I mush prefer the longer, safer route through meditation, hypnosis and lucid dreaming, rather than risky shortcuts like shrooms and stuff.

This bring back memories. We don't get much snow and ice where I live, but about every 4 years we do get an ice/snow storm. One time the power was out, there was nothing to do, and a friend of mine lives by this hill in a neighborhood that's a popular shortcut, so we all went over to his house, played in the snow in the front yard and had a laugh at all the cars coming through trying to get up the hill.

I've seen video tips where they show shortcuts and it really is disorientating. Good on them for trying something new but I can't see myself buying it. I also enjoyed the demo but it felt slightly thin.

Yes a slomo would be sweet for a second i thought the 2 slower cats were gonna hit the wall but they obviously found the shortcut.

I think you've got a point there NetRunner, but I also believe that it is very difficult to be categorically against torture. To say that one would never, under no circumstances, allow another human being to be tortured is something I have a hard time believing.

If 9/11 could've been prevented by forcefully obtaining information from one of the perpetrators, a lot of people would agree that while torture is never the right thing to do, it can sometimes become a necessity. Or what if the lives of your loved ones were at stake? Would you refrain from resorting to this kind of violence, even if it was your last chance of saving them?

I believe the problem lies within people's judgment. Similar to the invasion of Iraq, torture has not been used as the absolute last resort, but instead served as an atrocious shortcut, helping the current administration to reach their goals.

"Like it or not, stereotypes are true for a reason."

Stereotypes are true? Hahaha since when does an uneducated generalization has any strong truth value?

The very logic (if any) of a stereotype defeats the concept itself. A generalization about ALL members of a group or category based solely on first impressions or commonly held assumptions in society; oh yeah I'm sure something like this is valid.

Stereo + typos = Solid IMPRESSION

are impressions true? probably
Is an impression about a group of people true considering the enormous amount of factors and variables in a person's life? good luck proving that.

It is not that "stereotypes are true for a reason" it is that stereotypes EXIST for a reason which in part is this:
Availability heuristic a mere cognitive shortcut so that our limited brain can "make sense" of reality.

just because a certain thing is more likely to take place does NOT make a weak assumption true.

"But when you look at the numbers, with an accent like that, she is most likely Christian. The fact that you AUTOMATICALLY thought that I was referring to her lack of intelligence (which I was) makes you just as guilty as I."

Nice language play, it could work if this was Congress but the intent is clear on that first post you made.

I don't use themes as my laptop is primed for work. But to make Windows (2000) useable I need the following;

Filebox Extender - http://www.hyperionics.com/
Let's me add quickly acessible shortcuts to files and folders from any Explorer window plus a pin on top ability. Without it Windows seems totally useless for serious work of any kind.

nDroid - http://codenite.com/index.html
Best application starter I have found (I have tried many). It's not the most essential type of software but nevertheless convenient.

Clipdiary - http://clipdiary.com/
Retrieve and store items from the clipboard. It would be tough to do without this as copying and pasting is at the core of my working day.

SnagIt 9 - http://www.techsmith.com/screen-capture.asp
I'm still on the trial version of this but let me tell you it is ESSENTIAL. Up to now I've been using a few small programs to handle images like Irfanview but despite my needs being essentially basic, I am going to buy this. It has a variety of capture options and you can apply effects, callouts and text and other alterations.
But it goes further by organising all your images and has a great interface where you can perform the basic operations like resizing and rotating. You can also tag images to assist in retrieval and easily use images in other programs. Now I'm happy to dump all my miscellaneous images into one working folder.
The decider for me was the simple ability to merge images and so do basic page mockups which has been useful as I'm working with a web designer at the moment.

And finally I found these two programs very recently that haven't proven themselves yet but are looking promising;

DK Finder - http://www.dkellner.hu/freeware/finder/
This is a fast search tool. I gave up on the likes of Google Desktop Search as being too unwieldy/imposing/useless. This looks much more like it.

Ka Type In - http://www.konradp.com/products/typein/
Stores all those commonly used bits of text, be they code, signatures or standard responses. Two clicks and it's pasted into the current application.

Hope someone finds one of these useful!

Shortcuts often lead to trouble!

