Besides, just about *every* job disallows having sex at the office, it isn't like people who to do it don't ignore it anyways . . . Making rules that are just going to be ignored is stupid.
If you monitored your office mates heartrates 24-7, do you think that would change anything?
Hmm. Looks like two people just decided to get an accelerated beat at the same time...
It used to be that abortions were legal in the U.S. up until 'quickening' or fetal movement. Now groups want to say that life begins before an embryo has even implanted or differentaited.
RU-486 results in 1 death in 200,000 making it twice as safe as penicillian. Those people who have suffered the worst side effects were those who took it despite being having contra-indicating factors warning against its use. (from religioustolerance.org)
RU-486 still has complications in 8-10% of cases requiring surgical follow up, which I think is what you're alluding to. http://www.americanpregnancy.org/>
But I thought these folks were ALL ABOUT women's health!
I used to think doctors were all about health too, but most of them don't seem to care. I'm saying this as a guy who has met a fair number of doctors who were simply unable or unwilling to do simple diagnostic work. Apathy and negligence are problems throughout the medical profession. The number of unreported incidences of malpractice is high. A significant accident occurs in one out of three major operations, if memory serves. I could be off on this, I don't have time to google it. All I know is that I've had one friend injected with so much insulin that they went into a coma, and my mom had her teeth filed down by the dentist when she specifically asked for them not to be.
Vaginal administration of RU-486 isn't contra-indicated, however. It's an off-label use, which is different. You haven't really supported the notion that it should be banned (though from what I've googled on the NIH research, oral administration is far more effective.), or even supported the notion that that was in fact the cause of these women dying.
Bacterial infections are treatable, though some strains of S. Aureus are now resistant even to vancomycin, and starting to become resistant to the various fluroquinolones. But considering that they don't know the facts related to these women's cases, and that the infections weren't treated properly, it would seem that these women simply weren't receiving proper medical care to begin with in terms of follow up visits. That, rather than a pill, was the cause of their death. The "human at conception" camp opposes RU-486 for reasons that have nothing to do with protecting women's health.
Up until the late 1800s, 'quickening' or the time when fetal movements could be felt, was the point of no return for a pregnancy. The notion that 'life has always begun at conception' according to religious doctrine is simply not true. If you ask someone to show you a biblical passage that makes the claim that life begins at conception, I promise you they'll show you a passage that says somthing else entirely. Without fail. The notion that "people are fully human at conception" is literally the belief that undifferentiated cells are people.
But when even Bill Frist tried to argue that it should be slightly later, he was essentially shouted down by his own party who didn't want to hear it.
They'll cover how to use condoms in the in flight training video right after they explain how to strap on seat belts.
While I'm a guy, if I were headed into outer space for 31 months I'd want to be on the pill. At least so I could keep everything regular and predictable.
If they're worried about sexual harrassment, they should send married couples. That'd make sense.
Simply saying, "they might have done that bad thing because of poverty, or inequality, or whatnot" is like saying, "not only are they not fully to blame, but you may be partly to blame for contributing to an environment that makes their bad behavior unavoidable."
Sounds like blaming the victim to me, and it's just as digusting when done to some rape victim as it is when done to the better off. "You were robbed because your society failed to alleviate the poverty in some third world nation." etc. etc.
How you define crime determines how you fix it. If poverty is the cause of these scams, are we required to go bring Nigerians out of poverty? The cause of these scams is the fact that they're profitable. If they weren't, people would not do them.
As Sun Tzu said "Know thyself, know thy enemy and win the battle every time.". (paraphrased)
Sun Tzu was giving advice to generals, not soldiers. He also emphasized that in battle, fleeing should not be viewed by one's troops as a possibility. You fight close to home or with your back to a mountain, and your strength will be doubled. In ancient warfare, most casualties occurred during a willy nilly retreat rather than actual battle.
To put it another way, one strategy in a game of 'chicken' is to throw your steering wheel out the window and make sure your opponent sees it.
Enemies are less likely to fight if they see their defeat as inevitable and their opposition's will is unbreakable and the possibility of a just peace is offered to them.
Because earlier posts tend to get the gimp mod points, where as a later post much actually BE interesting or insightful to get modded up. Naturally, you want to be positively recognized with a minimum of effort...
