As I say to my students 'if you had to have brain surgery would you prefer someone who has been through medical school, trained and researched in the field, or the student next to you who has read Wikipedia'?
As someone who uses wikipedia quite frequently, I would like to answer "what a stupid question that is" and ask the idiot professor "if you had to have brain surgery would you prefer someone who has been through medical school, trained and researched in the field, or the student next to you who has read the encyclopedia Britannica?'
I'd also ask him, if you were on a desert island with two people who were not medical doctors and suffered appendicitis, would you rather have your surgery from the one who has read the wikipedia article on appendicitis or the one who can't read?
The topic is proof that a PhD is not proof of intelligence. I have known some very intelligent PhDs and some moronic ones, and discovered that the morons always add "PhD" to the end of their name, while you may know the smart ones for years before discovering that they have ever been through grad school. My money says this guy puts "PhD" in his written signature.
I don't know, maybe you're right, but I've been dirt-poor during periods in my life and never resorted to dishonesty. OTOH I know people who were born with money who steal for the hell of it.
Tami (AKA "Lucy Furr", she's in some of my journals) is one of those. Of course, her whole family is dishonest (and monied) from what I hear.
There's another woman I know (also in the journals), Casey, who's a crack whore despite being born into money. You just never know.
True, but you're assuming that A is a jackhole. If he's driving at a reasonable speed and paying attention he's not going to have to slam on his brakes.
Amen. I'm not going to "slam them on" except to avoid an accident but I'm not going to need to (unless there's one of those damned stupid runners dashing out from behind a trash truck right in front of me or otherwise to avoid an accident).
I have very good brakes, four BIG disks. Twice so far those brakes have kept me out of collisions that I would certainly have had were I driving my last car (stupid people here, turning left from the right lane RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU).
Once those brakes almost caused a collision. I braked hard on the interstate to avoid hitting an animal that darted in front of me, and the tailgater behind me almost had her airbags go off. She was lucky; as soon as the animal was out of the way I punched the accellerator as she was sliding out of control.
When your child changes in ONE DAY and it's the day she gets the shot, it's pretty damned hard NOT to believe the shot's at fault. It's like some guy showing you scientific proof that hitting your thumb with a hammer doesn't hurt. "We don't know WHY it hurts, but we've proven it's not the hammer."
My oldest daughter Leila was diagnosed as mentally retarded (IQ 65) but I've come to realise that she's autistic. I'll never forget the day she got her MMR shot.
My oldest daughter Leila has a measured IQ of 65. She's now on SSI disability. She was diagnosed with mental retardation, but as her dad who broiught her up I knew better - her reasoning abilities aren't at fault. I tried to tell each and every one of her teachers that, was ignored, and at the end of the year every one admitted that yes, I was right and the tests were wrong. I've since come to realise that she's autistic. Nobody who meets her now can believe that her IQ only measures 65.
Her development as an infant was advanced by every measure - until she recieved the MMR shot. She screamed and cried all day, and in a panic we called the doctor (now retired, maybe dead) who assured us that it was normal and there was nothing to worry about.
She was never the same again. The spark was gone from her eyes. Her life changed the day she got that shot. She now lives on government disability payments, in poverty, and will never hold a job.
Her sister's IQ is 132, well above normal. You're not going to convince ME there was no link. I was there. Show me all the studies showing red is really green you want and I'll be convinced that the researcher is color blind or dishonest.
I had measles and mumps, and I'm fine. Leila isn't. My friend Mike had polio (which has been completely eradicated in this country so there's no excuse for polio vaccinations here any more) as a child and he walks with a limp and one hand doesn't work well, but he has a productive job. Small pox and diptheria are gone, no need to vaccinate against them either. I knew kids with strep throat, none of whom developed pneumonia. AFAIK there is no vaccine for meningitis.
Cost benefit ratio, you say?
And besides, your straw man is on fire. The problem isn't the vaccine, it's the thimerisol.
-mcgrew
"I've got no sympathy, none at all. Throw them out of the airlock" - Prosthetic Vogon Brian Jeltz (IIRC)
Unfortunately it doesn't work like that - lights timed for 35 mph are timed for 17.5 mph and 7.75 mph
Well then, do 17.5 mph, problem solved. You're not going to get there any faster by driving faster than the lights are timed for anyway. The only problem is that all the other drivers are too stupid to realise this and you have to stop for a green light, because the morons have raced to the red light and are now picking their nose and not paying attention as the light turns green.
