* Posts by Shakje

653 publicly visible posts • joined 2 Nov 2007

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Naughty-step Apple buries court-ordered apology with JavaScript

Shakje

Re: Stupid, stupid move.

Marquee seems to work on most, blink only on FF (I saw Opera mentioned, but haven't tried it yet).

Granny upstages Microsoft, storms stage at Surface launch

Shakje

Re: It gets worse

Because no positive review could be anything other than a shill?

Some positive reviews, some negative, different people have different opinions. It will be good to see some user reviews, but if you're going to dismiss anything that says anything positive, it's just a bit sad.

Bond's Walther PPK goes digital: A civilized gun updated

Shakje

But I thought everyone knew

the P228 was a pea shooter?

Better luck next time Blofeld! Five Bond plot myths busted

Shakje

Guys, EMP

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/120315-EMP-Missile-Is-No-Longer-Science-Fiction

^_^

It's not what you might expect, but...

N00bs vs Windows 8: We lock six people in a room with new OS

Shakje
Thumb Down

It's like Win 95 all over again.

Some people just need to learn to adapt to change. What I found saddening was this:

“Microsoft needs to put some tutorials in this or it will frustrate a lot of people.”

“Microsoft will have some kind of introduction to this, won't they?”

So I'm guessing that you didn't let them watch the welcome video which explains how to use the UI then?

US climate-change skeptics losing support

Shakje

Re: Most Americans also claim to follow one deity or another.

Sure, but science stays out of the arena of whether or not there is a deity. It doesn't publish papers on it, and people don't submit papers on it (of course, what they do in their own time is different). On the other hand you have AGW which has a mass of papers published on it, and the skeptics who, in many cases, refuse to even submit because they think that the whole thing is a conspiracy.

Do you know what would make their case? SUBMITTING A PAPER. Then, if it gets rejected out of hand, they can put it in the public domain, and people can look at it, dissect it, and ask why it was rejected, assuming there's nothing fundamentally wrong with it. If it gets accepted, congratulations, you're taking part in the scientific process, not just mouthing off to journalists and conference centres.

Valve's Half-Life

Shakje

Compliment != complement

Sorry for being a pedant

ENCODE’s ‘junk DNA’ claims spark biological bunfight

Shakje

Honestly, nothing can "bolster" ID

It's a complete and utter failure of thinking. Even religious people who are willing to look at it objectively should see this, it's bad, it makes bad assumptions, it has no falsifiability, and it is promoted in the most intellectually dishonest way.

However, what it does mean is that when arguing with creationists (which can be fun and stimulating in its own way [i.e. if they say something stupid that you haven't heard before, it gives you something to investigate]) this will become a new argument. It doesn't have to be valid, but it gives them some firepower to convince the layman who can't be bothered to read anything except creationist dogma like Behe. It promotes a misunderstanding of science that is detrimental to the spread of knowledge through the populace, which is why creationism is so dangerous in general.

South Korea bans Apple's AND Samsung's ageing phones, tabs

Shakje

So both companies were fined small amounts

And they both have a really good excuse to only sell their latest, more expensive offerings to consumers, and you think this is a good result? K.

I like the idea behind it, I just don't think it's actually hurt either, and has possibly benefited them.

Ubisoft: 'Vast majority of PC gamers are PIRATES'

Shakje

Re: And at the same time...

If that's really a problem for you, download the games you want, burn your Steam folder to DVD, then just install the client on your laptop, copy across the games folders you want, done. If you want a new game, then buy the DVD, enter the serial code into Steam and install off the DVD.

Do you really think that Steam installs every game you own? The basic client comes with nothing installed, then you choose what to install, and if you don't have enough HDD space for the game from Steam, you don't have enough for the game from DVD.

No internet connection? You need to login long enough to get the game files onto your PC, then just start in offline mode, done.

You're being an idiot about something you've never used, and getting everything wrong. If you really hate Steam that much (when it's actually been designed and worked out pretty damn well, offers great deals on games, fast content delivery, and reasonably good social experience) then don't get any games on it, but there's no doubt that it offers more benefits than problems, unless you're using a computer in an area that is impossible to buy games in anyway.

Beak explodes at Samsung's evidence leak in Apple patent spat

Shakje

I agree in principle

that if there's new evidence that it should be admissible if it's important enough, and then time extended for the opposition to work out a response, but in practice I can't see it working. Imagine a case where someone knows they have a weak case, but they have lots of shady evidence. So they delay the trial over and over and over again by just proposing new evidence that seems like it might be relevant on the surface, but isn't really. If it's likely that they will end up with the death penalty (not trying to get into an argument about capital punishment) then delaying indefinitely is a bonus for them, but for the legal system, and the associated costs, it's ridiculous.

