Robots have bugs and glitches requiring timely patches and PRODUCT recalls
So do people. Psychiatrists and psychologists exist for a reason.
Blue screen of DEATH gets a new meaning.
It's had that meaning for quite a while, seeing as how much of our modern transportation infrastructure is either computer controlled or heavily dependent on computers. Yet, amazingly, the majority of accidents still happen due to driver/pilot error. Thousands of lives could be saved if we'd take control away from people, yet we continue to insist on having human operators because of our paranoid fears of computer malfunctions.
Seriously, this only illustrates how ethics and courage are not part of the empire mindset; just window dressing. This is how fat lazy cowards can take over the world. On the grander scale, its no different than traditional cultures going up against the Spanish, Romans etc- who's goal was conquest and not the honor of a risky act of sacrifice.
That's right - I'm sure that the Aztecs would have been complaining about the "unfairness" of it all, if they hadn't been scared shitless by the sound of boom-sticks, and I'm sure some spoiled twits back in Spain had notions similar to yours. Idiots have been whining about the advance of military technology for centuries - meanwhile those with a decent IQ and a bit of common sense have gladly embraced new tech as a means to protect lives and be more effective. If you want to clutch on to a Vietnam-era AK while cowering with the Taliban in some shitty little cave, feel free. You can feel all warm and fuzzy about how much "ethics and courage" you're showing as a hellfire missile turns you into pink jello. Me, I'll gladly watch from a distance, happy in the knowledge that every such explosion means I'll have one less flag-draped casket to carry down the tarmac.
Americans would attack everybody if it didn't cost them anything personally; that IS the reality.
President Ahmedinejad? I didn't know you had a Slashdot account! I guess being laughed at during your speeches at the UN and Columbia University wasn't enough for you, huh?
because as we all know, minefields have never been difficult to remove after they've out lived their usefulness. oh wait...
They're not for the most part. Western doctrine has mandated for quite a while that all minefields be marked physically, and that the locations of individual mines must be accurately plotted on a map / range-card. We've even looked at creating mines which are self-neutralizing after a set period of time. Mine removal is only an issue when they're used by guerrilla forces and shitty armies.
Of course, your statement really had nothing to do with what he was saying, anyway.
This could trigger a similar situation where there was suddenly not enough room to store the same amount of data that was already on the device. (For some values of "suddenly" and "already").
Yes, but what's the likelihood of that occurring? We're talking about block level duplication here. If you have two identical files and you add a bit to the end of one, you're not creating a duplicate fi;e - you're just adding a few blocks while still referencing the original de-dupped file. Now, if you were doing file-level duplication it might be an issue, but this way... I can't see it ever being a problem unless your array is already at 99.9% percent capacity (and that's just a bad idea in general).
However, none of it has anything to do with science.
Well, science has helped us to understand that the universe was not designed with us in mind, and that it generally doesn't give a damn whether we thrive or die. Science has shown us that many of the phenomena which frightened and awed us are easily understood, and can be replicated and controlled by us. Science has given us the tools to explore our world and improve the lives of those around us. Sure, science doesn't answer the question of "why are we here", but it provides the illumination necessary to chase away the demons hiding in the shadows. It allows us to create our own meaning, free from the ignorant fears of our ancestors. With it we can pursue goals which result in the betterment of our species. Without it, we descend into ignorance and savagery.
All of which is a long-winded way of saying that it seems we are on the same page.
Fair enough:) I've just seen way too many people make the claim that "science only tells us 'how', religion tells us 'why'". That kind of assertion really galls me because it lends unearned legitimacy to religion, while erroneously limiting the scope of science. Your initial comment seemed to be of that sort; I'm glad to see that I misjudged you.
I'm well-versed in the history, thank you very much. I was talking about how most people today embrace their religious beliefs, not the history of religious belief.
I meant no offense; I apologize if it came across that way.
