Every presidential candidate bullshits. I don't have a problem with that. It comes with the job. Americans can't understand simple truth, and most don't want to hear it anyway. Until that changes, being a bullshitter comes part and parcel with the job of an elected official.

>> ^IAmTheBlurr:

>> ^shagen454:
The important point is still relevant: Mitt Romney is a semantic liar. But, what - do we expect American politicians to not actually lie to our face and not get angry / and put on a huge dramatic show when it is pointed out?

Semantic liar or fundamental bullshitter? I find him to be worse than a liar and I have something that you might be interested in reading. It's from Harry G. Frankfurt from his essay "On Bullshit".
It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off; he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose.


Yeah, there are enough nuts out there like you to sway gun sales figures for fear that Obama or some other Democrat is gonna take yer guns! Meanwhile, Obama's most significant legislation pertaining to gun control is ALLOWING people to take guns into national parks. While bullshitting is an unfortunately necessary part of life, it actually has to be believable.

>> ^quantumushroom:

There's a reason gun sales soared last xmas. Stay tuned...

Pretty much sums up my ex-girlfriend too.

>> ^IAmTheBlurr:

>> ^shagen454:
The important point is still relevant: Mitt Romney is a semantic liar. But, what - do we expect American politicians to not actually lie to our face and not get angry / and put on a huge dramatic show when it is pointed out?

Semantic liar or fundamental bullshitter? I find him to be worse than a liar and I have something that you might be interested in reading. It's from Harry G. Frankfurt from his essay "On Bullshit".
It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off; he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose.

>> ^shagen454:

The important point is still relevant: Mitt Romney is a semantic liar. But, what - do we expect American politicians to not actually lie to our face and not get angry / and put on a huge dramatic show when it is pointed out?


Semantic liar or fundamental bullshitter? I find him to be worse than a liar and I have something that you might be interested in reading. It's from Harry G. Frankfurt from his essay "On Bullshit".

It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off; he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and of the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose.

That big fookin button that says SARCASM would of been switched to the ON position. You are wrong. You owe me a promote or quality.

An apology as well, written in a 500 word short essay.

In reply to this comment by kymbos:
Fairly confident Yogi was joking, BR. I think you owe him an upvote.

Some relevant essays:
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/10/fraud-caused-great-depression-and-this.html
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/07/theres-no-recovery-because-government.html
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/08/real-reason-sec-has-been-shredding.html
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/11/obama-prosecuting-fewer-financial-crimes-than-under-either-bush-presidency.html
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/11/real-free-market-capitalists-demand-that-financial-fraud-be-prosecuted.html
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/11/i-will-never-do-business-in-the-united-states.html

I learn so much about what I believe when I talk with you. And here I thought I wanted to reform our election system so that corporations could not so easily subvert the democratic process. And here I thought I wanted to reform our economic system so that corporations were held responsible for their actions and not allowed to siphon and hoard societal wealth. Who knew that I was such a fan of the global corporate empire? And who knew that removing all barriers to corporate wealth and power would result in liberty? It sounds so unintuitive and absurd on it's face that I would not have believed it had I not learned it from someone in possession of such formidable mental prowess. Your advanced wisdom is truly indistinguishable from magic. Expecto Patronum Mano Invisablo!>> ^marbles:

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
^The more we deregulate, privatize, cut taxes for the wealthy and cut services for the rest, the worse things get. Unregulated capitalism has become its own worse enemy. If we want to save capitalism from itself, we need regulate it, so that it can not be used as a weapon to subjugate the working poor, the middle class and labor. The economic reforms you call for are the same reforms called for by corporatists and plutomists like the Kochs, The Scaifes, Luntz, Norquist among other corporate elites. How is it that you can rail against crony capitalists and regurgitate their propaganda in the same sentence? In my opinion, it is be you are being manipulated to put for an agenda that appeals to your base nature by people who could not care less about you.
Unregulated capitalism has brought us:
-Vast Income Inequality
-High Unemployment
-Wage Cuts while productivity continues to rise
-Endless War for profit, oil
-Massive political corruption at every level of government
The 'free market' you dream of is a pie in the sky, no different from St. Peter and the Pearly Gates or 72 Virgins. "Free" Market ideology has been at work in American Government for over 30 years, and it has resulted in the creation of a global corporate state that is anything but free. Stop making excuses for failure. It's OK to admit you were wrong. Being wrong only becomes problem when your foolish pride hinders you from assessment. Pull your head out of the sand. @marbles