People don't realise that in the city, the speed limit signs are meaningless (except here in Springfield, where they have a different revinue generating method which I'll describe shortly). If the lights are timed at 22 mph, then it doesn't matter that the legal speed limit is 40, the real speed limit is 22.
Here in Springfield* they time most lights at ten MPH above the posted limit. So unless you want to stop at every intersection you have to break the speed limit.
But since it's the capital city, the Springfield cops won't pull you over if you're driving a car manufactured in this century* (although the state and county cops will) because they're afraid you might be a judge or a politician who can do you a world of hurt. So the traffic court is full of blacks and rednecks, with the blacks complaining that they're being discriminated against because they're black and the rednecks complaining because they never pull over the blacks "and they all drive like shit."
So the town's poor subsidise that town's rich. This has the added advantage of keeping the poor whites and blacks at each others' throats rather than going after the shitheads who run things.
-mcgrew
* There's a local joke: a tourist goes to Chicago and gets in a cab, and the cabbie promptly runs a red light. "Hey!" exclaims the tourist, "you ran a red light!"
"'S okay," the cabbie says nonchalontly, "I'm from Springfield." And whizzes through another red light.
"Holy fuck you did it again!!!"
"Relax, I told you, I'm from Springfield!" As he says this the light ahead turns green and the driver slams on the brakes.
"What did you do that for? The light was green!"
"My brother's in town, he's from Springfield too."
That doesn't make any sense to me, and I don't see how it would fly. If you hit someone in the rear, you're following too close!
A friend of my ex-wife once complained about being ticketed when she was in an accident. The light turned yellow, the driver in front of her stopped, and she rear-ended the other driver. Evil-X's friend was livid that the other driver had the gall to stop for a yellow light!
They keep parroting that "crime doesn't pay" but it obviously DOES pay, and it pays well. Most crimes are not solved. Most criminals are not caught - only the stupid ones and the unlucky ones get caught.
In fact, society should be damned glad that most slashdotters are honest and have conscienses (no that's not spelled right, so jail me) because if most of us were dishonest we could do one hell of a lot of damage!
Some times I wish I could be dishonest, I'd be a rich man. But it's just not in my nature.
Thank you for that! I hope your comment gets highly rated by the mods.
I want to add that I have a SERIOUS problem with this topic's title. NOBODY owns "content", EVERYBODY owns it. I have a legal monopoly on sale and distribution of my content, but I DO NOT OWN IT.
Maybe in other countries one can own "intellectual property" but Article II section 8 of the US Constitution is clear enough on this point that you don't have to be a lawyer to understand it. You can own a painting, but you can't own the image on the painting. You can own a book, you can hold a monopoly on distribution of copies of that book, but you cannot own the novel itself.
If we keep letting these corporations call imaginary property "intellectual property" sooner or later they WILL be able to own it. PLEASE, people, STOP CALLING IT "INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY and stop talking about "ownership" of said imaginary "property"!"
Why Does anyone even bother with the likes of GoDaddy and Network Solutions for their hosting services?
There, fixed that for ya. Obviously somebody bothers or they'd have gone out of business as a host long ago.
I agree with you, I've been using register4less.com as I don't need a lot of space, fifteen bucks a year for registration AND hosting! I have yet to have a single complaint. Back when I had thefragfest.com (lapsed after boredom, someone told me it's a porn site now) I had a 404 which used their 404 page, they told me what I had to do to have my own 404 page. Still using them for mcgrew.info and one other site.
That's -73.15 celcius, or -99.67 Fahrenheit. 294.3 Kelvin would be a very comfortable temperature for superconductivity, I wonder if I'll see it in my lifetime?
I've been very nearsighted all my life (see my sig for details), which means that the eyeball isn't perfectly spherical; it's longer than wide. This caused first a torn retina, then a detached retina.
I had surgery last Thursday to correct the detached retina, a vitrectomy. From the Wikipedia article:
A gas bubble may be placed inside the eye to keep the retina in place. If a gas bubble is used, sometimes a certain head positioning has to be maintained, such as face down or sleeping on the right or left side. It is very important to follow the physician's specific instructions.
The question on my mind is, where does Universal get these incredibly stupid lawyers, how did these incredibly stupid lawyers get their law degrees, and if someone sues me how can I ensure that the person suing me has an incredibly stupid lawyer?
Considering yesterday's story about MediaSentry's ignoring a court order, ALL the MAFIAA lawyers are dumb as a box of rocks. If they ever sued me I'd just get a local shyster (maybe the one that handled my divorce) and take the SOBs to the cleaners!
