.
Not to be terribly pedantic, but this isn't quite accurate. He doesn't have the power to sign bills into law. He has ten days (minus Sundays) to look at a bill after it's passed by congress before it automatically gets passed.
What he has is the power to veto bills, which is the only reason he has need for a pen.
Don't even get me started on pocket vetoes...
From the wikipedia article:
Methylene blue was used at the end of the century as a successful treatment for malaria. It disappeared as an anti-malarial during the wars in Asia, as U.S. soldiers disliked its two inevitable, fully reversible side effects: green urine and blue sclera.
Am I the only one who thinks it'd be pretty cool to look like I'm on melange?
Considering how contagious ebola is, you'd also be putting a swift and dramatic end to the lives of everyone else around you. We're only fortunate that we can't get it through airborne transmission. Monkeys can though, so it's only a matter of time.
Ebola is seriously not something to mess with. Give me alzheimers any day.
The desktop so quickly gets cluttered with so many program shortcuts, files and folders, and file and folder shortcuts that it becomes a nightmare within weeks. The start menu at least has only applications and application-related links.
Some people really do treat their desktop the same way they treat their desk top.
Yes, this is a trademark issue. As it is, Hasbro does have to protect their "Scrabble" trademark if they want to keep it. There are better and worse ways of doing so through, and I'm pretty sure this isn't one of the better ways.
The timing of the matter is a little suspicious if trademark was the focus of the suit. IANAL, but since Hasbro didn't have any competing product in Facebook until the lawsuit, I think the Scrabulous guys can get away with not paying much damages if they quickly changed their name to something entirely unrelated and re-released it. After all, it's not like they outright called their product "Scrabble."
The American system is vastly better in this respect, and as a result I think it works a lot better at teaching creativity and free thinking, as well as adapting to each person's individual needs.
I'm not sure how you got the second half from the first, but it doesn't really follow. Have you ever heard of the concept that too many choices are not better for a person, but worse? See, they did this experiment where they put a varying number of different flavors of a certain product on a supermarket shelf, to see how many people bought the product. Well, what they found was that naturally, as more flavors were introduced, more people were likely to buy, as the extra variations filled the niche that different people desire. Then, to their surprise, as they kept increasing the amount of flavors, the number of people who bought the product actually started dropping sharply.
What these researchers found out was that too many choices confused people, so that they ended up frustrated, threw their arms up into the air, and left to buy something else altogether.
The US education system is like that, if you only look at the good parts. That is, the open-endedness of the system, the ability to go anywhere and do anything. The education system reflects the idea of the American dream.
Unfortunately, the bad parts significantly outnumber the good parts. The nannying. The whole idea that there are no winners or losers anymore. The bullying. The typecasting and stereotyping.
Part of it has to do with television. Kids these days watch a lot of TV. Kids are immensely impressionable. What has been happening is that kids are now mimicking behaviors they see on television. Television shows that feature jocks and nerds and such aren't a reflection of reality anymore, reality is actually reflecting television. Well, it's not so simple, as such behaviors have been around for the longest time, since the first time one man of one color killed another man of a darker color just because the second man was darker. But, television reinforces it, makes it seem like that's how things are and ought to be. And so instead of things getting better (which is what a good system is supposed to be), they're getting worse.
And it's worse for math and science. Television likes to show the science-loving students as the rejects, the outcasts. They tend to have the "cool," good-looking ones that everyone wants to be as the stupid ones. The entire idea of jocks stems from this. Why can't someone be well studied and physically excellent? So kids, consciously or unconsciously gravitate towards the cool end of the spectrum, by dumbing themselves down. It's most noticeable in girls, where popularity effectively means being dumb. People wonder why there's such a drop-off of interest in science among young girls. Yes, they're discouraged from match and science by old schoolers, but that should mean that they're putting their vast intellect to other uses. But they're not doing that either. They're dumbing themselves down to be more likable and more popular among the jock-type boys who act stupid and don't bother trying to become smart because the think that's how they're supposed to be.