Good Job. I link an essay that specifically identifies the problems and you respond with hollow partisan talking points that ignore the problems. Nationalizing risk by the big banks and privatizing profits is not free market capitalism, no matter how much you claim it to be.
Free market ideology didn't create a global corporate state. Putting our economy in the hands of a select few did. The Federal Reserve is an above the law private banking cartel. And whether you believe in a free market or not is irrelevant. Believing that Wall Street politicians are going to solve the problems that they help create is the real delusion.
Banks have taking over the government. Your solution: Support Wall Street puppets and regurgitate their talking points.
Banks have taking over the regulatory agencies. Your solution: Pass more Wall Street written regulations.
Government uses our tax money to bailout corporations and wage war around the world. Your solution: Give them more money to funnel to the top and fund more death and destruction.
So who's really being manipulated here? The corporate shadow government is erecting bars around your glass house and you're busy parroting their talking points. Good job pal.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

^The more we deregulate, privatize, cut taxes for the wealthy and cut services for the rest, the worse things get. Unregulated capitalism has become its own worse enemy. If we want to save capitalism from itself, we need regulate it, so that it can not be used as a weapon to subjugate the working poor, the middle class and labor. The economic reforms you call for are the same reforms called for by corporatists and plutomists like the Kochs, The Scaifes, Luntz, Norquist among other corporate elites. How is it that you can rail against crony capitalists and regurgitate their propaganda in the same sentence? In my opinion, it is be you are being manipulated to put for an agenda that appeals to your base nature by people who could not care less about you.
Unregulated capitalism has brought us:
-Vast Income Inequality
-High Unemployment
-Wage Cuts while productivity continues to rise
-Endless War for profit, oil
-Massive political corruption at every level of government
The 'free market' you dream of is a pie in the sky, no different from St. Peter and the Pearly Gates or 72 Virgins. "Free" Market ideology has been at work in American Government for over 30 years, and it has resulted in the creation of a global corporate state that is anything but free. Stop making excuses for failure. It's OK to admit you were wrong. Being wrong only becomes problem when your foolish pride hinders you from assessment. Pull your head out of the sand. @marbles


Good Job. I link an essay that specifically identifies the problems and you respond with hollow partisan talking points that ignore the problems. Nationalizing risk by the big banks and privatizing profits is not free market capitalism, no matter how much you claim it to be.

Free market ideology didn't create a global corporate state. Putting our economy in the hands of a select few did. The Federal Reserve is an above the law private banking cartel. And whether you believe in a free market or not is irrelevant. Believing that Wall Street politicians are going to solve the problems that they help create is the real delusion.

Banks have taking over the government. Your solution: Support Wall Street puppets and regurgitate their talking points.

Banks have taking over the regulatory agencies. Your solution: Pass more Wall Street written regulations.

Government uses our tax money to bailout corporations and wage war around the world. Your solution: Give them more money to funnel to the top and fund more death and destruction.

So who's really being manipulated here? The corporate shadow government is erecting bars around your glass house and you're busy parroting their talking points. Good job pal.

