Oblivion did a great thing and released without protection, still it was a success. I bought it (usually purchase one good game a year and crack the rest since i never play them through). Bioshock seems like a game in the same league as Oblivion and users will pay for it anyway, lesser games probably have a different story (since the games are less attractive). In that sense the severe copy protection on Bioshock is not logical and reasonable and mostly affects paying customers that are forced to compromise there machines.
Some ethnographers say OSS is the closest mankind ever has gotten to solving the problem with this minor fact - that one mans bread is another mans problem..
; relates to The Cornucopia of the Commons (if i spelled it correctly).
You write a very long and interesting answer. However, I only made one point and that was that the scientific methods used by physicists must evolve and hence it's good to look at other areas of research for inspiration. The "physicist research" today is getting more abstract for sure and also more complex. So in a sense your moving closer to theoretical math as a field of research.
"What a silly thing to say! String theory is scientific no matter how they arrive at their results? What if they're using a Ouija Board?"
No I didn't say that. I just said you might need new scientific methods/tools to address new problems. Methods are a big part of science. But they are not written in stone and keeps evolving and adapting to the area you research. Your view of science is to me very narrow. You know that there are other areas of science that exist outside your realm, take a look at those for inspiration.
"I can go out and do an experimental observation of grass, and then formulate the theory "grass is green". This makes a prediction. It is falsifiable. But it is not a scientific theory, because it explains no more than what I'd already observed. I assume you agree to that much? You need to predict more than you assume. Part of the criticism here is based on the fear (voiced also by 't Hooft) that string theory may ultimately amount to little more than that."
I only stated that you can build research on assumptions (or vague and non-existent proof) if you want to explore without the knowledge of the actual goal (like in qualitative study were the goal is often unknown). In a way such assumption might be proven wrong but the value might then be the bi-product. - In such case I would agree (even if it's off topic) that enormous resources to such field is wrong since it's such a long shot, though it might still mandate research in the area. You are also very accustomed to the observation, which someone mentioned, is getting extremely difficult to perform, perhaps another sign for evolved methods in this kind of research.
"As I understand it, you're saying it's fine to sacrifice the goal of fewer assumptions for the goal of a more general theory in this case. That's not a view representative of what most physicists think. I'd say the goal of fewer assumptions is actually much more important in this case."
No, I just say it's can still be science if you start of research with assumptions. Your thinking is very goal orientated which might be bad if your are looking for something that you don't understand or can grasp. So in a sense string theory research can be a better way to discover and explore unknown aspects of physics (those you don't know of and cant imagine at the moment) than if you bet at a sure card.
All the other problems of string theory as a resource hog or that it's a closed of group and if that is good for science is off topic (but is it really a closed group, you can view and criticise the results?). Separate the issues, some are political and not scientific.
Well, couldn't what you say (k98sven) be interpreted as proof that there is a need for new qualitative methods in this kind of physics research. Traditionally physics has used other methods. Isn't string theory more complex (on the border to philosophy if i understand it right) and hence need other scientific methods (and from my knowledge of an field beyond my scope the trend is towards more complex scientific methods). However one thing I can say for sure. It's science whether you approve the methods or not. In qualitative studies it's quite common to start of with vague or even non existent proof, in a way it helps when you want to explore new areas of research... the side affect can be as mentioned better math and not proof of string theory, though its still science. What you present is a stiff rigid view of science which is not correct. I see this as a great example of how physics are evolving to more complex and hard to prove issues.
This article by Wired might have some arguments for the panel. According to the article the problem really is the management model and revenue distribution. This economic model favors the artist without cutting the management people out of revenues (of course the problem is in the end that big music companies don't want to cut profits and keep absurd percentages - witch ends up in so few peoples pockets that its a ridiculous disadvantage for any society). It also solves the DRM problem since any artist (or a group of artist) can choose to make any song Linux playable if the want (and of course they do want as many as possible to hear their songs).
http://wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/nettwerk.html ?pg=2&topic=nettwerk&topic_set=
Slashdot Mirror
Oblivion did a great thing and released without protection, still it was a success. I bought it (usually purchase one good game a year and crack the rest since i never play them through). Bioshock seems like a game in the same league as Oblivion and users will pay for it anyway, lesser games probably have a different story (since the games are less attractive). In that sense the severe copy protection on Bioshock is not logical and reasonable and mostly affects paying customers that are forced to compromise there machines.
