The same thing that happens whenever a big company doesnt pay a fine. Absolutly nothing.
Since you cant put a corporate entity in jail, and current structures are such that shareholders and executives face few legal penalties for the actions of the corporation (rather than thier own personal actions, such as in the enron ordeal) there's little real incentive for them to actualy pay up.
Does a guy driving a hummer really notice a 1-inch speedbump? Microsoft's CFO will probably be laughing as he draws the fine from pettycash.....
Add a few zeroes on the tail end, then we'll see if they notice.
If these files which I can legally recieve over bittorrent are DRM'ed -or- require me to maintain my subscription to keep watching them, then fughetaboutit. I'm keeping my money, thanks.
It only took what, 20 years?
I'm sure next they'll announce a new re-useable capsule ala soyuz, going back to the cheap&reliable method.
... oh... wait... nevermind...
One interesting note, the police in Nashua (where this happened) boast/advertise that they are "nationally accredited" and recieve all kinds of awards for professionalism and such.
I live here in NH and am very upset by this. Many police cars here carry cameras on thier dashboards and tape you when they cops pull you over for a ticket! In addition, all the tollbooths on rt 93 around Manchester all have cameras.. I wonder if any felony acts are being commited there, where I've seen no signs warning me I was on camera?
Im the network admin here, and I got sick and tired of people trying to fix the printer and clear paper jams on thier own, since they rarely did so properly and often took half the machine apart and broke things causing extended downtine. Administrativly I have no "teeth" to make them stop (they dont know this) so I just put up a non-functional camera on the wall up in the corner pointed at the printer.
-instantly- I had people coming to ask for my help fixing the printer.
I generally frown on slashdot submissions of "check out my blog!" but the topic is valid.
Why not link to some usefull info directly rather than submitters blog?
Same way some PC game makers have combatted it. Make it actually worth the $23432 they charge for the physical media. Include extra goodies like picturebooks of the band, lyric sheets, cool posters, whatever. The last few PC games I bought all came with extras like fold-out maps, lots of hand-drawn (looking) artwork, sometimes even soundtrack CDs. I know its just gimmickry, but if I am going to get a game, I want to get more than stamped plastic. Frankly, I find that warez is more usefull for replacing a game I bought but lost the CD too than for pirating the latest-and-greatest.
I would much rather go buy a CD. But when they want to charge me $20+ for -only- the media with no extras, those free-ish downloads start to look mighty attractive...
Just my random thoughts.
You kinda covered a lot of ground, but I'll try and be brief since we're hashing up an old thread.
Overall I like your ideas in that you seem to question the "obvious" to make sure its really so obvious.:-) Again, I wish more people did this.
In general, I dont think that any moral code has any superiority or inherant authority over another. I'm not a 100% cultural relativist, but I feel that morality can (but isnt always) be a social norm. You mentioned the Aztecs, which is a great example of a moral code which is most likely completely foreign/unacceptable to most modern people. This is a good example because the human sacrafices and such would certainly be held as immoral by you and I, but it wouldnt be wrong to say "Immoral for us, moral for the Aztecs." if you see what I'm getting at.
Backtracking a tad with the tolerance/conflict issue, if the other person;s morality doesnt allow for tolerance than I guess we have a genuine problem:-) Sadly this is more common than it should be, however I dont have a good "one size fits most" solution.. I guess if I had to, I'd advocate a "case by case" method for dealing with that kind of moral conflict. Same with the "greed is good" scenario. I may personally feel that net-gain vs net-loss make "greed is good" a very poor moral standard, but my thinking it doesnt make it so. It just makes it my opinion. Again, far too few people realise this concept on a concious level;-)
Again, really interesting discussion. Glad to see some thoughtfull exchanges on slashdot which didnt degenerate into smears and "pwn@ge";-) If you wish the last word, its yours. I likely wont keep this thread alive.
The issue of conflicting moral codes is an important one, and I -really- wish more people would give serious debate/thought/etc on how to resolve those conflicts! As it stands now, I guess thats what the law is for. Tolerance also comes in to play.. if I see someone run over a squirrel, something I consider morally objectionalbe, I dont go hunt them down and slash thier tires or anything like that. By the same token, if someone sees my girlfriend show her face in public and they are morally opposed to it because of religion, i expect them to be tolerant of her differing set of values.
As mentioned in another post, my personal morality stems from a desire to see the greatest good to the greatest number. Not all are as altruistic, both among the theists and non-theists. Your comments about cereal-box morality are very true, and I think we agree in that matter.