This was required summer reading at my high school back in the 80's. I ended up writing my college app essay about him. Really has stuck with me.
>> ^Boise_Lib:

>> ^hpqp:
Thanks, I did not know this! Respect +100

goes off to look up his bio in local library
>> ^RadHazG:
Feynman was in fact, an expert safe cracker. He managed to crack almost every safe part of the Manhattan proj. and made a point of trying to bring to the heads attention how vulnerable the safes in fact were to being cracked. Their response? To instead have everyone change the codes and warn everyone about Feynman! Typical. Check out is autobiography. It's one hell of a read.


There are many books out there, this is my favorite one by far:
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!

Hi Netrunner, I've just finished reading a book that reminded me of your posts the whole way through. It's called "A thinking reed" (from Pascal's Pensees) and is the Australian politician Barry Jones' autobiography... now it's not a perfect book by any means, it's a bit like a group of related essays rather than a cohesive work, but it is interesting and entirely the sort of discussion I can see you wanting to engage in.

I linked to it in this video http://videosift.com/video/Barry-Jones-Reprieve-speech so I won't repeat myself, but the death penalty was only one chapter in a very long book!

I'm pretty sure it's available in your parts, if not then get in touch.

Here is a review, but from an Australian point of view, it doesn't really explain why a U.S. citizen might want to read it... but I think that learning about other systems can only help understanding your own. Oh, and the Russia trip where he persuaded the police he was a high ranking Communist was rather amusing, as were other parts

http://www.theage.com.au/news/book-reviews/a-thinking-reed/2006/10/27/1161749298281.html

A lot of the features people seem to think would improve C are the features that would completely defeat the purpose of the language. Adding object-oriented features would add overhead (and OO features can be imitated through coding techniques anyway). Adding exception handling adds HUGE overhead. Adding garbage collection, like Java? Ridiculous amount of overhead. Methods for catching dangling references: more overhead. Pretty much anything you do add is going to degrade the language for its specific purpose.

Now if you can afford to handle some of that overhead, you have C++ as an alternative, which was made to introduce some of those extra features, yet still maintain its speed. And this is what many projects do. The Linux kernel needs to be as fast and efficient as possible, and so it uses C. On the other hand, there are desktop environments like KDE that use C++ instead to take advantage of those extra features and aren't as concerned with raw speed considering the environment they run in. And this continues all the way up to higher level languages.

As for insecurities and bugs, there is no reason to blame the language. Even in the hands of a good programmer, any language is a liability. Java is the perfect example, due to its enormous adoption in the early 2000s. There are TONS of Java programs out there that are insecure, buggy, and error-prone, and yet one of the goals of the language was to minimize this. Is it easier to make these mistakes in C? Of course! But it's nonetheless a necessity in the programming world.

Just take a look at the Linux kernel. It's written ENTIRELY in C, and yet it's certainly more stable and secure than the Windows kernel, which is a combination of C and C++. (And go ahead and suggest to Linus Torvalds that it should be switched to C++ or some other "more modern" language. He'll give you a nice 10 page essay on why you're wrong.)

Oh, to add to that, most of the drivers written for your computer are written in C.

The point is that C is most definitely NOT past its prime, and in fact due to the embedded systems industry, it's getting a resurgence.

I don't mind if a game is simular to another game or only a slight tweak , I just find it annoying when one is fincaily rewarded massively over another one when the other game accentually put the ground work down.

In the case of notch at least he admitted it was largely taken from fotress craft but the same would apply I would hope that the origonaters of an IP get rewarded fincaily to a fair extent.

my piont about changing the art work over is that focuses things on the game play and physics , if you were to come up with a bullshit % chart of how close one game is to another , I think angry birds would be very close to crush the castle be like 5% difference in game mechanics and that being only the launcher , its a bit like me taking doom replacing the guns and all the textures but keeping all the other mechanics and level designs exactly the same , where as a game that innovates properly would change the guns the ai the levels and the textures.

as I say I don't think things should be automaticly blocked or copping something largely is inherently a bad thing , the aspect I dislike is the lack of fair reinbursment and the lack of things being attributed properly , its like when you write an essay if you incoperate someone else's work into your work you attribute them.