As to the second bit, what you're really saying is "in the last few decades, in a handful of nations, a fraction of the religious populations has focused only on answering 'why'". I'm glad you provided that clarification, but I'm not sure why you'd want to base the statement "religion addresses the question of 'why'" on a small percentage of the modern population. That's rather like saying "dogs are Chihuahuas" just because you and your neighbor each own a Chihuahua. It's a silly generalization that doesn't even statistically reflect reality.
In other words, for them, religion is a way they can answer "why?"
Why ask why? Just drink bud dry.
Science does answer "why" questions. For instance, if the question is "why does morality exist", it can be answered through evolutionary psychology and games theory. What science doesn't do is answer the broad question of "why are we here". Science doesn't bother with it because it's a dumb question (yes, they really do exist). Before you even ask it, you're already assuming that there's some sort of reason. It's the same as asking "who created the universe" - even before you start, you're assuming that someone did. That's a completely back-assward way of asking questions. On top of that, religion just pulls the "answer" out of a hat. Neither religion nor science can answer that type of question - the only difference is that science is honest about it.
Religion is trying to use myth to provide an emotional and psychological framework that many people seem to need.
I agree that this is why most people are drawn to religion, but I heartily disagree with the idea that people need to be lied to. You can form "an emotional and psychological framework" that is both satisfying and enlightening, without having to resort to bullshit.
He's wrong. Whether you're using a nuclear rocket or just using a nuclear reactor to power a bunch of VASIMR engines, you'd still have a huge advantage over conventional spacecraft. Your original question is difficult to answer, though. A nuclear rocket would have more thrust than a conventional one so you could get higher acceleration. With VASIMR you'd get less acceleration than normal rockets, but you could use them for a much longer period of time, so you'd still end up reaching your destination much more quickly.
Seriously, whenever a story about Chinese invention or Russian invention appears, the tone of comments instantly change.
Very true. If this had been an article about an American project, there would be WAY more people alternating between complaining, fear-mongering, and derisively mocking it.
Seriously, if both Russia and USA didn't work together, the International Space Station etc. was a complete failure since Soviets had some special expertise and Americans had some special expertise.When you watch NASA TV when ISS stuff going on, it is almost like half Russian, half English broadcast.
Yep. Just like without Canada, the US wouldn't exist! After all, if you look at the continent, Canada takes up more than half of it...
Read some books/watch some documentaries about their nuclear powered bomber project which actually flown until even red bureaucrats figured it is way risky.
The US made some, too, while managing NOT to have a Chernobyl and an economic/political collapse.
You can get up to $5200 a year toward school, but once you are done taking the money they expect you to stick around for 1 year or they want their money back (unless you get let go, then the money was free).
So what you're saying is that they'll give you free money to go piss on your bosses desk?
Oh come on! Are you a product of parents of the 70s "free love" and "intellectual exploration" process? Who in their right mind chooses a job based on "loving" to do it?
Me? I've always done work I enjoyed. When I stopped enjoying one particular type of work, I just moved on to something else that seemed interesting. Why would you want to be stuck with a job you hate?
But science and religion address different questions anyway, so it's all a bit apples-and-oranges.
No they don't. Read some history. Religion has "answered" all sorts of questions. The problem is that it's answers were simply made up, so when science came along it became apparent that religion was the equivalent of a blindfolded guy on a marry-go-round trying to hit a target with a set of darts. Modern,(moderate) religion likes to pretend that it "answers different questions", but it's approach is still exactly the same, as is it's success rate.
because science (i.e. by the 'academics') typically results in 80% wrong facts, and 20% absolute fact. Academics can't accept this, cause science is supposed to always produce 100% fact: i.e. it's philosophically bad in our society of 'yes and no' that science is sometimes "right".