As for acts of faith, the followers rarely follow the teachings. How many christians follow the example in deuteronomy 28:53, or would be prepared too? Would you want them too? I'm glad my parents didnt/wouldnt... I think its far better to talk about what the followers themselves said. For example take the following insight into the motivations/actions of some prominent faithful people:
Pope Innocent The Second said "And bring hither all the heathens, mosselmen, and pegans of our realm and burn them at your fires of purification" and then started a crusade...
George W Bush said "Bring It On!" and then started a crusade...
Osama Bin Laden said, roughly, "Thrust the spear of justice deep into the heart of the infidel! Murder his children, bomb his homes, and pillage his land!" and then started a crusade...
The list goes on. Your point is very accurate that many religious people do not follow the precepts of thier religions (as is obvious from the above), but if you studied those religions more carefully you probably wouldnt want them too........ http://www.petergodly.com/ illustrates the point in a more light-hearted way;-)
The end point I guess im trying to make is that people should be judged (by you, by me, etc) not by thier creed but by thier deed. I know many people whom are religious, many whom are not. I count both among my friends. I've seen religious people perform acts in the name of thier god(s) which I considered reprehensible, and I've seen the same people demonstrate honest compassion and humility. Do not make the mistake to think that faith is a prerequisite for morality/ethical-behavior.
If its "Open Source" than I, either a paying or non-paying customer, can get the source and re-compile it on my own.
If its Free -and- Open Source, than some anonymous 12 year old can get the source, and re-compile it, without any licensing fees or issues.
If its BSD/GPL-style-free, than said 12 year old can also re-distribute without sending in signed forms or paying anyone.
Where is the confusion?
>could you explain to me what makes something bad?
Do you feel guilty when you steal a cookie from a cookie jar? Yes? Than it was bad. Really simple there... and YES that means that what is right and wrong will vary from person to person and culture to culture.
>is it bad to kill people ? why?
YES!! The worst possible crime you can ever commit is to kill someone. The reason WHY is because there is no afterlife and once you kill a person you have removed forever all that that person ever was and could contribute to society. Atheists have more reason to dislike murder than any religious person ever could.
>what is a person anyway? is a fetus a person? is a 1 year old a person?
I'm afraid I dont have a strong opinion either way about that one. What you are really asking about is the big abortion question, but since I'm male and can/could never have one, I really have no right to an opinion there. I'm not dodging your question, I'm just saying I havent given it any serious thought.
>why is it bad to stop one of those things for living?
See answer to murder I wrote above.
My moral obligation comes from only one place: me. Where else would you ever want my morality to come from? Before you answer, think very carefully and consider the actions of other people who draw thier morality from religion....
Again totally misunderstanding the basic concepts. If you are trying to claim that a sense of morals must come from religion, then I ask you to explain why dogs (who clearly have no religion...) get scared and guilty after they poop on the rug, eh? Obviously thats just an example, but the point is that morality and religion are mutually exclusive.
In fact if you look at history (the crusades, 9/11, the holocaust) you could very easily argue that religion causes more IMORALITY than morality! I'm sure a book or two has been written about it. If you want to talk about chrisitan morality, read your bible. I have. Deuteronomy 28:53 is a great source of morality, make sure you let your kids read it!
You seem to think non-theists are self centered or something. You couldnt be more wrong pal. I cant speak for other Atheists, by MY personal moral obligations stem from one simple premise I hold. Call it philosophy if you wish, I call it common sense: The needs of the many outweigh the wants of the few. This includes my wants. I wont take what someone else needs to get what I want but do not need.
I dont midunderstand anything. I am my own master, and make my own life. I dont exploit other people because its wrong. The differance is that I dont need someone else to tell me what is right and wrong or what some old book or some god says is right and wrong... I know on my own...
When you get down to it, its a question of motivation. You dont do bad things because you fear punishment by your $DIETY.. I dont do bad things because I know (and agree) that they are bad things.
Lame. Its BECAUSE I'm an Atheist that I have a moral obligation to seek what is real and true. Poster demonstrates a completely off-topic fundamental misunerstanding of all the issues involved.
Two reasons. First, because better alternatives already exist. Secondly, because my PHB wants to play nice with the existing microsoft/windows desktop stack.....:-/
Want to play nice? Open up MAPI, Active Directory, TNEF, your botched Kerberos, and.net so that there can be compatible-but-not-reverse-engineered implementations.. THEN we'll call it a truce...
Slashdot Mirror
The same thing that happens whenever a big company doesnt pay a fine. Absolutly nothing.
