Pangloss

Ok, you're what I would consider to be a fairly objective person, or at least non-partisan, and as open-minded as anybody on this site. Can you define what constitutes torture for me? The reason it seems gray to me is that it seems to me that there are a whole host of things you can do to people. Blasting music in someone's cell, for example, would be considered torture by some, but not by others. And any scientific means of determining what constitutes torture seem to be overshadowed by lack of any objective measure. Is it torture if, for example (as AgentChange mentioned above) there are lasting psychological effects? If that's the case then isn't imprisonment itself a form of torture? Where, exactly, do we draw the line? How can there NOT be a gray area? (Although I didn't get the impression that you were saying that there IS no gray area, just that waterboarding doesn't go in it.)

It's not a composition fallacy at all. It's a simple statement of fact. Waterboarding was applied to this individual, who in the assessment of an experienced intelligence analyst was not going to provide that intelligence under normal means of coersion. You can't prove a negative, so I agree that there is a random chance that God might have appeared to him the next day and instructed him to give up the information. You're quite right. Torture, yes, waterboarding, I don't know. We now have direct evidence that it works, and whether it's "torture" is pretty subjective. It clearly falls into a gray area. That's why I'm putting it back on the "maybe" list. I respect your opinion on it (probably more than you think), but let's be honest -- your position on the Bush administration is pretty well known. I need something more objective.

Well there's a clear (if unpleasant) answer to that. If you leave them "intact" then they have a greater hope of life after their ordeal is over.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=3978231&page=1 The above link goes to an ABC News exclusive interview with former CIA analyst John Kiriakou, who led the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah. The intelligence gathered by waterboarding led directly to the disrupting of numerous attacks against civilians. Kiriakou states clearly that Zubaydah was not made cooperative by any traditional imprisonment means, such as seclusion and normal interrogation. He simply was not going to give any information. Under waterboarding he lasted 35 seconds, after which time he had a vision from Allah telling him to cooperate with authorities (no, really), after which time he proceeded to answer every single question presented to him by interrogators, "as you are sitting here talking to me". Mind you, Kiriakou believes it was wrong, and it's worth listening to why he thinks it was a mistake to do it. I think his perspective is fascinating, and I image it won't be long before we'll be able to find out his full perspective for only $14.95 at Amazon.com. (sigh) But in the meantime, the lengthy interview is worth watching. My personal opinion is that waterboarding may need to go back on the list of approved measures.

He's taking a little break from the board instead.

The OP has been answered and we've had some good discussion here, in spite of some fanboy nonsense that had to be removed. I think we'll close this on a positive note.

ROFL! I never thought about that word in quite that context before. Cute.

That's another valid point, IMO, the selectivity of interface features/functionalities. One of Microsoft biggest problems over the years has been its determination to be "all things to all people", forcing the OS to appeal to the lowest common denominator at the cost of the more granular kind of control that appeals to techies. One of my current complaints about Vista, for example, is a change in the behavior of context-sensitive right-click menus. They don't respond to quite the same location clicks as they did in XP. And sometimes they don't respond at all, because of -- and this is a 20-year-old problem! -- incorrect current window context! I'm just waiting for some enterprising young programmer to put out a rollover window activator, circa 1992! Yeesh! MacOS is even worse, but I've always thought it odd that Linux fans despair over their OS's unpopularity. Popularity would be the WORST thing that could ever happen to Linux.

----------- That post about processes reminded me of something that very much acts in Vista's favor -- it's MUCH more efficient about utilizing multi-core processors than XP was. The division of labor and memory utilization is MUCH improved under Vista. How that compares with other operating systems, however, I cannot say. It would not surprise me if Linux or MacOS were superior in this regard.

Ok, you don't think the "additions" are worth the additional drain on resources. Fair enough -- I respect your opinion on it.

I'm asking you how Vista "does less for more resources". That was the statement you made. If you were just stating your opinion about Vista, then fine, I'll just chalk it up to your usual Microsoft bashing. But if you actually had a substantive point then I'd like to hear what it was. Some of us here are actually interested in a realistic assessment of the current situation in the field of personal computing, rather than the latest dopey "lol"-isms from Slashdot. Lockheed, I missed this in my last pass, pardon me: It does run shorter if you have all the new GUI features turned on. In other words, if you're asking it to do more. If you turn those features off, it lasts about the same amount of time as it did under XP. This is consistent with the various PC mag articles that were flying around during Vista beta testing. Video cards were barely utilized by XP, and if you ran a 3d game under XP your battery life would suddenly (and unsurprisingly) evaporate. Why? I've been running Vista continuously on this computer for about a year.