Leaving aside the fact that your last sentence makes absolutely no sense, you're completely wrong about the rest of it. Every scientist knows that much of what they study will probably turn out to be wrong. That's why a "theory" in science is the highest level that an idea can attain - because even the most conclusively proven theory can be overturned if the right evidence is discovered. So yeah, the majority of our theories may turn out to be wrong, but it doesn't matter because we won't know about it until we discover better theories through the scientific method. Science isn't about finding the "right" answers, it's about constantly finding better answers.
There's an Isaac Asimov quote which serves to underline this idea:
"When people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together."
(And that's why there will always be a religion-science conflict)
No, the reason there's a conflict between religion and science is because power-hungry fascists like to keep the public ignorant so that they can control them. It goes something like this:
You tell your followers that lightning is created by an all-powerful Magic Man who can destroy them at will. But it's ok, because you have the inside track to the head honcho, and you'll keep them safe as long as they bring you lots of meat, wine, and gold to "sacrifice" to him. Then some smarmy guy with glasses comes along and starts talking about electrons, and suddenly your magical explanation starts to sound less plausible to your flock. That's bad for business. So you send out your buddies to tell everyone that "Electromagnetism is just a theory!". You bribe the local lords to pass laws outlawing its teaching. You do whatever you can to try and keep your followers ignorant and, like all good fools, they happily help you do it.
There's no conflict between science and generic Deistic beliefs. It's only organized religion that keep creating problems.
blah blah ad hominim.. blah blah no anti-virus.. blah blah networking services are disabled
1. You shouldn't use phrases you don't understand and can't spell, ie. "ad hominim attack".
2. Expecting grandma and grandpa to fuck around with system services is ridiculous.
3. Your "solution" would completely destroy my home network. It would also make my workplace even less productive than usual.
To sum up: while I'm fully capable of locking down my computer to the extent you describe, such an approach would not serve my needs, and is not feasible for most people/situations.
They can ban Lawn Darts because if used incorrectly can be very dangerous but they can't ban guns which also if used incorrectly can be very dangerous.
They can't seem to ban cars, either, even though they kill and injure more people than guns and darts combined.
Not if you listen to the NRA. They are perfectly safe to have and use around the home and children provided they are used correctly.
Which they are. GP was talking about them being dangerous to the person on the other end. It's a bit of a misnomer, anyway - no piece of technology is dangerous on it's own, and won't be until we develop AI.
I think he had you in mind when he made the deaf-mute comment. You completely missed the point he was making. Isolating functionality doesn't mean blocking yourself off from the net - he was talking about using dedicated devices to provide routing services in order to minimize the chance of being compromised. You don't put locks on your house to keep yourself from going out - you use them to keep others from coming in.
Hell, I never even bothered with CD's. You can make a live-USB version with minimal effort. If they really wanted to make it easy for people to install, they'd have a download packaged into a self-extracting executable which also writes a boot-record to the flash drive. That way even people who don't know how to burn CD's would be able to use it.
Of course, I suppose that anyone who doesn't know how to burn a CD would probably have a hell of a time trying to figure out how to make the computer boot from USB....
I'd like to think that the human race will learn to be a bit more rational over the next 200 years. There might still be a couple nuts pushing this stuff if we haven't managed to cure mental illness, but Hopefully we won't have to put up with it being pimped via Hollywood movies and completely credulous news segments.
Yep, they do have the occasional lunacy. I was rather disgusted when I saw them pimping the "crystal skulls" fraud. Still, they're nowhere near as bad as the History channel.
Um... before you try to say something sarcastic, it's always a good idea to make sure that you know what you're talking about. Like, for instance, looking up the word "anecdote" in the dictionary would have been a good start.
Slashdot Mirror
You're clearly trolling, but what the hell:
Robots have bugs and glitches requiring timely patches and PRODUCT recalls
So do people. Psychiatrists and psychologists exist for a reason.
Blue screen of DEATH gets a new meaning.