Since you cant put a corporate entity in jail, and current structures are such that shareholders and executives face few legal penalties for the actions of the corporation (rather than thier own personal actions, such as in the enron ordeal) there's little real incentive for them to actualy pay up.
Does a guy driving a hummer really notice a 1-inch speedbump? Microsoft's CFO will probably be laughing as he draws the fine from pettycash.....
Add a few zeroes on the tail end, then we'll see if they notice.
If these files which I can legally recieve over bittorrent are DRM'ed -or- require me to maintain my subscription to keep watching them, then fughetaboutit. I'm keeping my money, thanks.
It only took what, 20 years?
... oh ... wait ... nevermind ...
I'm sure next they'll announce a new re-useable capsule ala soyuz, going back to the cheap&reliable method.
One interesting note, the police in Nashua (where this happened) boast/advertise that they are "nationally accredited" and recieve all kinds of awards for professionalism and such.
I live here in NH and am very upset by this. Many police cars here carry cameras on thier dashboards and tape you when they cops pull you over for a ticket! In addition, all the tollbooths on rt 93 around Manchester all have cameras .. I wonder if any felony acts are being commited there, where I've seen no signs warning me I was on camera?
Im the network admin here, and I got sick and tired of people trying to fix the printer and clear paper jams on thier own, since they rarely did so properly and often took half the machine apart and broke things causing extended downtine. Administrativly I have no "teeth" to make them stop (they dont know this) so I just put up a non-functional camera on the wall up in the corner pointed at the printer.
-instantly- I had people coming to ask for my help fixing the printer.
I generally frown on slashdot submissions of "check out my blog!" but the topic is valid. Why not link to some usefull info directly rather than submitters blog?
You must live in Europe, where government still at least maintains the visage of standing up for the have-less'es....
Same way some PC game makers have combatted it. Make it actually worth the $23432 they charge for the physical media. Include extra goodies like picturebooks of the band, lyric sheets, cool posters, whatever. The last few PC games I bought all came with extras like fold-out maps, lots of hand-drawn (looking) artwork, sometimes even soundtrack CDs. I know its just gimmickry, but if I am going to get a game, I want to get more than stamped plastic. Frankly, I find that warez is more usefull for replacing a game I bought but lost the CD too than for pirating the latest-and-greatest.
I would much rather go buy a CD. But when they want to charge me $20+ for -only- the media with no extras, those free-ish downloads start to look mighty attractive...
Just my random thoughts.
Do I need to be Chinese to volunteer? I'd gladly give some time to shut down spammers, regardless of national residence...
www.scalix.com
You kinda covered a lot of ground, but I'll try and be brief since we're hashing up an old thread. :-) Again, I wish more people did this.
:-) Sadly this is more common than it should be, however I dont have a good "one size fits most" solution .. I guess if I had to, I'd advocate a "case by case" method for dealing with that kind of moral conflict. Same with the "greed is good" scenario. I may personally feel that net-gain vs net-loss make "greed is good" a very poor moral standard, but my thinking it doesnt make it so. It just makes it my opinion. Again, far too few people realise this concept on a concious level ;-)
;-) If you wish the last word, its yours. I likely wont keep this thread alive.
Overall I like your ideas in that you seem to question the "obvious" to make sure its really so obvious.
In general, I dont think that any moral code has any superiority or inherant authority over another. I'm not a 100% cultural relativist, but I feel that morality can (but isnt always) be a social norm. You mentioned the Aztecs, which is a great example of a moral code which is most likely completely foreign/unacceptable to most modern people. This is a good example because the human sacrafices and such would certainly be held as immoral by you and I, but it wouldnt be wrong to say "Immoral for us, moral for the Aztecs." if you see what I'm getting at.
Backtracking a tad with the tolerance/conflict issue, if the other person;s morality doesnt allow for tolerance than I guess we have a genuine problem
Again, really interesting discussion. Glad to see some thoughtfull exchanges on slashdot which didnt degenerate into smears and "pwn@ge"
The issue of conflicting moral codes is an important one, and I -really- wish more people would give serious debate/thought/etc on how to resolve those conflicts! As it stands now, I guess thats what the law is for. Tolerance also comes in to play .. if I see someone run over a squirrel, something I consider morally objectionalbe, I dont go hunt them down and slash thier tires or anything like that. By the same token, if someone sees my girlfriend show her face in public and they are morally opposed to it because of religion, i expect them to be tolerant of her differing set of values.
;-)
As mentioned in another post, my personal morality stems from a desire to see the greatest good to the greatest number. Not all are as altruistic, both among the theists and non-theists. Your comments about cereal-box morality are very true, and I think we agree in that matter.
