What I'd be concerned about is our meddling again and creating different problems. IANAEE (I am not an ecology expert), but I would think that, yes, we probably caused the extinction of Species X by hunting, etc., but how are we going to mess things up by bringing them back? Are we just going to tip the scale in the other direction now, and get overrun with Species X? In other words, humans suck at trying to balance the ecology, whether it's killing off species, or perhaps restoring them.
Re:Oh Wait...that pig thing -- OFF TOPIC!
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Post Apocalyptic
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Actually, the cow thing first started in some town in Switzerland which some politician saw on a trip to Europe. I thought it was absolutely ridiculous, but you should have seen all the damn tourists! They loved it.
Frankly, I got sick of 'em being in the way, but am glad they brought some money to the city and some charities.
Re:Am I the Only Person Who Doesn't Like GIS?
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Post Apocalyptic
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I actually finally listened to it for the first time today and thought it was pretty cool. It's fun for me to listen to Geek (TM) conversation about topics I find interesting, because there are NO technical people where I work and, alas, I married a non-geek girl who just rolls her eyes when I get excited about getting ipmasqing to work on an old 486. This is really weird, but none of my friends are geeks either!
Anyways, I suppose it's a way to live vicariously through those guys! Sad, but true!:) It's fun and interesting.
Won't Slashdot get sued, thrown in jail, tortured, and otherwise persecuted for linking to the source code for DeCSS?
I think CmdrTaco is going to get lashed with a wet noodle for this one.
IIRC, the Open Source license states that you're free to take and re-distribute source code (paraphrasing) as long as appropriate credit is given to the authors (and a copy of the license wording is available or included). So, even the Open Source License idea is going against that guy I think.
However, the universe is an amazingly huge place as far as we can tell and we have only looked in an infinitesimally tiny amount of it.
It's the proverbial needle in a haystack. You can't simply dismiss other life in the universe by saying "If there were other races out there we would see evidence for them..." because we haven't looked everywhere for evidence yet. Your argument is akin to saying: "I think I dropped my contact lense in the middle of the Sahara desert, but I looked in one square centimeter of it and haven't found it, so it must not be there."
Can you imagine all (no offense intended) Mac users with their really easy to use system trying to get X to run? X is a nightmare to configure and setup especially compared to the ease of using Macs. I personally am not a huge fan of the Macintosh, but I don't think that Linux has a chance in hell to capture Mac users as the article states, unless aforementioned Mac users are the few who are predisposed to hacking.
Perhaps Linux has "lapped" the Mac in numbers (or in press coverage more likely), but probably not in loyalty of the Mac users to their boxes!
Anyways, as I am a firm believer in, people should use what suits their tasks. Some people like and use Macs, others Windows, others Linux. Unless Linux comes pre-installed and with no need to tinker, Mac users will remain Mac users IMO.
Re:But do you want universal access by company PC
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Universal Access
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I completely understand your concerns, but I think the benefits outweigh the negatives. If a company like Ford will provide internet access for a man or woman working on an assembly line, who never even thought of being able to access the internet, this idea will be a boon to them. If an employee wants to use their employer provided internet connection for the vast majority of other useful things (besides ragging on the company) on the Net (education, news, games, medical info, etc.) they will benefit. So, for a large amount of employees, I think this will be A Good Thing!
Word and Excel already allow you to turn off automatic execution of macros so you can safely open a file without auto-running a macro. It's not the best solution, obviously, but it does provide a basic method for not instantly trashing your system with an evil macro...you have to go through extra work to do that!:)
I think what he was saying was that the social interaction of attending a real university would be missing. This is a very important part of the study. Learning to interact with your peers in a mutually beneficial way. What social interaction do you learn at college? How do snort down beers and shots of whiskey? I went to school to learn a curriculum, not to become a touchy-feely people person. I interact socially via other means anyway. The first priority for me when attending college was to learn how to solve problems (engineering) and understand the basic scientific principles. While I enjoyed social interaction with friends and girlfriends:), I probably would have gotten better grades if I didn't have those distractions. (except for the girls, can't do without em.). I think that people who believe in learning social interaction as a priority at college (opposed to the actual studies) are, by and large, Liberal Arts majors if you ask me. (Not intended as a troll, just an opinion).