Which brings up an interesting notion. Would it be possible to time when a post was first made, and not allow it to get mod points once, say, 24 hours has passed? That way, first posting would get less of a karma bump.
The rich, after all, have a higher percentage of their income taxed, and most people consider that a good thing, even though its unequal treatment.
Good point. I guess I should have said 'making exceptions on a case by case basis' as opposed to employing certain universal standards.
If we're going to give tax exemptions for businesses, it'd be nice if they standardized it according to certain criteria for all businesses rather than negotiating it on a business by business basis with those businesses who are big enough to show up on the political radar.
1. I think the pricing of CDs would take care of itself if the music industry couldn't monopolize radio and essentially hype its own product 24-7.
2. Copyright is not a natural right, but an artificial one granted for the purpose of encouraging artists to move creative works into the public domain. Creatives works are making more money than ever now. So why was the length of copyright increased.
3. "Information wants to be free" is not, in my mind synonymous with "information should be free." It's a reminder that there are huge economic costs in terms of enforcement and lost opportunity costs in preventing the freeflow of information.
Tax refunds are not taking away money from corporations, not giving them money. Most of our tax revenue comes from those corporations anyway, you know.
I realize that there are some benefits to tax breaks, but not only does it seem like a subversion of law to give breaks if there isn't a clear and immediate economic benefit to the community, but it seems like a subversion of law. Why shouldn't all people get equal treatment from the government? If the RIAA didn't donate huge amounts of money to the government, I might be more inclined to see Gov't favoring of the music industry as a mutually beneficial relationship, as opposed to a straightforward conflict of interest.
Personally, while I don't think CD prices are over the top, I wouldn't buy any music if I knew the RIAA got a cut.
True, but bear in mind that copyrights and patents are not natural rights as determined by the founders. They were supposed to be just enough to compensate their authors for creation of the work. With the extension of copyright duration, the fundamental nature of copyright has changed. The original intent was to allow authors to continue to support themselves while putting creative works into the public domain. Now the point is to simply compensate the owners of copyrights, without thought for the public domain.
In that case, if someone would spend the time to put ONE computer in each village/town that got weather, markets, etc
Yeah, That'd probably be enough. I can't think of a single society that wouldn't benefit from improved communication and the enhanced organization that goes with it.
Besides, look at how helpful libraries were for the U.S.
I don't think computers would solve everything. But look at it this way. At least now these folks can make some cash off of the old Nigerian mail scam bit. It's currently one of Nigeria's largest sources of income.
I heard a while back that a thin film of selenium, when exposed to hydrogen gas, would become transparent.
Would it be possible to make a transparent photovoltaic cell? You know, like a window that could filter out ultraviolet light and turn it into electricity, yet transmit visible light?
For that matter, would it be possible to add optical brighteners to greenhouse glass to increase the quantity of light that plants can use while reducing the risk of heat damage from noonday sun?
It's inconceivable. You don't know what that means. Scaling a mountain Disrespectful to gravity Say your goodbyes
The ropes gone but still there's me. I'm just a pirate. I need no sympathy. Because I'm ambidexterious You are two I guess.
Any cup that you choose doesn't really matter... to me....to me
Mama,killed the Sicillian Put some poison in both cups That loud bastard bottomed up, Mama,the chase has just begun But Buttercup has thrown me down a cliff Mama ooo, Didn't mean to make you cry- But now we've gotta run through the fireswamp. Look a big, giant rat.
(cut foward in the song)
She's a cute princess everybody loves her. She's just a poor girl from a poor family. Spare her her life with this man Humperdink. let me go. I'll kill myself. Stab myself to death.- Bismillah! no-,we will not let you go-let me go- Bismillah! we will not let you go-let me go Bismillah! we will not let you go-let me go Will not let you go-let me go Will not let you go let me go No,no,no,no,no,no,no- Mama mia,mama mia,mama mia let me go- But Humperdink has a dagger set aside for you... for you.... for you...
The parent post makes an important point. Misdiagnosis in general, and psychological scapegoating in particular, is a huge problem in the modern medical industry. If you know what your problem is, you can research it and develop an understanding of the condition which is far better than what a doctor will explain to you in a hospital visit and treat yourself accordingly. Because of this, diagnosis is, arguably, the most important function of modern doctors.