It's had that meaning for quite a while, seeing as how much of our modern transportation infrastructure is either computer controlled or heavily dependent on computers. Yet, amazingly, the majority of accidents still happen due to driver/pilot error. Thousands of lives could be saved if we'd take control away from people, yet we continue to insist on having human operators because of our paranoid fears of computer malfunctions.
Seriously, this only illustrates how ethics and courage are not part of the empire mindset; just window dressing. This is how fat lazy cowards can take over the world. On the grander scale, its no different than traditional cultures going up against the Spanish, Romans etc- who's goal was conquest and not the honor of a risky act of sacrifice.
That's right - I'm sure that the Aztecs would have been complaining about the "unfairness" of it all, if they hadn't been scared shitless by the sound of boom-sticks, and I'm sure some spoiled twits back in Spain had notions similar to yours. Idiots have been whining about the advance of military technology for centuries - meanwhile those with a decent IQ and a bit of common sense have gladly embraced new tech as a means to protect lives and be more effective. If you want to clutch on to a Vietnam-era AK while cowering with the Taliban in some shitty little cave, feel free. You can feel all warm and fuzzy about how much "ethics and courage" you're showing as a hellfire missile turns you into pink jello. Me, I'll gladly watch from a distance, happy in the knowledge that every such explosion means I'll have one less flag-draped casket to carry down the tarmac.
Americans would attack everybody if it didn't cost them anything personally; that IS the reality.
President Ahmedinejad? I didn't know you had a Slashdot account! I guess being laughed at during your speeches at the UN and Columbia University wasn't enough for you, huh?
because as we all know, minefields have never been difficult to remove after they've out lived their usefulness. oh wait...
They're not for the most part. Western doctrine has mandated for quite a while that all minefields be marked physically, and that the locations of individual mines must be accurately plotted on a map / range-card. We've even looked at creating mines which are self-neutralizing after a set period of time. Mine removal is only an issue when they're used by guerrilla forces and shitty armies.
Of course, your statement really had nothing to do with what he was saying, anyway.
This could trigger a similar situation where there was suddenly not enough room to store the same amount of data that was already on the device. (For some values of "suddenly" and "already").
Yes, but what's the likelihood of that occurring? We're talking about block level duplication here. If you have two identical files and you add a bit to the end of one, you're not creating a duplicate fi;e - you're just adding a few blocks while still referencing the original de-dupped file. Now, if you were doing file-level duplication it might be an issue, but this way ... I can't see it ever being a problem unless your array is already at 99.9% percent capacity (and that's just a bad idea in general).
However, none of it has anything to do with science.
Well, science has helped us to understand that the universe was not designed with us in mind, and that it generally doesn't give a damn whether we thrive or die. Science has shown us that many of the phenomena which frightened and awed us are easily understood, and can be replicated and controlled by us. Science has given us the tools to explore our world and improve the lives of those around us. Sure, science doesn't answer the question of "why are we here", but it provides the illumination necessary to chase away the demons hiding in the shadows. It allows us to create our own meaning, free from the ignorant fears of our ancestors. With it we can pursue goals which result in the betterment of our species. Without it, we descend into ignorance and savagery.
All of which is a long-winded way of saying that it seems we are on the same page.
Fair enough :) I've just seen way too many people make the claim that "science only tells us 'how', religion tells us 'why'". That kind of assertion really galls me because it lends unearned legitimacy to religion, while erroneously limiting the scope of science. Your initial comment seemed to be of that sort; I'm glad to see that I misjudged you.
I'm well-versed in the history, thank you very much. I was talking about how most people today embrace their religious beliefs, not the history of religious belief.
I meant no offense; I apologize if it came across that way.
As to the second bit, what you're really saying is "in the last few decades, in a handful of nations, a fraction of the religious populations has focused only on answering 'why'". I'm glad you provided that clarification, but I'm not sure why you'd want to base the statement "religion addresses the question of 'why'" on a small percentage of the modern population. That's rather like saying "dogs are Chihuahuas" just because you and your neighbor each own a Chihuahua. It's a silly generalization that doesn't even statistically reflect reality.