From what I've investigated, looking into getting a Masters at University of Illinois, is that you take tests at a proctoring site (physical, not virtual)like Sylvan Learning Center. The University hires a company which specializes in giving tests, like the places where you take SATs or GRE tests.
While I understand you're initial concerns, I think some of them are answered. For example, some of the schools I've investigated for getting a Masters in CS, like the University of Illinois, aren't simply offering "A web page". They're offering things like streaming video and pdf class notes which are synchronized with the video all from the comfort of your home. You can fit it in with a busy schedule because it's at your convenience; furthermore, I like the idea of streaming video...you can pause your professor, re-listen to a section, and go on! Questions are submitted by e-mail, or on-line chats, or newgroup type forums. Granted for some courses with heavy lab requirements (Chemistry, Physics) you may still need to physically attend school, but if we ever get some really good experiment simulation software, that may be able to be done from home too. Your comment about life skills is also interesting. Don't you believe that these "life skills" are changing to more computer-oriented tasks? Perhaps becoming a little more of a self-learner by using the web and it's resources, people may develop better life skills for the world that's currently evolving.
I really used to buy all sorts of books from amazon, they always had a very nice web site and an extremely comprehensive supply of books. After these fiascos, I am NOT going to buy from them any more. Richard Stallman's "Boycott Amazon" Essay is a great location to start to find out what to do. I know this was brought up in prior Amazon discussions, but just as a reminder... I don't agree with Mr. Stallman's philosophies totally, but I sure agree with him on the Amazon issue!
Have you even attempted to put yourselves in the shoes of the officers or have you just been suckered by the tripe the news media throws at you? I feel horribly about what happened to Diallo and it was a terrible tragedy. Those officers were bad cops, not necessarily bad people. They thought he was reaching for a gun, one of the cops fell causing the others to think he had been shot. It's perfectly understandable if you put your life in danger every day, and generally want to help people, that you get a little wired on adrenaline and when you see someone reaching behind himself (which you should NEVER do in a tense situation in front of a cop) when you're chasing after another criminal. The self-righteous attitude has got to be dropped by the people so easily condemning the officers when they have no clue what it's like in their shoes!
More and more women are becoming successful in various businesses as executives, lawyers, etc. and depending upon which source you quote (extreme liberal, moderate, or far right), they are getting equal pay. If women aren't signing up for CS classes, why do people like Borg insist that we must "care" and force people to do things that maybe they decided they're not interested. If a woman is interested in computers or engineering, there is nothing hindering her in the U.S. from joining. The absolute smartest engineer I ever met was one of the few women in my engineering class in college. She had the aptitude and the interest to take engineering, many other women I meet just aren't interested, or don't think in the way that CS or engineering people do. There is nothing wrong with that! This nonsense that something is wrong with "the system" is specious babble used by everyone from Jesse Jackson defending violent thugs to criminals blaming society on death row and it is getting very tiring. If women want to study CS, they will. Furthermore, if she can generalize boys by saying "boys are wilder than girls", therefore they get more time on the computer, why is it that the statement "Maybe girls just aren't interested" valid? In general, perhaps boys are wilder and girls just aren't interested in computers.
In 1999 I worked 900+ hours OT. I honestly didn't remember how to interact or have fun with my wife anymore after this. I never helped her out at home or took her out to dinner (maybe a few times. However, THAT IS THE LAST TIME THEY'LL GET ME TO DO THAT. I don't care if a project is critical. My wife is more critical. If companies want 900 man-hours more, hire somebody else. If you ask me, the government has got it all wrong as usual. I don't know anyone who works less than 45 hours/week (except for me now.) Great article!