As for acts of faith, the followers rarely follow the teachings. How many christians follow the example in deuteronomy 28:53, or would be prepared too? Would you want them too? I'm glad my parents didnt/wouldnt... I think its far better to talk about what the followers themselves said. For example take the following insight into the motivations/actions of some prominent faithful people:
Pope Innocent The Second said "And bring hither all the heathens, mosselmen, and pegans of our realm and burn them at your fires of purification" and then started a crusade...
George W Bush said "Bring It On!" and then started a crusade...
Osama Bin Laden said, roughly, "Thrust the spear of justice deep into the heart of the infidel! Murder his children, bomb his homes, and pillage his land!" and then started a crusade...
The list goes on. Your point is very accurate that many religious people do not follow the precepts of thier religions (as is obvious from the above), but if you studied those religions more carefully you probably wouldnt want them too........ http://www.petergodly.com/ illustrates the point in a more light-hearted way
The end point I guess im trying to make is that people should be judged (by you, by me, etc) not by thier creed but by thier deed. I know many people whom are religious, many whom are not. I count both among my friends. I've seen religious people perform acts in the name of thier god(s) which I considered reprehensible, and I've seen the same people demonstrate honest compassion and humility. Do not make the mistake to think that faith is a prerequisite for morality/ethical-behavior.
If its "Open Source" than I, either a paying or non-paying customer, can get the source and re-compile it on my own.
If its Free -and- Open Source, than some anonymous 12 year old can get the source, and re-compile it, without any licensing fees or issues.
If its BSD/GPL-style-free, than said 12 year old can also re-distribute without sending in signed forms or paying anyone.
Where is the confusion?
>could you explain to me what makes something bad? Do you feel guilty when you steal a cookie from a cookie jar? Yes? Than it was bad. Really simple there... and YES that means that what is right and wrong will vary from person to person and culture to culture. >is it bad to kill people ? why? YES!! The worst possible crime you can ever commit is to kill someone. The reason WHY is because there is no afterlife and once you kill a person you have removed forever all that that person ever was and could contribute to society. Atheists have more reason to dislike murder than any religious person ever could. >what is a person anyway? is a fetus a person? is a 1 year old a person? I'm afraid I dont have a strong opinion either way about that one. What you are really asking about is the big abortion question, but since I'm male and can/could never have one, I really have no right to an opinion there. I'm not dodging your question, I'm just saying I havent given it any serious thought. >why is it bad to stop one of those things for living? See answer to murder I wrote above.
My moral obligation comes from only one place: me. Where else would you ever want my morality to come from? Before you answer, think very carefully and consider the actions of other people who draw thier morality from religion....
Again totally misunderstanding the basic concepts. If you are trying to claim that a sense of morals must come from religion, then I ask you to explain why dogs (who clearly have no religion...) get scared and guilty after they poop on the rug, eh? Obviously thats just an example, but the point is that morality and religion are mutually exclusive. In fact if you look at history (the crusades, 9/11, the holocaust) you could very easily argue that religion causes more IMORALITY than morality! I'm sure a book or two has been written about it. If you want to talk about chrisitan morality, read your bible. I have. Deuteronomy 28:53 is a great source of morality, make sure you let your kids read it!
You seem to think non-theists are self centered or something. You couldnt be more wrong pal. I cant speak for other Atheists, by MY personal moral obligations stem from one simple premise I hold. Call it philosophy if you wish, I call it common sense: The needs of the many outweigh the wants of the few. This includes my wants. I wont take what someone else needs to get what I want but do not need.
I dont midunderstand anything. I am my own master, and make my own life. I dont exploit other people because its wrong. The differance is that I dont need someone else to tell me what is right and wrong or what some old book or some god says is right and wrong ... I know on my own ...
When you get down to it, its a question of motivation. You dont do bad things because you fear punishment by your $DIETY .. I dont do bad things because I know (and agree) that they are bad things.
Lame. Its BECAUSE I'm an Atheist that I have a moral obligation to seek what is real and true. Poster demonstrates a completely off-topic fundamental misunerstanding of all the issues involved.
Two reasons. First, because better alternatives already exist. Secondly, because my PHB wants to play nice with the existing microsoft/windows desktop stack ..... :-/
Want to play nice? Open up MAPI, Active Directory, TNEF, your botched Kerberos, and .net so that there can be compatible-but-not-reverse-engineered implementations .. THEN we'll call it a truce...
I wonder when the last time Steve Jobs, Theo DeRaat, or Linus Torvalds had a problem with spyware was? *ducks*
I can think of more than 20 ....