Yeah, basically words mean whatever people want them to mean over here in the states.
"Liberalism" is always conflated with socialism in the US. Socialists call themselves 'progressives.' Socialist feminists and radical separatist femanists are conflated with liberal feminists.
The radical right started a campaigin against the national endowment for the arts claiming the NEA supported pornography and things like that, and the result was cutting funding for programs like Sesame Street and public broadcasting...
I guess some Republicans have a funny definition of 'pornography.'
Conservatives, on the other hand, are called racists and Nazis. And while Repubican leaders still make the mandatory pilgrimage to Bob Jones university each election year, most conservatives of course, do not support racism any more than other Americans. For whatever that's worth.
I'd like to see what would happen if one house of congress was elected by approval voting instead of this 'winner take all' strategy.
Newspapers influnce opinion, which may influence policy. A direct contribution directly influences policy, and that is fundamentally undemocratic.
I have a simple solution.
A simple solution which is easily circumvented if employed as actual policy. Preventing campaign finance abuse is like trying to prevent piracy. You either have to clamp down all mass media, or there will be a loophole to sneak through.
Look at it this way; during an election campaign, could I, as a private individual, purchase a newspaper ad for my favorite candidate? Could I write an article supporting them? Sure! And if I can, the difference between me doing this and the party doing it themselves is trivial. A party can find out who its supporters are. They can be told who their supporters are. And they'll know that it's good policy for them to help their supporters.
If a person can influence an election through any kind of control of the mass media, then they'll be able to sell that influence to a political party in exchange for support. The best that 'campaign finance reform' can do is, as you've said, try and make contributions more obvious and let the voters chooose.
Of course, if polititians start finding this publicity a liability, more indirect quid pro quo relationships are still possible.
Cheney could easily find a way to wriggle out of his Haliburton uniform if he wanted to do so.
This is kindof like mice voting to put a bell on the cat. It sounded like a great plan, till they tried to implement it.
If someone has money, then that money can be turned into political clout. Period. As long as people can write newspaper columns or own and edit newspapers, they can be paid to support one candidate or another, directly or indirectly. To prevent this from happening would require enormous restrictions on individual liberty. This isn't like with judges, where you can prevent someone from bribing a judge who will rule on their case, or otherwise having a relationship with the judge or jury. Polititians have a relationship with everyone.
Personally, all things being close to equal, I vote for the candidate who has taken the fewest campaign bribes.
But as long as there are inequalities of wealth this will translate into inequalities of political power. Democracies don't tend to weild power so much as formalize it.
Actually, Burt Rutan proved last year that it was possible for private citizens to launch themselves into space. Now, space isn't orbit, but we're talking about space here,
I'm in space. You're in space. We're all in space.
Look! I'm launching myself into space *jumps up and down*
By 'nationwide' I assume you mean 'US wide.' IBM (International Business Machine has a lot of factories in China and other , where they could do what they please if they wanted. The US is not the world.
The adoptation of these standards by mutlinational corporations helps to make this a standard implemented worldwide.
When I was a young boy, I took karate lessons from a company called "Shotokan Karate which operated through our local YMCA. It was mostly young kids in dojos being taught by older men.
I was doing a little research on Japanese words as they related to animation, history of anime, etc. and found this
Shotacon () (also Shota ) is a Japanese and anime term for a sexual complex where an adult is attracted to an underage boy.
WTF! Couldn't they have picked a slightly better name for their organization?
Slashdot Mirror
Besides, just about *every* job disallows having sex at the office, it isn't like people who to do it don't ignore it anyways . . . Making rules that are just going to be ignored is stupid.
If you monitored your office mates heartrates 24-7, do you think that would change anything?
Hmm. Looks like two people just decided to get an accelerated beat at the same time...
There's only one kind of sexual release which doesn't include jealousy or partners as a standard component
True. But are they really going to let them fire shotguns while they're on the shuttle?
It used to be that abortions were legal in the U.S. up until 'quickening' or fetal movement. Now groups want to say that life begins before an embryo has even implanted or differentaited.