While I am by no means an expert on history, I have often read that the first thing Hitler did was outlaw private ownership of guns. You seem to even support that occurring in Cuba with Castro with the statement "...with guns not allowed." I have also read that Milosevic also passed numerous laws outlawing guns when he took power. However, since one of the first things a dictator will do is remove the right to own guns, isn't that an indication that a dictator, vying for extreme power over the masses, is attempting to remove the last ounce of power any rebellious forces will have against an oppressive dictator? I do indeed think that governments will attempt to remove liberties one by one if the people don't speak up. Once the government is able to abolish guns, I believe that the people are in a precarious position from that point on. While countries which outlaw guns, such as Great Britain, may retain their freedom for years, as they have, they are still in a position of weakness should the wrong people take power. I do not own any guns and personally despise them, but I think that the right to have them is necessary (for the U.S. at least).
...behind Australia's virtual complete elimination of private rights to firearm ownership? I agree. In history, other countries which followed down this path wound up ruled by dictators and wishing they hadn't allowed such "safety" measures: Cuba, Nazi Germany, Yugoslavia. Give any government an inch and they'll take every subsequent mile piece by piece. If the U.S. government did what the Australian government just did, I'd pull the plug on my internet connection permanently. A big middle finger to those idiots. I'd rather be without the internet than to have the government in my computer.
To me, the answer is simple, the consequences should lie with the person who used some software to hurt someone or damage something. Where does the finger-pointing stop? If someone writes an extremely lethal virus and compiles it using gcc is somebody going to try and blame GNU for providing the tools to build the virus? There is a major problem today, in the US at least, of blaming everyone and everything remotely associated with someone bad (think: Doom and Columbine wackos). As much as I personally dislike guns, I believe the same argument holds there as well...guns don't shoot themselves. Blame the responsible person: the one who committed the act!
As much as I despise AOL, this is good customer service for a family-oriented service provider. I am nauseated by the thought that many believe that it's a specific game's fault for producing rotten kids (ala those Columbine idiots); however, simply providing a rating as a tool for parents to use is a Good Thing.
Start/Programs/Tools/System Info. There are various utilities on the "Tools" menu in "System Info" -- doing this from memory so take with grain of salt. Just last night I found a corrupted driver, which was causing intermittent crashes, using the "System File Verification" utility. Deleted the driver, re-installed it, back in business. Not too hard to handle when it tells you which file is bad.
I think if MS responded to competition by simply making their stuff BETTER... Have you used *any* ms products since pre-Windows 95? Their products are loads better than they used to be. THIS IS NOT A FLAME-BAIT BUT A VALID OPINION: In a certain sense, for the average joe, MS products are better than Linux products...you know why? Because they're easy and fun to use. What fun (or use) is a #> prompt to all the Grandmas and Grandpas out there getting interested in computers? Granted, I know Linux is a MUCH more powerful and stable OS and really do like it better, but I'm a geek. To most folks, power and stability aren't jack without ease of use, massive game support, educational s/w, and the "eye-candy factor". MS provides good looking, easy to use stuff which has definitely improved in terms of stability and power over the years. I'LL BE RUNNING FOR COVER NOW.
I don't understand how people who can configure a fairly complex OS like Linux can't keep Windows 98 from crashing. MSIE in Windows 9x has crashed EXACTLY 1 time on me when I tried to enter a "Netscape-only" web site. NETSCAPE, OTOH, crashes EVERY TIME I RUN IT IN LINUX (or Windows). Core dump, rm core,./netscape, core dump, rm core,./netscape, wait 10 seconds, core dump, rm core,./netscape. Either the majority of Linux users are all a bunch of conformist liars or they can only solve complex problems, paralyzed at working with easy stuff.
I don't understand how people who can configure a fairly complex OS like Linux can't keep Windows 98 from crashing. MSIE in Windows 9x has crashed EXACTLY 1 time on me when I tried to enter a "Netscape-only" web site. NETSCAPE, OTOH, crashes EVERY TIME I RUN IT IN LINUX (or Windows). Core dump,./netscape, rm core, wait 10 seconds, core dump, rm core,./netscape. Either Linux users are all a bunch of liars or they can only solve complex problems, paralyzed at working with easy stuff.