Part of the problem has to do with the nanny state. I read somewhere that it is the rise of feminism, and the feminism of society that's destroying all of the fun in life. Everything has to be 100% safe now. Everything needs a label. And if anybody gets so much as a scratch on the playground, it's time to bring out the lawyers. And this idea of babying every child has extended to emotions as well. Children don't win or lose anymore. Now the winner goes home happy and the loser sues for emotional distress. Actually, the loser doesn't sue, the loser's parents sue. So what this means is that nobody knows their strengths and weaknesses, because suddenly everybody seems to be equally good at everything.
Yeah, it's great that a future tailor thinks he has the same chance of becoming a medical surgeon as a future medical
Yeah, I'm sure everyone knows someone. That, by no means, is evidence of any trend whatsoever. I know someone who's into snuff films. But that by no means indicates a rising popularity of snuff films. I can replace "Snuff films" with almost anything and it'll still hold true.
Fact of the matter is that summer blockbusters that are done decently well and marketed well are largely immune to any effects downloading might or might not have to movie going. In fact, look at Iron Man. Poorly marketed, but very well received. Now contrast that with Meet Dave. I don't know if Meet Dave is in the newsgroups yet, but I know that the acquaintance of mine who doesn't go to movies because of downloading will never watch it.
Simply speaking, a good movie will draw viewers to the box office. A bad one won't. Piracy has no effect on ticket sales either way. The only effect piracy has on a movie's revenue stream is on DVD sales, and only because DVD's are so grossly overpriced.
There's a big difference between something mostly works, and mostly doesn't work. Joe's drug mostly works. A bad movie is one that mostly doesn't work.
When something mostly works, and it doesn't work for you when you try it because of the marketing hype, it's call being unlucky. When something mostly doesn't work, it's called being lied to. Quite frankly, I'd rather be unlucky than lied to.
Interface design and marketing are Apple's strengths. They are complimentary, and hence when put together, they magnify each other's effects.
It's not urbanization that's the problem, it's suburbanization.
Everybody wants their 3000 sq. ft. home, which needs to be heated in the winter and cooled in the summer. If everyone used to live in a 1000 sq. ft. apartment, then home energy consumption per capita has gone up 3 times. Compound that with the fact that an apartment building tends to be more efficient at heating 1000 families than 1000 houses, and it gets worse.
On top of that, in surburbia, everybody needs a car for transportation. An urban family might have one car per four or five people, for special occasions. They'd walk or take mass transit to do their daily tasks. In surburbia, they'd have two or three per four or five people, and even if not, they have to travel much greater distances to get to their destination (10-15 miles vs. 2-3 miles). Again, transportation energy consumption has gone up 3 times.
There are reasons for "greening" up urban areas. Reducing energy consumption and rising energy costs are not among them.
First time, I read that as "guy with a hand towel." And I thought to myself, if one could dig, sieve, and operate a vibrator with a towel, then Douglas Adams was right!
Then I reread your comment, and it wasn't nearly as inspiring anymore.
Let's see among the major corporations in the technology sector and outside, who will defend this new position, and will speak out against it (or not speak at all, for that matter). Then we'll really see which companies are evil, and which ones truly have large software patent portfolios only for self-defense purposes.
Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, Oracle, IBM, HP, Cisco, TI, Intel, AMD, Nvidia, Sony, Nokia, Nintendo, I'm looking at you guys.
Why couldn't it be both?
In eastern Texas, there's only one Intelligent Designer and He certainly didn't design such a contraption. Therefore, the jury must convict!
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4287
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/3275
Not perfect, but better than nothing. I only wish I could name them and redirect links between them.
Better yet, ask them for a definition of a hero. See whether they come up with a vague, idol-type of definition, or whether they can consciously make the distinction. I would give you that if they could figure out the more specific definition of hero even if it took them hours or days, that they would fall into the category of knowing what hero means. But I think most people would present the vague one and call it quits.
It's like the short video experiment on seeing how many college students know the definition of suffrage by asking them to sign a petition against women's suffrage. A few actually ask what suffrage means, and some even know the definition of the word, but the majority just sign and assume suffrage means suffering.