I'm having a hard time imagining what Morgan Spurlock could possibly tell me about OBL. Still, I'll keep an open mind about it.

I meant to put something about this in the OP, but one of the more intriguing aspects of the story to me was the company they contacted to assist them. It's called Reputation Defender, and their web site can be found here: http://www.reputationdefender.com/ I've seen a lot of web sites that help you with identity theft, but I don't think I've seen one with quite this angle before -- protecting and recovering things like photographs, malicious rumors, etc. Quite an interesting little niche, isn't it? IMO that's one of the great things that has arisen BECAUSE we've left the Internet alone. Human ingenuity knows no bounds, and companies like this spring up almost daily, cleverly filling those niches of individual need. Why not? I know I'm preaching to the converted when I say government intervention would kill all that innovation faster than anything, but it is perhaps worth noting that this is something that many liberals and conservatives agree on (though perhaps more of the former than the latter). I thought both your posts were interesting, Moo, so I don't mean to single this out and nit-pick on it, but I wonder if "severely" might be too much. Not to put too fine a point on it, but is he responsible for the *extent* of the damage his action had? Or just the action he actually took?

To clarify, I think both of the stories are legit, but both seperately and together they demonstrate a lack of depth in media coverage.

ABC News' 20/20 magazine show ran an interesting piece on Friday night that provides an interesting angle on the question of Internet freedom. Here's the print version: http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3872556&page=1 In a nutshell, a young woman died after taking her father's Porsche for a joyride. The accident was extremely graphic, involving partial decapitation. From a geek perspective, it seemed to combine a number of compelling elements. A drop-dead gorgeous teenage girl, a beautiful, expensive automobile, and a uniquely flashy and violent death. For the typical teen-angster, what's not to like? The California Highway Patrol took photographs of the scene. Apparently at least one CHP employee emailed the photographs beyond the confines of CHP offices, and one employee was suspended for that action and is now defending himself in a lawsuit brought by the family. He claims that the CHP does this all the time to scare the public into driving right (I think we've all seen stuff like that, right?). But he had no authorization, from his employers or the family. Personally I don't think he has a leg to stand on -- should be fired, should pay a civil penalty. He knew better. But what's really unfortunate about this story is what happened next. Part of it I think we can all predict and understand -- the photos appeared on web sites around the internet. Unfortunately the girl's name and address were also publicized somehow, and the family began to be inundated by emails and phone calls from anonymous people harassing them in various ways. Why did you spoil your daughter with a Porsche, she got what she deserved, etc. Photos of their decapitated daughter were even emailed to the girl's younger siblings! Pretty nasty stuff. The family has been trying to get the images removed from the Internet, and therein lies (IMO) our most intriguing subject for discussion. Should the family be able to accomplish that? Is it a reasonable thing for them to attempt to do? Should they have any expectation of success? Should the government be helping them in any way? I think these are interesting questions. One web site with the photos is hosted by a far-left blogger mostly known for displaying grusome photographs of American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan (he was sued for this but the lawsuit was dropped). Apparently that host, after being contacted by ABC News, has agreed to remove the photos if the family contacts him directly. I think I can see where he might be coming from there, both before and after he changed his mind. I don't know that he was wrong to stand on that principle, but I think he's making the right choice now. That's how I see this, as more a matter of doing the right thing versus standing on principle even if somebody gets hurt. Just because the first amendment protects your right to say offensive things doesn't mean it's a good idea to say them, and you make a statement about yourself when you do so. What do you all think?

Just a few days ago the story was that intelligence officials were contradicting the White House on the subject of Iran. Nobody seemed to have any trouble believing that those intelligence officials MUST be correct, because, after all, it was contrary to the White House position. Thank goodness for the objectivity of our inspiring intelligence network, so thoughtfully and carefully placed outside of executive control! And yet just a few days later we get the story about CIA documents being shredded, and suddenly the White House is right back in the supervisory role. An ABC News story on Saturday ended with the reporter stating that Harriet Myers' claim to have asked the CIA not to shred the documents couldn't possibly be true, because she could have simply ordered the CIA official not to shred them. Thank goodness for the dependency of our inspiring intelligence network, so thoughtfully and carefully placed under executive control!