Some ethnographers say OSS is the closest mankind ever has gotten to solving the problem with this minor fact - that one mans bread is another mans problem..
; relates to The Cornucopia of the Commons (if i spelled it correctly).
You write a very long and interesting answer. However, I only made one point and that was that the scientific methods used by physicists must evolve and hence it's good to look at other areas of research for inspiration. The "physicist research" today is getting more abstract for sure and also more complex. So in a sense your moving closer to theoretical math as a field of research. "What a silly thing to say! String theory is scientific no matter how they arrive at their results? What if they're using a Ouija Board?" No I didn't say that. I just said you might need new scientific methods/tools to address new problems. Methods are a big part of science. But they are not written in stone and keeps evolving and adapting to the area you research. Your view of science is to me very narrow. You know that there are other areas of science that exist outside your realm, take a look at those for inspiration. "I can go out and do an experimental observation of grass, and then formulate the theory "grass is green". This makes a prediction. It is falsifiable. But it is not a scientific theory, because it explains no more than what I'd already observed. I assume you agree to that much? You need to predict more than you assume. Part of the criticism here is based on the fear (voiced also by 't Hooft) that string theory may ultimately amount to little more than that." I only stated that you can build research on assumptions (or vague and non-existent proof) if you want to explore without the knowledge of the actual goal (like in qualitative study were the goal is often unknown). In a way such assumption might be proven wrong but the value might then be the bi-product. - In such case I would agree (even if it's off topic) that enormous resources to such field is wrong since it's such a long shot, though it might still mandate research in the area. You are also very accustomed to the observation, which someone mentioned, is getting extremely difficult to perform, perhaps another sign for evolved methods in this kind of research. "As I understand it, you're saying it's fine to sacrifice the goal of fewer assumptions for the goal of a more general theory in this case. That's not a view representative of what most physicists think. I'd say the goal of fewer assumptions is actually much more important in this case." No, I just say it's can still be science if you start of research with assumptions. Your thinking is very goal orientated which might be bad if your are looking for something that you don't understand or can grasp. So in a sense string theory research can be a better way to discover and explore unknown aspects of physics (those you don't know of and cant imagine at the moment) than if you bet at a sure card. All the other problems of string theory as a resource hog or that it's a closed of group and if that is good for science is off topic (but is it really a closed group, you can view and criticise the results?). Separate the issues, some are political and not scientific.
Well, couldn't what you say (k98sven) be interpreted as proof that there is a need for new qualitative methods in this kind of physics research. Traditionally physics has used other methods. Isn't string theory more complex (on the border to philosophy if i understand it right) and hence need other scientific methods (and from my knowledge of an field beyond my scope the trend is towards more complex scientific methods). However one thing I can say for sure. It's science whether you approve the methods or not. In qualitative studies it's quite common to start of with vague or even non existent proof, in a way it helps when you want to explore new areas of research... the side affect can be as mentioned better math and not proof of string theory, though its still science. What you present is a stiff rigid view of science which is not correct. I see this as a great example of how physics are evolving to more complex and hard to prove issues.
This article by Wired might have some arguments for the panel. According to the article the problem really is the management model and revenue distribution. This economic model favors the artist without cutting the management people out of revenues (of course the problem is in the end that big music companies don't want to cut profits and keep absurd percentages - witch ends up in so few peoples pockets that its a ridiculous disadvantage for any society). It also solves the DRM problem since any artist (or a group of artist) can choose to make any song Linux playable if the want (and of course they do want as many as possible to hear their songs). http://wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/nettwerk.html ?pg=2&topic=nettwerk&topic_set=