But what if Universal had signed a contract with each and every DJ and reviewer that got a promo copy that said "in exchange for getting this CD a week early, you have to keep it secret."
What if pigs could fly? What if I won the lottery? What if CowboyNeil got laid? What if Sony's Ceo's wife was a crack whore? (oh wait...) What if water was undrinkable?
If you're wondering why your post was marked "flamebait" it's because there's no mod "-1, incorrect and false". Also because you are calling people thieves when, in fact, they are NOT thieves. Here is the difference between copyright infringement, stealing music, and piracy:
Stealing music: You walk into a record store and stick a CD under your shirt when nobody is looking. You then walk out without paying. If caught you will be charged with misdemeanor thieft and pay a few hundred dollars fine. The store has paid for the CD you stole and no longer has that CD.
Copyright Infringement: You walk into a store, pick up a CD and pay for it. You then rip the tracks to MP3 and place them in your shara folder in kazaa, allowing people to download them from your computer. The people downloading them are not breaking the law. Rather than a criminal matter, it is a civil matter and if caught you will be liable for thousands of dollars, despite the fact that the people downloading from you may discover that although they "kinda" like the track they hear on the radio they LOVE the one you provided, and go buy the CD.
Piracy: You go on the high seas, find a rich man's yacht, kill him and all his passengers and take his boat. It is a felony and if caught you will face prison or perhaps even the death penalty.
This is America, buddy, where no rich and powerful man ever goes to prison unless a richer and more powerful man wants him there. It's called a "plutocracy".
Um, sorry, but WRONG. The ISBN number is registered by the publisher, and has nothing to do with copyright, nor is it issued by the copyright office
I have no idea where you got your info, but unless things have changed since 1985 you're wrong. My ISBN numbers were issued by the copyright office and are on the documents the copyright office sent.
Slashdot Mirror
It wasn't meant to be anaylitical discourse. It was meant to be testemony.
As I say to my students 'if you had to have brain surgery would you prefer someone who has been through medical school, trained and researched in the field, or the student next to you who has read Wikipedia'?
As someone who uses wikipedia quite frequently, I would like to answer "what a stupid question that is" and ask the idiot professor "if you had to have brain surgery would you prefer someone who has been through medical school, trained and researched in the field, or the student next to you who has read the encyclopedia Britannica?'
I'd also ask him, if you were on a desert island with two people who were not medical doctors and suffered appendicitis, would you rather have your surgery from the one who has read the wikipedia article on appendicitis or the one who can't read?
But since the professor doesn't trust wikipoedia I looked him up in the Uncyclopedia, which actually has a news item on the subject today.
The topic is proof that a PhD is not proof of intelligence. I have known some very intelligent PhDs and some moronic ones, and discovered that the morons always add "PhD" to the end of their name, while you may know the smart ones for years before discovering that they have ever been through grad school. My money says this guy puts "PhD" in his written signature.
I don't know, maybe you're right, but I've been dirt-poor during periods in my life and never resorted to dishonesty. OTOH I know people who were born with money who steal for the hell of it.
Tami (AKA "Lucy Furr", she's in some of my journals) is one of those. Of course, her whole family is dishonest (and monied) from what I hear.
There's another woman I know (also in the journals), Casey, who's a crack whore despite being born into money. You just never know.
True, but you're assuming that A is a jackhole. If he's driving at a reasonable speed and paying attention he's not going to have to slam on his brakes.
That wasn't an article, it was a comment I made that I was flamed mercilessly for. ;)
Amen. I'm not going to "slam them on" except to avoid an accident but I'm not going to need to (unless there's one of those damned stupid runners dashing out from behind a trash truck right in front of me or otherwise to avoid an accident).
I have very good brakes, four BIG disks. Twice so far those brakes have kept me out of collisions that I would certainly have had were I driving my last car (stupid people here, turning left from the right lane RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU).
Once those brakes almost caused a collision. I braked hard on the interstate to avoid hitting an animal that darted in front of me, and the tailgater behind me almost had her airbags go off. She was lucky; as soon as the animal was out of the way I punched the accellerator as she was sliding out of control.
Well, I expect both of them in both you guys' lifetimes, but I'm a geezer.
Thank God for that, I'd hate to live another 246 years of the hell I've already lived through.