Just because something is hovering at the edge of our consciousness doesn't mean we're actually conscious of it. And the farther a concept leaves our consciousness, the faster it disappears.
Quite frankly, I don't think anyone who knows and respects the idea of a hero would use the word so nonchalantly. It's the notion of having a "common" usage, and the rise of this usage, that I maintain insults true heroes. Certainly, you are entitled to your ad hominem as you see fit, but even if I am being pedantic, I think this is something worthy of being pedantic for.
Unfortunately, I have to disagree. The average person really doesn't have a good idea of what constitutes heroism. The average person has the vague idea that somebody who does something unusual worthy of acclaimation is a hero, but I don't think most people would be able to get very far beyond that. The media's purposeful distortion of the word for the sake of sensationalism doesn't help at all. But when producing a deliverable on-time and within budget can be heroic to a, I presume, well-educated person as in TFA, I think it is rather illustrative of the sad state of the people indeed.
Not to pick on you specifically, but you're the perfect example of someone whose understanding of hero is by and large accurate, but vague.
Heroes are people (or animals, sentient creatures to be most broad) recognized for putting their lives on the line to do something meaningful for others. Heroes sometimes are rewarded for their actions with only death--not even success necessarily. And yes, there are various degrees of heroism, and to further complicate matters, various degrees of recognition for heroism.
As well, there's a distinction between being heroic, brave, and plain foolhardy, though by no means are the former and latter two attributes mutally exclusive. In particular, heroic acts are done for the benefit of others, often with no or highly disproportionate previously agreed upon compensation. Brave and foolhardy acts, whose distinction lies in whether the actor is competent or otherise, do not have this additonal stipulation.
Any use of hero in a context outside of such a situation not only dilutes the meaning of heroism, but insults the people who are truly heroes. As for why such a dilution happened in the first place, I suspect it has to do with the common aphorism, "You're my hero!" which is indended to mean, "I aspire to be like you." The common use of the phrase, corrupted "hero" to mean anyone who is worthy of anyone's idolatry.
To directly reply, it doesn't really matter whether someone is a professional or an amateur, so long as the intended effect is accomplished. Granted, amateurs are less likely to assist because they know they're more often a liability than of any actual help. But putting on a uniform does not automatically make someone a hero, and vice versa, the lack of formal training doesn't automatically disqualify someone from being a hero or doing something heroic. In fact, I'd argue having a uniform would actually raise the bar for heroism, as most actions considered heroic if done by a passerby would be merely a part of the job for a trained and paid professional. And yes, politicians are the farthest removed from any standard of heroism, as much as anyone else who sits in an armchair and does little else but talk.
I can't wait for videos of when they start drilling into it.
What problem? Terrorism, raping children, piracy, they're all one and the same, right?
What about ninjacy? I bet that'll make the pirates mad as hell too.
All your pirates are belong to ninjas.
I was agreeing with you up until your wifi part. Using somebody else's wifi isn't necessarily stealing their bandwidth. They'd have to be on one of those ridiculous pay per GB plans for it to be stealing. Otherwise, it'd just be using somebody else's wifi. If they didn't want you to use it, they would've locked it, or kicked you out and then locked it (and yes, the unlocked front door analogy works here).
It's stealing if you take a newspaper from a newstand without paying for the newspaper. It's stealing if you take somebody's wallet, or even something as innocous as a comb, out of their purse. Intellectual property cannot be stolen, the temporary right to monopoly granted by the government can only be infringed upon.
Calling ID a philosophy is an insult to all philosophers and thinkers. ID is, at best, a mythology, a fiction, some fanciful story some guy told that got written down. It's like the stories you tell at the bar over a beer, they might be true, they might be made up, but nobody knows and nobody cares. They're just stories.
Philosophy is a method of thinking, perceiving, judging, and acting. Philosophy describes a way of life, or describes aspects thereof. Philosophical writings are not stories, though stories can contain a philosophical message, which the bible and most other holy books do.
It already is. But the FBI have more important matters to deal with than to bust a few kids downloading a CD. Like terrorists. And illegal immigrants. And terrorists.