Maybe I put that badly, Aemaeth. The "activist judges" thing has been beat to death as a talking point, used in cases where maybe it applied and maybe it didn't until too many people I'd think are sick of it just like they are getting with so many other talking points on both sides of the aisle. When you get down to asking them what activism they generally don't have the slightest idea. It's just another way to say 'I didn't like the decision'.

On the social merits I like it myself. Everyone deserves to be treated like a real human with real feelings and rights and I don't see how what they do in their bedrooms changes my life in the slightest. On the legal merits someone needs to show why it's wrong if they want to argue it's a bad decision and we do have precedent in Federal law for that sort of thing.

Amendment XV of the Constitution guaranteed equal rights by race some 100 years or so before it was ever enforced and when it finally was enforced I'm sure some claimed activist judges as well. It wasn't activism though, it was just the court finally doing their jobs. As I said before I'm not familiar with the California Constitution but it seems to me that's the argument they are making, they are simply enforcing what should have already been by State law. Rather than the "activist judges" argument which explains nothing and argue nothing we need something more to to go on if we're to assume it was a bad decision. Bad in what way, why?

I'm not a blind defender of the court, they make plenty of bad decisions too and sometimes with good intentions. Look no farther than the drug war for a dozen examples of it. But if we're to fight it there's process to follow. It can't be just our own activist judges or claims of them from the other side in the past as a justification. Take a shortcut in the process and it's a precedent now, the other side can shortcut your fix too. Bad news for both sides of any issue in the end.

I have browsed FORA quite a bit because I like to hear intelligent debate on subjects instead of a one-sided news story. It gives me a little more information from both sides to help build a base for an semi-educated opinion.

One of my strong passions is for personal liberty. With personal liberty comes personal responsiblity and personal rights - it's a group package in my mind. Being American has no doubt subjected me to countless years of conditioning of the great dream is to own your own house and land. (Of course being more aware, I know this is not strictly an American dream.) Eminent domain is needed for public function, but I've seen it abused (and then justified by the Supreme Court) to not build public projects, but buildings for private profit. I think that is wrong.

It's akin to picking on the unpopular kid in grade school. It's akin to police using the Patriot Act to spy on regular criminals when the entire basis of it was to catch terrorists. It's used because it shortcuts personal liberties. It is supposed to be hard to convict someone. That what protects personal liberties. In my experience when I bring this up, people will question if I don't want the criminals caught. WTF? Any functioning society needs rules and 'punishments' for those who break the rules. In every society there will be criminals. Period. Not every society will value or protect personal liberties though. Which is more important? On which side shall we error?

Well, I seemed to go off on a mini rant there. Have good day!

In reply to this comment by marinara:
In reply to this comment by curiousity:
Glad you enjoyed it. It's an issue that seems to whimper through the night unless it is your property they are taking.



I never thought I would be interested in eminent domain, but the video was exciting, perhaps it was the personality of the debaters?

I have a housing forclosure crisis playlist here on videosift, and I like CSPAN type stuff.

So do you just browse through the FORA website to find stuff? or what focused you on the eminent domain issue?

>> ^CrushBug:
Sure, but after you press Win+F, what shortcut key shoots the fricken' annoying animated search dog dead?


That's why I updated to Vista.

>> ^CrushBug:
Sure, but after you press Win+F, what shortcut key shoots the fricken' annoying animated search dog dead?


Registry entries, I'm afraid.

Sure, but after you press Win+F, what shortcut key shoots the fricken' annoying animated search dog dead?

"Typing on it, well, sucks. We kind of hate to say it, but this thing more than likely won't replace what ever keyboard you're writing your novel on -- it's better off used as an absurdly configurable swiss army knife for tasks like gaming, Photoshop, or just about any other productivity app that doesn't require a lot of typing."

I can't see any reason why anyone would use this keyboard. I mean, it's really cool and all, but the practical value is pretty low. I would not want to game on something like this, it fails at typing, and I don't see why you'd use this for photoshopping. When I'm 'shopping, I just use the normal keyboard shortcuts, don't see any reason to force me to look at my keyboard every time I want to do something else.

Speaking of which, I almost never look at my keyboard as it is, and I don't want to. Why would forcing me to look at my keyboard be a good idea?

No correlation with intelligence, that's just a widely circulated myth. Most people get the answer wrong because of perceptual shortcuts.