When your child changes in ONE DAY and it's the day she gets the shot, it's pretty damned hard NOT to believe the shot's at fault. It's like some guy showing you scientific proof that hitting your thumb with a hammer doesn't hurt. "We don't know WHY it hurts, but we've proven it's not the hammer."
My oldest daughter Leila was diagnosed as mentally retarded (IQ 65) but I've come to realise that she's autistic. I'll never forget the day she got her MMR shot.
Her sister's IQ is 132.
But her freedom of speech isn't at risk
Yes it is. Freedom of speech also is the freedom to NOT speak.
My oldest daughter Leila has a measured IQ of 65. She's now on SSI disability. She was diagnosed with mental retardation, but as her dad who broiught her up I knew better - her reasoning abilities aren't at fault. I tried to tell each and every one of her teachers that, was ignored, and at the end of the year every one admitted that yes, I was right and the tests were wrong. I've since come to realise that she's autistic. Nobody who meets her now can believe that her IQ only measures 65.
Her development as an infant was advanced by every measure - until she recieved the MMR shot. She screamed and cried all day, and in a panic we called the doctor (now retired, maybe dead) who assured us that it was normal and there was nothing to worry about.
She was never the same again. The spark was gone from her eyes. Her life changed the day she got that shot. She now lives on government disability payments, in poverty, and will never hold a job.
Her sister's IQ is 132, well above normal. You're not going to convince ME there was no link. I was there. Show me all the studies showing red is really green you want and I'll be convinced that the researcher is color blind or dishonest.
I had measles and mumps, and I'm fine. Leila isn't. My friend Mike had polio (which has been completely eradicated in this country so there's no excuse for polio vaccinations here any more) as a child and he walks with a limp and one hand doesn't work well, but he has a productive job. Small pox and diptheria are gone, no need to vaccinate against them either. I knew kids with strep throat, none of whom developed pneumonia. AFAIK there is no vaccine for meningitis.
Cost benefit ratio, you say?
And besides, your straw man is on fire. The problem isn't the vaccine, it's the thimerisol.
-mcgrew
"I've got no sympathy, none at all. Throw them out of the airlock" - Prosthetic Vogon Brian Jeltz (IIRC)
Unfortunately it doesn't work like that - lights timed for 35 mph are timed for 17.5 mph and 7.75 mph
Well then, do 17.5 mph, problem solved. You're not going to get there any faster by driving faster than the lights are timed for anyway. The only problem is that all the other drivers are too stupid to realise this and you have to stop for a green light, because the morons have raced to the red light and are now picking their nose and not paying attention as the light turns green.
People don't realise that in the city, the speed limit signs are meaningless (except here in Springfield, where they have a different revinue generating method which I'll describe shortly). If the lights are timed at 22 mph, then it doesn't matter that the legal speed limit is 40, the real speed limit is 22.
Here in Springfield* they time most lights at ten MPH above the posted limit. So unless you want to stop at every intersection you have to break the speed limit.
But since it's the capital city, the Springfield cops won't pull you over if you're driving a car manufactured in this century* (although the state and county cops will) because they're afraid you might be a judge or a politician who can do you a world of hurt. So the traffic court is full of blacks and rednecks, with the blacks complaining that they're being discriminated against because they're black and the rednecks complaining because they never pull over the blacks "and they all drive like shit."
So the town's poor subsidise that town's rich. This has the added advantage of keeping the poor whites and blacks at each others' throats rather than going after the shitheads who run things.
-mcgrew
* There's a local joke: a tourist goes to Chicago and gets in a cab, and the cabbie promptly runs a red light. "Hey!" exclaims the tourist, "you ran a red light!"
"'S okay," the cabbie says nonchalontly, "I'm from Springfield." And whizzes through another red light.
"Holy fuck you did it again!!!"
"Relax, I told you, I'm from Springfield!" As he says this the light ahead turns green and the driver slams on the brakes.
"What did you do that for? The light was green!"
"My brother's in town, he's from Springfield too."
That doesn't make any sense to me, and I don't see how it would fly. If you hit someone in the rear, you're following too close!
A friend of my ex-wife once complained about being ticketed when she was in an accident. The light turned yellow, the driver in front of her stopped, and she rear-ended the other driver. Evil-X's friend was livid that the other driver had the gall to stop for a yellow light!
They keep parroting that "crime doesn't pay" but it obviously DOES pay, and it pays well. Most crimes are not solved. Most criminals are not caught - only the stupid ones and the unlucky ones get caught.