saying that I bet ethical Developers probably don't attribute because if they did they would probably get sued for copyright infringement.

there are plenty of Games where I have enjoyed copying unreal toruniment - from quake 3 , mashed - from micro machines , worms from - original tank game. peggel from pachinko , plants v zombies form desctop tower defense.

in most of those examples sugnificant changes were made , more so than crush the castle to angry birds.

looking at plants v zombies as a good example of what I dislike you can have a very large company that has the resources to exploit a game more than the small developer and then they accentually steal the potential for that small developer to develop an IP to fruition. unlike back in the 80s when developers could come up with a new IP or mechanic typ and then gradualy develop it and build in size whalst coming up with new IP.

oh well i will stop blathering on , we probably agree on most things anyway.

>> ^Fletch:

>> ^westy:
Put it this way , if you replaced all the art work in crush the castle with angry birds most people would think it was angry birds.
... with catapults.

I'm just saying that if you put them side by side, the gameplay is different enough for me that I can prefer one over the other, as the catapult adds a timing aspect. The graphics are secondary for me, and not the core of what makes a particular game.
Yes, the targets were a rip-off. Would you be satisfied if the makers of Angry Birds recognized Crush the Castle in the same way Notch recognized Infiniminer, which he totally ripped off and made a mint? What about Fortresscraft, which is a huge ripoff of Minecraft? Who's at fault if one's game isn't popular enough to make lots of money? Gameplay, marketing, luck, timing and just the intent of the developer all play a part, and any one of them can sink an otherwise quality title. Crush the Castle is free to play online and only 99￠ on Android. How much money have you given the developers?

>> ^Stormsinger:

>> ^marbles:
>> ^Stormsinger:
>> ^marbles:
>> ^Stormsinger:
@marbles
If you put in remote control that can override the pilot, how long do you think it's going to take before some hacker takes over a plane? And considering that it's a -whole- lot safer for the hijacker than doing it in person, I'm pretty sure it will happen more often than terrorist hijackings have.

What are you talking about? It's already there. It's called remote access. The autopilot software has had remote access capabilities for decades. Read the essay you quoted.
On a side note, the NORAD computers were probably hacked.
Ptech software (loaded with back-doors and trojans) was on pretty much all the government's computer systems. Ptech clients included the FAA, NATO, United States Armed Forces, Congress, Dept. Of Energy, Dept. of Justice, FBI, Customs, the IRS, the Secret Service, and even the White House.

“Most modern aircraft have some form of autopilot that could be re-programmed to ignore commands from a hijacker and instead take direction from the ground . . . .”
Note the words, "THAT COULD BE". Implying that it doesn't do so at this point.

Are you purposely acting dense?
"at this point" ??? It doesn't do so until if and when you need it to ignore commands from a hijacker... like DURING A HIJACKING. That's one of the main purposes of having remote access to the autopilot.

I give up...I thought this was a real discussion, but it's become clear you aren't interested in that. "Could be reprogrammed" does not mean on-the-fly, in the middle of a hijacking. That would be called "turning it on". Frankly anyone who would attempt to reprogram an autopilot on a plane while it was in the air should be locked up for many years, and NEVER allowed near any kind of computer ever again. You have a better chance of surviving the hijacking than of some nitwits attempt to write complex programs correctly the first time and to do so in mere minutes.
Let me know when you're willing to read what I fucking write, instead of twisting it to try and make it some attack.


How about reading what you fucking quote first. Tell yourself whatever you need to. ""Could be reprogrammed" does not mean on-the-fly" -- it doesn't? of course it does. Do you expect the hijacker to land the plane so you can reprogram it?

Read the other quote from the former head of British Airways “suggested ... that aircraft could be commandeered from the ground and controlled remotely in the event of a hijack.”

It's part of the autopilot system. There's no need to hack into the system and "write complex programs correctly ... in mere minutes."

Why is that so hard to understand?