You could start adding rules about how many they can do, and how relevant each one has to be, but at the end of the day, that system is already in place, and it generally works quite well. If there's evidence that they failed to submit, then they should do so at the appeal, or get their arses in gear and submit it in a timely manner the first time. What they've done is to release something that, while it's in the public domain (sorry, replying to something further down), is probably not something that most jury members would know about, or have actively gone to find out, which some of them may now know of. They ignored the court, and basically stuck two fingers up at it, and for that they deserve to be punished, regardless of how the rest of the case goes. Just because you might like Samsung, or agree with them on this, doesn't make it all right for them to just ignore the legal system and practically spit in its face.

Jackson’s Hobbit becomes a trilogy

Shakje

Re: hmm

So erm, why hasn't anyone mentioned Braindead?

Apple blacklisted by Chinese consumer watchdog

Shakje

On the other hand

Took my iPhone in after the lock button stopped working, walked in, booked an appointment, went back next day, showed them the problem, and they replaced it no questions asked. It was a couple months outside the warranty, but they never even asked about it.

Streetfighter 2: The World Warrior

Shakje

I loved the game, but...

the amount that people complain about CoD games being a repackaging, they're obviously too young and/or nostalgic to remember SF2.

Brit global warming skeptics now outnumber believers

Shakje
Happy

@imanidiot

Sort of right, but it's simpler than that. If there was a being that was all-powerful and completely detached from our universe then it wouldn't be covered by science. There would be no reason for us to know about it. The real problem is, that as soon as such a being interacts with our universe it becomes measurable. So if there are claims of a god creating our universe, or taking part in miracles, or helping an army win a battle, or listening to prayer, or, say, sending his only son to die for us on a cross and satisfy a rather strange conception of justice (especially for an all-powerful, all-merciful being), then that god is measurable, or, at the very least, his actions are. Up until now, there has been nothing to suggest any divine intervention, so yes, your god may exist, and may be unmeasurable and unexplainable by science, but if he is, he's not the god of any major religion (close to Deism, but even then...).

Science does point to a cause for creation, very much like seeing a fried egg points to some frying event, however, just as I don't attribute a fried breakfast to god (rather to myself or my wife), I see no reason to attribute the creation event to your god, unless you decide to take a religious text as your evidence. In that case, why not just start praising Xenu?

Shakje

The question should really be

how many scientists believe it is driven by natural causes?

I would guess that there is a worrying disconnect in those figures.

Is the Higgs boson an imposter?

Shakje

Yes, you boy

MAN THE QUANTUM YARD ARM

CERN catches a glimpse of Higgs-like boson

Shakje

@Thecoeking

Hah!

Upvoted.

BT Vision beats rivals to honour of being worst UK Pay-TV

Shakje

Re: Talk-Talk Bottom? Same old, same old.

So, what you're saying is, that when you can't report the issue online, can't email, and can't phone that they should just, what, guess you've got a problem?

Or is the fail that they don't want another landline, only a mobile number?

I'm not sure what you want them to offer you...

Darwin alarmed by six-legged mutant cane toad

Shakje

Re: Paul.

Depends on the original text. I'm pretty sure (having had several discussions with various people about the matter) that the word for soul in this context is entirely different from the word that is used to suggest god put his "breath" into humans to make them live. Many would hold that this is what is really meant by the soul and why humans are different from animals.

Are you a hot BABE in heels and a short skirt? SCIENCE is for YOU

Shakje

Re: The hard sell

People who are nerdy and geeky tend to be a social misfit as a result (less interested in social interaction). They also tend to be more inclined to study more, and get more excited by the wonderful world of science. I'd rather people that spent their time studying in science than people who were fooled into it because it looked cool.

Vatican subtly shifts its position on The Blues Brothers

Shakje

Re: Bring on the Babel fish

Strangely, if I translate it to Italian and back I get:

"intellectual arrogance of postmodern alchemy"

both in GT and BF. Maybe they got an Italian who can't speak English to translate it?? I'm assuming this was the original meaning...

Top US Senator to Apple, Google: 'Curb your spy planes'

Shakje

@vic 4

It's a sad day when someone feels that they have to star out manhood.

Jeremy Hunt 'sympathetic' to Murdoch's BSkyB bid

Shakje

@IDoNotThinkSo #2

It was the most active media lobbyist?