In fact, society should be damned glad that most slashdotters are honest and have conscienses (no that's not spelled right, so jail me) because if most of us were dishonest we could do one hell of a lot of damage!
Some times I wish I could be dishonest, I'd be a rich man. But it's just not in my nature.
Thank you for that! I hope your comment gets highly rated by the mods.
I want to add that I have a SERIOUS problem with this topic's title. NOBODY owns "content", EVERYBODY owns it. I have a legal monopoly on sale and distribution of my content, but I DO NOT OWN IT.
Maybe in other countries one can own "intellectual property" but Article II section 8 of the US Constitution is clear enough on this point that you don't have to be a lawyer to understand it. You can own a painting, but you can't own the image on the painting. You can own a book, you can hold a monopoly on distribution of copies of that book, but you cannot own the novel itself.
If we keep letting these corporations call imaginary property "intellectual property" sooner or later they WILL be able to own it. PLEASE, people, STOP CALLING IT "INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY and stop talking about "ownership" of said imaginary "property"!"
-mcgrew
Why Does anyone even bother with the likes of GoDaddy and Network Solutions for their hosting services?
There, fixed that for ya. Obviously somebody bothers or they'd have gone out of business as a host long ago.
I agree with you, I've been using register4less.com as I don't need a lot of space, fifteen bucks a year for registration AND hosting! I have yet to have a single complaint. Back when I had thefragfest.com (lapsed after boredom, someone told me it's a porn site now) I had a 404 which used their 404 page, they told me what I had to do to have my own 404 page. Still using them for mcgrew.info and one other site.
That's -73.15 celcius, or -99.67 Fahrenheit. 294.3 Kelvin would be a very comfortable temperature for superconductivity, I wonder if I'll see it in my lifetime?
Coldest Temperature (North America): -81.4 oF/-63 oC, Snag, Yukon, Canada, February 3, 1947
This weekend? It's a long way to Andromeda's house! I hope she brings some moonshine beer with those quasar sandwiches!
Well yes, I'd gathered that, but out of the gazillion quotes why that particular one?
I had surgery last Thursday to correct the detached retina, a vitrectomy. From the Wikipedia article:
The question on my mind is, where does Universal get these incredibly stupid lawyers, how did these incredibly stupid lawyers get their law degrees, and if someone sues me how can I ensure that the person suing me has an incredibly stupid lawyer?
Considering yesterday's story about MediaSentry's ignoring a court order, ALL the MAFIAA lawyers are dumb as a box of rocks. If they ever sued me I'd just get a local shyster (maybe the one that handled my divorce) and take the SOBs to the cleaners!
But what if Universal had signed a contract with each and every DJ and reviewer that got a promo copy that said "in exchange for getting this CD a week early, you have to keep it secret."
What if pigs could fly? What if I won the lottery? What if CowboyNeil got laid? What if Sony's Ceo's wife was a crack whore? (oh wait...) What if water was undrinkable?
What if your post got modded "-1, troll"?
If you're wondering why your post was marked "flamebait" it's because there's no mod "-1, incorrect and false". Also because you are calling people thieves when, in fact, they are NOT thieves. Here is the difference between copyright infringement, stealing music, and piracy:
Stealing music: You walk into a record store and stick a CD under your shirt when nobody is looking. You then walk out without paying. If caught you will be charged with misdemeanor thieft and pay a few hundred dollars fine. The store has paid for the CD you stole and no longer has that CD.
Copyright Infringement: You walk into a store, pick up a CD and pay for it. You then rip the tracks to MP3 and place them in your shara folder in kazaa, allowing people to download them from your computer. The people downloading them are not breaking the law. Rather than a criminal matter, it is a civil matter and if caught you will be liable for thousands of dollars, despite the fact that the people downloading from you may discover that although they "kinda" like the track they hear on the radio they LOVE the one you provided, and go buy the CD.
Piracy: You go on the high seas, find a rich man's yacht, kill him and all his passengers and take his boat. It is a felony and if caught you will face prison or perhaps even the death penalty.
Flamebait: See the uncyclopedia entry
-mcgrew
This is America, buddy, where no rich and powerful man ever goes to prison unless a richer and more powerful man wants him there. It's called a "plutocracy".
What made you pick that particular quote for your sig?
Um, sorry, but WRONG. The ISBN number is registered by the publisher, and has nothing to do with copyright, nor is it issued by the copyright office
I have no idea where you got your info, but unless things have changed since 1985 you're wrong. My ISBN numbers were issued by the copyright office and are on the documents the copyright office sent.