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What I'd be concerned about is our meddling again and creating different problems. IANAEE (I am not an ecology expert), but I would think that, yes, we probably caused the extinction of Species X by hunting, etc., but how are we going to mess things up by bringing them back? Are we just going to tip the scale in the other direction now, and get overrun with Species X? In other words, humans suck at trying to balance the ecology, whether it's killing off species, or perhaps restoring them.
Actually, the cow thing first started in some town in Switzerland which some politician saw on a trip to Europe. I thought it was absolutely ridiculous, but you should have seen all the damn tourists! They loved it. Frankly, I got sick of 'em being in the way, but am glad they brought some money to the city and some charities.
I actually finally listened to it for the first time today and thought it was pretty cool. It's fun for me to listen to Geek (TM) conversation about topics I find interesting, because there are NO technical people where I work and, alas, I married a non-geek girl who just rolls her eyes when I get excited about getting ipmasqing to work on an old 486. This is really weird, but none of my friends are geeks either! Anyways, I suppose it's a way to live vicariously through those guys! Sad, but true! :) It's fun and interesting.
Won't Slashdot get sued, thrown in jail, tortured, and otherwise persecuted for linking to the source code for DeCSS? I think CmdrTaco is going to get lashed with a wet noodle for this one.
IIRC, the Open Source license states that you're free to take and re-distribute source code (paraphrasing) as long as appropriate credit is given to the authors (and a copy of the license wording is available or included). So, even the Open Source License idea is going against that guy I think.
However, the universe is an amazingly huge place as far as we can tell and we have only looked in an infinitesimally tiny amount of it. It's the proverbial needle in a haystack. You can't simply dismiss other life in the universe by saying "If there were other races out there we would see evidence for them..." because we haven't looked everywhere for evidence yet. Your argument is akin to saying: "I think I dropped my contact lense in the middle of the Sahara desert, but I looked in one square centimeter of it and haven't found it, so it must not be there."
Can you imagine all (no offense intended) Mac users with their really easy to use system trying to get X to run? X is a nightmare to configure and setup especially compared to the ease of using Macs. I personally am not a huge fan of the Macintosh, but I don't think that Linux has a chance in hell to capture Mac users as the article states, unless aforementioned Mac users are the few who are predisposed to hacking. Perhaps Linux has "lapped" the Mac in numbers (or in press coverage more likely), but probably not in loyalty of the Mac users to their boxes! Anyways, as I am a firm believer in, people should use what suits their tasks. Some people like and use Macs, others Windows, others Linux. Unless Linux comes pre-installed and with no need to tinker, Mac users will remain Mac users IMO.
I completely understand your concerns, but I think the benefits outweigh the negatives. If a company like Ford will provide internet access for a man or woman working on an assembly line, who never even thought of being able to access the internet, this idea will be a boon to them. If an employee wants to use their employer provided internet connection for the vast majority of other useful things (besides ragging on the company) on the Net (education, news, games, medical info, etc.) they will benefit. So, for a large amount of employees, I think this will be A Good Thing!
Word and Excel already allow you to turn off automatic execution of macros so you can safely open a file without auto-running a macro. It's not the best solution, obviously, but it does provide a basic method for not instantly trashing your system with an evil macro...you have to go through extra work to do that! :)
You are being a little too pedantic! You can safely say that you have faith in the water department, or drivers on the roads. That faith may be shaken now and then, but it's nevertheless faith (which fits into items #1 & 5 below). faith [fayth] (plural faiths) noun 1. belief or trust: belief in, devotion to, or trust in somebody or something, especially without logical proof 2. RELIGION religion or religious group: a system of religious belief, or the group of people who adhere to it 3. RELIGION trust in God: belief in and devotion to God Her faith is unwavering. 4. set of beliefs: a strongly held set of beliefs or principles people of different political faiths 5. loyalty: allegiance or loyalty to somebody or something Encarta® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.
I think what he was saying was that the social interaction of attending a real university would be missing. This is a very important part of the study. Learning to interact with your peers in a mutually beneficial way. What social interaction do you learn at college? How do snort down beers and shots of whiskey? I went to school to learn a curriculum, not to become a touchy-feely people person. I interact socially via other means anyway. The first priority for me when attending college was to learn how to solve problems (engineering) and understand the basic scientific principles. While I enjoyed social interaction with friends and girlfriends :), I probably would have gotten better grades if I didn't have those distractions. (except for the girls, can't do without em.). I think that people who believe in learning social interaction as a priority at college (opposed to the actual studies) are, by and large, Liberal Arts majors if you ask me. (Not intended as a troll, just an opinion).