"12.53pm: Blair says the strongest lobbying from a media group during his 10-year premiership was from the BBC over the licence fee"

How does that make it the most active? It just means that out of the other media groups, the biggest push came from the BBC in relation to the license fee. It doesn't say anything about whether they were most active (since it only talks about one issue), and it doesn't say it's the biggest lobbying group. Just that the biggest lobbying effort went into the BBC over the license fee.

Massive DDoS attack blasts 123-reg offline

Shakje

@AC 00:58

Hi John, can I see you in my office please?

Shakje

Re: Motive?

Doesn't it look a bit like a test run?

Pirate Bay struggling to get on feet after DDoS to the knee

Shakje

Erm

"That knee must be hurting bad, as from where we’re sat, it’s still unavailable, though downforeveryoneorjustme said it was up. Perhaps it depends which leg you’re talking about"

Are you on Virgin?

Pints under attack as Lord Howe demands metric-only UK

Shakje

Re: Not only that..

As mentioned below, the money would go into infrastructure work, which would go into workers' pockets, which would go into the economy. Like how they've solved the recession in the US, every time there's been a major recession.

UK's '£1.2bn software pirates' mostly 'blokes under 34'

Shakje
FAIL

Re: Who Piracy Really Hurts

Of course, most people would just go with one of the free office suites, rather than pay anything at all. Clearly it's actually LibreOffice etc. that's hurting businesses that don't exist because there isn't a market.

Ten... freeware gems for new PCs

Shakje

Re: Hmmm MSE

I have a couple of hundred games on my Steam account, and MSE hasn't flagged a single one.

When it comes to dealing with the deepest recesses of Windows, I'd far rather that MS was the one writing the code with internal documents to help, than someone else dealing with undocumented functions. That doesn't mean MSE is the best solution, just that your argument that it should be shunned because a different coding department of the same firm wrote something that you think is bad yet you still bought is a pretty rubbish reason not to use something.

Virgin Media site goes titsup in Pirate Bay payback attack

Shakje

Re: Stand up for your rights

And here is the problem, as with a lot of emotive discussions on here. If you really want to actually help with a problem, you can't just state things as if they're true because you think they are.

What actual use are either of the following:

"If prices were low and quality high then the levels of copyright infringement (Note not piracy) would be greatly reduced"

"I assert lowering price wouldn't have this affect... it is a mindset thing not a case of being unable to afford it"

Neither is about the facts of the situation, they're just doing what politicians do every day, which is taking a stance based on opinion and carrying on.

Do you know how the music industry could actually work against piracy without investing lots? Just trial a really low cost service in one country and see if their sales figures increase, or if piracy declines.

The fact of the matter is, that there is no really definitive studies to tell one way or the other, and until someone produces something that does, then these comments are nothing more than opinion (wow, that sounds just like what I said on the death penalty comments, oh well).

Google's self-driving car snags first-ever license in Nevada

Shakje

Re: @Dave 126

At the end of the day, what do statistics on interventions actually matter? It's presumably something that can be improved, but if they cause significantly less accidents than human drivers (as I would expect to be the case) then it's got to be a good thing. I suspect that the biggest barrier to these is overselling it as a safe car, because as soon as it has its first "big" accident, which is inevitable, people will go overboard to criticise it.

Copyfighters jumpstart MPs' probe into Blighty's IP law

Shakje
Meh

Re: Andrew - we know what you're against

It's a live one! Quick, throw it back in so it can have a long and happy existence with some new experience of avoiding hooks.

Star Trek's Wesley Crusher blasts Google+ landgrab

Shakje

Re: I agree with Wil 100%

n00bs is so 80s

Shakje

Re: Trekkie Spaghetti

I find jokes are always better when they are thoroughly explained. Thanks anon.

Total War Battles: Shogun

Shakje

Perhaps

having to select the command from the bottom of the screen is intended to mirror your role as a general, rather than a god. Not necessarily the right decision, just a guess at motivation...

Expert: UK would break its own rules with web-snoop law

Shakje

Re: So what?

I've often wondered about how a UK constitution could work. It would have to be put in a position where it overrides existing laws and sentences. It would be bloody messy, but if it's something that we truly believed was the fundamentals of life in our country, and core to our humanity, I don't see any other way of doing it.

I also find it difficult to argue for a "fixed" constitution. There are things that we do all agree on, but I don't think we all agree on them in the same manner. For instance, I think that everyone has the right to life, but those in favour of capital punishment wouldn't agree, and anti-abortionists would raise it, and who knows where morality will be in 200 years time? I mean, it's the same sort of problem that America faces with the right to bear arms. Regardless of whether gun law is good in the States or not, I don't see owning a weapon as a fundamental human right, and there are plenty of other things that some people might think were fundamental which I wouldn't agree with.