RU-486 results in 1 death in 200,000 making it twice as safe as penicillian. Those people who have suffered the worst side effects were those who took it despite being having contra-indicating factors warning against its use.
(from religioustolerance.org)
RU-486 still has complications in 8-10% of cases requiring surgical follow up, which I think is what you're alluding to.
http://www.americanpregnancy.org/>
But I thought these folks were ALL ABOUT women's health!
I used to think doctors were all about health too, but most of them don't seem to care.
I'm saying this as a guy who has met a fair number of doctors who were simply unable or unwilling to do simple diagnostic work. Apathy and negligence are problems throughout the medical profession. The number of unreported incidences of malpractice is high. A significant accident occurs in one out of three major operations, if memory serves. I could be off on this, I don't have time to google it. All I know is that I've had one friend injected with so much insulin that they went into a coma, and my mom had her teeth filed down by the dentist when she specifically asked for them not to be.
Vaginal administration of RU-486 isn't contra-indicated, however. It's an off-label use, which is different. You haven't really supported the notion that it should be banned (though from what I've googled on the NIH research, oral administration is far more effective.), or even supported the notion that that was in fact the cause of these women dying.
Bacterial infections are treatable, though some strains of S. Aureus are now resistant even to vancomycin, and starting to become resistant to the various fluroquinolones. But considering that they don't know the facts related to these women's cases, and that the infections weren't treated properly, it would seem that these women simply weren't receiving proper medical care to begin with in terms of follow up visits. That, rather than a pill, was the cause of their death. The "human at conception" camp opposes RU-486 for reasons that have nothing to do with protecting women's health.
When it comes down to it, abortion is still far safer than pregnancy. There were 399 deaths from pregnancy in 2001 alone.
Up until the late 1800s, 'quickening' or the time when fetal movements could be felt, was the point of no return for a pregnancy. The notion that 'life has always begun at conception' according to religious doctrine is simply not true. If you ask someone to show you a biblical passage that makes the claim that life begins at conception, I promise you they'll show you a passage that says somthing else entirely. Without fail. The notion that "people are fully human at conception" is literally the belief that undifferentiated cells are people.
But when even Bill Frist tried to argue that it should be slightly later, he was essentially shouted down by his own party who didn't want to hear it.
They'll cover how to use condoms in the in flight training video right after they explain how to strap on seat belts.
While I'm a guy, if I were headed into outer space for 31 months I'd want to be on the pill. At least so I could keep everything regular and predictable.
If they're worried about sexual harrassment, they should send married couples. That'd make sense.
More water for Sergy, less vodka.
Simply saying, "they might have done that bad thing because of poverty, or inequality, or whatnot" is like saying, "not only are they not fully to blame, but you may be partly to blame for contributing to an environment that makes their bad behavior unavoidable."
Sounds like blaming the victim to me, and it's just as digusting when done to some rape victim as it is when done to the better off. "You were robbed because your society failed to alleviate the poverty in some third world nation." etc. etc.
How you define crime determines how you fix it. If poverty is the cause of these scams, are we required to go bring Nigerians out of poverty? The cause of these scams is the fact that they're profitable. If they weren't, people would not do them.
As Sun Tzu said "Know thyself, know thy enemy and win the battle every time.". (paraphrased)
Sun Tzu was giving advice to generals, not soldiers. He also emphasized that in battle, fleeing should not be viewed by one's troops as a possibility. You fight close to home or with your back to a mountain, and your strength will be doubled. In ancient warfare, most casualties occurred during a willy nilly retreat rather than actual battle.
To put it another way, one strategy in a game of 'chicken' is to throw your steering wheel out the window and make sure your opponent sees it.
Enemies are less likely to fight if they see their defeat as inevitable and their opposition's will is unbreakable and the possibility of a just peace is offered to them.
Because earlier posts tend to get the gimp mod points, where as a later post much actually BE interesting or insightful to get modded up. Naturally, you want to be positively recognized with a minimum of effort...
Which brings up an interesting notion. Would it be possible to time when a post was first made, and not allow it to get mod points once, say, 24 hours has passed? That way, first posting would get less of a karma bump.
