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Comment Re:how, exactly (Score 5, Insightful) 984

Probably because the differentiation between "macro-evolution" ("speciation") and "micro-evolution" is an ID foil. *ALL* evolution is microevolution. There's nowhere in evolutionary theory that says a frog must give birth to a mouse for evolution to occur. Micro-evolutionary changes are sufficient to explain speciation over a long enough time frame.

One of the recurring problems in these kinds of discussion is the definition of speciation. If you nail down an ID'er with evidence of speciation, they change the definition ("Oh, well, it's still a bacterium, isn't it?" ) and start talking about an amorphous concept called "kinds". Then you show the feathered dinosaur fossils, and they yell "hoax" (in spite of the fact that there have been many more species of feathered dinos than archeopteryx discovered), and when that doesn't pan out, they say it's not really a transitional species, it's a distinct, god-created animal that is now extinct. This is clearly the avoidance behavior we all sometimes engage in, designed to protect a comfortable delusion.

You can't 'win' this kind of argument. The BEST we can hope for is that it will fall 'out of fashion' over time.
Censorship

Journal Journal: "A little bit of censorship"

Good god. I've been reading discussion by /. readers about censorship, and it seems that many otherwise thoughtful readers believe that 'a little censorship' is ok.
Microsoft

Journal Journal: Is Installing XP a licence violation? 2

Blah.

Last night I did something (I am not sure I remember what it was, exactly, but it had to do with network filesystem access and a powered-down switch) on my workstation that caused XP to refuse to shut down. No biggie, this has happened before. I hit reset.

The machine boots back up, and I log in - and I see a dialog box I've never encountered before. "The hardware configuration of this machine has changed significantly, requiring Windows XP to be re-activated."

United States

Journal Journal: Cultural and Societal Priorities in a Changing World 1

This may come as a surprise to some of you reading this, and others may say, "Oh, yeah, I knew that all along". As a society, our priorities are all fucked up. I don't mean everyone else's priorities. I mean 'ours'.
User Journal

Journal Journal: How to support diversity in the Information Technology space

Anyone who reads my posts will know that I'm not a Microsoft fanboy. I don't, however, want to see Microsoft "destroyed" or "broken up". I'm not interested in 'attacking' successful companies. I don't think the rules should be any different for successful companies, either.

This may seem odd coming from someone who is such a vociferous opponent of the M$ mindset. Let me explain, and it will all come clear.
United States

Journal Journal: Whatever happened to 'the pursuit of happiness'?


Interestingly enough, I used to be a political conservative. Then, I was a political liberal. Then I became a political libertarian. Now I am some political stance that has no 'label' in our society - except maybe "radical" or "crackpot". The strangest thing about this progression is that my opinions, in the largest part, about the important things, haven't changed. The information I have access to, however, has changed, thus informing my political views.
Technology

Journal Journal: Teknopolitically Correct 18

There's a certain disturbing tendency among techno-geeks everywhere that I tend to chalk up to a general tendency to be conservative in intellectual affairs. That being said, it infuriates me when this particular bit of intellectual kindness is adapted and regurgitated as though it were 'proven fact' among those 'in the know'.

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