As a result, I've come to the conclusion that if I were to ever live to see a UK constitution, it would only work (i.e. not be rejected by the populace, or misused, or misapplied) if a couple of criteria were met:

1. It could change. It can (and would have to) be a very difficult process, but if something really is seen to not be relevant any more by the population, why should it continue to be fundamental to our laws?

2. It would have to be decided democratically. The people would have to have a feeling that they had direct input into it. How this would be managed I'm not sure, but it would require a referendum on the selected rights at the very least. I might not like the outcome, but I have faith in democracy, and am happy to accept the consequences of being in the majority/minority on issues, whichever it turns out to be.

3. It would have to have absolute authority. Once decided, it would have to be the very foundation of UK law.

Now, this is where I'm unsure whether or not it's actually workable, but I don't see it being feasible, and accepted under any other scenario.

Gaia scientist Lovelock: 'I was wrong and alarmist on climate'

Shakje

Re: SCIENCE

Evolution doesn't attempt to suggest a why and the concept of there even being a why makes it a leading question. If you can demonstrate why anyone should accept that there is some purpose for life, I'll be happy to listen.

PC World, Currys, Dixons websites all go titsup

Shakje

Re: Cable Cuts

Maybe it was the fibre leading to their datacentre?

PR mag: Let promoters edit clients' Wikipedia entries

Shakje

Re: The statistics are shoddy

Didn't bother to read the paper because it's not really something that interests me much, but seriously, what a joke.

Shakje
FAIL

Come on guys...statistics..

"Those who made direct edits to pages of clients found that the edits "always stuck" 31 per cent of the time."

is just plain wrong. It clearly should be:

"31 per cent of those who made direct edits to pages of clients found that the edits "always stuck""

It's a little disingenuous to say it the first way, as it changes the whole focus of the article. E.g. almost 60% of people said that their edits stuck most of the time, with only 25% saying that their edits occurred less than half the time. Doesn't really seem like such an issue any more does it?

Killers laugh in face of death penalty threat, say US experts

Shakje
Stop

Hmmm

I see a lot of posts in this forum on both sides commit the same basic errors that the paper has been trying to correct - that you need a properly conducted study to assess these claims.

The problem, in general, I've always found with the death penalty arguments is that they are driven by this very human idea of "common sense". It's obvious to some people that the death penalty is a deterrent in some or all cases. It's obvious to others that state-killing makes the population more violent. The reason that you have conflicting views is because you've taken an opinion, and decided that because that opinion seems obvious to you (presumably with absolutely no basis in psychology, or in studies concerning capital punishment) that it must be right, and then you may even have gone cherry-picking to show why your opinion is right above all others. Since neither side is (mostly) basing their statements of fact on anything other than personal opinion, you end up with some useless information about what people feel, without having any idea of what the actual answer is in regards to the death penalty.

This is the same problem that features heavily in talks about video gaming violence. It's obvious to some people that kids who play games must become more violent. It's obvious to others that it has no long term effects. Throw in a few anecdotal examples of kids who never jacked cars until they played GTA, and the classic "I played video games all my life and I turned out ok" and you have a melting pot of anger and conflicting opinion.

Do video games cause increased violence? I honestly don't know. I'd like to think they don't, and I do think that I turned out ok, but there's still no really definitive answer on the issue, so I'll reserve my opinion until there is.

With the death penalty it's a little more difficult, because there's a moral aspect as well. Personally, I think it's wrong for the state to kill someone, but that really comes down to my views on morality, crime and punishment as a whole, and is heavily influenced by determinism. But when it comes down to whether or not it's effective as a way of influencing society or lowering crime rates, there's pretty even split on whether it does or it doesn't, and many of them have flaws, and there are an *awful* lot of factors that have to be considered whenever you talk about something like this.

I was talking to someone once who tried to argue that because the murder rate was far lower in the 50s in the States, it showed that society was gradually getting worse and declining morally (this was intricately linked to his beliefs as a Jehovah's Witness, which necessitated a declining society, but he's a really smart, learned guy, and I enjoy talking to him, however he did try and tie in this figure with abortions, atheism, and socialism). Of course, if you look at the data, there was a sharp decrease about 1945, and started rising as the new generation grew up. Now I don't want to make too many inferences so I'll let you piece it together yourselves, but I don't think it's coincidence that an event which took away large chunks of the most murderous age group in society matches up with a sudden drop in crime.