John Rennie isn't objectively qualified to determine whether Scientific American is crossing that line, swansont. If they've done so, he's the perpetrator. That's the price you pay when you decide to enter a fight on one side or the other. So what you've posted isn't a refutation, it's a countering opinion. There is a huge difference. Besides, you're talking about the man who invented the term "global warming deniers", which is all about having an agenda and putting opposition in its place. (Or at least popularized it; I mean what the hell is the editor of an ostensibly objective and scientific magazine doing pushing an agenda?) Rennie should have held his institution above the fray. Instead he's chosen to place it right in the middle of the fight. Frankly SciAm is spending its reputation like it's an actual budget item instead of a resource you keep tucked away for a rainy day. They have enough "income" to keep it going, but they would be better served following an honest pattern of scientific objectivity along the lines of Nova or Nature, instead of getting down and dirty in the trenches. From which I surmise that they've just never seen YT2095's signature.

What kind of programming? What is it you're interested in doing with your programs?

I'm thinking he doesn't eat a lot of Happy Meals.

Wouldn't that be an example of doing more with more resources? We've been screaming at this industry to move past 2d desktops for years, with millions of people buying 3d-accelerated video cards that couldn't accelerate a single blasted thing in Windows. And it seems to me that I've seen plenty of demonstrations of 3d Linux desktops over the last couple years. Don't get me wrong, I totally agree that there remain numerous (even predominent) computing situations where moving in this direction is not only useless, but actually a negative. The ridiculous Microsoft "Windows everywhere" campaign is one of the dumbest ideas since the default password. But human-computer interaction is a perfectly valid area of research and endeavor, and personal computers are SUPPOSED to be inefficient at specific tasks (compared with embedded systems). The computer's plenty fast as it is. What's pathetically slow is our ability to work with it. So I ask again, how does Vista "do less for more resources"?

I agree, it had nothing to do with politics. It was boots-on-the-ground marketing necessity. Sometimes extremists win these perception battles, sometimes they lose them. It's probably for the best, but if they ever build a time machine some day, I'll find some way to hijack it and get me some of those pre-veggie-oil fries. Mmm, mmm. But serially, I think we forget to look on the bright side sometimes. I don't care how many vegans scream in your face, taste is taste, and so there's plenty of motivation for invention and innovation here. It's surely just a matter of time before those Star Trek "Food Replicators" come along and render the whole issue moot. And if we put the big macs down now and go out and get a little exersize, we might even live to see it!

You're a fine one to talk about diversions when it's the entire purpose of your argument, splitting hairs over the definition of "liberal"! You keep saying that I haven't proven that he's a social liberal, and yet that's exactly what I did in pointing out that he's recreated their welfare state. You call that exclusively economic, I say that's bogus -- there's a social design component to welfare. You say tomayto, I say tomahto. End of discussion, right there. You even get the last word. Bravo.

I'm not sure if you realize this or not, but they just bumped the sizes up one notch. The "supersize" is just the "large" now. It's the same size. Or at least that's what they did in my area -- these guys are franchised so maybe it's different where you live? I agree with the sentiment, though. Personally I find McD's best when only visited once in a blue moon (in fact that's a pretty accurate amount -- those fries taste great twice per year! anything more than that and they get awful real quick). But people should be able to eat what they want. Some of the discussion I've seen in various places (and a 60 Minutes report) about individual portion nutritional info sound workable. Cumbersome, but possible.

Why not? RAM is cheap. Vista does not use a full gig of RAM, btw. I'm running it right now and it's hovering around 620. Usually it's in the 500s. Is that a lot for an OS running little more than Internet Explorer? Sure it is. Personally I could care less. You wanna run a command prompt, more power to you, but I want my operating system to do MORE, not less. Managed code is one of the great enablers of the 21st century. More bloat, please! My objection is to the fact that it breaks so often. Only reason I'm even running it on this particular computer is that I don't do much on it. Vista on my laptop was a total bust, and I won't load Vista on another PC until I convert over fully to Visual Studio 2008 AND determine that it has no Vista issues. Not before.

Gee! I haven't seen such liberal angst since the results of the French presidential election came in! I don't think I could have gotten a hotter reaction from the SFN Left if I'd made the subject of this thread "THE SURGE IS WORKING!!!!111one" But hey, good for you, guys -- nothin' like a hearty exchange of views. Clearly it irks people who are of a left-of-center persuasion to have somebody like Chavez associated with their personal ideologies. My advice: Don't take it personally. Nobody in their right mind blames American liberalism for Chavez's rise to power. Every branch of political ideologies has its share of embarassments. Chavez is what he is. Don't feel bad about it, don't distance yourself from it, STAND UP TO IT. You want to fight the right? Good for you. Let's start by cleaning up the left.