The rich, after all, have a higher percentage of their income taxed, and most people consider that a good thing, even though its unequal treatment.
Good point. I guess I should have said 'making exceptions on a case by case basis' as opposed to employing certain universal standards.
If we're going to give tax exemptions for businesses, it'd be nice if they standardized it according to certain criteria for all businesses rather than negotiating it on a business by business basis with those businesses who are big enough to show up on the political radar.
Your argument would make more sense if music was a necessity rather than a luxury good.
A few things;
1. I think the pricing of CDs would take care of itself if the music industry couldn't monopolize radio and essentially hype its own product 24-7.
2. Copyright is not a natural right, but an artificial one granted for the purpose of encouraging artists to move creative works into the public domain. Creatives works are making more money than ever now. So why was the length of copyright increased.
3. "Information wants to be free" is not, in my mind synonymous with "information should be free." It's a reminder that there are huge economic costs in terms of enforcement and lost opportunity costs in preventing the freeflow of information.
Tax refunds are not taking away money from corporations, not giving them money. Most of our tax revenue comes from those corporations anyway, you know.
I realize that there are some benefits to tax breaks, but not only does it seem like a subversion of law to give breaks if there isn't a clear and immediate economic benefit to the community, but it seems like a subversion of law. Why shouldn't all people get equal treatment from the government? If the RIAA didn't donate huge amounts of money to the government, I might be more inclined to see Gov't favoring of the music industry as a mutually beneficial relationship, as opposed to a straightforward conflict of interest.
Personally, while I don't think CD prices are over the top, I wouldn't buy any music if I knew the RIAA got a cut.
True, but bear in mind that copyrights and patents are not natural rights as determined by the founders. They were supposed to be just enough to compensate their authors for creation of the work. With the extension of copyright duration, the fundamental nature of copyright has changed. The original intent was to allow authors to continue to support themselves while putting creative works into the public domain. Now the point is to simply compensate the owners of copyrights, without thought for the public domain.
Yeah, which is why I'm not going to buy any music unless I'm sure they're not part of some music mafia or that said mafia doesn't get any money.
We need to have more 'good and bad' lists so people can be better informed on who the litigant musicians are.
Metallica learned its lesson about having its name associated with lawsuits.
Hopefully we could do the same for other supporters of the RIAA. Madonna is in it too. A lot of the established, has-been names are.
Here's a list
In that case, if someone would spend the time to put ONE computer in each village/town that got weather, markets, etc
Yeah, That'd probably be enough.
I can't think of a single society that wouldn't benefit from improved communication and the enhanced organization that goes with it.
Besides, look at how helpful libraries were for the U.S.
I don't think computers would solve everything. But look at it this way. At least now these folks can make some cash off of the old Nigerian mail scam bit. It's currently one of Nigeria's largest sources of income.
Hey all,
I heard a while back that a thin film of selenium, when exposed to hydrogen gas, would become transparent.
Would it be possible to make a transparent photovoltaic cell? You know, like a window that could filter out ultraviolet light and turn it into electricity, yet transmit visible light?
For that matter, would it be possible to add optical brighteners to greenhouse glass to increase the quantity of light that plants can use while reducing the risk of heat damage from noonday sun?
(to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody)
...to me
It's inconceivable.
You don't know what that means.
Scaling a mountain
Disrespectful to gravity
Say your goodbyes
The ropes gone but still there's me.
I'm just a pirate. I need no sympathy.
Because I'm ambidexterious
You are two I guess.
Any cup that you choose doesn't really matter... to me.
Mama,killed the Sicillian
Put some poison in both cups
That loud bastard bottomed up,
Mama,the chase has just begun
But Buttercup has thrown me down a cliff
Mama ooo,
Didn't mean to make you cry-
But now we've gotta run through the fireswamp.
Look a big, giant rat.
(cut foward in the song)
She's a cute princess everybody loves her.
She's just a poor girl from a poor family. Spare her her life with this man Humperdink.
let me go. I'll kill myself. Stab myself to death.-
Bismillah! no-,we will not let you go-let me go-
Bismillah! we will not let you go-let me go
Bismillah! we will not let you go-let me go
Will not let you go-let me go
Will not let you go let me go
No,no,no,no,no,no,no-
Mama mia,mama mia,mama mia let me go-
But Humperdink has a dagger set aside for you... for you.... for you...