>> ^marbles:

>> ^Stormsinger:
>> ^marbles:
>> ^Stormsinger:
@marbles
If you put in remote control that can override the pilot, how long do you think it's going to take before some hacker takes over a plane? And considering that it's a -whole- lot safer for the hijacker than doing it in person, I'm pretty sure it will happen more often than terrorist hijackings have.

What are you talking about? It's already there. It's called remote access. The autopilot software has had remote access capabilities for decades. Read the essay you quoted.
On a side note, the NORAD computers were probably hacked.
Ptech software (loaded with back-doors and trojans) was on pretty much all the government's computer systems. Ptech clients included the FAA, NATO, United States Armed Forces, Congress, Dept. Of Energy, Dept. of Justice, FBI, Customs, the IRS, the Secret Service, and even the White House.

“Most modern aircraft have some form of autopilot that could be re-programmed to ignore commands from a hijacker and instead take direction from the ground . . . .”
Note the words, "THAT COULD BE". Implying that it doesn't do so at this point.

Are you purposely acting dense?
"at this point" ??? It doesn't do so until if and when you need it to ignore commands from a hijacker... like DURING A HIJACKING. That's one of the main purposes of having remote access to the autopilot.


I give up...I thought this was a real discussion, but it's become clear you aren't interested in that. "Could be reprogrammed" does not mean on-the-fly, in the middle of a hijacking. That would be called "turning it on". Frankly anyone who would attempt to reprogram an autopilot on a plane while it was in the air should be locked up for many years, and NEVER allowed near any kind of computer ever again. You have a better chance of surviving the hijacking than of some nitwits attempt to write complex programs correctly the first time and to do so in mere minutes.

Let me know when you're willing to read what I fucking write, instead of twisting it to try and make it some attack.

>> ^Stormsinger:

>> ^marbles:
>> ^Stormsinger:
@marbles
If you put in remote control that can override the pilot, how long do you think it's going to take before some hacker takes over a plane? And considering that it's a -whole- lot safer for the hijacker than doing it in person, I'm pretty sure it will happen more often than terrorist hijackings have.

What are you talking about? It's already there. It's called remote access. The autopilot software has had remote access capabilities for decades. Read the essay you quoted.
On a side note, the NORAD computers were probably hacked.
Ptech software (loaded with back-doors and trojans) was on pretty much all the government's computer systems. Ptech clients included the FAA, NATO, United States Armed Forces, Congress, Dept. Of Energy, Dept. of Justice, FBI, Customs, the IRS, the Secret Service, and even the White House.

“Most modern aircraft have some form of autopilot that could be re-programmed to ignore commands from a hijacker and instead take direction from the ground . . . .”
Note the words, "THAT COULD BE". Implying that it doesn't do so at this point.


Are you purposely acting dense?

"at this point" ??? It doesn't do so until if and when you need it to ignore commands from a hijacker... like DURING A HIJACKING. That's one of the main purposes of having remote access to the autopilot.

>> ^marbles:

>> ^Stormsinger:
@marbles
If you put in remote control that can override the pilot, how long do you think it's going to take before some hacker takes over a plane? And considering that it's a -whole- lot safer for the hijacker than doing it in person, I'm pretty sure it will happen more often than terrorist hijackings have.

What are you talking about? It's already there. It's called remote access. The autopilot software has had remote access capabilities for decades. Read the essay you quoted.
On a side note, the NORAD computers were probably hacked.
Ptech software (loaded with back-doors and trojans) was on pretty much all the government's computer systems. Ptech clients included the FAA, NATO, United States Armed Forces, Congress, Dept. Of Energy, Dept. of Justice, FBI, Customs, the IRS, the Secret Service, and even the White House.


“Most modern aircraft have some form of autopilot that could be re-programmed to ignore commands from a hijacker and instead take direction from the ground . . . .”

Note the words, "THAT COULD BE". Implying that it doesn't do so at this point.