In other words, for them, religion is a way they can answer "why?"
Why ask why? Just drink bud dry.
Science does answer "why" questions. For instance, if the question is "why does morality exist", it can be answered through evolutionary psychology and games theory. What science doesn't do is answer the broad question of "why are we here". Science doesn't bother with it because it's a dumb question (yes, they really do exist). Before you even ask it, you're already assuming that there's some sort of reason. It's the same as asking "who created the universe" - even before you start, you're assuming that someone did. That's a completely back-assward way of asking questions. On top of that, religion just pulls the "answer" out of a hat. Neither religion nor science can answer that type of question - the only difference is that science is honest about it.
Religion is trying to use myth to provide an emotional and psychological framework that many people seem to need.
I agree that this is why most people are drawn to religion, but I heartily disagree with the idea that people need to be lied to. You can form "an emotional and psychological framework" that is both satisfying and enlightening, without having to resort to bullshit.
I don't think that Microsoft is worried about the "too-poor-to-buy-a-newspaper" market segment.
Wow, that's SO insightful!!! Except ... people still aren't doing that now. Apparently you didn't RTFA or WTFV, and neither did 3 guys with mod points.
You're not serious, are you? It's as if I'd said "you know, I've never been shot" and you responded with "AHA! But you DID break a fingernail!".
He's wrong. Whether you're using a nuclear rocket or just using a nuclear reactor to power a bunch of VASIMR engines, you'd still have a huge advantage over conventional spacecraft. Your original question is difficult to answer, though. A nuclear rocket would have more thrust than a conventional one so you could get higher acceleration. With VASIMR you'd get less acceleration than normal rockets, but you could use them for a much longer period of time, so you'd still end up reaching your destination much more quickly.
Seriously, whenever a story about Chinese invention or Russian invention appears, the tone of comments instantly change.
Very true. If this had been an article about an American project, there would be WAY more people alternating between complaining, fear-mongering, and derisively mocking it.
Seriously, if both Russia and USA didn't work together, the International Space Station etc. was a complete failure since Soviets had some special expertise and Americans had some special expertise.When you watch NASA TV when ISS stuff going on, it is almost like half Russian, half English broadcast.
Yep. Just like without Canada, the US wouldn't exist! After all, if you look at the continent, Canada takes up more than half of it ...
Read some books/watch some documentaries about their nuclear powered bomber project which actually flown until even red bureaucrats figured it is way risky.
The US made some, too, while managing NOT to have a Chernobyl and an economic/political collapse.
Yep. If they hadn't stoked the flames, they wouldn't have gotten burned.
You can get up to $5200 a year toward school, but once you are done taking the money they expect you to stick around for 1 year or they want their money back (unless you get let go, then the money was free).
So what you're saying is that they'll give you free money to go piss on your bosses desk?
Are they accepting applications?
Oh come on! Are you a product of parents of the 70s "free love" and "intellectual exploration" process? Who in their right mind chooses a job based on "loving" to do it?
Me? I've always done work I enjoyed. When I stopped enjoying one particular type of work, I just moved on to something else that seemed interesting. Why would you want to be stuck with a job you hate?
But science and religion address different questions anyway, so it's all a bit apples-and-oranges.
No they don't. Read some history. Religion has "answered" all sorts of questions. The problem is that it's answers were simply made up, so when science came along it became apparent that religion was the equivalent of a blindfolded guy on a marry-go-round trying to hit a target with a set of darts. Modern,(moderate) religion likes to pretend that it "answers different questions", but it's approach is still exactly the same, as is it's success rate.
because science (i.e. by the 'academics') typically results in 80% wrong facts, and 20% absolute fact. Academics can't accept this, cause science is supposed to always produce 100% fact: i.e. it's philosophically bad in our society of 'yes and no' that science is sometimes "right".