The parent post makes an important point. Misdiagnosis in general, and psychological scapegoating in particular, is a huge problem in the modern medical industry. If you know what your problem is, you can research it and develop an understanding of the condition which is far better than what a doctor will explain to you in a hospital visit and treat yourself accordingly. Because of this, diagnosis is, arguably, the most important function of modern doctors.
And they often screw it up.
Are you running Moodle on a Windows or Linux server?
Yeah, basically words mean whatever people want them to mean over here in the states.
"Liberalism" is always conflated with socialism in the US. Socialists call themselves 'progressives.' Socialist feminists and radical separatist femanists are conflated with liberal feminists.
The radical right started a campaigin against the national endowment for the arts claiming the NEA supported pornography and things like that, and the result was cutting funding for programs like Sesame Street and public broadcasting...
I guess some Republicans have a funny definition of 'pornography.'
Conservatives, on the other hand, are called racists and Nazis. And while Repubican leaders still make the mandatory pilgrimage to Bob Jones university each election year, most conservatives of course, do not support racism any more than other Americans. For whatever that's worth.
I'd like to see what would happen if one house of congress was elected by approval voting instead of this 'winner take all' strategy.
Newspapers influnce opinion, which may influence policy. A direct contribution directly influences policy, and that is fundamentally undemocratic.
I have a simple solution.
A simple solution which is easily circumvented if employed as actual policy. Preventing campaign finance abuse is like trying to prevent piracy. You either have to clamp down all mass media, or there will be a loophole to sneak through.
Look at it this way; during an election campaign, could I, as a private individual, purchase a newspaper ad for my favorite candidate? Could I write an article supporting them? Sure! And if I can, the difference between me doing this and the party doing it themselves is trivial. A party can find out who its supporters are. They can be told who their supporters are. And they'll know that it's good policy for them to help their supporters.
If a person can influence an election through any kind of control of the mass media, then they'll be able to sell that influence to a political party in exchange for support. The best that 'campaign finance reform' can do is, as you've said, try and make contributions more obvious and let the voters chooose.
Of course, if polititians start finding this publicity a liability, more indirect quid pro quo relationships are still possible.
Cheney could easily find a way to wriggle out of his Haliburton uniform if he wanted to do so.
This is kindof like mice voting to put a bell on the cat. It sounded like a great plan, till they tried to implement it.
If someone has money, then that money can be turned into political clout. Period. As long as people can write newspaper columns or own and edit newspapers, they can be paid to support one candidate or another, directly or indirectly. To prevent this from happening would require enormous restrictions on individual liberty. This isn't like with judges, where you can prevent someone from bribing a judge who will rule on their case, or otherwise having a relationship with the judge or jury. Polititians have a relationship with everyone.
Personally, all things being close to equal, I vote for the candidate who has taken the fewest campaign bribes.
But as long as there are inequalities of wealth this will translate into inequalities of political power.
Democracies don't tend to weild power so much as formalize it.
Actually, Burt Rutan proved last year that it was possible for private citizens to launch themselves into space. Now, space isn't orbit, but we're talking about space here,
I'm in space. You're in space. We're all in space.
Look! I'm launching myself into space *jumps up and down*
Somebody FUND me!!!
By 'nationwide' I assume you mean 'US wide.' IBM (International Business Machine has a lot of factories in China and other , where they could do what they please if they wanted. The US is not the world.
The adoptation of these standards by mutlinational corporations helps to make this a standard implemented worldwide.
Ths is lngr and invlvs vwl chngs nt cnsonts, whc are mr imprtnt, if you undrstnd me.
More like someone naming their software package "eratica" or somthing like that.
When I was a young boy, I took karate lessons from a company called "Shotokan Karate which operated through our local YMCA. It was mostly young kids in dojos being taught by older men.
I was doing a little research on Japanese words as they related to animation, history of anime, etc. and found this
Shotacon () (also Shota ) is a Japanese and anime term for a sexual complex where an adult is attracted to an underage boy.
WTF! Couldn't they have picked a slightly better name for their organization?