Things like inter-state migration, gun laws, increased gang activity, all these things can change the murder rate, so it's still a pretty open ended question, so can we please all stop stating what we think is obvious as fact? Or treating people who disagree with these opinions as if they're stupid because it's not obvious to them? Take Newtonian gravity. If we step even a teensy little bit outside of our everyday experiences, it breaks. This alone should show us that everything we think of as obvious, until it's backed up with *solid* evidence, is a lucky guess at best.

I apologise for the long post, but it is one thing that really annoys me.

Swiss, German physicists split the electron

Shakje

Re: Hmm, I wonder what the fundamental particle of rabid control-freakery is called?

I'll bite.

"hadn't yet reached the 'glories' of North Korea and Stalinist USSR, but was well on the way"

"have difficulty distinguishing [...] reality"

Do you actually know what the Stalinist USSR was like?

Compulsory coding in schools: The new Nerd Tourism

Shakje

Re: Andrew - you are wrong.

The problem with this whole argument against the article is that you might have to fix shelves to a wall when you buy your own house (potentially even make a wardrobe or something?), you might have to fix your own clothes when you get a hole in them, you might have to, occasionally, cook some food. These are life skills that could be seen to be useful in day-to-day situations. How many people actually need to code on a day-to-day basis?

I guess the counter to this is that it helps with logic, but this is where you're missing the point of the article (and maybe Andrew didn't state it strongly enough in the article, or I'm just misreading him). Being taught a bit of HTML and CSS does not help logic skills. It maybe helps a bit with spatial awareness (nothing near as useful as an FPS I would wager), but not with the logical and mathematical skills that come with coding. The worse problem is that these are the very things that people find intimidating and frightening about coding, the things that make it seem arcane and confusing. What do you think the net effect is if we teach them something which has no relation to this? It just makes the other things more arcane.

At the end of the day, the skills that you get from coding at a lower level only come when you use a "grown-up" language. This doesn't have to be C, or C#, or even Java, but something as simple as Logo. Just something simple that controls a turtle, and that idea of you put something in, and something comes out. Later on this can be fleshed out with the concepts of control structures, and then OO. The silly thing is, this shouldn't be that hard. Kids are smart, and they're able to grasp this stuff (I mean even just grade it, so that the people that demonstrate understanding of the higher concepts get better marks etc.).

Maybe something like 0x10c in fact.

Developer leaks Microsoft product plans for next two years

Shakje
Stop

Re: HOORAH

Seriously, he's obviously a troll, who cares if he uses caps lock or not, it's not burning your eyes out is it? MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO WORRY ABOUT REALLY. See what I did there?

Life on Mars found – in 1976

Shakje
Coat

Re: darned unfortunate

Maybe we gave it a cold?

'Don't break the internet': How an idiot's slogan stole your privacy...

Shakje

Re: freedom?

Since when did being part of a minority movement translate to being good? When people use the term "part of the herd" or "following the herd" it really pisses me off, because it's clear that instead of actually assessing whether or not they are right, and giving other people the reasons why they might be wrong, they're just happy justifying their position by saying it's a minority position.

Just because you follow majority consensus doesn't mean you're right, but it does tend to apply more this way than the other (e.g. evolution, shape of the earth, heliocentrism, age of the earth, and so on). Sure, minority opinion is right some of the time, and that's when it really has to be fought for, but it should stand on its own merits, and it's never because it's a minority opinion that it is right, that's just incidental. By suggesting that this is the most important thing about what you're trying to say, it just looks like you don't have anything else worth arguing.

Let's look at it the other way, what if not many people have the wrong conscience? Or have a miswired brain? But those that do agree with your viewpoint. Now for goodness sake try and convince me otherwise, because I'm quite happy to listen when people have something to say.

NJ lab claims plasma fusion breakthrough

Shakje
Thumb Up

Re: No radioactivity?

I just wanted to thank Derek for making an appearance, it's quite refreshing to see someone linked to the story putting in a stint on the forums. You're also one of those unique people who is clearly technical, but great at communicating (in the same way as, without wanting to make a dangerous comparison for your ego, Feynman was).

Thanks for the posts, also the divots are very cool :)

Facebook accused of 'wanton' use of Canadian woman's pics

Shakje

@NomNomNom

And what's more, they can look at the footage themselves online if they're paranoid for the cheap price of £4.99 a month.

Use the holy word of God to stay secure online, says bishop

Shakje

Re: @westboro

Ah I see, liberals and Democrats can't be Christians too? Gotcha.

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