From what I've investigated, looking into getting a Masters at University of Illinois, is that you take tests at a proctoring site (physical, not virtual)like Sylvan Learning Center. The University hires a company which specializes in giving tests, like the places where you take SATs or GRE tests.
While I understand you're initial concerns, I think some of them are answered. For example, some of the schools I've investigated for getting a Masters in CS, like the University of Illinois, aren't simply offering "A web page". They're offering things like streaming video and pdf class notes which are synchronized with the video all from the comfort of your home. You can fit it in with a busy schedule because it's at your convenience; furthermore, I like the idea of streaming video...you can pause your professor, re-listen to a section, and go on! Questions are submitted by e-mail, or on-line chats, or newgroup type forums. Granted for some courses with heavy lab requirements (Chemistry, Physics) you may still need to physically attend school, but if we ever get some really good experiment simulation software, that may be able to be done from home too. Your comment about life skills is also interesting. Don't you believe that these "life skills" are changing to more computer-oriented tasks? Perhaps becoming a little more of a self-learner by using the web and it's resources, people may develop better life skills for the world that's currently evolving.
I really used to buy all sorts of books from amazon, they always had a very nice web site and an extremely comprehensive supply of books. After these fiascos, I am NOT going to buy from them any more. Richard Stallman's "Boycott Amazon" Essay is a great location to start to find out what to do. I know this was brought up in prior Amazon discussions, but just as a reminder... I don't agree with Mr. Stallman's philosophies totally, but I sure agree with him on the Amazon issue!
Have you even attempted to put yourselves in the shoes of the officers or have you just been suckered by the tripe the news media throws at you? I feel horribly about what happened to Diallo and it was a terrible tragedy. Those officers were bad cops, not necessarily bad people. They thought he was reaching for a gun, one of the cops fell causing the others to think he had been shot. It's perfectly understandable if you put your life in danger every day, and generally want to help people, that you get a little wired on adrenaline and when you see someone reaching behind himself (which you should NEVER do in a tense situation in front of a cop) when you're chasing after another criminal. The self-righteous attitude has got to be dropped by the people so easily condemning the officers when they have no clue what it's like in their shoes!
More and more women are becoming successful in various businesses as executives, lawyers, etc. and depending upon which source you quote (extreme liberal, moderate, or far right), they are getting equal pay. If women aren't signing up for CS classes, why do people like Borg insist that we must "care" and force people to do things that maybe they decided they're not interested. If a woman is interested in computers or engineering, there is nothing hindering her in the U.S. from joining. The absolute smartest engineer I ever met was one of the few women in my engineering class in college. She had the aptitude and the interest to take engineering, many other women I meet just aren't interested, or don't think in the way that CS or engineering people do. There is nothing wrong with that! This nonsense that something is wrong with "the system" is specious babble used by everyone from Jesse Jackson defending violent thugs to criminals blaming society on death row and it is getting very tiring. If women want to study CS, they will. Furthermore, if she can generalize boys by saying "boys are wilder than girls", therefore they get more time on the computer, why is it that the statement "Maybe girls just aren't interested" valid? In general, perhaps boys are wilder and girls just aren't interested in computers.
In 1999 I worked 900+ hours OT. I honestly didn't remember how to interact or have fun with my wife anymore after this. I never helped her out at home or took her out to dinner (maybe a few times. However, THAT IS THE LAST TIME THEY'LL GET ME TO DO THAT. I don't care if a project is critical. My wife is more critical. If companies want 900 man-hours more, hire somebody else. If you ask me, the government has got it all wrong as usual. I don't know anyone who works less than 45 hours/week (except for me now.) Great article!