Leaving aside the fact that your last sentence makes absolutely no sense, you're completely wrong about the rest of it. Every scientist knows that much of what they study will probably turn out to be wrong. That's why a "theory" in science is the highest level that an idea can attain - because even the most conclusively proven theory can be overturned if the right evidence is discovered. So yeah, the majority of our theories may turn out to be wrong, but it doesn't matter because we won't know about it until we discover better theories through the scientific method. Science isn't about finding the "right" answers, it's about constantly finding better answers.
There's an Isaac Asimov quote which serves to underline this idea:
"When people thought the Earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the Earth was spherical they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the Earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the Earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together."
(And that's why there will always be a religion-science conflict)
No, the reason there's a conflict between religion and science is because power-hungry fascists like to keep the public ignorant so that they can control them. It goes something like this:
You tell your followers that lightning is created by an all-powerful Magic Man who can destroy them at will. But it's ok, because you have the inside track to the head honcho, and you'll keep them safe as long as they bring you lots of meat, wine, and gold to "sacrifice" to him. Then some smarmy guy with glasses comes along and starts talking about electrons, and suddenly your magical explanation starts to sound less plausible to your flock. That's bad for business. So you send out your buddies to tell everyone that "Electromagnetism is just a theory!". You bribe the local lords to pass laws outlawing its teaching. You do whatever you can to try and keep your followers ignorant and, like all good fools, they happily help you do it.
There's no conflict between science and generic Deistic beliefs. It's only organized religion that keep creating problems.
blah blah ad hominim .. blah blah no anti-virus .. blah blah networking services are disabled
1. You shouldn't use phrases you don't understand and can't spell, ie. "ad hominim attack".
2. Expecting grandma and grandpa to fuck around with system services is ridiculous.
3. Your "solution" would completely destroy my home network. It would also make my workplace even less productive than usual.
To sum up: while I'm fully capable of locking down my computer to the extent you describe, such an approach would not serve my needs, and is not feasible for most people/situations.
They can ban Lawn Darts because if used incorrectly can be very dangerous but they can't ban guns which also if used incorrectly can be very dangerous.
They can't seem to ban cars, either, even though they kill and injure more people than guns and darts combined.
Not if you listen to the NRA. They are perfectly safe to have and use around the home and children provided they are used correctly.
Which they are. GP was talking about them being dangerous to the person on the other end. It's a bit of a misnomer, anyway - no piece of technology is dangerous on it's own, and won't be until we develop AI.
I think he had you in mind when he made the deaf-mute comment. You completely missed the point he was making. Isolating functionality doesn't mean blocking yourself off from the net - he was talking about using dedicated devices to provide routing services in order to minimize the chance of being compromised. You don't put locks on your house to keep yourself from going out - you use them to keep others from coming in.
You win the "genius comment of the day award". If I hadn't commented already, you'd definitely have my mod point!
Interesting. One of these days they'll finally catch up to their Muslim brothers, and start using battery acid.
Hell, I never even bothered with CD's. You can make a live-USB version with minimal effort. If they really wanted to make it easy for people to install, they'd have a download packaged into a self-extracting executable which also writes a boot-record to the flash drive. That way even people who don't know how to burn CD's would be able to use it.
Of course, I suppose that anyone who doesn't know how to burn a CD would probably have a hell of a time trying to figure out how to make the computer boot from USB ....
I'd like to think that the human race will learn to be a bit more rational over the next 200 years. There might still be a couple nuts pushing this stuff if we haven't managed to cure mental illness, but Hopefully we won't have to put up with it being pimped via Hollywood movies and completely credulous news segments.
Yep, they do have the occasional lunacy. I was rather disgusted when I saw them pimping the "crystal skulls" fraud. Still, they're nowhere near as bad as the History channel.
Um ... before you try to say something sarcastic, it's always a good idea to make sure that you know what you're talking about. Like, for instance, looking up the word "anecdote" in the dictionary would have been a good start.