While I am by no means an expert on history, I have often read that the first thing Hitler did was outlaw private ownership of guns. You seem to even support that occurring in Cuba with Castro with the statement "...with guns not allowed." I have also read that Milosevic also passed numerous laws outlawing guns when he took power. However, since one of the first things a dictator will do is remove the right to own guns, isn't that an indication that a dictator, vying for extreme power over the masses, is attempting to remove the last ounce of power any rebellious forces will have against an oppressive dictator? I do indeed think that governments will attempt to remove liberties one by one if the people don't speak up. Once the government is able to abolish guns, I believe that the people are in a precarious position from that point on. While countries which outlaw guns, such as Great Britain, may retain their freedom for years, as they have, they are still in a position of weakness should the wrong people take power. I do not own any guns and personally despise them, but I think that the right to have them is necessary (for the U.S. at least).
...behind Australia's virtual complete elimination of private rights to firearm ownership? I agree. In history, other countries which followed down this path wound up ruled by dictators and wishing they hadn't allowed such "safety" measures: Cuba, Nazi Germany, Yugoslavia. Give any government an inch and they'll take every subsequent mile piece by piece. If the U.S. government did what the Australian government just did, I'd pull the plug on my internet connection permanently. A big middle finger to those idiots. I'd rather be without the internet than to have the government in my computer.
To me, the answer is simple, the consequences should lie with the person who used some software to hurt someone or damage something. Where does the finger-pointing stop? If someone writes an extremely lethal virus and compiles it using gcc is somebody going to try and blame GNU for providing the tools to build the virus? There is a major problem today, in the US at least, of blaming everyone and everything remotely associated with someone bad (think: Doom and Columbine wackos). As much as I personally dislike guns, I believe the same argument holds there as well...guns don't shoot themselves. Blame the responsible person: the one who committed the act!
As much as I despise AOL, this is good customer service for a family-oriented service provider. I am nauseated by the thought that many believe that it's a specific game's fault for producing rotten kids (ala those Columbine idiots); however, simply providing a rating as a tool for parents to use is a Good Thing.
Start/Programs/Tools/System Info. There are various utilities on the "Tools" menu in "System Info" -- doing this from memory so take with grain of salt. Just last night I found a corrupted driver, which was causing intermittent crashes, using the "System File Verification" utility. Deleted the driver, re-installed it, back in business. Not too hard to handle when it tells you which file is bad.
I think if MS responded to competition by simply making their stuff BETTER... Have you used *any* ms products since pre-Windows 95? Their products are loads better than they used to be. THIS IS NOT A FLAME-BAIT BUT A VALID OPINION: In a certain sense, for the average joe, MS products are better than Linux products...you know why? Because they're easy and fun to use. What fun (or use) is a #> prompt to all the Grandmas and Grandpas out there getting interested in computers? Granted, I know Linux is a MUCH more powerful and stable OS and really do like it better, but I'm a geek. To most folks, power and stability aren't jack without ease of use, massive game support, educational s/w, and the "eye-candy factor". MS provides good looking, easy to use stuff which has definitely improved in terms of stability and power over the years. I'LL BE RUNNING FOR COVER NOW.
I don't understand how people who can configure a fairly complex OS like Linux can't keep Windows 98 from crashing. MSIE in Windows 9x has crashed EXACTLY 1 time on me when I tried to enter a "Netscape-only" web site. NETSCAPE, OTOH, crashes EVERY TIME I RUN IT IN LINUX (or Windows). Core dump, rm core, ./netscape, core dump, rm core, ./netscape, wait 10 seconds, core dump, rm core, ./netscape. Either the majority of Linux users are all a bunch of conformist liars or they can only solve complex problems, paralyzed at working with easy stuff.
I don't understand how people who can configure a fairly complex OS like Linux can't keep Windows 98 from crashing. MSIE in Windows 9x has crashed EXACTLY 1 time on me when I tried to enter a "Netscape-only" web site. NETSCAPE, OTOH, crashes EVERY TIME I RUN IT IN LINUX (or Windows). Core dump, ./netscape, rm core, wait 10 seconds, core dump, rm core, ./netscape. Either Linux users are all a bunch of liars or they can only solve complex problems, paralyzed at working with easy stuff.